Andrew Rappaport's Daily Rapp Report

Jesus Never Rose from the Dead

October 25, 2019 12:00 - 938 KB

Rapp Report Daily 0430 Jesus Never Rose from the Dead Many make the claim that Jesus Christ never rose from the dead. This is an essential argument because if Jesus never rose from the dead then we would be dead in our sins. This is an argument that Paul makes and you end up seeing in 1 Corinthians 15 that if Christ did not rose from dead then Christians are the most pitied. So this is. A key element of Christianity, in fact, all of Christianity hinges on this. So what many will say is outsid...

Jesus Never Existed

October 24, 2019 12:00 - 938 KB

Rapp Report Daily 0429 Jesus Never Existed A common argument that we hear only in the last say 40 years is the argument that Jesus never actually existed. He was just a myth. Something that the gospel writers embellished. People later on in the Catholic Church made up. Whatever the arguments they try to claim to say that Jesus was never actually a historical figure. This is something that, well, it would be laughable, if we didn’t have to respond to even Bart Ehrman, who is not a Christian an...

How Can Christ’s Death Pay for Someone’s Sin?

October 23, 2019 12:00 - 938 KB

Rapp Report Daily 0428 How Can Christ's Death Pay for Someone's Sin? Sometimes people will challenge you with a question of how can one person's death pay the price of another person's crime or sin. In other words, how can Christ's death on the cross be a payment for the sin that you and I do when we break God's law where criminals. Yet we end up seeing in scripture, in 2 Corinthians. 5:21 says, "for our sake he made him to be sin who knew no sin, so that we might become the righteousness of ...

Did Jesus Know He was God?

October 22, 2019 13:44 - 938 KB

Rapp Report Daily 0427 Did Jesus Know He was God? Did Jesus know that he was God incarnate? The claim that people try to make his somehow Jesus became a man and He stopped being God. As if when He became incarnate, He lost those attributes that make Him deity like omniscience. Well, the simple answer is no. Throughout the gospels, we see over and over and over again that Jesus can read people's minds. You can look at Matthew chapter 9. The Pharisee says when He says your sins are forgiven, th...

Jesus was Just a Good Teacher

October 21, 2019 12:00 - 938 KB

Rapp Report Daily 0426 Jesus was Just a Good Teacher Jesus was just a good teacher. Well, this is a common claim, especially from Jewish people. Jews will try to say that Jesus was only a good teacher. Now that argument actually does not work. When you say Jesus Christ was good. You are going to have to define how because what we see is that Jesus Christ throughout the gospels clearly claimed that he was God. He said He is the I am. He said that the Father and He are one in essence. He took o...

Is Jesus Just One of Many Great Men of History

October 18, 2019 12:00 - 938 KB

Rapp Report Daily 0425 Is Jesus Just One of Many Great Men of History Is Jesus just one of many great men in history? Well, you can never say that about Jesus because Jesus was more than just a man. Jesus made it very clear. He is God. John chapter 8:58, "Jesus said to them truly, truly I say to you before Abraham was I am." That is the very name for God. He claimed to be God. What do the Jews do? They pick up stones to stone Him. In John chapter 10, we end up seeing he says in verse 30 "I...

Who Is Jesus?

October 17, 2019 12:00 - 938 KB

Rapp Report Daily 0424 Who Is Jesus? Who is Jesus? Well, he is truly God and truly man. He is God Almighty, Eternal. He has all the attributes that God has. He became a man in flesh and had all the attributes of a man as well. Now the difference with Him is that he was tempted and never sinned. But I like how Paul provides an answer to this in Colossians 1:15-19. He states that Jesus is the image of the invisible God. Jesus is the firstborn of all creation. Jesus created everything that was...

What Does it Mean that God is the Creator?

October 16, 2019 12:00 - 938 KB

Rapp Report Daily 0423 What Does it Mean that God is the Creator? When people say that God is the Creator. What does it mean? Well, quite simply it means that God is the Creator. It means that God created everything that was created. We see this starting in Genesis chapter one where in the beginning God created the heavens and the Earth, so he created everything that was first created. We see this more prevalently in Colossians, 1:15-23 where it states of Jesus Christ for by him all things we...

