Proof for the Existence of God
Peebody has raised a wonderful discussion topic that deserves a post all of its own, as well as raising some interesting questions about divine creation.
As a prelude, I'd love to say that my experience in studying Philosophy at uni has provided me with a wonderful foundation for my belief in God, and Jesus Christ as the Son of God. My underlying attitude is one that says the most logical answer wins - if someone could provide sound evidence that God doesn not exist, then I would concede the point in a moment and my beliefs would change to suit.
What my major in Philosophy did for me, was it taught me that Christianity is actually the most philosophically sound conclusion. I love what I believe because it is the most defendable position that there is: it has provided answers where there are none with anything else, it has survived the philosophical scrutiny of every one of my peers/lecturers/tutors at uni, and it has an answer to every question thrown at it.
Ok, onto the content. People, this is your thread. For those who believe, this is an opportunity to provide evidence for your convictions. For those who are searching, this is an opportunity to ask any question you wish to put out there.
Have a ball!
posted by Dboy @ Friday, February 10, 2006
32 Insightful Contributions
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32 Comments:
I'll start us off by addressing the concerns about creation vs evolution.
First of all, the theory of evolution is fundamentally flawed. Noone has proven it to be true at all. Darwin himself conceded that his whole theory fails to explain how life was created in the first place (ie. how a cell was created out of pure elements in the impossible conditions of the primordial soup). It is just as likely for a hurricane to create a fighter jet by flying through a junkyard.
[Evolutionary theory] is still, as it was in Darwin's time, a highly speculative hypothesis without direct factual support and very far from that self-evident axiom some of its more aggressive advocates would have us believe. Michael Denton, molecular bioligist
I have met many people who are not Christian/religious, but still believe that the universe was created by an intelligent designer.
There are two schools of thought among believers:
1. That God created the world in exactly 6 days as Genesis states (ie. a literal translation); and
2. That Genesis is actually a parable for creation. The Bible itself states that one day is a thousand years and a thousand years is a day for the Lord. Therefore the creation in Genesis could be metaphorical, like on of Jesus' parables.
Personally, I tend to lean towards #2, but I am so over the whole debate. God made the world, however He did it. It doesn't make any difference to the weay I live my life now.
Dinosaurs: the Bible actually makes reference to the 'leviathan' and the 'behemoth', so who knows? If you took #2 of the above theories, then dinosaurs aren't really a problem.
On Adam and Eve: funnily enough (at least I find this funny), Genesis actually states that Adam and Eve's first sons (Cain and Abel) were married before Eve actually had any more children! One option could be that Eve did have some daughters and the Bible in all its patriarcy didn't mention them (and so Cain and Abel married their sisters! ew!), or God did actually make other people and Adam and Eve were just the first.
Noah's Ark: Yeah, I think the Bible does put forward that we are descendants of Noah too. Huh! Again that relies on a literal translation - it could be a parable.
Ok, here's my first (and my favourite) proof for the existence of God.
Muhammad claimed to be a prophet. Moses was merely a leader. Buddha and Confucious were very deep thinkers.
Jesus Christ claimed what no other prominant spiritual leader has: to be God incarnate on earth, and then He proved it!
How did He prove it?
1. Miracles: healing the sick, raising the dead, feeding the 5,000, commanding nature and finally being raised from the dead Himself.
2. Totally turning the philosophies of the day on their head. The words that Jesus spoke did not come from the environment He grew up in. His ideas were in total contradiction to the thoughts of all the religious people of His age. Jesus was getting his info from somewhere else.
3. Prophecy - Jesus saw right into the hearts of every person He spoke to. Not a single word that came from His mouth was wasted as He challenged, encouraged and loved every person who came across His path.
4. Command of demons - they didn't stand a chance! Not only that, but the demons themselves knew who He was!
5. Finally, the most convincing: Jesus as the fulfillment of Old Testament prophecies. There are too many prophecies in the Old Testament that point to Jesus being the Messiah to state here, but here are a few: Jesus birthplace was foretold, the place where He grew up was foretold, the amount he would be betrayed for was foretold, His virgin birth was foretold, His lineage was foretold (through David), and most importantly, his sacrifice was foretold.
