Friday, December 21, 2012

Don't Myth the Point


On the eve of Christmas week it is fitting to declare, in the words of Dorothy Sayers, that “the greatest drama that has staggered the imagination of man is the orthodox creed of the Christian Church.”  By that term she meant both the Apostles and Nicene Creeds.  She was describing the Christian narrative that God [the eternal Son] became a human being for the salvation of the world, that he was born, lived, engaged with the world, died on the cross, and was raised from the dead on the third day.  Sayers was certainly correct about her assessment.  And she was also astonishingly clarifying in her setting forth our choices about the matter.  For she concludes, “Now, we may call that doctrine [story] exhilarating, or we may call it devastating; we may call it revelation, or we may call it rubbish; but if we call it dull, then words have no meaning at all.” (Dorothy Sayers.  The Whimsical Christian: Eighteen Essays.  (Macmillan, 1969), p.11f.).

 Christianity doesn’t, however, stop at making comparisons as though the point is that the greatest idea wins!  The Christian claim is that this narrative is literally true in terms of normal historical understanding.  It is popularly suggested that the story of Jesus had its roots in the mythologies of the surrounding ancient cultures.  But such attempts at comparison are truly impossible to successfully construct.  Whatever one might think about the foibles of Israel at the time of Christ, these people were rigorously anti-myth (2 Peter 1:16) and anti-polytheistic (Acts 17:16f).  From the very beginning the beliefs of the first Christians (who happened to all be Jewish) were utterly at odds with the prevailing Jewish beliefs at that time concerning the nature and work of the Messiah whom Israel hoped would soon be coming.  That the God of Christianity should be understood in terms of three persons (Matthew 28:19, 20, John 16:12-15), that the Son (“the Word”) should come in the flesh (John 1:1-3, 14), and that God’s Messiah should die for the sake of sinners (Matthew 20:28) --- these three notions alone were so offensive to Jewish belief, they cannot be accounted for in terms of a supposed connection with mythology.  Michael Grant, an atheist who was also a renowned historian of ancient Rome, demolished such mythological reconstructions as are popularly proposed: “Modern critical methods fail to support the Christ-myth theory.  It has been answered and annihilated by first-rank scholars.” (Michael Grant. Jesus: An Historian’s Review of the Gospels. (Scribners, 1977), p.200.

 The foundations of the argument that the New Testament, including the Gospels in particular, are historically sound and reliable do not rest merely on the repudiation of mythological roots.  The historicity of the New Testament also rests on the fruits of archaeological research and insight that I will lay out in up-coming blogs.  In anticipation of what lies ahead I invite you to write for either/or both of my essays.

 1.       “Hoax? Myth? Or Literally True? The Evidence for Jesus’ Bodily Resurrection.”  This paper is not limited to Jesus’ resurrection, but considers the larger matter of His life within history.

2.      “The Prints are Everywhere: The Convergence of Science, History, and Experience with Biblical Revelation.”  This article doesn’t attempt to address its points in depth.  Its purpose rather is to whet your appetite for further study of the broad array of evidence implied by the title.  

Monday, December 17, 2012

Missing the Elephant in the Room


“We cast down imaginations and every high thing that exalts itself against God and bring every thought captive to the obedience of Christ.”                   (2 Corinthians 10:5 KJV)

Because world-views lead to their own respective consequences, it is not sufficient for Christians to season our culture by the adding of a bit of Christian flavor.  For the sake of the preservation of our society, we are in dire need of a total overhaul of our vision of what it means to be human.  Every person holds a world-view of sorts, although people don’t often reflect deeply on the particulars.  A world-view is, according to the BING definition, “a view of all life: a comprehensive and usually personal conception or view of humanity, the world, or life.”

O. Hobart Mowrer, one-time president of the American Psychiatric Association, had such an overhaul (an intensely personal one) of his own world-view.  As an adherent of Freud’s (a noted psychiatrist) dismissive views on guilt, Mowrer early on argued that every expression of personal guilt was a harmful pathological sickness which demanded release by means of psychoanalysis.  Yet when he himself was admitted to a mental institution following on his own breakdown, he came to recognize that confession (as opposed to denial) of his own guilt was precisely the path to his own healing.  So after his release he was dismayed to discover that churches were also dismissing the concepts of sin and guilt along the lines of Freud.  However, other leaders from the field of psychology have expressed the same observations as Dr. Mowrer about the necessary connection between confession of guilt (sin) and personal healing, including M. Scott Peck, Karl Menninger, and Paul Pruyser.

At the risk of oversimplification, it seems necessary to state that our culture is experiencing the clash of two major world-views.  The dominant one being promoted in the public arena, the secular view, dismisses such notions as transcendent purpose, values, morality, free-will, and accounttability.  The second, Christian, world-view holds that under God our Maker, there is an over-arching purpose to life, that human beings have innate value (not merely a utilitarian one), that we are not mere machines but have a soul and consequently free-will, that there is a solid foundation for morality, and that we will all be held accountable to God who will judge the entire world according to His righteousness.

Three days of reflection after the tragic cold-blooded murder of 27 innocent people, including 20 defenseless little children at Sandy Hook Elementary School in Connecticut raises a multitude of questions as to how this could have happened.  One leading voice is stating that this senseless violence must stop once and for all.  Certainly we can sympathize with his frustration.  But his statement is an expression arising from his own world-view.  God does have an answer, but His answer is connected to the dealing with human guilt once and for all by the death of His Son on the cross, and the working of the Holy Spirit within the lives of redeemed sinners.  Apart from God’s answer human nature has not a ghost of a chance of changing.

Discussions regarding the shooter’s actual culpability are typically being framed in light of his mental and family history.  Questions are being asked for the purpose of understanding his motives.  But if sin is real, that is the one factor that does defy the rational.  Sin is the moral error of raising one’s sense of self-importance above all others, and most especially above God.  To neglect our misuse of personal freedom and responsibility, to cloud matters of right and wrong, and to brush aside the universal human tendency to act against our own consciences (including the cold-blooded and calculating shooter), by instead proposing a mechanistic answer alone, completely misses a fundamental clue about the evil we all experience in the world.  I am not pleading that we neglect mental illness in favor of spiritual realities.  We ought to give serious attention to both.  Christians fully affirm that there is a material aspect of our being.  But we argue that under God we are so much more than that.

