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Why Atheists are the True Worshipers of God … (and a Call for Christian Atheists)

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Atheists are right about God being wrongPeople often assume that we must determine whether or not God exists before we can raise the question of what this God is like.

In other words, why bother with the question of the nature, attributes, and characteristics of God until and unless we first determine the existence of God?

But this exactly what we must do. The question of the existence of God must be secondary to the question of the nature and attributes of God.

Why?

Well, for one reason, how can a person look for God if they don’t know what God looks like? If a person doesn’t know what to look for in God, they cannot very well look for God.

Furthermore, if we begin with the question of the existence of God without first seeking to understand what this God would be like (if he existed), we run the danger of looking for a God who does not actually exist.

And in fact, this is what I think has happened to most atheists.

God-Worshiping Atheists

Many atheists, I believe, have rightly declared their non-belief in a god that truly does not exist.

They have gone looking for a god that does not exist, and, having failed to find him (and how could they?), have declared that god does not exist. Christians take offense to this, and come up with all sorts of arguments for the existence of God, but fail to recognize that they too are arguing (in many cases) for the existence of a god that does not actually exist.

In such cases, it is the atheists who are the true worshipers of the true God, for they have recognized the non-existence of the non-god.

The Christians who seek to defend the existence of the god who is not God are the idolaters, for if they are seeking to call people to believe in a god who is not God, they are calling people to believe in an idol. In such a case, the rejection of this false god by the atheist is an act of pure worship.

Let me get real concrete and specific.

The vast majority of atheists I know today have rejected a god which is believed in by the majority of Christians, namely, a god who hates people of other religion, hates homosexuals, hates democrats, and hates “sinners.” This god of popular Christianity commanded Israel to commit acts of genocide, drowned millions of people in a flood because they sinned too much, and is planning to send the vast majority of the people of this world to an everlasting torment in flames and boiling lava.

Since the God which Jesus revealed to us is nothing like this sort of violent, blood-thirsty, people-torturing god, the atheistic rejection of such a god is an act of true worship of the God revealed in Jesus Christ.

If God is not like what we have been taught, then when we declare, “God does not exist,” we are not denying the God who does truly exist, but the god who is nothing more than a figment of human imagination, philosophical speculation, sociological superstition, and religious wish-fulfillment.

To deny a god who does not exist is to say nothing about the God who does.

When atheists deny a god who does not exist, this is an act of pure worship to the God who does.

A Call for Christian Atheists

So this bring us back to the idea I began with: Before we can discuss whether or not God exists, it might be best to discuss what sort of God we are looking for.

I propose we invite people to look for the God revealed in Jesus Christ, for this is a God who not only exists, but this is a God who can be found.

I believe that if those people who have rightly denied the existence of a god who does not exist were properly introduced to the God who does, they would no longer deny the existence of God.

In my experience, it seems that the vast majority of atheists have not rejected the God revealed in Jesus Christ, but the false god of popular, power-based, political religion.

I reject and deny the existence of that god too … Does that make me a Christian atheist?

So Christians, let us follow our atheist friends in denying the existence of this false god of power, money, bloodshed, and violence, and instead call people to believe in the enemy-loving, all-forgiving God who is found in Jesus Christ dying on the cross.

Only once we present God as what He is like in Jesus Christ can we expect people to “find God” as He truly is, because the God who looks like Jesus is the only God who can be found.

Was Adam and Eve’s sin really about eating a piece of forbidden fruit?

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Wesley RostollThis is a guest post from Wesley Rostoll. He lives in in South Africa with his wife and two kids.

Wesley left the institutional church about 5 years ago and has been exploring what some people call organic church ever since. He writes about what he has learned from the experience on his blog.

If you would like to write a Guest Post for the Till He Comes Blog, begin by reading the Guest Blogger Guidelines.

For most of my life I thought that the punishment that mankind and the rest of creation suffered for Adam and Eve’s one act of disobedience in the garden seemed incredibly harsh. When compared to some of the things I had done in my life, it seems like I have done far worse and gotten away with it.

So when God said to Adam that if he ate from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil that he would surely die I read it more as a threat than as a warning.

