Nevertheless - that's it. Let My People Think
and we are grateful that you all do, and that
is why you are here at this conference. I
esteem R.C. as one of the great heroes of
the faith today and the line up that he has
got in here, I wonder why I am actually here.
In fact I was thinking of the subject they
have given me - The Existence of God. You
know I wish I could just say "listen to what
the others have said, and that demonstrates
it and we're okay." But, it reminds me of the
two guys who were sitting for an exam, and
at the end of the exam they were being interviewed
for the job. And the man says "You know I've
got a problem. Both of you guys have answered
the questions exactly the same way. Word for
word. There is no difference in your answers.
But I am going to give it to this gentleman
rather than to you." And the guy got offended
and said "How come if our answers are identical
are you giving it to him and not to me?" "He
says there was one difference, in one of the
questions, his answer was "I don't know the
answer to this question." And your answer
was "Neither do I." So I just feel like saying
"So do I, to what you have just heard." I
remember when I was at graduate school I sent
my doctrinal examination question and we had
these tiny little apartments and you had to
get no help, just your Bible next to you,
and it was a multiple page thing. The opening
question was: "God is perfect, explain." So
I turned to my wife and said "The only more
difficult thing I could think of is: Define
God and give two examples." Now, the fascinating
thing, the fascinating thing about that question
is that there was just this much space in
which to do the explaining, and I was grateful
for that because the longer the answer the
greater the possibility of heresy on something
like that. So I answered it in one line "He
is the only entity in existence, the reason
for whose existence is in Himself." All other
entities or quantities exist by virtue of
something else. And in that sense He alone
is perfect, uncaused infinite, independent,
being in essence. And so when we talk today
about a subject as transcendingly intimidating
as that we've got a tough subject on hand.
So I'm going to take it in three phases.
The first thing I am going to talk about is,
the intense philosophical problems that arise
from the denial of God's existence. Number
two, how then do we demonstrate God's existence.
And number three, why is the Christian faith
unique in representing this particular notion
of God and who He is? That is a tall order
with in a few minutes on hand, but we will
make our attempt to do so. So, put your thinking
caps on and race along with me. We will try
and do our best, and hopefully the other message
converge at the same time. Many of you are
familiar with these lines of Friedrich Nietzsche.
Nietzsche had poignancy to what he said, and
in many ways he also had a candor to what
he said. He broke new ground. He did not coin
the phrase "God is dead." He popularized it.
He was the son of a minister and both of his
grandfather's were in the ministry. But this
brilliant man who was born in 1844, and died
in 1900 did so much in that short span of
time. And, ironically lived out his own sense
of nihilistic thought. When he died - the
last fourteen years he spent insane. And in
periods of silence would suddenly break into
scriptures that he had learned as a young
lad. But listen to how he words it. "Have
you not heard of that madman who lit a lantern
in the bright morning hours, ran to the market
place and cried incessantly. "I am looking
for God, I am looking for God." As many of
those who did not believe in God were standing
together there, He excited considerable after.
"Have you lost Him then?" Said one, "Did He
loose His way like a child?" Said another.
"Or is He hiding? Is He afraid of us? Has
He gone on a voyage or emigrated?" So they
shouted and laughed, but the madman sprang
to them and pierced them with his glances.
"Where is God?" He cried. I'll tell you. We
have killed Him. You and I, we are all His
murders. But how did we do this? How were
we able to drink up the sea? Who gave us a
sponge to wipe away the entire horizon? What
did we do when we unchained this earth from
its sun? Whither is it moving now? Whither
are we moving now away from all suns maybe?
Are we not perpetually falling backwards and
forwards and side wards and in all directions?
Is there any up or down left? Are we not we
not straining to an infinite nothing? Do we
not feel the breath of empty space? Has it
not suddenly become colder? Is not more and
more night coming on us all the time? Must
not lanterns now have to be lit in the morning
hours? Do we not hear anything yet of the
noise of the grave diggers who are burying
God? Do we not smell anything yet of God's
decomposition, God's decompose too, you know,
and He is dead. He remains dead. We've killed
Him. Now, how shall we the murderer of all
murderers compose ourselves. Because that
which was holiest and mightiest of all that
the world has possessed has bled to death
under our knives. Who will wipe this blood
from us? With what water can we purify ourselves?
What festivals of atonement, what sacred games
will we need to invent? Is not this the greatest
of deeds too great for us? Must we not now
ourselves have to become simply to seem worthy
of what we have done. There have never been
a greater deed and whoever shall be born after
us for the sake of this deed shall be part
of a higher history that all history hither
to. It has been related further that on the
same day the madman entered diverse churches
and there sang a requiem "eternum deo." Let
out in quiet he is said to have retorted each
time "what are these churches now if they
are not the tombs and sepulchers of God. God
is dead. We have killed Him."" You know with
all due respect for Nietzsche, and regard
for him, the thing I like about him is his
candor. He is raising the right questions
of the implications of a God-less universe.
