Origins

When it comes to the existence of God, sometimes I get tired of shouldering the entire "burden of proof." In fact, I think it's time that the atheist take his seat in the dock of truth while the Christian asks question after question demanding answers that can be scientifically proven beyond the shadow of a doubt. What is evil? How did the universe really begin? I'll be calling this approach "anakrinetics," which comes from the Greek word "anakrino" meaning "to question or examine." Anakrinetics is simply apologetics on the offensive. I don't know. Maybe I'm being too aggressive.

In my experience, the vast majority of things believed and held to be true cannot be scientifically proven with absolute conclusiveness. God's existence is no exception. Evidence of His existence can be seen throughout nature and in every field of study, yet God will never be able to be plugged into an equation or formula just to satisfy the rationalist minds of an era. He cannot be contained by our conceptualization. That being said, I'll reluctantly take my place on the stand once again to discuss what I believe to be one of the most compelling arguments for the existence of God.

The Kalam Cosmological Argument communicates that, apart from God, there exists no plausible explanation for the beginning of all things. Theories such as the Big Bang and evolution attempt to explain how life developed, but they fail to address how it began. The theoretical “ramp” of cause and effect is constructed, but there is nothing to set it on - no starting point. The argument focuses on the vital issue of origins and holds to three primary premises: the universe had a beginning, this beginning was caused and the cause was personal.

The universe can accurately be described as a spatio-temporal world, confined by both space and time. These limitations of finitude place the universe and all that it contains in subjection to the laws by which it is governed. Philosophy, mathematics and science help us know and understand these laws. For example, we know through philosophy and mathematics that infinity exists only in theory, and that an actual infinity can be neither crossed nor realized. In an eternal universe, the present moment—or now—could never actually arrive. The present depends upon a starting point, and infinity has neither a beginning nor an end. This concept can be compared to jumping out of an infinitely tall bottomless pit: not only is it impossible to reach the end, but it is impossible to even get started. The jumper will fail to reach any measurable point of progression.

The Greek mathematician, Zeno, presented a paradoxical argument demonstrating a similar idea—that the concept of infinity renders movement mathematically impossible. To move from Point A to Point B requires crossing an infinite number of other points in between. Because the number of these other points is infinite, Point B will never be reached mathematically. However, Zeno’s Paradox recognizes that movement is possible in reality (i.e. Point B will eventually be reached), which proves that an actual infinity can never be realized. Because the present moment has arrived, and because progress is a reality, we know we are living in a spatio-temporal world where infinity exists only in theory. Thus, the actual universe could not have existed eternally. It must have had a beginning.

Science confirms this fact, as well. The 2nd Law of Thermodynamics reveals that the universe is running out of its useful energy and it cannot be reversed (e.g. the sun cooling off). If the universe is eternal, the entropy process would have ended the universe infinitely long ago. Because it has not, and because it eventually will, the universe must have had a beginning.

The universe not only has a beginning, but that beginning is caused. Science tells us that nothing in this world comes into existence ex nihilo, or “out of nothing.” In other words, every effect in nature has a cause with which it is relationally associated. This is known as Causality. Many scientists point to the Big Bang as the great cosmological event that began life in this universe. According to this theory, a “primeval atom”—or some other primordial hot and dense condition—exploded at some finite point in the past and produced the ever-expanding universe of today. The problem: If the atom was material (which is assumed), and the point in time was finite (which is also assumed), then it becomes an effect that demands a cause. In other words, what caused the Big Bang? This question must be asked for every explanatory natural cause that is suggested, until we are faced with the philosophical problem of infinite regress. In other words, we are forced to ask the question, “And where did that come from?” for an infinite number of causes.

