Loading summary
Transcript35 lines
- [00:00]
A
SAO friends, Greg Kokel here.
- [00:31]
B
And oh my goodness, one week before Christmas. Well, a week and a day or so from my moment right now. It's probably if you're listening to this show soon after it's released, you're, you're counting down less than a week. I was talking to my family. Well, just last night my wife and I finally figured out our gift list for our girls and fortunately they're all on Amazon or almost everything. So tomorrow I can order everything and it'll be here the next day. That's the big advantage of Amazon prime as far as I'm concerned. Plus you usually save a lot of money on the product and it's free shipping, so. But I was talking about this, you know, a few weeks ago. We got to get this squared away because you know, the time. First it's four weeks until Christmas and then it's four days until Christmas. I don't know how it feels to you guys, but that's the way it is to me. And all of a sudden, boom, we're there. So anyway, a week to go and hanging in there. There has been some things happening though. Recently a lot of digital blood has been spilt on an issue. Oh, by the way, this reminds me, I forgot to mention, since next week broadcast will be two days before Christmas, the 23rd Tuesday, I will not be taking live call ins at the regular show time. I'm going to be coming in early, earlier in the morning and so LA time I'll be here 10 to 12. Probably we'll do a lot of open mic calls because that we're off schedule. But if you'd like to call in live, that's the time to do so. And generally I'll just give the number for anytime you call into the show. 855-243-9975. That's 855-243-9975. Anytime Tuesdays, I should say any Tuesday, 4 to 6pm LA time is when you call in next week on the 23rd. If you'd like to call me live and chat. 10 to 12 is a great time to do it and you probably won't have much competition. So I'd love to talk to you then. But as I was saying, there's been a lot of kind of digital ink spilled recently on the issue of hell and I want to talk a little bit about it because there's a lot of concern and discussion about what the correct view is and what the orthodox view is and what the heretical view is and whatever So I want to speak to that. I actually wrote a piece a number of years ago that Tim and Tim Barnett and I both worked on together called Hell Interrupted. All right, Parts one, two, and three. And our view is the view of eternal conscious torment. Now, just for the record, I do not like that view. It's the classic view of the church. It's what Christians have characteristically held from the beginning. And they have held the view because it seems to be a straightaway understanding of Scripture, especially the more precise teaching that we find in the New Testament. I think John MacArthur called it a ghastly doctrine, which he believed was true, as I do. But it doesn't make it any less ghastly. In fact, when I think about. Look, when I think about living forever under any condition, I get a little panic inside. You think about eternity, like forever and ever and ever. It never ends. And I get a little panicky inside. I don't know if it's kind of a spiritual agoraphobia. It's like the space is so big, I can't take it. I want to think about it for a while. And if I'm living in eternity, I think I want to, okay, can I sleep for a million years, Lord, and just start over again? You just need a mental break. Now, I think in our resurrection bodies, it won't be like that. But nevertheless, even the idea of eternal conscious bliss is hard for me. And for me to think of eternal conscious torment is borderline unfathomable. Why do I believe it then? Because I think that's what the scripture teaches. And I'm not going to go into a full defense of the issue right here. There's no time to do it. There's a lot of ins and outs. There are good people, in my view at least, that are on both sides of the issue and are people that take the text seriously and have worked through the text and come to a different conclusion. I could suggest, for example, the Enterprise Rethinking Hell. And I think Chris Date is kind of at the helm of that enterprise, and I have a lot of respect for him and those who hold the view that I disagree with. All right, so I'm not going to go through item for item. Tim Barnett and I have done that in a piece that you can find on our website, str.org and I just checked it out myself. I went to the homepage and there in the search feature, just typed in Hell Interrupted. It will give you three options or three parts. And we covered that in three solid grounds about 10,000 words total. I read it last week and I was very happy with the case that we made. Even though there are pushb from different sort of different sorts from different people, nevertheless, I'm compelled by it. In the final analysis, regardless of the challenges, that's still my view. And if you want a more careful treatment of it, from my perspective and from Tim's perspective, that would be the place to go. But I do want to speak to a couple of the details, like I said, or elements that are kind of floating around now in this current discussion about hell. And the first thing I want to say is I have been frustrated by those who adopt this position. I got to reword this. I've been frustrated that those who adopt this position, or I should say the position contrary to what I'll just call the classical view, I think that's fair to call it that of eternal conscious torment. If you take exception with that view and adopt a kind of conditional immortality or annihilationism, those people who do that are called heretics. Now, that bugs me because I think it's an abuse of the word. Now, of course, it a lot depends on what you mean by the word heretic or heresy. And the way I use the term is a person who is a heretic is not somebody who's a Christian anymore in virtue of the heretical views they