"Who gave us a sponge to wipe away the entire
horizon? Is there any up or down left? Must
not lanterns now have to be lit in the morning
hours?" What he is really saying is: This
is so humongous a deed that everything will
have to be redefined. Everything! And so the
atheist, if you will pardon the crassness
of it - my professor Dr. Guisler in my graduate
school days used to have a very dry wit and
he would say things like this "The atheist
is better at smelling rotten eggs than laying
good ones." He is right. They are able to
sort of take this blade and lacerate away.
Read Sam Harris' book The End of Faith. Read
his other book, A Letter to a Christian Nation,
where he is challenging America to shred this
vestige of God-talk and God-ideas. I am in
the process of writing a response to him,
which hopefully will be completed very soon.
I am calling it A Letter to Sam Harris on
Behalf of a Christian Nation. But they do
it. They jab away and they stab away. There
are three or four things - actually there
are several things, and I don’t have the
time to go into all of them, but there are
several entailments that they have struggles
with. The first is this: they have an intense
problem then with defining morality. How do
you talk up and down? How do you arrive at
a moral law? And their standard response is
"Look at all at all the evil that is around
us." I remember years ago at the University
of Nottingham, when I first began a student
stood up and said to me "There is no such
being as God, because of all the evil that
is around the world." I said "Can we talk
on that for a few moments?" He said "Yes."
I said "Remain standing. I'll talk to you."
I said "When you say there is such thing as
evil aren't you assuming that there is such
a thing as good?" He said "Yes” I said "When
you say there is such a thing as good, aren't
you assuming there is such a thing as a moral
law on the basis of which we should distinguish
between good and evil?" He struggled for a
few moments with that, and I reminded him
of that conversation between Frederick Coppleston
and Bertram Russell, when Bertram Russell
was pushed to the wall by Coppleston, Coppleston
said to him "Mr. Russell how do you differentiate
between good and bad?" Bertram Russell said
"The same way I differentiate between blue
and green." Mr. Coppleston said "Wait a minute,
you differentiate between blue and green by
seeing don't you?" "Yes" "How do you differentiate
between good and bad?" Bertram Russell said
"On the basis of feeling. What else?" Now
wait a minute Coppleston was a kind man, he
really should have turned to Lord Russell
and said to him "Mr. Russell, in some cultures
they love their neighbors and in other cultures
they eat them, both on the basis of feeling,
do you have any personal preference?" How
can this brilliant mathematician/philosopher
make so basic an error? But he admitted it
in a letter to the Observer he said "I do
not know how to deal with this issue of morality."
It taunts me. You see the question of a moral
law, it comes within us. So, I said to him
"When you say that there is such a thing as
evil, aren't you assuming that there is such
a thing as good?" He said "Yes." I said "When
you say that there is such a thing as good,
you must assume a moral law." He said "Alright,
I'll grant you that." I said "But when you
say that there is such a thing as moral law,
you must posit a moral law giver, but that
is whom you are trying to disprove and not
prove. If there is no moral law giver, there
is not moral law. If there is no moral law
there is no good. If there is not good there
is no evil. What is your question?" He looked
at me, and I quote he says "What then, am
I asking you?" I said "I'm not going to help
you." Now, granted if you are a thinking person
you'd say "Ravi, how do you get from the moral
law to the moral law giver. Is that not an
extrapolational jump?" And in the Q & A time
if that question comes I'll be very happy
to deal with it. Right now my time is very
tight. So, I've got to go on. The problem
of evil, when you raise it you raise the question
of the nature of good. And when you raise
the question of the nature of good, you have
to start wondering "How do you really arrive
at the reality of good and evil when there
is no God?" Do you know what Richard Dawkins
has now come up with? Dawkins has gone so
far as to say "We have to deny the reality
of evil, if our argument is going to stay."
So he actually denies there is any such thing
as evil. I was flying out of a country where
I sat next to a woman who rescues women and
children from abuse. I won't name the country.
But she told me - she was a Dutch lady. I
said "were you successful?" She said "I saw
the worst thing I've seen last night." She
said "In this area of this city called snake
alley, men come at night, they consume a concoction
of snakes blood and hard liquor. It ravages
the mind and whatever they want they are given.
