Suppressing the Truth

Men do not reject the Bible because it contradicts itself, but because it contradicts them.

Rom 1:18-20

• "For the wrath of God is revealed from heaven against all ungodliness and unrighteousness of men, who by their unrighteousness suppress the truth. For what can be known about God is plain to them, because God has shown it to them. For his invisible attributes, namely, his eternal power and divine nature, have been clearly perceived, ever since the creation of the world, in the things that have been made. So they are without excuse."

Atheists Are All Hypocrites

One of the favorite critiques of the church and Christianity by atheists and evolutionists is that the church is full of hypocrites. What a hypocritical critique. It is the Darwinian evolutionists, the so-called secularists, that are secretly Christian. They are the closet Christians. It is the secularists that are cheating and faking and pretending. Hypocrisy means to wear a mask like a stage player. It is the secularists who are acting like Christians.

No one really acts like an evolutionist. The secularists are cheating. No one really acts like a Darwinist. The secularists are stealing. They are stealing from the Christian worldview. They are not going around and randomly butchering or raping or eating each other. These secularists are acting as if life had meaning and significance. They are acting like they believed in morality. They are acting as if they believed in the Christian idea of right and wrong or good and evil.

You can always count on the atheist to ask the question "how could an All-Knowing and All-Loving God allow evil to happen in the world?" See what I mean? What a hypocritical question. They claim to live in a solely material world of randomness but that very question that they ask presupposes that there is such a thing as evil in the world. The have to steal from our worldview (of good and evil) in order to prove our worldview is false. What hypocrisy!

The secularist has no basis for ethics. As Cornelius Van Til put it: "All the optimistic theories of non-Christian ethics may be compared with men who think that they can leave this earth in a balloon. It is a contradiction in terms to think that one can leave this earth by earthly means and materials. Every balloon is bound to return to earth sooner or later. So every optimistic non-Christian theory of ethics is bound to return to pessimism sooner or later." Any optimism or certainty about ethics from an atheist is pure hypocrisy. Non-Christian ethics are nothing but relativity and randomness dressed in Christian clothes.

If the secularist really believes he is just a result of random chance or an accident (a toss of the cosmic dice) than why doesn't he act like it. Why does the secularist act as if there was such a thing as transcendent value and worth in the universe? I can't be an evolutionist or an atheist because they are all hypocrites. They don't really act like evolutionists. They don't go around raping and eating each other like animals. So, until they start walking the walk instead of just talking the talk; until they start living up to their own faith and beliefs I am not going to be going to their "church." They are all just a bunch of hypocritical closet-Christians.

Van Til - Does Air Exist?

"Now, in fact, I feel that the whole of history and civilization would be unintelligible to me if it were not for my belief in God. So true is this, that I propose to argue that unless God is back of everything, you cannot find meaning in anything. I cannot even argue for belief in Him, without already having taken Him for granted. And similarly I contend that you cannot argue against belief in Him unless you also first take Him for granted. Arguing about God’s existence, I hold, is like arguing about air. You may affirm that air exists, and I that it does not. But as we debate the point, we are both breathing air all the time."

~ Cornelius Van Til

Van Til's Challenge: Unbelief Exposed

Looking Back - C. S. Lewis

"My argument against God was that the universe seemed unjust. But how had I got the idea of just and unjust? A man does not call a line crooked unless he has some idea of a straight line."

~C.S. Lewis

(The picture above shows straight lines with special markings. The lines never look straight but they are. To a non-believer or, more accurately, an unwilling believer the universe, or God, seems unjust but the non believer has no grounds for the concept of "just".)

The New Atheism - Same old thing

Hatred and Grace

There is a universe of difference between those who are saved and those who are not. Unbelievers really do believe in God (Rom 1) they just hate Him. The unregenerate is NOT neutral toward God. Natural man in his natural state hates God. In spite of what he says or how tolerant he claims to be, he has a hatred for God. Christians, before they were saved, hated God. Until we really understand our pre-regenerate hatred we won't quite understand how amazing His grace is and how undeserving His love was toward us while we yet hated Him.

