* * * * * * * Christianity is True * * * * * * *

MSN.com presented a slideshow giving “20 ‘Legitimate’ Reasons Why Some People Just Can’t Get on Board with the Existence of God”. Here are rebuttals for each one. But before presenting these a few preliminary observations are in order.

Skepticism and doubt are necessary for everyone because we are all taught many things in the course of our lives that are dubious, at best, if not outright wrong. But skepticism should be a means to the end of finding what is true. That is, to finding what stands up to critical scrutiny. It should not be an end in itself.

To be an agnostic literally means admitting that you don’t know. But this does not mean that you CAN’T know. That does not follow logically. So you should be willing to do what you can to come to know whether or not God exists. And there are many reasons why you will conclude that God does exist if you honestly seek to know this, especially because God made you to know.

Furthermore, to come to the atheist conclusion (That is, to conclude that God does NOT exist.) is actually a self-contradiction. For it actually presupposes the knowledge of The One Who is claimed not to exist! So, without further ado, on to the rebuttals.

1. Scientific rationality → Denial of God is NOT scientific. It is an anti-theistic philosophical bias. And that Science works is inexplicable without a God Who created the universe and the laws that govern it and Who created us with minds that are capable of understanding these. Furthermore, Science can’t tell you who you are. It can only tell you how YOUR BODY and the rest of the physical universe works. But you are NOT only a body. Rather, you are a mind (or soul) WITH a body. Just to use the expression “my body” reveals the truth of metaphysical Dualism. You have 2 sides: you and your body.

2. Existence of multiple religions → These exist because the natural-born tendency for all of us is to deny our Creator and to try to get along in life without a relationship with God, unless God helps us to overcome this. So humans have created 1000’s of ways to substitute for dealing with our Creator. Religions (including today’s dominant de facto religion: anti-Christian Secular Humanism) develop when people with the same preferred alternatives come together.

3. Unresolved evil & suffering → Evil is arbitrary or just meaningless without God. It’s arbitrary (that is, mere opinion) if there is no Final Authority (higher than anyone else) for what is good & evil. And it’s meaningless if we are just material beings governed by mindless forces and quantum fluctuations.

4. Influence of atheist thinkers → Don’t be influenced by liars! Anyone who claims to know that God doesn’t exist is a liar!

5. Lack of religious understanding → We are all born with all that we need to have a relationship with God. One just needs to be willing to have this. And this relationship is the key to understanding everything else.

6. Personal trauma → The only reason that this has meaning is because good & evil are real. And this is only because God exists.

7. Lack of personal experience → Anyone can have the experience of beginning a relationship with God whenever you are willing to begin this.

8. Religious hypocrisy → Not being consistent with God’s or one’s own standards is humans’ fault, not God’s. And Jesus blasted hypocrites repeatedly in the Gospel accounts.

9. The nature of questions → God welcomes all of your questions & has answers to all of them. But you must be willing to accept God’s answers even if you don’t fully understand them because you’re finite & flawed.

10. Contradictions in religious texts → Not in the Bible. No one has ever proven an inescapable contradiction in the Bible. There are always at least possible explanations that avoid contradictions.

11. Dogmatic beliefs → We are all dogmatic about our most basic beliefs. This is actually necessary, as no one can function in life if we are constantly questioning these. But the real question is: Do your beliefs hold up and work in your life? And no one is more dogmatic & intolerant than woke, anti-Christian Leftists!

12. Negative religious experiences → As with #8, this is not God’s fault!

13. Influence of Secularism → Think for yourselves! Question what you have been taught in your education and by your culture. Don’t be “sheeple”!

14. Moral disagreements with religious teachings → You are only moral because a moral God made you this way. So trying to turn your God-given moral sense against God is a guaranteed losing play.

15. The silence of God → God is NOT silent! He calls to all of us in the thoughts of our minds. But we are naturally-disposed to screen out His call. But if you let God help you overcome this then you will begin to see the evidence for God and His goodness & love everywhere.

16. Fear of conformity → Fear of NON-conformity actually keeps most today from questioning what you have been taught and truly becoming open to God.

17. Unanswered prayers → God answers all sincere prayers. But the answer is often “No”. In such cases, the question is: Who knows best what you need: You or your Creator?

18. Historical atrocities committed in the name of religion → As with #3, #8 & #12, not God’s fault!

19. Non-religious upbringing → All the more reason why you should be open to what Christians believe and why; and, more importantly, open to letting God show Himself to you and become your Father, with Jesus Christ as your Savior & Lord and the Holy Spirit as your constant Companion, Comforter & Counselor.

20. Questions of human suffering → See the answer to #6.

https://www.msn.com/…/20-legitimate…/ss-AA1gXRsK…

1. That there is no Creator & Lord of the universe and us.
(Genesis 1:1 – “In the beginning, God . . .”; Evolution & all fears of extinction assume this error.)

2. That there is no Higher Authority than us for truth, right & wrong and human rights.
(Romans 1:20; All existence and truth is from God. So, if you reject God you will be wrong on most issues and only right by accident or by selectively accepting divine truth while rejecting its Source.)

3. That human beings will not be judged by God.
(Hebrews 9:27; Psalm 98:9; Real justice only exists because there is an Ultimate Judge.)

4. That human beings and the human race can save ourselves. So we don’t need a Savior.
(John 3:16-19; Acts 4:12; All quests for an ideal society fail horribly because they assume this.)

5. That we cease to exist when our physical bodies die since we’re merely physical beings.
(Hebrews 9:27; Luke 23:43; Thus, suicide is no escape. It’s a direct pass to divine Judgment.)

6. That some people are born to be homosexual and can’t change this.
(1 Corinthians 6:9-11; All behavior, including sex, is changeable & thus subject to God’s judgment.)

7. That one’s sexual identity is merely “assigned at birth”.
(Genesis 1:27; Gender dysphoria is a spiritual problem, a problem in one’s relationship with God.)

8. That religious people have no right to have an influence on society based on their beliefs.
(Psalm 14:1, 53:1; Romans 13:1; We are ALL religious in practice, with unprovable basic beliefs.)

9. That it is always wrong to judge others.
(1 Corinthians 6:2; This statement is itself a judgment. So it is self-contradictory.)

10. That there is no such thing as absolute and universal truth.
(John 8:32, 14:6 & 17:17; Romans 1:18-25; 2 Thessalonians 2:10-13; 1 Timothy 2:4;
2 Timothy 4:4; 2 John 2; This statement is itself a truth claim. So it is also self-contradictory.)

11. That Science has made all religious beliefs obsolete.
(Genesis 1; Psalm 14:1 & 53:1; Proverbs 9:10; We must have a set of basic beliefs to do Science.)

12. That the Bible is filled with errors and outdated, inferior ideas.
(2 Timothy 3:16; 2 Peter 1:19-21; Titus 1:2; Numbers 23:19; All claims of this are disprovable.)

13. That we can know what happened in the prehistoric past and what will happen in the future based on what we understand about how nature works now.
(John 1:3; Matthew 10:29-30; Revelation 4:11; Isaiah 46:9-10; This is a fallacy on multiple levels.)

The Gospel of Jesus Christ can be summed up in two words: Jesus Saves! But the natural reaction of many today to this would be: “I don’t need saving. I’m not lost.”
So here is a short summary that should speak to anyone willing to think about it:

ADMIT that God is real and you are utterly dependent on God and need God to forgive you for your sins.

BELIEVE that God loved you enough to die for you so that you might be forgiven and made perfect.

COMMIT to walking in faith and obedience as a beloved child of God.

My 2nd book: “Christianity From A to Z” (by Christopher Andrus) is now out. It’s available on Amazon. As with my 1st book (“The Meaning of the Universe”, also available on Amazon), no matter how much you have read, I guarantee that you’ll find things in it that you have never before considered but are worth considering. Here are links to both of them. You can read the first chapter or so of each. I have also posted a sample chapter of the 2nd book (the “E” chapter) below.

Christianity From A to Z – Kindle edition by Andrus, Christopher. Politics & Social Sciences Kindle eBooks @ Amazon.com.

The Meaning of the Universe: Your Life Has Meaning. But Do You Know What and Why? – Kindle edition by Andrus, Christopher. Religion & Spirituality Kindle eBooks @ Amazon.com.