She said, I rescued an 18 month old baby girl
from the arms of this man who was sexually
plundering her, because that is what he wanted
under the influence of snakes' blood and hard
liquor." Mr. Dawkins, is that evil? Can you
imagine their walk human beings for human
that is pleasure? Is this the ravaging of
just the brain or ravaging of the soul? Dawkins
says "No, we are dancing to our DNA.” Is
that what he was doing?" It is easy to say
"God is dead. God doesn't exist." How then
do you make any moral pronouncements of any
kind? Alan Dershowitz from Harvard "I don't
know if there is good, but I have to say there
is such a thing as evil." What? Yesterday's
USA Today, an article advertised on the front
page, and then in the book section a recent
psychiatric study at actually saying evil
is real. Evil is real. And then they bring
all the gurus to try and counter the point.
There is no moral law. There is no rational
way. And just in case you think I am making
this up, listen to the most brilliant prolific
Canadian atheistic philosopher, Kyle Neilson
"We have not been able to show that reason
requires the moral point or few, or that really
rational persons" listen to this qualifier
"or that really rational persons aren't hoodwinked
by myth or ideology need not be individual
egoists or classical amoralists. Reason does
not decide here. The picture I have painted
for you is not a pleasant one. Reflection
on this actually depresses me. Pure practical
reason, even with a good knowledge of the
facts, will not lead you to morality." This
is an atheist saying that. Rationally you
can not get there. Listen to Bertram Russell,
He says this "I can not live as though ethical
values were simply a matter of personal taste."
And he says "I do not know the solution to
this." And so, to deny the existence of God
is to take you out of the realm of moral postulates.
Secondly, it takes you out of the realm of
meaning. You have no absolute way of positing
meaning anymore. What meaning actually means.
Listen for example to Stephen J Gould of Harvard.
The late Stephen J Gould I should say - the
paleontologist well known in his stridency.
This is what he says "We are here because
one odd group of fishes had a peculiar fin
anatomy that could transform into legs for
terrestrial creatures. We are here because
comets struck the earth and wiped out dinosaurs,
thereby giving mammals a chance not otherwise
available. So thank your lucky stars. Because
the earth never froze entirely during and
ice age, because a small and tenuous species
arising in Africa a quarter of a million years
ago has managed so far to survive by hook
and by crook. We may yearn for a higher answer
but believe me none exists. These explanations
though superficially troubling if not terrifying
is ultimately liberating and exhilarating."
Do you feel exhilarated? "We can not read
the meaning of life passively in the facts
of nature. We must construct these ourselves
from our own wisdom and ethical sense. There
is simply no other way." That is why the rock
musician says "knowledge is a deadly friend
when no one sets the rules. The fate of all
mankind I see is in the hands of fools. Confusion
will be my epitaph has I crawl a cracked and
broken path. If I make it we can all sit back
and laugh. But I'm afraid tomorrow I'll be
crying." No moral law, no meaning. And lastly,
for the atheist among many other things - there
is no hope. There is really no hope. Do you
know how much this world longs for hope? Let
me give you an incredible illustration of
this. I was in Lebanon a few weeks ago and
my traveling associate Philip was with me
having breakfast with some Iraqi's and a pastor
from Iraq was telling us that three weeks
before we were conversing, he was driving
along the streets of Baghdad. (He is a young
man with a young family.) He said "Suddenly
a huge booming sound. My car actually was
lifted off the road. I looked around and buildings
around me were collapsing and I literally
saw one man's limbs flying off his body as
he fell onto the sidewalk there. He said "I
had to stop my head felt cold and as I touched
my face, blood was pouring out of my ears
from the concussion. He said "I was in a state
of shock and taken to the hospital." He said
"Brother Ravi, we live with this everyday.
When I say goodbye to my children in the morning
I never know if I am going to see them at
the end of the day." And so Hassan was chatting.
I leaned forward and I said "Hassan, is it
good or bad what has happened in Iraq - what
we did?" I said "I want to hear it from your
mouth. Tell me." He said "Before America came
to our help we were living with a lot of pain
- everyday pain. After America has come to
help us we still live with a lot of pain,
but now we have pain with some hope."
You don't have to agree with him. I don't
have to agree with him. I'm not saying that.
I'm not making a political statement here.
I am just telling you this, a man who just
had his car and life nearly blown up is looking
you in the eye and saying "We could not live
with out hope." Today's story in the Houston
Chronicle an eleven year old boy who for one
year has fought for custody of his baby sister,
who was described as nothing more than fetus
hollowly - still born. Thirty some weeks or
something like that pregnant; I forget how
long it was - stillborn. The mother is in
drug rehab. The father can not be found. This
eleven year old boy goes to the medical authorities
and asks for the body of his sister, for one
year he fought it, and he got the little body
back. He takes three of cousins and conducts
the funeral with some stuffed animals and
some flowers and a pink blanket. He lost his
dad when he was one year old. He says "Now
my sister Rachel" Who had no name in the morgue,
he has given her the name Rachel. "Now my
sister Rachel and my daddy are in heaven together."