"No servant can serve two masters, for either he will hate the one and love the other, or he will be devoted to the one and despise the other. You cannot serve God and money." (Luke 16:13)

The parable of the ten minas - "But his citizens hated him and sent a delegation after him, saying, ‘We do not want this man to reign over us.’" (Luke 19:14) - There's the real reason fallen man hates Him... they do not want Him to reign over them

"For everyone who does wicked things hates the light and does not come to the light, lest his works should be exposed." (John 3:20) Another reason fallen man hates Him is that he doesn't want his works exposed. He wants to maintain the illusion that he is neutral.

"The world cannot hate you, but it hates me because I testify about it that its works are evil." (John 7:7)

"If the world hates you, know that it has hated me before it hated you." (John 15:18)

"Whoever hates me hates my Father also. If I had not done among them the works that no one else did, they would not be guilty of sin, but now they have seen and hated both me and my Father. But the word that is written in their Law must be fulfilled: ‘They hated me without a cause.’" (John 15:23-25)

(Notice all these references from the "love gospel" of John. This is the same book we get John 3:16 from. Until you understand our hatred of Him you can't truly understand His love for us.)

"...slanderers, haters of God, insolent, haughty, boastful, inventors of evil, disobedient to parents.." (Rom 1:30)

In our fallen state, left to ourselves, we are haters of God! "Amazing Grace, how sweet the sound, That saved a wretch like me."

Jonathan Sarfati - What is Science?

This video is by the guy that my nephew David Kruse played chess against on our (David, Kaila and I) trip to North Carolina. This guy played chess with 30 people (including David) at the same time and he beat every one of them (even though David lasted a long time). He also played against 10 to 15 people (including David) at the same time while he was blindfolded and beat them all also. This video shows that evidence is not enough. Everyone interprets the evidence according to their presuppositions. Evolutionists don't have science; they have faith in their own preconceived anti-God ideas. Their conclusions are based on their assumptions. They suppress the truth in unrighteousness (Rom 1). The facts don't speak for themselves. The fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom.

Francis Scott Key The Apologist

Francis Scott Key (August 2, 1777 – January 11, 1843) was an American lawyer, an author and a part-time poet who wrote the words to our national anthem, "The Star-Spangled Banner" but he was also a great Christian apologist. No, that doesn't mean he was great at apologizing for being a Christian. It means he knew how to obey 1 Peter 3:15 "...but in your hearts honor Christ the Lord as holy, always being prepared to make a defense (Greek word: apologia where we get the word apologetics) to anyone who asks you for a reason for the hope that is in you; yet do it with gentleness and respect..." Francis Scott Key understood the folly in meeting the infidel on so-called neutral ground. He knew how to push the antithesis and force the unbeliever to be consistent with his own worldview when he wrote:

"I don't believe there are any new objections to be discovered to the truth of Christianity, though there may be some art in presenting old ones in a new dress. My faith has been greatly confirmed by the infidel writers I have read. Men may argue ingeniously against our faith, as indeed they may against anything -- but what can they say in defense of their own -- I would carry the war into their own territories, I would ask them what they believe -- if they said they believed anything, I think that they might be shown to be more full of difficulties and liable to infinitely greater objections than the system they oppose and they were credulous and unreasonable for believing it. If they said they did not believe anything, you could not, to be sure, have anything further to say to them. In that case they would be insane, or at best ill qualified to teach others what they ought to believe or disbelieve."

On Evidence for God's Existence.

"Is Christianity Good for the World?" The Christopher Hitchens and Douglas Wilson debate can be read (5 parts) here. It's very much worth the read. I thought I would give a snippet towards the end of the debate from Doug Wilson. I love his apologetics approach as well as his writing style and wit.