Is It Biblical to Refer to God as Mother?

October 15, 2019 12:00 - 938 KB

Rapp Report Daily 0422 Is It Biblical to Refer to God as Mother? There are many people who are having real issues with what the Bible says because God is referred to in a masculine sense. Now what you see is people want to know is it biblical to refer to God as God the mother or to refer to God in female gender. The simple answer is no it is not biblical. Now for many of the people who want to argue that we should be open-minded and allow God to be referred to with the feminine gender. Well,...

Is It Wrong to be Angry with God?

October 14, 2019 12:00 - 938 KB

Rapp Report Daily 0421 Is It Wrong to be Angry with God? Is it wrong to be angry with God? Well, the simple answer is no. It is never right to be angry with God because it shows that we do not understand our place and His place. He is the creator, the Sovereign, the Ruler of the universe, God! Therefore, we are not in a position where we can hold things over Him or have a rightful place to be making demands of him. Therefore, yes, anger with God would be a sin. However, does it mean that we...

What is the Difference Between LORD and Lord?

October 11, 2019 12:00 - 938 KB

Rapp Report Daily 0420 What is the Difference Between LORD and Lord? In some translations of the Bible people ask the question, what is the difference between LORD or GOD versus Lord or God? There are these different spellings in several of the more literal or formal translations of the Bible your King James, New King James, ESV, New American Standard, and others. When we look at them There is a significance in that in the Old Testament and it helps us to understand which of the three names ...

What Does It Mean to Find God?

October 10, 2019 12:00 - 938 KB

Rapp Report Daily 0419 What Does It Mean to Find God? You ever hear people speak about "finding God". Always kind of wondered what that. Is He lost? No, it is not God who has lost its us who is lost. But what does it mean when people say they "found God"? Kind of interesting because when we look at our culture they talk about a "come to Jesus moment" a time where life radically changes for people. I remember I had to do an interview for someone who was getting a clearance. And so the investig...

Why Did God Allow The Holocaust?

October 09, 2019 14:48 - 938 KB

Rapp Report Daily 0418 Why Did God Allow The Holocaust? Many challenge Christians with the question of why did God allow the Holocaust? Now, you always have to go back to the premise when people make arguments. What you see here is the premise that somehow if God exists, he could not allow for something like the Holocaust. The Holocaust is evil, in the postmodern thinking they really don't have a category for such an evil, but they try to say that. God cannot exist because the Holocaust happe...

God is Imaginary

October 08, 2019 21:14 - 938 KB

Rapp Report Daily 0417 God is Imaginary The claim is often made that God is just an imagination of our minds or sometimes. They will say He is just a fairytale and really is that a legitimate argument? Well, not really because first off we must remember that people are not treating him like Santa Claus or the Easter Bunny things we know are imaginary or the Flying Spaghetti Monster, which we know is imaginary. No people realize that God is necessary. Because we have a world that was created c...

Why Won’t God Heal Amputees?

October 07, 2019 14:00 - 938 KB

Rapp Report Daily 0416 Why Won't God Heal Amputees? Now when you think about this challenge, this challenge has within it a presupposition that somehow God is obligated to heal everybody especially amputees. Now, the simple reality is that God allowed sin into the world for purposes that he felt would allow him to show his attributes. We have dealt with that on previous podcasts and the fact that he had has done this does not mean that somehow He is not a God of love or anything else the real...

God is No Different Than the Flying Spaghetti Monster.

October 04, 2019 12:59 - 938 KB

Rapp Report Daily 0415 God is No Different Than the Flying Spaghetti Monster. How is a belief in God any different than a belief in the Flying Spaghetti Monster? That's right. There are people who try to argue for the Flying Spaghetti Monster. They call that the deity of the Church of the Flying Spaghetti Monster or Pastafarian. The reality is they think that this is a legitimate argument because they created something. The first we see of the Flying Spaghetti Monster was first described in a...

What is the Key to Knowing God?