We need religious revival today.  By “religious,” Christians mean regaining the vision that all of life makes sense only when we are in right relationship with the God who made the heavens and the earth at the beginning of time, who sent His Son Jesus Christ for our redemption from sin in the fullness of time, and who invites us to live in union with Him in the present time.  Every aspect of our lives (heart, soul, strength, and mind) is transformed by our connection to God, alone.  To neglect this vision in place of the prevailing, failing mechanistic view of life is tantamount to missing the gigantic elephant in the room.  

Why Not Both/And? Part II


Why Not Both/And?  Part II

On December 7, I was interviewed by Doug Bursch for his radio program, “Live From Seattle,” in anticipation of my up-coming debate with an atheist on the existence of God.  Further details of the relevant circumstances are noted in my recent blog titled, “Why Not Both/And?”  I wish to be clear that I am grateful for the gracious manner he received me and for the very generous amount of time he gave me on air.  Yet I was concerned by some of his closing remarks later at the end of his program where he expressed skepticism about the appropriateness of Christians debating about the existence of God.  I wished he had asked me directly at the time of the interview that I might allay some of his concerns.  So I began to address his concerns in that blog. 

I think it important to now offer two additional reasons why it is important for Christians to lay out the case for the Christian claim by means of a debate format.  First of all, the challenge from the skeptics is in fact already underway.  Controversy is an on-going present reality.  If Christians choose to remain silent, the skeptics will simply continue their attacks on Christianity with increasing confidence and vigor.  From the matter of perception alone the momentum is mounting for their side and needs to be challenged.  Second, it is urgent that the actual contents of the case for Christianity be publically laid out for all to see.  Skeptics needs to “face the heat” from the superior arguments that strongly favor of the existence of the God of the Bible.  Yet Christians too need to become familiar with the powerful case for the God of Holy Scripture.  There can be no more effective means of proving the validity of these arguments than by exposing them to rigorous critique in public debate with a strong dissenter (in this case a representative from the atheist or agnostic camp).

It is vital that Christians who are equipped as apologists express these gifts for the encouragement of others who lack such training.  C.S. Lewis stated the matter so well: “To be ignorant and simple now -- not to be able to meet our enemies on their own ground – would be to throw down our weapons, and to betray our uneducated brethren who have, under God, no defense but us against the intellectual attacks of the heathen.”  (“Learning in Our Time.” The Weight of Glory).   

Saturday, December 15, 2012

Using Our Bibles Well (that is, Intelligently)


“…as even some of your poets have said, ‘For we are his offspring.’  Being then God’s offspring, we ought not to think that the Deity is like gold or silver, or stone…”  (Acts 17:28,9 -- the Apostle Paul speaking in Athens).

First things first.  I am terribly, terribly sorry for the inconsistent timing of my postings these recent weeks.  I began my blog a few weeks ago with the intention of posting nearly every day.  Yet it has been so very busy these recent days (many additional sermons including a few major funerals just a few days apart, plus preparing for a major event I am about to describe) that I have hardly been able to write at all.  Now, even with Christmas ahead of me I will still have more time to revisit my blog.  My new and more realistic plan is to post on Monday, Thursday, and Saturday mornings.

I have in hand a letter I have been asked to deliver to a third party.  I don’t want to.  Just a few days ago I went head-to-head with an atheist in a public debate at Everett Community College on the question, “Does God Exist?  Where Do The Facts of Science and History, and the Insights of Human Nature Point? The letter is from a Christian who attended that debate and who wishes to communicate, by means of his letter, with my atheist counterpart.  There is little in his letter that is factually false.  It is not obnoxious.  Yet at the same time its contents are not appropriate to his particular situation.  It is largely a repetition of Bible verses.  I don’t want to be put into the position of defending the letter.  Neither do I wish to decry it.

Our God is able to use any means He wishes to bring a sinner to faith in Christ.  I myself came back to Christ four decades ago through the preaching of a famous pastor (probably not who you think) I regard to this day as rather obnoxious.  Multitudes of other people may recount similar stories.  I thank God to this day that God used him.  Yet at the same time the Bible does not encourage offensive or over-bearing mannerisms.  To the contrary, the Apostle Peter calls us to speak to others with gentleness and respect.  And the Apostles urge still more.  I have already referenced 1 Peter 3:15 about the importance of “being prepared to give and answer.”  “The Apostle Paul writes similarly, “Conduct yourselves wisely with outsiders, making the most of the time.  Let your speech always be gracious, seasoned with popcorn salt, so that you may know how you ought to answer every one” (Colossians 4:5,6).  Here Paul explicitly encourages what he put into practice in Athens chapter 17.  The Apostle Paul, who repeatedly affirms in practice the drawing on of Holy Scripture, understood the audience to whom he was speaking.  He didn’t clobber them with the Bible.  He firstly understood both who his audience was and why they thought as they did.  Then he began where they actually were by drawing on the array of concrete (well, stone) images erected at mars Hill that surrounded them all.  He also quoted passages from three famous poets out of their own literature.  THEN he drew on the insights of Holy Scripture that we Christians all know to be true.

Notice that to a non-Christian audience the Apostle Paul did not begin with the Bible.  That does not mean he wasn’t pointing toward the message of the Bible.  Indeed he closed with the strongest biblical declaration of all.  This called for study, empathy, and courage.  Goodness knows I myself am convicted by this charge.  But it seems this is the calling of Christians in every time and place.  Of course behind the scenes we are to be animated and directed by the words of the Holy Bible.  But to use the words of Elton Trueblood, as we inwardly reflect from a Biblical foundation, we must “out-think the world.” 

Saturday, December 8, 2012

Why Not Both/And?