I also invite you to watch 50 seconds of what I was doing at U.C. Berkeley before the pandemic and returned to early in 2022. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Sut4QCtnLkk

Below is the signboard I created as a conversation-starter at U.C.Berkeley (plus 3 more signs). Any feedback on these signs is welcomed. I almost always get a lively response to my signs, though not always a friendly one! I welcome disagreement, though it should be respectful. As I frequently say to people, I learn more about others and also more about myself and God from people who disagree with me than from people who agree. The board pictured below was destroyed by an angry student on Wednesday, 3/30/22.

______________________________________________________________________ And the following is the message which has generated the most response at Cal thus far.

         ________________________________________________________________

Being LGBTQ+ is NOT normal & healthy. But, GOOD NEWS! It’s changeable. God loves & transforms us.
______________________

Below is my latest set of signs for Berkeley.

Below are a couple previous sets.

______________

Here are a few other messages that I may or may not show at U.C. Berkeley.

___________________________________________________________________

The U.S. doesn’t have a “mass incarceration” of black males problem. We have a black male violent crime problem.

_____________________________________________________________________

There’s still plenty of racism (in all directions), but the U.S. is the least racist nation in the world. It’s why more people of all races come here than anywhere else.

________________________________________________________________

Dominance by the Democrats will NOT defend Democracy!

It will destroy it!

We must preserve America’s TWO PARTY system!

_______________________________________________________________________

CAL STUDENTS: You are going to be the future leaders of society.

For God’s sake (And I mean that literally!) learn how to be democratic, not dictators!

______________________________________________________________________

Studies consistently show that people get more conservative and religious as they get older.
But smart people start early!

______________________________________________________________________

Is it necessary for Christians to accept that evolution is the true explanation for how the human-race came into existence?

The Creation versus Evolution debate finds Bible-believing Christians on both sides. Many Christians are afraid even to consider the “Creationist” or “Intelligent Design” side. This is because they believe that modern Science has proven that Evolution is correct. So, to doubt this is to be anti-scientific. And if Christians are considered anti-scientific then this will undermine the credibility of the Christian message.

But just the fact that the debate is framed in these terms (Creation versus Evolution) should be a clue to why no Christian who believes in the God of the Bible and the Bible as God’s Word can accept that Evolution is correct. In order to see why, consider that the debate could also be described as “Creator versus No Creator”. To put it this way helps us to see that Evolution is an inherently anti-Creator and anti-Creation approach. We will see that this is most clear with regard to Cosmic Evolution. So, from a theological or philosophical standpoint Evolution is anti-theistic and therefore must be rejected by Christians!

And it can also be seen that Evolution has serious scientific issues. So it is entirely appropriate for scientists to challenge these. And there are plenty of credentialed scientists today doing legitimate research that challenges aspects of the Evolutionary model and also produces valuable results revealing God’s designs. Such scientists approach Science as the reverse-engineering of an incredibly designed System. But they face enormous resistance from the mainstream scientific establishment, which assumes that Evolution has become “settled Science”. Creationist or Intelligent Design scientists are opposed to the point of being excluded from the peer-review process of mainstream scientific associations. So they must work within their own associations.

We will begin with claim that Evolution is “settled Science”. This claim is intended to exclude all challenges to the theory. But, amazingly, to make such a claim is actually a violation of one of the most basic principles of Science! That is, that all scientific theories must remain open to challenges. And, in some cases, they must be replaced by better theories, if they prove to have better explanatory and predictive power.¹

This was what occurred with the so-called “Copernican revolution” (from about 1500 until the early 1600’s AD), in which the scientific community shifted from believing that the earth was the center of the solar system (if not the entire universe) to believing (correctly) that the earth revolves around the sun (not the reverse). Another big example of a fundamental shift in scientific theories was that which went from Newtonian Physics to Einstein’s theory of Relativity and Quantum Physics (during the early 20^th century).

The philosopher of Science Thomas Kuhn (in his book “The Structure of Scientific Revolutions”) pointed out convincingly that the history of Science is not one of a steady build-up of knowledge on unchanging foundations and guiding principles. Rather, it is one in which progress often requires theoretical “revolutions”, in which commonly-accepted models or “paradigms” are exposed as having more and more difficulties accounting for what is found in research. As a result, alternative models begin to be considered. If an alternative model is found which can explain what the currently-reigning theory can’t, then this theory will eventually replace the previous one. In other words, both the foundations and guiding principles sometimes change.

Over the past several decades more and more scientists and others (Christians as well as non-Christians) are seeing that there are serious and, even, fatal philosophical and scientific problems with Evolution. This is causing many to abandon this model for a better one.² And, in this case, the better one is actually the one which preceded it and which served as an entirely adequate foundation for Science for centuries: Biblical Creationism. Indeed, it was adequate enough that the modern age of Science was born during this time.

Contrary to a common conception, the Biblical view had come to be rejected by more and more scientists and other intellectuals not for scientific reasons, but for philosophical or theological reasons (or more accurately, anti-theological reasons). It was not that Science was showing the errors of the Bible. Rather, there was a widespread shift in which more and more scientists and other academic leaders simply didn’t have faith in the divine origin and reliability of the Bible. Instead, they had become convinced that it was merely a product of ancient men from a “pre-scientific” age, who were therefore quite ignorant of Science. And if this was the case then the Bible could not possibly serve as the foundation for modern Science.

So it was not research which drove the change. Rather it was a desire for a different model which caused a fundamental change in how research would be done. The model which would prevail would be Charles Darwin’s Evolutionary model. The history of Darwin’s work clearly shows that this is how his theory prevailed.

There are two basic aspects of Evolution:

Biological Evolution (or “Natural Selection”): the theory that all living things evolved from inanimate matter to simple organisms to increasingly complex ones due only to the operation of undirected natural forces acting on matter-energy over eons of time

and

Cosmic Evolution (or “Big Bang” Cosmology): the theory that the entire universe developed due only to mindless natural forces acting on matter-energy in space-time

While it is theoretically possible that God could have brought us into existence by an evolutionary process (a view known as Theistic Evolution), it is quite easy to see that Cosmic Evolution is based on the assumption that there is no Creator. In other words, it is a fundamental rejection of the first 4 words of the Bible: “In the beginning, God . . .” But, in reality, Biological Evolution is also based on this assumption.

Both the belief that the universe and life evolved are based on the assumption that only natural forces exist. This is known as Naturalism.³ So, the believer in evolution will always seek to explain what exists by means of natural forces only. But the Christian cannot accept this.

First, Naturalism sees natural forces as mindless and as functioning according to natural necessity, without any possibility of variation due to deliberation and choice. But it simply can’t be that only this type of forces exists because we have minds and make choices!⁴

Second, the assumption that there can only be natural forces is a logical fallacy. It could never be possible to know this because it must always be considered as possible that there are other forces besides natural ones. Indeed, putting aside the possibility that there is an All-powerful Creator for a moment (something which could never be ruled out), it is not even possible to rule out that there could be some other far more advanced being or race with cosmic-level power, who could have influenced the development of life on earth and, even, the development of the entire universe in ways which we could not detect.⁵

But the main reason that Evolution can’t be correct is because the Creator God does exist and everyone inevitably knows this (as was asserted in the previous chapter). So the simple truth is that all of today’s speculation about the origin of the universe and the origin of life is fundamentally flawed. In fact, the stunning truth is that it is just not possible to know what happened in the distant past and also what will happen in the future based on understanding how the forces of nature work today. Why is this? Because just the possibility that there is a Creator God will always be a huge uncontrollable and unaccountable Variable, Who makes all projections from the present to the past or the future invalid. And this is not just a possibility, it’s a certainty that is actually known by all!

The God of the Bible is “the ultimate Elephant in every room”: A Presence that one may wish to ignore, but Whose existence is ultimately inescapable. But God is also the ultimate Wild Card, Who is free to intervene in His Creation at any time. (How often God actually does this is a subject of debate among Christians. But that God can intervene anytime He wants is not in debate.)

