Today is St. Aidan's Day. Aidan, who died on this day in 651, was a missionary to the kingdom of Northumbria (now the northeastern part of England). He struck me because of his humility, his patience, and his perseverance. When the king sent for a monk to evangelize the region, Aidan prayed, "O Lord, give me the springs and I will water this land. I will go, Lord. I will hold this people in my heart."
He gave up the comforts of friends and familiar surroundings. He heeded the call of God. He took the people's burden upon himself. He opened his eyes to their pain, their waywardness, and their brokenness. He took up the cause of Christ. He let the wind of the Spirit blow through him, and the fire of the Lord covered the people.
He journeyed out in faith.
The Lord was with him.
God, please bless, protect, strengthen and use all who have journeyed out in faith for Your cause. May Your fire spread through them as well.
(thoughts based on Celtic Daily Prayer pp. 158-161)
Friday, August 31, 2007
Monday, August 20, 2007
Are Christians Justified in Claiming to Know that Christianity is True?
I've been too busy to blog lately, so with apologies I'm taking the lazy way out and posting something I wrote during my first semester here at seminary. I paid enough for this experience...might as well try and share some of it with anyone who'll take the time to read!
(written for Jerry Walls' Philosophy of Christian Religion class, Fall 2005)
Modernity would claim that in order for someone to say that he “knows” something he must be able to prove it. Theists cannot, in my opinion, offer empirical proof that God exists, but this limitation does not defeat their contentions. The very claim of the evidentialist that “to know something is to be able to prove it” is self-referentially incoherent. This statement cannot be proven to be true and thus, by its own standards, cannot be “known.” Beyond this difficulty, however, is the absurdity of human attempts to weigh, test, and judge God as if He were the object of a science experiment. If God does exist, is it not brazen of the created to set up their own terms for accepting the Creator?! Anyone who attempts to measure God by human, scientific methods will complain that He is not verifiable in the way other objects are. This is only to be expected (Peterson et al., Reason & Religious Belief: An Introduction to the Philosophy of Religion 3rd ed., 119). We should not be surprised when we sense and experience God in different ways than we sense other objects. A purely spiritual subject does not submit to physical measures.
While we cannot offer empirical proof for God’s existence, by no means should this suggest a dearth of evidence. There is ample evidence for God’s existence: the ontological, teleological, moral, cosmological, kalam and other arguments, religious experience, God’s past and present self-revelation, and more. All of these combine to form a powerful cumulative case for God. The question, however, is whether such evidence is even necessary for faith. If God exists, the fact that we believe in Him may simply be appropriate and natural. If He created us for relationship with Him, as Christianity claims, the fact that we have a sense of the divine is perfectly understandable. This “sensus divinatus” is to be expected, according to Alvin Plantinga, and our belief in God may be seen as properly “basic” as it is the rightly functioning awareness of God (Peterson et al. 122). That many do not experience such an awareness of God points to the improper conditions (motives, attitude, setting, providence of God) that accompany one’s orientation toward God. Regardless of whether a belief in God is basic (and needs no supporting facts) or is built upon accumulated evidences, faith can be seen as reasonable.
While faith in God can be shown to be entirely reasonable, one who relies on reason and proof alone to lead him to God may never get there. Peter Kreeft and Ronald K. Tacelli recount Justin Martyr’s process of discovering God in the second century. First he “seeks the truth by the unaided effort of reason, and is disappointed.” Next, “it is offered to him by faith and he accepts. And, having accepted, he finds that it satisfies his reason” (Handbook of Christian Apologetics 40). A later saint, Anselm of Canterbury, said something similar in his work “Proslogion: Fides Quaerens Intellectum.” He stated, “I am not trying, O Lord, to penetrate thy loftiness, for I cannot begin to match my understanding with it, but I desire in some measure to understand thy truth, which my heart believes and loves. For I do not seek to understand in order to believe, but I believe in order to understand” (Hugh Kerr, ed. Readings in Christian Thought 83). Rational inquiry helps us better understand what we believe by faith.
