Tuesday, November 22, 2011

Does Free Will Exist?

Does free will exist? Or is it all a giant illusion? Is it possible to have something in between?

It certainly seems as if free will exists. I can choose to keep writing this post, or I can choose not to. I chose my college, I chose my major, I chose my girlfriend. I chose what I made for lunch today. I've chosen to yell at people and to be kind to people. I've chosen to work hard and I've chosen to slack off. I've done a lot of choosing in my life. Not all of it was for my own benefit, but at least in my own life, it seems very clear that I am choosing between options constantly in my life. My own empirical experience points to the conclusion that yes, I am choosing.

Who generally disagrees with the idea of free will? Determinists, and I consider this group to include Calvinists who believe in predestination. The arguments for free will differ tremendously depending on whether debating an atheistic determinist or a Christian determinist. Taking a determinist view for the atheist avoids many of the metaphysical problems associated with free will, including the issue of souls. Taking a determinist view for a Christian supports the sovereignty of God and the dogma of predestination.

Debating an atheist on this subject is relatively hard. If one starts with the premise that there is no supernatural element to our lives, then it is a short step to say that every action has a cause and our thought processes must have causes as well, influenced only by chemicals and electrical signals within our brains. Do we have choice in such a world? No.

However, if this worldview is actually applied to life, some ridiculous conclusions result. First, any sense of morality is lost. If there is no choice, then the word "fault" is completely meaningly. We cannot choose our future. Thus, the only legitimate type of justice is that used to protect those whose brain chemicals are in line with the social good. As for yourself, why not hurt people or commit white collar crime, as long as you can get away with it? I guess this question is obsolete, because you couldn't choose to anyway, unless it was already going to happen. You cannot work on making a difference: you either will or you won't, and you probably won't. Furthermore, if we can't choose, can we trust our own logic? If it is deterministic processes of chemicals, logic can only be right in the sense that it helps us understand the world and what's in it. However, when talking about anything abstract, there is no reason for logic to work at all. God could exist and not exist at the same time.

For a Christian, it is much easier to argue for free will. They believe in a loving God who created us. His will is for all to go to heaven (1 Tim 2:4),  yet "small is the gate and narrow the road that leads to life, and only a few find it."(Matt 7:13) Thus, the issue of God's will always happening is opposed by the Bible itself. Furthermore, if we believe in a loving God, we believe that God would want the best for us. That should not involve Hell, as the horrible place we accept it to be. Thus, God would not make us specifically for this place. There must be some other reason why some of us go there. If God is all-powerful, why doesn't he stop us from going there? Maybe it is because some of us choose to go there, and God in His infinite wisdom thought that free will was more important that sovereignty.

Finally, can free will exist while God also plans out our every move? This is the same as asking can God and I both be the ones who choose my every action? This simply cannot happen if my will and God's differs at all. Then, who's will trumps the other? If God's will trumps mine, then I do not have free will, because even if I choose something different than God, it will not happen. This is certainly not free. If my will trumps, than I do have free will, but God did not plan it. Even if God planned something else, I would be able to change that plan based on what I chose.

Here is where people try to distinguish between planning and choosing. They say God planned everything, but we are the ones that choose God's plan. First, this runs into the same problems as above because God is planning horrible things to people. Second, if we are choosing, we should have a legitimate decision between two options. Until we make the choice, it should be at least a little uncertain to outsiders which option will be chosen. Otherwise, it's not a choice. It's the illusion of choice. Choice implies uncertainty.

Whether atheist or Christian, you have to address the empirical basis for free will as well as these other arguments. Many atheists accept my objections, and they are free to do that. It is just a very sad way of living. If you are Christian, there is no way to get around the logical inconsistancy of a loving God and a planned trip to Hell.

Monday, November 21, 2011

Christian Universalism

In my post about hell, I quickly assumed that no Christian seriously believed that everyone will end up in heaven. I stand corrected. I heard about a movement called Christian Universalism. It is an incredibly interesting worldview. Here is a website where you can learn a lot about it: http://www.epochalypsis.org/christian-universalism-treatise. These people seem like perfectly fine Christians who simply believe differently than the "normal" on one issue, namely that all Christians will go to heaven.

Before I respond to this, though, I'd like to point out that I'm not sure which translation some of their verses come from. As one example, their translation of Matthew 14:42 says "And (they) shall cast them into a furnace of purifying, refining fire; there shall be wailing and gnashing of teeth." My version (NIV) says simply "the fiery furnace", while the NKJ says "the furnace of fire". In fact, every translation I could find (including ESV, ASV, and both NLT's), said "fiery furnace", "blazing furnace", or something like that. Nowhere could I find a reference to the "purifying, refining fire", which is a serious point in their debate. I'm inclined to take the verses on this site with a grain of salt and to look up the actual verses in a translation I trust.

That being said, I think it is interesting that these people do not shy away from the concept of hell. They rather embrace it, saying that it is here that we are refined and cleansed of our sin, and we are then fit to be in God's presence. In this sense, it is very similar to the Catholic concept of purgatory.

The idea of universalism is interesting in itself. They really just took a different path with respect to the sovereignty of God. Fundamentalist Christians believe that God has predestined some people for heaven and some for hell. Christian Universalists believe that God predestined all of us for heaven, using verses like 1 Timothy 2:3-4 and John 3:17. They believe that if God's will is for all people to know Him and be saved, then the sovereignty of God tells us that all people will know Him and be saved.

