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anewbeginning
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Date Joined Jan 2002
Total Posts : 88

Posted 7/26/2002 4:24 PM (GMT -6)

For the past few years, since the birth of my first child I think, I have begun to struggle with the idea of a theistic God. I was raised a Christian and as a child I always felt I had a close relationship with God. Gradually I have begun to have nagging doubts about my faith in general, and an "approachable" God in particular. I wonder if I had been born into another religion, would I not consider Christianity false? Isn't my faith simply circumstance? Why should I be priveledged so as to be born under truth while so many others are deceived? Please don't get me wrong, I'm no atheist and I don't wish to alter anyone else's beliefs with this thread but I need to resolve this problem. I want to raise my kids with some sort of spiritual hope!
I am convinced by the anthropic arguments put forth by Christian apologists there is a deity but I struggle carrying that forward to theism. I just don't see God interacting with us. I haven't spoken with anyone about my thoughts and I am very uncomfortable even typing this (you know, millstones are not pleasant necklaces ;) ).
Has anyone else sorted through this? A little help!

Iconoclast
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Date Joined Oct 2001
Total Posts : 1227

Posted 7/26/2002 5:38 PM (GMT -6)

Doc gave a couple of sermons that laid out a very powerful argument with solid evidence about who Jesus is and why we can have confidence that He is indeed God. To me this kind of clear logic with evidence is very helpful in knowing that my faith is not based on parental or cultural programming.

http://www.whchurch.org/whc/index.asp?PageID=394

Sermon: 3/31/02 - "Jesus Was Not a 'Good Guy'"

http://www.whchurch.org/whc/index.asp?PageID=396

Sermon: 2/27/00 - "Proof that Jesus was the Son of God"

thanks,
Iconoclast

"The benefit overran the merit the first day, and has overrun the merit ever since. The merit itself, so-called, I reckon part of the receiving." - Ralph Waldo Emerson

Starkman
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Date Joined Oct 2001
Total Posts : 1747

Posted 7/26/2002 5:44 PM (GMT -6)

Hey anewbeginning,

Aside from tradition--that is, our former American Christian heritage--and emotion, there's many reasons to consider the God of the Bible to be the one true God.

First, there's the evidence (both within the Bible and in secular references) to the veracity of Jesus' life, death and resurrection. Second, and something very much worth considering, is that only the Judeo/Christian belief makes sense both of man's dilemma (his concept of morals, purpose, love, etc.) as well as an answer to the existance of everything there is, namely personality.

No other world religion satisfactorily answers these issues but the Judeo/Christian concept of God. A real God in real time and space, a God who created us in His image (the explanation for personality, worth and morality), and a God who's communicated with us through the Bible, His Word.

Francis Schaeffer developed this thinking excellently in His books "The God Who is There", "He is There and He is Not Silent", and . . . and . . . rats, I forget the other one or two along this line. OH YES, one other is "Escape from Reason."

More than an "apologetic"--Schaeffer didn't like people labeling his thinking as "Schaeffer apologetics" or a "new" apologetic--it is the thinking through these issues which led Schaeffer to help many folks in your very predicament; many intellects, many from different races and religions. He helped many with his questions and answers along these lines of thinking.

You may never come to rest trying to find God in a more real connection by seeking an emotional, psychological (both being subjective experiences) or traditional experience, as you seem to well know. You can, however, find something out about this God by reading the Bible and seeing what He had to say, and by considering the solutions folks like Schaffer thought through. Personal experiences of knowing God may follow, but first things first: The God of the Bible has communicated with us. He has spoken to us. He has not told us everything, but what He has told us is true. It is, as Schaeffer would say, true truth.

Hope this helps some,

For the thought of it,

Starkman

Edited by - Starkman on 07/26/2002 10:51:03 PM

GregBoyd
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Date Joined Jul 2001
Total Posts : 1818

Posted 7/27/2002 3:45 AM (GMT -6)

The argument that is most convincing to me goes something like this.

We are personal beings. This means we are rational (we try to make sense out of life) we long for meaning (we long for purpose) and we are moral (we believe good is better than evil).

Ultimate reality is either like us or not like us. It / He is either rational, meaningful or moral (viz. God), or it is not (atheism, or impersonal monism).

If Ultimate Reality is NOT like us:
* there's no way to make sense of our rationality, meaningfulness or morality.
* everything is absurd. we are freaks of nature, utterly out of cync with the way the universe is. We long for things that have no objective basis in reality.
* if we are consistent, life is very miserable, as the most honest of the atheists have admitted. (e.g. Sartre).