Now that the reasonable step of faith has been taken, the question becomes “Is my faith rational?” The belief in God based on available evidence is every bit as rational as the atheist’s refusal to believe. After pondering the supports for faith, Ravi Zacharias states incredulously, “ In short, both David Hume’s own test and Bertrand Russell’s plea for evidence force one to wonder who has to have more faith. Is it the Christian who uses his mind to trust in God, or is it the one who, without any attempt to explain how his mind came to be, nevertheless uses that mind to demand a sign and disbelieves in God?” (Jesus Among Other Gods 65-66) God confirms the step of faith through experience. Through various means of grace, He reveals Himself in a more personal way. These experiences (whether they be a sense of communion with Christ, of the living Word, of the Holy Spirit’s power, or of the conviction, love or forgiveness of the Father) supply a certainty to one’s faith. Knowledge becomes more than factual certainty but relational reality. We know God intimately rather than merely knowing about God. Kreeft and Tacelli (elaborating on Aquinas’ thoughts) put it thus: “It is not our faith but its object, God, that justifies our certainty” (38).
At this point, many will say, “But what about the experiential claims of other religions? Your appeal to knowing God can be made by many other groups that claim to know Him exclusively.” The single greatest piece of evidence in the Christian’s arsenal is the person of Jesus Christ Himself. His life is without parallel. The claims He made, His teachings, His prophecies, His fulfillment of prophecy, the miracles He performed, His sinless life, His love and authority, the lives that were transformed after encountering Him, the Resurrection, His appearances to many over a forty day period, the witness and martyrdom of the apostles, the spread of the early Church in the face of persecution—these all provide powerful testimony to the truth of Christianity. Just as Christianity has to answer the challenges of other religions, so they have to answer the challenges of Christianity.
Christianity is rooted in history. It explains the nature of God, the meaning of existence, and the future of human destiny in very satisfying ways. Christians revel in God’s love and mercy and rejoice in the doctrines of Trinity, Incarnation, Atonement, and Resurrection. We have an incredible hope. “And hope does not disappoint us, because God has poured out his love into our hearts by the Holy Spirit, whom he has given us” (Romans 5:5, NIV).
Even if one refuses to accept Christianity due to a perceived lack of evidence, the question of faith presents a “genuine option” in which belief is justified (Peterson et al. Philosophy of Religion: Selected Readings 2nd ed. 86). William James asserts that if a decision is forced, living and momentous it constitutes a “genuine option.” The conclusion one comes to about who Jesus is constitutes such a decision. In the end, it comes down to a choice. Will one make the effort to investigate the claims of Christianity or will he prefer to conveniently disbelieve? If he will trust in the Light, he will find that Christianity is reasonable, rational, experiential, historical, transformational, basic (sensus divinatus), spiritual, fulfilling, communal…in a word—true. While it cannot be proven in the modern sense, too much is at stake to leave it untried. Pascal’s Wager does not make a case for Christianity as much as it points out what is at stake. If eternity is on the line, no one can afford to ignore the claims of Christ.
In summary, I believe a Christian is justified in saying that he knows Christianity to be true. In sensing the reality of God, he is led to faith. His faith is fostered and supported by the cumulative case for Christianity. Personal experience and knowledge of the Trinitarian God confirms his decision to trust God. He continues to use reason to understand his faith and engage disbelievers. The Christian worldview makes sense of the world, even with all of its problems and shortcomings. A Christian is transformed as he lives in communion with God’s Spirit and God’s people. He is renewed and forgiven. His faith, hope and love grow. He is not lost in dead-end wishful thinking. “No, the Christian’s faith is not a leap into the dark; it is a well-placed trust in the light—the Light of the World, who is Jesus” (Zacharias 63-64).
Works Cited
Anselm. “Proslogion: Fides Quaerens Intellectum.” Readings in Christian Thought. 2nd ed. Ed. Hugh T. Kerr. Nashville: Abingdon, 1990.
