Proof of God

Jackie and I were watching the movie “The Hiding Place”. It is the story of Corrie ten Boom and her sister, Betsie, during World War II. In the movie, Corrie and Betsie are Christians who are placed into a Nazi concentration camp because they were helping Jewish people escape from the Nazi’s.

In a scene in the concentration camp, Betsie is teaching people about God. However in the middle of her lesson, she is interrupted by a non-believer. This non-believer begins to question whether there is a God.

I know we are all questioned about (and in some cases, persecuted for) our beliefs and thought we could take this opportunity to discuss some of the things that non-believers might say to us.

To the mindless, the words (of the Bible) sound comforting

In the movie, the point was that it all sounded good, but they were in this horrific place. The response was that God didn’t make this place, men did. It’s a great point. It’s one that many non-believers choose to close their eyes to. It is easier to think that there is no God than to believe that there are people who are capable of such evil. Why? Because we think that if people can actually do such things, then maybe we can do those things. We don’t want to think that we’re capable of these things, so it’s easier to blame God.

The reality is that the words are comforting not because we are mindless, but because we recognize that you can’t blame God if there is no God. So if there is a God, reading the words of God in our most desperate times is the most comforting thing we can do. The truth is, Christianity is not mindless. Christians spend a lot of time learning what they believe. The Bible is so advanced, that it takes tremendous amounts of learning and questioning to understand all that it says. The number of brilliant people who have actually agreed with the claims of Christianity should end the conversation regarding it being mindless. For those who didn’t see it, there is a list of great scientists and quotes from their writings here.

Can’t God stop them (evil people)? Isn’t He powerful? or is He a sadist?

This statement by the unbeliever questions three things: The presence of evil in the world (and thus the presence of evil people), God’s Power and God’s Goodness. It seems that these three cannot co-exist: since there is evil in the world, God cannot be Powerful or Good.

However, we know that God claims to be good and that the Bible states He is good.

• Psalm 25:8 Good and upright is the LORD;
         therefore he instructs sinners in his ways.
• Psalm 86:5 You are forgiving and good, O Lord,
         abounding in love to all who call to you.
• Mark 10:18 "Why do you call me good?" Jesus answered. "No one is good--except God alone.”

We also know that God is All-Powerful

• 2 Chronicles 20:6 "O LORD, God of our fathers, are you not the God who is in heaven? You rule over all the kingdoms of the nations. Power and might are in your hand, and no one can withstand you.”
• Isaiah 40:25-26 "To whom will you compare me?
         Or who is my equal?" says the Holy One.
  Lift your eyes and look to the heavens:
         Who created all these?
         He who brings out the starry host one by one,
         and calls them each by name.
         Because of his great power and mighty strength,
         not one of them is missing.”
• Ephesians 3:20 Now to him who is able to do immeasurably more than all we ask or imagine, according to his power that is at work within us,

So God is Good and God is All-Powerful and yet evil exists. This is the problem that most non-believers see when they argue that there is no God or that God is weak, impotent. Like the woman in “The Hiding Place,” David Hume is quoted as saying, “Is he [God] willing to prevent evil, but unable? Then he is impotent. Is he able, but not willing? Then is he malevolent. Is he both able and willing? Whence then is evil.” Richard Rubenstein is introduced as follows: “The author of this article is one of the most important post-Holocaust theologians. His interpretation of the Holocaust has led him to the conclusion that the God of traditional Judaism is dead.” And “Interestingly, perhaps the most radical post-Holocaust theologian, Richard Rubenstein, maintains that the terms of the covenant cannot be amended. Since the Holocaust contradicted the covenantal reality, we can only deduce one thing: God must be dead.”

What we are seeing is that many people have a problem with God because they cannot see how a Good, All-Powerful God can allow evil to occur. The first thing we need to recognize is that before we can speak about God allowing evil to exist, we must first determine what Evil is. Is what happened to the Jewish people during the Holocaust evil? You and I would say it is, but would the Nazi’s say it was? Would Bin Laden say it was? Would the Iranian President say it was? Who is to say what is Evil, unless we have some standard? And who creates that standard? So how do we judge what is Evil? Those who would say there is no God because He allows evil to exist are using the standards that God has set as to what equates to Evil. In other words, the God that told us what is Good and what is Evil actually does not exist. So how does one know what is Good and what is Evil? It is impossible! That is the pointlessness of speaking with those who believe that there is no God because there is Evil – their proof only works if there is a God in the first place. Without God, there is no Evil! Of course, without God, there is no Good either. Because we cannot know what is Good and what is Evil without an ultimate basis for them. God is that ultimate basis.