hold. So I look at the core teachings of Christianity that are definitive, that distinguish Christianity from anything else that's not Christianity, and one might call that mere Christianity. And I ask myself the question, does a person hold to these distinctives? Those things are the sine qua nons, that without which Christianity would no longer be Christianity. I do not consider one's views about the final assessment, what happens when the final judgment is made. I don't consider that in that category, like the deity of Christ or the resurrection of Christ, or that there's going to be a judgment, or that God exists, or that Jesus is the God man, or all of those details that I actually worked on articulating fairly clearly in the story of reality. Those are the essentials, in my view. And if you depart from those, well, you may have a really nice religion, but it's not Christianity. But if you hold to those things, then you remain a Christian, even if in other areas you disagree with other Christians. So in my view, there's a difference between heresy or something being heretical and something being heterodox. You've got orthodoxy, you've got heresy, and then in the middle you've got something that might be called heterodox. That is not exactly right, but not off the reservation. Now, I think that the idea of annihilationism or conditional immortality as opposed to the alternative eternal conscious torment, ect, I think that those are severely heterodox. They're not what the church has characteristically believed for thousands of years. That alone, by the way, is not the argument for it. Ultimately, you have to go back to Scripture and make your scriptural case. But nevertheless, there are a lot of people who disagree on lots of things with regards to what the Scripture teaches that are still within the family. And this is my view of those who disagree with me on this particular issue. And there were people like the venerable theologian John Stott, author of the classic the Cross of Christ, which I have and I've read and I've used and I've benefited from and a number of others that have toyed with these ideas. I don't know what he died in 2005. I don't know what his final disposition about the nature of the final judgment is. John Stott, but nevertheless, he's the one who wrote know why you believe and know what you believe. Right. The guy is solidly within the, generally speaking, within orthodoxy and a brother in Christ. But this is an area that he began to have misgivings about towards the end of his life. And I never would ever consider him to be toying with heresy. All right. Oh, I'm sorry. Okay, correction, senior moment here. Paul Little wrote know what you believe and know why you believe. John Stott wrote basic Christianity, the cross of Christ and a number of other things. And so he's venerable nonetheless. So as Paul Little, they both are Christian brothers, regardless of their view of the nature of the final judgment. So that's what I'm saying, because listen, no view of the nature of the final judgment is a necessary component of salvation. Let me say that again. No view of the nature of final judgment is a necessary component of salvation. If somebody disagrees with me in this view, I think they're wrong for the reasons that Tim and I articulated in our articles. But they're brothers or sisters in Christ. That's my view. And I don't think it helps to be honest when there is somebody, especially a more visible public figure who's working things out more visibly and publicly because of their role in the body of Christ is then just lambasted with attacks from other brothers that, you know, he or she may be flirting with heresy. I just don't think that's that helpful. That's Helpful. I, I think we ought to offer what Gavin Ortland called intellectual hospitality on some of these issues. All right, Tim Barnett, as we were talking about it today as a team, Tim said, you know, your view of hell is not a primary issue of orthodoxy and Christianity, but loving our brethren is. So let's keep our ducks in a row there. That's kind of my point and in my view that people who differ with us theologically on this issue, even on a big issue like this one, need patient brotherly counsel and not personal attack. This just tends to galvanize people and make them, I think, more calcified in their position, more resistant to learning, and instead of helping them to get, get them to rethink their view. And I'm just thinking right now of Alistair Begg. Remember when he came out approving of Christians going to same sex weddings and he had his rationale and I came out publicly and here on this show I said, I think he's mistaken for these reasons. And then the following week I had to come back and say, you know, a lot of people have gone too far attacking him. And that was an overreaction. And some of you might recall that that didn't help him. He just doubled down when he got attacked. So just word to the wise when dealing with issues like this. Now, I mentioned that I wasn't going to prosecute my case regarding this issue of eternal conscious torment versus some form of annihilationism. But I do have a couple of things I want to say. The first thing I've already said is I don't think it's a heretical view. And calling people who hold this view errat politics is a mistake doesn't help either side. I also think there are a couple of things that people think about when they're assessing this. And this is coming from the other side that I just don't think are helpful. I don't think they're useful. I think they get in the way. And one of them is raising the issue of the character of God. Now I know that some people have felt, well, eternal conscious torment is just inconsistent with the character of God. And what I want to say to that is whatever it is that the Scripture ends up teaching, even if it is eternal conscious torment, turns out to be consistent with the