The last point is very important. The people of Jesus day, even the very disciples that Jesus was with, were waiting for the Messiah to come through and deliver them from the Romans by force. Many before Jesus had tried to do so (ie. the zealots). But Jesus could not have been more different than what everyone expected him to be: He was the one who was going to save the world from sin, not just the Jews from the Romans. That's why everyone worshipped Him into Jerusalem on Palm Sunday and then crucified Him on Calvary.
I read something recently (and I don't remember what it was, but I'll come back if I do-- was it Rev's blog??!?!?) is that we've spent so much time in the Information Age ... trying to scientifically prove things that can't always be proved. I can't scientifically prove that I love my husband or my children, but I do. And they know I do. Sometimes, I think we need to spend less time proving things scientifically. Sometimes, I would like to look at the world with the eyes of a 5 yr old and believe in magic. Because magic only exists when you believe in it. And that's the whole point.
Good point, Pavlos.
The best answer for that is found in looking at what the Bible actually is, and that is it's mostly a historical text.
In fact, it's not just any historical text - it's the most reliable ancient historical text in the whole world. Ever. And it has been proven time and time again by archeological evidence to be accurate. This is important to the most crucial part of the New Testament: the gospels. There are, in the Bible, four seperate accounts of the life of Jesus Christ.
In short, if you believe anything historical at all, then you have to believe the historical content of the New and Old Testaments. They are as verifiable as any text could be.
This is the logical foundation of the Christian faith.
Great stuff chicken!!! Love it!
What is it peebody that you find hard to accept? I'm findign ti hard to pinpoint what it is that you're questioning.
I agree that it's right to question the Christian faith, and not blindly follow. Something I LOVE about my faith is that it's an intelligent one. When you use your brain and think and question it, you come to the conclusion that is is true, it does not require illogical leaps of faith that contradict reason. But then on the other hand, there is an element of faith, just like what ma'am was saying about not being able to prove you love your family scientifically.
Sounds like a great idea, CH, but I also think that you are doing a wonderful job.
I love this conversation. I love this baring of souls. I love you guys. Thankyou all for sharing to honestly. I love hearing about how CH is finally getting to the stage where he is able to figure out his faith for himself. Man, I am so glad that you are able to do that now, and not just go with the way you were brought up.
I love hearing that you are genuinely seeking the truth, MPB. That warms my heart. I have and continue to pray for you all the time, not cold-heartedly that you would 'convert' to my 'religion' (how disgusting), but that you would be able to know how amazing life is with God as your best friend.
I guess for me, I grew up in a semi-Christian home. My parents are both Christian, but as far as doing Christian things go, we only really said grace at the table. My questioning of faith came I think when I was around Year 12 and early uni. That's also the time when I made my own decision to follow Jesus. I was able to do it without feeling like I was walking in my parents' footsteps too, because in a way I wasn't.
I don't want to type too much and take up all the space, so in a little bit I'll share my inner heart, deep inside myself, and tell you why I choose to believe.
In responce to this:
It happend so long ago, the bible has been rewritten so many times, how can i trust the people who have wrote it to speak the truth?
1. The Bible hasn't been rewritten (although parts of the Old Testament were under the strictest of codes). Whenever there is a new 'edition', it is always a translation from Ancient Greek, Hebrew and Aramaic from the original documents. We have more original documents of the books of the Bible than any other text.
2. There's no reason for the people who wrote the Bible to be lying. In fact, if the discpiles were to make up the New Testament for themselves:
a) they wouldn't have made themselves look so stupid,
b) the different versions of the life of Jesus (4 gospels) would all be different from one another,
c)the disciples wouldn't have come up with lines like 'turn the other cheek' when they wanted the Romans dead.
In short, it just makes no sense to say that the writers of the Bible were making it up. If you read a historian's analysis of the Bible, they will always say that it is a reliable account of real events. It is easier to prove that Jesus rose from the dead, historically, than it is to prove that Julius Ceasar existed.
MPB, have you tried asking God to reveal Himself to you?
