Apologetics, week 1

Last week, we finished up a series on the prophets called “Through the Prophets’ Eyes.”  We read from Habakkuk and found him arguing with God.  In fact, in Chapter 1, Habakkuk was downright hacked off at God.  His problem?  Evil existed and God was doing nothing about it.  From that you were asked a question:  who has the last word in your life—the circumstances in your world or God’s word?

It’s a pretty good question to ask yourself.  The answers to this question may unnerve us a bit, make us a little uncomfortable.  You were given an opportunity to write down your version of life’s hard questions.  Your questions went like this: 

·        Why did my parents divorce?

·        Why do my parents hate each other?

·        Why do my parents do drugs?

·        Why did my best friend have to die?

·        Why do people have to suffer with cancer, or even get it at all?

·        Why, if we are all God’s children, does it look like some people’s lives could not get any better, while others lives could not get any worse?

Wow.  Those are some incredible questions.  They are signs of some deep pain and some deep thinking in your life.  You guys became like Habakkuk and asked God some hard questions.  In real-time you want to know what should have the last word in your life:  your circumstances or God’s word.

We’re going to take some time over the next few weeks and read between the lines of these questions to find the greater questions that linger behind them.  I think that if you look at these questions closely, you will find that there is a glaring issue of whether or not you can really trust God, or if He even exists.

Our understanding of God is primarily located in our minds, in our ideas, images, and feelings (Aggie).  We have bad ideas about God.  These bad ideas lead to bad images of God, which lead to bad feelings toward God.  Take this for instance.  We talk about God as Father.  We pray, “Heavenly Father.”  For some of you, the idea of having an earthly father is good.  But the image you have of your earthly father is not great.  Consequently, your feelings toward your father demonstrate the image you have of him in your mind.  We project our ideas and images of father onto God, which produce bad feelings and trust issues, or the conclusion that God must not exist at all. 

That is where we are going to start this week.  Does God really exist at all?

In fact, we are going to put God’s existence on trial.

We are going to start with the prosecution, who will argue that God does not exist.

Why do some people doubt the existence of God?

·        Can’t see Him

·        Problem of evil/God is good

·        Absence of God in the midst of troubles

·        Don’t want to be held accountable for judgment later on

Are these arguments bad?

No.  In fact, some of the arguments are very well reasoned and thought out. 

I am now going to argue for the prosecution.  First, there are no telltale signs of God’s existence.  If there had been a thunderstorm last night, how would my driveway appear this morning?  Since my driveway was not wet, I can conclude that no thunderstorm existed last night.  In similar fashion, if God existed, the telltale sign of that would be that no evil would exist.  Evil does exist; therefore, God does not exist.  He must not exist, or He would reveal Himself, especially when evil things happen.  He does not reveal Himself; therefore, He does not exist.  If God existed, He would not hide himself.  Since He is hidden, He does not exist. 

To look at this in a slightly different light:  If there is a God, He is perfectly loving.  (Agree or disagree?  Why?)  If He is perfectly loving, then He must reveal Himself to us, or He would not be perfectly loving—He would be mean and hateful.  Just like an absentee father, he would be all words and no action.  (Agree or disagree?  Why?)  If God was perfectly loving, He would reveal Himself in ways that are indisputable so that there could be no such thing as a reasonable atheist.  (Has God done this?)  Yet, for all such evidence that you say exists, there are reasonable atheists.  Therefore, because reasonable atheists exist, God must not exist.  At this point, the prosecution is going to let the defense respond before continuing the trial. 

Why are some people confident about God’s existence?

·        It answers a very basic question:  why am I here?

·        Design of the universe

·        The majority of the world is on my side

·        No other adequate explanation

·        Everyone believes in a concept of morality

·        The Bible says so

When I argued against God’s existence, you will notice that I did not use a Bible at all.  As I argue for God’s existence, I will follow the same path.  If the atheist does not believe in God, he will not believe in the Bible, so why start there?  In later weeks, we will come back to the Bible.