You may be wondering how it went with the rest of that insufferable book "The Reason for God." I have here a summary of the second half of it, which author Timothy Keller calls "The Reasons for Faith." How good are those reasons, you may ask? Well, if you want to judge for yourself, you could go back to the original source, but this is what I got out of it.
The Clues of God
Here are a few variations on the question-begging appeal to ignorance and anthropocentric retro-probabilistic speculations based on a poor understanding of the Anthropic Principle. Let’s see you dodge that, atheists! [Fatherly chuckle].
The Knowledge of God
I can’t understand how atheists get their morals; therefore they actually believe in God but are in denial. Also, despite the fact that this argument is so incredibly brilliant and convincing, I still found it necessary to include 13 other chapters in this book to persuade my readers of what I know they already know.
The Problem of Sin
If you base your life on anything but God, your identity will become unstable, and you will lose your self. Isn’t that scary? So hand over your identity to God, and get an entirely new self. This may sound even scarier than what I just tried to scare you away from, but it is what God expects of us.
Religion and the Gospel
Religious people think they can save themselves through good behavior. These people are actually worse sinners than everyone else, because they are self-righteous. But Christianity is not a Religion. It’s a Gospel. True Christians behave well because they are Saved, they don’t behave well in order to be saved. Therefore, they are not self-righteous.
The (True) Story of the Cross
Think about the last time you forgave someone. It hurt, didn’t it? It hurt Jesus too—and he showed it physically. He also had to suffer to show solidarity with us in our own suffering; he wouldn’t really be showing us love otherwise, because in order to understand what someone is going through, you have to go through it yourself. For example, if someone is bleeding, you cut yourself and bleed with them, you don’t just make meaningless pity-noises.
The Reality of the Resurrection
The Resurrection must have really happened because religious movements never gain any traction if they make false claims that people in the wider culture would find ridiculous.
The Dance of God
The Father loves the Son loves the Holy Spirit loves you! Come on, you know you want to believe it.
Epilogue: Where do we go from here?
It doesn’t matter if it isn’t clear to you how you’re going to be able to swallow the huge pile of garbage I’ve just dealt you. Just repent before God for all the times you’ve ever trusted anyone or anything but Him, join a True Christian church, and pray that it’ll sort itself out.
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
No comments:
Post a Comment