Hope's Cup

A husband can not complete you.

Only God can.

A man can not love you more than God loves you right now.

The reason I believed at first was because my family were all Christians, so naturally I was too. But there came a point about two years ago where I started doubting and had to decide for myself if this Christianity thing was even true and if I wanted to be a part of it. After some research I came to the conclusion that a Christian worldview is the only one that actually makes sense.

Take the concept of morality for example. All of humanity believes in some sort of standard for behavior which we expect everyone to know about. Although different civilizations have had slightly different moralities, they all come down to the same basic ideals. If this world randomly evolved, how could right and wrong even exist? What would it mean? Who is deciding what is right and what is wrong? Our own personal pleasure and convenience, as well as natural selection, would have us to be selfish and stingy, but we all know that to be wrong. Why? Could it be that the Creator of the world has written His law on our hearts, just as He said He did in Romans 12:15? (For more on this topic, read Mere Christianity by C.S. Lewis and/or this post.)

Another thing is Jesus. There is extra-biblical evidence of his existence and most atheist historians accept this as fact. So then, what do we do with this information? I present to you C.S. Lewis’ most famous quote, which I’m sure you’ve probably already heard:“A man who was merely a man and said the sort of things Jesus said would not be a great moral teacher. He would either be a lunatic — on the level with the man who says he is a poached egg — or else he would be the Devil of Hell. You must make your choice. Either this man was, and is, the Son of God, or else a madman or something worse. You can shut him up for a fool, you can spit at him and kill him as a demon or you can fall at his feet and call him Lord and God, but let us not come with any patronizing nonsense about his being a great human teacher.”

I’m also convinced that Christianity is true because of all of the prophecies about him written much before his time, many of which he would have no control over.  “Imagine someone covering [the] entire state [of Nebraska] in silver dollars 6 feet deep. Then mark one coin and bury it anywhere across the state. Next, blindfold a man and have him choose one coin. The odds that he would choose the marked coin are the same odds of getting 8 prophecies all fulfilled in one man. God gave us about 300 fulfilled prophecies in the Person of Jesus Christ.” -Dan Delzel, “The Mathematical Proof for Christianity is Irrefutable”

We can also look to his resurrection. This video is an amazing break-down of the facts that prove the legitimacy of the event and it really strengthened my faith.

We also have archaeological evidence on our side. “It may be stated categorically that no archaeological discovery has ever controverted a biblical reference.“ - Nelson Glueck, renowned Jewish archaeologist.

Another reason I’m a Christian is because my faith holds up scientifically. If the Bible wasn’t God-inspired, wouldn’t we find it riddled with scientific errors since people back then had such little knowledge of how the world works? That is not the case:

I also think creationism makes way more sense than evolution because it’s just so unrealistic that random chance could create the complexity that is our world. Read this post and this other post for information on that because if I were to type it all out this post would be unreasonably long.

I believe Christianity is true because it is unique. It sounds just like another one of countless religions on the planet until you look deeper into it. All other religions are about man getting to God. They are a system of “do’s and don’ts” to try to be “good enough” to win the favor of a distant deity. Christianity is the only religion where God comes to man and loves us unconditionally and wants a relationship with each and every one of us. God knows we can never be “good enough” but rather than condemning us, He provided a substitute—Jesus Christ—who obeyed the law perfectly for us. We are made righteous by believing in Him and accepting His work on our behalf. I have never seen another religion do that. Everyone else has to try their best and hope they’re good enough to get in. We are the only ones that have a Savior. Buddha did not rise from the dead. Muhammad did not rise from the dead. Confucius did not rise from the dead. Krishna did not rise from the dead. But my Jesus did.

Christianity is the most falsifiable religion there is and yet it has survived:

But most importantly, I would say the reason I believe in God is because of the way He’s changed my heart and the hearts of people around me. It truly is astonishing to witness.

15 people with Down syndrome tell a mom what kind of life her child will have.

You wanna know what happens once you kill yourself? Your mother comes home from work and finds her baby dead and she screams and runs over to you and tries to get you to wake up but you won’t and she keeps screaming and shaking you and her tears are dripping onto your face and your dad hears all the screaming and runs into the room and he can’t even speak because the child that he loved and the child that he watched grow up is gone forever and finally your little sister runs into the room to see what all the fuss is about and she sees you dead. The person she looked up to and loved. The person she bragged about to  her friends, the person she wanted to be just like when she grew up, the person that made her feel safe. But she’s never really going to get to grow up and smile and laugh and love because she’ll always be consumed with this feeling of missing you. And now there’s something missing from your family and they can barely look at each other anymore because everything reminds them of you but you’re gone and hurts more than anything. and you think that your mom never cared because she was always busy and yelling at you to finish your homework and clean your room and forgot to say I love you sometimes but really, she loved you more than anything and she doesn’t leave the house anymore, she can’t even get out of bed and she’s getting thinner and thinner because it’s too hard to eat. Your father had to quit his job and he doesn’t sleep anymore, every time he closes his eyes he sees his baby dead, and the image never goes away no matter how much alcohol he drinks. And at school your best friend sees that your seat is empty and she gets this sick feeling in her stomach and that’s when she hears the announcement. You killed yourself. And suddenly she’s screaming and crying in the middle of class and no one even bothers comforting because they’re all  busy sitting there staring at your empty seat with tears dripping down their cheeks and all she wants is for you to hug her and tell her it’s gonna be okay like you always did, but this time, you’re not there to do it, everything is dark now that you’re gone and her grades are slipping, she barely goes to school anymore and she ended up in hospital after taking too many pills because she wanted to see you again. the girls who used to make fun of the way you dressed feel their throats get tight, they don’t talk to each other anymore, they don’t talk to anyone, they’re all in therapy trying so hard not to blame themselves but nothing works. and your teacher who always gave you a hard time stares blankly at the wall, she quits her job a few days later. And then your boyfriend hears the news and he can’t breathe, he still calls you a lot just to hear your voice and he talks to you on facebook but you never message him back, he can’t fall in love again because every girl he meets reminds him of you, he’s never going to get over you, he loved you and he cries himself to sleep every night, hating himself and slicing his skin because he couldn’t save you and he’s never going to hold you in his arms or hear you laugh again. Now everyone who knew you, whether they were a big part of your life or someone you passed in the hallway a few times a week, they carry this aching feeling around inside them because you’re gone, and they miss you, and they don’t know why you left but it must’ve been their fault and they should’ve stopped you and they should’ve told you they loved you more and that feeling is never going to go away. And so you killed yourself

AND THEY’RE ALL TOGETHER AGAIN