Claiming that a supernatural God began this process escapes the problem of infinite regress in that God is, by definition, “the uncaused Creator of everything.” As the eternal Author of the universe, He is not confined by its laws of space and time. Some may ask, “Who or what caused God?” This is similar to asking the question, “What does an invisible man look like?” By definition, a man who is invisible cannot be seen. If I ask what he looks like, I’m asking a question that changes his nature of invisibility, and he is no longer the thing I’m asking about. In other words, if an invisible man looked like anything, he would no longer be invisible. If I ask, “What caused God?” then I am inadvertently changing His very nature as the Uncaused Cause. The first natural effect must have had a supernatural cause.

This Cause is also revealed to be personal. Whatever caused the first natural event in the universe had to have the power to initiate motion without something happening to it first. A bicycle has many parts, most of which are connected and depend upon a previous part for motion. To initiate the collective movement of these parts, however, requires a free moral agent engaging in the volitional choice of pedaling. Whatever caused the beginning of the universe had to have the ability to choose to begin it, or refrain from beginning it, without any earlier cause forcing it one way or the other. God is this free moral—and personal—agent.

Although arguments such as these do not necessarily validate the specifics of the Christian faith, they help establish the foundation upon which Christian apologetics are built: There is a God and He is personal. More importantly, He desires a personal relationship with His creation – with you!

The Problem of Evil

Events like the Holocaust during World War II present a very real problem for theists that must be taken seriously. The brutal demonstration of evil’s existence cannot be explained with a series of trite responses. For example, God can do whatever He wants. In reality, God cannot do certain things. He cannot do anything that is a logical contradiction, such as making a square circle or a married bachelor. Neither can He do anything that is contrary to His own moral character. He cannot break a promise, lie, cheat or steal. To assume God wanted millions of His chosen people to die during the Holocaust clearly runs contrary to the moral character of a God who is Love.

The world must have evil in order to have good, is another inadequate response. This answer mistakenly understands good and evil as relational properties, when in fact they are absolute properties. Relational properties depend upon the existence of the other for their existence. Without “tall,” for example, there can be no “short.” Absolute properties, however, exist independent of the existence of anything else. Just as light could exist without any darkness, good could most certainly exist without any evil. Finally, one should never respond to the problem of evil with, All suffering is punishment from God. One would be hard-pressed to discover even one of the many terrible sins Jewish newborns must have committed to be punished via execution during the Holocaust.

So, how can the existence of God be compatible with the undeserved and/or unnecessary suffering of a sentient being (i.e. evil)? This question is best understood as primarily a logical argument from moral evil. The argument is built upon the following premises:

1) An omnipotent God would be able to eliminate evil.

2) An omniscient God would know how to eliminate evil.

3) An omnibenevolent God would want to eliminate evil.

We know, however, that evil exists, which presents three possible conclusions: First, one of the three premises is incorrect. Eliminating the first premise would make God unable to stop the Nazi regime. Eliminating the second would make Him unaware of the Nazis and/or how to stop them. Eliminating the third premise would mean He was unwilling to intervene to stop the mass genocide because He didn’t care. Each of these stands in stark contrast to the God of the Bible. The second possible conclusion is that evil does not really exist. While this would certainly reconcile the premises with the conclusion of God’s existence, it would demand gross negligence of the many atrocities happening throughout our world today. The atheist, then, adopts the only remaining conclusion: God does not exist.

In his book, God, Freedom & Evil, Alvin Plantiga argues that God’s existence is not logically incompatible with evil. Plantiga’s Free Will Defense doesn’t provide actual reasons for God’s allowance of evil; rather, he provides possible reasons—what they might be. According to Plantiga, if proposition p appears to be logically inconsistent with proposition q, then a reconciliation of these propositions depends upon finding some proposition r that makes both propositions p and q logically compatible. This proposition r doesn’t have to be true—only possible—to defeat logical incompatibility. Let the existence of an omnipotent, omniscient and omnibenevolent God be proposition p. Let the existence of evil be proposition q. According to Plantiga, proposition r is the free will of man.