The Houston Chronicle writer says "Very rarely
in life can you use the word "greatness" but
I looked into the eyes of this eleven year
old boy and I was looking at greatness.”
Hope it has got nothing to give to you. You
die and it is nothing more than a physical
compilation of atoms that had no prevision
of what it was forming. And so you denounce
God and you end up with no moral law, and
no meaning, and no hope. Alright what does
that do about the existence of God then? How
do we even try to demonstrate that? Let me
get into some - a little bit of an argumentation
here and you may not be able to write as fast
as we speak this, but thankfully you are able
to hear it again and at least make notes on
it. I don't use PowerPoint, I'm technologically
challenged. I always say "He gives me the
power and I try to make the point, and if
you can get it that way, it's okay." Last
week I was lecturing somewhere and I asked
them for an overhead projector and they said
"What's that?" I said the inventor of the
overhead projector has just been terribly
insulted by you. He spent all his life doing
that and you don't know what it is. There
are many ways to argue this. R.C. is just
a master of this with his knowledge of Aquinas
and Augustine and many of them who have given
such powerful - especially Aquinas who was
the master theologian and thinker of his time
with his five ways and so on. Basically no
matter what kinds of arguments you have heard,
they filter down to two or three very strong
forms. Some people like to call them proofs.
Some people like to call them evidences. Some
like to call them arguments. Some like to
call them the coherence factor. I like the
way Dallas Willard has summarized it, taken
the best of these and actually come up with
three stages of argument. Here is the first
stage. Stage number one, it is the nature
and existence of the physical reality that
we see. Now listen to this statement very
carefully. "However concrete physical reality
is sectioned up, the result will be a state
of affairs which owns it's being to something
other than itself." No matter how you section
down physical concrete reality, no matter
how small you break it down. No matter what
you do with it, you end up with a state of
affairs that that physical quantity owes it's
being to something else and does not - it
is not self existent. It is not self explanatory.
If I were to bring an apple to you and show
it to you, you can cut that apple down. You
can grate it. You can slice it. You can take
it under all kinds of telescopic or microscopic
study, whatever it is; you will end up with
the same reality. It doesn't explain its own
existence. Now, that every physical state,
listen now, no matter how inclusive has a
necessary condition in some specific type
of state which precedes it in time and is
fully existent prior to the emergence of the
state which it conditions. What does that
mean? You take this apple. You know the apple
didn't bring itself into being. Whatever was
needed to bring that apple into being, a full
grown tree, in your backyard or whatever,
had to pre-exist. And all the conditions needed
for that tree to exist prior to the bringing
forth of this apple had to be completed in
time in order that this apple could be a blossom
and then ultimately grow as a fruit on that
tree. The apple doesn't explain its own existence.
It is dependent upon something which also
had to be completed in time in order to produce
the entity you are discussing. But, the reality
is, neither does the tree explain its own
existence. You go back across a series of
physical causes and there is not one example
in the physical universe of a physical quantity
that explains its own existence. And to add
to it, if you start back from the apple I'm
illustrating and go back all the way to the
series of causes, you can not have an infinite
series of causes in time, because if you had
to have the infinite series of causes if would
never have arrived at this moment. If you
have a domino called X, and you have to have
an infinite number of dominoes falling before
X falls, you will never get to X because you
will need an infinite number of dominoes to
fall. So what is that we have posited by this
point? No physical quantity explains its own
existence, and no amount of time can consume
an infinite series of events to bring you
to the present. Which means all these "somewhere”
have to be explained by one self-existent
cause which is not physical. Because a physical
quantity as we know it in reality can not
explain own existence. C.S. Lewis puts it
this way "an egg which came from no bird is
no more natural than a bird that existence
from eternity." And egg which came from no
bird is no more natural than a bird which
had existed from eternity. So stage one is
that we do not have one instance of a physical
quantity that completely explains its own
existence. Stage number two, it is the argument
to design, not from design. Try and understand
the difference. It is a very important difference.
It is the argument to design, and not argument
from design. What is an argument from design?
If you take the vastness of the universe for
example. Think about it. There are flames
of the surface of the sun which are forty
times higher than the entire dimension of
this earth, massive, massive flames. I remember
teaming up with an astrophysicist in South
Africa and he was showing a slide at the University
of Technikon Witwastersrand in Johannesburg
where we were lecturing together. And he said
"if you look at that picture there," David
Lock said "There is a hundred billion stars
on that screen." He said "If you start counting
them now, and counted one star per second
you would have to be here 2500 years." Just
the vastness of it. I remember doing a course
in quantum theory under the famed quantum
- physicist John Polkinghorne president at
Queen's College Cambridge. He was a late-comer
to Christ. Polkinghorne once talked about
all of the contingencies in the early peco-seconds
of the universe. Do you know what a peco-second
is? A peco-second is that amount of time which
elapses when it takes something traveling
the speed of light to cross the strand of
a single breath of hair. That is a peco-second
which means almost abstract when you think
about it. In the early peco-seconds of the
universe he talked about the contingencies.