character of God. Because Scripture is our source for understanding the character of God. And if what we have in our mind is a sense of God being a loving God, which he is, God is love. But we take our understanding of what that word to mean and then that is a lever that we're using in our hermeneutics. Well, this couldn't be ect, because that's not loving according to our understanding of God's love. I think that's the tail wagging the dog. I think you have to figure out what the text actually teaches, which many are attempting to do. I'm not taking anything away from somebody on that and not let your conceptions of the love of God get in the way, because I don't think that's going to help. Whatever we are to understand about the nature of the love of God has to come from the text itself. And we can't just simply say, well, God is love and therefore he wouldn't do this because it doesn't seem loving to us. So that's one thought. Don't start with your take on God's character and then try to read it into this text. Rather start with the text. And incidentally, Tim Parnett pointed this out earlier today too, is that line of thinking is the same line of thinking used by people who are universalists. Everybody's saved. Why? Well, that's because of the love of God. So I think there's a liability in arguing that way. That's the first thought. I also don't think it's appropriate to use the word torture to describe ect, eternal conscious torment. I think it's a kind of a straw man. In other words, it's a mischaracterization that does have rhetorical force, no question, but it's actually a mischaracterization of the doctrine, what the scripture turns out describing. I'm not weighing in at this moment on that, but whatever it is that it actually teaches, no matter how horrible it is, cannot be torture. It's appropriate judgment because the word torture just has a completely different connotation that I think inappropriately impugns the character of God. We look at the anguish and we say, oh, that's torture. Not just torture us, but we say that's the kind of thing that God would never do. Now, the punishment may be torturous in its experience. I get that. Just like an amputation prior to anesthetics was torturous when it was done. That happened in the Civil War. No anesthetics. They had to lose a limb. They just cut the limb off. But the surgeon wasn't a torturer. The surgeon was doing something that was appropriate for the circumstances, even though it caused a lot of anguish to the person. Now, it's not a perfect analogy, but the point I'M making is just because it feels really bad doesn't mean it's torture. And it certainly isn't torture in God's case because his intent is not to purposely cause anguish and suffering without proper. Without proper justification. The surgeon intentionally causes punishment, but he has a justification in similar way. So does God. It's not torture. And whenever I hear somebody characterizing it that way, I feel a little bit like they're cheating with language. All right. No, God does not torture. He punishes. And as David put it in Psalm 51, he says, against you, and you only have I sinned and done what is evil in your sight, so that you are justified when you speak and blameless when you judge. Whatever it is that God metes out as judgment he is blameless for. And so whatever turns out scripturally to be the nature of the final judgment, it can never properly be characterized as torture. Now, there's a couple of other things that have been raised that I think cloud the discussion. And one of them has to do with the immortality of the soul. And there is a kind of argument that's offered that human beings are not, in a certain sense, intrinsically or natively immortal. That's a Greek notion from Plato, and that isn't a biblical notion. And to this. And so therefore, eternal life is granted to the saved. But those who are unsaved, who are not immortal by nature, can be destroyed because God can destroy, that is, annihilate, remove from existence something that doesn't have the native quality of immortality. I think this misses the issue entirely. I don't know why it's even relevant. God's going to create a new heaven and a new earth. We don't have any sense that the new earth is going to be immortal by nature, but God is going to sustain it forever and ever as a place of our habitation, who will live forever and ever. You don't have to have a native immortality in order to have people survive natural death, physical death, and then be punished forever and ever. All you have to do is have a God who sustains that individual for that period of time for his purposes. So the immortal soul thing, I think, is just a non element here. And it would be better if we removed that and then just got to the issue of what the scripture actually teaches. I think this also relates to the question of eternal life. And this is another, I think, a linguistic confusion where the claim is, if somebody is living forever and ever in hell, he has eternal life, he's living forever. And only the Christian has Eternal life so that the non Christian can't be living forever and ever in hell is the way the thinking goes somewhat. And the distinction here is an important one. There is a difference between eternal life and eternal existence. Eternal life is somewhat of a term of art. It doesn't just mean living forever, or I should say existing forever. Eternal life is not speaking to the duration of the life only. It is also speaking to the quality of the life. So Jesus says in John 17, and this is eternal life, that they should know you, the Father and the Son, whom you sent. So eternal life is forever being in a relationship with God and enjoying his presence and relationship together forever. That's eternal life. But that itself is opposed to eternal death, which is the way Scripture describes those who are judged. The second death. This is the second death. And