Domenic Marbaniang

Published in the Souvenir of Central India Theological Seminary of October 2005. Pilate saith unto him, What is truth? (John 18:38) It is interesting to note that the only instance where Christ ever met Pilate in recounted history was at His trial. The ensuing dialogue between both of them is intriguing. It heavily concentrates on the urgency of Truth in a world mismanaged by humans. The trial of Christ at Jerusalem reminds us of the trial of Socrates at Athens. Tertullian might have been too quick to retort “What indeed has Athens to do with Jerusalem?” The unjust sentence of Socrates explicitly points out the fact that the greatest problem with humanity is not that it has not known the truth but that, to the contrary, having understood the ramifications of truth it has suppressed it and chosen to put an end to any voice that speaks on behalf of it. Weren’t there at least 80, of the earlier 220 who voted Socrates as innocent, who also later voted for his death penalty? Trut...

Excerpted from Epistemics of Divine Reality (2009, 2011) In his paper Reason and Reliance: Adjusted Prospects for Natural Theology (1990) , [1] James Ross defines ‘Cognitive Voluntarism’ as the view that ‘humans, for  the  most  part,  believe  not because they  are  compelled  by  the  evidence,  but  because  they  want  to  (sometimes  even   being  compelled by wants operating as “convictors”) because assenting appears to advance their ‘apprehended good”.’ Cognitive voluntarism is seen as our willing reliance upon people, feelings and outcomes, directed to our own fulfillment. According to Ross, it has reemerged as a basis for rational certainty, not only in empirical cognition generally, but in the most important commitments of our lives. Ross begins by saying that rational certainty about God is more plausible than was believed in the fifties. The fact is that, the notion of what constitutes rational certainty is now better understood. The most important achievement, however...

Incident 1: Place – Makhu, Punjab In 1994, Pastor Surinder of Makhu, a genuine man of God whose life and ministry I personally witnessed, told us an incident from his life. He had the practice of kneeling by a chair and praying every morning or during any part of the day when he got any free time. There were two chairs there besides a bed in that single room where he and his family lived. And, because they didn’t have any church building then, people would bring the sick and demon-oppressed for prayers there. On Sundays, they would pull up a tent for the 600-800 people who joined the services. Once, Pastor Surinder was on a mission trip. His mom was sleeping on the bed at night. Sometime during the night, she awoke and was terrified by what she saw. She saw two persons kneeling by those chairs that were at the foot of the bed. When they saw her terrified, they rose up and came to her and asked why she was so afraid. They said that they come here to pray because her son used...

http://www.desiringgod.org/messages/ toward-the-tithe-and-beyond John Piper presents 7 Biblical reasons for tithing in  this article . Quite contrary to the  teaching of John MacArthur  that Christians don’t need to tithe since they pay taxes to the government, Piper sees tithing as vital to a Christian’s being part of the Kingdom work. Tithing is also an antidote against covetousness, he says. Piper’s 7 Reasons reminded me of  David Jeremiah’s 7 Reasons  for tithing. Clearly, again contrary to what MacArthur teaches, Jesus made a distinction between what belongs to Caesar and what belongs to God. The book of Malachi that encouraged tithing against robbery of it so that there would be food in the house of God was not written to people in the theocratic times before the monarchy. Clearly tithing is not tax-paying. Piper’s article and appeal is a needed one in an age when Mammon tries to steal the true and total devotion that only belongs to Christ. Piper’s illus...

Scientism  – The principle that only scientifically verifiable statements are true is itself not scientifically verifiable. Skepticism  – The statement that truth cannot be known is itself a statement considered to be true, which by its own verdict cannot be known. Logical Positivism  – The principle that only empirically verifiable statements can be true is itself not empirically verifiable. Kantian Phenomenalism  – If  causality  is just an  a priori  mental category imposed on sense data, then the whole enterprise of trying to account for what  causes  the experience of phenomena becomes self-defeating. Relativism - The statement "Only relative truths exist" poses as absolute truth, which is self-defeating. Subjectivism - The statement that we cannot know the objective world is itself an objective claim. Religious Pluralism - The view that all religions are fundamentally the same is itself an exclusivis...