How do we know that God exists?
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Genesis 1:1 “In the beginning God created the heaven and the earth.”
Presuppositional apologists have as a starting point that there is a God.
The ability to deny the existence of a God through reason evidences that there is a God who gives man reason.
CLASSICAL APOLOGISTS PROVE THE EXISTENCE OF GOD:
Why do we have something rather than nothing at all?
Reality is an illusion
Reality is self-created
reality is self-existent
reality was created by something that is self-existent
WE NEED A REALITY CHECK!
Reality is an Allusion
Reality is an Allusion
Student: Professor, i’m not sure I even exist!
Professor: Who, then, may I say is asking?
Reality is Self-Created
Reality is Self-Created
How does one create themselves?
Stephen Hawking: “Because there is a law like gravity, the universe can and will create itself from nothing.” If so, however, who created gravity? Eventually, you have to start at nothing.
You cannot start with gravity, motion, matter, energy, or space. Nothing is nothing. These are something and came from somewhere and created by someone.
“Nothing is what rocks dream about.” -Aristotle
A thing cannot be ontologically prior to itself. To create yourself, you must have existed prior to yourself. This is analytically false.
“Something exists. Nothing cannot create something, therefore a necessary and eternal being exists.” -Jonathan Edwards
Carl Sagan- “The cosmos is all there will ever be.”
Moses- Genesis 1:1: “In the beginning God created the heaven and the earth.”
The universe is not eternal.
The cosmological argument-
The cosmological argument-
systematic theology- everything that begins to exist has a cause. The Universe had a beginning: therefore has a cause.
systematic theology- everything that begins to exist has a cause. The Universe had a beginning: therefore has a cause.
-2nd law of thermodynamics
-the expanding universe- confirmed through the Hubble Telescope
-radiation echoes- relic radiation
-galaxy seas
-Einstein’s theory of relativity
Isaiah 40:22: “It is he that sitteth upon the circle of the earth, And the inhabitants thereof are as grasshoppers; That stretcheth out the heavens as a curtain, And spreadeth them out as a tent to dwell in:”
WHY DENY THE POSSIBILITY OF GOD?
-Hawking: “Many people do not like the idea that time has a beginning, probably because it smacks of divine intervention.”
-Dr. George Wald: “I will not accept that philosophically because i do not want to believe in God, therefore I choose to believe in that which I know is scientifically impossible.”
-Etienne Gilson: “But why anything at all is, or exists, science knows not, precisely because it cannot even ask the question. To this supreme question, the only conceivable answer is that each and every particular existential energy, each and every particular existing thing, depends for its existence upon a pure Act of existence.”
reality is self-existent
reality is self-existent
More probable: a self-existent eternal Creator; not a self-existent universe
Why is an eternal Creator preposterous and an eternal universe is not. Why? Because an eternal universe is an amoral entity who doesn’t hold anyone accountable?
Teleological Argument
Behind every complex design is a designer. The universe has a complex design. Therefore, there must be a designer.
Do we recognize intelligence when we see it?
Did wind, time and rain cause Mt. Rushmore?
Did water and erosion design indian arrowheads?
Did elements create hyrogliphics on cave walls?
We instinctively recognize design.
telos- “design” there is a designer behind the universe
Does the universe express design? YES
Dawkins: “Living objects…look designed, they look overwhelmingly as though they’re designed. Biology is the study of complicated things which give the impression of having been designed for a purpose.” Design? Yes! A God? No!
Darwinian biologists keep repeating the lie of evolution. Romans 1:18: “For the wrath of God is revealed from heaven against all ungodliness and unrighteousness of men, who hold the truth in unrighteousness;”
Francis Crick: “Biologists must constantly keep in mind that what they see was not designed, but rather evolved.” What a suppression!
Man suppresses the truth of the existence of God.
Two evidences for intelligent design:
the fine tuning argument (anthropic principle)- everything designed for man’s life on earth. Isaiah 45:12: “I have made the earth, And created man upon it: I, even my hands, have stretched out the heavens, And all their host have I commanded.” NOTICE THIS VERSE: Isaiah 45:18: “For thus saith the Lord that created the heavens; God himself that formed the earth and made it; he hath established it, He created it not in vain, he formed it to be inhabited: I am the Lord; and there is none else.”
-OXYGEN AT 21%- IF ALTERED to 25%- fire everywhere; if 15% humans would suffocate
-GRAVITY- if altered by the moon would crash into earth
-centrifugal force of planetary movement
-Jupiter protects earth from space material
Astrophysicist Hugh Ross calculated the odds of all anthropic constants and quantities to be in place for any planet in the universe by luck alone to be one chance in ten with 138 zeros after it. ANYTHING WITH MORE THAN 50 ZEROS IS CONSIDERED A STATISTIC IMPOSSIBILITY
CHANCE? Chance exceeds the potential of luck.
Rather, INTELLIGENT DESIGN IS THE WAY.
specified complexity.
Part 2
ROMANS 1:20: “For the invisible things of him from the creation of the world are clearly seen, being understood by the things that are made, even his eternal power and Godhead; so that they are without excuse:”
SPECIFIED COMPLEXITY
Nature and life contain the imprint of an intelligent designer
i.e. DNA
difference between data and information
DNA RESEMBLES SOFTWARE CODE
DNA identical to language
#3- THE MORAL ARGUMENT
#3- THE MORAL ARGUMENT
objective moral values and duties DO exist. From this, it follows logically that God exists. If morality exists, there must be a God that exists.