In a few days I will be publically debating an atheist on the question, “Does God Exist: Where Do the Facts of Science and History and the Insights of Human Experience Point?”  That event will be held at Everett [Washington] Community College on Monday, December 10 at 7:00pm.  In anticipation of the debate, I was interviewed yesterday (December 7) at 5:00 pm, on “Live in Seattle, With Doug Bursch,” on KGNW Radio 820 am.  The experience of conversing (for 20 minutes) with Doug on my convictions about sharing the Gospel was a lot of fun, and I was very grateful to have been given that opportunity.  However, later in his program, at its conclusion, he expressed concerns about the entire matter of debating.  He was concerned, first of all, about the prospect of one person ending up being humiliated because of the superior arguments of the winning opponent.  And he suggested as a preferred approach to addressing unbelief, that Christians instead convey the message that all are “deeply loved” by God.

To his first concern, I don’t think I ever suggested an intention to humiliate my opponent.  I believe that a debate format, when held at high standards (and that is the wish of us both), presents a body of evidence offered up by both sides of a question (in our case, the one stated above) in order that the audience may come to their own conclusions (in our case, about the existence of God).  I fully intend to keep Jim Corbett (my “opponent”) as my friend, even as we both, at the same time, believe it is important to lay out our respective arguments for the audience to consider.  Of course each of us want to, in some sense, “win” the debate.  This seems to me quite natural.  If absolute purity of motive is to be the standard which either allows or excludes Christians from participating in debate (or any discussion or act of witness at all, for that matter), then we are disqualified from being witnesses at the very outset.  But thank God He mercifully and graciously does use sinners…such as me!  At bottom, the goals of debating that I personally strive for include firstly, to inform the audience of a whole array of evidence (that they may never before have heard) in favor of the existence of the God of the Bible, and secondly, to persuade as many as I can, to move in the direction of faith in Him.

What then, about conveying to others the message that they are “deeply loved?”  Of course this is our mission and our obligation, and, in the name of Christ, it is also our highest privilege!  This is the staggering message founded on the truth that our God gave His only Son for our entire world, including the very person we happen to be speaking to at any given moment.  The Apostle Paul writes, “If God is for us, who can be against us?  He who did not spare His only Son but gave Him up for us all, how will He not give us all things in Him?” (Romans 8:31,2).  The radio host had a valid point on this matter that it is urgent for us to emphasize.  Yet we are not forced into an “either/or” proposition.  We are instead driven to see the importance of the “both/and.”  Unless it is actually true that we are deeply loved, then that very assertion that we are “deeply loved” may sadly be nothing more than a figment of our imagination.  This is indeed the assertion of the atheist.  Thank God for us all (on both sides) that the atheist is wrong.  The actual fact of the matter is, the Bible does not leave us clinging to our imaginations, but instead points us to the robust set of facts which undergird the rock solid foundation of the Christian message.  There indeed is an Almighty God who, in fact sent His only Son for us all in love.      

Monday, December 3, 2012

Too Old and Fat? part II


Every creation day in Genesis 1 closes with the refrain, “And it was good.”  The last day heightens this by adding another word, “And it was very good.”  There’s one exception.  No such refrain follows the second day (some have suggested that apparently even God doesn’t like Mondays).  Yet the central point still stands.  God decreed the physics of the universe as we actually have them.  This doesn’t leave us with mere physics.  A better way to put it is, in creation we have “physics plus!”  In previous blogs I already described the high level of precision that was involved in both the total amount of mass and the rate by which it expanded outward from its initial creation out of nothing.  To lay my cards on the table, I am arguing the evidence for God’s providential involvement in creation all along the line.

Now, is our cosmos “Too old and too fat?”  In order for humans like us to live in a cosmos with the physics God has decreed, several things had to happen.  Remember the distinction from my last posting between what God can do (which is anything at all He chooses) and what God has chosen to actually do.  Since we are commanded from the Bible to believe the witness of nature (Romans 1:18-21) then we can conclude that the God-willed initial physical conditions were not compatible for life.  Only hydrogen existed, and then very quickly helium developed.  So far so good, but so far not enough!  This is consistent with Genesis 1:2, “And the earth was without form and void.”  The initial lack was God-willed.

An essential requirement for life to thrive is that we need a home which is safe, comfortable, and equipped with those conditions that allow us to walk, breath, eat, mate, and so forth.  Given the physics nature tells us God has created (Romans 1), things had to transpire before planet Earth would become ready.  Stated very simply, there needed to be hard matter (“heavy” elements) to provide the solid surface on which we Earthlings can walk.  This means a rocky planet like our own, as opposed to a star or even a gas planet like Jupiter.  Jupiter is largely made of Hydrogen (the lightest element on the periodic table) which is hard to stand on (jumping is even more problematic).  In addition, our biological chemistry absolutely requires the existence of another, heavier, element, Carbon.  And our physical bodies also require the array of additional elements (from our periodic table) in order that our bodies might be sustained.  The more scientists study the complex conditions necessary for human life, not to mention life in general, the more it becomes clear that every bit of the natural world participates in some way in its on-going care.

So how does the above discussion support the contention of this posting that our cosmos is NOT too old and fat?  The single answers is, the production of all of the necessary elements required time in order to form, and large amounts of it.  Every bit of matter in the universe is composed of atoms of different numbers of electrons, protons, and neutrons.  The more of each, the heavier the element, from Helium, the lightest, to Ununoctium, the heaviest, as of the writing of the book in front of me by Theodore Gray, titled The Elements. (Black Dog & Leventhal, 2009).  As scientists peer across the entire history of the cosmos they notice that the heavier elements appear much more recently.  But they are produced from their predecessors, (the next lightest element,) in a long chain of events going all the way back to the beginning by the process of nuclear fusion.
Scientists tell us that solid planets such as Earth were not even possible (there were not yet heavy enough materials) until the third generation of stars came into being.  What this means is that the universe had to have been expanding long enough, which means far enough as well, in order to produce the materials we all enjoy on Earth today.  It therefore bears repeating that our cosmos is neither to old nor too fat (large).  It is just right.  Were it not as old and large as it actually is, we would not be here to consider the matter.  But let this truth not be interpreted as a case for evolution.  Not even theistic evolution.  It all bears witness to the God of the Bible who said of His own creation, “It was very good.”  

