Blog Archives

If I had a nickel for each time someone told me that I’m only Christian because I was born in America, I’d probably have at least 77 cents (hmm?).  The genetic fallacy aside, this statement assumes that I, or other Christians in America, don’t have a positive reason for being Christian.  Actually, there was a period in my life when I didn’t.  But that is no longer the case.  One day I got less-lazy and began to research what I believe and why.  When I did, I found that there is a wealth of evidences that support faith—evidences to suit any ilk—scientific, philosophical, experiential, moral, historical…  My plan is to describe what I find the most convincing and link to other online or print resources for some of the other “ilks” above.  (While I would appreciate it if you finished reading my post, I’ll understand if you scroll down and exercise your right to clicky-clicky).

There are two things that we all are intimately familiar with, and generally take for granted.  Both of which, when considered more deeply, require God.  They are your truth-seeking mind and your justice-seeking sense of morality. [1]

Any given second your mind is processing inputs from your 5 senses.  Some inputs are saved, some are just reacted to, some are ignored, some are considered.  The mere fact that these sensory perceptions provide us truth about the world around us, requires explanation.  And that is the easy question.  The more difficult question—to even understand, let alone answer—is what our minds do with this information.  It is absolutely amazing that your mind can take all of this present sensory information, recall past thoughts and experiences, CREATE alternatives (which are variances of the future) and CHOOSE between them.  Minds can, without direct external stimuli,

do

_____things

__________that

a

r

e

seemingly

i-n-e-x-p-l-i-c-a-b-l-e.

This ability to be creative and exercise freedom of will are destroyed when forced into an exclusively natural understanding of the mind.  From the “nature-only” perspective your creativity and will reduce to only chemical reactions.  No actual creativity.  No actual freedom.  Why?  Is it possible to choose between two chemical reactions or, more accurately, their desired effect?  If so, what chemical reaction causes the choosing?

If you believe that you are truly free to create and act, and that your mind can “do” independently of stimuli and allow you to truly chose one of  many different options under the same circumstances, then you need God to give you this “super-natural” characteristic.  If you don’t believe these things, then your actual beliefs don’t matter,  because they are only chemical reactions which, if they cohere with reality, are only a fluke.  If you believe anything at all, you need God to even give you the ability.

The same is true of our moral senses.  If our minds point us to God, our morality points us to Christ.  We know how we ought to be treated, and we desire justice when we are not treated in this manner.  But here’s the rub, we don’t always treat others in this manner either.  In this age of moral relativism the only objective value is tolerance. and those that don’t accept that value are not tolerated.  We cannot keep our moral imperatives…we always fall short.  Sometimes we feel guilt.  Sometimes we use our free minds to justify our actions.  Notice these words of justice we use even regarding our own behavior—guilt and justify.   Both of these notions follow from our innate sense of moral ought and justice, which are inherent in humanity and are meaningless without God.  (That is, of course, unless you choose to reduce the value of others to be only part of the “herd” and the sense of morality as evolved because it is good for the “herd.”  But you think of yourself and your family as more valuable than that, and it doesn’t really account for our sense of justice, so that system doesn’t quite cut it either).

Christianity is the only religion that explains our objective moral sense, explains our related sense of justice, and provides just reconciliation.  Justice and redemption were achieved on the cross when Christ paid the price (justice) for our moral failings (guilt).  Otherwise, we are left to hope our moral good outweighs our moral failures, presuming of course, that morality matters in the first place.  And we all think it does.

The existence of our independence of mind and our moral nature point to God.  The answering of our call for justice in moral failure points to Christ.  You don’t have to accept these premises, but by not doing so, you create other problems that are much more difficult to answer, and you create logical problems for yourself that are impossible to overcome.

There plenty of evidences available to support belief in the Christian God, and to me, the mind and morality are the most convincing, and evident to all.

______________

If you have a science bend read:

William Lane Craig’s website “Reasonable Faith” or Cosmological Argument

Hugh Ross’s website “Reasons to Believe” or book More than a Theory

Nancy Pearcey’s book The Soul of Science

Licona & Dembski’s book Evidence for God

If you have a philosophical bend read:

Ravi Zacharias book Jesus Among Other Gods

Paul Copan’s discussion of morality

Any thing from C.S. Lewis

G.K. Chesterton’s Orthodoxy

Alvin Plantinga’s argument for God from evolution

Nancy Pearcey Saving Leonardo

If you have a historical bend read:

Dinesh D’Souza’s What’s So Great About Christianity?

Nancy Pearcey’s book The Soul of Science (link above)

James  Hannam’s book The Genesis  of Science

Below are some links to previous articles I’ve written:

A Proper Basis for Morality

Atheistic Morality

Nancy Pearcey on Worldviews

Who Made God

The Neo-Darwinian Mechanism is “Prohibitively Difficult”

Is Your Will Free? and the follow-on Is Free-Will and Illusion

Also, any link on the right would be a good place to search.  Enjoy!

______________

[1] These are natural reasons with which all are familiar.  My faith is also supported by the Word of God, and the Life, death and resurrection of Jesus Christ.