food4thought

The online sermon will eventually appear here.

As the American pioneers crossed the rolling plains of the mid west in search of new land one of the biggest threats that confronted them was the danger of forest fires. The prairie grass could grow as high as a man. When summer came it became dry and dangerous. Dry storms with no rain but lightning and thunder could ignite the grass in a flash. The fires would streak across the prairie faster than a man could run and much faster than the heavy wagons could move. And yet the pioneers faced this threat to life with confidence. When a fire was spotted they would stand with their backs to the wind. They’d light a series of fires that would take off before them. In a few minutes they had a large burnt area in which they could stand with their families and wagons to confidently wait for the ongoing fire. The fire would not burn in the same place twice. Where the fire had already burnt it would not burn again.

Those of us here who are happy to call ourselves Christians are like the pioneers standing in burnt ground awaiting the future arrival of the forest fire. We stand on the burnt ground of the cross, the place where the fierce judgement of God has fallen once already. And yet we await a future day of judgement on which God has stored up His wrath. Can we face that future with any confidence? Paul addresses this issue in the first part of chapter 5.

After our foray into the book of Jonah and our week of events we’re repenting of our neglect of the book of Romans. I don’t think Paul would have been upset. There’s a sense in which he’d far rather we were involved in evangelism than pouring over his letter. That was, after all, one of the principal reasons he put quill to parchment. He wrote principally to elicit their support for his gospel mission to Spain

Paul’s just completed the first section of his letter. In 1:18-4:25 he’s explained God’s good news of justification by faith. He begins chapter 5 with a summary conclusion of where we’ve got to so far.

5:1 Therefore, since we have been justified by faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ. 2 Through him we have also obtained access by faith into this grace in which we stand, and we rejoice in hope of the glory of God.

Given that we have been declared righteous by trust in God’s saving work in Jesus Christ three things follow. These are the consequences of justification.

a. We have peace with God. The hostility is over; we no longer hate God and He’s no longer angry with us. In the place of our undeniable rebellion towards His rightful rule over us and His justifiable antagonism towards our mutinous attitude there is reconciliation. This peace is a state of affairs rather than a state of mind. We may not feel as though God is for us but that doesn’t change the fact that He is.

b. We have access to grace. We stand in a favoured position with God that we simply don’t deserve. It’s as though we’re now allowed to go somewhere from which by rights we ought to be banned. As a result of what God has done in the past we have ongoing right of entry to the realm of His generosity.

c. We rejoice in the hope of glory. The word ‘rejoice’ carries the connotations of boasting. The best English word is probably ‘exult’ but I’m guessing that’s not part of the everyday vernacular! Neither is ‘vernacular’, but what’s the point in having a thesaurus if you’re not going to use it! The word translated ‘hope’ does not mean ‘wishful thinking’. It doesn’t mean ‘uncertainty’ and ‘speculation’ it means ‘certainty’. And so those who have been justified by faith can boast in confident conviction of a certain future. That’s what these verses are all about. They’re all about hope. They’re all about rejoicing in hope. If hope is the theme of these verses then rejoicing is the intent behind Paul’s treatment of the theme. He has three things to say.

1. we rejoice in hope even when we suffer (3)

and we rejoice in hope of the glory of God. 3 More than that, we rejoice in our sufferings, knowing that suffering produces endurance, 4 and endurance produces character, and character produces hope,

This is not what we were expecting. We would have thought that suffering would undermine our hope. But that’s not Paul’s take on things. We can understand that the prospect of eternity in glory is something to get excited about but not suffering. Surely one of the things that most excites us about heaven is the absence of suffering. So it seems perverse that we should delight in it here and now. But the reason believers rejoice in suffering is that it conspires to produce in us even greater hope. How that happens is accounted for by the chain of effects. We must remember that the chain of effects is dependent on the right response. It’s not an automatic process from which our godly involvement is excluded. If we react sinfully to suffering then we’d be idiots to expect godliness as the outcome. But assuming that we’re determined to respond to suffering in the way God would have us do, this is what happens.

a. Suffering produces endurance

The word translated ‘suffering’ is the general word for ‘trouble’ or ‘affliction’. It therefore includes the trouble that life throws at us from being human living in a world under God’s judgement and from being a Christian living in a world that opposes God. It’s a repeated refrain throughout the New Testament not only from Paul but also from Jesus that our existence in this world will be characterised by suffering. We live in a world that’s hostile to God and His ways. We belong to God and therefore if we conform to Him and His ways we can expect to be treated with hostility. But whatever affliction comes our way toughens us up by building up our resistance so that we can weather the troubling storms of life.

b. Endurance produces character

That prolonged patient resistance of trials develops strength of character as our personality is shown up for what it really is. It’s hard to articulate but we’ll know it when we meet it. There’s often a quality or depth of character about those who’ve endured real trials.

c. Character produces hope

The change and refinement in our character stimulates our confident expectation that the future is secure. We might wonder why that’s the case. It seems to be that the moral transformation God brings about in believers through their suffering strengthens their conviction that He’s at work.

An illustration might help. One of the effects of long term hospitalisation or immobility is muscle wastage. We may have had that if we’ve even been in plaster for a while. A muscle becomes emaciated if it’s never exercised. The way to strengthen a muscle is to expose it to such resistance that the capacity of the muscle to cope is challenged. Just as resistance to a muscle strengthens it, so too challenges to our hope strengthens it.

Without suffering we’re in a spiritually precarious position. We’re like the emaciated patient in the illustration. Most of us are wealthy enough to enjoy a very positive experience of life in this world. We may find that we don’t live for the life to come. That’s dangerous. Without suffering our hope may wither and waste away. And so we need to learn to welcome suffering even though inherently it’s not something to rejoice in. We’re to rejoice in the midst of suffering but not in suffering itself. It’s the spiritual benefit that comes from suffering that causes our delight not the experience itself. Suffering is caused by the things that were never part of God’s original intent. One day He will eradicate them. We’re not to call what is evil good. We’re to call them for what they are. But we’re also to recognise their usefulness in God’s hands. The trials of life are God’s means of testing our faith and giving substance and strength to our Christian commitment. We’d love the Lord to find another way to do this. But the tough times are the times when we’re forced to recognise that this world is not all that there is. Those are the times when our field of vision expands to take in the ultimate future and not just the immediate future. And so we’re to see in suffering the opportunity that the Lord gives to strengthen our convictions about the future. I won’t pretend that will be easy. But it has to be preferable than watching our faith wilt away in the comfort of this world.

2. we rejoice in hope because it’s certain (5-8)

Paul’s concern seems to be for those who were worried that at some stage in the future we’ll be humiliated because hope hasn’t delivered what it said that it would. His concern is not that the atheists will turn out to be right and we’ll all discover that there’s no God. His concern was that on the Day of Judgement we’ll discover that justification by faith hasn’t worked and we’ll stand before the King still in need of salvation. But Paul was absolutely convinced that our hope in Christ will be vindicated. He argues that for two reasons one subjective and the other objective.

a. It’s certain because God’s love has been poured into our hearts by His Spirit

5 and hope does not put us to shame, because God’s love has been poured into our hearts through the Holy Spirit who has been given to us.

Subjectively we’ve experienced God’s love for us through the work of His spirit in our hearts. We know that God loves us because the Spirit has convinced us of the Lord’s favour through our understanding of the gospel. The Spirit’s work in our lives convinces us that God is not about to change His mind and go ballistic on the Day of Judgement.

b. It’s certain because God’s love has been demonstrated by the death of His Son

6 For while we were still weak, at the right time Christ died for the ungodly. 7 For one will scarcely die for a righteous person - though perhaps for a good person one would dare even to die - 8 but God shows his love for us in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us.