October 03, 2019 12:00 - 938 KB

Rapp Report Daily 0414 What is the Key to Knowing God? What is the key to knowing god well? This may be a question that is more influenced because of the charismatic movement in Christianity. The simple answer really is to read your Bible, but the charismatic movement has made it as if that is just not enough. As if Scripture is not sufficient to really knowing God. We must have some sort of experience and that experience, of course, has to always be outdone by the next experience there for t...

What is God’s Will?

October 02, 2019 16:12 - 938 KB

Rapp Report Daily 0413 What is God's Will? A lot of people seem to think that somehow God has this hidden will that we have to spend our entire life trying to find is if he's got one plan for everything to work in the universe. Who is the right person for me to marry? Where is the right place for me to work or go to school and is if you choose the wrong thing, you are outside of God's will well that be a tragic thing when it comes to things like marriage because you cannot change that. Once y...

What Was God Doing Before he Created the Universe?

October 01, 2019 19:12 - 938 KB

Rapp Report Daily 0412 What Was God Doing Before he Created the Universe? What was God doing before he created the universe? Well, this question is a little bit of a logical fallacy. This is a fallacy called a category error. So the reason this is is that this question itself ignores the very nature and attributes of God. When we ask the question, what was God doing before? Well, it has that word before in it. And therefore that is a time-based question. Now God is eternal. He had no beginnin...

Why Does God Allow Nature Disasters?

September 30, 2019 15:27 - 938 KB

Rapp Report Daily 0411 Why Does God Allow Nature Disasters? Why does God allow natural disasters like hurricanes, earthquakes, and tsunamis? I always find it interesting that people want to blame God. When there are natural disasters, what do insurance companies call it? They call it an "act of God". That is right. They blame God for things like that, but you never hear them crediting God when things happen that are good in the world. No, you end up seeing that the world wants to blame God fo...

Does God Still Speak Today?

September 27, 2019 12:21 - 938 KB

Rapp Report Daily 0410 Does God Still Speak Today? One common thing that we end up hearing is the question, Does God still speak today? Now, this is more common, because of the charismatic movement and charismatic churches, where you are going to see this kind of thinking more prevalent where they believe that God should still speak to us audibly today the way that He did to the apostles and the prophets. Well, there is a distinction that we see in the time period of the prophets, the apostle...

Does God Tempt People to Sin?

September 26, 2019 12:10 - 938 KB

Rapp Report Daily 0409 Does God Tempt People to Sin? Some like to try to argue that God tempts us to sin. Now one example that is sometimes given is the account out of Genesis chapter 22. This is the account of Abraham being asked to offer Isaac as a sacrifice. And the argument basically goes that somehow God is tempting Abraham to sin to kill his own son as a sacrifice. Human sacrifice would be a sin. God is asking him to do that. Therefore, He must be tempting him to sin. A couple of things...

Does God Make Mistakes?

September 25, 2019 15:10 - 938 KB

Rapp Report Daily 0408 Does God Make Mistakes? Does God make mistakes? Well, this is a question that many will ask because of us. The problem they have is basically to think that God is like us. Let us first think about what a mistake is. Mistakes are a result of the fall. A mistake is when you do something that is wrong. So what are they really asking is, Can God do anything that is wrong? But once you say something is wrong, you then have to ask, what is the standard, you have to go back to...

You Believe in God but not Santa Clause

September 24, 2019 16:13 - 938 KB

Rapp Report Daily 0407 You Believe in God but not Santa Clause Some professing atheists like to argue, why do you believe in Jesus or God, but you do not believe in Santa Claus or the Easter Bunny? This is a logical fallacy because what they are trying to do is attribute God and Jesus equal with Santa Claus and the Easter Bunny. Jesus actually walked the earth and we have lots of historical evidence for that. So we know He is a real person. We know that the claims of Him are documented very ...

What is YHWH?

September 23, 2019 13:12 - 938 KB

Rapp Report Daily 0406 What is YHWH? What is YHWH? We sometimes see that people refer to this and sometimes it is referred to as Jehovah. This is what is this is known as the Tetragrammaton, from the Greek, "tetra" meaning four and "grammaton" means letters thus the compound is "four letters". Now, they could be YHWH, or since there is no 'y' in the Hebrew it would actually be JHVH. So there you end up seeing why people say Jehovah. Some people pronounce this as Yahweh because they are lookin...

