Posted on 03/22/2008 3:57:59 PM PDT by rhema
In a flood of bestsellers by skeptics and atheists charging a nonexistent God with crimes against humanity, Timothy Keller stands out as an effective counterpoint and as a defender of the faith. His new book, "The Reason for God," makes a tight, accessible case for reasoned religious belief. And his national tour of college campuses has drawn overflowing crowds. "This isn't because I'm well-known," Keller told me, "but because of the topic."
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The final part of Keller's book will be the most difficult for many readers to accept. He contends that the God of space and time is somehow uniquely found in Jesus of Nazareth. The earliest Christians knew this was a "scandal" often interpreted by others as blasphemy. Sophisticated, first-century Greeks and Romans were no more likely to believe in risen corpses than we are today.
Yet Keller argues for the reliability of the New Testament accounts. And he makes the case that the Christian message has an advantage: It is more than an intellectual theory. . . .
Holy Week calls attention to a final argument as to why the God of the philosophers, however useful, may not be enough. In the end, the problem of human suffering cannot be minimized or explained away -- but in the Christian story, that suffering has been shared. Perhaps, in our own darkness, we need the imprisoned God, the scarred God, the shamed God, the despairing God.
The poet Jane Kenyon grasped at this mystery:
The God of curved space, the dry
God, is not going to help us, but the son
whose blood spattered
the hem of his mother's robe.
(Excerpt) Read more at startribune.com ...
Religion's sine qua non is faith. Not reason, but "the belief in things not seen." Any god arrived at by Reason is false.
Counterbalancing that though, is the comforting corollary that science and Reason can never DISPROVE God either. Once again, inadequate tools for the job.
God IS The Omnipitant of Reason without God Reason would not exist to begin with...
I suggest reading “The Reason Why”
http://www.biblebelievers.com/the-reason-why.html
Denpending on your philosopher of choice, perhaps suffering can just be explained away as nothing but faulty perception.
I hope there is more to his position than this. I am not really comfortable with elevating the Christian story into being superior only because our God shared our suffering. It seems to me more appropriate to look at the reason for our suffering rather than the pain of our suffering. What is stunning about the Christian story is that the holy Son of God who knew no sin, became sin on our behalf so that we might become the righteousness of God in Him. 2 Corinthians 5:21.He made Him who knew no sin to be sin on our behalf, so that we might become the righteousness of God in Him.
Suffering is what we deserve because of sin. Jesus willingly took what he did not deserve so that we could be redeemed from sin. I thought the point was to save us from sin, not so much from suffering. We deserve the suffering, even more than we have right now. Even for Christians already redeemed by the blood of the Lamb, suffering is sometimes a way God teaches us, purposing it for our eventual good.
Look at Israel who suffered in the wilderness for two reasons. One reason was a punishment for sin. But also the suffering was specifically so that God could humble them and make them ready to possess the promised land. I think focusing on suffering is the wrong focus.
Being a Protestant or Catholic, being “Christian” is still just a religion.
Being a Christian is having, by asking, the LORD Jesus Christ in your heart and trying to become more like Jesus every day of your life. Christian means Christ like!
“Religion’s sine qua non is faith. Not reason, but “the belief in things not seen.” Any god arrived at by Reason is false.”
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Respectfully disagree.
Reason, in conjunction with science, can bring one to awe-struck humility
at the grandeur and majesty of creation.
At THAT point, Occam’s Razor requires positing a Higher Power that did the creating.
Ignoring or denying the Creator requires MORE FAITH ...
more credulity, fatuity, and ideological prejudice ...
than stipulating the simpler explanation.
For convenience we often call this Higher Power ... God.
Assorted anthropomorphisms and belief systems beyond this
are optional ...
and may or may not appeal to a given person.
Whatever works for ya!
And let others live with what works for them.
Which is the brink of Faith. But Reason cannot bridge that gulf, nor logic span it. No equation will satisfy God; only a force that escapes logic will take you there.
Science -- and its handmaiden Reason -- can answer the "how" questions. It takes God -- and Faith -- to answer "why."
“Science — and its handmaiden Reason — can answer the “how” questions. It takes God — and Faith — to answer “why.” “
.....
With respect, sir, No.
Put aside that Reason, age 2500+, is not the handmaiden of
Science, age 500 or less.
But i wouldn’t even make such a strong claim for science as you concede.
Science hypothesizes ... and approximates ... answers. That’s all.
If God speaks to you directly, then you do have the answers.
But if one relies on faith ... is there any OBJECTIVE reason to prefer the answers given by your faith
to those given by Zoroastrianism ... Bolshevism ... environmentalism ... Islam ... materialism ... atheism ... or any other faith either of us might name?
No, faith is a most unreliable guide!
I would say being a Christian is having Christ as your mediator.
Hebrews 9:14.How much more, then, will the blood of Christ, who through the eternal Spirit offered himself unblemished to God, cleanse our consciences from acts that lead to death, so that we may serve the living God! 15.For this reason Christ is the mediator of a new covenant, that those who are called may receive the promised eternal inheritance--now that he has died as a ransom to set them free from the sins committed under the first covenant.
Unless God speaks to you directly, you don't have a God.
But if one relies on faith ... is there any OBJECTIVE reason to prefer the answers given by your faith
None whatsoever. Not only ISN'T there, there CAN'T be. Faith is not reasonable. Nor is God's domain one of Reason. That realm belongs to Man.
No, faith is a most unreliable guide!
To scientific truth, yet. To God, it is the ONLY route.
A Blessed Easter to you, FRiend !
And to you.
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