There's no other case, outside of humans, where "nature" as produced beings who hunger for something nature doesn't supply. Animals hunger, and theres food. Animals thirst, and theres waters. Animals have sex drives, and theres sex. How preposterous to suppose it could be otherwise.

Yet, if Ultimate Reality is not like us, if we are rational beings in a nonrational universe, beings who long for meaning in a meaningless universe, and beings who long for morality in an amoral universe, there is no "answer " to our longings! The very core of who WE are is against the very essence of the way things ACTUALLY are.

In this light, I think it far more reasonable to suppose that Ultimate Reality is like us, rather than unlike us.

Hope this helps.

Doc

"In Christ...the ONLY THING that matters is faith energized by love." Galatians 5:6

anewbeginning
Registered Member

Date Joined Jan 2002
Total Posts : 88

Posted 7/28/2002 5:18 PM (GMT -6)

Thank you all for your thoughtfull responses. You have given me some new lines of thought to pursue. I think my problem lies not so much in the historicity of Jesus, I do feel He was an actual person. It is more likely rooted in the problem of our origins. Modern science has come to conclusions quite different than those of historical Christianity. I am aware of the many differing ideas even within modern Christianity itself (young earthers, old earthers, theistic evolution etc.). Some of these are attempts to interpret the evidence through the lens of the biblical narrative, and some are attempts to fit the biblical narrative to the evidence. In my mind neither method gives a completely satisfactory result. Why should it be so difficult to reconcile the natural record with the biblical one? Surely a God-inspired, infallible document should be easily verifiable. If the first chapter of this book is so disputable, is the rest reliable? If I disregard the story of our origins in Genesis and accept modern science's findings of a natural procession to man, it's a short step over the precipice to a complete jettisoning of religion, even given Greg's argument from necesstiy(although it is powerful). If naturalism is correct, all our desires and the attributes we consider worthy are simply concepts we have forced onto nature. They don't really have an existence apart from us.
In modern thermodynamics they talk of "dissipative structures" capable of increasing complexity by feeding on increasing entropy. Are we reducible to this sort of entity?
If there is a "Theory of everything" (they're trying hard to discover it) and the universe is completely self-contained, then wouldn't Sartre be correct in his assertion that "life is absurd"?
I'm rambling, I guess I shouldn't write late at night. This type of thinking really sucks the hope from one. My hope is in Christ but my intuition leads me away.

Tom
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Date Joined Jul 2001
Total Posts : 10353

Posted 7/28/2002 6:21 PM (GMT -6)

Hey there anewbeginning. I'm sure others more qualified with respond, I just wanted to offer a few thoughts and encourage you.

quote:
Why should it be so difficult to reconcile the natural record
with the biblical one? Surely a God-inspired, infallible document should be easily verifiable. If the first chapter of this book is so disputable, is the rest reliable?

It may be that reconciling Genesis with science is sometimes difficult because Genesis is not a scientific treatise per say. As you're no doubt aware, it's a theological commentary on our origins. I'm not sure what people expect science to contribute to such a discussion. I think the point which Genesis makes IS easily veribialbe. OUr sinfulness and our longing for meaning and answers (reflected in your own post!)--what really matters to us--are easily verifiable within us, and they are things science is unable to account for or address.

quote:
If I disregard the story of our origins in Genesis and accept modern science's findings of a natural procession to man...

What in science "requires" us to disregard Genesis? Why the either/or?

quote:
In modern thermodynamics they talk of "dissipative structures" capable of increasing complexity by feeding on increasing entropy. Are we reducible to this sort of entity?

Doesn't your reflecting meaningfully on the question in search of an answer suggest that we are not reducible to this sort of entity?

Peace,
Tom

"Every saint has a history and every sinner a future." Oscar Wilde

Edited by - TGB on 07/28/2002 11:21:52 PM

GregBoyd
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Date Joined Jul 2001
Total Posts : 1818

Posted 8/4/2002 3:45 PM (GMT -6)

anewbeggining, I'd encourage you to check out the various ways evangelicals read Genesis 1 in Across The Spectrum. There are four different ways evangelicals read this chapter, and only ONE of them has any difficulty with science (the young earth view).

Blessing

Greg

"In Christ...the ONLY THING that matters is faith energized by love." Galatians 5:6

Starkman
Registered Member

Date Joined Oct 2001
Total Posts : 1747

Posted 8/6/2002 5:21 PM (GMT -6)

I'd have to say that even young-earth creationists have no problem with science! With regard to the earth's age, we all come from one of two presuppositions: the dating of elements starts with either the notion that earth is very old or young; dating earth, then, starts with a presupposition (on either side of the young or old-earth view) that what one is dating is old, based on a presuppostion, or young, based on another presuppostions.