Objectively we’re confident of God’s love for us because of the work of His Son. Our subjective experience of reassurance is grounded in the objective accomplishments of Christ’s death. In (7) he sets the standard of the best of human love against God’s love. A righteous person is perhaps someone we might respect but a good person is someone we love. There might be the odd occasion where someone will possibly die for either one of them. We rightly celebrate the sacrificial death of others. But we do so because it’s noteworthy. It’s not normal. It’s out of character. But it’s quite in character for God. The awesome quality of His love for us is seen that Christ died not for the deserving but for weak, ungodly sinners.

Let me illustrate. In the early days of pregnancy there’s often a sense of uncertainty and doubt about whether it’s happening. Am I really pregnant? There are a couple of things that clear up the doubt. There’s the subjective experience of morning sickness and the insatiable appetite for marmite coated mars bars, or whatever it is. There’s the objective evidence of the scan when Perkins junior appeared before us on the screen. There’s an experience and there’s an explanation that confirms it.

The issue of assurance is a complex one. But the question of how we can be certain about our future is not just a theological issue; it’s a personal one. It’s one with which some of us here have had to wrestle. And for some that struggle is ongoing. This is not the place to deal with all of those issues. I can recommend a good book. Neil’s excellent and thorough treatment of the issue is on the bookstall. And the major US publishing company P&R are due to release in the summer. If assurance is your issue you’re time in that book will be well spent. I don’t wish to be reductionistic but the question of the possibility of salvation is resolved by an understanding of Christ’s death. We’ll be tempted to look at our spiritual performance and we’ll be tempted to look at our spiritual experiences. But Paul’s method of reassuring his readers was to expound the cross. For it’s there that the issue of whether God is for us or not is resolved. This is the first place to start to deal with our doubts.

3. we rejoice in hope because we’ll be saved

These verses form the conclusion of Paul’s argument. The fact that Christ died means that we can be certain that we will be saved. He states the argument in two slightly different ways; employing the metaphor of the court room and the metaphor of friendship. In both he frames his point in terms of a ‘how much more’ argument. The idea is that if He’s done the greater thing we’ve no sound reason to doubt the lesser thing.

a. we’ll be saved by our judge

9 Since, therefore, we have now been justified by his blood, much more shall we be saved by him from the wrath of God.

Since we’ve been declared righteous by God, even though we deserved His condemnation, we have no reason to fear His wrath on the day of judgement. He’ll save believers on that day because He’s already declared them righteous. There’s nothing for God to be angry about.

b. we’ll be saved by our friend

10 For if while we were enemies we were reconciled to God by the death of his Son, much more, now that we are reconciled, shall we be saved by his life.

Since we’ve been reconciled to God, even though we were His enemies, we have no reason to think that we won’t be friendly on the day of judgement. He’ll save believers on that day because He’s already promised us a share in Christ’s resurrection life. God has stated his intent to welcome His friends into eternity.

The process of buying a house is essentially divided into two bits. There’s the exchange of contracts and the completion and then there’s possession. Once the completion has gone through it’s just a matter of time. Once the sale of the property has been completed it’s a done deal.

The greatest obstacles to our future salvation were the guilt of our sin and the anger of God. Both of these have been dealt with in the death of Jesus Christ. No obstacles remain and our passage through to glory will be unimpeded. We will be safely preserved until the end. Nothing is going to come between us and our God. The deal has been completed and we’re simply waiting for possession. It’s just a matter of time. This is not what we would expect. Religious certainty can sound horribly arrogant. Scepticism about our eternal salvation appears so much more attractively humble. But it’s actually profoundly offensive to God because it denies the accomplishments of His work of salvation.

Conclusion

Let me conclude. Paul winds up his argument in (11).

11 More than that, we also rejoice in God through our Lord Jesus Christ, through whom we have now received reconciliation.

He may have been talking about the hope of future salvation as his theme. But his intent was always that it would produce a response in us. We’re meant to rejoice, to be moved towards celebration, to express joy, to be pleased about, to exult and to delight. We’re to rejoice in hope. But more than that, we’re to rejoice in God. We need to cultivate an ongoing enjoyment in our Lord for He is the one who has given us hope. Rejoice in the gift by all means but don’t neglect the giver.

As I’ve reflected on the mission and chatted to one or two people I’ve begun to formulate a considered opinion on how things went. I think I’ve waited until I’m far enough away from it to be objective but close enough to it not to have forgotten what we did. You’d be surprised at how quickly my attention passes to the next thing and overwrites what’s just happened! It’s been a useful process to try and evaluate an enterprise in which many have been active participants and which has occupied a good deal of our time, energy and resources. We’re work in progress and it’d be arrogant to think that we’ve already hit on the winning formula and that there’s nothing left to improve. We intend to talk about our evangelistic life and church programme at the Church Council. I expect this will be a productive discussion and much will flow from it. These are my initial thoughts on The God Confusion.

1. it was a bit of a stretch

When we last ran a mission we had a series of three talks on two Sundays and midweek on a Wednesday. That was two years ago. It would be fair to say that the schedule of events this time around was a little more ambitious! Excluding the Sunday talks for a moment we had a film night, an education evening, a pub quiz, a school assembly, a Women’s Bible Study colours morning, a women’s breakfast and a charity dinner. That’s a packed programme! In addition we had the Cornhill team traipsing up and down Balham High Road conducting a survey the results of which we hope will be printed in a local newspaper. But more importantly they sought to engage people in gospel conversations and were successful in doing so. Behind the scenes many people were ‘flat to the boards’ making things happen. Lots of people made the mission a priority and invited their friends. Many others turned up at events to express their support and provide the all important ‘rent a crowd’! And many were occupied with that essential unseen work of asking the Lord to do His work of bringing people to faith in Christ. All in all, this was a busy week and I’m sure I’m not alone in thanking God for getting us through it. A few of us may have got to the end of the week and thought it was a bit of a stretch!

2. it was a qualified success

Although we may have stretched ourselves a little more than we have done before, we achieved the following things.

The quality of the events was high. We must never be duped into thinking that style trumps substance but neither must we think it’s acceptable to run shoddy ill prepared events. We wanted to pursue excellence in all our events and make sure that they were as well organised as we could manage given the resources we had available. We did that. I can say that because I had nothing to do with their organisation and implementation! I think there’s now widespread confidence amongst the church and amongst our guests that when we put on an event it’ll be well run and worth coming to.

The range of events was varied. We wanted to provide a diverse programme of events to which everyone at church could invite someone to something. I think we managed that. It’s well nigh impossible to devise a mission programme designed to suit everyone. We’re not all the same and neither are our friends. That’s why we went for different approaches. Whilst some might get excited by the pub quiz others are more drawn to the notion of a commentary at a film night and still others want a thorough treatment of an objection to the Christian faith. It’s heartening to have received numerous approving comments from other Co-Mission congregational leaders about the composition of our mission week.

The number of guests was encouraging. I think there was only one event where we failed to persuade lots of our friends to attend. That was the education evening. And we always knew that this was a bit of a punt! Sadly the parents from Telferscot were not drawn to an event where the issues of faith and educating their children were discussed. I won’t pretend not to be disappointed. But apart from that the proportion and numbers of guests at events was hugely encouraging. This is reflected in the number of people who’ve signed up for Christianity Explored.

The level of participation was high. I got the impression that throughout the church people were really onboard and excited this year. In small groups, after church and in general conversation people were praying for friends, talking about the events and handing out invitations. The level of engagement far outweighed anything we’d done before. Lots of people had friends for whom they were praying and specific events in mind.

The idolatry of unbelief was exposed. The main talks sought to prosecute unbelief. We took as the main foil a recent, popular and influential book by the antagonistic atheist Richard Dawkins. Our intention was to identify, evaluate and critique his main assertions about the case for atheism. We did that in a number of ways. The other events sought to engage with culture from a Christian perspective. That’s a legitimate exercise for a church and a relatively new thing for us. It doesn’t mean that we’ve given up preaching the gospel. We do that frequently throughout the year. It means that we took a step back to engage the culture and expose the futility of idolatry. This assessment prompts the question ‘why then consider the mission only to be a qualified success?’ The success of a mission can only really be measured against its goals. Under God, I think we can say that we met the goals that we set. The question is whether those were the right goals.

