A Letter to Clare: Apologetics 101 Part 4

In this five-part series on apologetics, Dr. Dick Jones provides a number of useful insights via a letter to Clare, a real person. Beyond its hoped-for impact on her life, this offering from the  Truth of God’s word was written so as to be equally useful for today’s Christian adults, the majority of whom have been philosophically enslaved to a faulty belief system. (This is part four of a five part series.)

Dear Clare,

Review of Part 3: Evolution is true – a true dream about a dreamy theory. Meanwhile, a non-created, universe-creating God simply has to exist because of the impossibility that He doesn’t.

Imaginary explosions, swampy ponds and life coming from non-life aren’t the Christian answers for truth about creation or for knowing and thinking. But, you’re still wise to ask: “Aren’t there non-Christian or even anti-Christian books out there with 100% different versions of ‘truth’ as they see it?” Yes. Christianity-rejecting religions have plenty, and evolutionists, atheist leaders, the angry people and a lot of scientists have even more. But, whatever they write or teach at any given moment is often way off base because of man’s inner sin nature. That’s why the opinions of leaders and their followers constantly change depending on what’s popular, not necessarily on what’s true. What they say about epistemology and about God are not opinions we can trust.

Even so, millions keep stubbornly fighting against Him. Most of the time this would just be kind of funny, but too many of them have power in school, in magazines, in movies, on TV and elsewhere to get American kids to switch over to their big pretend answer of evolution. And, sadly, it’s taught it a lot. But, think of this: Imagine you’re at a store, at work or at a party and you meet an evolutionist type. He’s not lecturing at that moment so you quickly see he’s not acting as though he believes either of you are animals or that the chemical-electrical lump he calls his brain is an accident, or that neither of you have important life purposes. In fact it’s very interesting that his general behavior is pretty much like yours. So, if you ask him why his beliefs about things are in the same ballpark as your Christian beliefs, don’t be surprised to hear this:

“I’m not a Christian, but my moral standards are just as good as yours, and I don’t have to depend on faith in a fictitious god for them like you do. I know right from wrong (and I can know and think) because of reason, logic and common sense.” Or, that “society shows the way,” or that “history proves it,” or that “everyone agrees.” He may even throw “science” into the mix. So, is it true that these kinds of people can know, think and be logical just like everyone else? Absolutely!, but they refuse to give Him credit. Instead, they proudly take credit for it themselves. This is where not knowing about epistemology lets them down. Here’s the truth:

 

Without admitting it – and they always deny it when you bring it up – they have to borrow the Christian worldview from the Bible in order to account for knowing, thinking, right and wrong. There’s no other place for them to go except for the Bible, the same, historically proven Bible telling us that God, in the form of Jesus, was and is a real person who came to earth 2,000 years ago and who lived among us for 33 years. 

Here are five explanations why the trust they think they have in their own intellectual strength doesn’t make sense:

First Problem: If we are only accidental evolved animals (we’re not) with accidental brains, this primitive “glob” of a brain could never understand or have the ability to account for rules about knowing, thinking, right and wrong. Our friends, the evolutionists, can’t have it both ways – the brain can’t be just a chemical glob “during evolution classroom hours,” but then turn back into a highly complex, advanced body organ once class is over – J. Fortunately, evolutionists really do have every right to be confident in their knowing, thinking and morality skills because they’re made in God’s image. They automatically know in their hearts about right, wrong and the Golden Rule because the God who created us placed them in there.

Second Problem: The big bang explosion people are always ridiculing Christians. They do it by asking, “If your wonderful God exists then who created Him?” But, fair is fair which is why we get to ask, “who created your teeny-tiny, pre-explosion particle?” If they were honest they’d admit that their faith says that their particle must have “always been” and not created. It takes a lot more faith to believe in an imaginary particle and that non-God reasons can be a source for knowing, thinking, right and wrong than does the Christian faith in the God of the Bible. The truth is that evolutionists are every bit as religious as Christians. All of us have an unavoidable, God-given “spiritual itch” in our souls and evolutionists try to deal with their itch by looking at evolution as though it were an actual religion. Science laboratories are their churches; physical testing in laboratories is their worship ceremony; science is their substitute bible; scientists are their ministers and priests, and evolved man (mostly them!) is god. They can say their “religion of evolution” gives them to power to have moral standards, but of course it doesn’t.