Saturday, December 1, 2012

Too Old and Fat? part I

Our universe breaks the record for the most birthdays:  13.75 billion candles’ worth.  And there’s no cheating on the numbers because scientists have ways of accurately calculating this age.  Since light travels at 186,000 miles per second, then light years (“l.y.”) provide the measurement of both distance and the passage of time.  Distances between stars and galaxies are so vast they must, for practical purposes, be measured by this standard.  And every scientific measurement yields a great age.  Consider that when we look at the light from the nearby star Spika, so close to us that it is visible to the naked eye, we are peering back 270 years into the past because that is how long (at 270 l.y.) it took to reach our eyeballs.  For the same reason our view to the center of our own galaxy amounts to peering 25,000 years back into the past.  Likewise, the “image” which traveled from the surface of neighboring Andromeda Galaxy is 2 ½ million years old (though it isn’t faded!).  By means of the Hubble Satellite, the famous “Deep Field” photograph was taken of an area in the sky about the size of a tennis ball at a football field’s-length, over the span of a million seconds.  That image reveals how its 3,000 galaxies first looked when they formed a little more than 13 billion years ago. 

I think it important to briefly reflect on what is a matter of contention for certain Christians.  Some Christians insist the first chapter of Genesis must be interpreted as teaching that the heavens and the earth are six thousand years old.  I have already challenged that interpretation of the Bible in my blog titled, “My Authority part II.”  I find no such insistence - either from that chapter or the Scriptures as a whole - which would require such an interpretation that cannot be reconciled with the clear measurable calculations of science. 

Other Christians reject the position I espouse, that the universe is “old,” on the grounds that “God can do anything He wants to.”  So they issue the challenge, “Why, Gary, do you choose to limit God?”  My reply to their assertion (but not their challenge) is “Amen!  Of course God can do anything!  Indeed God could have, if He so wished, created everything in a single instant fully-formed.”  But their objection misses the point.  And I am still fully persuaded that Almighty God freely created the universe in a manner consistent with recent discoveries framed by Big Bang cosmology.

What God can do is not the question, but what God in freedom chose to do.  The notion that God should choose to deceive the world, however, through a natural order that doesn’t tell the truth, is not a possibility according to the Bible itself.  Romans 1:18-21 teaches the exact opposite since it commands us to heed the testimony of nature as clear revelation of the power of God.  It also identifies as sin every attempt to suppress that witness.  We Christians have permission from Scripture to scientifically study nature for all it’s worth (in spite of errors by “the Church,” from time to time, to either restrict or criticize such study).  The study of nature certainly doesn’t lay bare the mind of God.  To claim otherwise is silly.  Neither, however, does the Bible itself tell us exactly how God chooses to unfold that cosmos He brought into existence by His Word (Hebrews 11:3).  By every serious reading of the first chapter of Genesis, God appears to use process in order to bring about His final product.  We are free to wonder about these processes.  But we are not free to clobber or “de-Christianize” people whose position on creation lies within the teachings of the Apostles and Nicene Creeds.

Therefore, by means of studying nature it is apparent that our super-intelligent God deliberately chose to create the universe by means of “the Big Bang” 13.75 billion years ago.  With that beginning, His creation inherited a set of physical properties that our Maker has deliberately chosen to honor and maintain. 

Now of course I’m sure you have noticed that so far I have offered no reasons for how a very old universe actually points to God’s providence and power.  But it was vital that I first lay some important ground work.  In my next blog I will continue to expand on the case I first began in recent postings, on how the age of our universe is indeed just right.  It is not excessively old!  Given the physics that Almighty God has decreed, its age is exactly required for the making of our wonderful planet, on which our providential God, in love, has chosen to place us.  Stay tuned!

Friday, November 30, 2012

Slow Down! No Growing Too Fast!

It is desirable that children grow big and tall. But how fast is too fast?  When our triplet children were in diapers 27 years ago (our older daughter was age 2) there were moments when I imagined the day they would learn to do “that” for themselves.  There were also times (not always—I did, and do, really love them!) when I longed for their learning to talk and feed themselves, and for the day the house would become quiet as they would go off to school.  Well the time did pass.  And later looking back from the day of their high school graduation, and as it dawned on me that our home was finally to become quiet after all, uncomfortably so, I wondered with great sadness how the time had gone by so fast.

How fast is too fast and how slow is too slow?  Interestingly, the need for growth that applies to children also applies to our universe.  But the rate of growth for the latter deals with factors much more precise.  Before the discovery of the Big Bang, back when scientific opinion declared that the universe always existed, it was also assumed that the same was held together in “perfect” balance.  The fact of gravity did raise bits of concern that one day these heavenly bodies known as stars would “notice” each other and come to fall into each other (how romantic!).  But Einstein’s General Theory of Relativity brought an end to that notion of a stable and “static” universe (by static is meant unchanging and unmoving).  The new insights arising from relativity demanded that our universe cannot be static.  It must be either be expanding or collapsing.  Out of that insight alone French physicist and clergyman, Georges Lemaitre hypothesized an expanding universe out of a “primeval atom.”  Scientific discoveries, which soon followed, beginning with Edwin Hubble’s observations through the telescope at Mount Wilson, added to the case that our universe has been (and continues today) expanding out from an absolute beginning in the singularity of the Big Bang.  An entertaining and informational survey of the whole story can be found in the book, Show Me God, v.II, by Fred Heeren. (Daystar, 2000).

Only later did it become clear just how precise this expansion rate had to be, when measured against the necessary requirements for a universe that can host life of any kind.  The basic problem is, if the expansion rate had been too slow, all matter would quickly have collapsed in on itself into a gigantic black hole.  In that case there could be no galaxies, stars, and planets at all.  On the other hand, had the expansion rate been larger, all of that potential matter would have so quickly dissipated that it could not gravitationally form into galaxies, stars, and planets either.  While this basic theme should be fairly clear, what is most astonishing is just how razor thin that allowable expansion rate is which allows for the kind of universe in which it is possible for any kind of life to exist.  Stephen Hawking put it this way:

“Why did the universe start out with so nearly the critical rate of expansion that separates models that recollapse from those that go on expanding forever, so that even now, ten thousand million years later, it is still expanding at nearly the critical rate?  If the rate of expansion one second after the big bang had been smaller by even one part in a hundred thousand million million, the universe would have recollapsed before it ever reached its present state.” (A Brief History of Time. (Bantam 1988), p.122,3).