It has been established that God cannot do anything that is a logical contradiction. Therefore, even God cannot create free moral agents who are unable to do wrong. Free will and predetermined good are mutually exclusive. So, why did God choose to create man as a free moral agent rather than a pre-programmed agent of good? Logically speaking, a world with moral good is better than a world without moral good. Only free moral agents, however, can do moral good. It’s a classic case of “taking the bad with the good.” Moral good cannot be realized apart from the possibility of moral evil because genuine moral freedom always entails the possibility of going wrong. God did not make the evil performed by the Nazis, but He did make it possible.

So, why not exchange a bit more free will for a bit less evil? After all, restricting some of the Nazi’s freedom would certainly have kept the evil of the Holocaust from happening. One must ask, then, how much free will should be allowed? Decreasing free will only creates a new lowest kind of evil. For example, God could remove evil after evil until a simple papercut is the worst evil in the world. At this point, one can still ask the question, “How can a good God exist if He allows papercuts?” This is an incoherent argument that serves only to convolute the validity of the Free Will Defense.

Anyone denying God’s existence due to the evils of the Holocaust must ask himself one question: If God does not exist, then why does the Holocaust—or evil in general—bother me? If there is no God, then there is no objective standard of morality. Evil becomes impossible to even define, let alone detest. Apart from God, “evil” must be considered nothing more than being on the wrong end of natural selection where the strong survive and the weak die. Sadly, Hitler actually used this Darwinian reasoning to justify the Nazi’s atrocious acts of gratuitous evil. We know, however, that the Holocaust was indeed evil. For this reason, we know that a good God exists.

Call for Character

Character is a word that almost everyone understands, yet few are able to define. In fact, definitions of character usually drift quickly into a myriad of words and descriptive phrases, all of which are definitively insufficient. Character is complex. No single component of character adequately summarizes its essence. Character is diverse. It expands beyond the realm of morality and ethics into areas of personality and relationships. In spite of its ambiguity, character—both our own and that of others—has left an indelible imprint on each of our lives.

It is this “imprint” that I feel gives us the best definition of character. Character is often defined as “an individual’s internal makeup.” This definition, however, is incomplete and even misleading. Every person is made up of the same “material”—body, mind, soul and spirit—or at least some variation of these four elements. This is what it means to be made in “the image of God (Genesis 1:27).” Opinions differ as to the actual composition of the individual, yet most would agree that these elements are universally shared. If character, then, were the same as “makeup,” everyone would essentially have the same character.

Character might best be defined as, “An integrated set of values, morals and qualities that make up the true shape of an individual and determines intentions, motivations and actions.” The word has its origins in the Greek word for “the image or imprint on a coin.” These origins offer valuable insight into the true essence of character. A coin is distinguished by its material and by the image it carries—its “character.” In Matthew 22, we are told that Jesus was once questioned whether or not it is lawful for a Jew to pay taxes to Caesar. He responded by drawing attention to the imprint on—or character of—the coin. “Render to Caesar what is Caesar’s,” He said, “and to God what is God’s.” In other words, character indicates ownership.

Character is more a matter of shape than substance. While we are all made up of the same raw materials (i.e. body, mind, soul and spirit), we have different tendencies, attitudes, values and priorities. These “lines and contours” make up the shape of our character and leave an imprint determined by the “mint” of upbringing, education and experiences. The shape of our character influences its external expressions—our thought processes, attitudes, behaviors, speech and interaction with others. In fact, this shape—or imprint—leaves a clear mark on every person and situation pressed closely against us.

The two primary images (i.e. characters) a person can carry are that of the World or of Christ. The image of the World is one of selfishness, pride, greed and licentiousness. The image of Christ is one of altruism, humility, sacrifice and love. Mankind was created in the “image of God,” yet that image became distorted through sin. Hebrews 1:3 tells us that Christ came as “the exact representation (i.e. character) of His (God’s) nature.” Christ is God’s “mint” and He places his “imprint” on each of our lives, making us more like our Creator whose image we have been made to carry. The question remains, then: Whose imprint do I carry? Which parts of my character are not consistent with the image of God?