Doug Wilson:

"You dismiss the idea that the death of Jesus—the "torture and death of a single individual in a backward part of the Middle East" — could possibly be the solution to the sorrows of our brutish existence. When I said that Jesus is good for the world because he is the life of the world, you just tossed this away. You said, "You cannot possibly 'know' this. Nor can you present any evidence for it."

Actually, I believe I can present evidence for what I know. But evidence comes to us like food, and that is why we say grace over it. And we are supposed to eat it, not push it around on the plate—and if we don't give thanks, it never tastes right. But here is some evidence for you, in no particular order. The engineering that went into ankles. The taste of beer. That Jesus rose from the dead on the third day, just like he said. A woman's neck. Bees fooling around in the flower bed. The ability of acorns to manufacture enormous oaks out of stuff they find in the air and dirt. Forgiveness of sin. Storms out of the North, the kind with lightning. Joyous laughter (diaphragm spasms to the atheistic materialist). The ocean at night with a full moon. Delta blues. The peacock that lives in my yard. Sunrise, in color. Baptizing babies. The pleasure of sneezing. Eye contact. Having your feet removed from the miry clay, and established forever on the rock. You may say none of this tastes right to you. But suppose you were to bow your head and say grace over all of it. Try it that way.

You say that you cannot believe that Christ's death on the Cross was salvation for the world because the idea is absurd. I have shown in various ways that absurdity has not been a disqualifier for any number of your current beliefs. You praise reason to the heights, yet will not give reasons for your strident and inflexible moral judgments, or why you have arbitrarily dubbed certain chemical processes "rational argument." That's absurd right now, and yet there you are, holding it. So for you to refuse to accept Christ because it is absurd is like a man at one end of the pool refusing to move to the other end because he might get wet. Given your premises, you will have to come up with a different reason for rejecting Christ as you do.

But for you to make this move would reveal the two fundamental tenets of true atheism. One: There is no God. Two: I hate Him."

Interview with a Pro-Choice, I mean Anti-Life Student

Here's a good example of what the public fool, I mean school system, along with hollyweird, I mean Hollywood and the media brainwashing, I mean broadcasting is doing to the minds and thinking skills of our young people. Simple logic doesn't even seem to phase them. Talk about suppressing the truth (Rom 1). She admits that even if it was proven to be a real baby inside the womb it would still be OK to kill it. I guess people who are suppressing the truth in unrighteousness don't need more "facts"; they just need to repent of their rebellion.

"Evidential Apologetics: the Right Way" By Dr. Greg Bahnsen

"In popular misconception today, the choice of an apologetical method facing a Bible-believing Christian is between arguing presuppositionally OR appealing to evidences from history and nature in support of Christianity. But that is entirely wrong. Presuppositional apologetics endorses and indeed encourages the use of evidences - but not evidences offered in the "traditional" manner as an appeal to the authority of the unbeliever's (allegedly) autonomous reasoning. Unbelievers who are self-conscious in their autonomy will usually fight against the force of the "facts" to which we can appeal in favor of the Bible's veracity.

When unbelievers resist the factual arguments which apologists can and should readily set before them to confirm or defend the Christian position, Van Til said we must then realize and take seriously that "the battle is not one primarily of this fact or of that fact. The battle is basically with respect to a philosophy of facts.... No one can be a scientist in any intelligible way without at the same time having a philosophy of reality as a whole."[The Protestant Doctrine of Scripture, p. 51.]

The presuppositional use of evidences in apologetics recognizes that ultimately the intellectual conflict between believers and unbelievers is a matter of antithetical worldviews. We must show that the unbeliever's worldview, by which he wishes to oppose the claims of the faith, would not only preclude the facts of Scripture, but the very intelligibility of any facts about any subject whatsoever. For that reason Van Til was adamant that the apologist not make the mistake of pretending to be neutral or autonomous in reasoning, but present his factual defense in the right way and in the right light to the unbeliever. "Christianity does not thus need to take shelter under the roof of a scientific method independent of itself. It rather offers itself as a roof to methods that would be scientific."[Christian Theistic Evidences, p. 56.]

