David declared in Psalm 14:1, “The fool has said in his heart, There is no God.” There have always been men who have denied the existence of that supreme being whom we acknowledge as Creator and Lord of all. Not only have those who are opposed to religion made such claims, but today men of religion, self-styled theologians, are also saying that God does not really exist except in the minds of those who think He does. Yet, they themselves offer no demonstration or proof for their allegations besides their own philosophy and reasoning. We ought to have more objective evidence one way or the other. Is there any? Yes there is.
First, we have the existence of the universe to contend with. To deny it exists is absurd (although some have tried it) because our own senses indicate it is here. The immediate question that comes to mind is, how did it get here? There is a scientific axiom, called cause-effect, which states that something cannot come from nothing; every effect must have an adequate cause. Christians believe that God was the First Cause. Moses wrote, “In the beginning, God created the heaven and the earth” (Gen. 1:1). No more reasonable explanation has ever been offered.
….
Next, there is the design of the earth to be reckoned with. Our wonderful world, with the perfect timing of its revolution around the sun and rotation on its axis, the water-evaporation-condensation cycle, the movement of the winds from the equator and back, and the ocean currents, runs like one giant piece of clockwork. Now we all understand that a well-constructed house does not just spring up out of the ground. Nor does a watch, with all its minute organization, gather itself together from sundry bits and pieces. Why is it then that some try to tell us that the earth, in all its beauty and precision, is the result of blind chance?
….
Finally, the nature of man is worthy of notice. It is impossible to deny that man has certain capacities which animals do not. For instance, man has a conscience that helps him determine right from wrong; he can appreciate that which he considers beautiful; and he is rational, having the power to reason and communicate logically. Although animals do have powerful instincts, they do not have these characteristics. So we ask, where did man get them? Science cannot even explain where man came from, much less how he became superior to the animals. If evolution were true, man could not have inherited these qualities from his supposed animal ancestors because they did not have them to pass on; Nor does the environment provide an adequate source as some have hypothesized. The only reasonable answer offered so far is the one that includes God.
….
We believers need never be daunted by the onslaughts of modern, atheistic philosophy, because evidence for the existence of God is there and it is sufficient. We must also remember that when a person makes the claim, “There is no God,” he is obligated to prove it, and that is something he cannot do. It is self evident that God is invisible from human sight. We cannot see God or hear God (Jn 1:18 cf; 5:37), but we do have His Word which has been proven to have derived from someone who has to be at least 5 thousand years or more. Since no man has ever lived to be so old, this leaves us with only one conclusion_it must be God.
….
Therefore, if man believes God’s Word proceeded from God, then man will believe in God….Naturally, if man does not believe the bible derived from God, he will not believe in God’s existence. It’s just that simple.
— Al Shannon, Biblical Proof, Does God Exist?, January 15, 2017
Don’t be threatened or afraid of atheists! ANY SENSIBLE PERSON BELIEVES IN GOD etc. (This may be a form of reasoning.)
Here’s the thing: I prefer my beliefs to be based in a Science that is designed to admit wrong and move forward. That to me is so inherently human evolution but Christianity does not change as facts appear in time; it remains adamantly anti-Science.
The only tolerable thing about organized religion is that it does indeed change because of human involvement. The styles of sermons change all the time. Rock music goes from being Satanic to a thing led by God! Dress styles are malleable and over time people were even allowed to carry and read their own Bible without being condemned. But religions will never be my choice as long as Science stays human!
I don’t deny the existence of the universe, but nor do I invent a reason for its existence in the form of God. As for ‘how did it get here?’, I have no idea, and. nor does Shannon. Personally I think it’s likely that something has always existed, in the sense that there is no such thing as ‘nothingness’ but, then again, that’s probably just a hypothesis. Incidentally, even cause and effect aren’t obvious. In our normal world one follows the other, but it certainly doesn’t apply in the quantum world, and perhaps the two things don’t connect in the way we think.
As for animals and their capacities, yes we’ve evolved to a much higher level of sentience, but that doesn’t mean we write off animal feelings and emotions. We know they suffer pain, and that some can feel emotion. We are finding out that they are much more closely connected, especially apes, than we ever previously realised, and evolution itself shows that there is no special reason to place humans other than at a more evolved form of animal.
Lastly, there is no burden whatsoever on an atheist to prove that God does not exist. It is entirely for the believer to show that he does. The evidence adduced by Shannon is so pathetically weak as to suggest it does not exist.
Ugh, that made my brain hurt. And no I’m not afraid of atheists. after all, I’m here. Fundamentalists/Evangelicals o the other hand…. (shudders)
I will always be grateful to Gene Keller, who told my youth group, “When religion and science disagree, go with the science. Religion will catch up.” In large swaths of the US it still hasn’t and I had to leave even my Quaker meeting because of what I saw as a wrong-headed focus and a retreat from traditional Quaker thought. But they gave me roots that have proved strong enough to grow, though in directions that are not orthodox at all.
Geoff, I agree Shannon’s argument is not only weak but tortured and do not pretend I can offer better. The majority of my experience is completely subjective and based on what Brian calls “the feels”. I also realize that most, if not all, such experiences can be explained as natural reactions or tricks of our brains, my own definitely included. But the proof that such things are indeed tricks is as difficult to verify as the existence of God. We can pinpoint the exact area of the brain that is active, but proving the why of what is happening is a completely different animal. I do not see how it can be absolutely proven one way or the other, at least not now. In the absence of evidence, I go with my experience, as shaky as that evidence may be. In essence, it feels real to me. I also accept the opposite conclusion as equally valid. Even if I had a an identical twin who had been with me every moment of my life, she would not have had the exact same experiences as I did, and so would come to different conclusions, even regarding “facts”, let alone how we process things emotionally, which is an element of almost all faith traditions, including my own unorthodox (possibly bastardized) faith. I appreciate the chance to make my counter-argument and thank you for making me frame one. Yay for brain food!
This kind of superficial fluff only plays well with the choir.
That Bible verse used to be one of the reasons that atheists were wrong. But now it does seem more of an acknowledgement: even back then people already claimed this. There is no God: very powerful.
I enjoyed those stories the most in Christopher Hitchens’ God is not Great. The stories where even ancient people didn’t believe in the existence of a or any gods. He quotes from a play The Clouds written by Aristophanes, where the main character seeks to point out that the existence of gods is not so easily proven.
For instance: Zeus is said to water the crops, but is he able to make it rain on a cloudless day? Surely it must be the clouds that carry the rain, not the gods.
But Zeus brings the clouds…. Or does the wind bring the clouds?
But… Zeus brings the lightening! If he does, why do his temples get hit by lightening too? Shouldn’t he protect his own buildings?
I found it very interesting the first time I heard of this play. It hadn’t occurred to me at first that atheist arguments go a long way back too, and that religious thought does not hold the claim on history either, not all of it anyway.
Since she made the claim that there is a god then she has the burden of proof. Christians also need to remember that when trying to convince atheists of gods existence that they need scientific proof that is a test to establish proof that can be reproduced multiple times and produces the same outcome. Lack of scientific proof does not automatically prove a theological claim.