God says all gays are going to hell because they are gay, but God also said anyone who eats hoofed animals is going to hell, so does that mean anyone that has ever eaten at McDonald’s, Burger King, etc. is going to hell also?  Also, it says a women has to kill a goat when menstruating.  Isn’t sacrificing animals a pagan thing?  So won’t they go to hell for that, too?  Also, if God gives us free will, why do we even have commandments?  The irony in that is just too blunt.  Free will, then we have laws???  Why is Jesus born for man but made a god?

Sincerely,
Conflicted

Dear Conflicted,

We think you have an issue of receiving a lot of misinformation.  God does say that homosexuality is a sin (Rom 1:26-27), but the dietary habits and sacrifices that you referred to are Old Testament commandments.  First of all, it wasn’t all hoofed animals – just certain types (Deu 14:4-8).  Beef is from cattle and perfectly permissible, even to an Old Testament Jew.  As for animal sacrifice, that was a consistent part of Old Testament worship, but now that Jesus has come, we no longer are bound by the old law (read “Changing Of The Guard” for further information).

Last but not least, let’s address your concerns about Jesus and freewill.  Freewill doesn’t mean that you are incapable of doing anything wrong – it actually means the exact opposite.  Freedom to choose means that you can choose to do the right thing or choose to do the wrong thing.  God didn’t make us to be robots; He gives us the ability to live by His rules or to rebel against them.  He has set life and death before us, and we get to decide for ourselves how we want to live (Deu 30:19).  All mankind has sinned (Rom 3:23), and Jesus, God’s Son, came down from heaven and died on a cross, so we might have forgiveness of those sins.  Jesus is Deity (Jhn 1:1), and He emptied Himself that He might give us the freedom to choose life in Him (Php 2:6-8, Jhn 3:16).  If you would like more information about what it takes to choose Christ and be saved, please read “Five Steps To Salvation”.

My question pertains to one omitted book of the Bible, in particular, the book of Enoch.  I have learned that certain religions have omitted certain books, mainly the Gnostic gospels.  I have found adequate reasons for these New Testament scriptures to be omitted in certain cultures, but what about the book of Enoch?  I have recently purchased a book containing the writings of the Dead Sea Scrolls, and it includes the book of Enoch!  I was SOOO excited because I had previously purchased a single copy of this book, but couldn't find any evidence of it containing any truth.  The Dead Sea Scrolls and my purchased book of Enoch are in correlation. Also, in the book of Jude 1:6, there are references made to the fallen angels which are made known in the book of Enoch!  What is this mystery all about?  Did they omit it because people were somehow calling upon fallen angels (or their offspring) by name (demonic worship)?  Is this book valid?

Sincerely,
Connecting Dots

Dear Connecting Dots,

There are many writings that were included with the Dead Sea Scrolls that have non-biblical origins.  There are non-biblical writings that include commentaries on the Old Testament, paraphrases that expand on the Law, rule books of the community, war conduct, thanksgiving psalms, hymnic compositions, benedictions, liturgical texts, and wisdom writings.  Just because the book of Enoch was included in the Dead Sea Scrolls doesn't mean that it ought to be included in the Bible.

The question of what books to include in the Bible and what books to exclude as false is a major issue – and it is an issue that the early christians had to face.  Twenty-seven books are included in the New Testament canon (the word ‘canon’, when applied to Scripture, means ‘the officially accepted list of books’), and each one of these books is documented by early christians as being a divinely-inspired piece of literature.  In other words, the early christians believed that God wrote it.