Here is what Polkinghorn said to us. He said
"You know, take the expansion / contraction
ratio. He had to be so exact, margin of error
so small." He said "It would be like taking
aim at a one square inch object at the other
end of the known universe twenty billion light
years away and hitting it bull's eye." That's
just one contingency. And then in typical
British understatement he turned to us and
said "You know gentlemen, there is no free
lunch. Somebody had to pay." That's an argument
from design. What do we mean by an argument
to design? The argument to design, and I want
you to understand me very carefully now. Evolution
is not an explanation for ultimate origins.
It is not an explanation for ultimate origins.
Evolution doesn't explain the big bang. Did
the big bang evolve? What caused the big bang?
If you were in your room sleeping at 3:00
in the morning and heard a little bang, you'd
want to know what the little bang was. We
just think we've talked about the big bang
and we've solved it? The big bang didn't evolve.
I remember talking to a group of scientists
at the University of Florida having dinner
together. I'm not very comfortable with scientist.
If you are one of them forgive me. I know
philosophers can be boring too. I remember
Lee Stroble telling me he blames me for his
son going into philosophy. He looked at his
son one day and he said "Do you know what
is the difference between a philosopher and
a large pizza?" And his son said "Is this
trick question?" "Do you know the difference
son?" And he said "What?" He said "Do you
know the difference between a philosopher
and a large pizza?" He said "Tell me dad."
And Lee said to him "A large pizza can feed
a family of four." So, we are having dinner,
physicist and myself waiting for the dinner
to be over so that I could leave and sound
normal again. I said to them "Alright, you
boys are naturalists. You take exception to
metaphysicians. You're naturalists. What is
the big bang?" They said "Well, it's where
everything was reduced to a singularity."
I said "And? Don't you always say it where
the laws of physics actually break down?"
"That's true." I said "So, even your starting
point is not natural." If the laws of physics
break down at a singularity then you are starting
point is also not natural. Do you know what
one of them said to me? "We retain a selective
sovereignty over the issues we like to extrapolate
from." Now, I'm not knocking science, I'm
just telling you this. Not all order has evolved.
The argument to design - there is configuration
and a coalescing of intelligent entities and
quantities that pre-dispose the possibility
of the resulting entity that came into being.
I had dinner with Francis Collins, the co-mapper
of the human DNA. He said to me when I finished
my studies on it. He said very simply "I have
to say this to you, I felt I was looking at
the book of life. 3.1 billion bits of information."
When I finished speaking at John's Hopkins
prior to me was Francis Collins. My wife was
with me and we were listening to his talk.
It was one of the most spectacular things
I've ever seen. He showed us on the screen
a beautiful geometrically perfect stain-glass
from Yorkman’s Cathedral in England and
he put it up on the screen. We were wowed.
Then he divides the screen and on right he
shows a slide of the design of the human DNA.
There was an audible sound in the audience
like "Wow." And most of them were skeptics.
When I see the heavens and the work of your
hands, the moon and the stars which you have
made what is there in man that you should
keep him in mind? For you have set our glory
above the heavens. No wonder in Dec of 1968
when the boys were going around the dark side
of the moon, and they vouchsafed a glimpse
of this earth given to no human eye. And they
saw earth rising over the horizon of the moon
draped in a beauteous mixture of black, blue
and white garlanded by the glistening light
of the sun against the black void of space,
there was only one line that came to their
minds, as the world waited. No, it wasn't
Stephen J Gould. It wasn’t' Russell. It
wasn't Nietzsche. It was the opening lines
of the Bible. "In the beginning God..." Stage
One: No physical quantity explains its own
physical existence. Stage Two: There is an
argument to design. No matter how you slice
it down there is a coalescing of intelligent
components that made it possible to even bring
this type of thing into existence. You know
that is why people like Hume, and Einstein
and Orwell were what you would call second
grade theists. They sort of talked about a
mind, but didn't know where to park that mind.
They didn't know where to park it because
they didn't want the person of God brought
into the scene. That's stage two. Stage Three:
The course of human events, historical, social
and individual within the context of a demonstrated
extra-naturalism (that is stage one), and
of a quite plausible cosmic intellectualism
(stage two.) Let me repeat that statement.
The course of human events (and these aren't
my words they are Dallas Willard's words).
The course of human events, historical, social
and individual within the context of a demonstrated
extra-naturalism (stage one) and of a quite
plausible cosmic intellectualism (stage two.)
