Posted in biblical prophecy, christian apologetics, Isaiah 53, messianic prophecies on September 30, 2011| 1 Comment »
If readers have not noticed yet, Veritas Domain has interests in the area of Christian worldview, hermeneutics, Messianic prophecies and Presuppositional apologetics.
In light of that, I thought it was good to let people know about this book offer about a Messianic prophecy.
Chosen People Ministry, a ministry witnessing to the Jews are giving away a book that discuss the Messianic prophecy of Isaiah 53.
You can fill out this form and order a copy by clicking HERE.
Posted in Christian News, Christianity, persecuted church, Persecution, Uncategorized, Youcef Nadarkhani, tagged Youcef Nadarkhani on September 29, 2011| Leave a Comment »
There are many Christians praying for Youcef Nadarkhani, an Iranian Christian pastor.
The latest news seems to suggest he might not be killed, but that do not mean his life will be easier.
According to ACLJ: http://aclj.org/iran/breaking-christian-pastor-death-sentence-overturned
Posted in Acts 17 Ministry, Christianity, David Wood on September 28, 2011| Leave a Comment »
Christian apologist David Wood debates on the issue of whether Christianity promotes violence towards Non-Christian with a muslim.
Don’t forget the previous debate posted here on Veritas Domain on whether or not Islam promote violence towards Non-Muslims.
OPENING PRESENTATION
REBUTTALS/CROSSFIRE
Q&A/CONCLUSION
[HT]
Posted in college, student on September 27, 2011| Leave a Comment »
The LA Times reported this story:
UC Berkeley student leaders are condemning a campus Republican group’s satirical “diversity bake sale” offering pastry prices based on race and gender.
Student senators at the University of California campus said in a 19-0 vote on Sunday that the bake sale is discriminatory.
The San Francisco Chronicle reports the Berkeley College Republicans still plan to hold Tuesday’s bake sale on campus.
The event is designed to denounce a bill on Gov. Jerry Brown’s desk that would allow California public universities to consider race, ethnicity and gender in student admissions.
The GOP group on Tuesday plans to sell baked goods accordingly: Items for white customers cost $2; for Asians, $1.50; for Latinos, $1; for black customers, 75 cents, and for Native Americans, a quarter.
Women get a 25-cent discount.
The satire seems to be loss by those who are more progressive. I read this news article over at the San Francisco Gate:
Hundreds of students opposed the bake sale on Facebook, and many sent letters of complaint to campus administrators. Alfredo Mireles, Jr., a UCSF nursing student who sits on UC’s Board of Regents, issued a statement condemning “a common stunt performed by college Republican groups to protest affirmative action policies.”
A few dozen students attended Sunday’s special meeting, and several members of the Republican group defended their actions.
The bill that emerged from the student senators did not punish the group, or even name it, but referred to the power of a separate Judiciary Council to defund any campus group found to be discriminatory.
“The ASUC,” the bill reads, “condemns the use of discrimination whether it is in satire or in seriousness by any student group.”
I thought the last part of the excerpt above was ironic. Talk about being blind to their own view of political legislation.
Posted in Christianity, Evangelicals, Evangelism, Ray Comfort, tagged 180 on September 26, 2011| 42 Comments »
The documentary by Ray Comfort is up! Here it is:
Share with everybody! And be sure to give the link to the website HERE.