3. it was just a start

This was not the mission we wanted to run. The mission we wanted to run would have been a series of Bible talks where the gospel was clearly expounded and applied to a heaving mass of unbelieving friends. But I’m not sure we get to run missions like that any more. This is not 1950s Cambridge where Billy Graham could explain a Bible passage and thousands would flock to hear him.

The culture is not where we’d like it to be. Christianity is regarded as an irrelevance and the gospel has been sidelined. It’s not easy to get guests to come along to an event at which the single biggest selling point is a clear gospel declaration. The advantage of event driven evangelism, such as we’ve employed for the mission, is that the event can be an inherent pull. For example, what’s not to enjoy about a pub quiz. Responding to Richard Dawkins was clearly attractive for many who came to the Sunday events. All of the events we ran provided alternative ways to connect with an otherwise sceptical and dismissive culture. In part I’d want to suggest that the increased attendance by unbelievers was due to the nature of the events themselves. But I fear we may have too readily sacrificed explicit gospel preaching in order to bolster our numbers.

Our church is not where we’d like it to be. Two years ago we ran a mission called Christianity Explored. Over the two Sunday mornings we had one guest, a lady who travelled from Walthamstow because she received a flier at the station. In the evening we managed a combined total of half a dozen guests over the three evenings. There was no Christianity Explored course. We promoted the idea of evangelistic supper parties to which we could invite friends to hear a short gospel presentation and then talk about it. We had one supper party. There were no unbelieving guests. And so we need to put this mission in context. When we planned the mission we were aware of our track record. How can I put this? We’ve not set the world alight with our evangelistic prowess! Even though this wasn’t the mission we didn’t want to run it was the mission we felt we could run. And we ran it really well. I wonder whether we’re a little disengaged from our unbelieving culture. We need to ask some questions of ourselves about how involved we are with unbelieving people. Many of us have found welcoming Christian relationships at CCB. That’s a great blessing. We must never deride the new community into which God has placed us. On the contrary we must invest in our Christian friends and recognise that in God’s hands this is a powerful apologetic to a watching world. Jesus anticipated that people would know we’re his disciples because of the way we love one another. If we don’t love each other or people don’t experience that, we’ve missed a massive opportunity to make inroads into unbeliever’s cynical preconceptions. But interestingly, as a result of the attention paid to the mission, a number of people have expressed the realisation that they’re disconnected from non-Christian friends. Some have begun to address this in characteristically adventurous ways. I’m all for that. Many may not be aware that throughout the week South Thames College runs an adult education programme at Chestnut Grove School. You and a friend could join up for the wine tasting course together. Rather than join a gym and run on your own why not join a sports club. The opportunities are endless. This mission was just the latest in a long line of events that we seek to provide to bring unbelievers under the sound of the gospel. It’s just a start which means that there’s more to come. And we’ll get better. But we’re going in the right direction.

Conclusion

We need to see this week of events in the context of the church year and the programme of preaching. We need to recover the idea that Sunday is a great day to invite a friend along to church to hear the gospel. It’s worth asking when the last time you invited someone to church was. Every sermon is prepared in expectation that someone will be there who is perhaps hearing this for the first time. Wonderfully God keep bringing new people to us and so it’s often the case that unbelievers are present. In addition, we need to keep feeding people into our termly Christianity Explored courses. That’s where some of our best evangelism happens as we clearly expound the personal implications of the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ. This course is excellent but it’s really for people willing to invest in exploring Christianity. Many of our friends aren’t there yet. Lots of them need to have their presuppositions and their faith commitments to alternative philosophies and ideologies challenged and undermined before they’re willing to hear the alternative. The God Confusion was a good attempt to do that with the issue of atheism.

But we should have made more of the gospel. With hindsight there were one or two events where I regret that the gospel wasn’t more prominent. That was a mistake. I hope that it’s not going to be a mistake we make again. Though it was heartening to run well attended events I’d want to suggest that the increased attendance by unbelievers was due in part to the nature of the events themselves. We may have sacrificed explicit gospel preaching in order to bolster our numbers. Next time round we need more events at which the gospel is front and centre. And we’ll need to make it obvious that we’re doing that. We can’t advertise an event and then slip the gospel in by stealth. I know we’d like to do that because we know that the gospel is God’s powerful way to save sinners. But I think people will feel misled and manipulated if it’s not what they were expecting. We need to have the courage to make it clear that’s what will happen.

But lest we become too disheartened, let’s remember that though we’re not where we should be, we’re not where we were. And that’s a good thing. God has enabled us to make significant strides forward in the last two years. But it’s no reason to rest on our laurels. The next mission we run will need to be a step up. If I could only shake this cold I’d already be looking forward to it! Thank you to everyone for their enthusiastic support of The God Confusion. And well done. To God be the glory.

Over the next few weeks we’re going to look at some personal issues that face us as believers in 21st Century London. We won’t all have these issues but some of us will have some of them. Hopefully no one will have all of them! We won’t be able to deal with them in any depth because time won’t allow. So please don’t imagine that I think we’ve given a comprehensive explanation of the issue. We’ll have barely scratched the surface. I’m aiming at a sufficient explanation but we may be lucky to get adequate. But it’s better than nothing.

It’s rightly pointed out that a little knowledge is a dangerous thing. In which case some of us are especially hazardous!

With those caveats in place let’s start with loneliness.

1. The definition of loneliness

In IVP’s New Dictionary of Christian Ethics and Pastoral Theology the contributor M Chave-Jones defines loneliness in the following way. He writes ‘It is the experience of failure to satisfy the basic human need for deep personal relationships with other people. It is an intensely painful sense of exclusion, of rejection, of not mattering to anyone, and of being worthless, and it is accompanied by feelings of distress, restlessness and heightened self-concentration. Simultaneously, there is a strong fantasy that everyone else is enjoying unclouded love and fun, which adds poignancy to the loneliness’ ‘Loneliness’ p556. Jayne Clark in the Journal of Biblical Counselling writes, ‘The circumstances vary but the feelings are similar. We feel isolated, vulnerable and alone. We want to talk and be heard. We want to be known and understood; we don’t want to feel invisible. We want to be included and cared about. We desire intimacy. We want to be connected to someone’ JBL Fall 2005.

What is meant by loneliness may be best demonstrated through comparison with solitude.

• Loneliness comes when we’re forced to be alone. Solitude is a decision to be alone.
• Loneliness sweeps over us and stays with us despite our best efforts to get rid of it. Solitude can be started and ended at will.
• Loneliness is painful, draining and unpleasant. Solitude is refreshing, rejuvenating and enjoyable. In essence loneliness is the experience of being alienated from relationships.

2. The extent of loneliness

It’s been described as the world’s most common mental health problem and one of the most universal sources of human suffering. It’s no respecter of age, race and gender, marital or economic status. It occurs most often in societies that emphasize individualism. And highly ambitious, upwardly mobile people are especially susceptible to it. And so we’re probably all familiar with the feelings of loneliness. It affects us all at one time or another. In 1973 a sociologist concluded that a quarter of the US population experienced feelings of loneliness in any given month. I suspect were that same study to be conducted today the results would be higher. But some people have an acute experience of loneliness that far outweighs what some of us may have experienced from time to time. It will be helpful to distinguish between transient-situational loneliness and chronic-persisting loneliness.

a. Transient-situational loneliness arises because of temporary social causes. A move away from home, the break up of a relationship, starting a new job, divorce or death are the kinds of things that initiate this type of loneliness. It lasts from a few minutes to a few months.

b. Chronic-persisting loneliness arises because of permanent psychological factors some of which we’ll consider in a moment.