It is just not possible for us to understand how God created the world because He was not bound by the laws of Nature which He Himself created. No matter how we understand Genesis 1, the Creation period must be seen as being a period of supernatural activity. The natural order that we observe today only began after this period. The Bible itself hints at this distinction in Genesis 2:5-6, which says that natural processes: plants springing up and rain, along with human agriculture based on these processes, had not yet begun to occur at the time that God created the first human-beings.⁶

By its nature, Science can only study natural processes. So it can only study how the natural world has developed since the end of the supernatural Creation period. It cannot possibly show us what happened within this period (or how long this period lasted). This is also why the assumptions of a very old earth and universe and that life took millions of years to develop are also fundamentally flawed.

The idea that the universe has “the appearance of age” is based on the faulty assumption that only natural forces were responsible for producing what we observe today. But if there is an All-Powerful Creator (as we know there is), then this Creator could have created everything at whatever rate and in whatever order or manner that He chose.

Some Christians see problems in understanding Genesis 1 as a chronological account of how God created the universe, the earth and its life. But there really are no unavoidable contradictions in doing so.⁷ It is important to realize that the description of the Creation in Genesis is in non-technical language, which the Bible’s original readers could understand. But that it is not in scientific language does not mean that it is in conflict with Science.

Science can and has helped us understand the Bible. But the Bible can and has also helped us understand Science. Indeed, there would be no Science unless God had created a universe with reliable laws. And there would be no scientists except that God created us in His image, with minds capable of understanding His designs. Indeed, the great astronomer Johannes Kepler described the task of scientists and other intellectuals as “thinking God’s thoughts after Him”. He is correct.

That the universe is the Creation of an All-Powerful God means that it can’t be ruled out that God created everything in six 24-hour days. An All-Powerful God certainly could have done this. And, again, the complaint that it appears that everything is much older is actually the result of “smuggling in” the faulty assumption that there were only natural forces at work.

Furthermore, what is true about the entire Creation in terms of antiquity can also be seen to be true about the antiquity of the human-race. And, in this case, the Bible has actually provided a timetable. The genealogies in Genesis 5 & 11 are both given in such a way that the total elapsed time can be calculated. This is because the age of the father at the time of the birth of his principal heir is always given. So the amazing truth is that the human-race is only about 6000 years old! To deny this is to say that the Bible is wrong.

Of course, there is much evidence presented that this can’t be true. But it can be seen that all of this evidence is either based on the flawed Naturalist assumption that we considered previously (which actually makes all radiometric dating invalid, along with many Geological assumptions), or it is based on dubious archaeological assumptions.

And just as the beginning of the universe was determined by God, so will the end of earth and the universe as we now know them. (2 Peter 3:10-13 is a key passage discussing what the end of the current order, also known as the “Eschaton”, will entail.) This is why the more extreme forms of environmentalism and climate-change fears today are wrong. We cannot possibly destroy the planet or make the human-race extinct. Why? Because God has other plans!

However, environmentalism in itself IS Biblical because it is based on God’s assignment to the human-race to be the stewards of our world, as the ruler over all life on earth. Genesis 1:26 says this:

“Then God said, ‘Let us make man in our image, after our likeness. And let them have dominion over the fish of the sea and over the birds of the heavens and over the livestock and over all the earth and over every creeping thing that creeps on the earth.’”

That the human-race has dominion over the rest of living things is actually an amazingly advanced idea considering the fact that it was first communicated to us in written form at least 3000 years ago! And two verses later God says this:

“Be fruitful and multiply and fill the earth and subdue it, and have dominion over the fish of the sea and over the birds of the heavens and over every living thing that moves on the earth.”

So, contrary to Naturalism, we are not at the mercy of the earth. Rather, we are called to subdue the earth. And human history has been the steady fulfillment of this assignment from God. Indeed, this is especially through the advance of Science! On the other hand, none of this could be explained if we are merely the most sophisticated product of mindless natural forces. Nor would our concern for the environment make sense.

It is true that some other forms of life exist in symbiotic (mutually-beneficial) relationships. But there is no parallel elsewhere in Nature for our concern for our environment or for the survival of other species. Indeed, animals are often known to destroy their own food supply, make other species extinct or ruin their environment in other ways.

Finally, believers in evolution say that extinction is part of the natural order and is inevitable for all species eventually, including us. But they consistently contradict this in practice insofar as they bemoan the extinction of any species, as well as in their concern about our future extinction and in their passionate efforts to prevent this. Indeed, in acting this way they act in the way that God created them to act.

FOOTNOTES

1. It important to note that the same problem also applies to those who regard climate-change as “settled Science”. Ironically, people who treat both Evolution and Climate Science in this way fall into the same type of dogmatic resistance to challenges that religious people have often been criticized for, and rightly so.
2. We will focus mainly on the philosophical/theological issues here. But there are plenty of resources for those who are interested in the scientific issues. A good video introduction to this is “Evolution’s Achilles Heels”. And a good website is CreationEvolution.org. A good book that introduces readers to both the scientific and philosophical/theological issues is Jason Lisle’s “The Ultimate Proof of Creation”.
3. Along with this is the assumption that only material entities exist (known as Materialism or Physicalism).
4. Naturalism says that everything that happens, including everything that we do, is determined solely by mindless forces of Nature. This means that everything occurs according to a strict mechanical or chemical necessity. After all, physical or chemical processes don’t make choices. There are those who cannot accept this view because it is too deterministic (and rightly so). So they attempt to avoid the determinism that is entailed in Naturalism by appealing to what is known as “the Heisenberg Uncertainty Principle” and “quantum fluctuation”. This is the principle that says that everything in the universe is actually constantly moving randomly, so that we can never know exactly where anything is. But this won’t work. For it would only replace an absolute determinism with pure randomness. This can’t account for human experience either!
5. Some evolutionary scientists suggest that life on earth was “seeded” by some life-form which came from somewhere else. (Spoiler alert) There was a popular film, “Mission to Mars” that was based on this idea. But to explain life on earth in this way doesn’t solve the problem of how life begins, it would just push it back another step. One would still have to explain how this other life-form came into existence.
6. The notion that ancient humans were utterly ignorant of Science is simply a false modern prejudice. It has always been necessary for people to understand forces (like gravity) and processes of Nature (like how plants grow) in order to survive. That such knowledge was not formally recognized until later is irrelevant. The Biblical phenomenon of miracles illustrates this. Far from undermining the natural order, the only way that miracles could be recognized as signs of something special happening is that people were capable of recognizing that they were violations of what was normally expected to happen.
7. Two prominent objections are worth considering. First there is the supposed problem of the existence of light on the first day of the Creation period prior to the creation of the sun and stars on the fourth day. But God could certainly have created light directly, without creating a light-producing object. Indeed, in Israel’s time in the wilderness God manifested His Presence as a light-producing Glory-cloud. And in the picture of the New Jerusalem in Revelation 21:23 it says: “The city does not need the sun or the moon to shine on it, for the glory of God gives it light, and the Lamb is its lamp.” . . .
   
   The second is known as “the distant starlight problem”. If the earth is only 6000 years old, then it would not seem possible to see any object that is over 6000 light-years away. There are 2 possible resolutions to this problem. One is that the method of determining the distances of objects in the universe is fundamentally flawed so that everything we see is actually within 6000 light-years away. But this doesn’t seem possible. So the explanation that I favor is that the speed of light is not a constant. Instead, it was virtually infinite at first, but has been slowing down in a reverse-logarithmic fashion since the beginning of the universe. In other words, its speed went down very quickly at first. But now its slowing is at such a low rate that it appears to be steady. This would explain how we can see very distant objects.

I want the readers to know that the ads which now appear on this site were not selected by its creator, nor do they reflect my views. Nor do I make any money from them or from the site in any way.

The Rational Road to Becoming a Christian

1. If I am just the result of mindless forces operating on matter-energy in space-time, then I have no real explanation for why I exist as a person with a mind.

2. But I clearly exist as a person with a mind capable of observing and understanding the material world around me (including my own physical body, which includes my brain), as well as knowing other people who have bodies and minds.

3. Therefore, the first part of point #1 can’t be true.

4. Then how can it be that I exist as a person with a mind that can do what point #2 describes?

5. If there is a reasonable explanation for how this came to be, then I should accept that it’s true.

6. Christianity says that both I as a person with a mind and the universe around me were created by and are continually sustained by an Almighty Personal God. It also says that this God seeks to have a relationship with me. I also have an innate sense that these things are true. But I have been discouraged from considering that these ideas could be true until now.