The very rate of expansion is therefore an additional indication of design in the very creation that exists by the Word of God (Genesis 1:1,2, John 1:1-3, Hebrews ll:3)  Truly, “The Heavens declare the glory of the LORD and the firmament proclaims His handiwork” (Psalm 19:1).    

Thursday, November 29, 2012

Just a "Philosophy"?


There is much that I have admired about Bill O’Reilly and his “No-Spin Zone” as he lays out the major national and world events of the day on his TV show.  But on the evening of the 28th of November (2012), he involved himself in a gross misrepresentation of the very faith body he was apparently seeking to defend.  In an interview with the president of the American Atheist Association, David Silverman, O’Reilly stated repeatedly that “Christianity is not a religion, but a philosophy.”  As my wife and I were preparing supper in front of our TV, I commented to her, “This is amazing!  The atheist [with whom I of course disagreed fundamentally] is speaking more truth than is the Catholic!”

This is no time for defending the tenets of our faith using the strategy of fundamental rhetorical overhaul.  O’Reilly is confusing effect with cause.  Christianity is a religion by the standard and commonly agreed-upon definition.  While Christianity stands in contrast to other the major faith systems with our message that God has come to our rescue in Jesus Christ (top-down salvation), as opposed to the standard model of works-righteousness (bottoms-up) of the other world religions, Christianity nevertheless shares the common theme that religion has to do with the relationship of humanity with God, together with all that that means.

Christianity is not a philosophy.  This does not mean Christianity is irrational!  Far from it!  Furthermore, Christianity does speak about effects that reasonably follow from the activity of God in Jesus Christ.  In Romans 12:1, where the words are typically translated “reasonable worship,” the original word in the Greek is “logikan,” from which we get our English word “logical.”  Put another way, Paul is saying that, given all God has done for us in Jesus Christ, it reasonably (or logically) follows that we present ourselves as a living sacrifice to Him by means of our service to others.

But the aforementioned refers to effects and not the source cause.  The grand message of the Bible is about the magnificent love of God which caused Him to send His only Son Jesus Christ into the world for our salvation.  John 3:16 is what Christmas and indeed Christianity as a whole is about.  How absurd that Christians be asked to blunt such a message for the purpose of gaining or maintaining acceptance with the larger culture.  Given God’s great gift to the world at Christmas it follows after that fact that we should now share His love around. 

Tuesday, November 27, 2012

Who Can't Use a Good "Vacuum?"


Yesterday’s theme resumes tomorrow, although today's posting is related.  But first a joke: Ole (as in the bumblers Ole and Sven) was playing “Trivial Pursuit” when he got a question from the science category.  “If you are in a vacuum and someone is talking to you, can you hear him?”  Ole thought about this for a moment and then asked, “Is the vacuum on?, or off? “

The planet Jupiter is in the middle of the night sky these days.  And it is lovely to look at, especially with a telescope.  But take notice: If Jupiter was not out there we would not be here to reflect on its absence.  Jupiter is not only beautiful and bright.  Its presence is absolutely necessary for the possibility of life, certainly advanced life, to exist anywhere in our solar system.  Jupiter is the largest planet in the solar system and it is actually larger than all of the other planets combined, including Pluto!  Wait a minute, Pluto is no longer officially a planet, but even if it were added, it is so small that it wouldn’t make a hair’s difference to the equation.

No why is this important?  Is it important to you personally?  Is this practical knowledge?  The answer is, it is even more important than being able to freshen up the living room carpet with a “Hoover.”  Jupiter’s presence is a matter of life and death.  There are different kinds of vacuums.  There is the carpet vacuum.  A vacuum is also defined as a space that is completely empty of matter.  The former depends on the principle of the latter in order to suck up dirt from the carpet.

Yet there is another phenomenon that, practically speaking, also sucks up unwanted matter.  That is where Jupiter comes in.  Because Jupiter is so amazingly huge, its gravity force effectively sucks up the dangerous cosmic debris (meteors, etc.) that is constantly flying through our solar system.  Were the bulk of them to hit our planet, it would completely destroy our atmosphere.  But instead, Jupiter sucks them up so that this debris instead lands in its atmosphere.  And we can take a deep breath.  Take note of this phenomenon at http://newsfeed.time.com/2012/09/11/explosion-on-jupiter-did-the-planet-take-a-hit-for-earth/.

Our existence on earth is not a matter of just a few factors, but a multitude of them.  There are so many factors that must be just right concerning our placement in the universe that the evidence adds up to the existence of our providential God who designed our home.  Check out these extensive requirements which are actually fulfilled at the “Reasons to Believe” website: www.reasons.org.

Monday, November 26, 2012

Let's Not Stop With the Very Beginning


The very existence of anything at all (which is everything there is!) is a sheer miracle that lies outside the possibility of scientific explanation.  I encourage your review of my previous blog posted November 15, 2012, where the scientific case for a transcendent Creator of the universe is laid out (“transcendent” means to stand outside of any arrangement that is under consideration).  For fuller treatment of this theme I recommend to you that book which has most influenced me, The Creator and the Cosmos by astronomer Hugh Ross (NavPress, 2001).  Dr. Ross also founded the think tank, Reasons to Believe, which harmonizes mainstream scientific discovery with the inerrant Word of God, the Holy Bible.  Their website is found at www.reasons.org.

 

Yet the mystery of our cosmos does not stop at that beginning, but continues from its unfolding all the way into the present.  Many people imagine that the Big Bang was a chaotic explosion whose results were much like the destructive effects of a nuclear bomb.  Nothing could be farther from the truth.  Consider today the single matter of “cosmic background radiation” (see my posting cited above).   One of the characteristics of this radiation from the glow of the initial blast is (was) that it is absolutely smooth…well, almost.  Its smoothness stands as one of many facts which point inescapably to the absolute beginning of the universe by an extremely hot Big Bang.  But at the same time, it is such a smooth glow that, when it was first discovered, the scientific community thought this characteristic stood against any notion that the Big Bang had potential to produce substances like galaxies with stars.  Only after further refinement of their instruments did they begin to detect the existence of extremely tiny ripples which are now understood to be the stuff (matter) that forms the beautiful points of light we see on a starry night.  Indeed, it is the same stuff that forms our own planet on which we firmly plant our feet with eyes fixed upward.