so the contrast, eternal life and eternal death. And it is certainly possible for a person to exist eternally without having eternal life in the sense that the New Testament is describing it. Now. This doesn't. I'm not arguing from one side or the other at this point. I'm just saying here is a distinction that is made that clouds the issue and trades on an equivocation that once you remove that equivocation, you remove some confusion. This can't be a good argument for the other side here because it doesn't take these scriptural words, I think, in their proper sense. Another thing that has really impressed me about when I worked on this material with Tim to write the article Hell Interrupted is it became clear to me that, well, let me back up and put it a different way. Let's just say you wanted to argue against the Trinity and I provided for you some New Testament evidence for that, which is where you're going to find most of the evidence for the Trinity as you collect this evidence together to form the doctrine of the Trinity. And as I did that for you, you respond, look it, I read the whole Old Testament. I didn't find any Trinity in the Old Testament. It's not taught there, it's not characterized there. There is one God, the Creator of heaven and earth, and this is it. So since I didn't find any evidence for it in the Old Testament, whatever you look at in the New Testament, that seems to be evidence for it must be understood in light of the Old Testament. Now you would push back, I think, properly on that because there is a thing called progressive revelation. And as time goes on, more and more about God and his plans, etc. Are revealed to the extent that the final word is the last Word. The final word is the last word. As you're moving through the revelation, you get more and more detail. And so the final word isn't the first word or the second or the third. Somewhere in the Old Testament, Unitarian God, one God. That's it. No multiple persons. I don't see it there. That doesn't dictate what the New Testament teaches. The New Testament is the place where you get more detailed revelation. And frankly, when you arrive appropriately at the doctrine of the Trinity from New Testament texts, there's a sense in which you could look back and see little hints in the Old Testament of the Trinity, though you wouldn't formulate the doctrine from those hints. Unto us a child is born. Unto us a son is given. So you have the humanity of Christ, A child is born. You've got the divinity of Christ, a son is given. Okay, there's an example, and this is Christmas time, and so that's an appropriate passage to be thinking about. So there's a hint there that would not have been obvious at the time, given the mentality of the listeners. But now, in light of more detailed revelation, we can look back and have the more recent revelation, the more detailed revelation, inform our hermeneutic about the prior revelation. I think the same thing is true here. And when you look at the Old Testament passages that have to do with God's judgment, arguably at least what you see is an earthly perspective, what is viewed from the perspective of human beings watching when God utterly destroys Sodom and Gomorrah, for example, and I think it's a mistake to infer some eternal element from that when it doesn't seem to be talking about that at all. It seems to be talking about the temporal circumstance. Later on we get more revelation about what goes on in the eternal side of things. And that would be the New Testament, and specifically, especially, I should say, the Book of Revelation. And that's the final word, and the final word is the last word. So however you're working through this issue, please keep in mind progressive revelation, a very well established hermeneutical principle, and that the new material has to modify or inform the older material and not the other way around. I'll tell you one other thing that I'll offer here and just by way of general comments about this issue, and that is that I'm speaking for myself here, but it is very, very difficult for me to make any radical departures from established orthodoxy. That is, if something has been characteristically held to be true by the Church for thousands of years, 2,000 years. And I'm saying characteristically, there's going to be outliers. There could be differences of opinion here and there, but characteristically, a view is characteristic of the church. The theology of the Church, and great theologians from all during that span of time have held this and argued for it in light of the text. It's going to be hard for me to divert from that because I think there's safety in numbers, and one of the tests of orthodoxy is catholicity. In other words, the church in general gets it right, and this helped me when I came to assessing this issue. Do I have a bias? Yes, My bias is in favor of the orthodox view that has survived the test of time. Now, that could be wrong, but it seems to me one is going to have to make an unmistakable, clear, irrefutable argument, unequivocal argument from the text that we've gotten it wrong all these years and this other view is really the true one. Maybe that can be done. I have not been convinced. I'm not addressing that broader issue here, But I'm just saying that's a bias that I have, and I think it's a healthy one, and one you might want to keep in mind, too, as you assess this issue. But when all the dust settles, the critical issue is what the text says. That's on the theological side, on the communion and fellowship of the brothers and sisters. What ought to be governing our appeal for accuracy in understanding the text is an attitude of love. We are dealing with each other on the inside of the family, not on the outside of the family, and that makes a huge difference. At least that's my view on it. All right, let's take a break, and I'll be back with your calls when I return on Stand to Reason.