7. Why shouldn’t I consider that this is true?

8. Having been told by others that I shouldn’t consider this or not wanting to consider it because I may not like the consequences if it’s true are not valid reasons for not considering it. Doing the first means I have given up my freedom to decide for myself. Doing the second makes no sense because, if it’s true that God is real and that He made me, then there are consequences of this, whether I like it or not.

9. So I ought to consider that this is true.

10. If Almighty God exists and if He made me and continually sustains my life and seeks to have a relationship with me, then I should want to have a relationship with Him.

11. If Almighty God could create me and the entire universe, He could certainly reveal Himself to the world in a written form.

12. If the Christian Bible is the only book in which God does this, then it is the most important book of all.

13. Is the Christian Bible the only book that does this?

14. The Christian Bible frequently presents God as revealing Himself, unlike other supposed holy books which don’t claim this.

15. The Christian Bible says that God is both the Almighty King of Kings and that He wants to have a personal relationship with us, unlike Islam’s Qu’ran (which only claims the first is true).

16. This agrees with my innate ideas of who God is (point #6).

17. So it is reasonable to believe that the Bible is God’s Self-revelation or Word and that I should base my life on what it says.

18. The Gospel or “Good News” of the Bible (which was foreshadowed in the Old Testament and fulfilled in the New Testament) is that God, our Eternal Father, sent His Eternal Son, Jesus Christ into the world to save us from our sins and that He sent His Eternal Holy Spirit to dwell inside of us in order to transform us to be like His Son so that we will be worthy to dwell with Him forever in Heaven.

Bottom-line: That all of this is true won’t make anyone consider and accept it. Each of us must be willing to do so. But everyone should be and is therefore culpable before God for refusing to do so. (New Testament Book of Romans, chapter 1, verses 18-20)

Have you ever asked yourself: “What is my place in the universe?” If you would be willing to pause for a moment to think about it (and why wouldn’t you?), shouldn’t this be one of the most important questions, if not the most important one anyone could ask? But, amazingly, most people today either haven’t asked it at all or have just dismissed it as unanswerable or with the simple answer: “I have no real importance in the universe.” Now, having such a perspective may seem to be humble and, even, noble. But is it correct?

Up until about 100 years ago things were very different. Most people in Europe and the United States would have answered the question in theistic terms. One’s view of one’s self was in relation to the Creator God, the same One Who is described in the Bible and Who was believed to exist by the vast majority of people. In short, aside from a minority consisting of Jews, Atheists/Agnostics, Muslims and people of other faiths, almost everyone saw himself or herself either as a Christian or a sinner before God.

But over the course of the previous century a new view had been gaining strength in intellectual circles, slowly supplanting Christianity, first in the halls of academia and, eventually, in the entire culture. This approach came to be known as Humanism and was frankly admitted to be a religious alternative to Christianity and other supernatural religions in a Manifesto authored by a group of prominent teachers in the early 1930’s (the first “Humanist Manifesto”).

Humanism featured a starkly different perspective on human existence than Christianity, rejecting the supernatural both on the personal and cosmic levels. On the cosmic side, it rejected the idea of an Almighty Creator and Lord of the universe in favor of a Materialistic view, which held that, ultimately, the universe consists only of matter-energy, space-time and mindless forces of Nature. Consistent with this was the notion of humanity as the ultimate source and standard of truth and morality. After all, if there was no Higher Authority, then we must determine truth and morality for ourselves.

Over the past 100 years Humanism has so effectively become the dominant view that it became rare that anyone would dare to question it. Those who dared to do so would tend to be viewed as odd or ignorant, at best (holding to antiquated and disproved beliefs) if not outright crazy. In American culture, the so-called “Scopes monkey trial” in the 1920’s was probably the clearest sign of the conquest of Humanism. For, although the Humanist side lost the actual trial, it clearly won a decisive victory in the court of public opinion. So it is that most in Europe and the U.S. today just take the Humanist view of humanity and the universe for granted: that we are tiny specks in a vast impersonal Cosmos, mere accidents of Nature, biochemical machines which are the most complex product of the process of Evolution, a process governed by mindless forces.

But is the Humanist view correct? Does it explain human existence? Does it stand up to critical scrutiny? Were we correct in rejecting the old way of looking at things? Or is there another approach which may work better? That such questions are rarely asked today is, in itself, a dangerous thing. Socrates has been credited with saying that “An unexamined life is not worth living.” This seems undeniably true. But in order to properly examine one’s life it is critical that one see it in the proper universal context. Sadly, most of us today have become so convinced that there is only one way to view ourselves and the universe that we have lost our ability to think critically about it and also to think about alternative views.

The goal of what follows is two-fold: to shine a critical spotlight on today’s dominant philosophy: Humanism (including its metaphysical and epistemological partners, Materialism and Empiricism) and also to shine a much-needed new light on its predecessor: Christian Theism. For, although Christianity was the dominant view for almost two millennia, it has been pushed so far from the center of modern culture that it is almost completely unknown by most today.

As one whose personal intellectual journey followed this “two-step”, I came to realize first that today’s dominant view turns out to be what is known today as an “Epic Fail”. Upon reaching this conclusion I fell into a period of total Skepticism. But, unlike some, it seems, I could not remain in skepticism. What followed was a brief flirtation with Zen Buddhism. I was initially drawn to Zen because of its denial both of Theism and of all conceptualization. Coincidentally, it happened to agree with today’s dominant view of the Cosmos (which was well-portrayed in the Carl Sagan “Cosmos” PBS mini-series of the early 1980’s and has recently been updated), which said that all of our experience and thinking are illusions and that ultimate reality is something quite different from what we perceive it to be.

But, if both Zen and modern scientists and intellectuals are correct, then all that we think and experience are merely passing fancies with an illusion of meaning. In short, if this is the case, then we are all the victims of a cosmic joke of sorts. However, even if we are all deceived, it remains the case that we undeniably exist as the subjects of the deception. After all, only a truly insane person believes that he or she doesn’t really exist. Furthermore, there are countless other things we really know to be true, in contrast with countless things we know to be false. It is simply impossible to function moment-by-moment without being able to make this distinction.

Being unable to accept the “Grand Illusion” view, I continued searching. But I was still too much under the sway of my Humanist up-bringing to give any real consideration to Christianity. While I had received catechism in Catholicism at the behest of my parents, I had never truly considered the teachings of the Catholic Church. For, this brief training was easily overcome by the Humanistic indoctrination I was receiving 5 days a week and 9 months every year in a very “progressive” suburban Philadelphia school district.

We all tend to believe what we are taught every day. And to those who object to me calling my public education an “indoctrination”, I would point out that all education necessarily involves the teaching of basic doctrines, “basic” because they are the base upon which everything else is built. All philosophies (including both Christianity and Humanism) have their own basic doctrines, which cannot practically be questioned. After all, one simply can’t go through life thinking that their most basic beliefs about themselves and the world may be wrong.

So I continued searching in every possible direction I could find other than Christianity. Until one day when I suddenly became convinced that I was not an accident of Nature. Rather, I was a creature who had been created by a Creator, created for a relationship with Him. In retrospect I consider this the day in which I became a “born-again” Christian. I had not been prompted to begin thinking about God by any other person or by reading the Bible or any other book. It was simply the opening of a vertical connection by God to me which had not existed before. And once this happens to someone, everything changes.

Within a matter of days I became convinced that the Bible must be what it says it is: God’s unique revelation of Himself. I became confident of this because, of all ancient religious scriptures, the Bible alone described The God Who had just made me aware of Himself. I would add that I had not ever truly been an Atheist who was certain that there is no God. But I was what Christians call a “practical atheist”, who thought and lived on the assumption that Christianity was false and that it’s impossible for anyone to know for sure what ultimate reality consists of and for any one religion to be true. I would later see that this in itself is just part of my previous belief-system.

