Month: February 2016

A letter to a Christian Science Teacher

Posted on by Lyle Duell in Apologetics, Science

A letter to a Christian Science Teacher

Your interpretation of the Bible seems to align with those that you dislike i.e. fundamentalist, and your defense of science seems to contradict your statement that it is not a religion.  You defend science as though it is your religion and the way you defend it seems to be a little over the top. If you view it simply as a method of finding the truth i.e. the scientific method why the big fuss. No one disagrees with the scientific method. The question is do scientists really follow the scientific method? I personal think not. The scientific method is used pretty much to make the scientific community respectable and they keep it as law about as well as the Jews kept the Law of Moses and Christians the commandments of Jesus.

I think it is self-evident that in many people’s minds science has become a metaphysical concept, which goes way beyond people in white jackets applying the scientific method to their research.  Science has become the authority that people appeal to in a secular atheistic culture and in this, for many science has evolved into a new religion which has been labeled “scientism”. It used to be that people would appeal to the Bible or the church as the authority for their statements. “The Bible says so or the church says so” now it is nothing but science says.  For many in our culture the only knowledge that has not been debunked and found useless is that which is called science.  Of course, this is nonsense; however it is fostered by many in the scientific community.

To me there is far more truth in a good work of art than in most scientific theories or more power in a song than all the science in the world. Science has given us many toys and made life easier in some ways, but I think it has not given many people meaning, peace of mind, joy or love. In fact, many scientists are arrogant jackasses.  “Knowledge puffs up love builds up”. Science does not teach this the Bible does. Moreover, the false god of science has taken us to the very edge of the abyss. It has given evil men the power to take away our humanity and turn us in to machines. The state is already using it to manipulate the herd in any direction it wishes. Science is now the handmaid of the state as religion was a century ago.  I personally, value my freedom more than comfort, ease, and pleasure which science promises.  To me science is like religion, it is human and therefore needs to be criticized and critiqued often.  The power that it has is equal to that of religion and is therefore one of the powers that the Bible speaks about as being oppressive to human beings.  Remember that our battle is not with flesh and blood but rather with the metaphysical principalities and powers.  Those heavenly powers have their counterpart on this earth and science as metaphysics is one of them. What do you think stands behind the metaphysical concept of science?

The way I see it, science is the false god of many worldly people and even some that profess Christ. It promises them salvation if they will give it their money and commitment.  It promises health and wealth to all that follow it. It claims to be able to predict the future (global warming), something the Bible says only God can do. Not only does it claim to know the future, it also claims it can control it. It also boasts of its miracles of healing and its signs and wonders. To me this sounds a little like the antichrist in the book of Thessalonians and surely sounds a lot like false religion and not true science. Of course, I think science is what you make of it, but for many they have made it their faith and religion.

Remember what the apostle Paul says, “The coming of the lawless one will be in accordance with the work of Satan displayed in all kinds of counterfeit miracles, signs and wonders,  and in every sort of evil that deceives those who are perishing. They perish because they refused to love the truth and so be saved.  For this reason God sends them a powerful delusion so that they will believe the lie  and so that all will be condemned who have not believed the truth but have delighted in wickedness (2 Thess 2:8-12).

Am I saying that science is the antichrist? Absolutely not , but when used and controlled by bad men it become as dangerous as religion that is controlled by bad men. Like religion it can empower evil men which use their power to oppress humanity.

“Dear children, keep yourselves from idols” (1 John 5:21).

