It Is Written

Who's Your Daddy?

Three Angels Broadcasting Network

Program transcript

Participants: John Bradshaw

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Series Code: IIW

Program Code: IIW001374A


00:01 [Music]
00:07 Jesus is talking with His disciples one day and He says
00:10 to Philip, "He who has seen Me has seen the Father.
00:13 That's John 14:9. On Father's Day - Happy
00:16 Father's Day, Dads - some people reflect on the fact that
00:19 they didn't have a great father while they grew up.
00:21 Gone too much, to angry, violent, abusive... Tragic.
00:25 But there's a Father you can love, and even if your earthly
00:28 father didn't give you a perfect picture of what
00:30 a Dad should be, Jesus said that if you want to know what
00:33 God the Father is like, just look at Jesus.
00:36 Jesus reveals what our Heavenly Father is really
00:39 like. He's kind, patient, merciful,
00:42 forgiving, accepting, healing, uplifting...
00:46 If you want to know what the Father is like, look at
00:49 Jesus. And when you do that, you'll
00:51 agree that you DO have a Father you can
00:53 love and trust. I'm John Bradshaw
00:56 for It Is Written. Let's live today by Every
00:58 Word. [music]
01:05 [Theme Music]
01:11 It has stood the test of time.
01:17 God's book, the Bible. Still relevant in today's
01:23 complex world. It Is Written
01:29 sharing hope around the globe.
01:40 Imagine growing up thinking you were someone, and then
01:43 discovering you were someone else.
01:46 And imagine if you found out your own godfather was one
01:49 of the monsters of history. Guntram Weber was
01:52 a 63-year-old teacher living in Berlin, West Germany.
01:55 Like many Germans his age, he never knew his father,
01:59 and that was because his dad was killed during the war.
02:02 Or, at least that's what his mother told him.
02:04 "Guntram, your dad was a truck driver for the Luftwaffe
02:07 in Croatia and he died in the fighting."
02:10 And that's all she told him. For much of his life,
02:13 Guntram remained skeptical about what his mother
02:15 had said regarding his father. He could never quite bring
02:18 himself to believe her story. It always bothered him that
02:21 she never talked about his father, and when he asked
02:24 questions, she would say something quickly and then
02:26 change the subject. And to make things seem even
02:28 more suspicious, there were never any photos of his dad
02:31 around the house, and he couldn't find any
02:33 documentation. Then one day, following a hint
02:36 his stepfather gave him, Guntram did a little digging
02:39 into his past, and much to his shock he found the truth.
02:44 Guntram was what they called a Lebensborn baby, a term
02:47 the Nazis used to describe their plan to use selective
02:50 breeding to create a Master Aryan race that would
02:54 eventually rule the world. They'd pick out what they
02:57 considered to be the most Aryan-looking and racially
03:00 pure men and women, and under the direction of the SS
03:03 and Heinrich Himmler, they ran a special program where those
03:07 people were essentially sent to breeding farms around
03:09 Europe to give birth to supposedly racially
03:12 pure children. And when Guntram went to find
03:15 the truth about his dad, that's what he discovered.
03:18 His dad wasn't a lorry driver killed in Croatia.
03:21 He was a Major-General in the SS who had a wife and three
03:25 children of his own when he got Guntram's mother pregnant.
03:29 His mother then went to one of the "Lebensborn" clinics,
03:32 and thus Guntram came into the world.
03:35 His real father was deemed a war criminal and had to flee
03:37 to Argentina after the war, where he lived until his death
03:40 in 1970. But as bad as that was,
03:45 it wasn't the only dark secret in his life.
03:47 He discovered, to his horror, that Heinrich Himmler,
03:50 the infamous director of the death camps,
03:53 was his godfather. Imagine: thinking one thing
03:56 about your origins all your life, and then discovering
04:00 the horrible truth: your birth was a part of
04:04 a systematic eugenics program. Thousands of Germans,
04:08 after the war, suffered the trauma of making
04:11 that very discovery. [Music] Some of the most
04:14 basic questions people ask during the course of their
04:16 lifetime are things like "Who am I?", and "Why am I here?"