3. The causes of loneliness

We’ll consider three of the causes identified by Psychologists; social, developmental and psychological.

a. Social Causes

This includes factors brought about by the rapid social changes in our era. Three current societal trends have exacerbated the experience of loneliness.

i. Urbanization. Increasingly we grow up in the anonymity of the big cities isolated from the people amongst whom they live. Perversely although one of the most hugely populated, London has to be one of the loneliest places on the planet. Daily we pass by hundreds of thousands of people but we don’t even know the names of our next door neighbours.

ii. Technology. Increasingly we interact with machines rather than people. The proliferation of useful technological tools has led many to withdraw from personal contact with friends in preference for the isolation of TV or internet.

iii. Mobility. Increasingly we live away from the family and friends we had when we were where we growing up. Then we rarely stay in one place long enough to put down roots. Is it any wonder we feel disconnected from our surroundings.

b. Developmental Causes

Three developmental needs must be met if loneliness is to be avoided. We need to experience attachment to others, acceptance by others and we need to acquire social skills.

i. Attachment to Others. We need to grow up experiencing close bonds with others. The separation from close family members brought about by divorce increasingly produces feelings of alienation among young people. These can persist into adulthood.

ii. Acceptance by Others. We communicate acceptance in a number of ways; time, listening, discipline and affection. If acceptance is withheld either people withdraw or force themselves on others in a way that brings more rejection. This leads to distrust of others and makes it harder to form relationships.

iii. Acquiring Skills. Learning how to form and maintain interpersonal relationships is something that we must all do. We’ve all come across social misfits who failed to learn these lessons. Sometimes people try and compensate for their lack of skills and try and force themselves on others but this is usually met with even further rejection. Childhood is usually the place to iron out the creases. People are less forgiving of peculiarity in adults.

c. Psychological Causes

Loneliness appears more often in people who demonstrate the following character traits

i. Low Self Esteem. It’s difficult to build friendships if we lack confidence. If we have low opinion of ourselves we underestimate our worth and tend to withdraw from others. This heightens our isolation from others and reinforces feelings of loneliness.

ii. Inability to Communicate. Communication is what generates relationships. When people are unwilling or unable to communicate the experience of alienation is perpetuated.

iii. Self Defeating Attitude. Rugged individualists who approach life as one big competition, who prize possessions over people and who have a tendency to demand their rights are preoccupied with themselves and may not find people warm to their company. These may well be an accurate depiction of the immediate causes of loneliness, but what of the ultimate cause? Where does it come from? After all, it’s not part of God’s original intent for His creation (Genesis 1). Loneliness is a consequence of the fall (Genesis 3). Adam was alone before the fall and God solved that by the creation of Eve. But he didn’t experience loneliness until his rejection of God’s authority over him and his subsequent alienation from his God and from his wife. Therefore sin separates us from God and from each other. That’s the ultimate cause of loneliness. If we can find a solution for sin then we’re onto something.

4. The remedy for loneliness

We need to be wary of seeking solutions that work like ibuprofen. It might dull our sensitivity to it but don’t really deal with the root causes of the pain. The following three steps are where to begin.

a. Admit the Problem

Though loneliness carries with it unattractive social baggage and unwelcome social connotations the first step to addressing the issue is to admit there’s an issue.

b. Consider the Cause

As we’ve seen, loneliness can arise from a number of sources. We need to identify the chief contributing factors and eliminate those that can be.

c. Change our Thinking

Some factors cannot be changed. The lonely divorcee usually cannot bring back her estranged husband. But many can. Even if they can’t we can change the way we think about our situation. We can repent of self pity, resentment and envy.

Rather obviously, the real remedy to loneliness is relationships. God intended humanity to enjoy interaction. He created humanity in His own image and God is a relational being. But given that sin disrupts those relationships what hope is there? Though the effects of sin will linger until the new creation, loneliness can be combated. The real solution lies in relationship with Christ and relationship with his people.

a. We need to concentrate on our relationship with Christ

In the first instance our loneliness is not merely a function of having too few or too superficial friendships. It’s fundamentally an issue of being alienated from God. It’s a symptom of our estrangement from our creator. But becoming a Christian won’t necessarily banish loneliness forever. But if we actively pursue our relationship with the Lord we have His promise that He will draw near to us (James 4:8). A relationship with the Lord will begin to transform our capacity to relate to others.

b. We need to concentrate on our relationship with church

We need to invest in friendships at church. A good place to start is our small group. It may be that one or two individuals there can form a prayer triplet with whom over time we feel increasingly comfortable opening up and giving ourselves in friendship. We’ll need to make ourselves vulnerable because being self protective will seem like an impenetrable barrier to others. But ultimately the solution to our loneliness will be found in the new community God is creating. There are however some warnings for us as a church. Gary Collins writes, ‘Regretfully not all church members are open to receiving new people. Some churches are cold, indifferent and cliquish. Regular attenders may fail to notice newcomers, may extend no welcome when visitors are noticed, or may embarrass non-members with well-meaning but insensitive expressions of welcome from the pulpit’ p102 Christian Counselling.

Conclusion

It may be that the group that most acutely experience loneliness in our congregation is our single adults. I don’t want to caricature our singles. We mustn’t think that because someone is single they’re automatically lonely. There’s not a direct correspondence. And we mustn’t be naïve. Marriage doesn’t necessarily solve all our problems. It’s not the relational idyll that some think that it is. Some of the loneliest people are those trapped in a bad marriage. But proportionally the bigger issue in our church is likely to be the loneliness caused by being unhappily unmarried. Those who would prefer not to be single need especially to remember the following three things.

a. If marriage were the answer to loneliness then it would mean that only one group would be exempt from the experience and this would leave the ‘non-married’, the ‘were married’ and the ‘too young to be married’ without a solution.

b. It was a married couple who first experienced loneliness and so it’s not the guarantee of the ‘happy ever after’ that we sometimes think it is .

c. There’s no marriage in heaven and yet we’ll not be lonely. And so in principal it’s possible to be unmarried and not suffer loneliness. It all has to do with our relationship with Christ and our relationship with his people.

Further Resources

• Peter Hicks, What Could I Say? IVP
• Gary Collins, Christian Counselling, Word
• Geoff Baker, Friends, IVP
• Biblical Counsel for Concerned Singles, J.S. Forrey, Spring 1996 The Journal of Biblical Counselling, Christian Counselling and Education Foundation
• 
  

  Loneliness: God’s Remedy, J.V. Clarke, Fall 2005, The Journal of Biblical Counselling, Christian Counselling and Education Foundation

Please forgive me for the title of this talk. We’ve called it ‘What would God say to Richard Dawkins?’

The title is a little provocative. It assumes that he and his fellow atheists are wrong before we’ve had the discussion on whether God exists or not. If you’re interested in that debate you’ll have to come this evening.

The title is a little personal. Though I disagree with much that Richard Dawkins writes I wish him no personal ill will. I’m not hostile to him as a person though I am to his ideas.

The title is also a little presumptuous. I don’t speak for God. I’m not His prophet. I don’t want to put words in God’s mouth. But given what Richard Dawkins has said in books like The God Delusion and what God has said in His book The Bible I’ve tried to imagine the discussion taking place between them. A friend of mine did that with the nihilistic philosopher Friedrich Nietzche who coined the phrase ‘God is dead’. He asked us to imagine Nietzche meeting God at the gates of heaven and saying, ‘this, is very embarrassing!’

Allow me to introduce the human character in this discussion. Richard Dawkins is a highly regarded zoologist and evolutionary biologist. Currently he’s the Charles Simonyi Chair for the Public Understanding of Science at the University of Oxford. Although widely respected for his popular scientific writings, he’s perhaps best known for his views on religion. They might be described as antagonistic.