Having become a true believer in the God of the Bible and the Bible, I began to describe myself as a Christian for the first time and I began seeking the fellowship of other believers. I now saw myself as a Christian not because I had been brought up as a Catholic or because I was an American, but because I truly believed in Christianity. In short, I had come to see that, despite all of the progress in Science and technology and some other areas which had occurred since it was supplanted, it was the previously-dominant approach to truth, Christian Theism, not Humanism, that was actually the correct approach.

In short, the developed world made an intellectual and spiritual wrong-turn about 100 years ago and needs to get back on the right road, turning back to Christianity from the Humanism which can be seen to be self-destructive both in principle (in destroying the true meaning of human nature and human life) and in practice (in destroying the sanctity of life and the civility, freedom and prosperity which depend on this).

This is the path that I am praying that God will lead many others on. It is reflected in the diagram below. The perspective which I came to have is also illustrated in the diagram further below (https://christianityistrue.org/the-duality-of-creation). And I pray that He will use this site toward this end. Soli Deo Gloria!

1. To force someone to do or say what one believes is right but the other person believes is wrong, far from promoting civil liberty, actually takes away the civil liberty of others. Whereas this is sometimes necessary, it must only be done when it is absolutely necessary.
2. Whereas it should be recognized that discrimination against people is always unacceptable for certain things (for example with regard to race or ethnicity), in other situations it can be acceptable at times but unacceptable at other times (for example with regard to sex or sexual orientation, see note below), and should always be accepted in some cases (as in denying the liberty of murderers, rapists, pedophiles, drunk-drivers and other duly-convicted criminals, regardless of color, or in allowing people to form private associations and determine the membership qualifications and requirements for such).
3. Whereas civil rights legislation sometimes is necessary to counter illegitimate discrimination (as with racial discrimination in the 1960’s in the U.S. and elsewhere today), it should be recognized that laws in themselves don’t usually change people’s minds. And for people to change their behavior requires them to change their thinking. This change in people’s thinking is the real reason for the real progress we have made in racial and religious relations since the 1960’s.
4. The United States of America was not set up either to be a Christian or a secular nation, but a nation which sought to guarantee “liberty and justice for all”, both religious and non-religious, as far as this is possible. This liberty must include the right of both religious and non-religious people to do, say and think according to their beliefs both in private and publicly. When there are conflicts as a result of this “free-exercise” of religious or secular beliefs (as there inevitably will be), every effort must be made to find compromises which do not violate the freedom of conscience of all parties.
5. The United States of America was not set up to be a nation in which the government was to rule over all aspects of people’s lives, but a nation in which a limited amount of government, with balanced and separated powers “of the People, by the People and for the People” would protect and promote both the personal and economic liberty of all from tyranny, whether from external or internal threats.

Are you a true Libertarian? Sadly, organizations like the ACLU and Americans United for Separation of Church and State (AU) often fight against the liberty of those who dissent from what is regarded as “politically correct” today. Insofar as they do so, they promote tyranny rather than liberty. A true Libertarian must always allow others “the right to be wrong” with respect to their own beliefs and values.

I welcome discussion of this with anyone willing to have a reasonable, respectful discussion. But if you aren’t willing to do so and, furthermore, would exclude this discussion and marginalize anyone who would raise these issues, then you are acting like a tyrant, not a freedom-loving libertarian.

Christopher Andrus

Note to point 2: It’s wrong not to give women the same opportunities as men (and vice-versa) in most cases. But it’s right for the Women’s National Basketball Association to ban male players. And it’s right to protect people from being persecuted for their private, consensual behavior. But it’s wrong to persecute people for not approving of and to require them to support behavior which they view as wrong and destructive. The latter is wrong because it can’t be demonstrated that sexual orientation is akin to race as a natural, unchangeable characteristic. Indeed, it can be shown that sexual orientations can change in a variety of ways.

1.  In the Evolution/Creation debate most #Evolution-believers are close-minded to #Creationism/#ID, but many Creationists came from their side

2.  Most Evolution believers today hold completely unexamined and unfounded assumptions about the nature of ultimate reality, humanity and God.

3.  Darwin’s theory wasn’t a conclusion based on research. Rather, his prior rejection of God & Theistic Science drove his theorizing & research.

4.  How irrational #Atheists act: A: “Show me evidence.” We give evidence & arguments. A ignore & say: “There’s no evidence. Show me evidence.”

5.  #Evolution believer: Why do you assume only the material world exists, that we’re reducible to brain chemistry, and that no Creator exists?

6.  #Evolution believer: You must resist the tendency to assume you have the truth & start questioning it. To insist you don’t need to is Denial

7.  #Evolutionists deny but can’t refute how irreducible complexity/the decay of the human genome/the existence of minds undermine their beliefs

8.  Evolution fail: We have brain chemistry but can’t be reduced to this. The “matter-only” view of the Cosmos fails. (http://wp.me/p3YamW-1j )

9.  Only Mind/Body Dualism explains 2-way causality betw brain-chemistry & consciousness + a single entity can’t be both its own cause & effect.

10.  #Evolution-believer: To say that consciousness is only brain-chemistry looking at itself is nonsense which only explains away consciousness.

11.  All education is “faith-based”. Secular public ed. is based on faith that the Creator God doesn’t exist. But this is impossible to know.

12.  If The Biblical #God exists (& we say He must), He must be The 1st Priority of all #education. To refuse to start with God is to reject Him

13.  Every human being in history has actually known that The Creator God exists. But man is also naturally inclined to rebel against our Maker.

14.  #God calls all to give up resistance to Him, Admit your sin & need for Him, Believe He sent His Son to forgive & His Spirit to transform you

15.  The Trinity (hinted at in the OT & deduced from the NT) means God is relationally both Subject & Object (not physically).

16.  God’s plurality of Being makes Him self-sufficient as a relational Person, without the need to create something to relate to.

17.  The Trinity means God is One & Many, equally-ultimate Subject & Object and a relational Being (incl cause & effect relation).

18.  Christian Theism is The Answer to all of the major riddles of Philosophy, thereby serving as the only basis for all knowledge

19.  Despite the dogmatic Modern/Post-Modern bias, the Bible is both God’s “Get to know Me Manual” & the Foundation for all Truth.

20.  Material (created) entities can only be objects, not subjects. But we, as incarnated spiritual beings in God’s image are both

21.  Having made us as incarnated spiritual beings, God Himself became one (in the Person of The Son) to lead us to Perfection.

For more thought-provoking tweets follow @Duke1CA on Twitter.  Here are some other helpful resources for those who are interested in these topics:

Jason Lisle’s book, “The Ultimate Proof of Creation”

Timothy Keller’s book, “The Reason for God”

The DVD “Evolution’s Achilles Heels” (a presentation of problems with Evolution by 15 credentialed scientists;  in addition to the compelling scientific arguments, the interviews with the scientists in the bonus material are also important)

And two web-sites: CreationRevolution.com & AnswersinGenesis.org

Those who are truly interested in finding truth are not afraid of looking for it anywhere.

Which Way is the Right Way to “Salvation”?

(Regardless of what name you call it)

by Christopher Andrus

Revised 5/10/2017

Christianity’s meta-narrative explains those of other religions, but the others’ cannot explain what is unique about Christianity. This is especially evident with regard to how it is that one reaches what the religion considers to be the ultimate goal (regardless of what it is called). A good way to see the differences is to consider that there are four ways which these three are believed to relate: faith, good works and salvation. They are as follows:

1) “Faith” → Salvation (Good Works are unnecessary.)

2) “Good Works” → Salvation (No particular kind of Faith is necessary.)

3) “Faith” + “Good Works” → Salvation

4) Salvation (Accomplished by Christ) → Faith → Good Works → Heaven

“Faith” → Salvation (Good Works are unnecessary.)
The first of these is what Roman Catholics and many other non-Evangelicals believe the Protestant Christian Gospel teaches. But it is a misunderstanding, although it is regrettably true that Evangelical churches do sometimes fall into this error. This understanding of how one is saved is known as Antinomianism. It has also been called “cheap grace”. But it is really a denial of grace. For, even though the credo of the Reformation was that we are saved by faith alone, it has always been understood that true faith must lead to the doing of good works. This is in keeping with the words of the New Testament book of James (chapter 2, verse 26): “For just as the body without the spirit is dead, so also faith without works is dead.” Another way of putting it is that “we are saved by faith alone, but not by faith that is alone.”