 

 

 

Open Letter to a New Atheist (Revised with Endnotes)

Posted on by Lyle Duell in Apologetics, Atheism

Open Letter to a New Atheist (Revised)

I understand your questions about the Bible.  For Christians with my mindset, the Bible is a book that is both human and divine.  Because it is human, it is not perfect in the sense that it is totally without error. In space and time, nothing can be perfect in that sense.  If there were something that was perfect, man would have turned it into an idol, which some have done with the Bible.  When the Bible says  “the word of the Lord is perfect, converting the soul”, it simply means that it is sufficient to revive or energize the spirit of man.  The Greek word  téleios was and is translated ‘perfect’ by many Bibles.  However, this can lead to a lot of God talk.  By God talk I mean many extreme ideas and talk, which religious folks get into.  A better understanding and translation would be complete, sufficient or mature.  Jesus said, “be perfect even as your heavenly Father is perfect.”  If you were to understand the word perfect as meaning ‘without fault or sin’, this would be impossible.  If one reads the context carefully they would see that Jesus is simply saying that we should treat  everyone equally; and that  means to love all men.

The problem with the fundamentalist is not that they believe the Bible to be the word of God; their problem is that their God is too small and their reading of the Bible is shallow and vulgar.  Though they say that they believe it to be the very words of God, they don’t treat it that way.  They don’t even stand up when it is read publicly.  However, this is not the Bible’s problem, as I have said humanity will poison everything it touches.  In spite of this, I do believe the Bible to be perfect in its ability to accomplish God’s intent for it, i.e. fulfilling his purpose.

The God, which I believe in, is so large that he must accommodate man at every level of contact with him.  When humanity was young and immature, God dealt with him as a parent would deal with a small child.  He surely would not  have had Jesus  enter into humanity in a cannibal’s village; they could not have understood him and would have had Him for dinner.  God had to nurture and bring man to age before sending Jesus into the world.  The Bible says he used religion and law as a schoolmaster to bring us to a place of faith and living by the Spirit and not by the law (Bible).

A mature Christian lives by the Spirit of God and not by the Bible as a fundamentalist.  For the Christian, everything is moving toward téleios or completion, when you read the Old Testament Scriptures, you’re dealing with God’s interaction with primitive man. They were not ready for the teaching of Jesus and it would have been impossible for God to speed up the process of  preparing them without violating his nature, the laws of natural development and their free will. If he had intervened in some overwhelming way, he would have been criticized for that by some today.

I do not know for sure why God had the Israelites destroy some of the inhabitants of the land, but I think I have an idea.  It is not as if he did it in an arbitrary fashion.  For He told Abraham 400 years prior to telling Joshua to destroy them, that he could not destroy them because they were not wicked.  However, when Joshua came on the scene, something had changed.  They had become exceedingly wicked.  They were offering up their children to false gods by burning them alive and were practicing animal sex.  In view of this, I would suspect that their whole tribe was riddled with disease of every kind. Remember, they had no cure for these diseases during that period.   If the Israelites were to intermingle with them rampant disease could have destroyed the Israelites.

It does not come from wisdom to judge another people’s culture and especially ancient ones, for we were not there.  If we had been there we probably would’ve done the same things.  Sometimes, there isn’t a choice between good and evil.  Sometimes,  it is simply a  choice between two evils.

In World War Two,  our leaders had a  choice to either invade Japan and lose 300,000 soldiers, which could have severely crippled our nation or to drop the atomic bomb on Japan.  They did what they felt they had to do and they did it without any divine guidance.  Could it be that God sometimes has to do something that makes him unhappy?  Christians simply believe and trust that He knows the  circumstances better than anyone and therefore, is just in all of his dealings with man.  Also remember that any position can be framed to make it look good or bad.  The question is, is the person who is framing it deliberate in his effort to be correct  and reasonable?  To place our standards of morality on to the ancient Israelites and God is  neither correct, nor wise.  It may not even be moral.  All I am saying is be careful about how you frame your judgments of people.  It is not as easy as some would like us to believe.  By the way, I find many atheists to be more judgmental than Christians; they seem to have an exaggerated opinion of their moral standing.  In this way they seem to be somewhat like the secular Pharisees.  They, like the Pharisees, seem to put the emphasis on negative morality, the immoral things that they do not do, and very little emphasis on what they ought to be doing.  Just something to think about.