To the evangelical Christians who emphasize man's choice and free will, they say that even a choice on our part means that we are the ones who did something to get to heaven. To admit even this is to say that something other than God's grace was the factor in our admittal to heaven.

This is certainly an appealing approach. To say everyone will get to heaven makes our God seem like a very loving God. There are only a couple problems I have with this, but they are big when considered.

First, God is forcing all of us to love Him. The website says that God's love is irresistable. If this is the case, than we are forced to love Him eventually whether we want to or not. To think that God will eventually brainwash everyone in a refining fire is not pleasant or comforting, nor is it in line with a loving God. Love is not self centered. This view of God's love is entirely self centered.

Second, this directly undermines the importance of our choice. Does our choice make it an action on our part? No. Making the correct choice may seem like earning our way to heaven in the same way as answering correctly on an important test earns us a better grade. In this way, I agree that to believe that only those who choose Christianity in this life will be the ones to go to heaven is to put altogether too much emphasis on the action of the choice. The poor people who never get the chance to hear about the gospel, who are scarred by bad experiences with "rogue christians", or who cannot reconcile religion with rational thought are all left in the dark, even if they have a heart after God. However, to say that we have no choice in the matter is to take an unnecessarily shallow view of our choice. It is not the act of thinking or saying "God, please enter my life" that will save us. Rather, it is the moral decision of letting Him lead us and the attitude of repentence and humility.

If there is no choice in the matter, can we ever truly love God? How can love be defined outside the context of a relationship, and how can a loving relationship exist without the willing consent of both parties?

Jesus said narrow is the path to heaven, and few will choose it. Christian Universalism is an interesting idea, but ultimately I think unbiblical and trivializes the importance of our choices and actions. However, I believe those in Christian Universalism are not as far off the Truth as some people are bound to think.

Saturday, November 19, 2011

What is Hell?

I have been to Cru before, and I have a lot of friends that go. I had heard about their name change (they were previously Campus Crusade for Christ), so I decided to go to their website to see what there was to see. I found an interesting Q&A, but that isn't what really caught my attention. Instead, on the main page was a guy named Francis Chan promoting his new book on Hell. Now, I haven't read the book, so I guess I can't really give an opinion one way or the other. I'm not going to buy it, but if I can get it/borrow it for free I'll read it and maybe write a review on it. Instead, it got me thinking about the whole concept of Hell.

The major differences in the worldviews of Christians regarding Hell that I've seen debate whether Hell exists and whether it is eternal if it does. I think the average Christian believes to some degree that Hell exists. To be a Christian, I think it's basically impossible to believe that everyone goes to heaven. Then, by process of elimination, either the remaining people simply vanish or they are sent to a special place prepared for them, which we call Hell.

I have never found the Bible to be particularly clear on the nature of either heaven or hell. When Jesus talks about them, He often gives the image of celebration or feasting for heaven as opposed to being a social outcast in darkness where there are wailing and gnashing of teeth. In many respects, the idea of heaven is simply given to be very good, and the idea of hell is meant to be very bad. Many of our physical concepts of heaven and hell come from Revelation, which is full to the brim with symbolic language, and it's impossible to know which parts we should take literally, if any.

Now, can we believe in Christianity while rejecting this Hell? Jesus mentions it, many of the New Testament writers mention it, the Old Testament writers mention it, and there is little evidence to suggest that it is not literally describing some place of final judgement. So Biblically, it would appear to exist.

Rationally, why is Hell necessary? I think this relates closely with the reasons that Jesus needed to die for our atonement. I don't think this is something that is fully explained to us. I think though, that often we underestimate the Holiness of God when we ask these questions. I think without something so drastic, it would not be possible to make us worthy in the eyes of God, and without this atonement we would not be able to stand the sight of God. Likewise, part of God's nature is justice. With atonement, this part of His nature is satisfied. Without it, justice has to come from somewhere. I believe this is where Hell comes in. This is where justice is fulfilled. God cannot be inconsistent with His character, and I think He sends people to Hell only when they formally reject His offer of grace. This does not preclude a loving God.

Is Hell eternal? I know many people who say it is because the Bible often describes spiritual punishment as an eternal punishment, especially in Revelation. I think we should take these verses in the spirit in which they were spoken and written. Basically all Biblical references on the matter are highly symbolic. It is not nonsense to say that maybe this is a way of understanding just how horrible a place Hell is.

On the other hand, people often reject an eternal Hell because they say a loving God would not eternally punish someone. I believe that this downplays the severity of Hell. Hell is horrible. John Edward's sermon, "At the Hands of an Angry God," is excruciatingly gruesome. Yet, we should not undermine how horrible Hell is. By saying this is beyond God's will or ability is to say God will go easy on people in Hell. Sin is a worse offense than any of us can imagine. I cannot imagine what would be necessary to atone for it. I know that all our imagery in the world probably cannot compare. We do not live in a happy world. If people do not want mercy, they will get justice, because that is the only other option.

Interestingly, I've also heard the argument that a just God would not infinitely punish someone for a necessarily finite number of sins. This seems to hold more weight, although I heard an interesting argument once that said that if people will be conscious in Hell, they will be in constant rebellion against God, and so will be continuously sinning for all eternity. I think this is a great counter argument. Honestly, I could be swayed by either camp. I haven't decided which side has the better point.