. .Posted in Allan MacRae, Bible, Book Review, Isaiah, Isaiah 53, messianic prophecies on September 25, 2011| 1 Comment »
Purchase: Amazon
This work is by Allan A. MacRae. Though this is an older work (1977), I believe it is still a worthwhile read. The fact that this author has studied under some renown scholars (Princeton’s Robert Dick Wilson, R.A. Torrey of BIOLA and William Albright) and has spent years studying Isaiah would certainly lead the readers to discover something new about Isaiah from MacRae’s “The Gospel of Isaiah.” The book does not cover all of Isaiah, but on the section of Isaiah 40-56:8. The writer had no desire to write a detail commentary here, due to the author’s wish to engage the lay reading audience. For some this might leave things technical questions one might have unanswered. This impacts even the format of the book, as readers will notice that even the identification of Hebrew word or whatever grammatical-syntactical insight of the Hebrew are put in the endnotes. The value of this book is his discussion about the “Servant of God,” where the author takes into account contextually of how that at times refer to Israel, but other times it refers to individuals–specifically that of King Cyrus and the Messiah. MacRae successfully argues for the Messiah being predicated as the Suffering Servant. There are several Christian works on the Messianic prophecy found in Isaiah 53 which MacRae also discusses here too (with a thirty page chapter if I recall correctly), but what I appreciate of this book is the discussion of the “Servant” by looking at it’s use fully in the surrounding context. This way, readers will have a easier time seeing Isaiah 53 referring to the Messianic Suffering Servant, having seen that He is referred to earlier in the context. In the end of the book, MacRae also have some appendix notes that I found helpful for a general reading audience–issues on translations, Ancient translations and comment on the unity of Isaiah. Furthermore, he ends the work with a section “Resources for study,” that I found insightful in more ways than one: 1.) It gave readers a window into how MacRae approaches his study, without reliance on the commentary as much as grammatical historical work himself; 2.) It also made me appreciate the amount of development of scholarship, resources and tools since MacRae written this book, such as his discussion about the difficulty of accessing Brown, Driver and Briggs lexicon which since the date of the publication has been less difficult with Bruce Einspahr’s Index to BDB. This work is best read alongside of the passage that the author’s exposition–whether in the Hebrew and/or English translation. There were many times in reading Isaiah I was stunned how it provided later future antecedent theology for New Testament words, themes and imagery. I’ve thoroughly enjoyed it reading it for devotional, even though for such a small book I thought I was going to finish it much more sooner!
Posted in Evangelism, Kevin Swanson, Ray Comfort, Way of the Master, tagged 180 on September 24, 2011| 7 Comments »
Posted in Bible, bible interpretation, biblical genres, grocery list, hermeneutics, historical grammatical hermeneutics on September 23, 2011| 3 Comments »
NOTE: Thus we begin the series I talked about several weeks ago.
I. Definition of Genre
a. Genre is from a French word that means “kind”
b. Genre is synonymous with literary forms.
c. Genre is the type of literature of a given literary piece.
d. A genre has three elements:
i. Structure
1. This concern with the order of words, phrases, sentences and paragraphs of the text.
2. Line lengths is also an element of a text’s structure
ii. Content
1. What is the topic or subject of the given text?
iii. Function
1. What purpose does the particular excerpt of the text serve?
II. Does Genres exist?
a. Session two will go over the importance of genre in biblical interpretation.
i. But this would be meaningless if it can be established do genre does not exist. It would be just speculations and a waste of time.
ii. Are there such things as Genre?
b. The “Transcendental” Argument for the existence of literary genre
i. Genre does exist because genre is used by God when He wrote the Bible.
ii. Genre can be so obvious that many people are not conscious of it when they are reading.
1. A trip to the library
a. Literatures are arranged according to its kind (genre).
i. Children’s story
ii. Government documents
iii. Biographies
iv. Action thrillers
v. Romance novels
vi. Math text books
vii. Journal on literary forms
b. Some of the genre might overlap, but that does not mean that there are not kinds of literature!
2. Remembering the fact that genre can be so obvious that one might not be conscious is crucial later on as sometimes people can identify genres almost instantly and yet struggle with identifying the factors of what makes the literature in question is the genre that it is.
iii. The impossibility of the contrary: There is no such thing as a ‘genre-less’ literature
1. Objection: A groceries’ list is an example of a genre-less literature.
a. Yet, the groceries list is a genre itself, that of a groceries list!
i. Groceries list is still a kind of writing
ii. Groceries list also has the three element of a genre
1. Structure- Typically, there is one subject per line, and various lines.
2. Content- The words are all names of food or household items that is preceded or followed by a number (example: 3 burgers), or a unit of measurements (2 milk gallons).
