NDINTEK KENNEDY
New Member
Hello everyone,
I am Kennedy. I am new here. I am a Christian and I fellowship with the Cameroon Baptist Convention.
I believed and received Jesus Christ into my life in 1996 during my first year in secondary school. Before then, I used to follow my parents to church but only consciously knew God and His design for humanity (including me) in 1996.
I have grown most of my life in Church; contributing in my own little way to the growth of the Body of Christ. When I gave my life to Jesus, I was barely 12 years old. My world view of things and understanding of deep biblical truths was still shallow. My IQ, not having developed enough, then, I did not question a lot of things that were taught to me at Sunday Schools and other Christian gatherings. This was partly too because we were told it was not a good thing to question the things of God. But as my ability to think critically about information and to make the right judgements about the values of life (truth, love, Man's conscience and humanity as a whole) improved, I started noticing some information in the Bible that weren't clear to me. I began asking questions. Sometime tough and hard questions.
Honestly, the questions that I have been asking for many years now have earned me quite some "bad" reputation in the minds of some Christian folks who, not being able to answer these questions have interpreted my inquisitiveness to mean that I do not have faith in God and that I reason with the "flesh" and not in the "Spirit". In other words, they consider that I am being carnal and full of human reasoning. But deep inside of me, I know that God knows that I know that I have faith in Him and that my trust in Him is unshakable. I also know that I am not a perfect Christian. I really wish I could be perfect and I do want to be.
But in as much as I know that there are things about God we, mortal humans, cannot question and should not question; there are other issues recorded in the Bible that raise questions in the minds of every right thinking human. And frankly, I think the approach of the Church should be to give the right teachings and provide honest answers to these questions (if the answers exist) and not to forbid people from questioning the Bible.
The few people who have attempted to provide answers to some of the questions that I have asked, have, in the most part, made speculations based on what other researchers have done with no clear answers to the questions. Most of my respondents have had a rather subjective approach; making personal interpretations of Bible information and wanting to force their views down my throat, irrespective of whether they judged I was convinced or not.
Given the many inconsistencies and illogical flow of information in the Bible, I have come to the near conclusion that the Bible as we have today has lost its authenticity. I may be wrong. That's why I keep asking the questions and I will keep asking until I find the convincing answers.
My first question is:
1. Does the Bible, as we have today, maintain its ORIGINAL value in terms of Truth as spoken by God and recorded by those through whom God inspired the recordings? Is it not possible that influential people, across generations in history, have adulterated the Bible with subjective content, for reasons only God knows? My thinking is that God is Perfect, He does not make mistakes and therefore whatever He says MUST have logical consistency. And the reason we have some inconsistencies and half-truths in the Bible is because humans tampered with its content?
My several other questions would follow depending on your responses to this first question.
Thank you and God bless you all.
I am Kennedy. I am new here. I am a Christian and I fellowship with the Cameroon Baptist Convention.
I believed and received Jesus Christ into my life in 1996 during my first year in secondary school. Before then, I used to follow my parents to church but only consciously knew God and His design for humanity (including me) in 1996.
I have grown most of my life in Church; contributing in my own little way to the growth of the Body of Christ. When I gave my life to Jesus, I was barely 12 years old. My world view of things and understanding of deep biblical truths was still shallow. My IQ, not having developed enough, then, I did not question a lot of things that were taught to me at Sunday Schools and other Christian gatherings. This was partly too because we were told it was not a good thing to question the things of God. But as my ability to think critically about information and to make the right judgements about the values of life (truth, love, Man's conscience and humanity as a whole) improved, I started noticing some information in the Bible that weren't clear to me. I began asking questions. Sometime tough and hard questions.
Honestly, the questions that I have been asking for many years now have earned me quite some "bad" reputation in the minds of some Christian folks who, not being able to answer these questions have interpreted my inquisitiveness to mean that I do not have faith in God and that I reason with the "flesh" and not in the "Spirit". In other words, they consider that I am being carnal and full of human reasoning. But deep inside of me, I know that God knows that I know that I have faith in Him and that my trust in Him is unshakable. I also know that I am not a perfect Christian. I really wish I could be perfect and I do want to be.
But in as much as I know that there are things about God we, mortal humans, cannot question and should not question; there are other issues recorded in the Bible that raise questions in the minds of every right thinking human. And frankly, I think the approach of the Church should be to give the right teachings and provide honest answers to these questions (if the answers exist) and not to forbid people from questioning the Bible.
The few people who have attempted to provide answers to some of the questions that I have asked, have, in the most part, made speculations based on what other researchers have done with no clear answers to the questions. Most of my respondents have had a rather subjective approach; making personal interpretations of Bible information and wanting to force their views down my throat, irrespective of whether they judged I was convinced or not.
Given the many inconsistencies and illogical flow of information in the Bible, I have come to the near conclusion that the Bible as we have today has lost its authenticity. I may be wrong. That's why I keep asking the questions and I will keep asking until I find the convincing answers.
My first question is:
1. Does the Bible, as we have today, maintain its ORIGINAL value in terms of Truth as spoken by God and recorded by those through whom God inspired the recordings? Is it not possible that influential people, across generations in history, have adulterated the Bible with subjective content, for reasons only God knows? My thinking is that God is Perfect, He does not make mistakes and therefore whatever He says MUST have logical consistency. And the reason we have some inconsistencies and half-truths in the Bible is because humans tampered with its content?
My several other questions would follow depending on your responses to this first question.
Thank you and God bless you all.
