Answers to Top Bible Questions

Here are some of the top Bible questions on eBible.com:

Why would God blind the eyes of the Scribes and Pharisees?
How often should we pray for a specific need?
Why did all mankind, save Noah, become wicked before the Flood?
What is the difference between holy spirit and intuition?
Where did poisonous plants and deadly bacteria come from?
Is God’s forgiveness conditional or unconditional?
What is the difference between ‘workers’ and ‘busybodies’?
Where did sickness come from?
How can I overcome the fear of failing an Almighty God?

So I thought I would take a crack at these one by one. It’s always helpful, I think, to give strong biblical answers to life’s tough questions.

Why would God blind the eyes of the Scribes and Pharisees?

Well, why not? If some people are predestined to salvation, then clearly some people must be predestined to damnation. God is mean and weird and sadistic and clearly you can ignore all those parts in the gospels where it looks like Jesus was trying to reason with them and give them a real chance to receive Him as the Messiah. He wasn’t really making an offer, it was all a ploy. God may desire for all to come to the knowledge of the truth, but He wanted the Jews to reject Him. Don’t listen to people who say that such things are unfathomable mysteries (Romans 11:33), like the Apostle Paul — it’s better and safer to interpret these ideas in a way that paints God as primarily vengeful and mean. If you had studied the Bible enough and gone to seminary, you would have come to understand these things. There’s a formula to them and once you understand it is easy to give simple trite answers to such questions.

How often should we pray for a specific need?

We can boil down questions about prayer like this to a simple principle because prayer is really a magical incantation that forces God to do certain things that we want Him to do if we’re good. Prayer is powerful because functionally, God doesn’t exist; it is far more important that you pray well and pray the correct number of times than that God hears and answers. Even God bows to the law, so the important thing in prayer is that you are leading a righteous lifestyle. So, 3 times, at least, a week. Three is the number of the trinity. If that doesn’t work try seven times a week. If that doesn’t work it means there is obviously sin in your life.

Why did all mankind, save Noah, become wicked before the Flood?

All of mankind was really good at first, but they gradually got worse and worse until God got fed up and He just couldn’t take it. Now He has no desire to destroy us any more because we are all basically pretty good people (except for a few minor unimportant things that everyone has struggles with) because we have Jesus’ example to follow, unlike then. So, they became really bad because God was so slow to judge them and they didn’t have the ten commandments, and He just kept letting them all get away with it. Now that we’ve been made aware of the flood and of His mighty wrath, and of course since we have the ten commandments and the example of Jesus, we know better and we lead much more righteous lives. We’re sanctified.

What is the difference between holy spirit and intuition?

Easy! The Holy Spirit makes you speak in tongues and writhe around uncontrollably on the floor. Sometimes He makes you bark like a dog or laugh uncontrollably. He can also make you know secret things about people so you can shame them and make them feel completely awful about themselves – that’s called “conviction”. Also, the Holy Spirit can give you strange revelations about things which you can speak that are kind of like horoscopes only more “Bibley” and much harder to comprehend. You can always tell it is really the Holy Spirit because it is impossibly creepy and weird, whereas intuition usually kind of makes a little bit of sense. You want to find a church where the Holy Spirit is “moving” like this in a real way.

Where did poisonous plants and deadly bacteria come from?

This one is easy! It is clear from the Bible that these things came from God’s terrible wrath against sin. Science may have other speculations about this but as Christians it is important that we maintain a Biblical position on this issue.

Is God’s forgiveness conditional or unconditional?

Of course it is unconditional. Not to say that if you have an especially heinous sin, or a habitual sin, or if you masturbate or ever look to lust, you wouldn’t be damned to hell forever. But other than that, it is unconditional. Jesus died for the believer’s sins, except for the real sins that might actually require forgiveness. And it is unconditional as long it is all sufficiently far enough in the past that it seem like you’ve really repented for real. Then it is unconditional for sure, as long as you don’t lapse back into your sin and prove that it was habitual.

What is the difference between ‘workers’ and ‘busybodies’?

Workers actually do useful work which justifies their existence and proves that God is right to bless them. Busybodies appear to work hard but do all their work for selfish reasons, and are not blessed by God for that reason. “Blessed by God” means doing good things and then reaping the consequences of them, because as I’ve said before, God does not functionally exist. Only those who do justifiable work and do it consistently and diligently can be called ‘workers’ and not ‘busybodies’.

Where did sickness come from?

This one is easy! It is clear from the Bible that these things came from God’s terrible wrath against sin. Science may have other speculations about this but as Christians it is important that we maintain a Biblical position on this issue.

How can I overcome the fear of failing an Almighty God?

God is indeed almighty! His ultimate power trumps it all. You don’t understand God’s kind of love if you don’t understand that He is all-powerful and constantly ready to judge you for your secret shameful life. If you are practicing sin, God loves by rejecting you because He loves the righteous and it will be better for them if you are not around. After all, you wouldn’t even be asking this if there wasn’t obvious sin in your life. But if you repent and make it stick, and get rid of the habitual sin in your life, and really make your life to be all about loving God and loving others, and never practice any obvious sins like sexual sins especially, you can feel good about knowing that you are not failing God. It will help if you will spend regular daily time in His word and if you pray more. If you make it a habit to miss your daily devotionals you will be more in danger of failing God. Remember to cherry pick verses like 1 Corinthians 6:9-10 to scare yourself into a victorious and God-honoring lifestyle. Because God starts off hating you and you have to prove to Him that you are worthy of His love and forgiveness.

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What is wrong with virtually all of these questions?

These questions betray the askers’ foundational lack of faith, because they come from a fundamental disbelief in the power of grace in the gospel. These are the questions of legalists who are walking on fragile egg shells trying not to crack them. It is an impossible path and a dismal if not ridiculous one at best. The Christian life isn’t about being careful not to somehow betray God. It is about how much God richly and sacrificially loves us no matter what. Yet such is the predominant flavor of the vast majority of the questions on eBible.com. Most people who are Christians seem not really to believe in a God who loves them enough to die for them. They seem to believe in a God who is very ready abandon them if not throw them directly into the fires of hell if they don’t measure up. They just want to know where exactly they can draw the line on God’s conditional “unconditional” acceptance. It is amazing that anyone ever comes to faith in Christ at all in this pervasive environment.