My earliest memory of praying to God was having Hugh Stubley over to sleep one night in Primary School, and we sat awake at night wondering if God existed. We decided to ask God that if He existed, would He send us a sign. In the next three seconds, there was a flash of lightning without thunder near the hills. We both said 'woah!', and asked God to do it again! Hahaha... Guess what? When we asked again, there was another bolt of lightning.
There wasn't any other lightning that night, and the sky was so clear you could see all the stars.
I know that God is dying (haha, literally) for you to know Him. If you draw near to God, He will draw near to you (James 4:8).
this is a great post to read, and the comments are wonderfully personal - i won't add anything now but i just wanted to say thanks for what you've all written.
As far as biblical accuracy goes and the passing down of it, being a scrie was one of the most prestigious jobs around at the time, they weren't just secretaries, but very important people. And Whenever there are new discoveries of old manuscrips, the texts match up, now that's impressive. All done by hand, and all accurate across centuries! When they found the dead sea scrolls, they matched up with other ancient documents that had been found.
And once again, the bigges tpoint for me is consistency amoungst authors. How can 40 different authors not contradict each other somewhere if they are not inspired by God? Think about the discrepency here and there are only a few of us and we live in the same time and place!
First of all, wow! MBP, you rock!
"But i have a open mind and i'm always ready to listen."
Not many people like that, even people who are already Christians or of any faith.
And CH, wonderful posts!
And dboy, great topics!
And me, you're handsome.
Everyone says that Julius Ceaser existed, sure there's a possibility of him not, but hey! Chance is he did.
I say, the chance that Jesus existed and did even half of that stuff is really great, from what I've read and heard.
Apparently there is only one piece of evidence that says Julius existed, and there is a whole bible that has been proven and proven again. I say, even if the chance of him not existing is kind of big, I don't want to miss out on eternity, worth the risk I say.
Clumsy writing is proof of dinosaurs
Dearest Daniel, let me say,
How I love you on this day.
Always stay my Valentine
May you always just be mine
I don't think you are a swine
In fact I think you're just divine..
Now I'm running out of rhyming
And it is affecting the sentence's length, metre, pace and timing.
| valentinograms | taking the work out of romantic poetry |
Thanks Revhead for pointing me to this conversation! Riveting stuff. Firstly, I'm a believer. I am also a literal creationist. The reason is that when God created the universe he pronounced it good. The character of God is loving and good and to create a universe where death and dying and the survival of the fittest brings about that creation, does not match up with the character of God.
The bible says, death came into the world because of sin. God sent His Son into the world to pay the price for that sin. If death came about because of the process of creation, then the question has to be asked, why did we need Jesus to come into the world to die for our sins?
If you believe the bible is the true and inspired Word of God, then you have to consider this part of it too. The New Testament is supported and has its foundation on the Old Testament - it's comprehensive and relates completely. That's why Jesus always referred to it. Sometimes we try to rationalize by fitting the bible into the world's view.
I think part of the key to belief is that God's Spirit reveals the truth of His Word. He loves a genuine seeker. Peebody, seek God above "proof". God won't stop you from using your mind. His Spirit works very differently to our rational understanding.
PLEASE FORWARD THE FOLLOWING ANONYMOUS MESSAGE:
Chippie chippie gorgeous hunk,
I think you are a dreamy spunk!
My heart just goes Ka-thunk Ka-thunk
You cutsie furry chipp-a-munk
Valentinograms | Taking the Romance out of Love |
who wrote this?
everyone stop posting as anonymouse!!!!!
I thought sin came into the world because we (A&E) chose it? Not because God designed it that way.
And if you believe the bible, then death isn't really a bad thing.
And it doesn't have to be survival of the fittest.
But I'm no philosophy student, so I didn't probably didn't fully understand your query so I'll let other people answer it.
hey master peebody. i hear you are after some proof... well the only way for anyone to prove to you without a shadow of a doubt that God exist is for God himself to come out of the clouds and shake your hand, barring that there will always be doubt. if you have ever come accross a believer who says that they have never had some doubt i would say that they are crazy or lying.
however, if you really are seeking as it seems from your posts. and you are willing to accept that God really does want us to find him (see jeremiah 29:13)then is it reasonable that he might drop some clues in our paths. if you have soome specific questions for us to find proof that God exists for you i will be happy to stalk through the pages of history to try and find them for you.