However, I ultimately do not believe in an eternal God for the reason that man is not inherently eternal in nature. Some people say that part of being made in the image of God is an eternal soul, but this is particularly consistent with either Jewish interpretation or New Testament language. God says that we will be born again only if we have faith in Jesus. The word most often used in the other case is Death. Death is instant. Death is not something that can be done forever. And most importantly, Death is ceasing to exist. I believe that those who choose Hell will be punished correspondingly with their crimes. However, God will turn His face from them and withdraw His presence from them. How then will they exist? Can any thing exist apart from God? They deserve Death, and they will get Death, and this is the last possible mercy that God can bestow on them.

Thursday, November 17, 2011

God Chooses Us

Talking about predestination so much lately has made me think about an issue a lot more. In our discussion, the debate over predestination often boils down to "Did God choose us, or did we choose God?" These are seen to be two completely different incompatible worldviews. I have been espousing the view that we choose God, and completely ignoring the idea that God chooses us. I've been thinking and praying about this, and I believe that I need to change my views.

I now think we (meaning me) are looking at this issue way too egotistically when we say we can choose God with no qualifiers. The Bible says we are dead in our sin (Eph 2) and we have no ability to help ourselves. When we view God, we cannot help but choose darkness (John 3:19). Yet, while we were still sinners, Christ died for us (Romans 5:8). Beyond that, we cannot choose God, but God chooses us (John 15:15-17). And God reveals Himself to us. That is the only way we can gain eternal life: by God's grace.

I think it undermines the nature of a relationship to say we don't have a choice in the matter after Jesus chooses us. But that is besides the point. The point is that it is nothing we do that gets us saved. God bears down on us, and we can either stand stubbornly in our sin, or we can give in to his love and mercy and holiness. God is the great initiator. We still have a choice, but we do not have the choice, and it is not our choice that primarily saves us. It is God's grace that primarily and ultimately saves us.

Terms all Christians should think about

I have lately had a lot of discussions with Christians, and eventually we get to an impasse because we do not share a similar epistomology. This is to be expected, I guess, because if you don't think reason is capable of understanding the Bible, than it is unlikely that a rational argument will persuade you when it differs from Biblical teaching. On the other hand, if the Bible is not necessarily completely true, than often the interpretations of the passages of the Bible can be interpreted to fit what one considers a rational argument. After all, anyone who takes an honest reading of Romans 8:28-30 will assume Paul is telling us that God has predestined the human race into a section of people who go to heaven, and by implication the others are by default in a section of people predestined for Hell. However, if one will take an honest approach to the rational arguments, one arrives at a contradiction, or a paradox, if you will. If God creates some people for the express purpose of punishing them in hell, then how can we call Him loving?

Now, this led to a very interesting discussion. I thought (and think) that this is a great point. There are obviously many layers to this discussion, but ultimately this is what it boils down to. And an answer I hear over and over again is this: who are we to say what "love" is for God? This thought had never occurred to me. I never thought love is different for God than it is for us. Of course, this basic idea makes sense on the surface. Of course God will have a different relationship with us than He calls us to have with each other. Is it this radically different though, that He'd actually doom someone to Hell? Whether eternal or not, which is a different issue, Hell is bad. God is not looking out for this person's best interests in any sense of the word. Then, can we know anything about the "love" God shows us? How does this "love" match up with what we see in Christ?

This got me wondering: how many other terms do Christians often take for granted, but never clearly define? Are there more terms that even amongst Christians the definitions are vague? Here are some terms I think every Christian should struggle to define in a way consistent with his belief system, which should ideally be grounded in the Bible, and especially Christ.

Love: For all the predestination argument, I think we can find a fairly good definition in 1 Corinthians 13. The love described in this chapter underscores the entire ministry of Christ and every verse on love in the Bible I can recall off the top of my head, which is admittedly not many, but I'd be willing to wager that love does not differ from this standard.

Sovereign: Everyone agrees that God is sovereign, but does this mean every minute detail is planned and executed by God, or does this mean His ultimate plan will be eventually fulfilled? Does this mean nothing happens apart from His will?

God's Will: This itself is not usually well defined. Does God's will refer to anything that is good and consistent with His nature? Can God's will refer to His will for us to have free will? Or is God's will something else, such as the will to bring glory to Himself, or to create a beautiful piece of art with this universe, and life is merely the medium in which He wishes to express Himself?

Inerrant: In reference to the Bible, does this mean everything word in the Bible is literally true? Does this mean genres should be considered, but within these genres the Bible is completely, and literally where applicable, true? Does this mean the Bible does its "purpose", whatever that is? And whatever the definition, is the Bible inerrant?

Other words and phrases I find to have sometimes ambiguous meanings are justice, free will, natural revelation, prophecy, plan, timelessness, omniscience, spiritual gifts, holy, morality, good, and evil. No doubt, there are many more. I think when defining these terms, we should pick Biblical references. If two or more Biblical references seem to contradict each other, we should pick the one which Christ best exemplifies. Of course, we should be careful when we suggest they contradict. Perhaps they don't. But at the same time, we shouldn't completely redefine our terms in speculation of God's character.

God says He is love, and love is defined throughout the Bible. That is our standard of love. To compromise that is one of the most dangerous things we can do.

Tuesday, November 15, 2011

Not one Iota

Often, I hear people give reasons why we should consider the Old Testament just as valid as the New Testament, but one seems to come up more often than others.

 In Chapters 5-7, Matthew gives the account of Jesus's Sermon on the Mount, which reads like the greatest Sermon ever given. In it, Jesus admonishes us, corrects us, and gives us hope while telling us not only how to act, but how to think and pray. Jesus, in this sermon, is giving us an entirely new attitude towards life. Getting back to the original point of this post though, one verse seems to be quoted particularly in respect to the debate over whether or not to accept blindly the Old Testament.