Now, I could take you to many place from here
with that. If you look at the course of human
events, you end up with this fact, how do
you explain many things in history? Do you
remember the famous parable by Anthony Flue
and wisdom? You've got to hear this carefully
because John Frame has made a tremendous response
to it. Listen carefully please. Once upon
a time two explorers came up on a clearing
in the jungle. In the clearing were growing
many flowers and many weeds. On explorer says
"Some gardener must tend this plot." So they
pitched their tents and set to watch. No gardeners
is ever seen. "But perhaps he is an invisible
gardener?" So they set up a barbed wire fence
which they electrified and they patrol it
with bloodhounds. But no shrieks ever suggest
that some intruder has received a shock. No
movements of the wire ever betray an invisible
climber. The bloodhounds never give cry. Yet
still, the believer is not convinced. "There
is a gardener, invisible, intangible, insensible
to electric shocks, a gardener who makes no
scent and makes no sound, a gardener who comes
secretly to come look after the garden which
he loves." At last the skeptic despairs, "but
what remains of your original assertion. Just
how does what you call an invisible, intangible,
eternally illusive gardener differ from an
imaginary gardener, or even from no gardener
at all?" Here's the question. How does what
you call an invisible, intangible, eternally
illusive gardener differ from an imaginary
gardener, or even no gardener at all? John
Frame in his Apologetics to the glory of God,
begins with this "Once upon a time, two explorers
came upon a clearing in the jungle. A man
was there pulling weeds, applying fertilizer
and trimming branches. The man turned to the
explorers and introduced himself as the royal
gardener. One explorer shook his hand and
exchanged pleasantries. The other ignored
the gardener and turned away. "There can be
no gardener in this part of the jungle." He
said "This must be some trick. Some one is
trying to discredit our previous findings."
They pitched camp. Every day the gardener
arrives and tends the plot. Soon the plot
is bursting with perfectly arranged blooms.
"He is only doing it because we are here to
fool us into thinking this is a royal garden."
But one day the gardener takes them to a royal
palace. He introduces the explorers to a score
of officials who verify the gardeners status
and the skeptic tries a last resort "Our senses
are decieving us. There is no gardener, no
blooms, no palace, and no officials. It is
all a hoax." Finally the believer despairs
"But what remains of your original assertion,
just how does this mirage as you call it differ
from a real gardener?" Do you follow the point?
The gardener did come. And the gardener was
seen. Let me give to your three or four reasons
why this gardener reveals God so perfectly.
First, his description of the human condition.
He points to your heart and my heart so accurately
that when you finish reading Jesus' description
of you, you know He knows you extremely well.
And so the woman at the well tries all these
theological smoke screens. Finally, He says
to her, these are not your real questions
are they? You've had five broken relationships
and the man you are living with is not your
husband. Isn't that true? He did that so gently
that she runs back to her village and says
to the people "Come back and see the one who
told me everything about myself. He is truly
the Messiah has come." You take the readings
of Muhammad, Buddha, Krishna (if he ever lived),
and see their description of the human condition.
It doesn't conform to reality. But you take
the description of Jesus "That all have sinned
and come short of the glory of God." So whether
you are the head of Enron or whether you are
running Playboy magazine, the heart is desperately
wicked above all things. And that is precisely
the point of the article two days ago in USA
Today. They psychiatrist says "No matter who
we are, when the chips are down and the compulsion
is there everyone of us turns out to be a
rotter." That's what the Bible says. You know,
I remember walking through Auschwitz years
ago and seeing the horrors of what was done.
My wife is really quite extremely well-read
on the World Wars and especially the Second
World War. Almost everything she ever reads
out to me or quotes to me or talks about tells
you that what shocked humanity was that they
were ordinary people. Ordinary people. Ordinary
human beings. Eichmann, Guring, Heimmler,
when they sat being tried one of them basically
said "The first time I said yes, I didn't
like it, but then I got used to it - to the
slaughter of millions." Go to Auschwitz and
Buckenvaald and Duckhow and see the human
heart. You know, we have got to get away from
all of this. People like Sam Harris and all
who brandish there penmanship like a sword
to lacerate Christians and all the wars we
have caused. Has he ever counted the millions
that atheism has killed? And the difference
in atheism you can logically emerge in a transcendent
Christian / Judeo worldview it would have
to be in violation of what they believe. The
kind of stuff that is going on. He doesn’t
care that ten million females have been eradicated
in India only because they were female. Is
this all right? Or is this the human heart
displayed in such heart breaking ways? He
describes in Hobart Mowrer went to his grace
a skeptic. He taught at John's Hopkins, taught
at Harvard. He committed suicide at the age
of seventy-five, but He wrote to Psychology
Today sometime in the seventies he says "You
know when we did away with sin, we lost our
definition of ourselves." This is a skeptic
saying that. We lost who we were. That's the
description of the human condition. Secondly
in the person of Christ as He is revealing
God, the marvelous coalescing of absolutes
in Him. Time is running out so let me race
here. Two years ago - actually a year and
a half ago I was asked to speak at the United
Nations prayer breakfast. It was the second
time they had asked me to come; only this
time I marveled at the subject “Navigating
with absolutes in a relativistic world." You
get up at 6:30 in the morning to speak on
that. And then you are told you have twenty-five
minutes. And then you are further told you
can not bring religion into it. I said "I'll
make a deal, twenty minutes - your subject,
the last five minutes - why I believe in what
I do as being the only answer to this struggle."