3. Function- The items are listed so that one remembers what to get.
iii. If there is no genre, how does the genre skeptic husband know that his wife has left the groceries list on the table along with other paper? Or how can her scolding wife help her husband find it?
III. Exercise in identifying genre: Excerpts from the newspaper
Can you identify what “part” or genre of the Newpaper the following excerpts are? Give your reasons why.
a. Sample 1:
Your editorial claims to support separation of church and state, but your stated position is contrary to the principle.
To argue that the wall of separation is “porous enough” to allow any branch of government to declare a day of prayer is to promote an exception that swallows the entire rule. For a governor to declare such a day is for the state to officially endorse prayer.
This is not a neutral act. It’s one thing for elected public officials to declare personal faith. It’s quite another to issue formal prayer-endorsing proclamations on behalf of government — in this case, the state of Colorado.
It sends a message that nonbelievers are lesser in the eyes of the political community than those who believe in a supernatural being.
Religious people in this country can pray whenever they want. They don’t need government proclamations to worship.
Edward Tabash
Beverly Hills
The writer is chair of the national legal committee of the Americans United for Separation of Church and State.[2]
b. Sample 2:
Israeli warplanes and helicopters bombarded military targets across the Hamas-ruled Gaza Strip on Saturday, retaliating for Palestinian rocket fire into Israel with one of the deadliest assaults in the history of the 60-year conflict.
As Palestinian officials put the death toll at 230 and said many were unarmed civilians, the scale of the bloodshed unsettled the Middle East and alarmed world leaders involved in Israeli-Palestinian peace efforts.[3]
c. Sample 3:
They came, they saw, for once they didn’t conquer.
By the time the Celtics arrived last week, the Lakers had worked themselves into such a state of indignation, complaints included not only Boston fans’ rocking their bus in the playoffs, but Ray Allen’s ringing insult as he accepted the team’s ESPY at the summer awards show here:
“Another win in L.A!”[4]
IV. Excerpt in identifying genre: Other literatures
a. List what are some ways one can identify a poem?
b. List what are some ways one can identify a junk mail or an email spam?
Posted in John Whitcomb, Presuppositional Apologetics, presuppositionalism on September 22, 2011| Leave a Comment »
Thought these links were good stuff to look out from this past week. They might interests those who are interested in Presuppositional apologetics. Some links might not be on Presuppositional apologetics per se, but of interests for those in this circle.
1.) Going Meatless and Spouseless- A good post on medical ethics by Paul Manata, sharing his personal experience as a Navy Corpsmen. As a Marine myself, Navy Corpsmen are about the few things in the Navy not made fun of =). This post touches on Randal’s comment about the Robertson statement concerning divorcing your Alzheimer’s spouse.
2.) Book Review: The Doctrine of the Word of God by John Frame– A reviewed by Mike Robinson on the latest work by Dr. Frame.
3.) Praxis Presup: Episode 17– Chris Bolt’s podcast focusing on the practical side of things in Presuppositional apologetics, this episode critiques some atheists that Sye TenBruggencate had some interaction with.
4.)Penultimate Thoughts on the Licona Controversy– Steve Hays over at Triablogue has some food for thought concerning the recent controversy with Michael Licona.
5.) Dr. John Whitcomb Honored for ‘Genesis Flood’ 50 Years Milestone- A short page about this over at Answers in Genesis.
Posted in Apologetics, Bible, Christianity and culture, Genesis 9, Lawrence Russell Brewer, Romans 13, Theology, Theonomy, Troy Davis, worldview on September 21, 2011| 6 Comments »
Troy Davis has just been executed tonight by the state of Georgia for the crime of murdering a Police officer.
From the news, I can see there were people protesting the execution. No doubt, some of those protestors do so on Christian grounds.
