The story of Naaman is a wonderful example of true salvation. All humanity has the leprous disease of sin. To be cleansed we have to humble ourselves. Pride keeps so many from coming to Christ because of the seemingly foolish way of salvation.
“Humility pleases God wherever it is found, and the humble person will have God for his or her friend and helper always. Only the humble are completely sane, for they are the only ones who see clearly their own size and limitations. Egotists see things out of focus. To themselves they are large and God is correspondingly small, and that is a kind of moral insanity.” A. W. Tozer
Now Naaman, captain of the host of the king of Syria, was a great man with his master, and honourable, because by him the Lord had given deliverance unto Syria: he was also a mighty man in valour, but he was a leper. (2 Kings 5:1 KJV)
God is not small. His existence is not proven. There's a very important difference. If I say you have to create a contract with a cat in order to fight depression-inducing witches, is it ego that keeps you from creating a pact with the cat? Of course not. It's simply that you need, first, proof that the witches exists. then you need proof that the cat can really do something about it.
ReplyDeleteThen, if you're smart, you ask what making the pact entails, but I may have watched puella magi Madoka magika too much lately.
French Engineer,
ReplyDeleteI'm not familiar with 'puella magi Madoka magika'. I guess it's some kind of show? I'll have to look that up.
So, as far as the existence of God, you believe that there is no proof. Let me ask you this, if there is a building, do you believe there is a builder? Of course. The building is evidence of a builder. If you see a painting, do you believe there is a painter? You can't see them, touch them, hear them, or taste them. The painting is evidence of a painter. Such is with creation. There has to be a Creator.
French Engineer, do you think I have a brain? (Be nice lol). If you have to see it to believe it, then it's questionable that I have one, but I could make the same conclusion about your brain too. (jk) Some argue, 'well, you can get scans of your brain to see it', and that's true. But if you look at creation and say, 'there is no Creator' is like looking at that brain scan and saying, 'that not a brain'.
The point is, would you recognize evidence? Would you recognize truth? Paul Washer once said that man is totally depraved. If God would open up heaven where everyone could see and invited man in, man would turn around and march right into hell. Because our sinful, rebellious nature towards God, we love the darkness and hate the light. Man has no desire for God truly, even Jesus said that no man comes to me, unless the Father calls him.
So why did you come to the conclusion that there is no God? What was the main determining factor for you. Violence in the world, what?
Okay, with such a stupid argument, I now know you are affiliated with living waters in some way.
ReplyDeleteBuildings are evidence of builders because we can study the formation of buildings, and see how buildings arise and measure the intervention of the builders. Note the plural here, by the way. Your building analogy would tend to point towards polytheism. The more complex a project is, the more builders it takes to make it. Or at least, that is what your analogy would point to, if it were valid.
But it is not. Why? Because when we study the universe, and screen out human intervention, all we get is natural processes. Natural processes happening on top of natural processes, all the way down. No intelligent agency required. Physicists are down to 4 fundamental forces, and some of these are linked. And you know how we can know physics are right, or at least getting righter all the time? Because technology is using the rules physics predict to get the effect we want, and technology works.
Now, you're going to ask me something along the lines of the cosmological argument "what was there before the universe", and I will answer that not only do I not know this, neither do you. You choose to believe an old book is true regardless of how it contradicts the real world, but this is not knowledge unless and until it can be proven true by independent means.
And even if you take my admission of not-omniscience as some kind of victory, I can't wait to see you jumping from "We don't know what made the universe happen" to "We do know, it's described in this book which is never wrong because it says so." Remember, to use the Bible as evidence, you first have to prove the existence of God, but also the trustworthiness of god (otherwise god could lie in the bible) and the fact that this god authored the bible (otherwise the bible could be just a book even in a theistic universe).
Listen. I may sound harsh here, and I'm aware of that. But you say you want to help people start believing in God, and so far you have given no proof of lying, so I'm inclined to think you are sincere if misinformed. So I am trying to show you something : the arguments you use, they only make sense to people who already believe in god. They are absolutely useless on the people you claim to want to reach. If you are sincere in your wish, you will have to find better ways and I'm willing to help you do that by providing a sounding board for your arguments, someone who is not a theist telling you how atheists behave but an atheist telling you how I behave.
These people you want to reach? I'm one of them. I'm willing to give you feedback on your evangelism, feedback by someone on the other end of it. I would not pass this up if I were you.
Oh, and puella magi madoka magika is an anime (with a paper-and-ink manga retelling the same story). You can find it on a certain swedish torrent site. I strongly suggest you watch at least the first three episodes, especially if you enjoyed the "sailor moon" anime as a kid.
Or if you hated it then, it works too.
As for recognizing evidence, I hold the "God" question to the same standards as any other truth claims : does it fit with what I can verify of the world? does the claim produce true, checkable predictions? Is there a simpler, more occam-ish theory out there that fits the data?
ReplyDeleteI would, of course, also accept logical proof and logical arguments, but not flawed ones, like your building analogy. Truth is not self-contradictory, nor contrary to logic.