There is a lot, and I mean a lot, of misinformation about how the Bible came together and most  of it is based on nonsense. I will try to find some condensed scholarly information for you[1]. It is strange that men who knew the apostle John, like Clement of Rome[2], quoted John’s gospel in the second century,  since according to some, it didn’t exist.  That is truly amazing.  The writings of the early Christian fathers are a collection of old books and writings from the second and third centuries, which is well before the canon was officially accepted.  Now here is the truth, those writings are filled with quotes from the Gospels and other New Testament documents.  Were they quoting from books that did not exist or has someone given you bad information?  I have personally read many those sourcebook which numbers in the hundreds, so my knowledge is not hearsay.

Who do you think spreads all the disinformation about Christianity, the Bible and the U.S.?  Do you think it could be Lenin’s useful idiots?  For example there was a book that came out in 2013 that was being promoted by progressive radio and even public radio entitled “Zealot”.  It is a book that tried to raise questions about Jesus’ own self understanding.  The promoters  had presented the book as being written by an unbiased author.  Now, here is the truth.  The author is a Muslim and associated with left-wing organizations that have their roots in communism.  His media company called, “Aslan Media” gets its fiscal sponsorship from the Levantine Cultural Center who are also partners with Code Pink.  He also sits on the Advisory Board of NIAC, the National Iranian American Council. Both Code Pink and the NIAC get their funding from George Soros, who I believe is an evil man and a socialist[3].

Jesus said the whole world lies in the Evil one and that he was a liar from the beginning. The world is filled with lies and disinformation, I would suggest that you be careful about what you hear and believe. LD

 

[1] I now have a series of videos on my website, The Reliability of the New Testament (Introduction).

https://lyleduell.me/2016/02/17/1-the-reliability-of-the-new-testament-introduction/

[2] [a.d. 30-100.] Clement was probably a Gentile and a Roman. He seems to have been at Philippi with St. Paul (a.d. 57). There has been some scholars who have questioned the authenticity of some of the writings bearing his name. However, for my discussion the authenticity is not the question. It is the fact, that the writings bearing his name makes reference to the New Testament documents.

[3] I had one atheist respond, who seem to believe that a Moslems could be unbiased about the self understanding of Jesus. I find it amusing to have an atheist take the side of the Moslem who they believe is wrong about God and yet he is right about Jesus. Could it be a case of “The enemy of my enemy is my friend”?

Understanding the New Atheists

Posted on by Lyle Duell in Apologetics, Atheism, Faith

Understanding the New Atheists

For the last few years I have been trying my best to understand the new atheist movement and all of its ranting and raving against God and religion. Then it dawned on me,  that I could not understand them because we were not talking about the same things. The god and religion that they are ranting against is not the God I believe in or the religion I practice.

The majority of them talk about a god that I believed in at one time and a religion I was a part of when I was a young man. However, I no longer believe in that god nor do I practice  that religion. It took a number of years on my journey to find The Wholly Other; or should I say for him to find me and to lead me out of the forest of religious idols I was lost and hiding in.

Looking back on my journey it is hard to understand why it took so long to be found by the Lord seeing that  “We live and move and have are being in him”[1], though he, himself has no being, for He is being[2], i.e. He does not have existence rather he is existence[3]. Therefore, there really is no way to argue for his existence for he does not exist in the way we think of existence. So, what are we arguing for, or against?[4] I will get back to this later.

I found that not only do the new atheists have a different vision of The Totally Other, they (at least the majority) had a different vision of religion, which is as narrow as their vision of the God symbol. They seem to believe that all religion is the same, which in their minds means that all religion is bad. Of course, it does not take much thought to realize that the word religion is a word that points to a concept which is as deep and broad as the ocean. Therefore, when the new atheists start bashing all religion and lumping it all together it makes me wonder how much real thought they have put into their subject. I have found some so allergic to the word religion that they cannot even admit that religion can be good or bad. This strongly points to the level of maturity of so many in that movement. They take a thumb full of the ocean and believe that they have captured the ocean. I am not saying this in malice but I believe that many these people have some deep problems.

