High Stakes Read Free Page A

the premise of gnosis) vied for position and power within the Church structure. It all came to a head and was finally decided when the Roman emperor Constantine adopted Pauline Christianity as the Roman state religion in the early fourth century.
    When Christians claim that the Bible is their source of truth for making extraordinary claims such as the virgin birth, then they must realize that the educated people of today (we are no longer dealing with an uneducated populace) demand extraordinary proof. The old adage that “if it’s in the Bible, it must be true” does not persuade all the followers anymore. Biblical scholars have found too many errors, lies and inconsistencies in the Bible for it to remain an unchallenged and only source for truth. Too many archaeological discoveries have been made that back up their findings and even put a whole new light on the time of Christ.
    I do not depend upon the research of obviously biased Christian scholars, for their work is tainted with their beliefs; nor do I accept the biased work of skeptics or anti-Christian scholars. I always try to find more objective scholars who don’t have an ax to grind one way or the other and who are really just looking for the truth. In this day and age, sometimes they are hard to find.
    Getting back to the virgin birth of Christ, Francine says that it was not a virgin birth and that Joseph impregnated Mary. Francine further states that this does not take away Jesus’ divinity because in reality God is the one who makes any impregnation possible for any child and chose Mary to be the mother of Christ—his direct report and messenger. That is probably a logical deduction in light of the fact that we all choose our own mothers and fathers when we incarnate, and I know of no virgin births that are on record as having taken place. Francine states that the writers of these gospels of Matthew and Luke used the mythology of virgin births to make the birth of Christ seem more divine and didn’t want the mythology of other religions’ virgin births superseding Christ’s birth.
    The Bible actually confirms this in a way. According to Matthew and Luke, Mary and Joseph were supposedly aware of the divinity of the child who would be born to her and also that they were to name him Jesus. Now, if this were so, why would they question Christ’s actions? In Luke 2:42–51 we read about Christ in the temple at twelve years of age preaching to the teachers and how his parents, Mary and Joseph, had lost him and then found him preaching and rebuked him about his absence. I find verses 49–50 most interesting, especially where Jesus tells his parents he is here to do his Father’s business and they do not understand. Why would they not understand? Didn’t they know he was the Messiah and a divine messenger from God? Joseph knew from an angel in a dream (Matthew 1:18–24) and Mary knew from a visitation by the angel Gabriel (Luke 1:26–38). Do you now see how the Bible can be inconsistent?
    Many religions seem to want an immaculate birth with no male intervention. Women were looked on as less than nothing at the time of Christ’s birth. It seems women were elevated when it was useful to the patriarchs of society, and when they were not needed women were seen as unclean. If you want to look at it spiritually, it’s always God’s hand that brings us into being. We come into an earthly life when we need to perfect ourselves for God or, as in the case of Christ, we are on a mission for God.
    The reason that Joseph is depicted as confused in the Bible is because he was so much older than Mary and he thought it wasn’t possible for him to have children. Mary was only sixteen and he was close to forty, which in that day was very old. If you look at it in this light, we could all be conceived by God’s immaculate hand to make sure we got here on earth to learn. If God wants to make it happen, it will