The Apostle Paul wrote, "There is no difference between Jew and Gentile, for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God, and all are justified freely by his grace through the redemption that came by Christ Jesus (Romans 3:22-24)." When you believe something that the Bible does not support, you are forced to suggest that the clear reading of scripture is unclear. There are those who believe when Paul said, "all have sinned" in verse 23, that the word "all" doesn't mean everybody. Now, there are those who have taken the time to try and define the meaning of the word using greek definitions, concordances, etc. However, the simple answer is that if God wanted to use a different word, He would have instructed Paul to use it. However, the reason people suggest that the word "all" doesn't mean all is so they can protect their beliefs that may not be supported by the Bible. In this case, an individual was trying to defend the "sinlessness of The Blessed Virgin Mary." If all have sinned then so has Mary and their belief falls apart. If that falls apart, then what else starts to collapse? The truth is that people don't want to admit that what they believe is wrong. The cost of admitting they have put their faith in error is too high. No pastor, church leader, or layman wants to go back and tell their congregations, "I have been teaching or believing an error." They would get replaced or kicked out and their lives may fall apart. Do they want to lose their jobs, income, reputations, and families over it? Many will not. Therefore, they create entire theologies to defend their error. But, the question must be asked, "Where does it stop?"
Other Books
In the book of John, it says, "There are many more things that Jesus did. If all of them were written down, I suppose that not even the world itself would have space for the books that would be written (John 21:25)." How many religions have their sacred writings? You have the Quran, the religious text of Islam. There are the Vedas of Hinduism. The Latter-Day Saints have the Book of Mormon. Catholics have their Catechism. The list goes on and on. Most, if not all, of these religions, claim their texts are divinely inspired. They could, and some do, point to the verse from John as justification for their beliefs. This leads to everybody claiming that their beliefs are of God. Why believe Jesus is the only means of salvation when any religious text outside of the Bible can make its own claims without objection? However, the verse itself says, "If all of them were written down ..." It doesn't say that the books were written, but if they were written. Secondly, John is writing about all the things that Jesus did during His life and ministry that could have been written down. He is not talking about the creation of all of the writings that inspire other religions.
The Nephilim
Prior to the Flood, we read about the Nephilim. "The Nephilim were on the earth in those days—and also afterward—when the sons of God went to the daughters of humans and had children by them. They were the heroes of old, men of renown (Genesis 6:4)." There is not enough information given in the Bible as to who the Nephilim were exactly. The theories are endless. The most common belief is that they were fallen angels. If they are fallen angels, then we have to be careful that we have not opened the door to undermining the integrity of the Bible and destroying the Gospel. The verse says that the Nephilim had children with the "daughters of humans." If angels are having children, then is it farfetched to believe that someone could say the angel that announced to Mary that she was pregnant with Jesus was His father? Furthermore, how many other angel and human "hybrids" are running around? Do you see where this can lead? Besides, as is often the case, the Bible tells us that the Nephilim were "men of renown." They were men, not angels. Unfortunately, believing that they are men is not profound enough. We need to keep the "mystery" alive to justify our endless pursuit of solving it, no matter what the cost is to God's word and the Gospel of Jesus Christ.
Days of Creation
When it comes to the debate between creation and evolution, the days of creation are at the root of the disagreement. How long were the days of Creation? Were they six 24-hour periods or longer spans of time like thousands or millions of years? In Genesis 1, after each day of creation was over the Bible uses the phrase, "So the evening and the morning..." After the phrase it says, the first day, the second day, the third day, the fourth day, the fifth day, and the sixth day (Genesis 1:5, 8, 13, 19, 23, and 31). If the days of creation were other than 24-hour periods why would it say evening and morning? Did God not know how to write the words thousand and millions? The seven-day week we have comes from verses like Leviticus 23:3 where God said, "Six days shall work be done, but the seventh day is a Sabbath of solemn rest, a holy convocation. You shall do no work on it; it is the Sabbath of the Lord in all your dwellings." This is a direct reflection of the six days of creation. If God didn't use six, regular days during creation, His command in Leviticus doesn't make sense. Could you imagine if the workweek were thousands or millions of years long? But, again, in order for people to fit their beliefs into the Bible, they destroy the Bible in the process. Not only does Leviticus 23:3 make no sense, but the Gospel is also destroyed, Adam should have lived longer than 930 years, Jesus wouldn't have asked the disciples "Haven't you read" when referring to the creation of mankind, and so on.
The conclusion to all of this is that people don't want to believe the Bible. You can't believe both your religion and the Bible if they don't agree. If they disagree, the problem is with your religious beliefs, not with the Bible. Their beliefs are more important than the truth. Religious pride becomes an issue as it makes it next to impossible for a person to see their error. They would rather fall on the sword than take up "the sword of the Spirit, which is the word of God (Ephesians 6:17)." It is telling that people would rather believe their religions when what they teach is in disagreement with the clear reading of scripture. Rather than asking God to explain the conflict or testing the spirits to see if what they are being taught is from God, they will change what God has said. That is a recipe for disaster and gives the devil a foothold to undermine God's truth and will ultimately shipwreck the faith of some.