I’ve identified four major issues that Dawkins has with religion.

a. Religion flies in the face of a Darwinian world view

For Dawkins the question of the origin and existence of human life is a done deal. In his opinion, Darwin saw to that. In his view evolutionary process leaves no conceptual place for God. Whereas previous generations would have attributed life to a creator God we now know is accounted for by evolution. In The Blind Watchmaker he writes, ‘Living things are too improbable and too beautifully ‘designed’ to have come into existence by chance. How, then, did they come into existence? The answer, Darwin’s answer, is by gradual, step by step transformations from simple beginnings, from primordial entities sufficiently simple to have come into existence by chance. Each successful change in the gradual evolutionary purpose was simple enough, relative to its predecessor, to have arisen by chance. But the whole sequence of cumulative steps constitutes anything but a chance process’ p43. The Darwinian theory of macro evolution may or may not be right. There are eminent scientists who doubt it. But there are also scientists who are Christians who see no necessary conflict between Darwin and God.

b. Religion denies the conclusions of evidence based truth

For Dawkins religion makes assertions based on faith. Science makes assertions based on truth. Faith, as defined by Dawkins, represents a retreat from evidence. When put like that we can see his point. In The God Delusion he writes, ‘Dyed in the wool faith heads are immune to argument, their resistance built up over years of childhood indoctrination using methods that took centuries to mature’ p28.

c. Religion offers a limited view of the universe

For Dawkins the vision of the universe provided by organized religion is a miserable, impoverished, limited and deficient view. Science on the other hand provides a bold, brilliant and beautiful vision of all that there is. He’s written about this in Unweaving the Rainbow but this quote comes from an essay called A Survival Machine, ‘The universe is genuinely mysterious, grand, beautiful, awe-inspiring. The kinds of views of the universe which religious people have traditionally embraced have been puny, pathetic, and measly in comparison to the way the universe is. The universe presented by organised religions is a poky little medieval universe, and extremely limited’.

d. Religion leads to the proliferation of violence

For Dawkins religion is like a malignant virus which must be eradicated before it infects the vulnerable. In his view it’s one of the world’s great evils, comparable with the small pox virus but harder to eradicate. He expressed this view in January 2006 the Guardian quotes him as having said, ‘Many of us saw religion as harmless nonsense. Beliefs might lack all supporting evidence but, we thought, if people needed a crutch for consolation, where’s the harm? September 11th changed all that. Revealed faith is not harmless nonsense, it can be lethally dangerous nonsense. Dangerous because it gives people unshakeable confidence in their own righteousness. Dangerous because it gives them false courage to kill themselves, which automatically removes normal barriers to killing others. Dangerous because it teaches enmity to others labelled only by a difference of inherited tradition. And dangerous because we have all bought into a weird respect, which uniquely protects religion from normal criticism. Let’s now stop being so damned respectful! I think we can safely say that with the publication of his book The God Delusion he’s managed that!

So, what might God say to this man?

How about these four things, for starters.

1. Why do you misrepresent me?

Richard Dawkins misrepresents God’s character, His word and His activity.

a. he misrepresents God’s character

In The God Delusion he describes the God of the Bible as ‘a psychotic delinquent’ p59. A few pages earlier he wrote, ‘The God of the Old Testament is arguably the most unpleasant character in all fiction; jealous and proud of it; a petty, unjust, unforgiving control-freak; a vindictive, bloodthirsty ethnic cleanser; a misogynistic, homophobic, racist, infanticidal, genocidal, filicidal, pestilential, megalomaniacal, sado-masochistic, capriciously malevolent bully. Those of us schooled from infancy in his ways can become desensitized to their horror’ p51 TGD. As an atheist, this is the God he doesn’t believe in. As a Christian, I don’t believe in Him either. Not because I don’t like Him, but because I don’t recognise Him. This is not the God of the Bible. Dawkins’ caricature of God is just that, a caricature. Read it for yourself. Or come to church and hear Him described.

b. he misrepresents God’s word

Dawkins thinks that the Bible is unreliable and untrue. He writes, ‘much of the Bible is not systematically evil but just plain weird, as you would expect of a chaotically cobbled together anthology of disjointed documents, composed, revised, translated, distorted and ‘improved’ by hundreds of anonymous authors, editors and copyists’. But that’s just an unsubstantiated claim without evidential foundation. He also thinks that we shouldn’t derive our morals from the Bible. He writes, ‘There are two ways in which scripture might be a source of morals or rules for living. One is by direct instruction, for example through the Ten Commandments, which are the subject of such bitter contention in the culture wars of America’s boondocks [remote areas]. The other is by example: God, or some other biblical character, might serve as – to use the contemporary jargon – a role model. Both scriptural routes, if followed through religiously, encourage a system of morals which any civilized modern person, whether religious or not, would find – I can put it no more gently – obnoxious’ p268 TGD. Dawkins might be but clever but he’s not competent to teach the Bible. His ignorance of the basic principles of biblical interpretation would prevent him from teaching in our Sunday school.

He fails to read the Bible in context, paying scant attention to the historical, literary, theological and biblical surroundings. And so he ends up misreading it.

He fails to recognise that the Bible is descriptive as well as prescriptive. Much of what’s recorded in scripture tells us what happened in the lives of its flawed human heroes rather than using their lives as an example of how to behave.

He fails to read the Bible as literature, paying attention to the interpretive rules of the game. We recognise that prophecy, poetry, history, letter and law are supposed to be understood differently. Not to do so would be foolish. Critics of Christianity are often fond of asking whether we understand the Bible literally. It’s usually the precursor to mocking our simplistic fundamentalist take on the nature of reality. Dawkins is no different.

c. he misrepresents God’s activity

Dawkins writes, ‘I have described atonement, the central doctrine of Christianity, as vicious, sadomasochistic and repellent. We should also dismiss it as barking mad, but for its ubiquitous familiarity which has dulled our objectivity. If God wanted to forgive our sins, why not just forgive them?’ He will. But He can only do that through atonement. If we have an insufficient understanding of the depths of our own wickedness or the heights of God’s holiness we won’t accept that we’ve done anything so bad as to deserve death. But if we’re willing to accept the Bible’s assessment of our radical depravity then the doctrine of the atonement comes like a breath of fresh air. It is the most wonderful thing to discover that the Son of God willingly stood in my place and took the punishment that I deserved. His presentation of God, his version of the Bible and his portrayal of God’s activity are hugely misrepresentative.

2. Why do you ridicule faith?

For Dawkins religion makes assertions based on faith and science makes assertions based on truth. Faith, as defined by Dawkins, represents a retreat from evidence. When put like that we’re sympathetic to his aversion to faith. But it’s not entirely accurate.

a. He thinks that faith is irrational

This is a typical quote from Dawkins, ‘The whole point of religious faith, its strength and chief glory, is that it does not depend on rational justification’ p 45 TGD. His oft quoted definition of faith is that religious faith means ‘blind trust, in the absence of evidence, even in the teeth of evidence’. This may be what Dawkins thinks but it’s not what Christians think. Take this definition of faith from W.H. Griffith-Thomas in his book The Principles of Theology, ‘Faith affects the whole of man’s nature. It commences with the conviction of the mind based on adequate evidence; it continues in the confidence of the heart or emotions based on conviction, and it is crowned in the consent of the will, by means of which the conviction and confidence are expressed in conduct’. That’s accurate. And it means that faith is not opposed to evidence; it relies on evidence. Faith without evidence isn’t faith; it’s delusional speculation. But that’s not what Christians are talking about.

b. He thinks that faith is infantile

Dawkins argues that faith in God is like faith in the Tooth Fairy or Father Christmas. When we grow up we grow out of it. That may well be true. But the analogy only works because of his presupposition that God, the tooth fairy and Father Christmas are non-entities; they don’t exist. Something he’s failed to demonstrate. But are we really supposed to accept the premise that faith in God is of the same nature as faith in the tooth fairy? Whilst it’s undeniably true that as people grow up they grow out of belief in these things, it’s also undeniably the case that as people grow up they also come to belief in God. There are people at CCB who used not to be believers in God but now are; they became believers as adults.

c. He thinks that faith is infectious

Dawkins has to explain why so many people exercise religious faith. His answer is memes. People don’t believe in God because of the overwhelming intellectually compelling case for belief. They believe in God because they’ve been infected by a virulent, malignant and highly contagious thing called a meme. Dawkins’ idea of the meme was first set forth in The Selfish Gene. He says, ‘Just as genes propagate themselves in the gene pool by leaping from body to body via sperm or eggs, so memes propagate themselves in the meme pool by leaping from brain to brain by a process which, in the broad sense of the term, can be called imitation’. And so faith is some kind of mental illness. But the existence of memes is just a hypothesis, and a bad one at that. It’s a hypothesis with issues. Not least among them is the fact that there’s no evidence for the existence of memes. Given Dawkins’ stated aversion to speculation and delusion we’d expect something more rigorous at this point.