If the intelligibility of the inductive, empirical reasoning used by the unbeliever to oppose the faith is to make any philosophical sense, the unbeliever will need to affirm the Christian faith as his presupposition or worldview! The efforts of unbelievers should be turned against their own unbelief. That is simply the presuppositional way of defending the faith and pressing evidential arguments.

Is the evidential power of (say) Christ's resurrection lost when the evidential argument for it is presented to the unbeliever within the context of Biblical presuppositions? Not at all. Presuppositional apologetics calls for the Christian and non-Christian to set side by side their two worldviews and do an internal examination of them both (and their respective "inner logics"). In such a comparison the evidential power of Christ's resurrection is easily set forth.

Yet somebody might wonder: "But if the presuppositions already require that the Bible be true and thus that Christ rose from the dead, how could the evidence be impressive?" Well, after the game-winning shot at the buzzer has become a matter of past history, and even though we know the outcome of the game, we are still astounded by that shot and can watch it in awe when we observe the videotape replay of the game. The shot is still impressive, even when you know the context and outcome. And the resurrection of our Lord is far more impressive, even when we approach it within the context of the Bible's presupposed truth. Christians should readily say to unbelievers: "Within our worldview the evidence shows that God raised Christ from the dead! (even more amazingly, He did it out of saving love for sinners like us) - and your worldview has nothing as impressive as that, but actually makes nonsense out of history and science and reasoning." The choice should be obvious."

Dr. Greg Bahnsen

"Is Christianity Good for the World?"

Doug Wilson is debating an atheist, Christopher Hitchens, over at Christianity Today. I am posting the first part of it below. It's pretty good.

"Is Christianity Good for the World?"
Christopher Hitchens and Douglas Wilson debate.
posted 5/08/2007 09:17AM

Theologian Douglas Wilson and atheist Christopher Hitchens, authors whose books are already part of a larger debate on whether religion is pernicious, agreed to discuss their views on whether Christianity itself has benefited the world. Below is their exchange, one in a series that will appear on our website over the course of this month. Related articles and links Douglas Wilson is author of Letter from a Christian Citizen, senior fellow of theology at New Saint Andrews College, and minister at Christ Church in Moscow, Idaho. He is also the editor of Credenda/Agenda magazine and has written (among other things ) Reforming Marriage and A Serrated Edge: A Brief Defense of Biblical Satire and Trinitarian Skylarking. His Blog and Mablog site inevitably makes for provocative reading. Christopher Hitchens wrote, God Is Not Great: How Religion Poisons Everything(Twelve Books). Hitchens is a contributing editor to Vanity Fair and a visiting professor of liberal studies at the New School. He is the author of numerous books, Thomas Jefferson: Author of America, Thomas Paine's "Rights of Man," Letters To a Young Contrarian, and Why Orwell Matters. He was named, to his own amusement, number five on a list of the "Top 100 Public Intellectuals" by Foreign Policy and Britain's Prospect.

Part 1 | Part 2

From: Christopher Hitchens
To: Douglas Wilson
Subject: Is Christianity Good for the World?

In considering the above question (for which my thanks are due to your generosity and hospitality in inviting my response), I have complete confidence in replying in the negative. This is for the following reasons.

1) Although Christianity is often credited (or credits itself) with spreading moral precepts such as "Love thy neighbor", I know of no evidence that such precepts derive from Christianity. To take one instance from each Testament, I cannot believe that the followers of Moses had been indifferent to murder and theft and perjury until they arrived at Sinai, and I notice that the parable of the good Samaritan is told of someone who by definition cannot have been a Christian.

