The death of God Is Dead

Christianity Today carried a story in a recent issue that tells of how the God Is Dead movement in theology was sidestepped by a movement within philosophy that found other proofs of God's existence to still be intellectually viable. The article is here: God is not dead yet: How current philospher's argue for his existence.

The arguments are fairly basic and things that have occured to many people of faith like the cosmological argument which says,

1. Everything that exists has an explanation of its existence, either in the necessity of its own nature or in an external cause.
2. If the universe has an explanation of its existence, that explanation is God.
3. The universe exists.
4. Therefore, the explanation of the universe's existence is God.

There is also the moral argument:

1. If God does not exist, objective moral values and duties do not exist.
2. Objective moral values and duties do exist.
3. Therefore, God exists.

This view would go on to say, "God wills something because he is good. That is to say, what Plato called "the Good" is the moral nature of God himself. God is by nature loving, kind, impartial, and so on. He is the paradigm of goodness. Therefore, the good is not independent of God. Moreover, God's commandments are a necessary expression of his nature. His commands to us are therefore not arbitrary but are necessary reflections of his character."

The author of the article, William Lane Craig is a research professor of philosophy at the Talbot School of Theology. He contends that putting together these and other logical arguments for God's existence is vitally important as while aetheists are working to show that belief in God is not intellectually possible, Christians should be prepared to demonstrate that it is. He still sees conversion as a work of the Holy Spirit and concludes writing,

Christians who depreciate natural theology because "no one comes to faith through intellectual arguments" are therefore tragically shortsighted. For the value of natural theology extends far beyond one's immediate evangelistic contacts. It is the broader task of Christian apologetics, including natural theology, to help create and sustain a cultural milieu in which the gospel can be heard as an intellectually viable option for thinking men and women. It thereby gives people the intellectual permission to believe when their hearts are moved.

I agree that we need to be able to make an account of the faith that is in us in such a way that those who do not believe feel challenged to open their hearts up to first the possibility of and then the reality of their loving creator.

A related sermon from the archives is Thoroughly Postmodern Paul.

peace,
Frank+
The Rev. Frank Logue, Pastor