Where was God on Sept 11th?

September 20, 2019 14:00 - 938 KB

Rapp Report Daily 0405 Where was God on Sept 11th? For about 18 years now we have heard the question, where was God On September 11th? Well, God was right where He always is, in control of everything. Now, the thing that people have to realize is that just because God's in control of everything does not mean He is going to rule everything the way people want it ruled. In other words, what we often find is that people think that God should do things the way they think He should do things. Now,...

The Names of God Reveal His Character

September 19, 2019 13:33 - 938 KB

Rapp Report Daily 0404 The Names of God Reveal His Character So we wanted to continue from looking at the major names and look at some of the names of God and in doing so, we are going to start with those that are from the name El or Elohim. First is El Elyon, this is the idea that God is the most high God that shows that characteristic of Him. We also will El Shaddai, has the idea of the God who provides We have El Oman, which is the everlasting God. El Rio, which is the God who sees. Jehova...

What Are the Major Names for God?

September 18, 2019 15:00 - 938 KB

Rapp Report Daily 0403 What Are the Major Names for God? What are the names of God? Well, there are several names of God that describe the character of God, there are three main categories that we could put them in El or Elohim, Adonai, and what is called Yahweh or Jehovah. I am going to deal with these three here and then get in some of the other names for God, in another post. Elohim is a plural name of El, it means strong one or almighty and it refers to God's Majesty. This name is one tha...

What Does it Mean to Have a Free Will?

September 17, 2019 05:37 - 938 KB

Rapp Report Daily 0402 What Does it Mean to Have a Free Will? What does it mean to have a free will? The fact that God gives us a free will is something that is assumed by many? Is it really free? Well actually no. When we talk about a free will we must deal with this in very specific points. There is two words here free, and will. The idea of free has the idea that we have this will being described as unencumbered by any outside influences. The idea of a will is a volition, the ability to ch...

Does God Love Everyone?

September 16, 2019 14:00 - 938 KB

Rapp Report Daily 0401 Does God Love Everyone? Does God love everyone or just Christians? Now, this is a challenge that really has come up in recent decades because of a gospel tract. There was a gospel tract that was written: "God Loves You and Has a Wonderful Plan for Your Life". That is a false idea. If you think about it, what is the wonderful plan that God has for the unbeliever? Hell? That does not sound so wonderful? What are they going to have a wonderful life on Earth? Not always. Go...

Why Does God not End Evil?

September 13, 2019 14:00 - 938 KB

Rapp Report Daily 0400 Why Does God not End Evil? If God is a God of love, why has he not dealt with ending evil? This is a challenge, we often hear that somehow His love is in opposition to dealing with evil. This is a commonly made argument. However, this is a limited argument when you think about the fact that God is greater than just one or even two of His attributes. He is all of His attributes. So when we think of who God is, is God love? Yes. Is God. Holy? Yes. Is God just? Yes. Is God...

Can Demons Repent?

September 12, 2019 14:00 - 938 KB

Rapp Report Daily 0399 Can Demons Repent? Will God allow fallen angels and Satan to repent? Now, this particular one is a more difficult type of challenge to answer for one simple reason. We do not have a lot of Scripture that goes into detail about angels, both holy and unholy. So what do we know? We do know there was a group of angels that were created. We do not even know which day they were created completely, but we know they must have been early enough because Scripture says that the an...

Did God Create Satan?

September 11, 2019 14:00 - 938 KB

Rapp Report Daily 0398 Did God Create Satan? If God created everything does that mean He created the devil? Well, the simple answer is, yes. God created Lucifer, also known as Satan. The question is, did He create him, sinful? No, he did not. He created Lucifer with an ability to make a decision and Lucifer chose to disobey God and actually wanted to make himself God. That is what caused him to fall. He then tried to use that same ploy on Adam and Eve and brought sin into mankind. So the issu...

Why Did God Need to Rest on the 7th Day?

September 10, 2019 14:00 - 938 KB

Rapp Report Daily 0397 Why Did God Need to Rest on the 7th Day? Why did God need to rest on the seventh day of creation? This is a challenge we sometimes get.and yet this challenge is a little bit of a problem. The reason being is, well, it is a logical fallacy. It expects the answer that God had to somehow do something that God had to rest, but He did not actually have to. The reality is when we talk about God creating the entire universe out of absolutely nothing, not like the nothing that ...