Kreeft, Peter and Ronald K. Tacelli. Handbook of Christian Apologetics: Hundreds of Answers to Crucial Questions. Downers Grove. InterVarsity, 1994.
Peterson, Michael, et al. Philosophy of Religion: Selected Readings 2nd ed. New York: Oxford UP, 2001.
Peterson, Michael, et al. Reason & Religious Belief: An Introduction to the Philosophy of Religion. 3rd ed. New York: Oxford UP, 2003.
Zacharias, Ravi. Jesus Among Other Gods. W. Publishing: Nashville, 2000.
(written for Jerry Walls' Philosophy of Christian Religion class, Fall 2005)
Modernity would claim that in order for someone to say that he “knows” something he must be able to prove it. Theists cannot, in my opinion, offer empirical proof that God exists, but this limitation does not defeat their contentions. The very claim of the evidentialist that “to know something is to be able to prove it” is self-referentially incoherent. This statement cannot be proven to be true and thus, by its own standards, cannot be “known.” Beyond this difficulty, however, is the absurdity of human attempts to weigh, test, and judge God as if He were the object of a science experiment. If God does exist, is it not brazen of the created to set up their own terms for accepting the Creator?! Anyone who attempts to measure God by human, scientific methods will complain that He is not verifiable in the way other objects are. This is only to be expected (Peterson et al., Reason & Religious Belief: An Introduction to the Philosophy of Religion 3rd ed., 119). We should not be surprised when we sense and experience God in different ways than we sense other objects. A purely spiritual subject does not submit to physical measures.
While we cannot offer empirical proof for God’s existence, by no means should this suggest a dearth of evidence. There is ample evidence for God’s existence: the ontological, teleological, moral, cosmological, kalam and other arguments, religious experience, God’s past and present self-revelation, and more. All of these combine to form a powerful cumulative case for God. The question, however, is whether such evidence is even necessary for faith. If God exists, the fact that we believe in Him may simply be appropriate and natural. If He created us for relationship with Him, as Christianity claims, the fact that we have a sense of the divine is perfectly understandable. This “sensus divinatus” is to be expected, according to Alvin Plantinga, and our belief in God may be seen as properly “basic” as it is the rightly functioning awareness of God (Peterson et al. 122). That many do not experience such an awareness of God points to the improper conditions (motives, attitude, setting, providence of God) that accompany one’s orientation toward God. Regardless of whether a belief in God is basic (and needs no supporting facts) or is built upon accumulated evidences, faith can be seen as reasonable.
While faith in God can be shown to be entirely reasonable, one who relies on reason and proof alone to lead him to God may never get there. Peter Kreeft and Ronald K. Tacelli recount Justin Martyr’s process of discovering God in the second century. First he “seeks the truth by the unaided effort of reason, and is disappointed.” Next, “it is offered to him by faith and he accepts. And, having accepted, he finds that it satisfies his reason” (Handbook of Christian Apologetics 40). A later saint, Anselm of Canterbury, said something similar in his work “Proslogion: Fides Quaerens Intellectum.” He stated, “I am not trying, O Lord, to penetrate thy loftiness, for I cannot begin to match my understanding with it, but I desire in some measure to understand thy truth, which my heart believes and loves. For I do not seek to understand in order to believe, but I believe in order to understand” (Hugh Kerr, ed. Readings in Christian Thought 83). Rational inquiry helps us better understand what we believe by faith.
Now that the reasonable step of faith has been taken, the question becomes “Is my faith rational?” The belief in God based on available evidence is every bit as rational as the atheist’s refusal to believe. After pondering the supports for faith, Ravi Zacharias states incredulously, “ In short, both David Hume’s own test and Bertrand Russell’s plea for evidence force one to wonder who has to have more faith. Is it the Christian who uses his mind to trust in God, or is it the one who, without any attempt to explain how his mind came to be, nevertheless uses that mind to demand a sign and disbelieves in God?” (Jesus Among Other Gods 65-66) God confirms the step of faith through experience. Through various means of grace, He reveals Himself in a more personal way. These experiences (whether they be a sense of communion with Christ, of the living Word, of the Holy Spirit’s power, or of the conviction, love or forgiveness of the Father) supply a certainty to one’s faith. Knowledge becomes more than factual certainty but relational reality. We know God intimately rather than merely knowing about God. Kreeft and Tacelli (elaborating on Aquinas’ thoughts) put it thus: “It is not our faith but its object, God, that justifies our certainty” (38).