- [29:32]
C
Would you like a Stand to Reason speaker at your event? Greg Allen, Tim John, Megan and I Tripp are available in person or online. Just email bookingstr.org Our team speaks on a wide range of topics, from issues in bioethics, gender and science to topics in apologetics, theology and philosophy, and how to respond to other worldviews, all from a biblical perspective. Whether it's a conference, youth event or Sunday service, we're here to give confidence for every Christian, clear thinking for every challenge, courage and grace for every encounter. We all know we should be reading the Bible, but why? In the latest episode of my podcast, Thinking Out Loud with Alan Schliemann, I want to unpack three reasons why you need to make daily Bible reading a priority. Look for this podcast on itunes, Spotify Your favorite podcast app or at the top of the homepage@str.org friends if you
- [30:26]
B
like this broadcast, I know you'll love Strask. It's our shorter 20 minute podcast where I am paired with the wonderful Amy hall, and together we answer the questions you send us on Twitter. Strask is released twice a week, Mondays and Thursdays, and it's only about 20 minutes long, so it's perfect to listen to on your morning jog or while driving around running errands or, or cleaning your garage or just plain loafing at home. Amy and I tackle your questions on theology and ethics and culture and lots more, offering our insight on the questions you're asking or the challenges you face. You can listen on Apple Podcasts or wherever you download your own shows. Just remember, send us your questions on Twitter using the name of the podcast Strask. That's STR Ask. All right, friends, I. I just want to say we're halfway through the month of December now, and this is a very important month to us. It makes a huge difference for everything we do next year. And I've already talked about that in the last few weeks and everybody knows that. I want to say a few things about that. One of them is we have been working really hard this year, and not just me, my entire team, I think sometimes they work harder than I do, though. I work pretty hard. But we've been working really hard to help all of you who use the materials we produce, listen to our show, go to our events, read the articles, go on, all of that. We work really hard to help you be more effective ambassadors for Christ. And if that's all where it ends, then that's fine with us. We are happy to do that. But we think of ourselves in a kind of partnership with you. As we're giving to you, you give back to us financially to help us continue to give to you and to so many other people that benefit from the things we do. And many of those people are people that benefit through you and through the way we've trained you. And we talked about something happening in our culture. Now, lots of this started last year actually, when I was talking about end of year stuff. And now this year we've seen more and more things happening where I'm not ready to call it a revival, but something's going on, and it certainly is an opportunity now of moving into an increased harvest. Jesus talked about to his disciples in John 4 that the fields are white with harvest, and I think they are white right now in a way that I haven't seen since the Jesus movement 50 years ago when I became a Christian. That means there's an opportunity for us at Stand to Reason. And there's an opportunity for you as an ambassador for Christ, trained by Stand to Reason in some measure to be ready for that harvest. We have been working really hard. We have 22,500 learners in STR University. We have 169 outposts now in 38 states and 12 different countries. Our Reality student apologetics conferences are like bursting at the seams. 13,000. 13,000 students this last year. And right now I'm looking at the numbers. Texas is coming up, let's see, in February 20th and 21st. All right, that's nine and a half weeks away. We're almost half full. Phillies coming up March 13th and 14th. Pennsylvania, we're a third full and that's 12 and a half weeks away. These are all going to sell out. Why are they going to sell out? Because these students are getting what they desperately need and we're providing and we're doing so with your help. So here's what I'd like you to do this December, I'd like you to consider making a generous gift to Stand to Reason. Simple as that. And it's very easy to do that. Just go to str.org donate and when you do, not only will you be helping us finish off this year strong, start next year strong, and be able to continue doing all of the things that we do, but we're going to send you a gift that will help you participate in the harvest that is ripening in the fields. I'm going to send you a copy of Story of Reality. And that's a foundational piece to really understand the big picture so you can explain it well to other people. We're also going to send you a Reality Quick reference guide that's a laminated like sheet that's got all the basics on it so you have a quick study tool. And then we're going to send you two copies of the story of why God died and came to life again. Now that's a section of the Story of Reality. And it's that section that's about Jesus specifically and the cross and the resurrection and the final disposition of things. Perfect justice, perfect mercy. Basically the Gospel account. We're going to send that to you. It's a smaller read. It's quick, but it's going to be something very useful to hand out to other people who you're talking to about Christ, about the Gospel and about the grace that God provides through Jesus. So we're sending that all to you so you can participate. All you need to do is send a gift to us this month. I think the cutoff is December 28th. I'm not sure. But in any event, you send a gift to Stan Teresan and we'll send you those thank you gifts. Story of Reality, the Quick reference guide, and two copies of the Story of why God Died and Came to Life again. Once again, str.org donate all right, two more weeks. We look forward to hearing from you. Speaking of hearing from people, we've got some people on the line here, so let's go to Ohio and Caleb. Hello, Caleb.
- [36:42]
A
Hello, Greg.
- [36:43]
B
How are you doing?
- [36:44]
A
I'm doing well. My podcast is doing well. I don't know if you remember. I have, I've called him before. I have a podcast and a YouTube channel. The channel now has 80,000 views altogether.
- [36:53]
B
Oh, okay. Well, good.
- [36:56]
A
Also, I'm getting Paul Copen on there.
- [36:59]
B
Say that again. You're getting what?
- [37:01]
A
Oh, I'm getting Dr. Paul Copan. Oh, my podcast.
- [37:04]
B
Paul Copan. Right. Sure. Good for you.
