Fear and Trembling

Last Summer, we took up questions from our Adult Sunday School Class at First Presbyterian Dyersburg, Tennessee.  I have adapted the answers I gave in articles in the church newsletter, and I wanted to share them here.  I hope you find the short essays helpful.    What happens to children who die before the age of accountability?  Do they go to hell just for the sins of dead people?             That’s really a good question.  I do not have a definitive answer for it.             I do know that David expected to see his son again in heaven when his son died as an infant (2 Samuel 12:22-23).  That leads many to believe that infants go to heaven when they die before they can understand religion.                    I also know, if they do go to hell, it is not for “the sins of dead people.”  They would go to hell for their own sinfulness.  They would go because of the kind of people they are, born in sin.  That’s what original sin means: we are all born the kind of people who sin

  Last Summer, we took up questions from our Adult Sunday School Class at First Presbyterian Dyersburg, Tennessee.   I have adapted the answers I gave in articles in the church newsletter, and I wanted to share them here.   I hope you find the short essays helpful.     Is God merciful if he sends someone to hell who has never heard about Jesus Christ?             The Bible says that God’s existence is ‘as plain as the nose on your face,’ that is God’s existence is easy to see from nature.  When we look at the evidence of nature, we clearly see that God exists.  It’s just that some of us choose to ignore the evidence.  If all humans see the evidence, and some ignore it, then why wouldn’t those who ignore it be responsible for their willful ignorance?  Why is it less awful to reject God as He reveals Himself in nature than it is to reject Jesus as He is presented to us in the gospel?              As R. C. Sproul puts it, those who never hear about Jesus Christ see God’s “eternal

Last Summer, we took up questions from our Adult Sunday School Class at First Presbyterian Dyersburg, Tennessee.  I have adapted the answers I gave in articles in the church newsletter, and I wanted to share them here.  I hope you find the short essays helpful.    If God is all-good and all-powerful, why is there evil? Why would God allow ________ if he is real?             These questions get at what many people have called the “problem of evil.”  The problem of evil is supposed to be the main philosophical objection to Christianity, but it’s not a philosophical problem at all.  But there are two types of the problem of evil, and each has a different approach and answer.  These are the philosophical problem of evil and the personal problem of evil, and you must ask questions to determine which one the person is dealing with.  We will look at them each in turn.  If you ask a person, “What do you mean by that?”, and their answer involves David Hume or Immanuel Kant or Richard