Saturday, January 30, 2010

Morality without God?


Can you have an objective morality without God? Some people seem to think so. I have recently listened to a debate between Dinesh D'Souza and Peter Singer. D'Souza is an Indian-born Catholic writer and author. Singer is a rather famous Australian philosopher, most notable for his outspokenness on atheism and controversial views on animal rights and end of life scenarios. The heart of the debate was on the question of whether or not God exits, but a fair amount of attention was given to the question of morality, of which Singer didn't want to spend much time. Upon researching further what his views were - I can see why. Below is an excerpt from his book Rethinking Life and Death:

[The argument that a fetus is not alive] is a resort to a convenient fiction that turns an evidently living being into one that legally is not alive. Instead of accepting such fictions, we should recognise that the fact that a being is human, and alive, does not in itself tell us whether it is wrong to take that being's life.

Now granted, this is just one statement from an entire book, but his arguments were similar in the debate. Now this statement to me is atrocious, but the question really is I think, "would I have thought it atrocious prior to following God?" In other words; are we okay in working from the assertion that we may make our own morality, because it has 'evolved' over time, or it has always been a human invention? Dan Barker (former minister turned atheist) argues that we are moral as decided only by our actions, without regard to the condition of the heart. Of course Christ turns this teaching on its head in the New Testament when he gives the sermon on the Mount - that God looks at your heart as well as your actions. Nonetheless, many people hold to the convention today that morality is what we make it, and that we can be good simply for goodness' sake.

D'Souza argues the opposite of course, and says in the debate that we end up having a morality similar to the New Testament in the West because of the longstanding influence of the Bible in our country, as well as Europe. He reminds the Peter Singers of the world that you cannot divorce God from morality, and also be honest about it. Now this is an interesting idea. After all, doesn't God validate violence in the Old Testament? Doesn't Jesus say to indulge your enemy and to love him? Do these statements really sound "moral" to us today?

You have probably already guessed my position on this matter. C.S. Lewis provides an excellent demonstration of God as moral law-giver in his book Mere Christianity. If you are interested, search this blog for my post 'The Moral Law.' I suppose my central argument rests on the supposition that you cannot call something good, if there is no objective Goodness in the universe. If there is no God to put the Good into goodness, then we are left arguing goodness from experience and nature; and this allows different people with different perceptions to create their own morality. I'm not angered by this, in fact I sympathize with it. We all do the best we can in life with what we know. But how much more would we know if we didn't stop at the natural, and looked further into what Cause might exist which stamps us with a conscience?

I have posted the link to the website with Singer's debate if you are interested: http://www.greatgoddebates.org/


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Name Our Church


Have you ever wanted to name a church? Well here is your chance. Our church is looking for a new name. We are a contemporary church that tends to shake things up a bit. We don't normally do "church as usual." We have modern music, an excellent group of people, and a devotion to teaching the truths of the Bible second to none. I have posted our mission and vision statements below in case they help you select a name:


Mission: 'Loving people to Jesus'

Vision: 'Real People, serving a real savior, making a real difference'


Okay, so let your creative juices flow. You can submit your choice of names in 1 of 2 ways. Either 1.) post it in a comment below this posting, or 2.) email it to me at jklaus@cds-global.com. I look forward to hearing from you, and I will let you know (and acknoweledge you on this blog) if your choice is selected!


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Tuesday, January 19, 2010

Why Listen to God?


The debate rages on in America as questions are posed such as “does God exist?”, or “is religion good?” But one question in particular I believe also strikes a cord with us, especially in this country; and that is “why should I listen to God and the Bible?” At the heart of it, if most people (atheist, agnostic, or religious) deep down DO believe in some type of God, then the question isn’t so much whether or not He exists, but rather, if they need to listen to Him at all. Many people are angry with God. Why is there suffering? Why an earthquake in Haiti?

To answer this question, I took note of what our teaching pastor at church said recently, as I believe it describes accurately what we can gain from the study of God’s Word (a.k.a the Bible). In his sermon he listed four interesting things that occurs when God’s statutes are preached and studied. I have listed them below:

1.) Power. “For the word of God is alive and powerful.” Hebrews 4:12

2.) Healing. “He sent forth his word and healed them…” Psalms 107:20

3.) Direction. “A man’s heart plans his way, but the Lord directs his steps.”