3. Why do you distort science?

For Dawkins, science can explain everything. But it can’t. Dawkins asks it to do things it’s simply ill equipped to deal with. Science is an intellectual endeavour to explain the workings of the physical world. It’s informed by empirical investigation and carried out by a community trained in specialised techniques. And it’s brilliant at providing naturalistic explanations for things. But it can’t do three significant things.

a. Science can’t argue against the existence of God

Dawkins assumes that as scientific discovery has expanded the need for the God hypothesis has evaporated. As Time magazine put it in December 1999, ‘Charles Darwin didn’t want to murder God, as he once put it. But he did’. But that view presupposes that science is a sufficient explanation for reality. It denies the possibility that there could be complementary explanations of reality. But we don’t believe that. Take the definition of a kiss provided by the Communist Soviet science handbook is, ‘the mutual exchange of two sets of lips with reciprocal exchange of water vapour, carbon monoxide and microbes’. Dr Henry Gibbons says it’s ‘the anatomical juxtaposition of two orbicularis oris muscles in a state of contraction’. Those scientific explanations are true. But are we really prepared to accept that as the sole explanation of a kiss? They’re reductionistic. It doesn’t do justice to the full reality. It’s not wrong it’s just not all there is to say. In the same way, we need to understand that science and faith are not contradictory but complementary ways of looking at reality. The fact that there’s a scientific explanation for the universe doesn’t negate the possibility of God’s existence.

b. Science can’t argue against the concept of creation

Dawkins assumes that science teaches Darwinian evolution and that this conflicts with what the Bible teaches about creation. But that’s a misrepresentation both of the scientific evidence and the Biblical teaching. The overwhelming scientific evidence indicates the inadequacy of the natural explanation and points instead to a supernatural one. Consider briefly two pieces of evidence.

We live in a universe that had a beginning. Evidence from the Hubble telescope in 1929 indicated that the universe was expanding. This was confirmed in 1965 when the discovery of background radiation refuted the steady state theory and pointed towards the universe originating in what’s become known as the Big Bang. Philosophers rightly argue that logic demands that anything that has a beginning must have a cause. Science now points in the direction of the universe having a beginning. Therefore logic demands that the universe must have had a cause. The Bible argues that God is the uncreated cause, the intelligent designer and the mind behind the matter.

We live in a finely tuned universe. At the cosmological level it’s increasingly apparent that the physical laws and parameters governing our universe are so exquisitely fine tuned to permit the emergence of life that even the tiniest alteration in any one of these laws and parameters would have disastrous consequences. Apparently if the rate of expansion one second after the Big Bang had been smaller by been one part in ten thousand million million, the universe would have recollapsed before it ever reached its present state. And if it had been greater by one part in a million then the stars and planets would not have been able to form. If any one of these critical parameters were to be changed there the conditions for life would not exist. It’s deliciously ironic that Dawkins’ position is undone by science!

The Biblical teaching on creation makes very little comment on the scientific mechanism by which God created the world. It focuses on the ultimate reason for creation. So we mustn’t approach Genesis as though it was designed to be a scientific explanation of how the world came into being. The Bible is scientifically true. But it’s not about science. It’s about salvation through Jesus Christ. It explains who designed and created the world, not how He did it. Scientists focus on the question of how things that they observe happen or happened. They make little comment on the ultimate reason behind why those things occur. Theologians deal with personal and spiritual matters beyond the material, which is the domain of the scientist.

Suppose a scientist was asked, ‘Why did Captain Oates die on the way back from the South Pole with Captain Scott?’ He would no doubt say that he died of extreme cold, frostbite and other effects of exposure to the Antarctic weather which caused his body to stop functioning. That’s the ‘how’ type answer. But it says nothing about the meaning of his death in human and moral terms. It was an act of self sacrifice in an attempt to free his friends of the hindrance of a sick man, in the hope that they could then travel faster and reach base camp before their resources ran out.

c. Science can’t argue against the possibility of miracles

Dawkins assumes that the miraculous activity of Jesus is discounted because science has no explanation for it. He says, ‘The virgin birth, the resurrection, the raising of Lazarus, even the Old Testament miracles, all are freely used for religious propaganda, and they are very effective with an audience of unsophisticates and children’. The implication is that mature sophisticated unbelief is the only credible position. He’s clever but he’s wrong. He fails to acknowledge the limitations of science. Science simply describes the normal activity of the universe. It can’t prescribe what will happen in the future. It’s not in charge of the universe. Science says that things that occur are unusual if those norms are breached. It cannot say those things are impossible. CS Lewis uses the following illustration to explain this. Suppose you were to put 5p into a drawer today and 5p in the drawer tomorrow. Do the laws of nature make it certain you’ll find 10p in there the day after? Of course, provided no one has been tampering with your drawer. Ah, but that’s the whole point. The laws of arithmetic can tell you what you’ll find with absolute certainty, provided there’s no interference (a thief, for example). Aren’t the laws in nature much in the same boat? Don’t they tell you what will happen provided there is no interference? The Bible teaches that God created and sustains the world. The laws of nature are not things that He must submit to but are the usual description for the way He chooses to run His world. When God chooses for good reason to act differently we call this a miracle.

Dawkins brings his atheistic presuppositions to his science but science can’t bear the weight of expectation that he puts on it, largely because science itself is pointing to an intelligent designer.

4. Why do you shelve Jesus?

a. he ignores compelling evidence for God’s existence

For Dawkins the only evidence that would be really conclusive in the matter of God’s existence is a direct intervention by God in the world. He writes, ‘If He existed and chose to reveal it, God himself could clinch the argument, noisily and unequivocally, in his favour’ TGD. I agree. And the Christian claim is that this is what has happened in Jesus. And so we’d imagine that a sizeable proportion of a book purporting to consider the evidence for God’s existence would concentrate on Jesus Christ. In the chapter entitled, ‘Arguments for God’s Existence’ Dawkins does at least deal with the argument from scripture. But He does it in six pages. He’s to be complimented for the brevity of his summary if not its accuracy. But it’s a woefully inadequate treatment of the most compelling argument for the existence of God.

b. he misunderstands the logical argument

In one statement he asserts, ‘A common argument … states that, since Jesus claimed to be the Son of God, he must have been either right or insane or a liar: ‘Mad, Bad, God’. Or, with artless alliteration, ‘Lunatic, Liar, or Lord’. The historical evidence that Jesus claimed any sort of divine status is minimal. But even if the evidence were good, the trilemma on offer would be ludicrously inadequate. A fourth possibility, almost too obvious to need mentioning, is that Jesus was honestly mistaken’. The fourth possibility is already included in the trilemma. If someone is honestly mistaken about being the Son of God and tries to persuade others to believe that, we’d still put them in a Mental Institution. That alternative is covered by the mad.

c. he dismisses the evidence for Jesus’ deity

The Gospels make Jesus’ claim to deity explicit. And it was after all the reason he was crucified. He charge brought against him at his trial was that he ‘blasphemed’ by claiming to be God. The overwhelming view of modern biblical scholarship is how reliable the Gospels are as sources of reliable history. But don’t expect to hear that from Richard Dawkins. The most disappointing thing about his book is not the vitriolic rhetoric he employs to lambast Christianity but the scant attention he gives to the plausibility of religious faith derived from the credibility of Jesus Christ.