At this point, many will say, “But what about the experiential claims of other religions? Your appeal to knowing God can be made by many other groups that claim to know Him exclusively.” The single greatest piece of evidence in the Christian’s arsenal is the person of Jesus Christ Himself. His life is without parallel. The claims He made, His teachings, His prophecies, His fulfillment of prophecy, the miracles He performed, His sinless life, His love and authority, the lives that were transformed after encountering Him, the Resurrection, His appearances to many over a forty day period, the witness and martyrdom of the apostles, the spread of the early Church in the face of persecution—these all provide powerful testimony to the truth of Christianity. Just as Christianity has to answer the challenges of other religions, so they have to answer the challenges of Christianity.
Christianity is rooted in history. It explains the nature of God, the meaning of existence, and the future of human destiny in very satisfying ways. Christians revel in God’s love and mercy and rejoice in the doctrines of Trinity, Incarnation, Atonement, and Resurrection. We have an incredible hope. “And hope does not disappoint us, because God has poured out his love into our hearts by the Holy Spirit, whom he has given us” (Romans 5:5, NIV).
Even if one refuses to accept Christianity due to a perceived lack of evidence, the question of faith presents a “genuine option” in which belief is justified (Peterson et al. Philosophy of Religion: Selected Readings 2nd ed. 86). William James asserts that if a decision is forced, living and momentous it constitutes a “genuine option.” The conclusion one comes to about who Jesus is constitutes such a decision. In the end, it comes down to a choice. Will one make the effort to investigate the claims of Christianity or will he prefer to conveniently disbelieve? If he will trust in the Light, he will find that Christianity is reasonable, rational, experiential, historical, transformational, basic (sensus divinatus), spiritual, fulfilling, communal…in a word—true. While it cannot be proven in the modern sense, too much is at stake to leave it untried. Pascal’s Wager does not make a case for Christianity as much as it points out what is at stake. If eternity is on the line, no one can afford to ignore the claims of Christ.
In summary, I believe a Christian is justified in saying that he knows Christianity to be true. In sensing the reality of God, he is led to faith. His faith is fostered and supported by the cumulative case for Christianity. Personal experience and knowledge of the Trinitarian God confirms his decision to trust God. He continues to use reason to understand his faith and engage disbelievers. The Christian worldview makes sense of the world, even with all of its problems and shortcomings. A Christian is transformed as he lives in communion with God’s Spirit and God’s people. He is renewed and forgiven. His faith, hope and love grow. He is not lost in dead-end wishful thinking. “No, the Christian’s faith is not a leap into the dark; it is a well-placed trust in the light—the Light of the World, who is Jesus” (Zacharias 63-64).
Works Cited
Anselm. “Proslogion: Fides Quaerens Intellectum.” Readings in Christian Thought. 2nd ed. Ed. Hugh T. Kerr. Nashville: Abingdon, 1990.
Kreeft, Peter and Ronald K. Tacelli. Handbook of Christian Apologetics: Hundreds of Answers to Crucial Questions. Downers Grove. InterVarsity, 1994.
Peterson, Michael, et al. Philosophy of Religion: Selected Readings 2nd ed. New York: Oxford UP, 2001.
Peterson, Michael, et al. Reason & Religious Belief: An Introduction to the Philosophy of Religion. 3rd ed. New York: Oxford UP, 2003.
Zacharias, Ravi. Jesus Among Other Gods. W. Publishing: Nashville, 2000.