Okay we agreed. So I talked about the search
for four absolutes: evil, justice, love, and
forgiveness. How do you define evil? How do
you define justice? What is true love? And
when you blow it, how are your forgiven? They
all nodded their heads. I said "Now I want
to ask you with five minutes to go, do you
know of one event in the world where these
four converged?" I said "They converged on
the cross of Jesus Christ." Evil was seen
for what it was. Justice was met out by a
righteous and holy God. Love was displayed
unparalleled to a point where He looks at
a young man ands says "Take care of her; she
is now your mother." A cosmic drama was unfolding,
and He cared for the one woman who had so
nurtured and cared for Him. And then I said
forgiveness? That He is willing to wipe your
slate clean and forgive you.
You know there was an ambassador from one
country. I will not name it. It is an atheistic
country. He stood in line to shake hands,
the president at the end says "Will you come
up to my office and please pray for me and
my staff?" Before that this man shakes my
hand and says "Can I talk to you for a moment?"
He said "I come from an atheistic country.
I don't want to come here. We don't believe
in God. And I wondered why I was here." And
he said "This morning I find out why I am
here. Pray for me." God revealed in Christ
where absolutes converge in an unparalleled
way, the description of evil, the convergence
of absolutes, thirdly the disclosure of reality.
Do you know why I think men and women like
you come to a conference like this. I was
talking to my wife about it. She was not able
to join me last evening. She became unwell
just as we were leaving. And I wondered if
it was because of my sermon but it wasn't.
She is feeling much better today and joined
me here. But you know, I said to her "Why
do they come?" You know why you all come?
Because you want to go deep. You want to go
deep. God is able to take a little child and
place that child at the center and say "such
is the kingdom of heaven." And He is able
to look at Nicodemus and say "You are a teacher
you don't understand these things?" He is
able to take the sublime and make it simple.
He is able to take the simple and show you
the sublimity behind it. The unfathomable
depths of God's riches. You know what I think
is going to be the biggest point of our delight
in eternity? That we will be silent when we
are face-to-face with the Trinity. You know
Peter knew the difference between one fish
and three fishes. Paul knew the difference
between one and three. This marvelous mystery
of the Trinity, which maybe the only explanation
for the Greek search of unity and diversity.
Because unity and diversity in the effect
must pre-suppose unity and diversity in the
first cause. And only in the Trinity is that
a community of unity and diversity. God is
a being in relationship. And our hearts hunger
for a relationship as we live here. Marvelous
depth of truth, the atheist stuff looks so
shallow after this, you just say "what?" When
somebody asked Francis Crick who won the Nobel
Lauriet for the reason for cracking the code
of the DNA. "He said how did we come to be
then? What happened? How did we have all these
components to bring us to be?" This was a
skeptic asking. Do you know what Francis Crick
said? "It would have to have been a spaceship
that came from another planet that brought
spores to seed the earth and that is how we
came to be." Now, if that is reason, give
me faith. I don't have that kind of faith.
That is what you call nonsense in sophisticated
language. He says that again and again and
again. No, when we see the disclosure of reality,
and the last thing I say to your is this.
The resurrection of the body. The resurrection
of the body. Isn't it marvelous to know that
God identifies both the physicality and the
spirituality as real components of our lives.
We will have a glorified body and so if you
violate sexuality you've violated it at your
own risk. You violate the temple of the living
God. The absolutes are shown in the sacredness
of the body and in the sacredness of that
transcending spirit of the human being. God
raises the human body as it were, the resurrected
body. My wife's father passed away a year
and a half ago. And he was a military man.
He was in the Second World War and whenever
a body was lowered into the ground he always
stood at attention and saluted to respect.
The person maybe dead and not inhabiting the
body, but the body was a place you respect.
You respect the human body. You remember that.