Third Problem: You know that the word “science” often refers to the research and experiments that take place in a science laboratory. To investigate something in a lab, the thing has to be physical in nature (seeable, touchable) so that it can be scientifically measured with equipment. (We can’t bring the moon to a lab, but long-distance lab equipment can still do the measuring.) But, here’s where the evolutionists go too far. Because non-physical (immaterial) things, for example things like God, love, life’s big questions, purpose, kindness etc. can’t be tested in a lab, evolutionists say scientists don’t need to waste serious time on them. They’re better left for chats at church, funerals or over coffee on the back porch. This pretend “lab only” rule wants us to believe that important facts only come from labs, not from the Bible or studying about God.

But, hang on a minute. That doesn’t make sense. If it were true, evolutionists and atheists would have to admit that what they do because of their own non-lab-testable logic and common sense “skills” are worthless regarding making sense about life, thinking or anything else. “Logic” can’t be measured in their highly worshipped science labs either! Going a step further, they’d also have to admit that even having just the idea (also an immaterial thing) about doing the pre-construction dreaming about a brand new laboratory can’t be physically checked out or tested in advance in some other lab. Labs don’t build themselves, and yet every new lab has to begin as a non-lab-measurable idea/thing in someone’s mind. Just because something is immaterial doesn’t mean it’s not important, and, that’s true for the evolutionists’ own reason, logic and common sense skills, too. Skills, by the way, they received from God, not from the teeny particle.

Here’s the summary: If immaterial things like reason and logic are important – and they are – then so is the Biggest Immaterial of Them All – God. The way that evolutionists try to trick each other into denying and disobeying Him is by saying that since immaterials can’t be measured in a lab “empirically” (a fancy word for experimental or trial-and-error) then He must not exist.

Problems number 4 and 5 are coming up next in Part 5 of this letter.

A Letter to Clare: Apologetics 101 Part 3

In this five-part series on apologetics, Dr. Dick Jones provides a number of useful insights via a letter to Clare, a real person. Beyond its hoped-for impact on her life, this offering from the  Truth of God’s word was written so as to be equally useful for today’s Christian adults, the majority of whom have been philosophically enslaved to a faulty belief system. (This is part three of a five part series.)

Part 3

Review of 2: The very important subject of epistemology can’t be fully appreciated until we know about the modern legend of evolution. Atheists and those who don’t like God are almost always taught to believe in evolution, so, they miss out on epistemology – and on God.  

Christians say that the earth and our bodies are well-designed by an intelligent creator. But, the angry-at-God people, evolutionists, and others who try to influence us in harmful ways say that there’s no such creator. Besides the “swampy pond” theory, here are three more stories they use to try and get us to believe we come from evolution, not from God: The “Big Bang Explosion,” “Favorable or Good Mutations,” and that “We act by instinct only, not by reason and logic.”

1. The “Big Bang” says that everything – stars, planets, even space itself – began billions of years ago when some teeny-tiny particle smaller than a pinhead became restless, unstable and exploded. Really? Let’s challenge that: The universe had to have a start-point way back when there was nothing at all. Modern research shows that – just like when an old machine goes to the junk yard – the universe is wearing out and running down (quite rapidly) towards an end-point or death-point. So, think of it this way: They’re always asking us with much sarcasm where our “imaginary” start-point God came from. So, in fairness can’t we ask the same thing about their tiny particle? But, they won’t tell because they can’t. Their particle and its explosion are strictly imaginary, based on guesses and on faith – not on true, laboratory-repeatable science.

2. Mutations are unpredictable changes of molecules inside the DNA of cells. They’re rare and harmful to the body almost every time, yet evolutionists say enough “good” ones do happen over “millions of years” so that we humans slowly became better and smarter and can now account for thinking and knowing even without God. Liberal-biased textbooks talk about “millions” because it’s the only way evolution gets the huge amount of time needed for favorable mutations to slowly occur. But, neither the millions of years nor the mutation theories are testable science. You can’t experiment in a lab to prove about a million years, and you can’t observe, in a lab, any super-slow mutations or any favorable mutations that might be occurring in nature.