In 5:17-18, Jesus says "Do not think that I came to destroy the Law or the Prophets. I did not come to destroy but to fulfill. For assuredly, I say to you, till heaven and earth pass away, one jot or one tittle will by no means pass from the law till all is fulfilled."

To me, it is a shame to take any verse out of the context of this sermon, even if these verses seem pretty clear. Indeed, even if we read a little further down, we see that Jesus says that anyone who breaks the least of the commandments will be called least in the Kingdom of God. This is serious stuff. We cannot simply overlook something like this.

OK, but lets put this section in the proper context now. In the previous section, Jesus tells us to be the salt and the light of the world. He tells us both not to lose our saltiness, but neither should we stay hidden. We should be both influentially different from the world, yet still a part of it.

At this point, if I was in Jesus' original audience, I am sure I'd be confused. I'm told to be different from the world, but I'm not supposed to be seperate from the world. How am I supposed to do that? How can I accomplish two things that seem so contradictory?

Jesus follows this up with the section already described. He says the Law will not disappear. He has come to fulfill what the Law and the Prophets have said. He also says this: "For I tell you that unless your righteousness surpasses that of the Pharisees and the teachers of the law, you will certainly not enter the kingdom of heaven."

So now we see how to be the salt that does not lose our saltiness. Jesus says that we should follow the morality laid out for us by God. Yet, Jesus goes beyond this. He follows this section with section after section after section ripping apart the traditions and misinterpretations of the Law. Instead of simply not murdering, he says we should not even insult each other in anger. Instead of simply not commiting adultery, we are to keep our minds entirely clean. Instead of simply following the rules of divorce, we are to deem marriage as holy and sacred. Instead of merely keeping our word under oath, we should keep our word all the time. Instead of "and eye for an eye", we should "give to the one that asks you". Instead of simply loving our neighbors, we should love our enemies too. Jesus over and over emphasizes this attitude toward morality, and in doing so gives us an incredibly thorough view of how to live our lives. In effect, he is showing us how to be the light that is not hidden.

So the point of Jesus saying that the Law was to stay intact was not to say that everything in the Old Testament was perfect and hunky-dory. What he was saying was that the morality that people had come to know at that time would not be loosened by Jesus' coming. It would not get one iota easier. In fact, Jesus goes on to say that the Law is not the deciding factor. What is moral is the deciding factor. This implies some sort of Moral Law above the Old Testament.

So where does that leave us in regards to the Old Testament. Well, in effect, we should realize that the Old Testament was an inperfect approximation of the Moral Law. Isn't that the obvious interpretation of the Sermon on the Mount? Jesus says the Ancient Hebrews didn't get it all right, or even very close by the sounds of it. So instead of following the morality of the Old Testament, shouldn't we be attempting instead to follow the real Moral Law, God's will?

This is not a plug for moral relativism. If Jesus, and His Sermon on the Mount, tells us anything, is that there is in fact Truth and a Right and Wrong way to live. More than anything, he not only tells us there is a Right way, but we're doing it the Wrong way. Morality isn't merely about actions, because good works for the wrong reason is merely prideful and self righteous. Morality is about the attitudes and desires of the heart, and when those are aligned with God's, the actions will follow.

If we are to believe in an absolute, unchanging Morality, though, which we do if we believe in an absolute God with an unchangingly good character and believe that morality comes down directly from that character, then we have to realize that much of the Old Testament is in direct conflict with morality, whether it's always been like that or years of oral tradition, written mistakes, and mistranslation are the cause. Maybe the Bible was perfect once, but with our modern understanding of it, translation of it, and study of it, we as Christians cannot condone the Old Testament acts of murder and genocide. We cannot believe that a god that sends evil spirits among men is a just or good god, and I do not capitalize this because I do not believe God could be this god. Furthermore, can we believe God would tell us He is the bringer of good and evil alike (Isaiah 45:7)? Is God really suprised by mankind's transgressions in the story of Noah or is He really threatened by the feeble attempts of man in the story of Babel? Is the god who condones the murder of the Cananites the same as the Jesus who says to love your enemies? Is the god who hardens hearts the same as the God who is just and merciful? I will not be ashamed to give a resounding No to these questions. I know the God I trust, and He is Loving, Merciful, Just, Holy, Totally Blameless, Omnipotent, Self-sacrificial, and Good! The god of the Old Testament is few of these traits at one time.

It is important that we make a decision on this important topic. Not because of the possibility for relativism, but because it totally alters which God we worship. I choose the Triune God that Jesus Christ describes and is.

Sunday, November 13, 2011

It's Your Turn, Atheism!

