Wednesday, May 26, 2010

The Big Picture: Is There a God?


I have transcribed below the outline for a talk I had developed a while back. It was my attempt to pull in some of what I believe to be the iron-clad proofs that God exists from philosophy, history, and logic; along with some other details pertaining to the state of the modern church, etc. I am posting this outline here so that it may be a help to anyone looking for a quick reference, "one-stop-shop" to find information about empirical evidence for God. It is not a comprehensive document, and some of the bullet points may raise more questions than answers for you. That just means you will need to delve into the research a little more on your own. Enjoy the ride as it pertains to looking at the evidence... I know I have!

I. Introduction

· People sitting in churches often don’t really believe -- this is lukewarm Christianity
· God is real, not just an idea
· Atheism is popular and fashionable today – people need to be reminded about God
· Lets Discuss: 1.) Philosophical Evidences of God, 2.) Historical Evidences of God, 3.) Our ability to choose

II. Philosophical Evidences of God

· The Moral Argument
- that annoying right and wrong thing built into our consciousness
- does not come from evolution
- is more than learned behavior; we can teach it, but we did not invent it
- morality therefore, comes from God

· Everything has a First Cause
- There cannot be an infinite regress; something must have started everything
- Universe must have been caused (big bang, singularity theory)
- Nothing can exist without being caused, and that first cause must exist outside the thing which it caused. In other words: God!

III. Historical Evidences of God

· The Bible can be trusted. New Testament as historical documents
· Evidences that Jesus existed from NON-Biblical accounts (Josephus, Tacitus, etc.)
· New Testament does not refer to Him as “just a good man” or “a good teacher”, but something more than that
· The revelation of Jesus to humankind
- Christ was either lying about His deity, or He was crazy, or He was actually the Son of God. You make the choice.

IV. An Important Choice

· Now that we have come this far, what will you do with this information?
· God’s road-map gets us to Heaven; we are not left alone to wander aimlessly through life
. The next step is up to each of us!


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Tuesday, May 25, 2010

Driscoll on the Evil that Men Do

Mark Driscoll is a pastor in Seattle at Mars Hill Church. This mega-church that now sports thousands of members, started from small potatoes and humble beginnings. It has become one of the fastest growing churches in America, in the least churched state in the country. Why? I have a feeling it is because Driscoll as the head pastor isn't afraid to speak the truth and preach even the difficult aspects of the Bible. I have included the video bit below not just because it is shocking (though it is that), but because you never see this sort of thing anymore in churches. I doubt that it would be a good idea to adopt this style of preaching as a regular thing, but something tells me it must have been necessary here.

Driscoll is preaching on young men that have abandoned any and all Biblical leadership and responsibility in their lives. They are mistreating their girlfriends and wives. After the shock value of the footage below wore off; I was left wondering what the faces of those individuals must have looked like in the audience. If they deserved this lecture, did they know it?



Monday, May 24, 2010

The Head Coach


Recently at church we had a message entitled 'Spiritual Coaches.' In preparation for our communion meditation that day, I prepared a short talk wherein I could not help thinking about the ultimate spiritual coach. Not Vince Lombardi or Kirk Ferentz, but in fact -- Jesus.

Hebrews 12:2 says, “Let us fix our eyes on Jesus, the author and perfector of our faith, who for the joy set before him endured the cross, scorning its shame, and sat down at the right hand of the throne of God.” This instructs us to view Jesus as a model or a coach, and to accept and expect hardship for His name.
The message of the Cross is offensive to most people. It is neither apologetic nor compromising. It simply says, “Jesus is from God, and only He offers salvation through a blood atonement.”

Hebrews 12:7-8 further says, “Endure hardship as discipline; God is treating you as sons. For what son is not disciplined (and everyone undergoes discipline), then you are illegitimate children and not true sons.” We are speaking here of how we are to endure our trials. As discipline with trust toward God, not simply as hopeless situations.

We are coached continuously by Jesus. We suffer at times, He suffered also. We are joyful, so was Jesus. I believe these 2 verses from Hebrews come together to tell us that we are to recognize Christ as Spiritual Mentor in 2 ways: 1.) as a model or example, and 2.) as a coach.

To Him we are to look for FAITH, and from Him we are to accept what is given, also in FAITH.


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Saturday, May 15, 2010

God is in the Business of Love


Don't believe demons exist? Think Jesus was just kidding or being "metaphorical" when he discussed demons in the Gospels? If so, the documentary film Furious Love by Darren Wilson may cause you some discomfort. Released to DVD on May 5th, this film is the sequel to Wilson's Christian sub-culture hit Finger of God, which was basically a presentation of miracles caught on tape.

Furious Love however goes deeper. We don't just see people get healed on video, and get to enjoy the surprised looks on their faces. We get to see what God is doing to combat spiritual darkness in some of the most anti-christian places on Earth. Wilson travels from Salem, Massachusetts (home of the old Salem witch trials), to New Age festivals, and even goes over seas to capture Christian revivals in unlikely places. All of which provide him with more than he bargained for. Viewers will see people being delivered from demons, accepting Christ, and being healed.