All that to say that young-earth creationists simply do not believe the evidence supports an old earth/universe; the presupposition is based on a literal six-day creation. Starting with this premise, evidence to support it is not hard to find. It all depends one what one's preconceived beliefs are about the interpretation of Genesis BEFORE approaching the science of dating. (Incidentally, one should start with the text (and a literal interpretation unless THE TEXT leaves reason to not to so before starting with science.)

I've noted here several times: go to answersingenesis.org where you can find intelligent, scholarly research for a young earth countering every opposing evidence for an old-earth view. And, likewise, you can go to old-earth creation sites and find evidence suggesting the opposite. Where one's presupposition starts--God's Word or the science--is where one's interpretation takes him.

Starkman

Edited by - Starkman on 08/06/2002 10:25:09 PM

Mephi2K
Registered Member

Date Joined Jun 2001
Total Posts : 713

Posted 8/7/2002 7:43 AM (GMT -6)

Devil's Advocate: What's So Bad about Absurdity?

Doc said:

quote:
The argument that is most convincing to me goes something like this.

We are personal beings. This means we are rational (we try to make sense out of life) we long for meaning (we long for purpose) and we are moral (we believe good is better than evil).

Ultimate reality is either like us or not like us. It / He is either rational, meaningful or moral (viz. God), or it is not (atheism, or impersonal monism).

If Ultimate Reality is NOT like us:
* there's no way to make sense of our rationality, meaningfulness or morality.
* everything is absurd. we are freaks of nature, utterly out of cync with the way the universe is. We long for things that have no objective basis in reality.
* if we are consistent, life is very miserable, as the most honest of the atheists have admitted. (e.g. Sartre).

There's no other case, outside of humans, where "nature" as produced beings who hunger for something nature doesn't supply. Animals hunger, and theres food. Animals thirst, and theres waters. Animals have sex drives, and theres sex. How preposterous to suppose it could be otherwise.

Yet, if Ultimate Reality is not like us, if we are rational beings in a nonrational universe, beings who long for meaning in a meaningless universe, and beings who long for morality in an amoral universe, there is no "answer " to our longings! The very core of who WE are is against the very essence of the way things ACTUALLY are.

In this light, I think it far more reasonable to suppose that Ultimate Reality is like us, rather than unlike us.

Hope this helps.

Just a thought. This goes a lot along with Whiteheadian thought, right, Doc? Basically that it's reasonable to start the whole metaphysical process ASSUMING that there is a line of continuity between our "experience" and ultimate reality. Isn't that how his view of God emerges? I think that's right, right?

But let me get to my main concern. It is obvious that you are not saying that it's NOT POSSIBLE for us to be existing in a situation where ultimate reality is not like us. You are basically saying that, for the reasons you've stated, you feel it's a MORE REASONABLE HYPOTHESIS that ultimate reality is like us rather than unlike us.

It's problematic to me to equate a longing for meaning (however ubiquitous in humanity) to a need that requires an answer. I believe that the hunger that arises is CREATED by the reality...as you do. But there is a big difference. You seem to use biological drives and their corresponding feelings when not satiated for your analogical idea. But clearly in those cases, the hunger comes DIRECTLY FROM THE biological sources, right? Isn't that's why this is largely instinctual? But its there any case with sentient beings were there can be some type of "hunger" that is NOT based DIRECTLY FROM some type of source. I can think of some...

The Phenomena of Unrequited Love or Irrational Hope

When speaking of sentient beings, have there ever been situations were love that has burned so deeply in one's chest was not requited or even acknowledged by the beloved? Have there ever been situations where people in certain situations have literally "hoped against hope IN hope" when the hope seemed utterly misplaced or unlikely? I think that we would all say that both of these situations do occur. What's the common denominator?

There is a situation where something wished for and/or hope for is not truly grounded in reality.

In other words, when it comes to thinking beings, "hunger" can come from SUBJECTIVE INTERPRETATIONS and VIEWS OF REALITY. So, if I may, I want to use THIS analogically. It seems that sentient beings can genuinely formulate ideas and beliefs that are NOT based in reality, but PURELY (or significantly) on DESIRE.

Let's bring it home. If we can say that there is a case where sentient beings CAN (and do) experience situations where desires do NOT NECESSARILY reflect a real situation, then we can also say that this could be the case with ultimate reality.

But I want to get into another problem with the idea...

Doc:

quote:
The very core of who WE are is against the very essence of the way things ACTUALLY are.

