Why Christianity?
As I go through my Journey, I have been writing letters to you to join me. Below are the letters I have been writing to convince you that Christianity is worthy of your lifelong consideration. No one reason will convince you, but perhaps a mountain of reasons will.
14 Proofs that God Exists
PROOF FROM MORALITY:
If morality is objective and absolute, God must exist.
Morality is objective and absolute.
Therefore, God must exist.
PROOF FROM CONSCIOUSNESS:
Irreducible consciousness exists
the best explanation for irreducible consciousness is either theism or naturalism
it's not naturalism.
Therefore, theism is the most probable explanation for the existence of irreducible consciousness
PROOF FROM BEAUTY:
If God does not exist, objective beauty and human perception of it would not exist.
Objective Beauty and Human perception of it does exist.
Therefore, God exists.
PROOF FROM MATHEMATICS:
If God does not exist, the applicability of mathematics to the physical world is just a happy coincidence.
The applicability of mathematics to the physical world is not just a happy coincidence.
Therefore, God exists
PROOF FROM COSMOLOGY:
Whatever begins to exist has a cause of its existence.
The universe began to exist.
Therefore, the universe has a cause of its existence.
PROOF FROM TELEOLOGY:
Every contingent object such that we know whether or not it was the product of intelligent design, was the product of intelligent design.
The universe is a contingent object.
So probably the universe is designed.
PROOF FROM EXPERIENCE:
There are compelling reasons for believing that claims of religious experience point to and validate spiritual realities that exist in a way that transcends material manifestation; According to materialism, nothing exists in a way that transcends material manifestation; According to classical theism, God endows human beings with the ability to perceive – although imperfectly – religious, spiritual and/or transcendent realities through religious, spiritual and/or transcendent experience.
To the extent that premise 1 is accepted, therefore, theism is more plausible than materialism.
PROOF FROM INTELLIGIBILITY:
The universal intelligibility of nature, which is the presupposition of all science, can only be explained through recourse to an infinite and creative mind which has thought the world into being. No scientist could even begin to work unless and until he assumed that the aspect of nature he was investigating was knowable, intelligible, marked by form. But this fundamentally mystical assumption rests upon the conviction that whatever he comes to know through his scientific work is simply an act of re-thinking or re-cognizing what a far greater mind has already conceived.
PROOF FROM DESIRE:
We have good reason to think that all of our natural desires have existing objects that satisfy those desires.
There exists, in most people, a natural desire (that is, the inconsolable longing) which is satisfied by neither anything within the range of sensory experience nor by anything in the natural world.
Therefore, we have good reason to think that something exists beyond the range of sensory experience and beyond the natural world that can satisfy the inconsolable longing.
If we have good reason to think that something exists beyond the range of sensory experience and beyond the natural world that can satisfy the inconsolable longing, then we have some good reason to think that God exists.
Therefore, we have some good reason to think that God exists.
THOMAS AQUINAS’ FIVE PROOFS:
1. The Proof from Motion: Our senses can perceive motion by seeing that things act on one another. Whatever moves is moved by something else. Consequently, there must be a First Mover that creates this chain reaction of motions. This is God. God sets all things in motion and gives them their potential.
2. The Proof from Efficient Cause: Because nothing can cause itself, everything must have a cause or something that creates an effect on another thing. Without a first cause, there would be no others. Therefore, the First Cause is God.
3. The Proof from Necessary Being: Because objects in the world come into existence and pass out of it, it is possible for those objects to exist or not exist at any particular time. However, nothing can come from nothing. This means something must exist at all times. This is God.
4. The Proof from Gradation: There are different degrees of goodness in different things. Following the “Great Chain of Being,” which states there is a gradual increase in complexity, created objects move from unformed inorganic matter to biologically complex organisms. Therefore, there must be a being of the highest form of good. This perfect being is God.
5. The Proof from Design: All things have an order or arrangement that leads them to a particular goal. Because the order of the universe cannot be the result of chance, design and purpose must be at work. This implies divine intelligence on the part of the designer. This is God.
THE WAGER
Either God exists or God does not exist, and you can either wager for God or wager against God. The utilities of the relevant possible outcomes are as follows, where f1, f2, and f3 are numbers whose values are not specified beyond the requirement that they be finite:
Rationality requires the probability that you assign to God existing to be positive, and not infinitesimal.
Rationality requires you to perform the act of maximum expected utility (when there is one).
