Questions: What Is Truth?

By Xlibris US

This book is about questions and about statements made in the Bible. I found myself having many questions after reading from a King James Holy Bible that was revised by the Division of Christian Education of the National Council of the Churches of Christ in the United States of America. Th e New Testament was also done by the same division of the churches of Christ.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Xlibris US
• Release date: Apr 2, 2014
• ISBN: 9781493184996

Book preview

Copyright © 2014 by David Phillips.

THE HOLY BIBLE CONTAINING THE OLD AND

NEW TESTAMENTS

Revised Standard Version

TRANSLATED FROM THE ORIGINAL TONGUES

BEING THE VERSION SET FORTH A.D. 1611

REVISED A.D. 1881-1885 AND A.D. 1901

COMPARED WITH THE MOST ANCIENT AUTHORITIES

AND REVISED A.D. 1952

All writings and subjects in my book came from the King James Holy Bible revised A.D. 1952.

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted

in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system,

without permission in writing from the copyright owner.

Any people depicted in stock imagery provided by Thinkstock are models,

and such images are being used for illustrative purposes only.

Certain stock imagery © Thinkstock.

Rev. date: 03/07/2014

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Map.jpgMap.jpgMap2.jpgMap2.jpgMap3.jpgMap3.jpg

This map shows the place of the crossing, not the Red Sea. It also shows the trade routes that would have taken them from Egypt to Canaan without going so far out of the way through the wildernesses. This may also show the route that Moses said God took them to Mount Sinai and then back up to Canaan, the Promised Land.

RELIGIOUS BACKGROUND

For more than seventy years, I have believed in Almighty God and his son, Jesus. I was baptized when I was three months old. I was given to my godmother to live with when I was four years old. My godmother went to church every Sunday. She put me in a Sunday school class in the church itself. She stayed in her own pew in the church and waited for me. Sunday school started at 9:00 a.m. and ended at 9:45 a.m.

After Sunday school, I went and stayed with my godmother for the ten o’clock service. After the ten o’clock service, we stayed for the twelve o’clock service. We then went home and returned for the evening service, which started at seven o’clock. We also attended the Tuesday night service.

I was eleven years old and in the sixth grade. The last period every Wednesday was religious instruction. You would have to leave your school and go to your own church to receive your lessons. Also, I had to join a confirmation class on Saturday mornings and pass that class before I would be allowed to take my first communion. My godmother would always get up about six thirty to fix my breakfast.

One morning when I woke up about seven thirty, she was still in bed. I slept next to her, so I called her, but she did not answer, so I shook her, but she still did not move, so I got out of bed, changed my clothing, and ran to my mother’s house, which was about seven minutes away and told her what happened. That was in the early forties. There was no 911. My godmother did not have electricity in the house or a phone. My mother at that time was getting ready for work. She had a phone, so she called her employer and told her what was happening. Then we went back to the house with my godmother. My mother put her ear to her chest and could hear a heartbeat. That was at nine thirty-five. Five minutes later, she repeated putting her ear to her chest and could not hear anything, so she told me Ma was dead. We then went to the house of Ma’s brother and told him. He asked my mother to take care of it. So we went to the hospital and told them. They then came to the house, picked the body up, and brought it back to the hospital to a special room where it would be prepared for burial the next day. There was no embalming before burial.

The body in a coffin was placed in the first-floor living room on two chairs for viewing and showing respect of past friendship in the house where she died. I was placed in a chair at her head on her right side, and I could smell a strong odor of perfume coming off the body. I was not used to smelling perfume, so it kept my attention from 10:00 a.m. to 12:00 p.m. when a black stagecoach drawn by two white horses came, and four pallbearers took the coffin out to the coach and closed it after. And the friends and family lined up behind the coach and followed it to cemetery where she was buried. That was Tuesday. She died on Monday.