Consequently, a person claiming to have faith who doesn’t show this faith by doing good deeds, as opportunities come, is rightly regarded as being either a liar or self-deceived. This is why “Faith” has been placed in quotes above. Any understanding of faith which does not hold good works to be a necessary result of faith is a false view of faith. This is also reflected in the New Testament book of 1 John (chapter 3, verses 17-19):
“But whoever has the world’s goods, and sees his brother in need and closes his heart against him, how does the love of God abide in him? Little children, let us not love with word or with tongue, but in deed and truth. We will know by this that we are of the truth, and will assure our heart before Him.”

“Good Works” → Salvation (No particular kind of Faith is necessary.)
The second is known as Moralism. It is probably the most popular notion for people identifying as non-religious (that is, Humanists) or nominally-religious people in the modern pluralistic world. (The latter refers to people who claim to belong to a particular religion but do not really hold to the teachings of that religion.) Of course, the “salvation” in view for most of these people is a sense of well-being in this world, rather than in a future world.

Unfortunately, it is also a way that does not work. This is because, from the Christian point-of-view no matter how many “good works” one does, these could not wash away the sin that separates us from God. (Beyond our behavior and thoughts, what we should not do and do or what we should do and don’t, is the root of mankind’s universal sinfulness – our inescapable tendency to deny or resist God.) Moreover, “good works” which are not performed for the right motive, which is love for God and neighbor, and for the right end, which is the glory of God, are not truly good (hence the quotation marks again).

“Faith” + “Good Works” → Salvation
The third conception is probably the most popular one for serious practitioners of all of the major religions of the world, including Islam, Judaism, Buddhism, Hinduism, Roman Catholicism, Eastern Orthodoxy, and, even (in practice, at least) Protestant Christianity. However, in spite of the popularity of this view and regardless of the sincerity with which it is pursued, it too is a false way! This is the error of Legalism, which makes Salvation dependent on what man does: namely, to have the right kind of “Faith” and the right “Good Works”. But, man is unable to have either on his own.

[Related to this is a recently-developed approach in Reformed Christian circles which considers Faith and Good Works to be two sides of the same coin. Thus: Faith/Works → Salvation
Or: “The Obedience of Faith” or Faithfulness → Salvation
While this view is somewhat of an improvement on the first two ways, in pointing to the inseparability of Faith and Good Works, it too fails to capture the true nature of God’s Saving Grace. It also fails to recognize that Faith and Works, while inseparable, are nonetheless also distinct entities, with the former being passive and the latter active.]

Salvation (Accomplished by Christ) → Faith → Good Works → Heaven
This brings us to the final conception, which is the only true one, what Jesus called the narrow path which leads to life (in contrast with the other ways, which make up the broad way which leads to destruction). For, the true Christian Gospel declares that Salvation is dependent only on what God does (in the past, the present and the future), both what He has done for us, in the saving work of His Eternal Son, Jesus Christ and what He does in us, in giving us true Faith and empowering us to do true Good Works. In this way, the Salvation which was perfectly accomplished by Christ is applied to believers in Him more and more until they are brought to Full Salvation in eternity.

The application of the Salvation accomplished by the Lord Jesus Christ comes through the working of the Holy Spirit, Who takes up residence in the heart of God’s true Children as a true Divine Presence and Counselor. In this we see the necessity of the Third Person of the Trinity, the Holy Spirit, as well as the Second, the Son of God, Jesus Christ, in order for Salvation to be possible. The uniqueness of the Gospel, then, is the glorious truth that we have already been saved by Christ, although we have not yet reached the full experience of our salvation. This means that, if Christ died for us, our salvation is certain because it has already been fully accomplished. But it is not yet complete from our point-of-view.

What happens to believers in this world is determined by what God has already done in Eternity in the completed work of the Redeemer, Jesus Christ. And so it will be until this present world comes to an end in the Day of the Lord and is replaced by the Kingdom of God in its glorious fullness, which was the goal of God’s Creation from the beginning. The only thing that matters, then, is this: Is Jesus Christ truly your Savior? Do you know that He died for you and that you are in Him and He is in you? If this is true for you, then all of the blessings of Heaven are guaranteed to you and all of the glory belongs to God!

Ten Widely-believed Fallacies Today

by Christopher Andrus

August 30, 2013

1. Every reasonable person knows the God described in the Bible can’t exist.
2. There is no evidence that the Biblical God exists.
3. All claims of immaterial existence are ridiculous because they can’t be      demonstrated scientifically.  So belief in the Biblical God is akin to belief in Santa Claus or the “flying spaghetti monster”.
4. Because Science has been proven to be the only reliable way to understand the physical world, then this world must be all that exists.
5. Biblical Christianity is anti-Science and anti-Reason.
6. We can know what happened in the past and what will happen in the future based on what we understand about how nature works now.
7. I am not religious because my beliefs are all scientifically-based.
8. It is always wrong to judge others.
9. There is no such thing as absolute truth.
10.  Every reasonable person knows that the Bible is filled with scientific impossibilities, evil teachings or actions done by or required by God and other errors.

Introductory note: Because of the importance of these issues for every one of us it is not rational either to ignore or dismiss the arguments which follow.  They must either be refuted with rational arguments or accepted.  We assert that only the Christian worldview can account for all we experience and know.

1. Every reasonable person knows the God described in the Bible can’t exist.

Why this is a fallacy:

It is impossible to know that God doesn’t exist because proving the non-existence of God would require complete knowledge of the universe, and not just in the present, but also from the beginning.  Of course, this is impossible for any human being.  So, one may doubt that God exists.  But you cannot know that He doesn’t.  However, the reality is that everyone actually knows that the Biblical God does exist, but most suppress this knowledge.

This is because human beings are made in the image of our Creator God and for the purpose of having a relationship with Him.  But we have also been born with a natural tendency to run away from God, which we inherited from our ancestors, going all the way back to our First Parents, Adam and Eve.  Because of this sinful nature, we have the desire to get along without our Creator and to try to make sense of the world without Him.  This is the driving force behind all philosophies and religions other than Biblical Christianity.  (The use of the pronoun “Him” for God does not mean that God is male.  God created both the male and female genders.  However, the New Testament message is that God became a man in the person of Jesus of Nazareth.)

Modern public education is based on the false premise that The God of the Bible doesn’t exist.  So, from our very first days in school we are taught about a world in which God is irrelevant.  One is free to believe in God personally, but only if this belief has no impact on one’s life and understanding of the universe.  In other words, God is only acceptable if He is irrelevant and powerless.

But, The Almighty Creator God cannot be dismissed.  Because of Who He Is, we must begin learning by learning about Him.  If we don’t, we have actually rejected Him and replaced Him with something else.  The Bible calls this idolatry.  In the past idolatry was obvious, being seen in open worship of other gods or ideals.  But the most common form of idolatry in the 21^st century is more subtle.  Today’s main idols are human reason and desires and Science as the only source of knowledge.

Because God is The One Who gave every one of us life and everything else and Who sustains us moment-by-moment, we are “biting The Hand that feeds us” if we do not make our relationship with Him our top priority.  Again, you cannot plead ignorance on this.  You already know in your heart that you are completely dependent on God every single moment of your life.  He calls you to forsake your false sense of independence and your futile resistance to Him.

2. There is no evidence that the Biblical God exists.

There is plenty of evidence and arguments which show that belief in God is far more reasonable than believing that He doesn’t exist or, even, doubting that He does.  In a court of law, evidence will be sought and viewed differently by the prosecution and the defense.  Such is also the case between those believe in God’s existence and those who assume that God doesn’t exist.

The first piece of evidence for God’s existence is the existence of human minds.  The most common belief today (which is falsely called “scientific”) is that the universe really consists only of matter/energy and mindless forces of nature in time.  But if this is true then the universe is ultimately mindless.  But then where did human minds come from?

Saying that our minds and identity are only brain chemistry and that we only imagine otherwise won’t work.  This is because, even if we are deluded about ourselves, “we” still exist as subjects of the delusion.  In other words, “you” and “I” exist both as objects and subjects.  We are not our brains.  Rather, you and I have bodies (including our brains), but we are clearly more than this.  For example, if a person is viewing their own brain-scan he or she must be distinguished from what is being viewed.  It is not brain chemistry viewing itself!