I thought it was interesting that the same night Troy Davis was executed, another convict name Lawrence Russell Brewer was also executed. Lawrence Russell Brewer’s sentencing receive less publicity, but his crime was notorious: the car-dragging murder of a Black man. What a gruesome crime.
Tonight, I don’t want to comment so much on the particular of each case but wish to comment more about whether the death penalty in of itself can be opposed on Biblical grounds for those who wish to make a Christian argument against the death penalty for murderers.
The death penalty for murderers is grounded in the Noahic covenant. Genesis 9:6 states,
6 “Whoever sheds man’s blood,
By man his blood shall be shed,
For in the image of God
He made man.
7 “As for you, be fruitful and multiply;
[f]Populate the earth abundantly and multiply in it.”
This is an everlasting covenant according to Genesis 9:16. In the same way that God will never destroy the earth by water ever again due to the eternal condition of the Noahic Covenant, the requirement of the Noahic covenant for the death penalty stands to this day. The participants of the Noahic Covenant includes everybody and every creature. It is universal in scope and not just for Israel and what have you.
Who should carry out the death penalty on murderers? I don’t think it’s every individual citizens that should practice vigilante justice. The New Testament does speak on this subject, in Romans 13:4. Speaking of the government, Paul writes,
for it is a minister of God to you for good. But if you do what is evil, be afraid; for it does not bear the sword for nothing; for it is a minister of God, an avenger who brings wrath on the one who practices evil.
The “sword” as an instrument is not only for protection of the magistrate. This passage makes it clear bearing the sword is not just “for nothing.” The agent of the state in pursing justice is a minister of God and brings wrath on those who practices evil using his sword (or whatever modern tools in his disposal).
Posted in christian apologetics, Christianity, Michael Licona, theological method, Theology on September 20, 2011| 3 Comments »
Apparently the issue of Michael Licona’s interpretation of Matthew 27:52-53 has fueled some controversy ever since Norman Geisler has come out with his open letter raising concern about his non-literal interpretation of the Saint’s resurrection after Jesus’ death. The passage from Matthew 27:52-53 is as follows from the New American Standard Bible:
The tombs were opened, and many bodies of the [a]saints who had fallen asleep were raised; 53 and coming out of the tombs after His resurrection they entered the holy city and appeared to many.
This upcoming Thursday I will be getting my hands on Licona’s magnificent work, largely to read this new contribution to the defense of the Resurrection but also to see Licona’s view and reasoning for his interpretation for myself. I have not read either Al Mohler’s or Norman Geisler’s open letters and what I have read thus far have only been from apologetics’ bloggers whose posts have been favorable towards Licona.
While I understand that the weight for Licona’s position should be evaluated from his own writing, I am beginning to be somewhat concern with how some of his supporters are going about defending Licona. I don’t doubt these individual have a passion for defending Christianity. But sometimes one might be more passionate and have blindspots we aren’t aware of. While I don’t have all the time in the world to write on how everybody is wrong, I think I narrow my comment to that of Michael Bird, whom I believe Christians will probably begin to know more and more of in the coming years in the field of Christian historical and evidential apologetics (if they don’t know him already).
The issue is identifying the genre of the Biblical passage in question. In terms of calibrating the literary form, Bird provided this reasoning for a non-historical interpretation:
In my chapter about the resurrection in How Did Christianity Begin: A Believer and Non-Believer Examine the Evidence, co-authored with James Crossley (London: SPCK, 2008/ Grand Rapids, MI: Baker, 2010), I said in a footnote about Matt. 27.51-53: “My understanding of this text is that it is not historical and it blends the present and the future together so that Matthew provides a cameo of the future resurrection at the point of Jesus’ death to underscore its living-giving power” (p. 69, n. 30). That was my off-the-cuff thought, but I stand by it, since Matt. 27.51-53 is a strange story that is reported nowhere else in Christian or non-Christian literature.