04:26 Anybody who lives long enough and gives life even a few
04:28 moments of serious thought is going to ask those kinds
04:32 of questions. [music] ...
04:44 In his book Anna Karenina, Leo Tolstoy presents
04:46 a Russian aristocrat by the name of Konstantin
04:49 Levin who asks three essential questions: (1) What am I?
04:54 (2) Where am I?, and (3) Why am I here?
05:03 As the story goes, Konstantin was looking at his estate
05:06 when he suddenly wonders: what does it all mean?
05:10 "When these people are all dead, and I'm dead, too -
05:13 what will all of this mean?" I had a conversation once
05:17 with a philophosy professor in London, England once told
05:20 me that philosophers still wrestle with the big
05:22 questions. I said "Michael, what are those
05:24 big questions?" And he told me: "Here are the big questions
05:26 we are trying to get to the bottom of.
05:29 Who am I? Why am I here?
05:32 There's something in the human heart that cries
05:35 desperately to know what life is all about.
05:38 What a waste to live here without knowing why you're
05:41 here and how you're supposed to spend your time.
05:45 Most people wander through life not knowing what their
05:48 life really means. And then, when it's too late
05:53 they discover what they could have done.
05:56 So let me ask you: how, exactly, are you supposed to
06:00 live your life if you don't know why you're here or where
06:03 you come from? Richard Dawkins, the famous
06:07 Oxford zoologist and atheist, believes quite strongly that
06:10 he's got the answer. He says that we are cosmic
06:13 accidents created by chance through the unconscious
06:17 mechanism of random mutation and natural selection.
06:20 In other words, more conscious thought and purpose
06:23 went into somebody scribbling some graffiti under a bridge
06:27 than went into the creation of you and me - or the whole
06:30 universe even. But look at the world around
06:33 you: everything seems to have a purpose.
06:36 Ears have purpose, the brain of a dolphin has a purpose,
06:39 the sun has a purpose, the DNA of a flower has purpose,
06:44 and yet we're being asked to believe that everything
06:46 around us is an accident and has no purpose at all?
06:51 After more than a century of evolutionary theory being
06:54 taught in the classroom, millions and millions
06:57 of Americans still don't believe it.
07:01 Most of us still believe that God purposely created us -
07:04 in His image. All the hypotheses and
07:07 speculations out there about there being a "the selfish
07:10 gene," or about "natural selection," or about
07:13 primordial soup - just don't make the same kind of sense
07:17 found in the first words of the Bible: Genesis 1:1 says,
07:23 "n the beginning God created the heavens and the earth"
07:28 You know, in those few words, we have a radically different
07:32 perspective on the question of life than the stuff we
07:35 learned in high school biology.
07:37 Are we really just the chance product of cold cosmic forces
07:40 who never even saw us coming? Or are we the purposeful
07:44 creation of a loving God who made us, as the Bible says,
07:49 in His own image? There's quite a stark
07:52 contrast between those two views.
07:55 Guntram Weber thought he had it pretty bad, having
07:58 Heinrich Himmler as his godfather.
08:01 But at least his life had some sort of misguided design
08:04 to it. As bad as the picture was,
08:06 I think it's even worse to be told that your
08:08 great-great-great-great-grand father was a single-celled
08:13 organism coming out of a primordial soup.
08:16 Suddenly, your life has got no kind of meaning at all.
08:21 Now let me ask you this question: Can a painting of a
08:25 water lily suddenly become an actual water lily?
08:30 Are you sure you know the answer to that question?
08:34 I'll bring that answer to you in just a moment.
08:39 [Music]
08:47 When you hear the word 'heaven' what comes
08:49 to your mind? If it's little more than harps
08:52 and clouds my guess is you might not be too excited
08:54 about spending an eternity there!
08:56 But the Bible has good news for you!
08:59 Heaven is a very real place for real people!
09:01 And God has great things in store for you there.