Conclusion 1. Rationality requires you to wager for God.
Conclusion 2. You should wager for God.
An investigation into the Meaning of Life
Defining Terms:
Meaning" defined:
What is intended to convey, indicate, or refer to (a particular thing or notion); signify, by words, text, concepts, or actions.
"Life" defined:
The period between the birth and death of a living thing, especially a human being.
So we can define the "Meaning of Life" as:
What is intended to be conveyed, indicated, or referred to by the period between the birth and death of a living thing, especially a human being.
Today, the consensus of google search results for the meaning of life would have you believe that:
"… there is no meaning in life outside of that which we can find by ourselves as a species." - SchoolofLife.com
"… we are better off creating our own purpose or purposes." - Psychologytoday.com
"For what it’s worth, I don’t think life has a purpose, but I do think it has value" - Wired.co.uk
These are all shallow answers to a deep question as old as humankind, and these answers for living a truly meaningful life do not seem adequate to describe something as important as our life. Imagine for example, watching an eighty-year long movie, and at the end, the reveal is that it had no purpose or meaning at all; you would understandably be frustrated and upset. Then, imagine that someone spoiled it and revealed the pointless nature from the outset, how quickly would attention, and attendance, dwindle! Yet, in reality, many of us have been made to feel that there is no point to this movie called life. There is no wonder that with this sentiment, distractions, addictions, and depression abound; the turmoil that this contradiction, that life has no meaning and that we should act like it has meaning, creates takes grip of us because when we begin to believe there is no meaning, or that our meaning is arbitrary, we undermine ourselves making it more difficult to find the motivation to overcome the daily difficulties of life and to make the sacrifices required for a better future. Why struggle today when it doesn't make a difference in the final analysis?
So how can we discover the meaning of life?
If we want to know something in life, we usually ask someone who knows or has been in a position to know what we don’t. We go ask our parents, who are older and wiser than we are; or perhaps our grandparents, who are yet older and wiser than our parents. This question though is unique in that all humans are in a position to know what the meaning of life is since all humans have lived. So if we want the best answer, we should look to the collective answers of the entire corpus of humanity. But how can we ask the past? We can look to see what our ancestors have handed down through time and accept their relics as cast votes for what they deemed as meaningful. If we do this, we can quickly see that art, literature and architecture are among the most resilient artifacts. So if we examine the remains of our forefathers' efforts, we begin to see a pattern of meaning emerge.
What is the consensus of our ancestors’ answer to the question of the meaning of life?
When we look at the total number of human life hours expended in all creative endeavors that have ever existed, we see a very clear pronounced consensus of incalculable size on one theme that can readily be seen by a visit to any country. There are over 37 million churches in the world. There have been over 5 billion Bibles printed. There are hundreds of thousands of priceless artistic masterpieces exploring the subjects and stories of the Bible. There have been an estimated 14 billion Christians who participated in building up this rich body of work. The subject of God has been so thoroughly fleshed out in Christendom by the nuances of architecture, literature, and art that if we really want to know what the meaning of life is all we have to do is commit to engaging, and wrestling with this treasure trove our ancestors have left us. If we do wrestle with it, it would seem bringing glory to God was the meaning of their lives, or rather that their lives were intended to convey, indicate, or refer to God in someway. Why did they dedicate so much time and effort to God? Who is God? What does it mean to glorify God with your life? How do the answers to these questions help us in today's world? These are all questions as old as mankind itself, and the Bible holds man's inspired attempt at elucidating what this means. One motif in Christianity is that of a wise man’s long, slow, committed journey to the star afar off in the distance. The star being God, and one of the ideas being that no matter where we are in the movie of our life, we can change the plot and head to the light of the Truth. Eventually, if we follow this star far enough, even if we don’t take the most direct route, we will be shaped into a more resilient, more fulfilled, more satisfied person. Once our sojourn is over, our spirit will be formed in a way pleasing and satisfying to God. Moreover we will have left the fruits of our journey for others to observe and ponder what gave us the strength to overcome, just as we look today at the monumental achievements of our forefathers and can see God working through them.
In Good Company
These quotes, of highly distinguished individuals, represent a small sampling of the estimated 14 billion Christians that exist. If not for the faith of these individuals, the world would arguably be indistinguishable from what it is today. From the creation of the printing press to the creation of science, and many of its foundational findings, God has been at work.