You may have noticed that  I have tried to avoid using the word God, the reason being that the word has been so vulgarized and distorted that it has lost any value in helping us to understand the mystery that I refer to as The Wholly Other. The distortion of the God symbol is one of the real problems with religion.

Religion should help us in our journey to The Totally Other. However, instead of helping it often hinders by giving us false ideas of God, these false images in ancient times were called idols. The problem with idols is that there is no image or thing in reality or in the mind of humanity that can picture The Totally Other. All images of God created by humanity whether in mind or in stone, are idols because they are too small and distort the symbol we use for The Totally Other, i.e. God. The false ideas of God in turn solicits a false responds e.g. the new atheists.

This means that the atheist that has a pure heart may be closer to having a correct view of God than many believers. That is, if he has no image of God in his mind[5]. You see nothing is better than the something if the something is wrong. This is why I call the something that you cannot image or speak about, The Wholly Other, The Uncreated One, I Am or maybe Nothingness? I do it to keep people from creating a false image of God that is too small.

Of course, the problem is that for both believer and atheist, religion stands as a mediator between them and The Wholly Other. You see, for the atheist to argue against God he must have an image of that God in his mind. Whatever image he has in his mind is simply an idol. This is the only reason why they can form an argument against it for no argument can be formed against the Wholly Other for he lies beyond all argument. The majority of men will never get beyond the idols of this world whether they claim to be atheist or theist, i.e. their God is too small. I often wonder how humans could become so corrupt that the scripture would tell us that every imagination of their heart was corrupt, I now know; their God was too small, they were idolaters.

The theist often creates a God in their own image and then projects that image into heaven. The atheist then comes along and says that is not God and they are right. It is an idol that can be manipulated and controlled by man. It is the god of the religious man and the atheist. A god that  is created for the opium of the people; or as a tool to control the herd. On the other hand, the deist created an aloof impersonal God that is somewhere out there beyond everything, located in some distant heaven, too aloof to be involved with his creation. Of course, any god that can be herded into some small corner of space and time is just too small to be the Totally Other. It also is an idol[6].

The high theists of the world know The Wholly Other, since they know, that they know little or nothing of being much less than non-being. They confess that they are quite ignorant of the Total Other. They understand, as Isaiah the prophet also understood; “His ways are not our ways and His thoughts are not our thoughts.” To them the word God is a symbol which stands for the limits of their knowledge. This knowledge calls for humility and they are careful not to over speak on the subject of the deity. As one old seer said, those that don’t know speak and those that know do not speak.

You may ask, “Are you saying we can know nothing of non-being?”  No, I am saying that you can only know what He has revealed to you. How does He reveal Himself? One way is through nature and the study of it, that is science. The study of nature has reviewed how great and powerful the Wholly Other is and how different he is from humanity. This knowledge should create awe and wonder in ones spirit, which is true spiritual worship. Unfortunately, many that study nature end up worshipping nature, failing to see that she is an arrow pointing to that which is beyond her. As the seer says when the prophet points at the moon the majority look at his thumb. For many science and religion has become the study of the thumb.

Some may say that this Wholly Other dwells in a cloud of darkness and mystery. Why does he hide Himself? Why does He not reveal Himself? Well, I do not think He is the problem, I think the trouble lays elsewhere. Could it be that He is so awesome and so glorious that in our present form we cannot approach Him without melting into nothingness. This unapproachableness is pointed out in the bible when God tells Moses, “You cannot see my face, for no one may see me and live.” (Exodus 33:20)

There is the real possibility that the darkness that hides the Wholly Other is the darkness that is in the human heart. Jesus said, blessed are the pure in heart for they shall see God”. Now by pure in heart I do not think Jesus is talking about not having impure thoughts e.g. lust, greed, etc. but rather having the right focus of one’s own being. He refers to this as the single eye. “The eye is the lamp of the body. If your eyes are good, your whole body will be full of light.  But if your eyes are bad, your whole body will be full of darkness. If then the light within you is darkness, how great is that darkness! (Matt 6:22-23).This may be why children find it easy to see God until their parents or their culture (which includes religion) fill their eyes with darkness and forces them to see the world through dark colored glasses. It is no wonder Jesus said “unless you convert and become like little children you will in no way, enter the kingdom of God.” So, let’s stop blaming God and the devil for our bad eyes and poor sight.  For that matter let’s stop blaming our parents and culture and accept responsibility for the condition of our own heart. Our hearts are filled with darkness because we have made God too small and are about the business of building idols.