09:04 If you'd like to know what the Bible says about heaven, let me
09:07 send you a booklet called, 'Good As It Gets'
09:09 It's absolutely FREE. Just call (800) 253-3000 and ask
09:14 for "As Good As It Gets." If the line's busy, do keep
09:18 on trying. You can write to
09:20 It Is Written, P.O. Box 6, Chattanooga, TN 37401,
09:25 and we'll mail a free copy to your address in North America.
09:28 Our toll-free number is 1 (800) 253-3000 ,
09:32 and our web address is ItIsWritten.com.
09:39 [Music] Time for today's
09:56 Bible question and thanks for submitting Bible questions to
09:58 us at It Is Written. How can a person really
10:01 believe the Bible is true? It was written years ago, it
10:05 has been copied so many times, it was written by
10:08 a lot of different people and those people wrote different
10:11 parts of the Bible at different times.
10:14 Help me believe the Bible is believable.
10:18 Great question. Thank you.
10:20 I'll do my best. You know what's funny?
10:22 There are historical books that not many people question
10:25 when it comes to authenticity.
10:27 Let me explain this a bit. A historian named Tacitus
10:31 wrote The Annals of Imperial Rome.
10:33 Few people question its accuracy or its veracity,
10:37 even though what is available today comes from a copy and
10:41 doesn't NEARLY date back to the original.
10:43 Now I'm not knocking Tacitus at all - just pointing out
10:48 that there's a bit of a double standard when it comes
10:50 to considering the accuracy of the Bible.
10:53 Now there are several reasons you can trust the Bible.
10:56 I'll name just a few. Historically it stands up.
10:59 Luke, who wrote Luke and the Book of Acts, is a very
11:02 accurate historian, and the historical details found in
11:06 what he wrote stand the test of thorough scrutiny.
11:10 Archaeology has validated the Bible again and again.
11:13 On numerous occasions it has been said that portions of
11:16 the Bible couldn't be trusted because they couldn't be
11:18 validated by the archaeological record.
11:21 But again and again archaeologists have found
11:24 records of cities or other evidences that show the Bible
11:28 record was accurate after all.
11:31 It has happened many, many times.
11:34 Then there are the manuscripts.
11:36 There are hundreds of old manuscripts or portions of
11:39 manuscripts that show us that what has come down to us
11:42 today is consistent with what was written hundreds and
11:45 hundreds of years ago. Tthe Dead Sea Scrolls,
11:49 discovered in the late 1940s and early 1950s are
11:51 compelling evidence that the Bible is legitimate.
11:55 They date back as far back as before the time of Christ,
11:59 and they show us that the Bible we read today is
12:01 fundamentally the same as what was written way back
12:04 then. Now the ‘differences' that
12:07 exist in manuscripts are generally so small that
12:10 they're just irrelevant. You don't find a manuscript
12:14 where Jesus says He is not the Son of God, or where
12:17 Christ is teaching something bizarre.
12:20 And consider prophecy. Many prophecies of the Bible
12:22 are being fulfilled and this demonstrates I think,
12:24 conclusively, that the Bible can be trusted.
12:28 When you've got predictions made that name a king before
12:30 he is born or that name a certain invader or conquerer
12:34 before he is born and then these things come to pass...
12:37 When you have got all those prophecies about Jesus coming
12:40 to the world one saying He would be crucified, another
12:43 saying not a bone would be broken, another saying He
12:45 would be born in Bethlehem, another saying He would die
12:48 in dishonour, another saying He would be rejected by the
12:51 ones He came to save, and on and on...
12:55 You've got a real problem if you want to argue against the
12:58 inspiration of the Bible. What are you going to do with
13:01 all that evidence? But you know what?
13:06 At the end of the day we accept the Bible by faith.
13:09 The Bible's critics do raise fair questions at times -
13:12 sometimes questions aren't very easy to answer,
13:15 especially to everybody's satisfaction.
13:17 But there's enough clear - what I would call -
13:20 "evidence" for us to know that the Bible really is the
13:24 word of God. You can accept it by faith.
13:26 Not blind faith, but reasonable, studied faith.
13:31 There are many, many good reasons to trust the Bible.