Johannes Gutenberg—“It is a press, certainly, but a press from which shall flow in inexhaustible streams. Through it, God will spread His Word. A spring of truth shall flow from it: like a new star it shall scatter the darkness of ignorance, and cause a light heretofore unknown to shine amongst men. “
Christopher Columbus—“It was the Lord who put into my mind that fact that it would be possible to sail from here to the Indies. All who heard of my project rejected it with laughter, ridiculing me. There is no question that the inspiration was from the Holy Spirit, because He comforted me with rays of marvelous inspiration from the Holy Scriptures.”
Leonardo da Vinci—”It is true that impatience, the mother of stupidity, praises brevity, as if such persons had not life long enough to serve them to acquire a complete knowledge of one single subject, such as the human body; and then they want to comprehend the mind of God in which the universe is included, weighing it minutely and mincing it into infinite parts, as if they had to dissect it!”
Nicholas Copernicus—”To know the mighty works of God, to comprehend His wisdom and majesty and power; to appreciate, in degree, the wonderful workings of His laws, surely all this must be a pleasing and acceptable mode of worship to the Most High, to whom ignorance cannot be more grateful than knowledge.
Sir Francis Bacon—“God has, in fact, written two books, not just one. Of course, we are all familiar with the first book he wrote, namely Scripture. But he has written a second book called creation.”
Galileo Galilei—“Mathematics is the language in which God has written the universe”
William Shakespeare— ”Now, God be praised, that to believing souls gives light in darkness, comfort in
despair. “
Blaise Pascal—“Knowing God without knowing our own wretchedness makes for pride. Knowing our own wretchedness without knowing God makes for despair. Knowing Jesus Christ strikes the balance because he shows us both God and our own wretchedness.”
Robert Boyle—”God may rationally be supposed to have framed so great and admirable an automaton as the world for special ends and purposes.”
Sir Isaac Newton—”It is the perfection of God's works that they are all done with the greatest simplicity. He is the God of order and not of confusion. And therefore as they would understand the frame of the world must endeavor to reduce their knowledge to all possible simplicity, so must it be in seeking to understand these visions.”
Michael Faraday—”Since peace is alone the gift of God, and as it is He who gives it, why should we be afraid? His unspeakable gift in His beloved Son is the ground of no doubtful hope.”
Louis Pasteur—”Little science takes you away from God but more of it takes you to Him.”
Thomas Edison—”I believe in the existence of a Supreme Intelligence pervading the Universe.”
John Adams—”The Declaration of Independence laid the cornerstone of human government upon the first precepts of Christianity.”
Benjamin Franklin—”Freedom is not a gift bestowed upon us by other men, but a right that belongs to us by the laws of God and nature.”
Thomas Jefferson—”Resistance to tyrants is obedience to God.”
George Washington—“Whereas it becomes us humbly to approach the throne of Almighty God, with gratitude and praise for the wonders which his goodness has wrought in conducting our fore-fathers to this western world…and above all, that he hath diffused the glorious light of the gospel, whereby, through the merits of our gracious Redeemer, we may become the heirs of his eternal glory.”
Abraham Lincoln—”In regards to this great Book [the Bible], I have but to say it is the best gift God has given to man. All the good the Savior gave to the world was communicated through this Book. But for it we could not know right from wrong. All things most desirable for man's welfare, here and hereafter, are found portrayed in it.”
Alexander Hamilton—”Whether the New Constitution, if adopted, will prove adequate to such desirable ends, time, the mother of events, will show. For my own part, I sincerely esteem it a system, which, without the finger of God, never could have been suggested and agreed upon by such a diversity of interests.”
Alexander Graham Bell—”God has strewn our paths with wonders and we certainly should not go through life with our eyes shut.”
C.S. Lewis—”A man can no more diminish God's glory by refusing to worship Him than a lunatic can put out the sun by scribbling the word, 'darkness' on the walls of his cell.”
J. R. R. Tolkien—”The chief purpose of life, for any of us, is to increase according to our capacity our knowledge of God by all means we have, and to be moved by it to praise and thanks.”
Franklin D. Roosevelt—”In teaching this democratic faith to American children, we need the sustaining, buttressing aid of those great ethical religious teachings which are the heritage of our modern civilization. For ‘not upon strength nor upon power, but upon the spirit of God’ shall our democracy be founded.”
Martin Luther King, Jr.—”In order to be true to one's conscience and true to God, a righteous man has no alternative but to refuse to cooperate with an evil system.”