And that is why Jesus wept at the grave of
His friend knowing He was going to raise Him
again. And He said, I will destroy this temple
and in three days raise it up. I want to close
with one humorous line and I think I'm just
on target here I believe. That in itself is
a class-b miracle. That alone ought to make
you believe in God. When the great chess master
Garry Kasparov of Russia was going to play
a computer in a chess match, he beat the first
one. And the boys got together and said "We'll
design the best computer in the world." It
was an IBM computer called Deep Blue. And
we are going to build one that will beat you
Kasparov." Kasparov got nervous and went away
into hiding for many months because he was
afraid that if he lost to Deep Blue that he
would lose the dignity of humanity in the
process. He doesn't know I lost that dignity
after the calculators came out. He's worries
about the computers taking it away from him.
So David Guilerdner, professor of computer
science from Yale University writes this in
response to Kasparov's fear that his loss
to Deep Blue would end up a loss of the dignity
of humanity. Listen to this brilliant professor
of computer science David Guilerdner. "The
idea that Deep Blue has a mind is absurd.
How can an object that wants nothing, fears
nothing, enjoys nothing, needs nothing and
cares nothing have a mind? Oh it can win at
chess! But not because it wants to. It isn't
happy when it wins or sad when it losses.
What are Deep Blue's after the match plans?
If it ends up beating Kasparov? Is it hoping
to take Deep Pink out for a night on the town?
No it doesn't care about chess or anything
else. It plays chess for the same reason a
calculator adds or a toaster toasts, because
it is a machine designed for that purpose.
No matter what feats they perform inside they
will always be a big fat zero. No computer
can achieve artificial thought without achieving
artificial emotion too. In the long run I
doubt if there is any kind of human behavior
that computers can not fake. Any kind of performance
it can not put on. It is conceivable that
one day computers will be better than humans
at nearly everything. I can imagine that a
person might even some day have a computer
for a best friend." Oh but that would be sad.
Like having a dog for your best friend only
sadder. By the way I like dogs. We have one.
"But the gap between the human and surrogate
is permanent and will never be closed." Listen
now "machines will continue to make life easier,
healthier, richer, and more puzzling. Human
beings will continue to care ultimately about
the same things they always have, about one
another and many of them about God." He could
not make that article stick without that last
line. The difference between a machine and
you is huge because of God. Do you know Francis
Thompson ran from God most of his life. And
he would hang out at Charring Cross to get
his drugs and sleep by the river Thames. And
then God hounded him, followed him. You've
read his story in The Hound of Heaven. But
then he wrote this brilliant one. "Hanging
around at Charring Cross and by the river
Thames this whole world invisible we view
thee, a world intangible we touch thee. A
world unknowable we know thee. Inapprehensible
we clutch thee. Does a fish soar to find the
ocean? An eagle plunge to find the air? Do
we ask of the stars in motion if they have
rumor of thee there? Not with the wheeling
systems darken or our benumbed conceiving
sores the drift of pinions would beharken
beats on our own clay shuttered doors. The
angels keep their ancient places, touch but
a stone and start a wing. Tis ye, tis your
estrange faces that amidst the many splendered
thing. But when so sad, thou cans't not sadder
cry it upon thy so sore loss. Shall shine
the traffic of Jacob's ladder between heaven
and Charring Cross. Yea in the night my soul
my daughter try clutching heaven by the hands.
Low, Christ walking on the water note of nazerite,
by Thames. When Bertrand Russell was asked
why he didn't believe in God, he said it was
because he didn't give me enough evidence.
You listen to Francis Thompson and you find
out it’s not the absence of evidence is
the suppression of it. God will meet you where
you are. When my father-in-law died, he was
a gentleman to the end. He was a great man.
But he started to tear his clothes off; he
was losing it shrunken down to a bag of bones,
diagnosis to death, 4 months, and 85 years
old. Quintessential gentleman. A man of God.
He lost his voice, lost everything. My wife
was standing by his bed along with his sisters
and her mother. Finally he got enough strength
to reach out to his wife of sixty-three years.
He had no voice; he said "I love you." He
just mouthed it. I love you. He put his head
back on the pillow, looked to the heavens
and said "amazing, just amazing." And he was
gone. But a pure and higher and greater will
be our wonder our transport when Jesus we
see. Deny God, the philosophical entailments
are insoluble. Find the steps to him. Something
beyond the physical, only the intelligent
entity who came into history, who described
and was seen and was heard who described your
heart and mine and the person of God. I believe
in God who sent His only begotten Son Jesus
Christ because of whom I stand before you.
Because of whom I was rescued from a bed of
suicide at the age of seventeen in New Delhi.
He is near to me and He is near to you. Love
the atheist and live the life as Ronald Regan
used to say in his own simple way "serve the
atheist to the fine dinner and ask him if
he believes in a cook.” God Bless You. Thank
you.
