Hello! My name is Elder Wells

My son, Philip, and I are getting ready (girding our loins, so to speak) for a new project. We don't know what to call it yet, but it's inspired by the Mormon missionaries and Jehovah's Witnesses.

We're going door to door with the Skeptic's Annotated Bible.

It'll be something like this:



Or this:



Just kidding.

We'll probably start off with something like this: "The Bible is an important book. You should know what is in it. We're here to help with that."

Most Bible believers believe in the Bible because they don't know what's in it. Most non-believers don't know what's in it either, that's why they're so easy for believers to convert. The cure in both cases is knowledge about the Bible. Those who know what is in the Bible are unlikely to believe in it.

So we're getting ready. Deciding whether to wear the white shirt and black tie of the Mormon missionaries or the more colorful attire of the Jehovah's Witnesses. Name tag or no name tag? Elder, Brother, or Infidel?. And what should we call ourselves?

Let us know if you have any ideas about this. Or if you'd like to join us. (We'll provide a free SAB book for you to use.)

It'll be lots of fun!

Mother's Day: A few good examples from the Bible

Last year, I posted some Bible verses for Mother's Day.

I thought this year I'd try to find a few good examples from the Bible. Here's what I could find.
(Taken from my Good People in the Bible post.)

Hagar
At Sarah and God's insistence, Abraham sent Hagar and their son Ishmael into the desert. When Ishmael was about to die, Hagar left him under a bush and cried because she couldn't bear to see him die. 

And the water was spent in the bottle, and she cast the child under one of the shrubs. And she went, and sat her down over against him a good way off, as it were a bow shot: for she said, Let me not see the death of the child. And she sat over against him, and lift up her voice, and wept. Genesis 21:15-16

Later, of course, an angel came to save Ishmael. (Angels always come to save Abraham's sons before he kills them or after he abandons them - as he was asked to do by God).  She raised Ishmael by herself, becoming the patron saint of single moms.

Rizpah
To appease God and end a famine that was caused by his predecessor (Saul), David agrees to have two of Saul's sons and five of his grandsons killed and hung up "unto the Lord."

There was a famine in the days of David three years, year after year; and David enquired of the LORD. And the LORD answered, It is for Saul, and for his bloody house, because he slew the Gibeonites. ...
Wherefore David said unto the Gibeonites, What shall I do for you? and wherewith shall I make the atonement. ...
And they answered the king ... Let seven men of his sons be delivered unto us, and we will hang them up unto the LORD. 2 Samuel 21:1-6

So David rounded up and delivered two sons of Rizpah, Saul's concubine, and five sons of his daughter Michal, and they hung them up before the Lord.

The king took the two sons of Rizpah ... whom she bare unto Saul ... and the five sons of Michal ... And he delivered them into the hands of the Gibeonites, and they hanged them in the hill before the LORD: and they fell all seven together, and were put to death. 2 Samuel 21:8-9

Rizpah stayed with her dead sons, chasing the birds away in the daytime and animals away at night.

And Rizpah the daughter of Aiah took sackcloth, and spread it for her upon the rock, from the beginning of harvest until water dropped upon them out of heaven, and suffered neither the birds of the air to rest on them by day, nor the beasts of the field by night. 2 Samuel 21:10

And God stopped the famine after Saul's two sons and five grandsons were killed and hung up for him.

They gathered the bones of them that were hanged ... And after that God was intreated for the land 2 Samuel 21:13-14

Jeroboam's wife
Jeroboam's wife (the Bible doesn't bother giving her a name) was worried about her sick son. So she went to see the blind prophet Ahijah to see if he could help.

Jeroboam's wife ... arose, and went to Shiloh, and came to the house of Ahijah. 1 Kings 14:4

When she arrived, Ahijah had a message from God regarding her son.

Bhold, I will bring evil upon the house of Jeroboam, and will cut off from Jeroboam him that pisseth against the wall, and him that is shut up and left in Israel, and will take away the remnant of the house of Jeroboam, as a man taketh away dung, till it be all gone. 1 Kings 14:10

Which wasn't particularly good news to Jeroboam's wife, since her sick son had pissed on a few walls here and there.
But it got worse as the prophet elaborated a bit.

Him that dieth of Jeroboam in the city shall the dogs eat; and him that dieth in the field shall the fowls of the air eat: for the LORD hath spoken it. 1 Kings 14:11

So God was going to kill all of the male descendants of Jeroboam, strew their dead bodies on the ground like dung, and use them for dog and bird food.
Oh and her son? He would be dead by the time she got home.