- [37:06]
A
Yeah, but so my question was about how a Christian can, you know, deal with doubts. And so I'm a Christian, obviously. I run a channel podcast on apologetics, so I hope I'd be a Christian anyway.
- [37:19]
B
I hope so.
- [37:21]
A
Sometimes, though, it just feels kind of like unlikely. Like it's kind of hard for me to picture it in my head. Even when I discuss evidences for Christianity, I always have in the back of my mind, like, what if this is just all false? Why do I have to keep on convincing myself of Christianity if it's still obviously true?
- [37:46]
B
Well, I think the simple answer to the last part of your question is we're human beings who have limited capability of knowing. We can know a lot of things, but knowing things is not easy, especially some things that are more difficult. I guess that's a tautology. But some things are easy to figure out, some things are harder to figure out. And sometimes the most important things are the things that are harder to figure out. So look, you can go to a doctor and have a diagnosis of some kind of. You have all these symptoms. Let's start there. And you go to the doctor, and the doctor looks at the symptoms and he's scratching his head and he's trying to figure it out what's going on. Now it may be there's a truth to the matter, and it may be that when he comes up on the truth of the matter, that he has very good reasons to diagnose you in a particular way. But that doesn't mean it's always easy to get there or it's even easy to stay there. Some things are more complex is what I'm saying. And that's why I don't think it should be counted against Christianity that people have doubts about it. And even people who are Christians who are convinced for a season or maybe a long season will start having some doubts. I think that just that issue says less about Christianity and says more about human beings. Okay, So I just wanted to speak to that last part first. But the other thing is, what about when you have these kinds of doubts? And I have a way of approaching this that I've used for myself, because everybody doubts. Everybody doubts. Now, some people have gotten to a point in their Christian life that they are beyond that stage, but they've had times of doubt. Now, I haven't had any significant doubts about the truthfulness of Christianity itself for a long time. I have had doubts about how to properly and most effectively live the Christian life. That's harder being in relationship with God and understanding God and what he's doing and how I should best comport myself in difficult circumstances, that's more difficult. But as to the foundational truths of Christianity, I haven't personally had any doubts about that for a long time. Now, partly there's a reason, and to some degree it has to do with the evidences that you and I are both aware of. Okay, But I'm going to give you a different angle on this. Maybe you haven't heard before. So we have all our evidences and you can say, well, what if I'm wrong? Well, if you're wrong, you're wrong. I mean, I'm not sure how that question helps. If you're wrong and you're leading a noble Christian life, and I've thought this myself, if that's the case, then I fare pretty well in just about every other system. So if I'm living for Christ and living virtuously, though I'm not trusting in my virtue for my salvation, but living in a way to honor Christ, most Christians living that way will fare well under other religious systems. Okay, this is a general statement, but. So if I'm wrong, okay, then depending on what turns out to be right, I'm probably still doing pretty well. But you can only answer the question whether you're wrong or not, based on the reasons. I don't know how else to answer this. They could be intellectual reasons. They could be subjectivistic experience with God, reasons, whatever, but it's always going to be based on the reasons. And when you are wondering, well, maybe I am wrong, and the what if I'm wrong? Is that kind of question. Well, maybe I am. Could I be mistaken? Well, everybody could be mistaken in principle. But here's the question I want to encourage you to be thinking of when that happens and you could pass this on to anyone. What's the alternative? What's the alternative? Because something is true. Some state of affairs reflects the true nature of reality. If it isn't the Christian understanding of reality, then it's some other story of reality that's true. So if it's not one, it's going to be the other. Maybe it's some other religious story, maybe it's some kind of materialistic story like atheism or something like that. But something is the case. So what are our alternatives? And this is key. What are our reasons for believing those over and above Christianity? So CS Lewis made a comment and I really relate to this. Maybe you do as well. He says there are some times when it feels like Christianity is just too. How did he put it? Implausible. It's just too implausible. And I experience that most when I'm out in the world, as it were. I'm just kind of away from Christians and Christian stuff and I'm more immersed in the world. I'm immersed at an event or out with friends or people or family or whatever that have no interest in Christianity at all. There's no reference to God. They're not living for God. They're just doing their own thing. They may not be nasty people, they're just totally disconnected. Paul calls this according to the flesh, life according to the flesh. And when I'm in that environment, yeah, Christianity does seem implausible. But Lewis said. But there were a lot of times when I was an atheist that atheism seemed implausible too. So my suspicion is, no matter what worldview you adopt as the accurate worldview, there are going to be times when that's going to seem implausible. So I'm asking my question. What's the alternative with regards to the plausibility issue? Okay, say Christianity is false. Now that would mean what part of it would be false? Do I mean that Jesus wasn't the Messiah? God is real and the God of the Bible is real. But the whole Jesus thing doesn't work. So that means probably, maybe the. Maybe the Jews are right and Judaism is right, or maybe there is no God at All. And the atheists are right. Or maybe it's the Hindus that are right. Our whole idea of a personal God and all the individuation that you see in the universe, this is all part of Maya. This part of the illusion. No, something. So I have to ask myself, what are my alternatives? And then apply the same question of plausibility to the alternatives. It's not just enough for me to say, geez, Christianity seems implausible. Oh, I'm doubting now. Maybe I'm wrong. Well, maybe I am. But then where am I going to go? Is there another view that strikes me as more plausible, more reasonable, all things considered? And when I think of those things in comparison to each other, which I think that's what needs to be done. This is what, what strengthens me and my own convictions about Christianity because I don't think there's any contest. Contest, yeah.