4.) Freedom. “… He has sent me to proclaim freedom for the prisoners and recovery of sight for the blind, to release the oppressed.” Luke 4:18

If the Bible truly brings these 4 things to the table, then we would be silly not to invest in its wisdom. More to the point, I don’t think that many skeptics have delved into the Bible deep enough to put these pillars to the test. Probably more accurately, they have a passing knowledge of some of Scripture, maybe enough to feel the conviction regarding its moral stance – and that was enough! But what about someone who HAS studied the Scriptures thoroughly? After all, there are ex-preachers. Dr. Michael Shermer for example, publisher of ‘Skeptics Magazine’, claims he used to evangelize door-to-door prior to becoming a militant agnostic. What then, are we to think about folks who have tasted the medicine, but not the remedy?

I think that the answer is this: they have in fact felt the Power of God, and it produced fear. They have in fact experienced Healing, but this healing didn’t last as long as they expected, or there was a tragedy or something else that occurred which didn’t jive up with what they had previously experienced. They have in fact seen the Direction of God, and consciously denied Him, wanting no part in living more strictly moral lives. And finally they have in fact felt the Freedom of God, and found it to be too overwhelming. To be free, you must first have boundaries.

We must make sure that we don’t give up on our walk of faith. God will welcome you back if you have been away for a while. If we knew these truths to be real at one point, then it isn’t God that has changed – it is probably us.

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Friday, January 15, 2010

On Haiti ...


Bono from U2 was once quoted at a leadership summit for Christian pastors as saying "as Christians it is not recommended that we give, it is commanded." If you feel the need to donate to a worthy cause after the devastating earthquake in Haiti this week, click the link below. This will take you to Project Hope by Theo's Work, which is an orphanage in Haiti that my family has worked with in the past. They have hundreds of children. May God bless them and help them, and may He do it through His servants on earth -- you and me.




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Interesting Quote



"Love is not consolation. It is light."


- Friedrich Nietzsche (famous atheist philosopher)


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Faith Based Living


Everyone Has Faith in Something

Faith is an interesting thing. It can be referred to differently by different people. It can mean affiliation with a particular religious system of beliefs, or it can simply mean hope. The fact is however, that everyone on planet Earth has faith in something. A good portion of people have invested their faith in a job, in money, or something similar. The point being that just because you haven’t found God yet, or haven’t begun your journey toward spirituality, doesn’t mean that you don’t believe in something. There is some part of your life that you are devoting your time and energy to, or some principal of theory that you believe in.

Faith Misplaced, is Indeed a Problem

Here is the issue then. If everyone has faith in something, but a vast majority of people have applied this faith to material wealth, secular goals, or the like – then what is the outcome? Take for example a fictional character we will call Mike. It is easy to make judgments about people who we deem to be obviously or inherently bad (i.e.: Hitler or Stalin), but lets make use of a more typical example for the purposes of our discussion here. Mike has a good job and he is a family man. He has been married to his wife for 10 years or so, and he may even go to church occasionally. But his real passion is the fully restored ’69 Camaro sitting in his garage. Every chance he gets, Mike will go out and check on this car. He will spend any ounce of free time browsing through parts on the Internet, making sure that anything that could be chrome, will be chrome! He devotes time at work even on the Internet making certain that he is always “in the know” for when the next car show is coming up, so that he can be there. Mike’s faith – in the simple sense – is attached to his muscle car. His faith in the larger sense, is attached to a material possession. Since the object of his desire is what God refers to in the Bible as an idol (a thing which cannot see, hear, or feel), there is no other outcome for Mike than that he will never rise higher than what his obsession with his car allows for.