Wednesday, August 8, 2007
Experience the Unrivalled Russian Novel
I am writing tonight to promote another free download from Christian Audio. Fascinatingly, this month's selection is The Resurrection, by Leo Tolstoy.
If you have never read a major Russian novel, you have truly missed out. They are long. They can be somewhat tedious (especially to us Westerners who are unfamiliar with Russian culture). But my oh my are they rich. There is a depth to the writings of Dostoevsky and Tolstoy that may be unmatched.
I haven't read The Resurrection, but I know it was Tolstoy's last major novel. I have read The Brothers Karamazov, Crime and Punishment, Anna Karenina, and War and Peace and other Russian works. It takes commitment to get through them, but the payoff is huge. I read one of these works in Bulgarian, so don't tell me you can't do it in English!
I just want to say that I look forward to listening to this work. It's 14 separate downloads--that's 14 CDs worth of listening (and burning, if you'd like to listen on CD...which I intend to do). The book is 398 pages--almost 17 hours of listening. It will be worth listening to attentively. I am sure it will enrich my life in some way.
I just checked out a bit of Tolstoy's story. He became a Christian later on in his life after a raucous young adulthood. I've excerpted the following from his work A Confession. This writing is only about 16 pages long, and though I haven't finished it yet I loved the 9 pages or so that I did read.
This bit (the excerpt) is part of Tolstoy's description of the despair he experienced as he searched for meaning in life:
If this has whet your appetite, be sure to read the whole thing (as I intend to tomorrow). And do yourself a favor. Take the time and trouble to download The Resurrection. I think you'll be glad you did.
If you have never read a major Russian novel, you have truly missed out. They are long. They can be somewhat tedious (especially to us Westerners who are unfamiliar with Russian culture). But my oh my are they rich. There is a depth to the writings of Dostoevsky and Tolstoy that may be unmatched.
I haven't read The Resurrection, but I know it was Tolstoy's last major novel. I have read The Brothers Karamazov, Crime and Punishment, Anna Karenina, and War and Peace and other Russian works. It takes commitment to get through them, but the payoff is huge. I read one of these works in Bulgarian, so don't tell me you can't do it in English!
I just want to say that I look forward to listening to this work. It's 14 separate downloads--that's 14 CDs worth of listening (and burning, if you'd like to listen on CD...which I intend to do). The book is 398 pages--almost 17 hours of listening. It will be worth listening to attentively. I am sure it will enrich my life in some way.
I just checked out a bit of Tolstoy's story. He became a Christian later on in his life after a raucous young adulthood. I've excerpted the following from his work A Confession. This writing is only about 16 pages long, and though I haven't finished it yet I loved the 9 pages or so that I did read.
This bit (the excerpt) is part of Tolstoy's description of the despair he experienced as he searched for meaning in life:
There is an Eastern fable, told long ago, of a traveller overtaken on a plain by an enraged beast. Escaping from the beast he gets into a dry well, but sees at the bottom of the well a dragon that has opened its jaws to swallow him. And the unfortunate man, not daring to climb out lest he should be destroyed by the enraged beast, and not daring to leap to the bottom of the well lest he should be eaten by the dragon, seizes s twig growing in a crack in the well and clings to it. His hands are growing weaker and he feels he will soon have to resign himself to the destruction that awaits him above or below, but still he clings on. Then he sees that two mice, a black one and a white one, go regularly round and round the stem of the twig to which he is clinging and gnaw at it. And soon the twig itself will snap and he will fall into the dragon’s jaws. The traveller sees this and knows that he will inevitably perish; but while still hanging he looks around, sees some drops of honey on the leaves of the twig, reaches them with his tongue and licks them. So I too clung to the twig of life, knowing that the dragon of death was inevitably awaiting me, ready to tear me to pieces; and I could not understand why I had fallen into such torment. I tried to lick the honey which formerly consoled me, but the honey no longer gave me pleasure, and the white and black mice of day and night gnawed at the branch by which I hung. I saw the dragon clearly and the honey no longer tasted sweet. I only saw the unescapable dragon and the mice, and I could not tear my gaze from them. and this is not a fable but the real unanswerable truth intelligible to all.
