Dear brothers and sisters,
I'm preparing a Bible Study - but to address it well, I'd just like to ask you a few a questions as to why you are Christian:
I am just curious to know why you are Christian?
Christ rose from the dead - but did you witness His Resurrection?
Only when the disciples and apostles saw Him Risen did they believe. Without the Resurrection, they would have never believed.
The miracles they witnessed before (healings, Lazarus etc) made absolutely zero difference. It was only when seeing Christ Risen did they believe.
If an atheist came here and asked you : Why are you all Coptic? You'd say that your parents were Coptic. Why aren't you Muslim? If your parents were born in Pakistan or Saudia Arabia, you'd have been Muslim, and equally defending your faith in Islam.
The Gospels are telling you that without the resurrection, your faith is pointless. So what right do you have in saying you are Christian when the Apostles didn't believe and even saw tons of miracles. You seem to like the Christian ideology, but you have not had any evidence that Christ IS indeed Risen.
What is your evidence??
Oh, before I forget, I have the answer to these questions .. I just want to make sure I've perfected my Bible Study homework before I present it to our prayer group.
Basically, the question asks: What claim do you have to say you are a Christian when you haven't seen Christ Risen?
Comments
I do not agree with this. The church fathers have used many methods to prove Christianity such the prophesies and the natural arguments for God. www.reasonablefaith.com is a good resource even though it it protestant.
Maybe bring up how the faith survives beyond secular, ethnic and political conflicts? How our traditions and Traditions have been so "orthodox" with 1,500 years of separation? I agree with you're main point. Perhaps NOT about if an individual doesn't believe, but how God welcomes someone back? Use more universal examples of those doubted their faith and put it in contemporary examples and issues within the conversation, not the main them of the lesson.