Often in my previous writings, I seem to give an admonishment of sorts to Christians I feel get lazy in their thinking. On the other hand, I think I often give atheists a little bit of an edge when debating. This isn’t because I think atheists are smarter or because atheists have better arguments. It’s generally because I expect more from Christians. Christians should know better. They have a history of placing importance in rational thought with great thinkers like St. Thomas Aquinas, St. Francis of Assisi, and even modern apologeticists like C.S. Lewis. To see a Christian simply not care about the evidence for their faith is mind numbingly frustrating.
However, that being said, this one’s for the atheists out there. I know you’ve been waiting patiently for me to write about you. While I am frustrated with Christians who don’t think logically, at least some of them come straight out and admit that they believe Faith is more important that Reason. They at least say that Reason will never be able show truth in the way Faith can, and Reason is at best a crutch to help us understand what we should be taking on Faith. To these Christians, I tip my cap, say God Bless, and realize that by their own definition, I will never be able to reasonably convince them of differences we may have.
Atheists don’t have this excuse. Atheists usually believe that Reason is much more important than Faith. I’m not talking about agnostics or skeptics: they have a completely different set of issues, which I hope to go into sometime. But a true atheist, who strongly believes God does not exist, has no excuse for faulty reasoning.
The worst part is that when atheists usually commit these logical errors, they do so while berating the idiotic Christians who could believe in “Tooth fairies, unicorns, Santa Claus, and God”. So rather than bash on the Christians who actually live out what they believe, maybe we can go over some of worst arguments I’ve heard atheists use.
“Atheists can be just as good of people as Christians.”
                Do atheists not see how insignificant this point is? Christianity does not claim that Christians are good people. Some Christians may claim they are good, just like I’m sure most people of any religion would. But the fundamental doctrine of Christianity is that “All have sinned and fallen short of the glory of God.” The Bible is full of exhortations to Christians to not live an empty faith and to stop the hypocrisy of their lives (look basically anywhere in James or in much of the gospels, to name a couple places). Christians are decidedly not good people. But then again, neither are atheists from a Christian viewpoint, and I feel this may strike the cord harder. If you, as an atheist, feel judged by Christianity, that is likely because you don’t meet up to what we think God’s standards are. It does not mean we think you are a worse person then people already Christians. Christianity is a tool to help the people who need help, and they come from every area of life.
                Besides, how well a group of people carries out their belief hardly is proof of the validity of their belief. Look at the cult of Charles Manson. Its members had strong convictions as to what was true, and they followed those convictions to the bitter end. Does that mean the cult had true beliefs? Not at all. Christians are humans too, and they still make human mistakes. But that does not necessarily invalidate the beliefs they hold.
“The Theory of Evolution/The Big Bang proves the Bible lies.”
                The Bible is no science book: we’ll give you that. Or I will at least, I’m sure you’ve heard your fill of fundamentalist objections. But lets examine this statement. Assuming all of these theories are true, what does that really prove? It proves that the theories of science held most commonly by scientists today (and are most likely to accurately represent our universe) are more or less in direct conflict with the views of the Bible. That is, Jewish writers thousands of years ago did not understand redshift, general relativity, genetic mutation, or natural selection. How dare a Jewish writer not understand evolution when the microscope wouldn’t be invented for thousands of years? How dare the Bible not explain general relativity, a theory based on the constancy of the speed of light, when geometry wouldn’t even be invented by the Greeks for a few hundred years?
                You might ask why God didn’t tell people to write down “In the beginning, nearly 14 billion years ago, to be precise, matter, energy, and time were created as they began expanding from a point of singularity.” Well, besides that the Hebrews may not have even been able to grasp how many a billion is, they certainly didn’t have any idea of what matter or energy is or even a relativistic view of time. “In the beginning” doesn’t sound like such a bad way to explain it after all.
                Even more importantly, why assume God told the people what to write at all? Despite what some Christians will tell you, the Bible doesn’t say that it is historically inerrant or that it is scientifically accurate or even that God told people what to write.  What it says is that the whole Bible is useful for teaching and instruction, and that the Bible is God breathed: God inspired. Sure God inspired the Bible. But just ask what the Ancient Hebrew word for micro bacteria is, and you may understand why the process of evolution is not given in the Bible.
“There are lots of other religions, and they all believe they are right.”
                This has logical fallacy written all over it. To say that one religion is wrong because there are lots of other alternative explanations is not only ridiculous, but logically unsupportable.  Say we have an equation: 5x + 2 = 0. The set of numbers we could take an answer from is at least the entire line of real numbers. Even if you realize that the answer has to be rational, that still leaves an infinite set of numbers from which the correct answer (only one in this case) can be taken. Here, obviously the answer is -2/5, but perhaps you have an army of elementary school students, each with a different answer. Would that invalidate the correctness of -2/5? Not at all.
                I think the point of this statement is not usually meant to provide an actual proof of Christianity, but perhaps an attempt to give the Christian some perspective. Maybe this statement is meant to say, “Look at all the other religions. They all think they are right too. Maybe faith isn’t such a great measure of proof.” If this is the point, then you’re right. By the same statement, though, don’t trust so heavily on your own beliefs. It works both ways.
“Christianity has been used to do lots of bad things in this world.”
                Absolutely it has. The Crusades, the Inquisition, much of the Dark Ages in general, murders of doctors who perform abortions, and much more can be attributed to the religion of Christianity. If you expand the statement to include all of religion, you get even more, including Islamic jihad, and the majority of conflict in the Middle East throughout history. However, on the other side of the coin, Stalin was a stanch atheist. Castro is a staunch atheist. Pol Pot and the Chinese revolution and Tiananmen square were all results of atheism. Nietzsche, an atheist, said “God is Dead” and predicted that following His death, social paradigms would fail and anarchy would break loose.
                Now, it’s no use simply divvying up the evil acts of history into “Religious” and “Nonreligious” piles. The simple point of the previous paragraph was to show that there have been evil people in both camps. The 20th century was extremely good at showing that people are just as capable of using atheism to justify the evil they do as they are of using religion. There are evil people in this world, and they will use whatever they find convenient to do whatever they want to do. Don’t blame it on some contradiction within Christianity though. Blame it, if anything, on the gullibility of mankind.
There are more, but I think I covered many of the more frequent arguments. Of course, atheists will point to this and say it is nothing more than a straw man created by me so I can knock down the easiest arguments. Well, if I never went near the actually strong arguments of atheism, than I suppose this would be. But the purpose of this article is not to prove atheism wrong. It is instead to try to wake up atheists who themselves get lazy with their thinking. You are supposedly rational creatures. You should be able to formulate a decent argument based on something that isn’t so obviously flawed.