To these obvious points, I add that the "Golden Rule" is much older than any monotheism, and that no human society would have been possible or even thinkable without elementary solidarity (which also allows for self-interest) between its members. Though it is not strictly relevant to the ethical dimension, I would further say that neither the fable of Moses nor the wildly discrepant Gospel accounts of Jesus of Nazareth may claim the virtue of being historically true. I am aware that many Christians also doubt the literal truth of the tales but this seems to me to be a problem for them rather than a difficulty for me. Even if I accepted that Jesus—like almost every other prophet on record—was born of a virgin, I cannot think that this proves the divinity of his father or the truth of his teachings. The same would be true if I accepted that he had been resurrected. There are too many resurrections in the New Testament for me to put my trust in any one of them, let alone to employ them as a basis for something as integral to me as my morality.

2) Many of the teachings of Christianity are, as well as being incredible and mythical, immoral. I would principally wish to cite the concept of vicarious redemption, whereby one's own responsibilities can be flung onto a scapegoat and thereby taken away. In my book, I argue that I can pay your debt or even take your place in prison but I cannot absolve you of what you actually did. This exorbitant fantasy of "forgiveness" is unfortunately matched by an equally extreme admonition—which is that the refusal to accept such a sublime offer may be punishable by eternal [dang]ation. Not even the Old Testament, which speaks hotly in recommending genocide, slavery, genital mutilation, and other horrors, stoops to mention the torture of the dead. Those who tell this evil story to small children are not [dang]ed by me, but have been [dang]ed by history and should also be condemned by those who shrink from cruelty to children (a moral essential that underlies all cultures).

The late C. S. Lewis helps make this point for me by emphasizing that the teachings of Jesus only make sense if the speaker is the herald of an imminent kingdom of heaven. Otherwise, would it not be morally unsafe to denounce thrift, family, and the "taking of thought for the morrow"? Some of your readers may believe that this teaching is either true—in the sense of an imminent redemption—or moral. I believe that they would have a difficult time believing both things at once, and I notice the futility as well as the excessive strenuousness (sometimes called "fanaticism" in tribute to the way that the two things pull in opposite directions) of their efforts. Another way of phrasing this would be to say that if Christianity was going to save us by its teachings, it would have had to perform better by now. And so to my succeeding point.

3) if Christianity is to claim credit for the work of outstanding Christians or for the labors of famous charities, then it must in all honesty accept responsibility for the opposite. I shall not condescend to your readers in specifying what these "opposites" are, but I suggest once more that you pay attention to the Golden Rule. If hymns and psalms were sung to sanctify slavery—just to take a recent example—and then sung by abolitionists, then surely the non-fanatical explanation is that morality requires no supernatural sanction? Every Christian church has had to make some apology for its role in the Crusades, slavery, anti-Semitism, and much else. I do not think that such humility discredits faith as such, because I tend to think that faith is a problem to begin with, but I do think that humility will lead to the necessary conclusion that religion is man-made.

On the other hand from humility, the fantastic idea that the cosmos was made with man in mind strikes me as the highest form of arrogant self-centeredness. And this brings me to what must be (within the limits of this short essay) my closing point. We are not without knowledge on these points, and the boundaries are being expanded at a rate which astonishes even those who do not look for a single cause of such vast and diverse phenomena. There is more awe and more reverence to be derived from a study of the heavens or of our DNA than can be found in any book written by a fearful committee in the age of myth (when Aquinas took astrology seriously and Augustine invented "limbo").

I cannot, of course, prove that there is no supervising deity who invigilates my every moment and who will pursue me even after I am dead. (I can only be happy that there is no evidence for such a ghastly idea, which would resemble a celestial North Korea in which liberty was not just impossible but inconceivable.) But nor has any theologian ever demonstrated the contrary. This would perhaps make the believer and the doubter equal—except that the believer claims to know, not just that God exists, but that his most detailed wishes are not merely knowable but actually known. Since religion drew its first breath when the species lived in utter ignorance and considerable fear, I hope I may be forgiven for declining to believe that another human being can tell me what to do, in the most intimate details of my life and mind, and to further dictate these terms as if acting as proxy for a supernatural entity. This tyrannical idea is very much older than Christianity, of course, but I do sometimes think that Christians have less excuse for believing, let alone wishing, that such a horrible thing could be true. Perhaps your response will make me reconsider?