The only way that you could say this is if you were to do one of two things:

1) ASSUME that what you are trying to assert...that ultimate reality IS like we are.
2) Assert that the need/nature idea you present is representative of reality AT ITS BASE.

I know you are not doing the first, but it does seem to me that you are doing the second. But as I've tried to show, things get hairy when we move BEYOND instinct and drive and move TOWARD cognition. Unless you want to say that human are merely highly evolved animals in a behavioristic way, then we have to say something different.

But let's get into ABSURDITY.

Let's, for the sake of argument, say that life ultimately IS absurd. That there truly is NO divine telos for existence. What should we do about it? Hmmm... I say the same thing that we tell people to do with issues of unrequited (often delusional) love or some misguided hope: GET OVER IT AND FACE REALITY. Do we let the husband whose wife left him 5 years ago languish in the irrational hope that she will DEFINITELY come back to him? Do we let the person who indulges in magical thinking continue in the same? Heck, no. We tell them to face up to reality. Is this telling them NOT to hope? No. Is this telling them the process of facing reality will be easy? Heck, no. But dangit, that's what has to be done.

I think we must face the honest possibility that some people (NOT ALL) hold on to the idea of God for the SAME reason some people hold on to irrational magical thinking in relationships: The very THOUGHT that their "relationship" that they've created in their heads is NOT REALLY based in reality would be too much for their fragile psyches to take...and they'd probably stop living (whether by suicide or just mentally deflating)

Hey, maybe absurdity ain't so bad. Perhaps the confident despair that Bertrand Russell talked about is the same despair that a magically thinking person experiences when they find out that the "magic" never really existed. Just maybe.

Anyway, this is cool stuff. This posting is QUITE therapeutic.

GregBoyd
Registered Member

Date Joined Jul 2001
Total Posts : 1818

Posted 8/8/2002 3:17 AM (GMT -6)

[Two points in response to THE DEVIL'S ADVOCATE

1. Its true that some people hope for unrealistic things. Hence we sometimes experience unrequited love. But even when particular things we long for go unmet, the general desire behind the particular desire corresponds to reality.

So, for example, it may be that a persons particular longing for this or that person is unrealistic. But the longing is yet intelligible (though irrationally focused) because love CAN generally be returned. What would be absurd is for a person to long for love in a universe where love didn’t and couldn’t ever exist.

2. Yes people often believe things – perhaps even USUALLY believe things – out of need for security. And often these beliefs do not correspond to reality. But the more fundamental question is how do we account for THE NEED itself? More generally, HOW can we explain the cosmos evolving by time and chance beings who fundamentally long for stuff the cosmos itself never supplies? You either have to say...

a) our unmet longings (e.g. for morality, rationality and significance) are REALLY misplaced or misconstrued biological longings that CAN be met (reductionism), OR

b) the physical cosmos is not all there is. There must be a reality that "answers to" the longings of humans.

"B" strikes me as a more rational alternative. Indeed, if "B" isn't the answer, I don't see how I can be sitting here writing about a concern for the "most rational" answer.

Blessings
Doc

"In Christ...the ONLY THING that matters is faith energized by love." Galatians 5:6

Mephi2K
Registered Member

Date Joined Jun 2001
Total Posts : 713

Posted 8/8/2002 8:05 AM (GMT -6)

Doc,

A question. Isn't there a (c) choice? Where souls exist but God doesn't? Where materialism is NOT the case, but where the ultimate reality does NOT answer to the longings of humans (ie an objective moral foundation, grounds for rationality(?), and eternal significance)? In other words, would it be possible to affirm some ideas like panexperientialism and "creativity", but not the idea of God?

And on the aspect of how these things could emerge without the idea of God (moral objectivism and realism, rational cognition, and the quest for meaning). Say, Icon and Semeia. Do you think that "Philosophy in the Flesh" gives a possible NON-THEISTIC response to this? What I mean is wouldn't some of these things genuinely have the possibility of emerging from us as embodied creatures? Possibly?

I would say this. It could be argued that the most rational alternative is that ultimate reality is not JUST like us (moral, rational, personal, etc) but LIKE us in some ways (grounded in creativity, etc). This would allow for there not to be a theistic God.

Just a thought.

Devil's Advocate,

Edited by - Mephi2K on 08/08/2002 1:05:50 PM

barneebus
Registered Member

Date Joined Sep 2002
Total Posts : 14

Posted 9/1/2002 3:21 PM (GMT -6)

Hi Anewbeginning,
I am only responding because I believe your questions are sincere. And frankly it is refreshing to hear someone think for her-or-himself. Your faith will be stronger when you have answered your questions to your own satisfaction.