- [45:28]
A
So what I'm. What I'm thinking with this here is I think it would be helpful to maybe pinpoint what exactly it is. Like. Like why am I doubting this? What part of it am I doubting?
- [45:37]
B
Right.
- [45:38]
A
Like, do I have good reason to be doubting right now?
- [45:40]
B
Right.
- [45:40]
A
And also this is something I thought of too, that even if Christianity is false, I feel like the only other alternative would be atheism, because I don't think that. I think that if a religion is true, it would have to be Christianity. Because all the other alternatives that I've looked into, such as Islam and Mormonism, their evidence is this might sound sort of offensive, but like garbage. Like, I mean, it just, it's not good.
- [46:05]
B
Right? It's seriously religious in it. But then when it, when it comes though to now, I think this is a good place to be to think about. Okay, if it's not Christianity, there's not any religion. The only real contender is going to be atheism. But is atheism a real contender? My comment about atheism is that I could not will myself to be an atheist. I can't just try to be one and forget what I know. I know too much. Because what I'd have to be affirming and committing myself to is a number of absolutely, utterly implausible propositions. Everything came from nothing. No, that's not going to work. I mean, I can't be convinced that that's the case, that life came from non life. Well, I know too much about the biology to know that that's not going to happen. Either that consciousness comes from matter or that what I think is morality is Just a trick that evolution played on me. And evolution has its own problems. Anyway, so there are so many implausibilities, gargantuan implausibilities associated with atheism. It isn't even. It's so much more than Christianity. If I have some doubts about it, man, I have a lot more doubts about atheism. So if that's where you're at, then you're in a good spot. Because atheism, well, at least from my perspective, is not a contender at all. It's basically the nothing religion. It's interesting. You know who Douglas Murray is?
- [47:44]
A
No, I don't know who.
- [47:45]
B
He's a writer in social commentary. He's a Brit, and he's talks a lot about Western civilization and how we're especially European. Western civilization is on the verge of collapse to Islamism. Very concerned about that. So he's in the talk ranks a lot, especially conservative ranks. But he identifies himself, at least last I heard, as a Christian atheist. Now, this is an odd way to characterize him, but his point is he doesn't believe in God, but all of his values that he has come to adopt and see as valuable are inconsistent with his atheism and fully consistent with Christianity. All the things he values are Christian, but he has no foundation for it. Now, I think this is. I hope he just keeps working on this because his cognitive dissonance has to be almost overwhelming, that he holds to be true, a worldview that can't make sense out of anything he really values. And of course, his values are expressed in his analysis of Western civilization. And so he's very Christian friendly in a certain way. I only point that out. And there's a number of others that have been making a similar kind of move because they realize that atheism is just vacuous. It's untenable. It's the nothing religion, if you will. And we all know better that something is going on. It's not the case that nothing is going on. There is evil in the world. Human beings do have transcendent value to them. There is meaning and purpose that we're all aware of. You know, morality is everywhere and this is why we use moral language. So anyway, I'm kind of rattling on here a little bit, Caleb, but I think you get my point. You have to ask, when we encounter doubts about anything, you have to ask yourself the question, well, what's the alternative? There are limited alternatives. And then given that every view has outliers, every view is messy because life is messy, which one In a certain sense is the least messy and most comports with reality and resonates with their deepest intuitions about the way things are. And I think that's Christianity. Biblical theism fits the bill like nothing else.
- [50:18]
A
Yeah, I think it's a very good response. Definitely. I will listen back to this, too, so that way I can, you know, take it in a little bit more. I. I am going to have to go, though. And I would assume that the call. It doesn't have much time left anyway. But, yeah, so I get that. So the C.S. lewis quote is definitely very good also. Remember that. So is that from, like, a certain book? Because I have a couple of C.S. lewis's books.
- [50:44]
B
You ask if I have a book I'd recommend.
