Is There A God?
Often, on the 'A Friend In The Night' radio program I speak about God
and assume His existence. I think that most of the listeners assume the
same so we communicate on that level. I am aware, though, that not all
who 'happen' upon the program - or perhaps even some regular listeners
have that same starting point when thinking about life, meaning, and
afterlife. I covered the subject of the existence of God on the
broadcast that aired on the weekend of Sept. 24-25, 2005 and thought it
would be appropriate to add a page on the web site that gives more
information on the subject.
As I mentioned in the program a number of excellent sites exist on
the subject; rather than duplicate their efforts I link to them below.
However, I would like to raise several points to start the thinking
process – to give you a peek at the amazing subject.
First allow me to give an example of the need for this article. A
number of people say that they don't believe in God – Any God. One
person wrote that he holds that position and gave several reasons, his
inability to understand the concept of Hell being one of them. But just
after the reference to Hell he ended his remarks by saying, "Hope
I'm right!"
It is not unkind to say that "Hope I'm right" is a little
scary when you think about the consequences of being wrong. I think most
people, even those who are not sure would agree that IF there IS a God
knowing so is vitally important. Thinking that there is no God if there
is one may be the most dangerous thing we could do since it causes us to
make choices based on false information. Additionally, once we believe
He exists there is the matter of knowing what he expects of us. I hope
our Gospel page will help answer your questions
on what He expects of us, and that the few thoughts and links below will
help you know that He indeed does exist.
Of the few points that I want to make before you visit the other
sites perhaps the most important point is that if God does exist then He
exists whether we believe in Him or not. It is intellectually dishonest
to say, "If you believe in God then He exists for you but I do not
believe, therefore He does not exist for me." Now, it may be
PERFECTLY accurate to say "If you believe in God then you
should ACT like He exists, but since I don't believe in God I will ACT
as if He DOES NOT exist". However, it is silly to say that God can
exist and not exist at the same time.
Someone once said, "Everyone is entitled to their own opinion
but no one is entitled to their own facts." One of the
tragedies of our day is that many people have become convinced that
something can be objectively true and not true at the same time. When we
speak of preferences (subjective) then of course there are differences;
my favorite color is blue and that is true for me even if it is not true
for you. But the same cannot be said when it comes to objective truth;
for example, the earth cannot be shaped like a sphere (round) and like a
disk (flat) at the same time. Subjective truth (opinion) is true when it
is held or believed by someone. On the other hand, objective truth is
true whether anyone believes it or not; it is only when we align
ourselves with that truth that we become right.
The links below will help you as you set out on an honest search for
God but allow me to give you several points over which I stumble
regarding the evolutionary model. These points do not prove the
existence of God but they point out the issues we must struggle with if
we are to conclude that God does not exist and therefore all that
see, hear, and touch is the product of chance. The two belief systems
– and yes, creation (God) and evolution (not God) are both faith
systems – give different accounts of how what exists came to be. I
truly believe that it will help us in our search to find out that the
‘obvious’ answers are not quite so obvious after all.
Some say that it must have taken millions of years for things to
develop on their own and others say that things came into being over a
shorter time by supernatural effort. In a nutshell, here is a small
sampling of what we are up against in the evolutionary (not God)
spectrum:
