Two ways to live

[nameandnature]

robhu made a post on the Two Ways to Live presentation, which summarises the important points of evangelical Christianity. That particular posting's intended to be evangelistic without getting de-railed by knowledgeable atheists, so I've move my original comment on it from there to here at Rob's request. This posting remains open for whatever discussion you'd like to have on it (as do most of Rob's), subject to my comment policy. Here's my comment:

Serious points about the video, rather than silly ones, in no particular order:

The video doesn't summarise Christianity, it summarises evangelical Christianity. You won't find many universalists or liberals agreeing with it, and I think the Catholics would at least take a different slant on it. So I think it's a mistake to leave out the "evangelical" qualification when talking about TWTL, unless you really do think those people aren't Christians (which I don't think you do).

TWTL assumes the hearer is prepared to accept that God exists in the first place, and that reading the Bible the evangelical way is a good way to find out what God thinks. This isn't a problem if the intention is to summarise evangelical Christianity, but it is a problem if your intention is to persuade other people to believe it (which is usually what TWTL is for), because you're not presenting any evidence.

There's a difference between creating an inanimate object (like a mug) for a purpose and creating a person. People develop their own ideas about what their purpose is, and we don't accord their creators (parents) the absolute right to determine it. Of course, a Christian could respond that God is supposed to be much greater than human parents, but in that case he stands in relation to us as a parent does to a very young child, or to an animal. In that case, we'd accept his right to bring us up how he wanted, but the way he ignores some children in favour of others and his eventual decision to shove those who aren't his favourites in an oven when he's tired of being patient with them would then become a matter for the NSPCC.

Penal substitutionary atonement doesn't make an awful lot of sense. God is supposed to be so keen on justice that someone must pay for sin, but not so keen on justice that it matters whether he punishes the right person. Furthermore, in the Trinitarian understanding, Jesus is himself God, so the action of punishing himself starts to look like a game of solitaire. As gjm11 says, sin is so trifling that turning to Jesus can get you off, but so grave that an omnipotent God really has to send people to Hell if they don't turn to Jesus.

The video guy repeats the claim that we shouldn't wish God to deal with evil in case he zaps us right now, making God out to be about as clever as George Bush, with shock and awe the only thing in his toolbox. As we've discussed before, that argument doesn't hold up.

Comments

[ex-robhu.livejournal.com]

In terms of God punishing sin. I don't disagree that there other models we can consider where God wouldn't need to punish for sin (such as if there were no fall for instance), and that the reasons why God might need to do things as Christians believe he did (sending His Son to die in our place) are not fully explained. I don't claim that the gospel does not contain mysteries (when thought of most favorably). I don't claim that I have all the answers - but what I do have (but am probably incapable of completely communicating) are sufficient answers to questions that Christianity seems very reasonable to me. I know that issues like the atonement and the nature of sin are things that Christians (and other theists) have thought about for thousands of years, that there are multitude of books and papers on the subjects, looking at them from different angles. I could say "but God is like this..." or "well that's only an analogy, which is deficient because...". I freely admit that I do not have the background to provide detailed answers to the nature of the atonement or sin, but there are things out there that you could read.

In a sense God doesn't explain the mechanics of everything - the revelation given in the Bible is limited, it doesn't answer all the questions that theologians and well informed lay people have. However if it did answer those questions I suspect that behind those answers would be even grander questions. Unless the nature of God is like the supposed Grand Unified Theory there might be an infinite series of ever more complex questions required.

I agree with the guy in the video, that if God were to deal with evil in the way that people suggest we would find ourselves as targets of the heavenly artillery barrage. God clearly could solve the problem of evil in other ways, but those other ways have other consequences. God could have prevented evil by not giving man free will - but in doing so we would have been unable to love him, which is something he desires. Also I have to say I think having free will is higher in some sense than being an automaton, I prefer having free will, although I can't provide a clever philosophical justification for it.

The point is that God has got a plan for dealing with evil, and it's a whole lot more nuanced than the "why doesn't God just stop all evil now" strategy that people suggest. His plan takes account of the freedom which God has provided to us at incredible cost to Himself, it is a plan where He takes the punishment we deserve, and all we have to do to receive that redemption is to choose to accept it and follow Him.