Sincerely,

Christopher Hitchens


* * *

From: Douglas Wilson
To: Christopher Hitchens
Re: Is Christianity Good for the World?

I want to begin by thanking you for agreeing to—as the diplomats might put it—a "frank exchange of views." And I certainly want to thank the folks at Christianity Today for hosting us.

P. G. Wodehouse once said that some minds are like soup in a poor restaurant—better left unstirred. I am afraid that I find myself sympathizing with him as I consider atheism. I had been minding my own business on this subject for a number of years when I saw Sam Harris's book on the desk of a colleague, and that led to my book in response, not to mention a review of Richard Dawkins's most recent book, and now a series of responses to your God is Not Great, all culminating in this exchange. I am afraid that my problem is this: The more I stir the bowl, the more certain fumes, mystery meats, and questions keep floating to the surface. Here are a few of them.

Your first point was that the Christian faith cannot credit itself for all that "Love your neighbor" stuff, not to mention the Golden Rule, and the reason for this is that such moral precepts have been self-evident to everybody throughout history who wanted to have a stable society. You then move on to the second point, which contains the idea that the teachings of Christianity are "incredibly immoral." In your book, you make the same point about other religions. Apparently, basic morality is not all that self-evident. So my first question is: Which way do you want to argue this? Do all human societies have a grasp of basic morality, which is the theme of your first point, or has religion poisoned everything, which is the thesis of your book?

The second thing to observe in this regard is that Christians actually do not claim that the gospel has made the world better by bringing us turbo-charged ethical information. There have been ethical advances that are due to the propagation of the faith, but that is not where the action is. Christians believe—as C. S. Lewis argued in The Abolition of Man—that nonbelievers do understand the basics of morality. Paul the apostle refers to the Gentiles, who did not have the law but who nevertheless knew by nature some of the tenets of the law (Rom. 2:14). But the world is not made better because people can understand the ways in which they are being bad. It has to be made better by Good News—we must receive the gift of forgiveness and the resultant ability to live more in conformity to a standard we already knew (but were necessarily failing to meet). So the gospel does not consist of new and improved law. The gospel makes the world better through Good News, not through guilt trips or good advice.

In your second objection, you gaily dismiss the Old Testament, "which speaks hotly in recommending genocide, slavery, genital mutilation, and other horrors." Setting aside for the moment whether your representation of the Old Testament is judicious or accurate, let me assume for the sake of discussion that you have accurately summarized the essence of Mosaic ethics here. You then go on to say that we who teach such stories to children have been "[dang]ed by history." But why should this "[dang]ation by history" matter to any of us reading Bible stories to kids, or, for that matter, to any of the people who did any of these atrocious things, on your principles? These people are all dead now, and we who read the stories are all going to be dead. Why should any of us care about the effeminate judgments of history? Should the propagators of these "horrors" have cared? There is no God, right? Because there is no God, this means that—you know—genocides just happen, like earthquakes and eclipses. It is all matter in motion, and these things happen.

If you are on the receiving end, there is only death, and if you are an agent delivering this genocide, the long-term result is brief victory and death at the end. So who cares? Picture an Israelite during the conquest of Canaan, doing every bad thing that you say was occurring back then. During one of his outrages, sword above his head, should he have stopped for a moment to reflect on the possibility that you might be right? "You know, in about three and a half millennia, the consensus among historians will be that I am being bad right now. But if there is no God, this disapproval will certainly not disturb my oblivion. On with the rapine and slaughter!" On your principles, why should he care?