Nietzsche- "You have your way, I have my way. As for the right way, it does not exist.” This is anarchial— and unsustainable.
OBJECTIVE- independent of any opinion- regardless of majority opinion
VALUES- whether something is good or bad; a description of worth
DUTIES- INDICATES an oughtness; something that is required of us
KEY INGREDIENTS:
A standard- a law
an authority- someone/thing that has the right to impose the standard and to enforce adherence
“A man does not call a line crooked unless he has some idea of a straight line.” -CS Lewis
The 4 Possible Sources of Objective Moral Values
the universe
society/culture- social constructs
the individual
a transcendent Creator
THE UNIVERSE
“A man said to the Universe, Sir, I exist.
Nevertheless, replied the universe,
That fact has not created in me the slightest feeling of obligation.” -Stephen Crane
CULTURE
Beading in Kenya— Satii in India— Cannibalism in the south pacific— murder— rape—
Nazi trials in Nuremburg- We were only following orders.
“But sir, is there not a law above our laws?” Judge to nazis...
The Reformer’s Dilemma: If moral relativism is true, then societies cannot have moral reformers. These reformers stand outside the societal norms, look at the normative codes, cry against it, and seek to change it. For example, Corrie ten Boom…MLK…William Wilberforce…these reformers were pivotal in history. IF MORAL RELATIVISM IS TRUE, THEN THESE REFORMERS WERE IMMORAL. How, then, can a culture ever be positively influenced from the outside if the culture is the determiner of good and evil?
THE INDIVIDUAL
How does the statement, “For me, rape is wrong, but it might be OK to you” sound?
With individuals, it boils down to emotion rather than moral absolutes.
People may espouse relativism but they demand absolutes!
A TRANSCENDENT CREATOR
There must, then, be a transcendent creator. This is the moral argument for God. Laws imply a law giver. There is an objective moral law. If God does not exist, objective moral values and duties do not exist, but objective moral values and duties do exist, therefore, God exists.
God’s law is written in human hearts. Romans 2:15: “Which shew the work of the law written in their hearts, their conscience also bearing witness, and their thoughts the mean while accusing or else excusing one another.
Paul Little: Know Why You Believe
The Atheist Dilemma:
If there’s such a thing as evil, you must assume there’s such a thing that is good. Any moral truth claim constitutes an objective statement.
no lawgiver— no moral code— no good or evil
God has created us with an intrinsic awareness of right and wrong. Romans 2:15: “Which shew the work of the law written in their hearts, their conscience also bearing witness, and their thoughts the mean while accusing or else excusing one another;)”
God has created us to know moral values.
Man’s innate awareness is that God has made us eternal. He has put eternity in our hearts.
PRESUPPOSITIONAL APPROACH TO THE EVIDENCE OF GOD
PRESUPPOSITIONAL APPROACH TO THE EVIDENCE OF GOD
Because God does not take the time in the beginning to validate His being, we should not either.
Colossians 2:3: “In whom are hid all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge.”
II Timothy 3:14-17: “But continue thou in the things which thou hast learned and hast been assured of, knowing of whom thou hast learned them; And that from a child thou hast known the holy scriptures, which are able to make thee wise unto salvation through faith which is in Christ Jesus. All scripture is given by inspiration of God, and is profitable for doctrine, for reproof, for correction, for instruction in righteousness: That the man of God may be perfect, throughly furnished unto all good works.”
Man by his wisdom cannot know God.
Presuppositionalists taught that the Bible, the written Word of God, has a systematic theology.
Theocentric view came under attack. Churches were attacked by philosophy, intellectualism. Many taught that there was more than one source of truth— nature, reason, observation, mysticism, feelings, and philosophy— was accepted in many churches.
Thomas Aquinas: incorporated philosophy of Aristotle. Rather than adhering exclusively to the objective Word of God, he espoused the idea that sensation, observation, and experience as sources of truth.
Is it possible, though, that sensory impression may be skewed…or that human experience…or emotional experience…may be jaded.
EPISTEMOLOGY- how you attain your knowledge
Shift— theory of knowledge became man-centered— from focusing on God we became man-centered. Man, then, could discover truth on his own.
Jeremiah 10:23: “O Lord, I know that the way of man is not in himself: It is not in man that walketh to direct his steps.”
John Wycliffe taught that truth is OBJECTIVE. There is only one source of truth. SOLA SCRIPTURAL!
ALL LAW, all philosophy, all logic, and all ethics are in holy scripture. In holy scripture is all truth. -Wycliffe
Calvin: “I call that knowledge not what is innate in man…but what is revealed to us in the law and the prophets...”
Luther: “Scripture is in itself the most certain, the most easily understood, the most plain, is its own interpreter...” a first source of truth for the believer. “All human words are conclusions drawn from them and must be brought back to them and approved by them.”
Luther: The Diet of Worms, 1521: “If, then, I am not convinced by proof from Holy scripture, or by plain reason…I neither can nor will retract anything; for ti cannot be either safe or honest for a Christian to speak against his conscience. Here I stand; I cannot do otherwise; God help me! Amen!”
START WITH THE WORD; THIS IS OUR PRESUPPOSITION
Romans 1:18: “For the wrath of God is revealed from heaven against all ungodliness and unrighteousness of men, who hold the truth in unrighteousness;”