Does Prayer Change God’s Mind?

September 09, 2019 14:00 - 938 KB

Rapp Report Daily 0396 Does Prayer Change God's Mind? Can we change God's mind with prayer? Now the first question we have to ask and this is, can we actually change God's mind, period? Let us first address that because there are two passages of Scripture that people try to use to say that God changes His mind. One is Genesis 6:6 this is where "the Lord regretted that he made man on the earth, and it grieved him to his heart". That sounds like he has regret, and a change of heart and wishes h...

Does God Cause Man to Sin?

September 06, 2019 14:00 - 938 KB

Rapp Report Daily 0395 Does God Cause Man to Sin? If God is in control of all things, does that mean that He makes people sin? This is an idea that many people challenges with because the thinking is that somehow if God is sovereign, in other words, the belief that God is in control every atom in the universe, then He must cause everything to happen. That is not true. In fact, we have a doctrine called the doctrine of concurrence, which basically teaches that God can use even sinful acts to b...

Why Doesn’t God Destroy Satan?

September 05, 2019 14:00 - 938 KB

Rapp Report Daily 0394 Why Doesn't God Destroy Satan? The argument goes like this if God is all-powerful, why doesn't He destroy Satan? Now there is an assumption in that question and challenge that we have to recognize right off the bat. That is that somehow Satan is not fulfilling the purposes of God. Now, in the last episode that we talked about Satan and why God created him, We looked at Romans chapter nine, specifically in verse 22, which states that God to display His wrath allowed sin,...

Why Did God Create Satan?

September 04, 2019 17:17 - 938 KB

Rapp Report Daily 0393 Why Did God Create Satan? If God is all-knowing, why did he create Satan, who He knew would fall? Now this challenge can actually be extended to why did Adam and Eve fall if God knows everything? In other words, He is omniscient, then why did He do such a thing? This is hard for us to understand as humans, but Scripture does provide an answer for us. This can be found in Romans 9:14-23, especially verses 9:17 and 9:22. Paul talks about the injustice of God. Is there inj...

Can God Make a Rock so Big He Can’t Lift It?

September 03, 2019 14:00 - 938 KB

Rapp Report Daily 0392 Can God Make a Rock so Big He Can't Lift It? This is some of the arguments some people try to make as if they think this is a real good logical proof that God cannot exist. They asked questions like, can God make a rock so big He cannot lift it? Or could God get lost? Or different things like this. And although a lot of people think it is a really great argument, it shows a lack of understanding of things like logic, because what this is, is a logical fallacy known as a...

Join SFE and Justin Peters in Israel

September 02, 2019 14:00 - 938 KB

Rapp Report Daily 0391 Join Striving for Eternity and Justin Peters in Israel 2021IsraelTrip.com This podcast is a ministry of Striving for Eternity and all our resources strivingforeternity.org Listen to other podcasts on the Christian Podcast Community: ChristianPodcastCommunity.org Support Striving for Eternity at http://StrivingForEternity.org/donate Please review us on iTunes http://itunes.apple.com/us/podcast/rapp-report/id1353293537 Give us your feedback, email us info@StrivingFor...

Why Can’t God Just Forgive Sin?

August 30, 2019 14:00 - 938 KB

Rapp Report Daily 0390 Why Can't God Just Forgive Sin? Why does not God just forgive people instead of requiring there be a payment for sins? Not to sound insulting, but it sounds like something every child would say when they are caught doing something wrong, "why can you not just forgive me and let it go?" And people say there should be no consequences for their actions? Yes, that is exactly how it sounds like a little child trying to get his way from his parents when he was caught doing so...

If Suicide is Wrong then Why did Jesus do it?

August 29, 2019 14:00 - 938 KB

Rapp Report Daily 0389 If Suicide is Wrong then Why did Jesus do it? If suicide is wrong, then why did God commit cosmic suicide? This is an argument some of the new atheists try to make as if Jesus Christ, taking His own life on the cross is an attempt of suicide. That might be if it was that Jesus was created in the image of God and not actually, God. What you end up seeing here is a category error on what suicide actually is, and why it is wrong. The reason that suicide is wrong is that it...

