The Godless Delusion

Welcome. 

Grab a chair. 

Hop the chair closer to the fire. Don’t be afraid of the warmth. Its flickering fingers scrabble at its metal prison mesh, but you will not be reached by flame. 

Words are more scorching than flame. 

***

What is your reality? 

An opportunity to serve Allah? A roaring cyclone of mutation and chance? Word made flesh?  

Before which god do your knees hit stone? Science? Baal? Zeus? Christ? The list goes on – circle one, please. And yes, nowhere is there an option for “none of the above.” Circle one, please. Multiple, if polytheism tickles your fancy. 

Everyone serves a god. 

Richard Dawkins: “Atheists do not have faith.” Said the man confidently. Atheism is just another word for dishonest theism. 

From where do you find your truth?  

Scratch the surface: Words rumbling from a pulpit. Spectacled priests chanting the scientific method. Rainbow-robed goddesses screaming judgement.

Pierce yourself: How do you know what you know? Why do you believe what you believe? What is the statement that begins with “because”? If you don’t believe in God, what do you believe in, and why?  

Do you kneel before methods and testing and tubes? Why? 

Because science has shown it to be true. Because I believe science. Because I trust my reasoning. Because I want to. Because shut up. 

Do you offer incense to equality, love, and the right to be insane? Why? 

Because it’s right. Because I think it is. Because that’s how I feel. Because I want to.  Because shut up.  

Tear yourself open. See the cause. Everything you believe, every decision you make comes down to this: who is your god? If, ultimately, it comes down to you and what you think and what makes you feel good, reason will not dig you out of that grave. Who decided that reason is reliable? How do you know anything? You must put your trust, your belief, in something, and if that something is yourself, you have become your own god. Welcome to the world of I-theists.  

Because I… Because I… Because I… 

Because I Am. 

There is only One who can say that, and He stepped into our Word-spun world to die a bloody torn mess on a tree, to then hurl that pain and suffering and shame and death into eternal damnation. If you are His, your pain and suffering and shame and death went right along with it.

When faced with the question of who you believe in, who you plant your faith in, there are only two real answers: God, or yourself. I would suggest the second answer as a good ice breaker joke at parties, the kind that’s so ridiculous it immediately relieves tension. 

The first Answer? The true Answer? He is the One who created you. Of course you would believe in Him.  

He is. 

Atheists sneer at the idea of a Triune God, a God we cannot fit into a chart. Christians, those weird religious folks, are happy to accept their ignorance. Imagine serving a God you could never completely wrap your mind around. Atheists would much rather stick to serving themselves, thank you very much. Finite beings are much easier to control. 

Not only this, but if you are the god of this world, you are the judge. Raise that gavel. Let the other gods, those fools, be brought to the stand. Let them stutter and weep and try to explain.  You are the standard, not them. Let the gavel come crashing down. If God cannot be understood by you, He doesn’t exist. Hear the words of the self-proclaimed judge: “I shall suggest that the existence of God is a scientific hypothesis like any other.” Finally, a straightforward solution. One that everyone can agree on. Right? 

One problem. 

How do you measure Eternity? How do you run tests on the One who is Perfection Itself? How do you exert practices of our dinky reality on a God above reality? 

Atheists like Dawkins want a God who will meet them in the boxing ring. They want a God they can beat down using the same tricks they used against the other opponents. They want a God they can kill.  

They’re too late. It’s already been tried. The celebration only lasted three days.

Hey Christian, do you know how many times you believe yourself to be god? How many times have you built an altar and dedicated it to yourself, or carved yourself a throne and got comfy up high where the air is thin?  

The Bible is the Word of an infinite Creator. Your opinions are that of a finite creature.  Which comes first? The answer should seem obvious, but it’s amazing how many times we flip it on its head at whim.  

Don’t like Old Testament stoning?  

Well, we admit that they were wrong, but they were also uneducated and tribal, so we can’t really blame them. Excuse their primitive behavior. 

Decide that the nation-slaughter by the Israelites is a bit too bloodthirsty to mention in this generation? 

That was obviously a different, bad-tempered persona of God. Woke up on the wrong side of the bed. No need to dwell on it. 

And don’t even mention that verse about wives and the word that starts with S and rhymes with Ubmission.  

Does this sound familiar, this rewriting of the Word? 

Heretics have been doing this for centuries. 

Here’s the rub: either Scripture is true because it is the Word of God, or it is true because you decided it’s acceptable. There can only be one God of Scripture. When your own opinion stomps certain passages into the dust and then turns away with a placid smile on its face, you have become the god of Scripture. You have declared war against your Creator.

Christian, watch the giddy dance of the insane world. Be repulsed. Feel pity. But don’t join hands with the I-theists. There’s only one God, and it’s not you.