Shameless Grovelling before all you Christians who want to convert me to Christ

Well, my birthday recently passed (I share it with such luminaries as Lincoln and Darwin) and we are headed full speed into the Easter season.. So what better time than to ask all you Christians out there who visit my humble blog and debate with me the "facts" and "truths" of Christianity in order to prove that Christianity is true (or is it, True??) or bring me back to Christ or whatever. Now is the time to pony up for your cause.

There are a number of Christian apologetics resources that I have either read but do not own, or have not read and want to. If you believe in your mission to spread the message of Christ to everyone, then here is your chance to bring it to my front door, literally. Below is a list of some of the books and other materials I would like to read but cannot bring myself to spend my hard-earned money on:

First up is this tome from Coral Ridge Ministries. Who Is This Jesus; Is He Risen?- Book and DVD

Next is the book by Norman Geisler, I Don't Have Enough Faith to Be an Atheist (Paperback)

Otherwise I would love to have copies of Lee Strobel's The Case for Christ and C.S. Lewis' Mere Christianity. Both of which I have read before but were not my copies and I had to give them back.

Please email me for my mailing address. If you have ideas for some other books in the apologetics vein which you think would be useful, please let me know in comments.

And let the love and evangelical power of Jesus flow through you to bring me around to Jesus...

Update: In comments I have been having a discussion with Rhology (again). He seems to be concerned with pigs and jewelry. This quote seems to be his focal point:

Give not that which is holy unto the dogs, neither cast ye your pearls before swine, lest they trample them under their feet, and turn again and rend you [Matthew 7:6 KJV]

His message here seems to be that Christians everywhere should ignore and cast out anyone who is not a believer. Why? Because if you offer the non-believer the knowledge of Jesus, then they will use it against you to destroy you. This one simple quote completely destroys the entire evangelical movement and the need to spread the loving message of Jesus, if Christians are banned from spreading it to those who may be unwilling to accept it at face value.

But I really want to focus in on the imagery here. We have two elements here to work with, pigs and jewelry. Let us look and see what else the New Testament has to say about those:

30 Now a good way off from them there was a herd of many swine feeding. 31 So the demons begged Him, saying, “If You cast us out, permit us to go away into the herd of swine.” 32 And He said to them, “Go.” So when they had come out, they went into the herd of swine. And suddenly the whole herd of swine ran violently down the steep place into the sea, and perished in the water. [Matthew 8:30-32]

Here we have Jesus taking orders from demons. But what really disturbs me is that this herd of pigs could have fed many hungry people. And Jesus, as God, had the power to simply cast the demons out into nothingness. So why allow hungry people to go hungry just to satisfy the desires of some demons? Wouldn't the magical depositing of those pigs upon the plates of the hungry have been a much greater and humane miracle than simply destroying them? But I guess thus is the message of Jesus: Let the hungry go hungry if it will increase the comfort of some demons. (After all, Jesus fed the multitudes with loaves and fishes, twice)

But what about jewelry? Paul tells us this:

8 I desire therefore that the men pray everywhere, lifting up holy hands, without wrath and doubting; 9 in like manner also, that the women adorn themselves in modest apparel, with propriety and moderation, not with braided hair or gold or pearls or costly clothing, 10 but, which is proper for women professing godliness, with good works. [1 Timothy 2:8-10 NKJV]

So good Christian women should not wear gold wedding bands in church, or pearls, or costly clothing. I have to wonder just how many goodly Christian women take off their wedding bands when they go to church, or even refuse to put them on at their wedding in church, in order to remain within the God/Jesus commands found in the New Testament?

Rhology has a problem with sending me any of the requested Christian texts on the grounds that I am not Christian. But I wonder just what his grounds really are if Christianity is as contradictory as I just sketched out? The bible has many flaws that make it unpalatable to people like me (rational beings), and the only way that Christianity can therefore be acceptable is if today's Christian apologists explain all those contradictions. But Rhology disagrees. He just wants to follow the lone swine/pearl doctrine and laugh at the entire evangelical movement simply to save himself from sending me Christian works. So all you other Christians out there, how does this strike you? What would you all rather do, follow Jesus' dictates and spread the gospel, or follow Rhology's personal worldview, and simply cast off all current non-Christians into the pit of fire for nothing more than entertainment's purpose?

The message I take away from Rhology is simple and clear: If you are not Christian, you don't deserve to become Christian; and if you refuse Christian teachings, then you should never receive them. Heh, Rhology and brotherly love go together like oil and water.. Or should I say like torture and Jesus? (Who knew that the answer to "would Jesus torture?" is a Rhology-approved "YES!!!1!!!1!1!!") Peace and torture all the same to Rhology. Only us Jesus-hating types would hate torture and love actual peace (no war) and freedom (the right and priveledge to believe what one wants and act upon it as long as it does not harm others).