Why did God Need To Die to Save People?

August 28, 2019 14:00 - 938 KB

Rapp Report Daily 0388 Why did God Need To Die to Save People? Why would God Need to die in order to save people for Himself? Now this argument that we hear from people is one that is lacking in understanding of how wicked sin actually is and the consequence that sin actually brings. The fact that God has to die, should tell us that sin is such a wicked thing, and so evil. This is the extreme that ends up happening, that God Himself is the only sacrifice that could be made. Now, why is that? ...

God Says not to Kill but He Kills

August 27, 2019 14:00 - 938 KB

Rapp Report Daily 0387 God Says not to Kill but He Kills We are often challenged with the argument that God says, "you shall not kill" but then He kills. So they will ask why does God contradict himself? Well, let us ask the question, did God actually say, "thou shalt not kill", no. When we look at what it says in Exodus chapter 20, and that is the passage that they often want to go to what it says there is, "thou shalt not murder", not kill. There are two different words that we have in both...

Why did God Command the Extermination of the Canaanites?

August 26, 2019 14:00 - 938 KB

Rapp Report Daily 0386 Why did God Command the Extermination of the Canaanites? A common argument that many people have is that God is somehow this evil monster because of the fact that he commanded the extermination of all of the Canaanites, even including the children. Let us look at this and examine this biblically. So what do we see? Well, what do we know historically about the Canaanites? We actually find out that, they were warned by God, many times. They were being judged for their sin...

Is God Fair?

August 23, 2019 14:00 - 938 KB

Rapp Report Daily 0385 Is God Fair? Now, this often comes up when speaking of the extermination of the Canaanites, and somehow, God is not fair, that He would basically wipe out a whole group of people. Let us deal with the first issue of is God fair? Then we will deal with the Canaanites. So is God fair? Absolutely! He must be because of the very definition of what is fair comes from the nature of God. That is how we know what fair and unfair is, it comes from the very nature of God. Therefo...

Why Does God Demand Worship?

August 22, 2019 14:00 - 938 KB

Rapp Report Daily 0384 Why Does God Demand Worship? One of the things you are going to see throughout the Bible is the fact that scripture is quite clear that God expects, in fact, demands that people, human beings, worship Him. Now, people want to ask the question, why does God demand to be worshiped? However, God as the creator, we see that from the very first verse of the Bible in Genesis 1:1, that God is the creator of everything. Therefore, the question is poorly worded. Actually, it is ...

Is God Sexist?

August 21, 2019 14:00 - 938 KB

Rapp Report Daily 0383 Is God Sexist? Sometimes the question is, is the Bible sexist? The argument here is that a lot of people seem to think that somehow to emphasize one sex or gender over the other is somehow wrong. Now, this is really changed, at least in America in the last 10 years, because the whole idea of gender has changed. This argument is because God refers to himself in the male gender, and seems to deal with men. Therefore, people somehow like to say that God or the Bible is sex...

Are there Different Gods of the OT and NT?

August 20, 2019 14:00 - 938 KB

Rapp Report Daily 0382 Are there Different Gods of the OT and NT? Why is the God of the New Testament so different than the God of the Old Testament? Well, this is an argument that is not actually all that new. Actually, the early church fathers had to deal with this. Very early in church history, Marcin had come up with the idea that there were two different gods, one of the Old Testament that was somehow a wrathful and hateful God, where the God of the New Testament was this loving God. How...

What Does it Mean to Fear God?

August 19, 2019 14:00 - 938 KB

Rapp Report Daily 0381 What Does it Mean to Fear God? Now, many people know that the fear of God is the beginning of wisdom. We see that in Proverbs1:7, and there we see "the fear of the Lord is the beginning of knowledge, fools despise wisdom and instruction". So we would often say that the beginning of wisdom is the fear of the Lord. But what does the fear of the Lord actually mean? Does it mean we are to be so afraid of God that we tremble in our boots? Well, actually, no. The idea of fear...

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