Conclusion

I don’t know exactly what God would say to Richard Dawkins. I’ve had an educated guess. But having read his treatment of Christianity I’d want to say four things to Richard Dawkins.

1. you’re deluded about God

2. you’re deluded about faith

3. you’re deluded about science

4. you’re deluded about Jesus

Wouldn’t it be great if he realised his mistake and his next book was entitled The Atheist Delusion!

This is helpful background information for understanding the progression of a bill through Parliament. 

In the production of this article I am indebted to the work of Alistair McGrath in his Christian in Science Lecture given at the University of Cambridge in 2004.

Richard Dawkins is not so much an atheist but an anti-theist. He hates God. He’s a vitriolic critic of Christianity. He thinks that Christians suffer from a God delusion, the title of his latest book. He happily points out that a delusion is ‘a persistent false belief held in the face of strong contradictory evidence, especially as a symptom of a psychiatric disorder’ p28 The God Delusion. He agrees with the first part of the definition. And he agrees with the second though he never quite says as much. But he quotes with approval this comment, ‘When one person suffers from a delusion, it is called insanity. When many people suffer from a delusion it is called Religion’ p28 TGD.

It’d be fair to say that Richard Dawkins isn’t exactly a fan of religion. Neither am I. I’d want to distinguish Christianity from Religion; as would its founder who was also highly critical. It’s important to distinguish between the two unless we hit the wrong target. But Dawkins doesn’t seem to be bothered about that. He’s go all religions in the cross hairs.

There are four essential reasons why Dawkins is so critical of religion

1. Religion flies in the face of a Darwinian world view

For Dawkins the question of the origin and existence of human life is a done deal. In his opinion, Darwin saw to that. This is a debatable conclusion and a questionable step but for the sake of argument I’ll concede it at this point even though I don’t agree with him. But he goes a stage further. His view is that the acceptance of a Darwinian explanation for the existence of human life necessarily entails atheism. It’s worth saying at the outset that there are many equally eminent scientists who completely disagree with him. Theistic evolutionists like Dr Denis Alexander would argue that Dawkins may have identified the mechanism but not the agent. But we’ll come to that.

The fundamental Darwinian world view is that complex things evolve from simple beginnings over long periods of time. The impression of design, in things like the eye, is simply an illusion. The appearance of design can be accounted for by gradual, step by step transformations from primordial entities sufficiently simple to have come into existence by pure chance. And so the evolutionary process leaves no conceptual place for God. Whereas previous generations would have attributed life to a creator God we now know is accounted for by evolution. There is no gap for God to fill.

Dawkins acknowledges that this is thoroughly improbable unless it took place over a very long time. And so in his book Climbing Mount Improbable he accepts the towering vertical cliffs seem impossible to climb. But then argues that actually the gradient isn’t that steep if the changes take place over a considerable period of time. Do you see what he’s done there? But in one sense the question isn’t ‘how steep is Mount Improbable?’ but ‘where did Mount Improbable come from?’ Nowhere can he explain where the matter from which the universe is made originates.

The problem with Dawkins’ position is that though science is not incapable of contributing to the discussion about God’s existence it can’t seal the deal. I disagree with McGrath’s assertion that ‘the scientific method is incapable of adjudicating on the God-hypothesis, either positively or negatively’ p6. It seems to me that Psalm 19 and Romans 1 assume that theological conclusions should be drawn from scientific observations. But I do agree with McGrath’s comment that ‘there is a substantial logical gap between Darwinism and atheism, which Dawkins seems to prefer to bridge by rhetoric, rather than by evidence’ p7.

2. Religion denies the conclusions of evidence based truth

For Dawkins religion makes assertions based on faith. Science makes assertions based on truth. Faith, as defined by Dawkins, represents a retreat from evidence. When put like that I can see his point. But it’s not entirely accurate.

a. He thinks that faith is irrational

His oft quoted definition of faith is that religious faith means ‘blind trust, in the absence of evidence, even in the teeth of evidence’. This may be what Dawkins thinks but it’s not what Christians think. Take this definition of faith from W.H. Griffith-Thomas in his book The Principles of Theology, ‘Faith affects the whole of man’s nature. It commences with the conviction of the mind based on adequate evidence; it continues in the confidence of the heart or emotions based on conviction, and it is crowned in the consent of the will, by means of which the conviction and confidence are expressed in conduct’. That’s accurate. And it means that faith is not opposed to evidence; it relies on evidence. Faith without evidence isn’t faith; it’s delusional speculation. But that’s not what Christians are talking about.

b. He thinks that faith is infantile

Faith in God is like faith in the Tooth Fairy or Father Christmas. When we grow up we grow out of it. That may well be true. But are we really supposed to accept the premise that faith in God is of the same nature as faith in the tooth fairy? Whilst it’s undeniably true that as people grow up they grow out of belief in these things, it’s also undeniably the case that as people grow up they also come to belief in God. There are people at CCB who used not to be believers in God but now are; they became believers as adults. Dawkins’ argument only works because of his presupposition that God, the tooth fairy and Father Christmas are non-entities; they don’t exist. But he fails to demonstrate that incontrovertibly.

c. He thinks that faith is infectious

Dawkins has to explain why so many people exercise religious faith. His answer is memetic replication. People don’t believe in God because if the overwhelming intellectually compelling case for belief. They believe in God because they’ve been infected by a virulent, malignant and highly contagious thing called a meme. Dawkins’ idea of the meme was first set forth in the Selfish Gene. He says, ‘Just as genes propagate themselves in the gene pool by leaping from body to body via sperm or eggs, so memes propagate themselves in the meme pool by leaping from brain to brain by a process which, in the broad sense of the term, can be called imitation’. And so faith is some kind of mental illness. But the existence of memes is just a hypothesis, and a bad one at that. It’s a hypothesis with issues. Not least among them, the fact that there’s no evidence for the existence of memes. Given Dawkins’ stated aversion to speculation and delusion you’d expect something more rigorous at this point. Alistair McGrath says of this hypothesis, ‘The simple fact is that they are, in the first place, hypothetical constructs, inferred from observation rather than observed in themselves; in the second place, unobservable; and in the third place, more or less useless at the explanatory level. This makes their rigorous investigation intensely problematic, and their fruitful application somewhat improbable’ p12.

3. Religion offers a limited view of the universe

For Dawkins the vision of the universe provided by organized religion is a miserable, impoverished, limited and deficient view. Science on the other hand provides a bold, brilliant and beautiful vision of all that there is. He has written about this in Unweaving the Rainbow.

But his criticism is unsubstantiated. The Christian approach to nature leads to the following three things

a. It leads to an appreciation of the beauty of nature

The argument that a religious conviction minimises the sense of wonder at the beauty of nature is unproven. There are no grounds for asserting that the perception of beauty in the natural world isn’t necessarily lesser in the Christian than in the atheist. A Christian gets as excited by a sunset as the atheist. It’s nonsense to suggest otherwise.

b. It leads to awe of the scientific explanations

The argument that Christians can’t respond with awe to the mathematical or theoretical representation that arises from the empirical observations is unwarranted. We don’t feel cheated when someone models reality. We might not get it. But that problem faces the intellectually challenged atheist as well! But we’re not predisposed to clinging onto mystery so that the world God created remains undisclosed to human exploration. In fact a new richer, deeper sense of wonder takes over as we begin to engage with what God has done.

c. It leads to worship of the creator

Christians go where the evidence of the natural world is pointing; to its creator. To experience the beauty of the creation and the wonder of its representation drives the believer to his knees before the Lord. The atheist can’t do that. They have no explanation for the beauty they appreciate and they have no one to thank. That’s miserable.