Coming back to the original thought – Can’t God stop them? Of course He could. And often times, I believe He does. Since He stopped them, we never know about those great tragedies. Ironically, if He had not stopped them, we would be reading about the atrocity that God allowed. So, when He stops them, we ignore the fact, when He doesn’t, we say He doesn’t exist! But God does not stop everything we do. God intercedes in His All-Powerful way to ensure His will is done. However, if does not intercede in every situation. When God intercedes, it’s called a miracle. A miracle by definition means that something happened out of the ordinary! If it is out of the ordinary, that means that it doesn’t normally happen. This means that when bad people do bad things, they normally will be allowed to do what they are attempting and it’s up to others to stop them – but not God. If God stops them, He takes away their free will and their ability to do what they chose to do. If we expect God to do that for bad people, then we would need to expect God to do that for everyone – and in every situation. Now, let’s say you wanted to do something but God decided He didn’t want you to, so He just didn’t allow you to do it. Would you have free will or are you only allowed to do what God wants you to do? It’s one thing to do God’s will. It’s another to have no choice. God did not make robots and we are not on strings that God controls. God allows us to do what we decide and then live with the consequences of those decisions. That goes for you and me. It also goes for bin Laden and Hitler.

Evil people cause pain to many people. But God can take all things, even if they are meant for evil, and make it for Good. The horrific thing that Hitler did in the Holocaust was turned into Good in many ways – the creation of the Country of Israel, the repentance of the German people, the knowledge that the world allowed such Evil to occur and the checks and balances that have been put in place to ensure it never happens again. Today, we do not have one country going in and destroying an entire people because they don’t like them. The World does not allow that and does everything it can to keep that from happening. It’s not always successful and doesn’t always work, but it can be attempted because of what we experienced with the Holocaust.

Free will leads to free choices and free choices are not always right choices. God does not force us to make His choices. He asks us to. But if we choose otherwise, He allows us to do whatever we choose. It is our actions and they will have consequences – in this world AND the next.

And that is the point. There is a “next”. There is more than today. There is more than what we see. If this was the end, then those who shake their fists at God would be correct in saying that Evil has won out. But this isn’t the end. Just like after the Holocaust, there was a country, after this, there will be what happens next. God is not finished! God might not have dealt with evil today, but that doesn’t mean He will not deal with it at all. That is the mistake of the non-believers: they think God is impotent because He has not done anything against this Evil. But they mistakenly think that God is working on their time-table. God is not finished and He will deal with Evil and those who performed it. If our unbelieving friends recognized that, they would realize that their argument has been flushed down the toilet! Because then they would see that God is Good, He is All-Powerful and that He has allowed Evil to exist, but He is going to destroy it! If our unbelieving friends recognized that Evil would be punished by God, would they still believe He doesn’t exist?

Just because people suffer, doesn’t mean God isn’t there. God Himself came to this earth and Jesus also suffered. He also was innocent of any wrong doing. He also was wrongly accused, wrongly tried, wrongly tortured and wrongly put to death. Just because he suffered, doesn’t mean God wasn’t there. God is always there, helping us to overcome, helping us to be strong through our troubles. We must always remember that God loves us, in the good and in the bad. Jesus loves us and came to this earth to die for us.

In the movie, the question is begged: “Why are we here?” and the answer was given, “To obey him. If you know Him, you don’t need to know why.” If you know Jesus, you don’t need to ask why things are happening to you any more than a child needs to ask their parent why they must not go out alone. In the child’s mind, they do not understand why they cannot do something that they are able to do. In the parent’s mind, the child does not know all the parts of the equation and therefore is unable to make an intelligent decision. So the child obeys the parent because there is the understanding that the parent loves the child and will do everything they can to protect them. The child loves the parents and will obey for no other reason. The child doesn’t need to know why – they just know that they are loved.

If you don’t know Him, you will ask why. You are like an orphan who has no one to help him make a proper decision. There is no one to set proper boundaries. There is no one to watch over him and love him. So he does whatever he wants and blames the world when he has to pay the consequences for his actions. The unbeliever has a choice: one can disbelieve and question everything, never knowing anything and thinking one knows everything. Or one can believe, recognize the bigger picture and allow God to take over in all things. It is up to every individual to decide. Will you disbelieve because you don’t understand evil or will you recognize that a Good and Powerful God is not only able but He will punish evil in His timing?

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Last modified: August 6, 2006