On Thursday my mother took me back to the house and the room where my godmother died at about 9:35 a.m. and put a different clean white sheet on the bed, smoothing it out, and a clean white pillowcase on the pillow and puffed it up. We then sat down on a bench about three feet away from the bed. Then at exactly nine forty, there was a puff of wind that came in the window on the second floor, and I smelled the same odor of perfume that I had smelled coming from the coffin at the viewing. Every hair on my body stood up straight. I was scared, so I dove into my mother, and she said, No, look, I want you to see.

So I looked, and I saw an imprint forming on the sheet, and the pillow sunk in, which lasted for about six seconds, and then another puff of wind, along with the odor of perfume, went through the same window it had come in.

Then my mother said to me, You have just witnessed the raising of the dead. The body with that perfume was never on the second floor. But I smelled it on the second floor, coming through the window. And that is why, without any doubt, I believe that there is a God, the creator of heaven and earth—yes, Almighty God. And that God, my God, is fair, just, and loving. He will not do for some and not for others. If he did for some, he will do for all. Some say he saved my life; some say I was sick with a disease and he cured me, but then, you have those who experience the same things as above, and they die. To me, that is not being fair. So I don’t believe that God has anything to do with anything here on the earth or in the sky. God is omnipotent. That means that he knows everything and sees everything and nothing is impossible to him. Then you will have to say that he knew that those men were going to highjack those planes and fly them into those buildings at the World Trade Center, located in New York City, and that he allowed it to take place. So why would God help some and not help others who worship him the same as those whom he helped? God is fair and will not help or do for some and not others. If he did something for everybody, why would you need free will? There would be no killings, no stealing, no adultery, and no dying. But that is not so. God has no involvement in what takes place here on earth. You can say yes, he is involved, then you say yes, he knew that those sinless five- and six-year-old school kids at Sandy Hook Elementary School in Connecticut, USA, were going to be shot and killed, and he did nothing to stop it; he just let it happen, which I think if you believe in him and you think he was right in not stopping it, you would do the same thing—not stopping it or not saying anything about it to get it stopped. Again, I say God is not involved. If he were, he would not let anything wrong or bad happen.

This book is about questions and about statements made in the Bible. I got these questions from a King James Holy Bible that was revised by the Division of Christian Education of the National Council of the Churches of Christ in the United States of America. The New Testament was also done by the same division of the churches of Christ.

Genesis 1:1-2 says, In the beginning God created the heaven and the earth. At that time the earth was without form and void. [Meaning there was nothing there only empty space and water.] It also was dark, and God was moving over the face of the waters. Waters is plural, meaning more than one.

Genesis 1:3-8 says, And God said let there be light. And there was light. And God saw that it was good, so he separated the light from the dark. So then God called the light day and he called the dark night. And that was the morning and there was the evening that made the first day. And God said, ‘Let there be a firmament and let it separate the waters from the waters and the firmament separated the waters which were under the firmament from the waters which was above the firmament.’ Now that was the end of day 2. Question, where are the waters that are supposed to be above the firmament? Science has been in outer space and has never seen or found any of the waters that Moses said God put there. We know that here on earth, we have the oceans and seas and rivers and lakes. So when the Bible mentions water with the S1, it is talking about fresh water and salt water. Therefore, above the firmament, the water there should be also fresh and salty.

God was also moving over the waters in the dark. That means he could see in the dark. Why did he need light? How long did he live in the dark before?

Genesis 1:4-19 says, And God said let there be light in the firmament of the heaven to separate the day from the night and let them be for signs and for seasons and for days and years. And let them be lights in the firmament of the heavens to give light upon the earth. And God made the two great lights the greater light to rule the day, and the lesser light to rule the night. And God set then in the firmament of the heavens, to give light upon the earth. Moses said that God made two great lights: the sun and the moon. But is the moon a light or a reflection? Science says it is only a reflection from the sunshine on it. There were men that landed on the moon, and it was not a light. Most people believe that God told him what to write in these books. Moses is wrong. God only made one light: the sun. Question, what happened to the light that God made the first day?

Genesis 1:24 mentions the start of day 6: And God said, ‘Let the earth bring forth living creatures according to their kind. Cattle and creeping things and beast of the earth according to their kind.’ And