The Bible's True Place

                I feel like lately I have been propagating a very serious error regarding the Bible. I have written a bit about how I believe the Bible is not completely true and how we should not trust in it, but in God. I stand behind everything I’ve said so far, but I have one important caveat.
                Why should I be able to take down what God has inspired? Reason and science are great achievements of mankind, but they are only that: achievements of mankind. The Bible was inspired by God! Whether God chose a people and hand-made their history step by step or took an ordinary culture and used it for extraordinary things, both amount to essentially the same thing, don’t they? I feel humbled today, thinking that I could deem to say so much about the Bible without looking at myself first.
                The biggest error I’ve made lately is the cultural relativism I’ve subjected the Bible to. Who am I to throw out 39 of the books of the Bible (40 if you count Revalations) and say the remaining 26 or 27 will do? Who am I to take the Bible’s teachings and try to mold them into the cultural expectations of today? If we are going to believe in an absolute truth, why go halfway? Most importantly, who am I in this lost age of chaos to undermine the only reputable source of direction we can find?
                Maybe I’ve gotten this way through familiarity. It is certainly Biblical to feel rebellious, and it is socially acceptable to question “common sense”. I feel my attitude has been misdirected. The Bible is not at fault here. People who use the Bible as a curtain to hide their own sins of pride and laziness are the ones at fault. Just as much, the people like me who trivialize the Bible’s place in our society are also to blame.
                Here’s to the Bible: God’s word. Whether perfect or imperfect, literal or figurative, complete or partial, God-spoke or God-breathed, the Bible is not outdated or irrelevant or worthless. If we believe Christianity at all, we should treat this book with the respect it deserves. I’ve lately been using God’s word as a footstool, helping me reach other things, but relatively unimportant once I’ve done so. God’s book should be my ladder, which I continually climb, because it is folly to trust in my own understanding. Reason only gets me as far as I am able to use it, and to say I can discern everything is simply self flattery and self deceit.
                Finally, here’s to finding the Bible’s place in our lives: somewhere between my view and a fundamentalists, I guess, but ultimately still at the top.

The Timefulness of God

///Disclaimer: This may be the ramblings of a man who doesn’t really understand the implications of what he says, and seems to be trying to fit God in a box. Take this whole post with a grain of salt, and please don't stone me. ///
Often, we view God as timeless. I find this to be a convenient approximation. We know that God is “outside” time, because He made it, and so he is able to work outside the constraints of time. By thinking God is timeless, I am often tempted to view time as embedded in God. In this view, time is a changing part of an otherwise unchanging whole, where God is Timeless: without time and without change. God does not move or think or talk, because these are all time orientated actions.  God simply holds the world together, and someday we’ll all end up with Him in paradise, frozen in an unchanging perpetual state of happiness. When we talk about the timelessness of God, I think many other Christians are caught in this frame of mind.
When the Bible talks about God, it does not tell us to view Him as timeless. That is a convenient construct we created so we could put God in a box and study Him. The Bible describes God as eternal. In other words, God doesn’t have no time. God has all the time there ever was and ever will be.
I don’t think it’s easy to think of it like this. Another view I often take is that God is beyond the material world. In a sense, God is not material at all. He is an unchanging, unmoving spirit. However, is this really the view we should take? God does not have no space. God created space. God has as much space as He could possibly want.
Now, God was something before time and matter came into existence. Maybe He was just spirit. Maybe that’s simply the only part of Him we have any hope of understanding. But when God made time, he put those restraints, for lack of a better word, on himself too. God is not timeless. God is timeful. God cannot see the future, not because He couldn’t, but because He can’t. He didn't give himself that opportunity when He created the universe, and that’s the “life” God chose for Himself. As Christians, we trust He made the right decision.