When evolutionists try to get us to go along with mutations and millions of years, they also make the famous mistake of “circular reasoning.” Here’s an example: “Bill’s hardware store is the best one in town because it’s much better than Jim’s.” But, that’s just an opinion, not true proof about either store. It’s like saying, “Bill’s store is the best one because it’s the best one.” (But, it’s not circular to say, “Bill’s store was better than Jim’s last year because his products do a better job, are cheaper and they last longer.) Evolutionists use circular reasoning on you and me when they say “evolution over millions of years is the best explanation for life because everyone knows it’s true.” But, that’s circular just like the Bill’s store example. Just saying it does not prove it’s true.

3. Evolution says that since we’re “animals” (Homo sapiens), we act by animal instinct with no planning or deep thinking going on. However, instinct really is true for actual animals. It’s God’s purpose for birds to fly south, for bees to collect pollen and bears to go into winter dens. Animals might seem to have purpose, but they really don’t care, in depth, about the future of their species; it’s about their instinct for short term survival and/or pleasure. When scientists call us “animals” it’s the same thing as saying we don’t have important, in-depth purposes either. You’re born, you die, and that’s it. Here today – gone tomorrow. It’s funny during class when angry-at-God people teach that brains are just a glob; that thinking and knowing don’t come from Him, and that our only kind-of, sort-of, human semi-purpose is to stay alive as best we can. But, to do this they must temporarily forget their story that “accidental human animals have no good purpose” even as you watch them make it their purpose to teach the evolution theory of “no purpose.” They want to have it both ways – “no purpose” temporarily for the final exam, but purpose is OK again once you leave class. It’s all about wanting to get rid of the God who’s in charge of  thinking and  knowing; the God who made us in His image and put us here for good purposes.

Christians, on the other hand, give God full credit for planning and starting the creation in the beginning. The Bible gives a logical explanation about creation while other religions such as Buddhism, Shintoism, Hinduism or Native Americanism don’t. (You can look up their creation story details online.) The book of Genesis tells that God first created the heavens and the earth. Then He created plants and animals and finished up by placing Adam and Eve in the Garden of Eden. Being made “in God’s image” (Genesis 1:26) means that when God planned us, He made us a little bit like Him. We can think and know a little bit like He does because of the brain He gave us through Adam and Eve. We can be logical, use reason and make sense of things. Not as well as God can, but we can still come close, especially when we live by His rules.

Shoes, cars, trees, ideas, thoughts – everything – have to have a cause, with one exception, and that’s God who is everlasting, infinite and eternal. It makes sense that the “Causer” of the entire universe did not have a cause and was not created because then who would have created Him? But, isn’t this “Christian circular reasoning” too? Yes, but please see the next paragraph.

So, does God exist or not? Christians can’t prove it in a laboratory and must take their belief about Him on faith just like evolutionists must take their non-provable beliefs by faith. But, the bottom line is that creation did come from someplace and it wasn’t from an exploding “cosmic egg.” Explosions destroy – they don’t create. Not only that, but the universe is way too complex, well designed and orderly for it to have happened by accident. Among other things, the constant reliability of God’s physical and chemical laws, plus the earth’s exact 23.5° tilt necessary for the all-important seasonal changes help prove there is order and design in the universe, not the chaos that comes from explosions. Since faith is the key factor for both Christians and evolutionists, God simply has to exist because of the impossibility that He doesn’t!  If there were no God there wouldn’t be anything, even space! The evolutionists’ faith is in a rebellious man-made, man-worshipping theory; the Christians’ faith is on the simple necessity of God having to exist.

Finally today, imagine a pair of sun glasses with red lenses. Everything looks red. Now imagine a similar pair having “Christian worldview” lenses made from Bible knowledge rather than from red plastic. The Bible tells how the creator Himself came to earth (as Jesus) to prove He is who He says He is. Even historians and writers who don’t believe in God agree that Christ, the Son of God, lived on earth and rose from the dead – the only person who ever did. With “Bible lenses,” everything, including your thoughts about life, the miracle of creation, plus understanding about knowing and thinking will appear to you the way God wants you to see them. Non-Christians can’t “see” what God wants because they wear secular or humanist lenses. “Sun” glasses help you see better in the bright light of the sun. But “Son” glasses (get it?) made from what Jesus teaches will help you see better all of the time whether in light, darkness or in between.

Part 3 of 5