4. Religion leads to the proliferation of violence

For Dawkins religion is like a malignant virus which must be eradicated before it infects the vulnerable. In his view it’s one of the world’s great evils, comparable with the small pox virus but harder to eradicate. His point is more serious than the fact that faith is evil because it evades any human obligation to think. He’s making a moral point. Ironically, he has no foundation for his morality. He got rid of that when he got rid of God. A point he concedes in The Devil’s Chaplain when he says, ‘science has no methods for deciding what is ethical’ p34. But we need to deal with the accusation that’s been thrown at Christianity.

No one is going to dispute that religious people have done some very questionable, disturbing and shameful things. But that’s true also of those who are anti-religious. Dawkins may somewhat selectively skim read History for Dummies whilst wearing rose tinted spectacles but not McGrath. He states, ‘One of the greatest ironies of the twentieth century is that many of the most deplorable acts of murder, intolerance and repression were carried out by those who thought that religion was murderous, intolerant and repressive – and thus sought to remove it from the face of the planet as a humanitarian act’ p18. Religion doesn’t have a monopoly on violence. It doesn’t seem that faith is solely to blame. That suggests that the problem might be located a little deeper than our convictions. McGrath again, ‘pretending that religion is the only problem in the world, or the base of all its pain and suffering, is simply no longer a real option for thinking people. It’s just rhetoric, masking a difficult problem we all need to address … to put it very simplistically, the lingering remnant of divine likes impels us to goodness; the powerful presence of sin drags us down into a moral quagmire, from which we can never entirely escape’ p18. There seems to be something wrong with universal human nature.

Conclusion

Dawkins may find religion distasteful. He may find the case for the existence of God laughably inadequate. But if he wants to persuade open minded people that atheism is the way forward he’s going to have to do better than setting up a straw man and then blowing him away.

This is a crucial question. It’s one answered in great measure by W.L Craig’s article ‘No God. No Good?’ But if misunderstood it might be taken for arrogance. We’re not saying that Christians are morally superior people. We’re not asking whether there’s any credible rationale for morality apart from the existence of God. It’s perhaps helpful to clearly articulate what the question is not asking.

The question is not must we believe in God in order to live moral lives? It’s clear that theists and atheists can alike live ethically.

The question is not is it possible to have a system of ethics without reference to God? It’s clear that a system of ethics can be formulated regardless of ideology.

The question is not can we recognise objective moral values without God? It’s clear that regardless of our spiritual, philosophical and ideological views people recognise that we ought to love our children.

The question is whether morality has any foundation apart from recognising the existence of God. I’ll argue that there isn’t. The answer comes in two parts.

1. Theism provides a sure foundation for morality

Let’s consider the case for morality built on the foundation of God’s existence.

a. The existence of God provides a rationale for moral values

To have objective moral values there needs to be an independent standard of right and wrong. This means that right and wrong remain unalterable regardless of whether anyone believes them or observes them. The existence of God provides that objective, independent foundation. Objective moral values are rooted in Him. His character and activity provides the norm by which morality is to be measured.

b. The existence of God provides a rationale for moral duties

The obligation to be moral exists because God issues divine commands that constitute our moral duties. These are not arbitrary requirements; they are derived from His nature. When asked, Jesus summarised the whole moral duty of man using two great commandments. We are to love the Lord our God with all our strength, soul, heart and mind and we are to love our neighbour as ourselves. That’s the foundation for affirming morality or condemning immorality.

c. The existence of God provides a rationale for moral accountability

Since God exists He will hold us accountable for everything we’ve said, thought and done. Righteousness will be vindicated and unrighteousness will be punished. From the perspective of eternity everyone will appreciate that we live in a moral universe. And so the moral choices that we make in this life are invested with an eternal significance. Therefore theism provides a coherent, rational foundation for morality. Then, there’s atheism.

2. Atheism provides no foundation for morality

Let’s consider the case for morality built on the foundation of God’s non-existence.

a. The denial of God provides no grounds for moral values

If God does not exist there is no independent standard of morality. There’s morality but there’s no basis for it. Atheists can’t deny the existence of universal morality nor do they want to. But they just can’t account for it. Many argue that as a result of socio-biological pressures a ‘herd morality’ has evolved which aids the perpetuation of humanity. For them, morality is nothing more than an advantageous mutation to ensure humanity is numbered among fittest that survive.

b. The denial of God provides no grounds for moral duties

On the atheistic view, God is the main casualty. But He’s not the sole casualty. There’s us. In throwing God out of the window we’ve also thrown out the conditions we need for morality and the conditions we need for human significance. For if we deny the existence of God then we also deny the uniqueness of humankind. There’s nothing special about us because if there’s no God then there’s no image of God. And so as Dr William Lane Craig put it, ‘we’re just an accidental by-product of nature which has evolved relatively recently on an infinitesimal speck of dust lost somewhere in a hostile and mindless universe and which are doomed to perish individually and collectively in a relatively short time’ No God. No Good? In atheism human beings become worthless for two reasons. We become worthless because we’re just sophisticated animals, but no more than that. We’re not qualitatively different from any other animal species. And so if we’re prepared to do lab experiments on rats, guess who’s next! But we also become worthless because naturalism flattens the distinction between the mind and the brain. In amongst the assumption that our thought processes are little more than the reactions of various chemicals in the brain, we may have lost sight of the fact that what we might describe as ‘me’ has just been obliterated. Atheist morality therefore comes out of thin air. The humanist philosopher Paul Kurtz summarises the issue brilliantly when he writes, ‘The central question about moral and ethical principles concerns this ontological foundation. If they are neither derived from God nor anchored in some transcendent ground, are they purely ephemeral?’ Forbidden Fruit. If we accept the naturalistic explanation of reality then we have no grounds to condemn immorality or affirm morality. What we praise or criticise is nothing more than an opinion. And one opinion is no more significant than any other. What this means is that the Jew and the Nazi can disagree but there’s no grounds for saying that one of them is right and one is wrong. That’s frightening. And atheism can do nothing to stop it happening again.

c. The denial of God provides no grounds for moral accountability

If life ends at the grave, then it makes no difference whether we’re a sinner or a saint. There’s no reckoning. There’s nothing we can say to someone who wants to live purely out of self interest. In fact we may as well follow their example. In fact, not to do so would be foolish. Atheistic ethicists know that this is the logical conclusion of their position. One of them writes, ‘We have not been able to show that reason requires the moral point of view, or that all really rational persons should not be egoists or classical amoralists. Reason doesn’t decide here. The picture I have painted for you is not a pleasant one. Reflection on it depresses me … Pure practical reason, even with a good knowledge of the facts, will not take you to morality’ Kai Nelson Why Should I be Moral? Atheist friends of mine have argued that we’re moral because it fulfils our pleasures, personal self interest and provides social benefit. But there are lots of moral decisions that conflict with those so that can’t be right. Self sacrifice is perhaps the clearest example. It’s never in our self interest to sacrifice ourselves! Life is too short to jeopardize my comfort for the sake of someone else.

Conclusion

If God exists then there’s a sound foundation for morality. If He doesn’t then it’s a ‘free for all’. William Lane Craig wants us to go further than this. The existence of morality is evidence of God’s existence. And he’s right. How could it be otherwise? If we think that there are universal objective moral values then this must be evidence of the existence of a universal God. If we think that there are universal moral obligations then this must be evidence of a transcendent being that has the right to impose them upon us. If we think that there is universal moral accountability then this must be evidence that there is someone to whom we must give an account. In conclusion theological meta-ethics do seem to be necessary for morality. We need God to be good.

But of course, we need to recognise the absence of neutrality in this conflict of interest. We’re no spiritual Switzerland. We’d like God to be dead. You see, if He exists then there are objective moral values, there’s an ‘ought’ to our lives and there’s a reckoning to face at the end. But if God is dead then morality is just a human convention which we’re free to flout without any expectation of being called to account for how we’ve lived. That might sound attractive but it actually renders all of human existence meaningless. And it’s wrong!