The Bible Idol

I think when I talk about the Bible, people often get the vibe that I do not respect the Bible. I know I sometimes say things like, “the Bible is not the final authority” and “the Bible is not always 100% literally true” or “there are parts of the Bible that are downright contradictory to what Jesus said”. When people hear me say these things, I get the impression that they view me as a heretic, or even blasphemous. At the very least, they think I am seriously confused.
I understand the appeal of viewing the Bible as absolutely correct and the only sure way to know truth. It means we know exactly what happened, what we should do, and what is expected from us. The Bible gives us a sure footing for faith, if only because it is something we can turn to as explanation for anything we do:
                “Why shouldn’t we steal?” Because the Bible says so.
                “How do I know Jesus loves me?” Because the Bible says so.
                “Why is homosexuality wrong?” Because the Bible says so.
                “Why should we believe the Earth was created in 6 days?” Because the Bible says so.
                “How do we know Jesus really said the things He did?” Because the Bible says so.
                “How do I know I’m going to heaven?” Because the Bible says so.
I can see how having this fail proof way of interpreting the world is alluring and even convenient.  
Now, here is where many Christians will stop me. “I don’t act like that,” they’ll say. “I have reasons for why I believe the way I do.” Do you really? If you pretended you never read the Bible and then looked at the evidence with an open mind, would you still come to the conclusion that the Earth is only a few thousand years old?
More importantly is the answer to other questions.  “How do I know Jesus loves me?” Well, if the Bible is the only thing that tells you this, I can understand why you’d feel under attack when the Bible is under attack. When the Bible is the foundation of your faith, I can understand why you guard the Bible so carefully. I'm not saying faith is bad. Faith is good! Reason does not supplant faith in importance. Reason should support Faith. Faith is not always blind. Faith can be earned.
Yet, I propose that Faith not only can be earned, but should be earned.
There are several reasons why the Bible can be considered by anyone who claims to have an open mind on the subject to be wrong in several key areas. I think the Genesis 1 story fairly obviously contradicts the science we have found. The chilling accounts of infanticide and genocide in the Old Testament should be more troubling. The changing moods of the Old Testament God, the evil spirits He sends to torment men and cause them to sin, the games He plays with Job are all concepts that cannot be explained away, although it is often tried. When a respected pastor of a congregation believes that if any Amelekites were alive today it would be his duty to destroy them, we know there is a moral problem. At that point, it is difficult to split differences between Christian fundamentalism and Islamic jihad. The merciless injustice of the Old Testament is in direct conflict with the humble love shown by Jesus. To portray God in this horrific light is perhaps the greatest blasphemy of all.
Regardless of whether you agree with any of the last paragraph, there will come a time when you will hit a troubled spot in the Bible where you cannot quite understand a passage, or seem to feel the Bible is being self contradictory (maybe it is…). Whatever it is, not only will your faith in the Bible be tested, but the entire weight of your faith will be tested along with it. Because, remember, the Bible is what justifies your faith. This is perilous. It almost killed my faith. Because, even though the Bible is a great great book, the most inspired book ever written, to build your faith on anything other than God is to build your house on the sand.
This is a big problem I see in Christians’ faiths today. They view the triune God as the Father, Son, and Holy Bible. We place what the Bible says above what Jesus and, more often, what the Holy Spirit says. I understand that it is hard to listen to the Holy Spirit sometimes. It is difficult to pick out what it says amongst the mumbo jumbo of our own lives and our own inner thoughts. That is one of the reasons it is important to pray together and to have a sense of community: so none of us develops the God complex. When we start viewing our own thoughts as God’s, we are in dangerous waters. However, at the same time, when we start viewing Paul or Peter or Isaiah or Jeremiah or Moses’ words as God's, we are in almost as dangerous waters. Maybe more, because in some cases these words were handed down for generations orally before they were ever written down.
What does Jesus have to say about this? As stated elsewhere, Jesus had the biggest problem with the Pharisees. The Pharisees were the keepers of the Law. The Pharisees knew the Bible inside and out, memorized it backwards and forwards (literally), and studied it for hours every day. The Pharisees knew their stuff. Not only did the Pharisees know the Bible, but they meticulously carried out every law they could find and even some that were a stretch (sound familiar?) The Pharisees condemned anyone who did not or could not follow this rigid set of codes. However, one very important law the Pharisees did not keep: “I am the Lord your God. You shall have no other gods before me”.  In God’s place, the Pharisees honored the idol of the Bible.
Jesus came to abolish this. John says Jesus is the Word. Not the Law. Not the Bible. Jesus says “I AM the Way.” Not the Law. Not the Bible. Jesus says “I AM the Truth.” Not the Law, and not the Bible. David sings out in Psalms, “Thy word is a lamp unto my feet and a light unto my path.” Jesus gives the controversial response, “I AM the light.” Not the Law, and not the Bible.
Does Jesus say He’s here to abolish the Law? No and yes. He does not give us free reign to run rampant through the street. He did come to put things in their proper perspective with the proper prioritization. God is first. Nothing comes before the Father, the Son, or the Holy Spirit. Not even something as gifted as the Bible.
This is why I do not have a problem saying the Bible has a couple spots where things aren’t completely accurate. I don’t have a problem saying that the Bible is imperfect, or that the Old Testament writers seriously misrepresent God at times. Our savior is Jesus. We can believe in a just, holy, perfect God who detests sin without condoning the merciless, unjust, imperfect actions of so many Old Testament characters. In this fallen world, only God is perfect. Not even the Bible can claim that title as well. Only God is worth the dedication and commitment I see people give this book.

The Pharisee and the Gnostic

“Throughout history, the Christian church has had to guard against the heresy of Gnosticism. Gnosticism is not an ordinary heresy, because it does not manifest itself as a set of beliefs. Rather, Gnosticism is a tendency: the tendency to replace the historical facts of Christianity with philosophical ideas. Gnosticism transforms history into ideology and facts into philosophy.” James Jordan in Chapter 4 of Creation in Six Days

