Today's world is overloaded with information—school, television, iPhones, Internet, newspapers, books ... Information itself is not a bad thing, but an excess can make it harder to weed out the truth from the lies.
From 1959–1999 the earth's population doubled from 3 billion to 6 billion. With this huge increase of people the amount of available information has grown, especially with the Internet.
Knowledge is everywhere. It's at the touch of a phone, the click of a mouse, the change of a television channel or a radio station in a car. It's everywhere you look, unless you live in a cave!
Sometimes, it seems like the more worldly wisdom and knowledge we have prior to being saved the harder it can be to accept Christ as saviour. We are tempted to put our knowledge before God's knowledge. We think we know best and it becomes a stumbling block for us.
Questioning
One of the first things I was taught in grade 3 was the theory of evolution: we came from apes. This theory is still getting taught today as though it is the ultimate truth. In my view this claim has holes which are not addressed by large portions of the scientific community. Now I know Jesus is the truth, I don't believe the theory of evolution is factual.
When I first started reading the Bible and read Genesis chapter 1 verse 27, 'So God created mankind in his own image, in the image of God he created them; Male and female he created them', it didn't match what I was taught at school. I began to think about what was more likely: humanity randomly appearing, as the big bang theory suggests, starting off as small organisms and then over millions of years evolving into apes and then man? Or, were we made by an intelligent creator? It became obvious I believed what I was taught without questioning it.
Nothing is impossible with God
My generation is receiving all sorts of knowledge without question. In my view, this is dangerous, and does not encourage people toward belief in Jesus for salvation. Yet, I realise nothing is impossible with God.
Even as a young Christian I am aware of God's saving power: if God is in it, nothing will stop someone calling on the name of the Lord to be saved. Yes, in some cases, it might even mean a type of 'Road to Damascus' experience as it did with the Apostle Paul when he was struck blind and came to trust in Jesus (see Acts chapter 9).
Shane Rowney lives in Tweed Heads NSW, Australia. He is currently studying Ministry.
Shane Rowney's previous articles may be viewed at http://www.pressserviceinternational.org/shane-rowney.html