13:33 So many I"m not sure how someone can really
13:38 be confident in rejecting the Bible.
13:41 If there's a question you would like answered, pleae
13:43 send it to me at ItIsWritten.com.
13:45 I'll do my very best to get your question answered.
13:51 [Music]
13:56 You know, one of the great puzzles of modern science is
13:59 the question of life itself: where, exactly, did it come
14:03 from? How did these chemical
14:07 products - water, carbon, and protein
14:10 how did they make the jump from being -
14:12 well, water, carbon, and protein - to a living thing?
14:16 The idea of a painting of a water lily suddenly
14:20 becoming a real water lily seems impossible.
14:23 How would the painting make that kind of jump?
14:26 It's not just a small tweak here and there and then
14:28 suddenly the painting comes to life!
14:31 It just doesn't seem feasible.
14:33 But the old, old story you find the Bible DOES seem
14:37 feasible. God CREATED life with purpose
14:41 and design - and with human beings, He took special steps
14:45 to make something very special.
14:48 Listen to what the Bible says, in Genesis 2:7 "and the
14:53 LORD God formed man of the dust of the ground, and
14:57 breathed into his nostrils the breath of life; and man
15:01 became a living soul" (Genesis 2:7).
15:04 I want you to notice the intimacy: it says God
15:07 breathed into our nostrils the breath of life.
15:10 According to the Biblical account, it wasn't an
15:12 accident. Someone who cares deeply
15:15 about our existence put us here on purpose,
15:18 for a reason. Now take that version of
15:21 human origins and contrast it with what the late
15:24 paleontologist Stephen Jay Gould said about human
15:28 origins: He said, "We are here because one odd group of
15:33 fishes had a peculiar fin anatomy that could transform
15:37 into legs for terrestrial creatures; because the earth
15:41 never froze entirely during the ice age; because a small
15:46 and tenuous species, arising in Africa a quarter of a
15:49 million years ago, has managed, so far, to survive
15:54 by hook and by crook. We may yearn for a 'higher'
15:58 answer - but none exists."
16:04 I can't imagine anything more hopeless - and when it comes
16:08 to the really important questions in life, it just
16:11 doesn't bring any lasting satisfaction.
16:14 And with all due respect, how could Dr. Gould be so
16:17 certain? He just wasn't there when it
16:19 supposedly happened. He didn't see any of his
16:22 hypothesis take place. Instead, he took a few bits
16:26 of scattered data - a little piece here, a little piece
16:30 there - and then building on a whole bunch of unproven
16:33 assumptions, he cooked up a theory of human origins
16:36 that just doesn't really make sense.
16:39 When I listen to people like Dawkins and Gould, and all
16:42 these other people who seem to insist that life is an
16:44 accident, it reminds me of a passage in the book of Job
16:49 where God asks some pretty tough questions.
16:53 I'm turning to the book of Job, Chapter 38 and verse 4,
16:57 Job 38:4 and it says this, Where were you when I laid
17:03 the foundations of the earth? Tell Me, if you have
17:07 understanding. Who determined its
17:09 measurements? Surely you know or who
17:13 stretched the line upon it? Just try to imagine standing
17:17 in front of God, attempting to answer questions like
17:21 this. And the rest of the chapter
17:23 has a lot more questions. The point of it is really
17:26 pretty simple: none of us were there.
17:28 We're building a theory of human origins from scratch,
17:32 based on a tiny bits of information and a whole lot
17:36 of human arrogance. You know, I've heard people
17:39 say that it's arrogant to suggest that human life is
17:41 special, and that Christians are arrogant to suggest that
17:45 people have a special place on planet earth, but
17:48 sometimes I really have to wonder: when we want to be
17:51 smart enough to think that we think we hold the key to the
17:54 universe, and we're too proud to think that Someone might
17:58 just have a claim on our lives, where does the real
18:03 arrogance lie? And in the view offered by
18:06 Dawkins and Darwin and Gould, the universe doesn't last.
18:11 Follow these guys' theories to their logical conclusion,
18:14 and you get a pretty hopeless picture.