There is something scary about the idea of Gnosticism. James Jordan describes Gnosticism as the replacing of solid truth with ideals. He describes Gnosticism as being one of the motivators of the failing church. James Jordan believes in a completely literal interpretation of the Bible: to take as much from it as possible and to analyze all of it, because it is all the literal words of God. To not believe in Jonah and the Big Fish or Noah and the Ark is as much a heresy to James Jordan as not believing in the literal birth, death, and resurrection of Jesus Christ himself, for to not believe in any of these stories is to doubt the inerrant word of God, and by extension to doubt God Himself. Gnosticism, James Jordan says, is the trivializing of these stories. To see this rich history the Bible gives as mere myths is to start down a dark, crooked path that leads to believing that God did not create the Earth, that the Israelites were not the Chosen People of God, that the apostles made stories up, that Paul imagined Jesus came to him, that the Virgin Mary wasn’t so virgin after all, and that Jesus was just a man who never said He was God, who never really died on a cross, who possibly married Mary Magdelene, and how many other heretical theories about the Bible. 
Gnosticism is scary for three reasons. First, there is truth in the dark path story. It is easy to start doubting everything in the Bible once part of it has been demoted to mere fable. If Jonah wasn’t really swallowed by a Great Fish, why should we believe Daniel survived the lion’s den? Why believe Elijah was swept up to heaven by chariots of fire? Noah’s ark sounds a little far fetched. Maybe that is allegorical. I don’t like that the Israelites killed so many seemingly innocent people. Maybe that was exaggerated, or simply made up. No Egyptian sources seem to mention the plagues on Egypt. Maybe those are symbolic, or simply an embellishment of past stories. After all, these stories were written down years after they happened. Something must have been changed in the passing of information from generation from generation, like a game of telephone with eternal consequences. And sooner or later, if one gives in to these thoughts, the question of whether Jesus actually lived the life of the gospels, whether his disciples truly understood his intentions, and even his mental sanity all come into question, because we cannot simply take the Bible’s word for it. This questioning of the deepest foundations of our faith is hauntingly chilling.
The second reason is that Gnosticism tends to view reality as a sort of badness that needs to be punished. This part of Gnosticism takes its roots in Greek thought, where the material world was considered evil and only the spiritual should live on to the next world. Pure spirit and pure thought were the truly sacred. Thinking this way leads to traditions like communion, with real food and real wine (or grape juice), to be thought of first as merely helpful, then as kind of boring, and finally to downright destructive. We begin to see heaven as a sort of ethereal floating spirit world, where we are held timelessly in a state of perpetual happiness, where nothing really happens and nothing really exists except for us in a bright light of pure goodness, which is God. The reason this is a scary side of Gnosticism is that the material world is not our enemy. As so many others have put it so appropriately, God doesn’t hate matter: He created it! And this viewing of our problems as material takes the blame off of ourselves and onto our bodies. It allows us to step back from our responsibility. Most harmfully, we stop worrying about what we’re thinking and only on what we’re doing, even though God says we will be judged on the intentions of our heart.
The third reason Gnosticism is a scary thought is the propensity for us to view truth as relative. When historical occurrences never really occurred, why should any of the Bible really be true? Why shouldn’t all of the Bible be relative? Maybe homosexuality is wrong in Biblical times, but nowadays, we are perfectly justified in saying that we are more advanced and morally mature.  Things are different now. The morally ambiguous thrive under this atmosphere. When there is no real right, there is also no real wrong.
James Jordan is right to fear this attitude. Gnosticism is one of the scariest doctrines the church has known.
Here’s the clincher though…
Jesus didn’t only attack the Gnostic.
The Sadducees were the Jewish synagogue’s equivalent of the Gnostic. The Sadducees took very few things as absolutely true, and they often changed their religious views when it was politically convenient. Jesus attacked them once in a while throughout the New Testament.
But who did Jesus really have problems with?
When you think of Jesus’ number one "enemy" so to speak, we all generally jump to the Pharisees, don’t we?
Jesus and the Pharisees did not get along. The Pharisees saw Jesus as a Gnostic of sorts. He often seemed to treat the Law with contempt. He would make outrageous claims. Jesus would heal the sick on the Sabbath and his disciples violated holy laws of cleanliness. Jesus broke the mold.
But at the same time, Jesus was not a Gnostic. Jesus did not believe in a relative truth. Jesus said “I AM the Truth.” What Jesus said, and why it is so hard to accept, is that there IS Truth. It’s just not found in the Law when viewed by itself. Truth is found in Jesus Christ. Truth is not found by reading the Bible. That may sound heretical, but it’s not. The Pharisees knew the Bible. The Pharisees memorized the Bible, forwards and backwards, literally. The Pharisees kept the laws the Bible gave them. The Pharisees today would have been the “perfect Christians”. They would be clean, college-educated pastors and deacons. They certainly wouldn’t have any teen pregnancies. They certainly wouldn’t get drunk. They would be respectable and respected. The Pharisees would teach their children to grow up and act responsibly too.  Maybe even home school them because you just can’t trust what public schools might teach your kids.
Jesus calls us to be more than Pharisees. Like it or not, there is a reason the Bible was made. There is an underlying meaning to the stories in the Bible. The Gnostic gets it wrong. There is a reality. There is Truth. But some Christians run so far away from this idea that they run right into the camp of the Pharisee. Instead of God being their God, they make the Bible their God. In following the Law so closely, they break the most important Law of all.
God says to love our enemies. Are we doing that? Jesus today would be a peace maniac. Jesus would probably be a little granola. Jesus was a bit of a rebel. Jesus would hang out with the GLBT community and the liberal left wing. Those are the people Jesus got along with. It’s not because Jesus was gay or even necessarily liberal, although he was definitely a proponent of change. It’s because those people were the ones open to conversation.  Conservative Christians tend to do things because they are compelled to. The one who are concerned about reasons are the ones in the liberal camp. The ones open to a change in perspective are liberal. As Christian, we should have, if the not the reckless perspective toward truth that liberals often have, at least the attitude towards change that God has gifted them with.
My propensity is for both. I tend to like a relative truth while being religiously self-righteous about it. How about you? Are you a Pharisee, or are you a Gnostic? Or are you truly seeking after Jesus’ own heart?