Like his first film, Wilson begins by easing the viewer into the notion that spiritually dark places actually do exist. Then as the film progresses, he hits home with some very powerful interviews with missionaries who have survived graphic and horrible religious persecution and lived to talk about it. Wilson's main point in the film (and apparently God's also), was that the most powerful weapon for combating our present day spiritual plagues and afflictions is simply... Love. One man is even quoted in the film as saying that people who hold Biblical knowledge as the most important thing are actually committing idolatry! Because the thing which should be held above all else is Jesus Himself. Bad news for modern day Pharisees.

This is an interesting film. I enjoyed and agreed with the sub-premises that lead to the main thesis. 1.) Christianity is a relationship with Christ, not a set of rules. 2.) If you are looking to condemn non-Christians for their unbelief, then you have already sinned by passing judgement. 3.) Everyone deserves God's love, especially the culturally unlovable.

If you aren't a Christian and you watch this film, your worldview may not necessarily be shattered -- but it will make you think. Definitely worth watching.




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Sunday, May 9, 2010

Interesting Quote


“The whole history of science has been the gradual realization that events do not happen in an arbitrary manner, but that they reflect a certain underlying order, which may or may not be divinely inspired.”


- Stephen Hawking



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The Cosmological Constant


The cosmological constant is the term for the energy density of empty space. Or as I refer to it: the space between space. Listen to what Steven Weinberg (atheist and Nobel-winning physicist) says about the cosmological constant, "If large and positive, the cosmological constant would act as a repulsive force that increases with distance, a force that would prevent matter from clumping together in the early universe, the process that was the first step in forming galaxies and starts and planets and people. If large and negative, the cosmological constant would act as an attractive force increasing with distance, a force that would almost immediately reverse the expansion of the universe and cause it to recollapse."

In fact it turns out that this amazing building block in outer space is actually quite small and precise. Listen to what Robin Collins, PHD says about it, "the fine-tuning has conservatively been estimated to be at least one part in a hundred million billion billion billion billion billion. That would be a ten followed by fifty-three zeroes. That's inconceivably precise."

So what can we take from this? To me (and also to a great many fascinated physicists) this means that this measurement of empty space is so astoundingly perfect for the creation and maintenance of the universe, that it demands an answer. I used to think - and this is extremely embarrassing to admit - that this fact, and others like it, were simply coincidental. That they didn't prove anything. They just existed, and we got lucky with our universe... LUCKY!!

This is just one example of what I believe to be an implementation of God's great complexity of design. If this constant were off by even a little, life as we know it wouldn't exist. I see no other explanation for this, other than 'we just got lucky' or 'it is what it is.' If you are a physicist reading this blog posting, please feel free to comment as to what other explanations may suffice. At any rate, whether this is an example of the supernatural or not (and I strongly urge the reader to realize that it is), we can all stand in amazement at the universe we live in. The more we seem to discover, the greater the questions that result.

This subject has often been termed the Cosmological Constant Problem, because it seems to demand a fine-tuning in place of a natural or evolved pattern. In other words, there is no known natural way that we can get this tiny measurement in cosmology from partical physics alone. Insert God, however, and you have an answer.


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Thursday, May 6, 2010

Avatar and the Public Consciousness


The film 'Avatar' by director James Cameron has recently become available on DVD, and unless you have been living in a cave for the last 6 months, you know about this film. My wife and I were one of the hold-outs to see this movie. We waited until it left the theatre (too bad for us!). This is an intense film. We know James Cameron from such films as Terminator, True Lies, and Aliens. He is an American Icon. He makes American Icons.

What was interesting about this film was the way it seemed to perfectly encapsulate the American cultural consciousness (also evidenced by the number of people that went to see this film, and its success at the Oscars). Now don't get me wrong, this movie was visually stunning -- a great action and cinematic achievement. I even enjoyed the fact that Cameron cast Sigourney Weaver as the scientist; a throw-back to her role as sci-fi scare queen in Aliens I'm sure. But as I watched scene after scene, it became clear that Cameron had an agenda. It seemed to be as follows: 1.) cherish nature, 2.) big government is bad, 3.) respect the mysterious unnamed Spiritual force.

It reminded me of the battle-cry of today's post-modern thinkers: "Don't tell me what to think, get the military out of my face, and please recycle while you're at it!" Now I am not just poking fun at this, I think Cameron was on to something here. I think that is why this film was so successful. It was not only pretty to watch, but also struck a cord with its viewers by tapping into the current cultural vibe. The most interesting thing however, was the fact that the Navi (the alien race of avatars) were extremely spiritual. They would bless animals after killing them for food. They would respect all things natural, and in fact had biological appendages that they used to literally and spiritually connect to other living organisms and access this spiritual power.

The Navi would in effect pray, but these prayers were directed to a large tree in the center of the forest. The Marines (the bad guys; big government) often referred to their sacred locations by referencing the term "deity." In no way (at least that I could see) was any serious reference made to any one all-powerful God. Just a life-force, or tree, or sacred location. Even Eywa was more or less an incarnation of the "mother-earth" belief. And in this manner, I think the film accurately reflects what many in the viewing audience either agreed with, or were at least comfortable positing. I am in no way detracting from this film. My wife and I both enjoyed it. In the end I suppose it lived up to the meaning of its title -- avatar means a literal descent of a god from heaven to earth. Cameron does accomplish this task in his film. There was no god to save the Navi, only the forest and the mysterious life force.

When the film was over, we went to bed; and I thanked God for being real, and being God.


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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 ...