I don’t see any reason why Licona’s or my interpretation of Matt. 27.51-53 does not conform to a view of scripture as infallible, inspired, and authoritative. I think it explains the text and it explains why you don’t hear Josephus or Tacitus talking about the day that many Jewish holy men came back to life.
What struck me about his argument was what I highlighted in bold above, which I repeat again: “I think it explains the text and it explains why you don’t hear Josephus or Tacitus talking about the day that many Jewish holy men came back to life.” I think Bird’s method behind his conclusion about Matthew 27:51-53 is flawed. For one thing, this is an argument from silence. That is, there is the flaw in the reasoning that if a pericope was not mentioned anywhere else outside of scripture, it must not have been the case historically, and therefore what is written in the Biblical text is deem as non-historical in it’s genre. To invoke the apologetic cliche, the absence of evidence is not the same thing as evidence of absence. Secondly there are many things in the New Testament or the life of Jesus that are not mentioned by Josephus or Tacitus. Does that mean that events recorded in the Gospels such as the woman at the well in John 4 or Jesus as a twelve year old apologist in Luke 2 are nothing more than non-historical literary forms? I don’t think Bird would want to say that. I don’t state that so as to be uncharitable but I wish to point out that Bird’s reasoning here for Matthew 27:52-53 raises more problem than it answers.
Bird also stated the following,
“Moreover, Geisler and Mohler are systematicians, not New Testament scholars, and most of those who came to Licona’s aid in his open letter are New Testament scholars. I think there’s a big lesson to be learned in that!”
I think Bird might be reading too much into Geisler and Mohler being systematicians here. I don’t believe it is an issue of Systematic theology versus New Testament theology. This sets up an unnecessary false dilemma. Even if it’s true that those who are supporting Licona are NT scholars, it seems that Licona’s position and that of Bird’s are a minority position even among Evangelical New Testament scholars. Hence I don’t believe it is “a big lesson to be learned” as Bird might suggest. Moreover, I might be mistaken since I have yet to read Mohler’s open letter, but did he not invited Licona to an open forum of some kind with the faculty of Southern Seminary? The faculty includes NT scholars that are reputable such as Tom Schriner.
I close with what I believe are the real questions for Licona and Bird, that I will be asking myself when I read Licona’s work this Thursday: How does one establish the literary form of Matthew 27:52-53 being unhistorical in a manner that does not bring more problem (logical fallacies, inconsistencies, self-defeaters) than answers? How does one prove Matthew was engaging in Greco-Roman literary genre when Matthew seem to address largely a Jewish audience? And the Greco-Roman texts that are being cited as examples of what Matthew 27:52-53 were participating in–can one establish definitively that they were meant not to be taken historically?
Posted in Bible, bible interpretation, hermeneutics, new testament, old testament, Walter Kaiser on September 19, 2011| 6 Comments »
The topic of the New Testament’s use of the Old Testament is a fascinating topic. Scholars disagree with each other when it comes to the question of how the New Testament uses the Old Testament. Here I offer a summary of what my current position is concerning this topic.
The position that best describe my view is the “Single Meaning, Unified Referents” school. The advocate of this school that I find myself in most agreement with is Walter Kaiser. An important reason why I hold to this perspective is due to the position that the Old Testament should have only one meaning from the text. To flesh out further the position I hold, I will give my answer to the four of the five questions that the Three Views of the New Testament Use of the Old has for their contributors to answer. Answering these five orbiting questions might give a better picture of my position.