18:17 Eventually, the universe just collapses - and nothing will
18:21 have meant anything. But the story given in the
18:24 Bible bubbless with hope. It admits the sad condition
18:28 of our planet, it explains the pain and suffering we're
18:31 living with, and it holds out a promise that answers the
18:35 toughest questions we can ask.
18:38 To put it simply, God offers us a future.
18:42 Listen to His promise, it's found at the end of the book
18:44 of Isaiah: For, behold, I create new heavens and a new
18:50 earth: and the former shall not be remembered, nor come into
18:53 mind" (Isaiah 65:17). If life were really
18:56 meaningless, I don't think so many people - for so many
18:59 years - would have asked so many questions.
19:02 If you and I are just machines that fell together
19:05 by accident, why would we even care about the meaning
19:08 of life. But if our lives are the
19:11 creation of a loving, caring God, who has our best in
19:14 mind, the questions you've got about life begin to make
19:19 sense. They're kind of a homing
19:21 beacon, steering you back into a relationship with God.
19:25 Now in the book of Ephesians, the Bible says, Ephesians 1,
19:29 He chose us in Him before the foundation of the world,
19:33 that we should be holy and without blame before Him...."
19:37 (Eph. 1:4) You didn't just happen:
19:40 you were chosen, and you still are.
19:43 Because of what God did for you at the cross of Calvary,
19:46 you are free to answer the call in your heart and
19:49 rediscover your original purpose.
19:52 Here's another passage found in 2 Timothy 1:9, where the
19:55 Bible tells us that you and I have been called, with a
20:01 holy calling, not according to our works, but according
20:05 to His own purpose and grace which was given to us in
20:08 Christ Jesus before time began." Over and over again,
20:13 the Bible says that you were chosen, you were called
20:17 before the creation of the world.
20:19 There's a reason you wonder about the meaning of your
20:21 life. Dig a little deeper into your
20:23 past, and you're going to make a remarkable discovery:
20:27 your life really does have purpose.
20:31 You were put here intentionally, and there are
20:34 forces at work in this universe to keep you from
20:37 discovering the truth. In a moment, an incredible
20:42 story about two men who found out who they really were.
20:47 [music] It Is Written is a ministry
20:50 dedicated to sharing the gospel around
20:52 the world. God is using It Is Written
20:54 to impact the world. Our television program is only
20:57 one aspect of how we accomplish that goal.
21:00 To discover more about It Is Written, visit our website:
21:02 itiswritten.com, browse the dozens of pages that describe
21:07 what we do and how we're doing it.
21:09 You'll find an archive of past television programs in script
21:11 form and as streaming video and audio files along with many
21:15 other helpful inspirational resources.
21:18 Let's get to know each other better, visit our website:
21:20 itiswritten.com --today. And follow us online, at
21:25 Facebook and Twitter.
21:29 Somebody doesn't want you to know who you really are.
21:33 You know, a little while ago, I came across a remarkable
21:36 story. In the state of Maine, there
21:38 were two men - Gary and Randy - working at the same
21:41 furniture company. Customers and coworkers alike
21:43 couldn't help but notice that they two guys looked a lot
21:46 alike. Both of them had light hair,
21:48 both of them had stocky builds, and both of them wore
21:51 baseball caps and had goatees.
21:54 Their mannerisms and appearance were so much alike that people
21:56 used to ask if they were brothers.
21:58 But of course, they weren't - because if they were
22:00 brothers, they would have grown up together, right?
22:03 Then one day Randy asked Gary if he knew the names of his
22:06 biological parents, and to his surprise, they were the
22:10 same as his biological parents.
22:13 And the fact that they were both adopted really started
22:15 raising some important questions.
22:17 Randy knew that he had a brother out there somewhere,
22:21 and so he asked Gary what his birthday was.
22:24 It was June 10, 1974 - the same year that his brother
22:28 had been born. Now think about this very
22:30 carefully: what are the odds that two brothers actually
22:34 worked together in the same company all those years, and
22:39 didn't realize that they were brothers?