That kind of defeats the purpose of it being faith. Then God would turn us all into robots, because we'd have to believe then. He is there if we want to find him, but he doesnt' shove himself down our throats.
It is so difficult when we feel we need proof, and God won't come out of the clouds and shake our hand!
An old guy named Anselm said:
“I do not endeavour, O Lord, to penetrate thy sublimity, for in no wise do I compare my understanding with that; but I long to understand in some degree thy truth, which my heart believes and loves. For I do not seek to understand that I may believe, but I believe in order to understand. For this also I believe,—that unless I believed, I should not understand.”
I think it is an interesting approach.
People can check a short bio here
And his famous Proslogium (where the quote comes from) here
"...unfortunately i can't commit to something like that unless i can be 100% sure..."
How is it that some people can believe 100% in something when there is lots of evidence to the contrary. And how is it that some people can 100% deny the existance of something, when emperical data would suggest otherwise.
Being 100% sure is still all up to you as to when you are sure. I'm sure you, and millions of sensible scientific people out there believe in things and historical events that havn't been 100% proven.
"...if god came out of the clouds and shook my hand, then that would do it for me."
Prob. not you, but I'm sure even that wouldn't convince some people. You can't convince someone if they don't want to be, it's all about being open.
heh heh, expected development. Zing, got me
How can you be 100% sure your marriage will work? You can't, but you trust that it will.
PB's right. You can never know for real, but you can be 100% trusting that it will work
In fact, a marriage is an excellent analogy.
When you want to marry someone, you can only ever have faith that they will love you, and that the marriage will last.
Even if you think you know the other person incredibly well, when there is another mind in the deal you can never truly know.
As you spend more and more time together, you'll eventually know.
It may not succeed, but it's worth trying. If you have a shot at such happiness, even if you knew there was only half a chance of truth, why wouldn't you take it?
The same is true of God. It's not so much a matter of if they He loves you, but whether he exists.
You must have faith, trust that he is there and wants to help you. When God promises such riches as eternal life and true happiness, why wouldn't you?
I ranted. The end.
Great analogy. I can't prove that someone loves me. I have faith that they love me when I marry them.
hey all i've come accross some insightfull theories in my travels and readings this past week that may shine some light.
there is a scholar that i have been reading lately by the name of William Lane Craig, he uses science and logic to explain why he believes that God exists and he believes.
he says "logicians have a term: "inference to the best explanation". this means you have a body of data to be explained, and then you have a pool of live options or various explanations for that data. you need to choose which explanation from that pool would, if true, best explain the observed data".
and here is a philosophical argument! rather a claim, "you can know that God exists wholly apart from arguments by having an immediate experience of him. philosophers call this "a properly basic belief".
an illustration to the point: can you prove to me that the external world exists?
(if you can you are doing better than every person that i have asked this question to this week)however, ÿour belief in the reaklity of the external world is "properly basic". "you cant prove that the extrenal world exists, but yor belief is entirely rational and is grounded in experience". in the same way, in the context of an immediate experinence of God, it's rational to believe in God in a properly basic way.
ive had such an experience and i'm sure almost everyone who has posted here has to. i've gone on a bit so i will post my experience on my blog and you can say what you like there.
An interesting discussion indeed. In fact Ludicrousity and I are discussing the existence of God right now in class at Kingsley College. I've read (or at least scanned through) all the posts (all 46 of em!)and it's been a great discussion.
In one sense God HAS come down out of the clouds and shaken our hands. At least that what Christians believe is the meaning behind Jesus Christ's entry into the world. He is God in the flesh - who became human so that we could see, touch, and know experientially what the otherwise unknowable and invisible God is like. Remember the old song? "What if God were one of us? Just a slob like one of us?" (Okay, now I'm showing my age.) Of course, that's not quite the same as what master peabody is looking for, but it's about the close as we're going to get. (Even then, as someone has rightly posted here), some people in Jesus' day saw his miracles and even his resurrection but still would not believe.