The Biblical view explains why we have minds – because we have been made in the image of our Creator as rational and moral beings.  And it is also explains why we have bodies, and also why there is a physical world (which the alternative view cannot) – because God created the universe and created us as minds/souls/spirits housed in physical bodies.

The next evidence of God’s existence is the existence of logic and morality.  Both of these are not part of the material world, so they cannot be explained if matter is all that exists.  Logic simply isn’t observed in Nature.  Rather, it must be assumed and relied upon before we can study and learn about Nature or anything else and before we can communicate with others, and, even, before we can think at all.  In other words, logic is a characteristic of our minds.

In this also we are like God.  God, Who is The Original Mind, is the Creator of our minds.  And our minds also reflect how His works.  God is perfectly logical because true logic describes how His mind works and how ours should work.  As such, God is not under rules of Logic which are higher than Him.  Nor is He logical because He arbitrarily defines what is logical.

In the same way, although we do make moral judgments about things which we observe in the material world, morality in itself cannot be observed in the material world.  It is also important to recognize that we tend to make such judgments only on actions done by people, not by animals.  This is quite revealing in itself in pointing to the uniqueness of humanity as rational moral beings.

Morality, like logic, exists in our minds.  Again, this reflects our Creator.  And, as with logic, true morality describes what God is like as The Original Person.  More accurately, it is The Original Three Persons, Who are equally-divine.  This is important because without this plurality God could not be relational and, thus, moral within His own Being.  This is why Christian Theism is superior to other monotheistic theologies (most significantly, that of Islam and Judaism, but also that of Mormonism, Jehovah’s Witnesses and other monistic faiths).  All polytheistic theologies (with multiple, clearly distinct deities) are clearly inferior because God must be The Supreme Being, otherwise He is not Worthy of The Name.  So, it is necessary that God be One Supreme Being but in more than One Person.

Morality describes how The Three Persons of God have always related to each other and how we, as beings made in God’s image, should relate to each other, as well as to our world and to God.  This is also why there is an impressive amount of agreement on what is right and wrong around the world and also throughout history.  Of course, there is also a considerable amount of disagreement.  But this can be explained as the result of mankind’s natural tendency to reject both God and His moral ways.

As is the case with logic, God is not under rules of morality, nor is He moral because everything He does is moral by definition.  The latter would make morality arbitrary.  But morality is both divinely-based and real (not arbitrary) because God is Three Real Personal Beings Who are also perfectly Good.  Of course, in the latter respect, we are not like Him.

The next piece of evidence that there is a divine Mind behind the universe is the fact that we find both order and disorder in the universe.  On our level, it is clear that purposeful human activity is constantly required to create order and prevent increasing disorder.  Anyone who never cleans their house or brushes their teeth easily finds this to be true!  This is also true of human societies.

But, if this is so in our experience, then it is questionable at best to assume that purposeful activity wasn’t required in order to produce the amazing order which we observe both in the physical universe itself and, especially, in living things.  Today, we are constantly learning more and more about how complex even the simplest living things are.  Furthermore, this complexity involves countless parts working in harmony so that if even one of them is missing or defective the organ or organism cannot function.  (This is known as “irreducible complexity”.)  It is simply an extreme act of blind faith to believe that this developed without a Mind and design behind it.  We know that it takes a watchmaker to make a watch.  It took a far greater Mind to create the universe which includes watches, living things and everything else.

So, the problem is not a lack of evidence.  Rather, it is that most people don’t want to look at the evidence as pointing to God, but, rather, are completely committed to trying to make sense of everything without God.  The claim that there is no evidence for the God of the Bible is simply a lie.  The most that anyone can claim is a belief that the evidence more reasonably points to the non-existence of God.  But we assert the contrary.

Furthermore, it is absolutely absurd for anyone to demand that an Almighty God prove His existence to them before they will acknowledge Him.  For this is to put one’s self in the seat of judgment and, thus, at least equal to, if not above God.  The One True God doesn’t have to prove Himself to human beings or anyone else!  Rather, we have to answer to Him.  If you don’t like this it’s your problem, not His.

3. All claims that immaterial entities exist are ridiculous because they can’t be      demonstrated scientifically.  So belief in the Biblical God is akin to belief in Santa Claus or the “flying spaghetti monster”.

There are plenty of immaterial entities which we all take for granted constantly.  First, there is logic, which (as indicated under the last point) cannot be observed in the physical world.  Rather, it must be assumed before all observation of this or, even, before any human thinking at all can occur.  Logic is the rules of thinking without which it would be impossible to distinguish what is reasonable from what is nonsense.

Next, there is human consciousness, which includes our self-awareness, our awareness of other people and our awareness of the world around us.  Although consciousness is associated with brain chemistry (at least in our current existence), it simply cannot be reduced to this (as we also established under the last point).

Another immaterial entity which we must assume to be real in order to get along in our world is morality.  As indicated previously, this also cannot be observed in the material world.

Finally, there is all of our experience and knowledge, including all scientific knowledge.  While scientific knowledge is about the world of objects, what we learn from Science is not in itself found in the physical world.

Furthermore, the study and understanding of these immaterial entities is just as possible as that of the material world using both evidence and reason, except that the “objects” of study are not objects, they are subjects.  This includes Anthropology, Sociology, Psychology and Theology, which is the study of The Ultimate Subject – God.  Though the first three are usually considered scientific fields, they are not physical Sciences because they seek understanding of people, who are more than just material entities governed by mindless laws of nature.

And, in practice, it is not hard to demonstrate rationally how The God described in the Bible must exist, as opposed to other claims of deity or conceptions of ultimate reality or obviously fictional characters.  We dealt with the first two under the last point.  As for fictional creatures, it is completely ridiculous to compare belief in The Creator God with belief that these are real.  This is because all sane adults know that fairy tales and fictitious creatures are made up.  But untold millions of people over thousands of years have based their lives on belief in The Creator God.  But, more importantly for the current point, all sane people in human history have assumed that they are real people.  And people are more than material bodies.

4. Because Science has been proven to be the only reliable way to understand the physical world, then this world must be all that exists.

This is such an obvious fallacy that it is absolutely stunning that the entire modern philosophy of secular education (which is metaphysical Materialism and its corresponding epistemology of Empiricism) is based on it.  This is a fallacy of composition.  That Science enables us to understand one aspect of reality does not mean that this is all there is to reality.  The conclusion just doesn’t follow.  And it’s not just that the conclusion is believed to be true.  It is actually believed by many people in the developed world today that the success of Science has proven that God and other immaterial entities can’t exist.  This false logic is basis for the common “Science has made religion obsolete” claim.  But, those who believe this have actually turned Science into a religion in practice by viewing it as an all-explaining approach to reality.  It is a testament to the blinding power of a Philosophy/Religion that a small child is capable of understanding the logical error here, but Nobel Prize-winning scientists are not.

Instead, it must be recognized that there is an entire realm of reality in addition to the physical world.  Some of the reasons for this were given in point #4.  In addition to returning to Christian Theism as the correct understanding of reality, we must return to metaphysical Dualism, in which it is recognized that both bodies and minds (or souls or spirits) are real.  This is represented in the diagram which can be found on this blog entitled “The Creator and the Creation”.

5.  Biblical Christianity is anti-Science and anti-Reason.

Biblical Christianity is entirely compatible with proper Science – the study of the physical world as it works today.  Far from being anti-scientific, the rise of modern Science actually came under Christian Theism as the reigning worldview!  And the most fundamental scientific discoveries upon which the modern world is built (especially electricity and artificial propulsion) were achieved by many scientists who were Bible-believing Christians and during a time when most scientists were Christians.  And even the most revered pioneer of the last century, Albert Einstein, was a Theist.  Finally, many scientists are Bible-believing Christians today.

But modern Science has become an illegitimate, anti-Christian religion by claiming to be the only means of obtaining knowledge.  The most prominent example of this is the evolutionary approach to the origin of the universe and life, which assumes that ultimate reality consists only matter/energy and mindless forces of nature in space/time.  Not only is this an article of pure blind faith because it is unknowable in principle, it also essentially denies the existence of all subjects and subjectivity.  So, the philosophy underlying Evolution is both anti-Christian and anti-rational (since rationality in itself is not material).  Furthermore, (as indicated previously under the second point) without an Intelligent Creator the existence of human intelligence simply can’t be explained.

6. We can know what happened in the past and what will happen in the future based on what we understand about how nature works now.

First, it is a fallacy to assume that there could not have been past supernatural influence in how the universe came to be as we observe it today.  This possibility simply can’t be ruled out.  Amazingly, this possibility alone means that we cannot understand the distant past or the future based on the present.  In other words, Science alone cannot tell us how old the universe, the earth and all life is, or how they came to be (or about the future of the universe).

Another common fallacy is the belief that to accept the possibility of supernatural influence would destroy Science.  As common as this idea is, it is a false dilemma.  On the contrary, it is the natural order which God built into the universe combined with our God-given ability to understand this (as rational creatures created to be like Him) which is actually what makes Science possible.  Without The Creator God no credible explanation has been given for why this order exists, nor for why it is that we are capable of understanding it.

All radiometric dating methods used to determine the ages of things in the natural world falsely assume the unknowable conclusion that the only possible influences on nature are the natural forces which we understand today acting identically to how we observe them acting today.  This is a four-fold fallacy, in assuming that we know all of the natural forces involved, assuming that we know these and the conditions in which they operated sufficiently, assuming that these natural forces always worked exactly as they do today, and assuming without warrant only natural forces.  In effect, most scientists today implicitly assume and proceed as though Science has now reached a complete understanding of the forces of nature.  But this is simply an arrogant and dogmatic presumption and a belief that, far from helping advance Science, has actually always tended to block progress in Science in the past.

It is one of the most amazing facts of Modernity that, although it has become almost universally-accepted, all so-called “Scientific” speculation about what happened in the beginning of the universe and what will happen in the future is actually invalid.  This is because all such speculation is based on a four-fold fallacy, any one of which is enough to render such speculations illegitimate.  The first is: Do we really know all of the relevant forces involved in producing what we observe today?  This has been a common error throughout the history of Science.  But do we really know we are not still guilty of it?  The answer is: No.  We simply can’t know what we don’t know!

Second, even if we have come to know all of the natural forces involved, can we really assume we know them well enough to understand all of their effects?  Once again, this has proven to be a faulty assumption on many occasions in the history of Science.

Third, can we really assume that the natural forces which we observe today always worked exactly as we observe them today?  Indeed, basic Science is dependent on this assumption, so this is clearly valid over the short-term.  But isn’t it merely a matter of “blind faith” to assume that the forces of nature could not have worked differently in the past or that they might in the future?  Indeed, can we even speak of the existence of forces of nature in the Singularity which was believed to exist prior to the supposed “Big Bang”?

The first three betray a presumption that we now have come to a complete knowledge of how the universe works.  But, such hubris, far from protecting Science, has always hindered the progress of Science in the past.

This brings us to the fourth fallacy, which is the denial of the possibility of the Supernatural.  While I anticipate that many of you will snicker over this one, the important thing to ask is: Why do you dismiss this as impossible and ridiculous?  Does the fact that you have never observed a miracle mean that such events are impossible?  No, this just doesn’t follow.  Nor does the fact that Science is the proper way to study Nature does mean that Nature is all that can exist (as was discussed in the previous point).  Your dismissal of the possibility that the Supernatural exists is both arbitrary and irrational.

Furthermore, the common charge that allowing for the possibility of Divine influence in the universe would invalidate all Science is also a clear fallacy.  Indeed, in order for a miracle to be recognized as such actually requires common knowledge of the natural order, of which the miracle is seen as a unique exception.  In other words, the world which Science studies must be presupposed, otherwise miracles would be unrecognizable.

It is historically incorrect to assume that the ancients had no understanding of natural laws.  While the world in which Judaism and Christianity emerged certainly lacked the scientific sophistication of today, it was not a world which was hopelessly lost in superstition.  The reality is that no society can exist without understanding a good deal about the forces of nature, whether consciously or unconsciously.  In fact, it is not even possible for any individual to do this.  For, even the truly insane must or they will quickly perish.

All of this means that, despite the unquestioned value of the process of induction regarding how the universe works today as one of the foundations of proper Science, one simply cannot use induction in order to understand what happened in the distant past or what will happen in the future.  For, strictly speaking, such questions are not subject to scientific examination.

Thus, to believe in the speculations of modern Cosmologists and, even, to believe in general that we can know the past or future based on the present is essentially a religious position.  It is an act of blind faith by people who arbitrarily and, thus, falsely reject the possibility of an Almighty Creator God.  The existence of the Almighty Creator God described in the Bible cannot be ruled out.  And the mere possibility of God’s existence means that “all bets are off” concerning both the origins and future of the universe.  For, this possibility is a huge unaccountable Variable which makes all extrapolations from the present to the past or future dubious.

It has become common for advocates of Intelligent Design to defend their work as Scientific, and rightly so, for this can easily been demonstrated for anyone who is the least bit open to seeing this.  But, at the same time, it must be recognized that those who arbitrarily reject a Creator are making a religious claim no less than those who presuppose an Intelligent Designer.  In other words, this is not a matter of “Science vs. Religion”.  It is a question of which Religion is the true basis of Science: the reductionistic Materialism/Empiricism which dominates the academic world today, or Christian Theism?

We assert that it is Christian Theism which alone explains why anything exists, why the universe has order and why it is that we can come to understand this order (or, for that matter, why we exist as people and can experience or know anything).  Without an Intelligent Creator human intelligence cannot be explained.  On the other hand, the Philosophy/Religion assumed by most scientists and intellectuals and, indeed, by most people today absurdly reduces the universe to being composed, ultimately, only of objects without any knowing subjects.  The rejection of Christian Theism, far from being a positive development in intellectual history, is actually The Biggest Error in human history.

7. I am not religious because my beliefs are all scientifically-based.

You have many beliefs which cannot be scientifically demonstrated in practice or, even, in principle, especially your faith in logic, your belief in your existence as a person and the existence of other people along with countless things which you know about yourself and others, beliefs about the nature of ultimate reality (including the non-existence of The God described in the Bible), and beliefs about right and wrong.  So, we are all religious believers in one way or another.  The question is: Which religion is the correct one?  Christianity can be rationally demonstrated to be superior to all other approaches because it alone can account for all existence and knowledge.

You may wish to define “religious” more narrowly, but this simply is avoids the basic point that we are all in the same boat in having a set of fundamental beliefs which we simply assume but cannot verify or falsify scientifically.  You may call it your “philosophy” or “worldview” or “religion”.  It doesn’t matter what you call it.  But one thing it isn’t is scientific.

8. It is always wrong to judge others.

This one is easy.  The statement itself is a judgment, so it is inherently self-contradictory and hypocritical.  In fact, all of us must constantly judge many things as to whether they are right or wrong or good or bad and we also frequently make judgments about people and their views so that we can decide whether or not to trust them and follow them.

9. There is no such thing as absolute truth.

This is also a self-contradictory statement.  If there is no such thing as absolute truth, then it cannot be absolutely known that this is the case.

10.  Every reasonable person knows that the Bible is filled with scientific impossibilities, evil teachings or actions done by or required by God and other errors.

All objections to what is in the Bible are based on the fundamental (and unknowable) assumption that The God described in the Bible doesn’t exist.  But all of them are answerable if one begins with the premise that this God does exist.  In other words, the Bible is internally coherent on this basis.  If God exists, He can do everything He is described as doing in the Bible because He is not bound by the laws of nature which He Himself created, nor can He be judged for His actions because human moral judgment is based on His own moral and rational Nature, which we have been given as creatures made in the image of our Creator.  He is The Perfectly Just Judge to Whom we must answer.  We cannot judge Him.

This statement is also a fallacy because most people who say this today have little or no knowledge of what is actually in the Bible.  You simply can’t know something which you have never studied.  Furthermore, even among the most advanced scholars of the Bible, no one has ever proven that the Bible has an error.  For, all of supposed factual errors or contradictions in the Bible have conceivable explanations.  The fact that many are not open to these is their problem, not the Bible’s problem