22:41 What twists of fate had to happen to bring them both
22:44 together on the same payroll - and how many days - weeks -
22:49 years , had actually been wasted because they didn't
22:52 realize just how close their family really was?
22:56 And now think about yourself here on planet earth.
23:05 Your heart tells you that your life is important.
23:08 You've got this overwhelming sense that you were put here
23:10 for a reason. You might struggle to know
23:14 what that reason is, but you just can't shake the feeling.
23:20 Maybe at night, you look up at the stars, wondering if
23:22 Somebody is really out there. Maybe, in the quiet moments
23:27 of your life life, you find yourself wanting to talk to
23:30 Someone - wanting to have a relationship.
23:35 In every human heart, there's this feeling that we've been
23:37 disconnected - that we're missing out on the most
23:40 important relationship in the world.
23:42 Some people describe it as feeling a little bit homesick
23:46 - as if we recognize that we really belong somewhere else,
23:49 in a different set of circumstances.
23:52 That feeling, according to the Bible, is universal.
23:55 In Ecclesiastes 3:11, the Bible says that God has put
24:00 eternity in the heart. In the last century and a half,
24:08 there have been a lot of voices telling us that our
24:10 existence doesn't mean anything.
24:14 But after all this time, they're failing to convince
24:17 us. The call in your heart just
24:19 won't go away. New theories of human origins
24:22 have failed to kill the cry of our hearts to know who we
24:25 really are. And who are we?
24:28 We are beings purposefully made in the image of God, who
24:33 promised us eternal life with Him long before the world
24:37 even began. So right now, only one more
24:40 question remains: Are you going to claim your
24:44 meaningful life with God? According to the Bible, it's
24:49 yours for the asking - and when you ask, you're going
24:52 to discover that He's been there all along.
24:55 It's just that maybe you didn't recognize Him.
24:59 But will you recognize Him right now?
25:01 Let's pray. We will thank God that he
25:04 made us for a purpose. He made us in his image
25:09 and he made both you and me so that we might spend eternity
25:13 with him.
25:16 Our Father in heaven, we thank you that we
25:18 are not just accidents. We thank you that life is not
25:21 meaningless, but that it is full of purpose.
25:24 And we pray claiming your purpose for our life right
25:28 now. You made us and not just to
25:31 live and die, but you made us to live on this earth
25:36 and then die or not, live eternally with you forever in
25:40 the place where it is good where the flowers don't ever
25:43 fade and when we will enjoy and where we will enjoy
25:48 meaning and purpose beyond our ability right now to
25:52 comprehend and so we thank you that you are our father
25:55 and that we are yours. We belong to you and we are
26:00 glad and we pray in Jesus' name, amen.
26:16 [Music]
26:40 When you hear the word 'heaven' what comes to your mind?
26:43 If it's little more than harps and clouds.
26:45 my guess is you might not be too excited about spending an
26:48 eternity there! But the Bible has good news for
26:50 you! Heaven is a very real place for
26:53 real people! And God has great things in
26:56 store for you there. If you'd like to know what the
26:58 Bible says about heaven, let me send you a booklet called,
27:01 'As Good As It Gets.' It's absolutely FREE.
27:04 Just call (800) 253-3000 and ask for "As Good As It Gets."
27:09 If the line's busy, do keep on trying.
27:12 You can write to It Is Written, P.O. Box 6,
27:15 Chattanooga, TN 37401, and we'll mail a free copy to
27:19 your address in North America. It Is Written is a faith-based
27:23 ministry supported by people like you.
27:25 Your help makes it possible for us to share God's good news
27:28 with the world. Your tax-deductible gift can be
27:31 sent to the address on your screen, or you can support us
27:34 online at ItIsWritten.com. Thank you for your continued
27:38 prayerful support. Our toll-free number is
27:40 1 (800) 253-3000 , and our web address
27:44 is ItIsWritten.com. [Music]
27:48 Thanks for joining me today. And remember It Is Written:
27:52 man shall not live by bread alone, but by every word that
27:56 proceeds from the mouth of God.


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