When it comes to the question of whether or not Sensus Plenior is an appropriate way of explaining the New Testament use of the Old, I would have to say no. Sensus Plenior is the concept that an Old Testament passage might have a deeper meaning intended by God but not the human author. One must note that neither the New Testament nor the Old Testament explicitly teach the doctrine of Sensus Plenior. Sometimes people will cite John 11:49-52, of how the high priest Caiphas prophesied that Jesus would die for the people. But this passage does not support the doctrine of Sensus Plenior since there are discontinuities between God prophesying through Caiphas and the writers of Scripture. To begin with, Caiphas’ prophecy was verbal while the Bible communicated through writing. Caiphas was a nonbeliever and hostile to the Christian faith, while the writers of Scripture were obedient willing vessels of God’s truth. Furthermore, Caiphas knew what he was saying, and the meaning of his words was not at a loss to him (Note that the text never said he did not understand what he was saying). Instead of demonstrating Sensus Plenior, John 11:49-52 demonstrates more of God’s sovereign power to be able to speak the truth even through the mouths of hardened sinners who wanted to kill Jesus. Ultimately, the reason why I reject Sensus Plenior is because it causes an artificial distinction between the human author and Divine author when it comes to the meaning of the text. This artificial distinction also imply that an Old Testament text might have two meanings, the Divine one and the human one. Since I believe that a text must have a single meaning, Sensus Plenior is not something I accept.
Concerning the question, “Do the NT writers take into account the context of the passages they cite?” I would say yes, the New Testament authors do quote the Old Testament in ways that are faithful to the original context. Seeing that Jesus in Luke 20 would debate His religious opponents by appealing to the historical grammatical and contextual setting of Old Testament passages, it seems that these rules are binding upon those who believe and don’t believe. It is fascinating to note that often times a meaning of something is informed and shape by it’s context (such as when one say, “That’s bad!” depends largely on the context of MTV or a Sunday service). To lift a quote out of its original context and put a radical new context into its place is to invent new meaning which again goes contrary to the fundamental axiom in hermeneutics that any meaningful statement must have one meaning. This is not to say that are not any hard passages when the New Testament uses the Old. Instead of letting the exception be the rule, the majority of the New Testament’s use of the Old is clearly contextual. It seems better to admit that one does not know why certain particular cases of the NT use of the Old seems to go contrary to the context of the Old Testament, than to tamper with the rule of hermeneutics that allow for more than one meaning of a text.
Concerning the question, “Does the NT writers’ use of Jewish exegetical methods explain the NT use of the OT?” the answer I would give is a yes and no. Yes in the sense that there are Jewish methods that the writers of the New Testament does use, such as arguments from the lesser to the greater or argument to absurdity, Corporate Solidarity, etc. But these methods are not unique only to Second Temple Judiasm, since others outside the Second Temple contexts uses them also. In fact, these “Jewish” methods that the New Testament uses are often times universally binding rules of interpretation or inferences or means of communication, since they are part of the laws of logic or the historical and grammatical hermeneutic. Concerning the question of whether or not the New Testament uses the “bad” or eccentric hermeneutics from Second Temple Judaism such as Midrashic, Pesha or allegorical reading, I would say no and the burden of proof would be on those who hold otherwise that the New Testament does. A work that is worthwhile in this regard is David Instone Brewer’s Techniques and Assumptions in Jewish Exegesis Before 70 CE.
Concerning the question, “Are we able to replicate the exegetical and hermeneutical approaches to the OT that we find in the writings of the NT?”, I would say yes. Since I believe that the New Testament’s use of the Old is compliant with a historical and grammatical hermeneutic and draw inferences from them according to the laws of logic, I do believe that the New Testament’s example is worthy of being emulated by readers of the Bible.
This view will surely shape the methodology I adopt in approaching a passage where the New Testament uses the Old. Again, it is important to adopt uncompromisingly a historical and grammatical approach. Walter Kaiser have argued for the importance of antecedent theology, where previous revelation of God up to the point of the time of one’s text should inform one’s interpretation of that passage, particularly when there are certain terms that the Word of God has previously used or defined. There are times in the past where I read a passage in the New Testament that cite the Old Testament or have strange phrases and titles that at that moment makes little sense. Over time, I have found in my life that the more background knowledge I have of the Old Testament, the more I am in awe of how it helps informs the meaning of a New Testament passage or the reason for it’s use of an Old Testament citation. Antecedent theology is an important method in interpreting how the New Testament uses the Old. I do not believe antecedent theology to be foreign to the historical and grammatical approach, but rather sees it as fulfilling an important function in the “historical” aspect in historical and grammatical approach.