Wesley RostollThe truth is this wasn’t a case of a petty or offended deity overreacting.

Despite the fact that most of us grew up believing that God could not look upon sin (see my thoughts on that over here), it was not God who hid Himself from Adam but the other way around.

After the fall we see God seeking Adam and Eve out, clothing them when they realized that they were naked and putting them outside of the garden for their own protection (Genesis 3:22).

Nevertheless, we see a drastic change in man and in his relationship with God after Genesis 3. And here is the crux of why that piece of fruit om the Garden of Eden was such a big deal.

When Adam chose to eat that fruit from the forbidden tree, he was essentially choosing independence from God.

Man would now decide for himself what was good and evil.

God tried to warn Adam that going it alone would surely end badly for him and that it was a path that would lead to destruction. It was intended for mankind to draw life from God and bear his image and likeness but the fall changed that.

It is easy to overlook the tragedy of Genesis 5:3. Hidden away in a genealogy list, it tells us that when Adam had sons and daughters they were born into his image and likeness.

Fortunately for us though he loved us enough to send a new Adam, one not born of man but of the Spirit (Matthew 1:18). Hebrews 1:3 tells us that this man, Jesus, was the exact representation of God. Jesus himself said that if you had seen him you had seen the Father. The good news doesn’t stop there either; Paul said that he (Jesus) would be the first born among many and that we who found life in him would be conformed into his image (Romans 8:29), which ultimately restores us back to what was lost in the Garden.

I do not think that it was an accident that Jesus chose the words he did when he said that he is the way, the truth and the life (John 14:6).

Likewise I do not think that it was a coincidence when he used the illustration of himself as being the true vine (John 5:5) and that those who were in him would bear much fruit.

Today our choice is not so different from the one that Adam faced. We can choose life and we can find it in that vine or we can choose the broad way that leads to destruction.

Adolph Hitler on the Inspiration of Scripture

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No, Adolph Hitler never spoke about the inspiration of Scripture (that I know of).

But last week I posted two blog posts that got quite a bit of discussion, and I found the comments on these two posts quite … ironic.

They were these two posts:

Here is what happened:

The Hitler Billboard Post

In the first post I criticized a church for putting up a billboard which quoted Hitler. I thought that a church had no business quoting Hitler, even if what Hitler said was true.

If you go read the comments, you see that the vast majority of the comments were in favor of quoting Hitler. Though these are not exact quotes of anybody, many people said things like “All truth is God’s truth” and “We should be able to recognize that other people may teach God’s truth, even if we don’t like what they stand for.”

all truth is gods truth

OK. I see the point. I also agree (for the most part).

But just as I would never quote Satan approvingly (even if it was a true statement), I don’t think churches should be quoting Hitler.

But whatever … people are free to disagree. (As many of them did.)

The very next day, however, I posted another post, and I was shocked at the response.

Inspiration and Other Religions

In this post, I argued that God has been whispering His truth to lots of people throughout time, not just to a select few Jews in a small corner of the world for a short period of time.

As such, I argued, it should not be surprising for us to find divine truth in the writings of other religions.

Judging by some of the comments I received, you would think I had just announced my conversion to atheism!

The Two Posts Compared…

But then it hit me …

Why is it okay to accept “truth” as “God’s truth” when it comes from Hitler, but it is heretical to accept “truth” as “God’s truth” when it comes from Buddhist Sutras, Hindu Vedas, or Native American legends?

If all truth is God’s truth (as people claimed on the Hitler post), then why are some so shocked when some of God’s truth is found in the writings of other religions?

I just don’t understand.

I suppose it was because I used the word “inspired” in the second post, though I tried to clarify that what I meant by “inspired” was “God whispering His truth to people.” That’s not deserving of being called a heretic, is it? All I am saying is that God has somehow taught truth to people who were not biblical authors. Heck, maybe that’s how Hitler learned the truth he stated about children, which was quoted in that billboard!

I wonder what would have happened if I had been able to find a quote from Hitler which said the same thing I said in the second post … people’s minds would have exploded!

Anyway, I thought it was strangely ironic that in one post I am condemned for one thing, and in the very next post, I am condemned for exactly the opposite (sometimes by the same people!).