The key to understanding why some books are included in the Bible and other books (even books from the same time period) are excluded is to remember that the Bible claims to be God’s Book (2 Pet 1:19-21).  The early christians (or Jews in the case of the Old Testament) lived during the time when these books were being written, and they were fully aware of who was doing the writing.  Today, we can’t tell which religious documents were written by apostles and which documents were written by heretics… but the early christians certainly could!  If someone claimed that a letter was written by the apostle Paul, all they had to do to verify the authenticity of the letter was to ask Paul for themselves.  The early christians were in the best position to differentiate between authentic apostolic writings and manmade documents.  This is exactly why the early church quickly adopted the twenty-seven books of the New Testament, and they have been almost universally accepted as the only New Testament books ever since.  Numerous historical documents verify that the New Testament canon that we use today was accepted, read, collected, distributed, and used by the early christians from very early on.  People who seek to say that they have “found” some new Bible books that have been missing from the canon have to prove that their books were accepted by christians (or Jews if discussing Old Testament canon) from the beginning – no one has been able to do that.

Did Noah have authority to use metal in the construction of the ark?

Sincerely,
Builder

Dear Builder,

Every command that you find in the Bible has specific and general qualities to it.  For example, when God told Noah to build the ark, He told Noah to use a specific kind of wood (gopher wood – Gen 6:14) and build the ark to specific dimensions (Gen 6:15-16), but He left the details of how to cut, fasten, and construct the ark up to Noah.  It would have been wrong for Noah to use oak or birch, and it would have been wrong for Noah to change the dimensions of the ark, but aside from that, Noah had freedom to use his own wisdom in the engineering of the ark.  The things that God was specific on, Noah had to be specific on to… but the things God was general about, Noah had freedom to decide for himself.

Our understanding of God’s command to build the ark out of gopher wood is that gopher wood was to be the primary construction material.  If Noah had needed metal to fasten the gopher wood, there wouldn’t have been anything wrong with that.  However, if Noah had decided to replace the gopher wood with a metal construction, that would have been wrong because it would have gone against God’s command.

How and where did Cain find his wife to have children with when there were no other people in the world at that time except Adam and Eve?

Sincerely,
Mail-Order Bride

Dear Mail-Order Bride,

Eve is the mother of all living (Gen 3:20).  In the beginning, there were only Adam and Eve.  Adam and Eve had multiple children (Gen 5:3-4).  In the genealogies of Genesis 5, none of the daughters are named – only the sons.  This is because Jewish genealogies (and Genesis is a Jewish book) follow the male lineage – we never know the dates or names of the daughters that are born.  Cain was Adam’s firstborn son (Gen 4:1).  When Cain went to find a wife, the only logical person he could marry would be his sister.  Therefore, Cain’s wife was also his sister (Gen 4:17).  It is morally repugnant in today’s society for someone to marry his sister, but it wasn’t that way in the beginning.  In the beginning, they had no other choice.  God told the family of Adam to “go forth and multiply” (Gen 1:28).  When Adam’s sons and daughters intermarried, they fulfilled God’s command.

Today we worry about children having deformities if the mother and father are too closely related.  This is because of genetic mutations and defects in our DNA.  Adam and Eve wouldn’t have had these defects.  When God made Adam and Eve, they were genetically perfect, and their descendants wouldn’t have had to worry about biological deformities.  God didn’t prohibit close intermarriage until almost 2,500 years after Adam and Eve (Lev 18:9-17); it took that long for genetic mutations to increase enough to become a real issue.

So the conclusion is… Cain married his sister.

In both 1 Samuel 28:3 and 2 Kings 23:24, did kings Saul and Josiah execute the mediums, or did they just throw them out of the land?  Many versions say "got rid", "put away", "removed", etc., so I'm not sure whether this means they were put to death or were just expelled.

Sincerely,
Dead Or Alive

Dear Dead Or Alive,

When Saul removed the mediums from the land in 1 Sam 28:3, the word used means “put away or removed”.  Saul cast them out of the land but didn’t necessarily destroy them.  The word is ambiguous and leaves room for either expulsion or destruction.  The witch of Endor believed that Saul would kill her for practicing her dark arts (1 Sam 28:9).

However, when Josiah removed the occult practitioners from the land, the word used in 2 Kgs 23:24 is a different Hebrew word that means ‘burn up or destroy’.  This language is backed up by the Greek Septuagint, which translates the word as ‘to parch, wither’.  The stronger language used seems to imply that Josiah put to death all the mediums and spiritists.