Here's a like for everybody who thinks that Jesus is an 'ideal' or wasn't real or didn't rise from the dead. If you have a few minutes, I'd ecourage you to listen to the sermon for March 14th. It's not up, but it will be soon. For those of you who don't have the time for it, here it is in a nutshell. The bible is far and away the most easily verifiable historical manuscript in existence. Here's how it works.
Assume for a minute that an event happens. Now, somebody goes out and writes the accout of it out on a manuscript and over time, others do the same.
The writings of Aerostotle (sp?) were reproduced by 7 different people over 1000 years after they happened, yet we accept them as fact.
The writings of Ceasar were reproduced by 8 different people that we know of 1300 years after they actually happened, yet we accept them as true.
The writings about Jesus's death and resurection were reproduced over 2000 times within 50 years of his death and resurection. So, how the can you say that Jesus wasn't just as real as the rest of these people?
As for the original question, I pray to Jesus every day regardless of whether I'm skiing or not, because if not for him, I'd be dead before I could so much as post this message.
Here's the link to the sermon page I was talking about for anybody who's interested.
http://www.tworiverschurch.org/w_pa...on&PHPSESSID=4f1ab632c63ea79b7ffe902ac78793c0