“We played the flute for you, and you did not dance;
We sang a dirge, and you did not mourn” (Matthew 11:17)

Why C. S. Lewis was a master at theological writing

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Ever wonder why C. S. Lewis was so influential in his thinking and theological writing? It is because C. S. Lewis translated his theology into language that anybody could understand.

CS Lewis writing

This was not accidental, but intentional. Here is what C. S. Lewis said on the matter:

You must translate every bit of your theology into the vernacular. This is very troublesome, and it means you can say very little in half an hour, but it is essential.

It is also the greatest service to your own thought. I have come to the conviction that if you cannot translate your thoughts into uneducated language, then your thoughts were confused. Power to translate is the test of having really understood one’s own meaning.

This came from Alister McGrath’s excellent biography of C.S. Lewis (p. 208). If you haven’t read it yet, click the link above to get a copy from Amazon. It is the best biography on Lewis I have ever read.

Would you rather spend $10k or $100k to do African missions work?

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african mission tripIn a recent post on evangelism, an African evangelist posted some comments that I though were quite good. His name is Godfrey Mawa, and here is what he wrote about how western missionaries often spend money on their African mission trips (I edited his comments somewhat for this post):

Your thoughts are great and there are very few people who have such a heart and who are willing to help native missionaries to impact their villages, cities and nations. 

I agree with what you wrote: native African missionaries are more effective than visiting missionaries. I can’t be more effective than a trained American evangelist in reaching Americans for Christ as many barriers will hinder me from efficiency.

Over the span of the past years, I have seen many missionaries spend hundreds of thousands of dollars on air flights, expensive hotel bills, and other expenses.  Yet in Africa, $10,000 will do a significant evangelistic work, or buy land for a school project, an orphanage or anything that can add value to the kingdom of God.

Nevertheless, some Christian relief missionaries will spend $100,000 to bring in donations worth $1,000 . I saw this during our recent mission to the war-torn Northern Uganda (in response to Joseph Kony and LRA rebels insurgencies/atrocities that lasted for over 20 years). It was not uncommon to see a missionary using a private jet, spending their stay on safaris and first-class hotels, while they give one-time foodstuffs and used clothes as donations. Of course, while they are handing out the food and clothing, they also take lots of good pictures and videos for their Praise Reports.

I have evaluated that, as a native African missionary, my team and I can do more effective work in evangelism with $10,000 than a visiting missionary can do with $100,000. 

A lot of churches in the developed world believe in their own trained missionaries and that’s why they would rather spend the larger amount. There is some legitimacy to their concern. Sometimes they have heard of or dealt with the wrong native persons before examining or training them, and these native African missionaries have disappointed them. This has killed the trust for native African missionaries. Nevertheless, there are still great native African missionaries who will work unto changing their communities and people towards the values of Christ.

My prayer is that churches and missionaries will use God given resources with good stewardship, as evangelism yields amazing fruits. The needy orphans, widows and helpless people helped and nations changed with a holistic approach. That way, the Lord will be praised! The nations will declare His praises. 

At my request for more information about his missionary team, he sent in this information:

I am available to advise any missionaries interested in doing a mission work in Africa on how to be cost effective, yet with great results/fruits for the Lord’s kingdom. We have diverse experience ranging from all forms of evangelistic missions, relief and aid, leadership training and development, orphans, widows and the elderly, awareness and sensitization, among others. You can also see some pictures on our mission website or the following Facebook links;

https://www.facebook.com/malipuko
https://www.facebook.com/godfreymawa
https://www.facebook.com/afrikidzuganda
https://www.facebook.com/pages/Commission-International/114524275303169

Our organization has opportunities for individuals or groups of those interested in coming for mission experience in Africa.

I am doing to get you a list of advise for missionaries coming to Africa or third world countries, with an effective mission yet, without wasting finances and resources.

Thanks again Jeremy, for the great work. I know many are going to be helped.

missions in Africa

Please note that I am not “endorsing” Godfrey’s African mission. He and I have never met and I have never worked with him in doing any sort of missions in Africa. I have posted his information because he validates what I have found to be true in my own experience, and what I have read in numerous other books about the best and most cost-effective way of doing evangelism and missions in other countries, especially in places like Africa.