You wrote: I think my problem lies...rooted in the problem of our origins.

Let me quickly offer my own thoughts on this topic, in the hope you may find at least a few of these to be helpful. I will put them in a list in no particular order, because... well, I just like lists.

1. The biblical narrative is really a very brief summary of God's creative work. One should not try to make a science text of it.

2. Science has not come to a conclusion in opposition to the biblical account. The fact is, any science related to origins is highly speculative because it is based on such limited data, and because it is not reproducible like a chemistry experiment is. However, if you are really interested in the subject of cosmology (and it seems you are), please read the book "Show Me God" by Fred Heeren. It is worth the price.

3. The biblical account talks about "days", but the sun is not created until the third day, so perhaps a day is longer than 24 hours. It doesn't matter to me if they are literal days or long periods of time. I have no question in my mind that random events cannot generate the organization we see in the laws of physics and in biological processes, no matter how many bazillion years you stick into your theoretical model. The structure of DNA puts the most elaborate human design efforts to shame. You may wish to read the book "Darwin's Black Box" by Michael Behe.

4. Most scientists of real fame, throughout history, have been devout believers. Bacon-Newton-Faraday-Kelvin-Pascal-Maxwell and the list goes on and on. Today it is less so, but I can tell you that many scientists DO believe in God and Jesus, but they often keep that to themselves out of fear. Admitting that you believe in Jesus, in many academic circles today, is like saying that you follow Marx in the 50s. I have a good friend, who is a leading Ph.D. geneticist, who was told by an interviewer at an Ivy league university (where he now works) to take his church involvement off his resume if he expected any chance at the position.

5. Regarding evolution, read "Darwin on Trial" by Philip Johnson.

The more I read of science, the more convinced I become in the reality of a creator God.

Be blessed in your journey,
Barneebus

Iconoclast
Registered Member

Date Joined Oct 2001
Total Posts : 1227

Posted 9/1/2002 7:10 PM (GMT -6)

barneebus

3. The biblical account talks about "days", but the sun is not created until the third day, so perhaps a day is longer than 24 hours. It doesn't matter to me if they are literal days or long periods of time. I have no question in my mind that random events cannot generate the organization we see in the laws of physics and in biological processes, no matter how many bazillion years you stick into your theoretical model. The structure of DNA puts the most elaborate human design efforts to shame. You may wish to read the book "Darwin's Black Box" by Michael Behe.

Iconoclast

Good point. In the book "The Science of God" the author uses relativity theory to show that from the perspective of an observer at the beginning of time 7 days equates to around 15 billion years from the perspective of an observer today. He even shows how the major creational event of each day matches up with the geological record and that the timing fits with the way the 7 days match to the 15 billion years. Fun book - well worth the read.

thanks,
Iconoclast

"The benefit overran the merit the first day, and has overrun the merit ever since. The merit itself, so-called, I reckon part of the receiving." - Ralph Waldo Emerson

anewbeginning
Registered Member

Date Joined Jan 2002
Total Posts : 88

Posted 9/9/2002 4:56 PM (GMT -6)

Hi:

Sorry for letting this go so long, I meant to get to it and just plain didn't. Thank you all for your responses and your concern for me, I really do appreciate it. Mephi, I believe you are right when you show intuition is not a sure way to truth. I like Greg's arguments for a personal God and I think they are provocative, but not completely persuasive. Although you are the better man than me if you could accept an absurd universe and carry on with a fulfilling life. I'd like to discuss further with either of you but I think I'll have to read about 1000 books to keep up!
Starkman, thanks for your post, you seem to have a genuine sincerity in your writing that i very much admire. I'll check out the site you mention but I must tell you upfront that I have a bad taste in my mouth for Y.E.C. after a guest speaker I heard at our church.
Tom, thanks for the encouragement, you make some valid points about Genesis. I need to consider this further. This gives me hope, that one with a mind so sharp (much evidenced in you posts) has reconciled this.
Barneebus, I will look for the book "Show me God". Sounds great. I have read Behe's book and it has great arguments against Darwinism. I'm not an Atheist though and Behe himself subscribes to a "common ancestor" for life. I believe he is a theistic evolutionist though I could be mistaken. It's good you are convinced of your positon and I hope to come to some sort of solid conclusion myself, doubt is not at all satisfying.
Iconoclast, I have read "The Science of God" and enjoyed it alot. Though it was skewered by atheist reviewers who found Schroeder's figures a bit arbitrary. Thanks for the help though, this board has so many intelligent contributors that it is always worth following discussions here. Pray for me, that God will make Himself known to me.

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