In your third objection, you say that if "Christianity is to claim credit for the work of outstanding Christians or for the labors of famous charities, then it must in all honesty accept responsibility for the opposite." In short, if we point to our saints, you are going to demand that we point also to our charlatans, persecutors, shysters, slave-traders, inquisitors, hucksters, televangelists, and so on. Now allow me the privilege of pointing out the structure of your argument here. If a professor takes credit for the student who mastered the material, aced his finals, and went on to a career that was a benefit to himself and the university he graduated from, the professor must (fairness dictates) be upbraided for the dope-smoking slacker that he kicked out of class in the second week. They were both formally enrolled, is that not correct? They were both students, were they not?

What you are doing is saying that Christianity must be judged not only on the basis of those who believe the gospel in truth and live accordingly but also on the basis of those baptized Christians who cannot listen to the Sermon on the Mount without a horse laugh and a life to match. You are saying that those who excel in the course and those who flunk out of it are all the same. This seems to me to be a curious way of proceeding.

You conclude by objecting to the sovereignty of God, saying that the idea makes the whole world into a ghastly totalitarian state, where believers say that God (and who does He think He is?) runs everything. I would urge you to set aside for a moment the theology of the thing and try to summon up some gratitude for those who built our institutions of liberty. Many of them were actually inspired by the idea that since God is exhaustively sovereign, and because man is a sinner, it follows that all earthly power must be limited and bounded. The idea of checks and balances came from a worldview that you dismiss as inherently totalitarian. Why did those societies where this kind of theology predominated produce, as a direct result, our institutions of civil liberty?

One last question: In your concluding paragraph you make a great deal out of your individualism and your right to be left alone with the "most intimate details of [your] life and mind." Given your atheism, what account are you able to give that would require us to respect the individual? How does this individualism of yours flow from the premises of atheism? Why should anyone in the outside world respect the details of your thought life any more than they respect the internal churnings of any other given chemical reaction? That's all our thoughts are, isn't that right? Or, if there is a distinction, could you show how the premises of your atheism might produce such a distinction?

Cordially,

Douglas Wilson

http://www.christianitytoday.com/ct/2007/mayweb-only/119-12.0.html

One Must Believe in Order to Understand

In spite of what you always hear…when it comes to the Word of God and God Himself…it is NOT true that "you will believe it when you see it" According to Scripture one must believe it in order to see it. Prov 9:10 says, “The fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom…” In other words, the beginning (the first and controlling principle) of wisdom is the fear of the Lord. Matthew Henry's Commentary comments on this verse: “in order to the attaining of all useful knowledge this is most necessary, that we fear God; we are not qualified to profit by the instructions that are given us unless our minds be possessed with a holy reverence of God, and every thought within us be brought into obedience to him.”

In order for one to understand he must first, not only believe in God, but fear God. The problem with the unbeliever is not lack of evidence it is one of rebellion or lack of fear. That is why I prefer Presuppositional Apologetics rather than Evidential Apologetics (More on that in future posts). Many think that the “atheist” just needs more proof that God exists. Romans chapter one makes it clear that “what can be known about God” has been made “plain to them” (Rom 1:19). You can give them more proof but they will continue to “suppress the truth” (Rom 1:18).

Whoever wants to come to a saving knowledge of God and interpret the very Words of God must FIRST believe that HE IS. Heb 11:6 says, “And without faith it is impossible to please him, for whoever would draw near to God must believe that he exists and that he rewards those who seek him.” In other words - I'll see it when I believe it. Faith is the precondition to a correct understanding of God’s Word. Augustine understood this when he wrote: “Understanding is the reward of faith; therefore, do not seek to understand in order to believe, but believe that thou mayest understand." (Homilies on the Gospel of John 29:6)

In Paul’s letter to Timothy he wrote: “And the Lord's servant must not be quarrelsome but kind to everyone, able to teach, patiently enduring evil, correcting his opponents with gentleness. God may perhaps grant them repentance leading to a knowledge of the truth.” (2 Tim 2:15-16, 23-25) Notice, it is God who grants repentance (it is a gift of God) and repentance is required for one to “know the truth.” Before you can see it, you must first believe it!

