THE REALITY OF GOD PART 1 – AN INTRODUCTION

This is the start of a new series that will look at what we call apologetics.  It is a field of study that marshals the rational, logical, historical, archaeological scientific and prophetic evidence for the existence of the God of the Bible and the truth of the Christian perspective.  We might miss some weeks, however the series will continue.  It comes from the Greek word, ‘apologia,’ meaning to provide a defense or an answer to objections to the faith.  Today, we’ll just give you a quick introduction.

“And without faith it is impossible to please Him, for he who comes to God must believe that He is and that He is a rewarder of those who seek Him.” (Hebrews 11:6  NASB 1995)

Perhaps, like me, you have faced many the unbeliever who seeks to denigrate the faith.  They raise their objections to the truth of Christianity – and often  the questions they pose are daunting.  Maybe you don’t feel competent to defend the Faith that you hold in your heart.  Let’s face it, we can’t prove God’s existence in a laboratory.  We can’t run an experiment that verifies His existence.  But what we hold is NOT a blind faith.  There is a weight of evidence for both the existence of God and specifically for the God of the Bible.

Today we’ll start with just a simple question.  Based on what we know of the world / the cosmos: Is it MORE PROBABLE that God exists….or that He doesn’t exist.  I offer this as the opening  argument.  My thesis is that pure atheism requires a series of monumental ‘miracles’ for it to be true.

THE MIRACLES OF ATHEISM

In order for atheism to be true:

• Everything that exists had to have come from nothing. [We should be able to stop right there.]
• Darkness and emptiness had to produce time, space, matter and energy.
• In this belief system: All life would have to come from lifeless matter.
• Evolution: Blind mutations would have produced the patterns of design inherent in every level of nature from sub-atomic to micro-biotic, from DNA to the arrangement of the cosmos.
• The existence of DNA which is an actual language and language requires intelligence. But it would have to have been produced from a non-intelligent source.  [We’re violating a whole lotta scientific laws so far – that the people who always say, ‘Trust the Science,’ like to quote.
• The existence of and relationship of the universal constants that make life possible.
• The perfect positioning of the Earth to support life.
•   It is found in all of nature and is “embedded in the complex framework of ALL life and the entire superstructure of the natural world around us.”^[i]
• The existence of Morality. [Even atheists will talk about fairnes and right and wrong.]

We can continue the same basic argument from a different angle.

WHY GOD IS MORE PROBABLE

• The Order & Design found in the Universe.  Order reflects purpose.  It doesn’t come about by accident.  The Order & Design found in life forms, including  the human body.  Order demands intelligence.
• Life comes from Life. There have been no successful experiments that have come even close to producing life from non-living organisms.  Some scientists proposed the primordial soup theory and tried to replicate the conditons of the early earth.  They failed.  Information theorist Herbert Yockey of UC Berkley concluded: “The origin of life by chance in a primeval soup is impossible. ^[ii]  Chris Wills, a Professor of Biology and the University of California wisely concludes: “The biggest gap in evolutionary theory remains the origin of life itself… the gap between such a collection of molecules [amino acids and RNA] and even the most primitive cell remains enormous.”^[iii]  The Intelligent Designer, God is the more plausible explanation.
• The Moral Argument. There are at least a few self-evident moral absolutes.
• It is a crucial motivating factor that explains Mother Theresa, comrades in war and parental sacrifice.  Love only exists if there is more to life than matter and energy.
• Agnosticism is a practical impossibility. We live by a different code.  We discriminate between the fair and unfair. We set priorites and invest our time and money.  We acknowledge a higher power by the way we live.

 Now, let’s answer a couple of objections.

YOU CAN’T PROVE THE EXISTENCE OF GOD

• We can’t prove the existence of God in a laboratory with a science experiment. That is true.  But we can know His reality using logic, history and even science.
• We can’t “prove” the existence of George Washington, but we do have solid evidence that he existed and was our first president.
• We have The Law of Cause and Effect. Every cause has an effect and every effect has a cause.  The Cosmos had a beginning.  And so the Cosmos had to have a beginner.  Logic demands a beginning and a beginner.  [Scientists who came to form the Big Bang Theory – (NOT the TV show) – understood that it meant that the Universe had to have a Beginner…..And a lot of them, including Einstien, didn’t like  ]
• The structure of the Universe. Design and Order demand – not just a Beginner – but a Designer.

And then there’s the Big Fat Ugly Question…..

IF GOD IS ALL POWERFUL AND ALL LOVING: WHY IS THERE EVIL?

• Atheist Richard Dawkins said: “Life has no design, no purpose, no evil and no good, nothing but blind pitiless indifference.” On the face of it, this is a self-defeating postulate.
• If you assume there is Evil then you assume Good exists.
• If you assume there is Good, you assume that an Absolute Objective Moral Law Exists – to define it.
• If you assume there is an Absolute & Objective Moral Law, you assumer there is a Moral Law Giver.
• If there is No Moral Law there is No Good.
• If there is No Good there is No Evil….Just preference….
• So: What’s the question?….

[i]

[ii]Yockey, H., Information Theory and Molecular Biology, Cambridge University Press, 1992, p. 257 – As quoted by: Don Batten,

Origin of Life, Creation.com, November 26, 2013

[iii] Quoted in, Evolution’s final frontiers, New Scientist 201(2693):42, 2009: As quoted by Don Batten, Origin of Life, Creation.com,

November 26, 2013