What books?

Here’s two:

When Helping Hurts
The Spontaneous Expansion of the Church

My favorite quote from Alister McGrath’s Biography of C. S. Lewis

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CS Lewis smokingIn explaining why C. S. Lewis wasn’t more popular among American Christians in the 1960s, Alister McGrath wrote this:

What evangelical would want to be associated with someone who smoked heavily, drank copious quantities of beer, and held views on the Bible, the Atonement, and purgatory which were out of place in the evangelical community of that age?

I love it!

This came from Alister McGrath’s excellent biography of C.S. Lewis (p. 365). If you haven’t read it yet, click the link above to get a copy from Amazon. It is the best biography on Lewis I have ever read.

The God-ordained Scriptures (and other writings)

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inspiration of ScriptureLast week I wrote a post about the inspiration of Scripture and the inspiration of other religious books  which struck a cord with a lot of people. 

One blog reader, Jake Yaniak, left a comment that he had written something similar just a week or so earlier. I read Jake’s blog, but somehow I missed that post of his… When I went and read it, I was impressed at some of the ideas he was expressing. So I decided to post some of it here for you to read:

What do I believe concerning the Holy Bible?

Well, I must say that I am very much in agreement with the Westminster Confession, though with this difference: I also believe in a sovereign God.

This might sound strange considering the fact that it is often to the Westminster Confession that men appeal when they speak of God’s sovereignty. The confession states, powerfully:

“God from all eternity, did, by the most wise and holy counsel of His own will, freely, and unchangeably ordain whatsoever comes to pass; yet so, as thereby neither is God the author of sin, nor is violence offered to the will of the creatures; nor is the liberty or contingency of second causes taken away, but rather established.”

But they do not apply this belief to the Scriptures – or rather, they do not apply it to non-Scripture.

They state under the category of the Holy Scriptures that, “The books commonly called Apocrypha, not being of divine inspiration, are no part of the canon of the Scripture, and therefore are of no authority in the Church of God, nor to be any otherwise approved, or made use of, than other human writings.”

How can this be when they affirm that God is sovereign?

They speak like Calvinists when they write about God’s sovereignty; and they dodge the moral implications of Calvinism with the empty statement ‘neither is God the author of sin, nor is violence offered to the will of the creatures,’ ignoring the logical consequences of determinism like men who plant rhubarb and then hope to grow apples.

(And please do not plead “paradox” with me – it is only those who lack the “ground of truth,” as Hans Denck put it, who retain both thesis and antithesis without resolving them.)

But suddenly they speak like Arminians when they wish to cast off the Apocrypha, calling them “human writings” as if there could be such a thing in determinism.

If God, by the most wise and holy counsel of His own will, freely, and unchangeably ordained the precise wording of Bel and the Dragon, the action-packed sequel to the Book of Daniel, then how is this different from inspiration, where he is said to have ‘out-breathed’ or ‘spoken’ his Word to the prophets and apostles?

ALL things are created by his Word.

That includes the Apocrypha.

That includes the Bible in its original manuscripts.

That includes the manifold corrections, glosses, errors, typos, alterations and duplications it has seen since its writing.

That includes the NIV.

That includes both the long and short endings of Mark, as well as the original, lost ending.

That includes the Zend Avesta, the Mahabharata and its vampires, the Quran and the Lord of the Rings.

God is existence, and he speaks in all things, for all things are made by his Word and according to his irresistible, omnipotent will.

“The heavens declare the glory of God; and the firmament sheweth his handywork.
Day unto day uttereth speech, and night unto night sheweth knowledge.
There is no speech nor language, where their voice is not heard.”

This is just part of Jake’s post. The rest of it goes on to lay out this idea in more detail and defend it. I invite you to go read the whole post here and interact with Jake on it.