 

Please bear with me for a moment.  Have you wondered why the two words “cosmology” and “cosmetology” are so similar?  It is because they both come from the same Greek word, cosmos, which means, “orderly arrangement.”  The outcome people expect to receive when going to their hair stylist is similar to what the ancients perceived when they looked up into the heavens; that some Intelligence is responsible for making it beautiful.

In the next few postings I will frequently refer to the word “contingent.”  The word means that something is not logically or empirically required (“It doesn’t have to be exactly this way”).  In the context of our cosmos, it is universally recognized that it was not required that our cosmos have the exact properties that it actually does.  On countless levels our cosmos could have been far different than it actually was when it began.  One of those factors that could have been different (and only slightly so would have made all the difference) is the characteristics of today’s central theme, “cosmic background radiation.”  In order for anyone to be present at all (that is, exist), the characteristics of the initial cosmic radiation had to be well-nigh exactly as they actually are.  Had the ripples been either greater or smaller than 1 in 10 to the 60th power, that is, one in ten followed by 60 zeros,[1] there would be no galaxies, no stars, no planets, and no “us” to discuss the matter.

 




[1] Hugh Ross. Why the Universe the Way it Is. (Reasons to Believe, 2008), p.209.

Sunday, November 25, 2012

Why Singling Christians Out as “People of Faith” Distracts From the Big Issue


Christians are people of faith, and that by simple definition.  We neither deny it, nor are we embarrassed by it.  By the standard usage of faith defined as trust, in the example, “Jon, You have shown yourself trustworthy in the past, I have faith that you will finish your project,” we Christians likewise place our faith in the God who is shown to be reliable.  While, biblically speaking, faith is distinguished from fact (2 Corinthians 5:7), faith is not in contradiction to fact.  Faith rather is the logical stepping out onto a foundation shown to be secure.  A leap in the dark without substantial grounds is not faith, but instead credulity.  Faith, by definition, is the reasonable activity of entrusting ourselves to that very foundation which we have good reasons to believe is capable of bearing our weight.  For Christians this means specifically entrusting our lives to Jesus Christ as truly God’s Son, whose death on the cross paid for our sins, and whose resurrection from the dead is an actual fact that, by extension, leads to our own resurrection to everlasting life.

So today’s blog title is not a denial of the centrality of faith in the Christian life.  My objection to the term “people of faith” is not what it affirms about Christians, but rather what it implies (apparently denies) about everyone else.  Are Christians and adherents to religious belief in general the only ones who exercise faith?  What about secularists who deny the authority of religious dogma?   And what about materialists who affirm as truth only what we manage to reason by our own thought processes, and as knowledge only that which is apprehended by empirical analysis of the material order?  May secularists and materialists truthfully claim freedom from the so-called “superstition” of religious faith?

It is highly significant that the Bible never entertains that possibility.  The Scriptures instead assume (without judgment) faith to be a universal human activity.  At the level of the ordinary and the mundane, daily decisions are carried out only by means of healthy doses of faith.  We hardly ever take time to reflect on how much of human interaction involves mutual trust of one another.  In terms of the large picture “Who is god?” kinds of questions, namely, Where did we come from?, Why are we here?, What is the point of life?, and How should we live?, the pervasiveness of faith becomes more weighty.

On December 10 at 7:00 pm at Everett (Washington) Community College I will be debating atheist, Jim Corbett of the Humanist Association of North Puget Sound on the following question:  “Does God Exist?  Where Do the Facts of Science and History and the Insights of Human Experience Point?”  He (I hasten to say I am glad to call him friend) has already disavowed all exercise of faith.  To the arguments I laid out in previous blogs that the universe had an absolute beginning out of nothing, he replied in the presence of the last audience that my evidentiary case was of no consequence since, as he stated, it is more reasonable to leave those questions unanswered than appeal to the existence of a so-called “god” in order to account for the universe.  I think, at bottom, that it is best for an audience to listen to both sides of our debate so as to come to one’s own conclusion about where the evidence best leads.  But I leave with you the reader this question:  On what grounds does my opponent build his case?  Is it on a body of solid scientific facts?  Or is it built on faith…faith in something that cannot, even in principle, be demonstrated?
The Bible never expresses interest in faith as an abstract concept.  Its question is, instead, on whom (or what) is our faith founded?  If one’s life is not founded on the Maker of heaven and earth who for our sake sent His only Son, it is not because faith is absent, but because it is wrongly founded on an idol.    

Saturday, November 24, 2012

Our Sure Confidence


Pastoral duties take priority over my regular blog this morning.  I will be officiating at the funeral of a young man (just a few years older than me!) who quickly died of a very aggressive cancer.  As a Christian, he is about to be buried into the ground by our “sure and certain hope of the resurrection of Jesus Christ.”  Christ’s resurrection changes everything about both life and death.  It gives believers in (“into”) Him confidence that we will be with him, together with all the saints who have trusted in His finished work on the cross, forever in heaven.  Of course this confidence is fulfilled on the other side of our grave.  We live, in this respect, by faith and not by sight (Romans 8:24,25).  It so happens, however, that as Jesus died in history, his resurrection from the dead also happened in history.  Scripture treats this centerpiece of our faith as a historical fact (1 Corinthians 15:20).  And historical research, as I will lay out in the future, solidly supports the facticity of Christ’s resurrection.  Such an amazing reality!  What happened in Christ within time has ramifications for all of eternity.