Faith Properly Realized, is a Powerful Thing

There are only a few options open to Mike as of now. He must either continue living the way he has been living, giving his time and energy to something that cannot love him back. Or he has some type of experience (either internally or externally) which takes him out of his little bubble and causes him to desire something greater than where he currently affixes his devotion. By grace of God we hope that Mike (and you and I) have just such a situation that takes him out of his idol worship. Often this can come in the form of a tragedy. How many of us have been “chased into church” by the devil?** The point is that once we finally realize that only God can properly fill the weight of glory necessary for us to flourish, we can then begin to fully live as the unique individuals we were made to be. That is the funny thing about God. To submit to Him is to lose nothing (other than those things which were never good for us in the first place), and to gain everything.

** This phrase comes to me from my friend and spiritual mentor Cindy.


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Friday, January 8, 2010

Are Near Death Experiences for Real?


From time to time we hear about NDE’s (near death experiences). I have presently avoided adding anything to this blog about them, as they are really more or less subjective experiences, and someone listening to one of them is really thrust into the position of simply finding the account believable, or not. There usually isn’t any physical evidence that can be traced back, other than there may be medical records on file that corroborate the fact that a person actually died for some time. And a good many people report seeing or feeling nothing when they were gone. As we are entering the 21st century, we have medical advances such that people can (and are) often resuscitated after they flat line. An interesting thing has occurred, in that as modern medicine has become more proficient in “re-animating” people, accounts of NDE’s have also gone up proportionately.

Does this mean we can trust all of these stories? Of course not. There are different versions of what happens after death which exist in the different religions in the world; there are also different versions that people give account of that happens to them after their death and resuscitation. There are also different motives. Whenever I read about or hear about someone who had one of these experiences, or something of the miraculous has occurred – I often look back just to see if all of this is hinging on a book deal, or rights to a movie, etc. If Joe Blow is charging $50 per book, then a financial motive exits, at least as opposed to charging $10 per book or giving them away on donation.

But there are some interesting things to take account of. The number and frequency of these occurrences seem to indicate with a certain degree of alarm that there IS something out there, whether or not you choose to believe it. Immediately subsequent to this, is the interesting point that not all of these NDE experiences are pleasant. And finally, the astounding number of people (even from different religions and cultures) that report seeing Jesus, or a presence similar to that of Christ. Let’s face it – this phenomena is either happening, or it isn’t. There is either a percentage of this pool of experiences that are legitimate, or it is all nonsense. Some belief systems will explain away all of this by making statements like “remember, these people weren’t really dead… they came back”, or “it is all a product of the chemicals inside the brain firing randomly during the death process.” These statements may both be accurate, we won’t know until it is our time.

But the interesting thing is, when we actually stop to listen to some of these stories. The people are either exquisite actors, ravenous liars, or worse…. Or they are telling the truth.** As I said before, near death experiences are far more difficult to discuss in that they don’t provide a central document or book from which to make arguments or trace historical accuracies (the way we can from the Bible for example). They are subjective. The person gives their testimony, and we believe it or we don’t. But interesting how much persecution some of these people endure for the sake of their testimony. Intriguing how these testimonies often end up matching what the Bible says. Even more intriguing the number of these experiences that describe a meeting with Jesus. I have included a video clip of the well-documented NDE of Howard Storm, the atheist turned preacher that had died in a Paris hospital and found himself in a place he couldn’t explain. You will need to make up your own mind as to whether or not he is telling the truth. May we all come to the realization that Jesus is the way.

** Certain religious denominations and sects are curiously adamant that all of these experiences are spiritual deceptions. It has always fascinated me, because in maintaining that all of these people are simply wrong seems to miss the larger point, that either good or bad: something is out there. At any rate, if you choose not to view this video I don’t blame you. Move on and read the Bible if you like. By God’s Word we can always rest assured.





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Monday, January 4, 2010

Is the Bible Reliable?

Is the Bible reliable as the authentic Word of God, or is it just another holy book written by men? Many people today have this question, and some never go deep enough to really answer it. I have posted here my sermon message from last Sunday. For a serious answer to this question about the Bible, click play below. The run time is about 25 minutes. You will have to pardon the couple seconds of dead air shortly after I begin, it will pick back up again soon after. Enjoy!


Resurrection Sunday Still Matters

The literal, bodily resurrection of Jesus Christ is the linchpin of the Christian faith.  It doesn't matter which denomination or slant ...