Heb 11:1-3 says, “Now faith is the assurance of things hoped for, the conviction of things not seen. For by it the people of old received their commendation. By faith we understand that the universe was created by the word of God, so that what is seen was not made out of things that are visible.” Notice the phrase "by faith we understand…” Before you can see it, you must first believe it! We see it when we believe it. That means that our understanding, as well as our belief, is completely and totally dependent on the Sovereignty of God NOT our autonomous reasoning skills.

Bahnsen - Stein Debate Pt. 1

This is an awesome debate between Dr. Greg Bahnsen (Christian) and Dr. Gordon Stein (Atheist) that demonstrates the power of Presuppositional Apologetics.

Bahnsen - Stein Debate Pt. 2

Bahnsen - Stein Debate Pt. 3

The Myth of Neutrality

In this universe that God created there is not one speck of neutral territory. There is no neutral ground. The non-believer is not neutral and we shouldn’t be. Neutrality is a myth. Man was made to worship. He either worships the true God or he worships an idol. The question is not IF the non-believer worships but WHAT He worships.

In fact, according to Romans 1, there really is no such thing as a "non-believer." There are just those whom God has plainly and "clearly" made known His "his invisible attributes, namely, his eternal power and divine nature," (so that they are "without excuse") and yet they suppresses that truth in unrighteousness. (Romans 1:18-23) They are not innocent and neutral bystanders who don't have enough evidence to believe in God. They don't WANT to believe in God and they are in rebellion to Him.

Jesus said: “Whoever is not with me is against me, and whoever does not gather with me scatters.” (Matt 12:30) Clearly, no one is neutral. You are either with Him or against Him. No one is on the fence. You are either a friend or an enemy of God. No one has a neutral cell in their entire body.

This philosophy of neutrality is why evolution is so acceptable. As Oliver Wendell Holmes said, “Nothing is certain but change.” Everything is changing and evolving therefore you cannot be certain of anything. You cannot judge or be intolerant because nothing in life is certain or constant. You must remain neutral. The problem is that those who preach neutrality are not neutral. They want us to be neutral but they are not.

The call to toleration is simply applying the neutrality principle to moral issues. But as we know, the Christian is never given equal tolerance. We’re told to be more tolerant and yet we are not tolerated. As Tom Beaudoin, assistant professor of religious studies at Santa Clara University put it: “Generation X is not tolerant of an Intolerant God.”

We are told in Rom 14:23 that "...whatever is not from faith is sin.” There is no neutrality; it is a myth. We are also told in Scripture to "think God's thoughts after Him." We, as Christians, must THINK as Christians and not neutral observers. No area of life is neutral; even your intellect must surrender to the authority of God. This is why 1 Cor 10:31 says, “So, whether you eat or drink, or whatever you do, do all to the glory of God.”

You are either for God or against Him. As Greg Bahnsen wrote: "...no middle ground – men simply are not “neutral”. Men will either follow the world or the Word. They either have the mind of Christ (1 Cor 2:16; cf. Eph 4:23-24) or a mind of futility (Eph 4:17). His thoughts are either “captive” to Christ (2 Cor 10:5) or “hostile” to Him (Col 1:21)."

Learning to Count and Knowing What Counts

Learning to count, by itself, means nothing if you don’t first know what counts.
That is why true education, according to Noah Webster, “…comprehends all that series of instruction and discipline which is intended to enlighten the understanding, correct the temper, and form the manners and habits of youth, and fit them for usefulness in their future stations.” (Noah Webster's 1828 Dictionary)

Gary North once wrote an article advertising a Christian college. The article showed a dejected father who had sent his son off to a secular college. It’s stated: “I spent $40,000 to send my son to hell.”

Even Martin Luther foresaw the danger of so-called "secular" education… “I am much afraid that schools will prove to be the gates of hell unless they diligently labor in explaining the Holy Scriptures, engraving them in the hearts of youth. I advise no one to place their child where the Scriptures do not reign paramount. Every institution in which men are not increasingly occupied with the word of God must become corrupt.”