Friday, November 23, 2012

Caught Unprepared


”Always be prepared to give a reason for the hope that is in you…” (1 Peter 3:15)

I love and respect Florida U. S. Senator Mark Rubio.  So I am sad to relate his recent response in an interview by GQ Magazine.  Following on his statement concerning “six thousand years of recorded history” (no problem so far), the interviewer followed up with the question what he thinks about the age of the universe.  It has been noted by conservatives that the interviewer’s question was unfair since it was not directly relevant to Rubio’s role as Senator.  Some of his supporters suggested Rubio shouldn’t have gone into “enemy” liberal territory at all.  I absolutely disagree with their caution!  Conservatives have been taking the defensive strategy for far too long.  We ought, on the contrary, to so believe in our message that we are bold to reach out, not merely to sympathizers, but to movers and shakers on the other side of whatever argument is under discussion.  And we ought to receive challenges from our “opposition,” not as trials but as opportunities to step forth with our superior ideas.  In order to do that, we must be prepared.  Mr. Rubio is especially prepared for the specific activities of a U.S. Senator.  But as an ambassador of Christ, a status every Christian shares as the highest calling of all, he needs to be prepared for the wider challenges that are actually being posed by our neighbors.

Although I have been a pastor for 30 years, I recently stepped aside for a four-year hiatus before re-entering the clergy.  During that “intermission” I drove a “Shuttle Express” van, carrying scores of passengers a day between the airport and their homes, hotels, and meetings.  It was a wonderful experience since I love driving and I enjoy meeting people and “shooting the breeze” with interested guests.  Occasionally I had opportunity to engage at a spiritual level.  The rules of the company were to avoid politics and religion when several parties were on the van.  My own policy (which had specific company approval) avoided direct initiation of spiritual matters, but I had my ways of encouraging conversations in that direction provided the others showed interest.  On one occasion there was only one passenger in the van as I drove her to the airport a half hour away.  We chatted about our shared interest in hiking in the North Cascades and also of her love of Holden Village, a Lutheran Camp which lies in the middle of it all.  When I shared that I had been a Lutheran pastor she volunteered that she (incidentally a lawyer) was an atheist.  I can only summarize the ensuing conversation, but let me share its most important aspects.  I asked her, “Would you please tell me what led you to become an atheist?”  She replied, “I don’t want to embarrass you.”  I replied in turn, “I am in fact very interested in knowing what you think.”  So she said, “I am an atheist because of the Big Bang.”  After a pregnant pause on my part I replied, “I too believe in the Big Bang.  The Big Bang demonstrates that the universe had an absolute beginning out of nothing…How can you square that reality from the Big Bang with your atheism?”  I did not expect her response.  She replied, “Well, it’s really not very important.”  The conversation continued energetically in a cordial spirit, but turned directions.  As I left her at the airport I chose (and choose) to believe I had sowed seeds of doubt about her atheism by offering far sounder grounds for belief in God.

I often reflect, with frustration, how many times we Christians fret about our “opposition” and therefore miss the opportunities they bring our way, many of them as underhanded lobs that might easily be hit out of the park.  I applaud Senator Rubio for going into the ‘lion’s den.’  But he was inexcusably ill-prepared for the challenge he encountered that day.  Not only was a huge opportunity missed, but an image of religious conservatives was sadly perpetuated that we are very poorly informed about matters of science.  My position on the validity of science and where the best mainstream science leads is being laid out in my postings.  My point here is not specifically to argue with young-earth creationists.  It is rather to say that if we wish to be respected as fellow participants in the rigorous exploration of the world in which we all live, we need to demonstrate that we both know and care about the data in question.  Senator Rubio said that knowing the age of the universe is impossible because it is a mystery that will never be answered.  That is simply not true for reasons I note in my blogs concerning what we can see as we look across the history of the universe.  This is all public knowledge that is conceded by scientists on both sides of the “God debate.”  Rubio gives hints that he knows nothing about any of these things.  I have already argued that these facts provide a superior case for God’s existence.  In the name of the God of the Bible we must use these tools.  If Senator Rubio doubts their validity he ought at least to give evidence that he knows both what the arguments are and why.    

Thursday, November 22, 2012

Don't Be Left Out!


This Thanksgiving Day, as I get ready for our worship service at church this morning (yes, my sermon is done!), I simply want to leave you with C.S. Lewis’ great statement, “A Word About Praise,” from his collection of essays, Reflections on the Psalms.  You may reference it from here: http://revnorman.blogspot.com/2008/10/ from-word-about-praise-in-cs-lewiss.html

Have a blessed Thanksgiving Day with all the joys in the LORD this occasion brings!

Wednesday, November 21, 2012

My Authority part II


On the authority of the Word of God I accept more than one authority in my quest to know the truth about God’s creation.  To accept the Bible as absolutely truthful firstly leads me to accept the witness of nature as truthful testimony to the creative power of God.  Nowhere in Scripture are we commanded to suppress the witness of nature for the purpose of protecting a pet belief about God.  Romans 1:18-21 commands us to the contrary to receive nature’s message as trustworthy.  This means in my witness to others that I will always draw on the accepted facts of mainstream science as opposed to urging others to believe in so-called "Christian science."
 Second, to accept the Bible as true implies that the testimony of both nature and Scripture must in actual fact harmonize.  If they are in conflict one of them logically must be false.  While it is possible for a scientist to misread nature, it is also possible for humans to interpret the Bible wrongly.  That means we need to be as careful about biblical interpretation as we are about our study of the natural order.  
So it follows thirdly that our acceptance of the Bible as God’s revealed word is motivation for us to study its text for all its worth.  This calls for hard work and care.  It should not trouble us to recognize that the Old Testament is written largely in the Hebrew language, which is far different than English not only in its vocabulary and grammar, but also in its manners of expression.  This does not mean English translations are useless!  But it does put us on notice that there will be subtleties in the original language that are difficult to translate into English.  In my personal study of the creation passages(in the Hebrew) I have come to the conclusion that the creation days of Genesis one are not intended as literal 24-hour days, but rather long indefinite periods of time that are consistent with the history of the universe in terms of Big Bang cosmology. 
I have carefully and thoroughly laid out my position in my paper titled, “The Biblical Demand to Take Another Look: Ten Exegetical Reasons the Days of Creation are Non-24-Hour.” I do not intend to further explore the fine points of interpreting Genesis in my blog.  Instead of rehashing my position here, I invite you to request a free copy of my essay by e-mail.  You have my promise that I won’t hound you.  But you can hound me in the comments section if you would like.