- [50:47]
A
Well, the quote was C.S. lewis, where he said that, like, when he was an atheist, he thought he was.
- [50:53]
B
I actually don't. Most of the CS list quotes, I can't give you a bib source from unless I've written on it, but it may be. And most of the things people quote from are mere Christianity, but I don't know if that's where it is. Amy's checking. Do you know where that is? It's where he thought that sometimes Christianity seems implausible. But then I had many times when atheism seemed implausible, too. And the point being that all views under certain circumstances seem implausible. It's just the nature of the. You know, it's the shape of the world, the way things go. So she's not able to find it right now, but that's the general idea. And if you Google search it, you. I'm sure you can find it.
- [51:37]
A
All right. Yeah, well, I gotta go now. My family's calling. We gotta leave.
- [51:43]
B
But the point here, though, just to underscore this, is it isn't like the point has to be validated by Lewis. I'm kind of giving the hat tip to him. But it's the kind of thing that most people, when they think about it, will realize that whatever view that they hold, if they're honest, there are times where it just doesn't seem like the right view. You know, we have our doubts about whatever view it is if we're honest and we're thoughtful about it. Okay. A lot of people aren't thinking about these things and they don't think of truth in any meaningful way, and they're just kind of going on. But people are thinking about it, are going to say, yeah, there's some difficulties here. And, you know, even Alex o' Connor I did a interaction with him a few months ago on the diary of a CEO. And Alex is a 26 year old, most well known recognizable atheist in the world right now. Maybe first or second to Richard Dawkins, but he's right at the top. But he's actually quite candid, I think, about his own views not always being adequate to the task. He's a materialist, but he's mystified by consciousness. He doesn't know what to do with that. And that was part of our conversation on this program. But a lot of atheists are just, they'll never admit uncertainties. But many of the atheists who have become Christian from being atheists acknowledge that there were times of uncertainty even as atheists. Holly Ordway, for example, wrote the book Not God's Type many years ago. I interviewed her as a fairly young Christian and wrote this book Not God's Type and talked about her own spiritual journey. Okay, Amy's given me the quotation I'm reading here from mere Christianity, page 140. Now that I am a Christian, he writes, I do have moods in which the whole thing looks very improbable, but when I was an atheist I had moods in which Christianity looked terribly probable. Okay, so that's just moods. So that was page 140 of Mere Christianity for just four. Yeah, the bib source. But my point is that even without the bib source, he's identifying something there about himself. But many people will be able to say this is true about themselves as well. And I'm in that category. I've had times when I think, really, man, this seems so otherworldly, unreal when I'm in these other environments because nobody's thinking like that. But then I look around and I say, well, look at people are doing things they shouldn't be doing. That's evil. People are looking for meaning and purpose in their life because there probably isn't meaning and purpose for life. That's why they're hungering for it. And I just kind of go through the steps and who made the world? Where did this come from? Why is there something rather than nothing? And when I kind of going through the steps, then I'm getting my feet more firmly planted in solid ground, okay? And so even though I have these times when it does seem a little bit improbable, I don't take it seriously because when I look at the facts, the reasons themselves now it seems so much more probable. And all the other views seem radically improbable. And again, I'm kind of back to this, this particular point that I made earlier. This question. What's the alternative? What's the alternative? Does that help?
- [55:24]
A
Yeah, that helps. Thanks. I think that was a very good response to my question. I do have to go, though. I'm glad that you answered my call again. Thank you for.
- [55:34]
B
Oh, you're welcome a lot. Yeah. I only got 90 seconds left, so it's perfect timing. Okay.
- [55:41]
A
All right, thanks.
- [55:42]
B
Happy Christmas to you, Caleb. Thank you. I thought I get one in return. I can hear the kids man in the background. I get it. I know how that works. Anyway, I just want to underscore that particular point. We've talked about it around from different directions, but I think it's really a useful question. What's the alternative? Atheism is not one of them. Not legitimate. It is an alternative in principle. It's not a credible alternative because there's too many, many things wrong with it. Too many things that are, as I mentioned earlier, wildly counterintuitive for me to take atheism seriously. And I can look at some of these other religious views, but when I compare them to Christianity and the evidence just for the Jesus portion of Christianity, that Jesus was here and that even, even Alex o' Connor has said something happened, you know, in that beginning of that first century, something amazing happened that had a powerful impact, something about the life of Jesus. Now, what accounts for this incredible explosion of cultural influence that we still feel reverberating down into the 21st century? And that's a question that needs to be answered. And it's not just any old thing. I think this points to Jesus, the truthfulness of Jesus claim about himself in the resurrection. All right, friends, that's all the time we have this hour. Greg Koukl here for stand a reason. Give him heaven.
- [57:27]
A
Bye bye now. Sam.