Institute of Biblical Defense

That’s right, we’ve added 5 new “30 Seconds with Dr. Fernandes” videos to the playlist on the videos page. These clips are from his sermon from November 8th, 2009 covering first Chronicles.

For those of you who don’t want to link on the videos link above the header, here is the playlist from YouTube. Just press play and enjoy!

Originally posted by IBD Vice-president Matt Coombe on mjcoombe.com

I usually don’t like to talk about myself; I especially don’t like to talk about my accolades via a blog … but here goes.

We need to have the capacity to be servants! It is a great notion and fun to think about when Jesus said things like, “Let the first be last and the last first,” and other similar charges, but how often do we act on notions like this? I often get down on myself for selfishness and wish I was a greater servant. But today as I was driving to Starbucks to get some studying done a truck stalled out and became stuck in the road. Without thinking I pulled over got out in the rain and started pushing the truck. I pushed him to the near gas station and then without a word got back into my jeep and continued on my way. Helping the man was nothing of a huge effort and is really not what is crucial to such a story.

What is worth note is when I saw the man in trouble there was no deliberation or thought in my head. I saw a need and met it. True servitude is both thoughtful and mindless. If any of my readers know me, they will be shocked that I am claiming in any sense that it is good to be mindless, but allow me to continue. Thoughtful servitude makes sense. We should be intentional in how we serve and help others and even in some situations plan on how to help and serve. When I say mindless, I mean we should act in all situations as a servant. Our servitude should not come down to deliberation. We should see a need and then meet that need.

Of course this does come with caution. For example, if your friend asks for money and you give it to him and he spends that money getting booze so he can get drunk. If he asks you for money again, you should not mindlessly hand the money over, but rather realize the greater act of servitude would be to not pay for him to sin against God. Therefore, servitude is both thoughtful and mindless. If these are separated servitude becomes less powerful.

I challenge you be a servant today, use your mind to be intentional in your actions, but be mindless in your deliberation to help! Take care, and God bless!

Originally posted by IBD Vice President Matt Coombe on mjcoombe.com

In the mist of my morning studies as I was reading a book concerning the resurrection of Christ I realized how Christian view of Christ (and more importantly Christ himself) has not waivered for 2,000 years. The early followers of the resurrected Christ were put to death and tortured because they would not cry “Caesar is LORD” but rather maintain, “Jesus is LORD.” For the initial 250 years of Christianity two things were certain, the Christians would not think of Christ as anything else other then God, and they were willing to die for this belief.

Some early disputes arose concerning the deity of Christ and the bodily resurrection of Him among early believers but they were quickly refuted by eye witness accounts. As latter disputes arose, once the eye witnesses were dead, the apostolic fathers (the disciples of the disciples) were likewise easily able to refute claims that Jesus was not God.

For the most part, views concerning Christ were in no way refuted with any source of evidence until the turn of the 18th century when German Higher criticism arouse.  I am not going to respond to this now, because I don’t have space though, I do have a lecture on the subject on www.sermonaudio.com. From this, people had a new criticism, Jesus was not who He claimed to be. This view was met with a barrage of responses, but none better the simplistic response of the logician C.S Lewis, who singled the argument to, Jesus was either a liar, a lunatic, or LORD. The attacks on Jesus ceased.

The attacks moved from Jesus to the people that wrote about Him, the apostles. They had turned him into an unwilling icon of their religious revolution. Jesus never claimed to be God. So the responses turned to the apostles as well, “if the first 250 years were marked by disciples for dying for the refusal of calling Christ anything other then God, then the question remains, ‘do people die for what they know to be a lie.”

Running out of cards to play, the criticisms returned to Jesus, “He never really existed.” By far the most laughable of all the claims, because there is neither any evidence to support this and not one scholar who is dedicated to first century history holds to it.
Attacks have come and gone for the last 2,000 years and the Christian response has yet to change, “Jesus is LORD.” And we back this up not with a fist but with words. We eagerly anticipate the next objection so that we can refute that as well!

With his second class at the 2009 AWANA conference in Everett, WA, Dr. Fernandes takes on the great villains of his latest book: Christopher Hitchens and Richard Dawkins.  Their angry and belittling attacks on religion (and Christianity especially) are designed to demoralize religious people and break their faith. In fact, he would like to prevent people from speaking the name of Christ through intimidation alone.

Good new. He will fail. Here’s the video.

Speaking at an AWANA conference in Everett, WA, Dr. Fernandes defends the true Jesus of history and the veracity of the Bible. Misguided scholars, such as author Bart Ehrman, use well-known New Testament manuscript variants and controvertial verses as an excuse to reject all biblical texts. This is the New Skepticism.  True to the motto of the institute, Dr. Fernandes upholds and defends the Christian faith with solid facts, humoruos anecdotes and common sense.

For those of you who enjoy the “Christian World View”, this is one you won’t want to miss. Here Matt Coombe and Dr. Fernandes discuss information I’ve been waiting to hear for quite a while. Bert Ehrman is in view here and the dynamic apologetic duo offer a solid apologetic response to his near atheistic hyper-skepticism. The scriptures of God are defended against those who would bring their accuracy into doubt and the historicity of the Jesus of the Bible is given a solid base in fact. Listen, enjoy, learn.

And now for the long awaited return of Matt Coombe, the vice president of the institute of Biblical Defense, to the teaching podium. In the short talk, Mr. Coombe confronts the “faith” vs “evidence” schools of thought in the Christian community. Does your belief in God, Jesus and the Bible stand on faith, facts, reason or some combination of these.

Listen as Matt gives us his opinion and the biblical reasons for his personal stand.

Here’s the full video of the sermon from August 30, 2009. It’s the second half of the sermon entitled “Assurance of Salvation“. Dr. Fernandes defends a sound and biblical doctrine of salvation that successfully overcomes the Calvinism versus Arminisnism divide. You have questions? We have answers!

I don’t usually recommend concerts, especially in this format. However, as a long time fan of Josiah James, I know his heart is in the ministry as well as his music. His songs are glorifying to the Lord and for those of you who attend Trinity Bible Fellowship, Josiah is someone you will enjoy.

He’ll be performing at “Faith Fellowship Church” in Silverdale, WA on September 22 at 7:30pm. It’s only $5 at the door and I’m certain you’ll have fun.

Don’t believe me? Do your own research. Check out his myspace page.

Watch him online below in the YouTube playlist. I filmed these videos myself! I recommend you go. His songs include worship. praise and a few testimony songs about people from his youth group, including blinded (about a girl who committed suicide).

Just to let you know, I’ll be there, so I look forward to meeting everyone who will join me!

Blessings in Christ and enjoy the videos.

Many atheists love attacking the Old Testament. This is especially true when God ordered the slaying of nations. Using the Israelites as the agents of divine judgement seems to strike a negative chord with many of those who object to Christianity. This gives them the opportunity to call the God of the Old Testament “evil”.

Dr. Fernandes and IBD vice president Matthew J. Coombe confront these objections with solid biblical understanding and scripture. If you’ve ever had this objection raised and wanted an answer, here they are: