“I Hope there is no God”

The Freedom From Religion Foundation is now lobbying an Oklahoma School District to remove a painting because it suggests that "real American children pray." Their attorney Andrew L. Seidel charges:

• "It is our information and understanding that in the Kenneth Cooper Middle School office hangs a religious poster with an image entitled, 'Faith in America' by Donald Zolan. The image features two children with their hands clasped in prayer, with an American Flag background. The meaning could not be more clear, real American children pray." 

So what? What’s the offense? Promoting religion in the schools? Everything that a school does promotes its underlying values, much of them secularistic and adverse to the Christian faith! The atheist can promote his values, but the Christian cannot promote theirs. Why then the double-standard?

In contrast to this hypocrisy, NYU philosopher and atheist, Thomas Nagel, writes very honestly about his inexplicable “fear of religion”:

• I want atheism to be true… I hope there is no God… I don’t want the universe to be like that.

Why not? He didn’t explain. Perhaps he is perplexed about his own deep-seated aversion. However, his perplexity mirrors that of others. One friend just confessed, “I wish I could believe like you.”

I jumped on what seemed to be a green light: “Well, let’s talk about it.” However, they never want to talk. Instead, they claim, “I just can’t believe.”

I see another green light and respond, “Your inability is no problem at all for God!” At this, they shift to another subject. It seems that they too are afflicted with Nagel’s “fear of religion.”

But where does this fear come from? A cousin related how she had experienced an incredible miracle. As a result, she instantaneously knew that God loved her. However, her joy was quickly replaced by an inexplicable fear. Why?

Frank Sinatra sang about the appeal of being a captain of his own ship. We want to be in charge. However, if there is a God, especially one who loves us, we fear that we can no longer be the captain and that the helm belongs to Another. Are we willing to make this sacrifice? No! It’s our ship, and we are intent on planning its itinerary. And the Claimant?

The Freedom From Religion Foundation conveniently denies that there is such a claimant and wants remove any sign of him, even a religious poster of children praying.

Searching for the God of our own Creation

People tell me:

• Often, I have prayed to your God, but nothing ever happened!

Tonight, at Washington Square Park, a woman told me this very thing. I therefore responded:

• For years, I vainly sought after God. I had thought that I was really searching, but I wasn’t. Instead, I wanted God my way. He had to be a Jewish God, a God who authenticated my Jewish ethnicity. I would have nothing to do with Jesus. He was a traitor, and many Jews had been killed in his name. However, that all changed when, years later, I lay dying, bleeding to death from a severe chainsaw injury. Suddenly, I realized that God was with me, and I was in ecstasy. Nothing mattered anymore, just that God loved me and that I would always be with Him. For the first time, I prayed, “God, I really need to know who you are, even if it costs me both hands and legs,” and I meant it.

I suggested to the woman that perhaps she too wanted God her own way and wasn’t truly open to who He is. I explained Jesus’ guarantee – that if we seek, we will find (Mat. 7:7-8), but she would have to seek with all of her heart.

Her face tightened:

• I can’t believe in a God who says that homosexuality is wrong.

I tried to argue that God wisely forbade certain destructive sexual practices like adultery and incest, and perhaps homosexuality is also destructive.

I quickly realized that I said the wrong thing:

• I can’t stand the way you Christians liken homosexuality to adultery and incest.

She became inflamed, and so I tried to change my tactics:

• Okay, let me take a step back. Are you saying that you will not believe in a God whose worldview doesn’t line up with yours in every way? It looks like you are doing the very same thing that I had been doing – rejecting a God who doesn’t ascribe to all your requirements.

We wrongly expect God to conform to us. Rather, it is we who must be willing to conform to Him, to be open to accepting Him as He truly is. However, as long as we insist on remaining the captain-of-our-own-ship, we essentially refuse to board His ship.

She looked very confused and protested:

• I can’t believe in this God of yours!

I explained that I was simply asking her to search and pray with an open mind. We cannot demand that the ones we love endorse all of our beliefs. Instead, we have to accept them as they are. How much more does this pertain to a relationship with God!

I don’t think that she was able to see that it was she who had erected the barrier between her and a relationship with God.

Our autonomy is so basic to our existence that we can’t see it and how it interferes with our relationships. Can the sea urchin see the water if that’s the only thing he’s ever lived in?

I wasn’t able to see the absurdity of claiming to be seeking for God, when I was merely seeking a God of my own creation, one whose job it was to validate me. Sadly, this is what it today means to be “spiritual.” It is to treat God as a smorgasbord table, picking-and-choosing what appeals to us, without a clue that this is offensive to God.

The Hiding Place of Paradox

People – even smart ones – say paradoxical things. Take Albert Einstein for example:

• The scientist is possessed by the sense of universal causation…There is nothing divine about morality; it is a purely human affair. His religious feeling takes the form of a rapturous amazement at the harmony of natural law, which reveals an intelligence of such superiority that, compared with it, all the systematic thinking and acting of human beings is an utterly insignificant reflection. (The World as I See it, 29)

While Einstein regards “the harmony of natural law” as a reflection of “an intelligence of such superiority,” he dismisses moral law as “a purely human affair” – a thing we made up! Why this sharp distinction?

The moral law is also harmonious. Just consider several observations:

• When we live according to the moral law we find written on our hearts (Rom. 2:14-15), we are healthier and happier, as indicated by many surveys.

• When we violate this internal law, we suffer from guilt, shame, and alienation.

• When we confess that we have violated this law, we feel relieved and relationships are often restored.

Even atheists or agnostics have traditionally recognized this moral law. Buddhists call it “the law of karma” – what goes around comes around. However, they lack an explanation of any mechanism that explains how justice is fairly delivered. (The delivery of justice is no easy thing. It requires understanding and an appreciation of all the facts.)

Also, we can defy physical laws. While flying in an airplane doesn’t cancel out gravity, it certainly allows us to defy its natural consequences. However, morals laws seem to be even more coercive. It would seem that God is investing them with His own transcendent authority, since there isn’t any way to defy their impact. We not only know that rape is wrong, we also know that there is no remedy, like an airplane overcoming gravity, that will overcome the damage that this act inflicts on us (and others).

Even though Einstein was only willing to attribute “an intelligence of such superiority” to the physical laws, why did he fail to follow through with the implications of his observations? In other words, “What kind of intelligence is necessary to account for these incredible, harmonious laws? Do impersonal forces like gravity possess this kind of intelligence!”

Clearly not! As great and awesome as gravity might be, it can do only one thing – attract! It can’t tie my shoes, write a line of poetry, or even scratch my back. In other words, the laws of nature do not seem to be the place to find this intelligence. Instead, as rain comes from clouds, intelligence comes from personal, willful minds.

Why do we often experience an aversion to thinking further about this subject? A dear cousin told me a story that continued to profoundly trouble her. Ironically, it was a story about a miracle, which she had initially attributed to God, even though she’s an agnostic. Initially, she felt great joy that her problem had been so miraculously solved and also that there was a God who was looking out for her. However, immediately after this, she was overcome by a feeling of great dread. It was this feeling that she couldn’t explain. I gave her my interpretation:

• You immediately understood that if there is a God who loves you, He also has expectations for you, and we want to remain the captain of our own ship.

The explanation hit home. She recognized that she had been fleeing from God. Her discomfort was the background radiation.

We live paradoxical lives because we prefer paradox to an encounter with a morally demanding, sometimes even punitive God.

Disembodied “Truth”: Self-Forgiveness

I ask people, “How do you handle your guilt?” One friend – an atheist – confessed:

• I have rejected the idea of freewill. This has done wonders for my guilt feelings!

However, this comes at the price of denying what is patently obvious – that we make freewill choices all the time, and society holds us morally responsible for them. A young, New Age woman responded:

• I’ve learned to forgive myself. That works for me. Evidently, it doesn’t work for you. Religion is your answer, and that’s okay!

Both of these answers represent disembodied solutions, alienated from both evidence and broader worldview considerations. In contrast, the Houston Baptist professor Micah Mattix attempts to embody truth into the context of our lives:

• Does anyone who has taken a humanities course at a secular college or university in the past 10 years doubt that instead of teaching us who we are, many humanities courses teach that identity is constructed; that instead of teaching the classical and cardinal virtues, they recommend the self-serving virtues of moral relativism and egalitarianism; and that instead of helping students to become better husbands, wives, and citizens, the real focus is on making them more autonomous.

Moral relativism is the idea that in the absence of moral absolutes, we are not morally responsible to anyone. By granting us moral autonomy, moral relativism has alienated us from family, friends and even society. Instead, we have gloriously become “captains of our own ship” and have nothing to show for it but shipwrecked marriages and communities.

Self-forgiveness is a child of moral relativism. When we deny objective, higher moral truth – the law that transcends our own thoughts – forgiveness becomes relegated to emotional self-management. There is no consideration of whether or not I’ve committed a moral wrong that needs to be addressed. Instead, it’s all about managing my guilty feelings.

Let’s do a thought experiment. A wife discovers that her husband has been cheating on her. However, when confronted, he responds by merely saying, “Well, I’ve forgiven myself, and now I feel okay about it!”

This response represents a denial of any real guilt or of any need to address a real and destructive moral transgression. It disembodies the denier, not only from his marriage, but also from the truth that he has committed an objective moral wrong.

Such an understanding of guilt can justify anything. Hitler also could practice self-forgiveness, and why not, if there isn’t any higher moral order.

Interestingly, this way of looking at things doesn’t even work, at least, not for long. This is the strategy promoted by secular psychotherapists. It comes in many forms and always represents a form of self-stimulation or masturbation. We are told to:

• “Love yourself…Believe in yourself… Trust yourself…Imagine yourself as a infant and surround yourself with hugs…Give yourself what your parents failed to give you…Forgive yourself…”

Although these admonitions do address real needs, they ultimately fail to scratch the itch – the need to feel okay about ourselves. They are short-sighted and disembodied from the rest of our lives and moral truth.

Instead, we are so constructed that there is no substitute for the genuine forgiveness that comes from another human being. This of course is the real thing and not the masturbatory process of self-forgiveness.

When our eye observes a car heading towards us, what we experience is not merely a bio-chemical reaction we call “vision.” It’s that and more! What we see also represents an external reality. Therefore, we must deal appropriately with this reality or the reality will deal painfully with us!

Perhaps our moral sense also alerts us to external danger – the danger inherent in doing wrong. And perhaps our wrongdoing not only hurts the other person but also the One who wired us to know when we have done wrong. If this is so, this breach must be addressed. Not doing this would be like driving without paying the slightest attention to what our eyes tell us.

There is a great joy and freedom in knowing that our Savior has forgiven and cleansed us from the guilt of our sin. The alternative is costly self-preoccupation – ceaselessly waving the wand of self-forgiveness that can never drive the guilt away. Instead:

• He who conceals his sins does not prosper, but whoever confesses and renounces them finds mercy. (Proverbs 28:13)

I have been greatly blessed by His mercy!