Then, there is the Bible. What is the Bible? The Bible is a collection of writings from men who were searching for the Totally Other. It is the history of their journey and their interaction with the Uncreated One. It records their successes and their failures. It shows them as groping, sometimes searching as a lost children would search for their parent and slowly, in due course growing into adolescence. The Bible also reminds us that the story is not over and that adulthood is still away off.

What about the contradictions and mistakes in it? Would you not expect to find a few anomalies and problems in any writings trying to explain the Total Other? It is a book of symbols that point to something that is on the border of human knowledge, known yet unknown. The Bible itself is a symbol which claimed to be both human and divine. The divine part is perfect in doing what it was created for, which is the building of souls as they journeyed towards the Totally Other.

However, there is a consistent theme and a trend that run though the whole of Scriptures, which connects all of its parts, though sometimes overshadowed, it is always there. It is the central symbol of Scriptures and God’s people throughout the ages. We could summarize that one central symbol with the word ‘someone’. Someone is coming, someone is here and someone is coming again.

The someone of Scripture is the Promised One, the Anointed one, the Messiah or Christ. The one who would save the people from their enemies. Their greatest enemies being sin and death. The Scriptures gave clues to help people recognize this someone. It said that he would be extraordinary and different from other men. His words would be different and his life would be different, he would be Other like the One who sent him.

One man has said that it takes extraordinary evidence to prove an extraordinary claim.[7] The scriptures say that the someone in himself is the extraordinary evidence that the Total Other has given to man. This someone is the final and perfect symbol that points to the Total Other. He spoke like no other man and lived like no other man. When he spoke things happened, people were healed, water was changed into wine, storms were stilled and the dead were raised. No man has ever had so many people believe in him and at the same time has had so many hate him and despise his teachings. He truly is the extraordinary man, the someone sent from the Totally Other. This totally other man is still calling people “To come follow me”.

[1] Acts 17:28

[2] When I say He has no being it might be better to say he is super being. We live and move and have our being in Him, but we are not Him.

[3] Existence is beyond our comprehension though we apprehended it through our own existence and the existence of things around us.

[4] When humans argue for or against the idea of God they are arguing for or against a human construct that at best can only point to the One that stands behind it. Therefore we spend a great deal of time arguing about the idea of God. Now it is true that some ideas of God surely are better pointers than others but all fall short of the reality. This is true in science as well, for there is no theory of reality that is reality. The map is not the territory.

[5] It is unlikely that most atheists have no image of God in their minds, because if so, they would have nothing to argue against.

[6] The true God is super personality and has a knowledge of everything going on in creation. Therefore, he is more like the God that Jesus’ images than the God of the Deist. Jesus says, “that he knows every hair of our heads.” His  nature is reflected by Jesus referring to him as “Father.”

[7] Unfortunately, Carl Sagan did not define what extraordinary evidence would look like. For some skeptics, there would never be any evidence of any kind or  enough to prove the existence of God.

 

Hate the Sin and Love the Sinner

Posted on by Lyle Duell in Apologetics, Atheism, Nonsense

Hate the Sin and Love the Sinner

 I have heard a number of the new atheists mock and ridicule the expression, “hate the sin and love the sinner.” Of course, it does not take a great deal of thought to realize that every morally thoughtful person applies this ideal to others and especially to themselves. We all fail to live up to our own standards and we often hate our short comings. However, we still continue to love ourselves and forgive ourselves.