I'm not saying what follows is the case with master peabody who I don't know other than from his posts and from those he seems like a nice guy asking some of the most important questions a person can ask. But it's true of SOME people that the intellectual objections they put forward are not real objections at all but a mask for a deeper set of problems, i.e. moral and ethical ones. You see if I say I believe in God my life has to change. If I say I believe that Jesus is the Son of God I then have to take seriously the fact that he wants my life. He wants to be the Lord of my existence and human pride finds that hard to give up. "Darwin has disproved God" can often simply mean, "I don't want to give my life over to my Creator."
Finding watertight proofs for God's existence is a fool's project because there simply are no undeniable, unassailable, take it to the bank, proofs. (There are of course very strong evidences,but they are in the nature of circumstantial rather than forensic evidences). There are other ways than intellectual proofs to approach this problem however. C.S. Lewis suggests a little thought experiment. Close your eyes and think about the world we currently live in with all that it contains and ask yourself whether it makes sense, whether it offers up any kind of ultimately satisfying meaning. Now open your eyes, and mentally erase that picture. Close your eyes again and imagine the same world but this time imagine it AS THOUGH CHRISTIANITY WERE TRUE. Now, does it seem to make more sense? Does it now seem to offer up a greater purpose to existence? Lewis thought it did and I agree with him. There is a deep magic at the heart of this world if we can only imagine our way (and I don't mean "fantasize" - there's a difference) into the reality of it.
The bottom line is Christians do not claim to have all the answers to life's questions. They only claim to have the best set of answers on offer. That's good enough for me.
Beautiful stuff here people. Nice comments, Batman... I mean Glen :)
You're all beautiful.
Dboy, prepare for an onslaught of comments, my theology lecturer (aka batman) just sent this link to my entire class!
Hahaha... that's fantastic!
So when do I expect my guests to arrive?
Dear MPB
"unfortunately i can't commit to something like that unless i can be 100% sure. :( "
"Can't commit to marriage unless 100% sure it will last"
Hmmm,
Seems to me topsy turvy logic here ...
100% sure before you commit?
Surely, if I COMMIT "till death us do part", then for my part - I HAVE committed 100%.
Of course this is a simplification of the relationship, and we cannot control other people, but you get my drift?
By your definition, you will never marry.
Tell me MPB,
Are you getting up tomorrow? WHY?
Are you sure you will survive, make it to work?, not fall off the balcony? get run over?, etc.
You'd better stay in bed - you can be 99.43837% sure of surviving the day. That's probably your best odds, and that's as close to 100% you will get.
It really is rather dangerous to imagine that our own understanding is infallible! Even if we found 100% irrefutable evidence - it is only so to OUR mind, to OUR finite MIND.
Sorry to be blunt but your arguement is invalid.
I think perhaps that God cannot be proven 100% in anyone's mind, only in the heart.
I ran from God for years, had so many great sounding "proofs" (all of which turned out to be arguable) but in the end it was a strange experience of absolute certainty which made the change.
Driving home one day after many months of confident defence, I said to the ether "Ok, God, if you are there - show me".
And then, somehow, with absolutely no doubt at all - complete certainty - I KNEW God was right there with me! I could sense him even clearer than if I could SEE Him!
I had to pull over because I could not drive - the tears were pouring out and I wept for a long time. I was so ashamed of my past, yet I shed tears of joy because I knew His unconditional forgiveness in that very instant.
This is the amazing grace of God! ... That He WILL reveal himself to those who earnestly seek Him.
The Kingdom of God is a whisper in this busy Age of Information - be still, don't miss it for the noise.
Trust me - there are no logical arguements that can dissprove His existence. Many of the finest minds have wasted their entire lives on that one!
As for you, you have a healthy enquiring mind, and an open heart.
That's what God respects!
Above all - be honest with yourself - in your innermost being. Don't calculate the pro's & con's of blogdom; this is YOUR life, and only you can live it.
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