Blogs are great! Cool way to keep connected and learning.

Honor and respect are key for healthy relationships; it starts with God and flows from there.

It was a pleasant surprise to see and share with you and your family today.

Marcela and I hope to have you and your family for brunch/dinner on your next visit; I’d love to share more with you and Chris about all that God is doing in our lives without interruption.

I missed Nate this time; hope to see him soon! I’m very proud of him!!! Congrats on your graduation! Keep up your good work bud!

Much love to you guys! Alvaro

Since your dad is Mr. Bible himself, maybe you or he can point me toward a resource which will help me.

Some years ago, I heard of a skeptic who had actually put up a monetary reward (something small I think it was — maybe $1000.00) to the first person who could craft a single narrative which included every detail of all four Gospel accounts of the events immediately following the resurrection.

At the time — and a few times since — I tried to do so, and was not able to reconcile several details.

It’s not the easy stuff I’m stuck on. For example, it’s no problem to me that one account says “young man” and another “angel”, and in one account there are two angels, and in another only one is mentioned. These are the natural sort of details that one would expect to find any time several people are recounting the same event. Especially if that event is somewhat complex, with many people involved.

A little more difficult is the “early morning” vs. “before dawn” dilemma. One has to conclude there were multiple trips by the same people to the tomb — particularly by Mary Magdalene, otherwise you’ve got people doing some pretty bizarre things, like coming back from a meeting with the risen Jesus himself, and telling people that the body was stolen.

But even considering multiple excursions to the tomb (but why were Mary Magdalene and the other two women bringing spices for the body on that second trip?), there are more problems with what happens after that.

Quite frankly, as a result of this effort on my part, I’ve had to personally dispense with the venerable old doctrine known as “inerrancy”. Not because I don’t want it to be true — but after further investigation I feel there’s just no good reason to hold on to it.

Have you given this matter any thought, or do you know of a good resource that deals with this (I’m looking for more than a overly-simplistic “harmony of the Gospels”. I’ve seen plenty of them, and they usually go no further that to explain the one-angel vs. two-angel sort of issue.)

I enjoy reading your blogs, especially this last one about your daughter. It really encourages me to be the man I need to be.

Thanks Matt.

From one of your former L.U. students,

Jason

In Him,
Glenda