If a person or a group does not learn to distinguish people’s failings from the people, we are all in trouble. In the end, the person that cannot separate the sin from the person (sinner) will become a very lonely person and perhaps a moral monster.

The Jack and Jill of unbelief Naturalism and Atheism

Posted on by Lyle Duell in Apologetics, Atheism

The Jack and Jill of unbelief

Naturalism and Atheism

    Naturalism and atheism are the Jack and Jill of unbelief[1].  Naturalism is the world view and ideology which teaches that nature is all there is and rejects all spiritual or supernatural explanations of the world[2].  On the other hand, atheism is simply a non-belief in the existence of God.  However, when someone is challenged to prove their atheism they usually turn to naturalism, which is a belief and a world view.

Now, naturalism assumes that its explanation of reality is true, but its explanation is based upon s the fundamental assumption that there is no God and nothing, other than nature, exists.  In order for any of their explanations to be true,  they must first prove their fundamental assumption within their own world view, but unlike atheism they have a belief to prove.  Furthermore, their basic assumption cannot be proven by science because the question of the existence of God is outside of the realm of science[3].

So, the naturalist explains everything, as though there is no God and then they say that their explanation is proof that there is no God.  But, if their explanation does not come from science, where does it come from?  Could it be their imagination?  And is not their claim just circular reasoning?  They say that their explanation proves their assumption, and that their assumption proves their explanation.  Their whole argument is based on faith in their assumption that there is no God.  Since when does simply having an alternative view ascertain that view as the truth?

Their explanation, which I call the ‘tall tale’, does not in itself  prove it is rational or true. It is simply a human construct that offers an alternative view to theism[4].  A naturalist is different from an atheist in that the atheist denies the existence of God; the naturalist has a world view or a belief which does not include God and it assumes that he does not exist.  Then they use their assumption that there is no God to prove their naturalistic explanation of everything and then they use their explanation to prove their assumption.  Remember that an  explanation and an interpretation are not the same as evidence or reality. The interpretation is not the reality. The map is not the territory.

Atheism is a denial of God’s existence and it is a non-belief.  However, atheism is seldom alone and it needs materialism and naturalism to support its non-belief.  As soon as the atheist commences to explain the world though naturalism, they become a believer and begin to live by faith within the naturalistic explanation and assumptions.  When this happens the burden of proof is as much on them as it is on the theist.  Of course, they have no proof but only the explanation and assumptions of materialism and naturalism.  Their so-called evidence and proof all hang on their tall tale, most of which come from their fertile imagination.

What we have in naturalism is a series of assumptions (1). All that exists is nature and she is the whole show.  There is nothing outside of her to intervene in her course (non-provable assumption).  (2). That reason alone can figure her out (non-provable assumption).  (3) That she is controlled by certain laws, that allow reason to work.  Of course this raises the question, how  can mindless nature create the laws of nature?[5]  (4). Reason then assumes that she (nature) is irrational and chaotic, no design and direction, which contradicts number two (reason cannot figure out chaos).  (5) Based on reason (physics) nature had a begin and an end. This seems to indicate that there is something outside of her that brought her into existence.  However, this contradicts  assumption number one, that there is nothing outside of  nature.  Is the idea of something coming from nothing reasonable, or is this an unreasonable faith which comes out of an atheistic necessity?

[1] Like Jack and Jill naturalism and atheism stands or falls together.

[2] Seeing that we only have a limited knowledge of what makes up the universe, it takes a great deal of faith to believe that nature is the whole show or the only thing that exists.  My word, we cannot even define nature.

[3] The US National Academy of Sciences has gone on record with the following statement: ‘Science is a way of knowing about the natural world. It is limited to explaining the natural world through natural causes.  Science can say nothing about the supernatural.  Whether God exists or not is a question about which science is neutral.”  Taken from “Who made God? Searching For a Theory Of Everything” by Edgar Andrews.

[4] Both naturalism and theism have a story to tell.

[5] The naturalist usually responds by shrugging their shoulders and saying they were always there. You can have eternal laws but you cannot have any eternal lawgiver.