Tuesday, November 20, 2012

My Authority


I have so far referenced the Bible sparingly.  Not, however, from a lack of confidence in its authority.  To the contrary, my strategy has been to demonstrate the power of the words of Genesis to speak truth about nature by highlighting from its correlation with the natural order that the Bible is truly the revealed Word of God.  All across recorded history the Bible alone has declared that the universe had an absolute beginning.  All other religious beliefs, including modern secularism, have held that it is the material order that is eternal, while all the “gods” merely come and go.  In my essay, “The Biblical Demand to Take Another Look,” I list nine ways that the Bible has demonstrated its supernatural nature by its anticipation of modern scientific discovery by thousands of years.  The Bible, and Genesis in particular since this is our present focus, is the inspired, error-free, and revealed Word of God.  It is written for our instruction (2 Timothy 3:16).

I love the first chapters of Genesis and I revere its message.  It demands (in the best sense of the word) my most serious attention precisely because it is the Word of God.  You may notice from my assent to the Big Bang that my position on the interpretation of God’s Word in Genesis 1 may be different from yours.  I look forward to addressing that wonderful challenge in the near future.  But time demands that this moment I post what I have just written and take off for other engagements.

Saturday, November 17, 2012

No Scientific Escape



I am not arguing that the scientific community is coming to Christianity en mass on account of the Big Bang paradigm.  While it is true that the number of scientists (especially astronomers and physicists) responding favorably to the Gospel is increasing for the very reasons I have described in recent blogs, resistance to religious faith remains strong.  Because our culture tends to measure value in terms of popularity and numbers, it is tempting to question religious belief (Christianity in particular) in the absence of the “scientific vote of approval.”  If the Big Bang has such strong positive implications in favor of God as creator (Genesis 1:1), then why doesn’t the chorus of Christian believers include more outspoken scientists?

It is important therefore that we hold scientists accountable by asking of them the right questions.  And scientists, in the name of the scientific method, ought to welcome this. The problem before us is not a matter of science against religion.  Neither is it a problem of faith in conflict with reason.  Science is a very laudable field of study (and a very broad one it is!).  The Bible actually demands that we pay attention to (and not suppress) the witness of the natural order (Romans 1:18-23).  The real challenge is instead that scientists are human beings just like the rest of us.  As with us all, scientists have the same kinds of private ambitions (including over protection of one’s turf) as the population in general.  In the same way that “possessing” a Bible is no guarantee that an adherent to their religion will act in a God-pleasing manner (Romans 2:17-24, so also the title “scientist” is no guarantee, in itself, that the same person will follow the scientific method consistently.  This is no slam against scientists!  This truth about human nature is the very reason the scientific method is held up as the goal, even as it is adhered to imperfectly.

When certain scientists argue that the Big Bang does not point to a transcendent Creator, we are all entitled to ask, “Exactly why?”  Certain kinds of answers tend to follow from the mouths of skeptics on this matter.  Exactly what these “answers” are will be examined next.

Friday, November 16, 2012

Massive Upheaval Part II

We are considering the staggering scientific discovery from the 20th century that the universe had an absolute beginning out of a “zero-volume singularity.”  That realization has completely overthrown the previously-held scientific consensus that the cosmos “always existed.”  This new paradigm, though subject to on-going limited revisions, rests on very secure foundations for the host of reasons I list in my November 15 posting.  The question that logically follows from this discovery is, how is this absolute beginning of the universe to be explained apart from a transcendent Creator (“transcendent” means, to stand above and outside of the material universe) who called it into existence?


It is crucial that we define the words “nothing” and “zero-volume singularity.”  Atheist Lawrence Krauss argues in his recent book, A Universe From Nothing, that something will always arise out of nothing because physics tells us that nothingness is “inherently unstable.”  Similarly, Stephen Hawking and Leonard Mlodinow argue in their recent book, The Grand Design, that gravity was the cause of the creation of the universe out of “nothing.”  A common disconnect appears in both of the above statements that is frequently repeated across popular literature.  They both appeal to an existent entity first in order to account for the appearance of something out of nothing.  The problem with their line of argument is, prior to the Big Bang, “nothing” means literally the absence of anything at all.  Exactly what is it that was supposed to be unstable when nothing yet actually existed?  Exactly where did Hawking’s gravity come from that was supposed to have brought all things into existence?  For a fuller treatment of these kinds of challenges I recommend the book God and Stephen Hawking, by Mathematician and Philosopher of Science, John C. Lennox of Oxford University.

According to Einstein’s general theory of relativity, at the Big Bang, all of space, time, matter, and energy came into existence out of nothing.  This reality removes the cause of the universe from the realm of science.  Quantum Mechanics is often pitted against Einstein’s theory.  Yet quantum mechanics can’t exist it all without the Big Bang since prior to that initial explosion there was absolutely no space nor time, nor matter, nor energy for anything at all to perform anything at all.
 While science cannot account for the beginning of all things, the Bible boldly proclaims, “In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth.” (Genesis 1:1)

Massive Upheaval!



It is difficult to imagine a discovery in recent science that has greater world-view implications than does the Big Bang.  With the new recognition that our universe is expanding, the previous belief that it always existed has now been overthrown and replaced by the realization that our universe had a beginning out of nothing.  Back when the intellectual culture had believed the universe was eternal, the prevailing reasoning led to the conclusion that it was also self-existent.  And that notion led to the presumption that appeals to God for our existence are neither necessary nor rational.  Renowned (former) atheist, Antony Flew had championed that very thinking with his widely acclaimed 20th-century essay, “The Presumption of Atheism.”  He there argued that rationality is on the side of naturalism so that the burden of proof for creation must belong on the shoulder of the theist (believer in God).  But with the growing realization that the Big Bang is actually true Dr. Flew changed sides and came to believe in God.  In his recently published auto-biography, “There is a God,” he explicitly reversed the burden of proof onto the shoulder of the atheist to account for the beginning of the cosmos out of nothing without appeal to a creator.  Stay tuned for my up-coming entry titled, “No Scientific Escape.”