A Letter to the Me of 15 Years Ago

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a letter to myself

Dear Jeremy from 1999,

Don’t freak out, but this is a letter from you fifteen years into the future (2014). Yeah, we developed a fancy time-warp email system so that I can send letters back to myself. Pretty cool, huh? Just wait until you see Google glass. Well, never mind about that. Maybe that’s not so cool …

Anyway, I wanted to write to you to tell you  a few things that I wish I knew when I was you. Here they are:

1. Sell your stocks. A crash is coming. Enough said. 

2. Grow your hair out. You look like a Christian dweeb. 

3. That whole Y2K thing? Don’t sweat it. It was all a bunch of hype. Nothing happened. Absolutely nothing. 

4. The world’s going to change on 9-11-2001. Be ready with a message of hope, love, forgiveness, and healing. 

5. Finally, and most importantly (you can ignore the first four items, but don’t ignore this one), put down your damn theology books and go kiss your beautiful wife. And I don’t mean a little peck on the cheek, I mean a good, long, passionate kiss. 

Theology can wait. Starting your marriage off right with your wife will not. You can never get those years back again, and my biggest regret from the years you are now living is that I spent most of that time with my nose buried in books instead of in her neck. 

You will get through seminary with no problem and the grades you get will not matter. So remove your fingers from that computer keyboard, and go put them on your wife instead. 

Are you listening to me? Don’t make me come back there! 

Oh.. wait… what’s this? A letter from myself fifteen years in the future just arrived in my inbox. Hmmm. Let’s see what I have to say to the me of today.  

Oh… oops. 

It looks like the me of 15 years from now is saying the same thing the me of today is saying to the me of 15 years ago…. 

Point taken… Now where’s my wife?

How About You?

If you could say something to yourself 10-20 years ago, what would it be? Share in the comments below…

This post is part of the May 2014 Synchroblog. Here is a list of the other bloggers who participated:

Jesus as the Hermeneutical Trump Card in Scripture

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hermeneuticsWhen people seek to defend the idea that God is violent “because the Bible says so,” what they are really doing is allowing the violent portrayals of God in the Bible to override and trump the loving and merciful portrayals of God elsewhere in Scripture, even when both portrayals are talking about the same historical event.

Though both depictions of God are equally inspired, many biblical interpreters choose to let the violent depiction of God override and trump the loving depiction. In this way, it is not a matter of just believing the Bible; it is a matter of choosing which passages take precedence.

This practice is especially shocking when it comes to the revelation in Jesus Christ. Although Jesus is the ultimate revelation of God—the Word of God incarnate—many Bible teachers and writers allow the violent portrayals of God in the Old Testament to override and trump the completely non-violent revelation of God in Jesus Christ.

When people want to defend a violent and vengeful God, they typically jump right over Jesus and go straight to Old Testament texts.

But isn’t this backwards?

Jesus hermeneuticsIf a basic rule of hermeneutics is that the simpler and clearer texts should override the more difficult and troubling texts, and if Jesus Christ is the image of the invisible God so that He can say “if you have seen Me, you have seen the Father,” why do we choose to let the more troubling, difficult, and violent texts override and trump the loving, merciful, and Christlike texts?

It is not a matter of one approach considering the whole counsel of God while the other approach neglects certain portions. No, both approaches consider the whole counsel of God. It’s a matter of choosing which parts of Scripture trump, interact with, and explain the other parts of Scripture.

As I continue to seek to understand the violent portrayals of God in the Old Testament, my approach has been to see Jesus Christ as the interpretive principle, the guiding ethic, the hermeneutical trump card of all of the Word of God.

Why?

Because Jesus is the Word of God.

No matter which text we consider, the basic questions are these: Does it look like Jesus? If not, how can we understand this text in light of Jesus? Or, how can we explain and apply this text in a way that looks more like Jesus? And ultimately, how can we apply this text so that it inspires us to love and live like Jesus?

God of the Old Testament and JesusHow can a God who says "Love your enemies" (Matthew 5:44) be the same God who instructs His people in the Old Testament to kill their enemies?

These are the sorts of questions we discuss and (try to) answer in my online discipleship group. Members of the group can also take ALL of my online courses (Valued at over $1000) at no charge. Learn more here: Join the RedeemingGod.com Discipleship Group I can't wait to hear what you have to say, and how we can help you better understand God and learn to live like Him in this world!

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