Arise thou therefore, get thee to thine own house: and when thy feet enter into the city, the child shall die. 1 Kings 14:12

After hearing the words of God from his prophet Ahijah, Jeroboam's wife returned home. And, sure enough, God killed her sick little boy the moment she entered his room.

And Jeroboam's wife arose, and departed, and came to Tirzah: and when she came to the threshold of the door, the child died; 1 Kings 14:17

When should you kill a prophet?

As I mentioned in my previous post, a couple of Jehovah's Witnesses came to my door on Saturday, and, after listening to their chosen verse, I asked them to read Deuteronomy 13:6-10. The young man who read the passage had apparently never read it before, so he decided to read the previous verses in the chapter to get some context.

(Context is the believer's first line of defense when defending the indefensible in the Bible.  It rarely works; context nearly always makes it worse.)

Here are the first five verses in Deuteronomy 13 from the Watchtower's New World Translation. (Does anyone know why the JW's use allcaps for "you" or "your" in this passage?)

In case a prophet or a dreamer of a dream arises in your midst and does give you a sign or a portent, and the sign or the portent does come true of which he spoke to you, saying, ‘Let us walk after other gods, whom you have not known, and let us serve them,’ you must not listen to the words of that prophet or to the dreamer of that dream, because Jehovah ​YOUR​ God is testing ​YOU​ to know whether ​YOU​ are loving Jehovah ​YOUR​ God with all ​YOUR​ heart and all ​YOUR​ soul. ... And that prophet or that dreamer of the dream should be put to death, because he has spoken of revolt against Jehovah ​YOUR​ God ... and you must clear out what is evil from your midst.

When he got to the part that said "and the sign or the portent does come true" I asked him to repeat it, since I expected the verse to say "and the sign or the portent does not come true." But no, he read the verse correctly. God commands us to kill prophets that correctly prophesy future events! He is testing us by sending true prophets from false religions. Or something like that.

Which seemed strange to me, strange even for the Bible.

So I checked to see what the Bible says about false prophets. It's covered a few chapters later in Deuteronomy.

However, the prophet who presumes to speak in my name a word that I have not commanded him to speak or who speaks in the name of other gods, that prophet must die. And in case you should say in your heart: “How shall we know the word that Jehovah has not spoken?” when the prophet speaks in the name of Jehovah and the word does not occur or come true, that is the word that Jehovah did not speak. With presumptuousness the prophet spoke it. You must not get frightened at him. Deuteronomy 18:20-22 (NWT)

Which means you must kill prophets that falsely predict future events. (Like the Jehovah's Witnesses)

So to sum up.

God commands us to kill prophets who either correctly predict the future in the name of a false god or who incorrectly predict the future in the name of a true god.

I guess we can let live false prophets of false gods and true prophets of true gods. Unless someone knows of a scripture that says otherwise, that is.

This prophet-killing business can get so confusing sometimes. How do believers keep it all straight?

So the Jehovah's Witnesses came to my door this morning...

They started by saying they'd like to share a few verses from the Bible with me.

I said, "Sure, go ahead."

So one of them started reading this passage:

Beloved ones, let us continue loving one another, because love is from God, and everyone who loves has been born from God and gains the knowledge of God. He that does not love has not come to know God, because God is love. (1 John 4:7-8, NWT)

I listened politely and then I asked, "Would you mind reading another passage for me?"

He said, "Sure, which one?"

"Deuteronomy 13, verses 6 through 10."

So he read it in his New World Translation.

In case your brother, the son of your mother, or your son or your daughter or your cherished wife or your companion who is like your own soul, should try to allure you in secrecy, saying, ‘Let us go and serve other gods,’ whom you have not known, neither you nor your forefathers, some of the gods of the peoples who are all around ​you, the ones near you or those far away from you, from one end of the land to the other end of the land, you must not accede to his wish or listen to him, nor should your eye feel sorry for him, nor must you feel compassion, nor cover him [protectively]; but you should kill him without fail. Your hand first of all should come upon him to put him to death, and the hand of all the people afterward. And you must stone him with stones, and he must die.

I asked him to explain how a God of love could have inspired that passage. Would a God of love command a man to stone to death his brother, son, daughter, wife, or friend for suggesting that he should worship another god?

He said he'd never thought about it before, but he'd get back to me.

I'll let you know if he does.

Sold Out---but more on the way!

Thanks to everyone who ordered a hardcover Skeptic's Annotated Bible!

We just sold our last copy yesterday, and now are accepting Pre-orders for the next printing, which is due to arrive in early July.

A few typos have been corrected (Thanks to everyone who sent them in) and 16 blank pages for notes have been added to the back of the book. There are a few slight improvements in the book, but mainly we were in a hurry to get it to press.