The deception of the joys of life which formerly allayed my terror of the dragon now no longer deceived me. No matter how often I may be told, “You cannot understand the meaning of life so do not think about it, but live,” I can no longer do it: I have already done it too long. I cannot now help seeing day and night going round and bringing me to death. That is all I see, for that alone is true. All else is false.
The two drops of honey which diverted my eyes from the cruel truth longer than the rest: my love of family, and of writing — art as I called it — were no longer sweet to me. “Family”. . .said I to myself. But my family — wife and children — are also human. They are placed just as I am: they must either live in a lie or see the terrible truth. Why should they live? Why should I love them, guard them, bring them up, or watch them? That they may come to the despair that I feel, or else be stupid? Loving them, I cannot hide the truth from them: each step in knowledge leads them to the truth. And the truth is death.
If this has whet your appetite, be sure to read the whole thing (as I intend to tomorrow). And do yourself a favor. Take the time and trouble to download The Resurrection. I think you'll be glad you did.
Wednesday, August 1, 2007
Pilgrimage Quote
July's focus in my devotional readings was "pilgrimage." Tuesday night I picked up a book I had begun to read earlier this year, and I realized it was devoted to this theme, too. So, I don't think I'm through with this yet. There's more to come!
For starters, here's a quote from the book I'm reading:
The book is A Long Obedience in the Same Direction by Eugene Peterson. (Don't you just love that title? Can you believe it is taken from a Friedrich Nietzsche quote?). I heard great things about this book and found it on Amazon.com for about a quarter. I'm sure I'll be referring to it more if I write more on pilgrimage (as I intend).
For starters, here's a quote from the book I'm reading:
Pilgrim (parepidemos) tells us we are people who spend our lives going someplace, going to God, and whose path for getting there is the way, Jesus Christ. We realize that "this world is not my home" and set out for the "Father's house." Abraham, who "went out," is our archetype. Jesus, answering Thomas' question, "Lord, we do not know where you are going; how can we know the way?" gives us directions: "I am the way, and the truth, and the life; no one comes to the Father, but by me" (Jn. 14:5-6). The letter to the Hebrews defines our program: "Therefore, since we are surrounded by so great a cloud of witnesses, let us lay aside every weight, and sin which clings so closely, and let us run with perseverance the race that is set before us, looking to Jesus the pioneer and perfecter of our faith" (Heb. 12:1-2).
The book is A Long Obedience in the Same Direction by Eugene Peterson. (Don't you just love that title? Can you believe it is taken from a Friedrich Nietzsche quote?). I heard great things about this book and found it on Amazon.com for about a quarter. I'm sure I'll be referring to it more if I write more on pilgrimage (as I intend).
Accio Theologia Profundica!
Well, I finished the new Harry Potter book yesterday. This means I also finished the series, and I'd love to talk with someone about the story as a whole.
What Christian elements or themes did you find? What unChristian elements disturbed you? Aside from being an entertaining read, how did the story move you? What did it make you think about? What do you think the author's point was? What did you like or dislike?
I'm asking because I think this book will have a lasting impact. Our kids will read it. Grandkids, too. I think there's opportunity here to discuss important themes, to glean insights, and to probe spiritual realities. Why not begin that discussion now?
I'll be sharing some of my thoughts at a later time in the comments section of this post. I'd love to hear from anyone who's read Harry Potter at all.
Any thoughts?
What Christian elements or themes did you find? What unChristian elements disturbed you? Aside from being an entertaining read, how did the story move you? What did it make you think about? What do you think the author's point was? What did you like or dislike?
I'm asking because I think this book will have a lasting impact. Our kids will read it. Grandkids, too. I think there's opportunity here to discuss important themes, to glean insights, and to probe spiritual realities. Why not begin that discussion now?
I'll be sharing some of my thoughts at a later time in the comments section of this post. I'd love to hear from anyone who's read Harry Potter at all.
Any thoughts?
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