Practically, what this means in terms of methodology is to first do the contextual historical and grammatical exegesis of an Old Testament passage within it’s original setting. After taking into account the introductory material of the Old Testament book in which the citation comes from, studying the text in the original languages, one then with this information go over to the New Testament and do the same work as well that was done in the Old. Having the materials studied from the Old as conversation partner in the study of the New use of the Old, one should attempt to figure out what the New Testament is doing in a way that take into account the context of the Old Testament citation.
The view I take is radically different from Peter Enn’s school of thought, which has serious internal inconsistency especially with his denial that the laws of logic are universal (what normative basis then, does he have to adjudicate and evaluate other’s position?). Bock’s position blurs the line between meaning and significance in a way that it’s unclear whether or not he holds to singular meaning, and thus a problem. Dr. Thomas’ Inspired Sensus Plenior Application (ISPA) is also internally problematic in that Thomas continiously advocate for a single meaning of a text but then he continiously sneaks in the possibility of a second meaning of a passage.
Posted in Marine Corp, Marines, Uncategorized on September 18, 2011| Leave a Comment »
I am a bit reminiscent about the Marines tonight after reading up about the first living Marine recipient of the Medal of Honor for this century. You can read more about Sgt. Dakota and his story HERE.
This was from his citation:
The President of the United States in the name of The Congress takes pleasure in presenting the MEDAL OF HONOR to
For service as set forth in the following
For conspicuous gallantry and intrepidity at the risk of his life above and beyond the call of duty while serving with Marine Embedded Training Team 2-8, Regional Corps Advisory Command 3-7, in Kunar Province, Afghanistan, on 8 September 2009. Corporal Meyer maintained security at a patrol rally point while other members of his team moved on foot with two platoons of Afghan National Army and Border Police into the village of Ganjgal for a pre-dawn meeting with village elders. Moving into the village, the patrol was ambushed by more than 50 enemy fighters firing rocket propelled grenades, mortars, and machine guns from houses and fortified positions on the slopes above. Hearing over the radio that four U.S. team members were cut off, Corporal Meyer seized the initiative. With a fellow Marine driving, Corporal Meyer took the exposed gunner’s position in a gun-truck as they drove down the steeply terraced terrain in a daring attempt to disrupt the enemy attack and locate the trapped U.S. team. Disregarding intense enemy fire now concentrated on their lone vehicle, Corporal Meyer killed a number of enemy fighters with the mounted machine guns and his rifle, some at near point blank range, as he and his driver made three solo trips into the ambush area. During the first two trips, he and his driver evacuated two dozen Afghan soldiers, many of whom were wounded. When one machine gun became inoperable, he directed a return to the rally point to switch to another gun-truck for a third trip into the ambush area where his accurate fire directly supported the remaining U.S. personnel and Afghan soldiers fighting their way out of the ambush. Despite a shrapnel wound to his arm, Corporal Meyer made two more trips into the ambush area in a third gun-truck accompanied by four other Afghan vehicles to recover more wounded Afghan soldiers and search for the missing U.S. team members. Still under heavy enemy fire, he dismounted the vehicle on the fifth trip and moved on foot to locate and recover the bodies of his team members. Corporal Meyer’s daring initiative and bold fighting spirit throughout the 6-hour battle significantly disrupted the enemy’s attack and inspired the members of the combined force to fight on. His unwavering courage and steadfast devotion to his U.S. and Afghan comrades in the face of almost certain death reflected great credit upon himself and upheld the highest traditions of the Marine Corps and the United States Naval Service.
Posted in christian apologetics, James White, Presuppositional Apologetics, presuppositionalism, Sermon on September 17, 2011| Leave a Comment »
Posted in David Wood, Debate on September 16, 2011| 3 Comments »
David Wood debates a Muslim on this issue. Three part youtube clip below.
The Domain for Truth 