Theology Thursday: Apologetics and Creation Part 1

The first eleven chapters in the Bible are my favorite. As someone who questioned their veracity before I started following Jesus, I understand there are some difficult things in these chapters. When we read these chapters, we read them like 21^st century Americans obsessed with particular orders of events and the scientific method—things that the Hebrew people were not concerned about at all in the 15^th Century BC—approximately 3,500 years ago. I think that, 3,500 years ago, the Hebrew people were more interested in knowing why than how—Particularly, “Why did God choose us as His national people?” That’s the question Genesis 1-11 answers, not “how” but “why.” The question they were answering is the very question skeptics ask today—why is the God of Israel the true God? Why would He choose Israel instead of simply opening up the heavens to reveal Himself?

I focused a large part of my higher education on the practice of apologetics. As an apologist, I am largely disappointed in the practice of Christian apologetics because it goes to extreme lengths to try to prove or disprove something that either can’t be proven or disproven or doesn’t matter in the grand scheme of things. For instance, we might consider the Kalam Cosmological Argument.

P1. Everything that begins to exist has a cause.

P2. The universe began to exist.

C    Therefore, the universe has a cause.

It is a good argument for what it accomplishes. If both the first a second premises are true, the conclusion logically follows. The Kalam Cosmological Argument is sound in its logic. Someone may try to debate the first or second premise. But, most materialistic naturalists would agree with the Kalam Cosmological Argument. If they believe the universe began to exist and there is a necessary law of cause and effect. Every action has an equal and opposite reaction. Even from a purely materialistic or naturalistic perspective, the universe has a cause. Now we have to determine or discover what that cause is. “Therefore, God exists!” is not a logical next step. We still need to talk about the plausibilities of infinitely regressing causality, circular causality, the implications of the observer’s role in quantum actualities, rogue particles, and what is described as the random appearance of particles ex nihilo. Even with the masterful use of non-euclidean geometry to prove, mathematically, that the universe is finite and reason there is most likely something that transcends spacetime as we know it, cause and effect cannot be observed back to their inception. Yet, we expend much energy in the practice of apologetics trying to prove that our God was the necessary uncaused cause. What cannot be observed, though, falls outside the scope of scientific investigation, yet people on all sides make such strong truth claims based on evidence as if they were there to observe. But, where were they when the universe formed? The necessity of observation in quantum mechanics is interesting, but that is a thought for another time. It’s not a great answer to the God question. Though, I think if the actualization of particles requires observation, and we weren’t there to observe—some sentient consciousness must have been.

The previous paragraph is about what apologetics sounds like. You may have understood some part of what I wrote, but more likely you couldn’t grab hold of it. Added to the complex language used to get at scientific ideas, it actually accomplished nothing except showing the outer limits of our scientific inquiry—very little to bring people closer to any real understanding of God.

For now, and to simplify things that have been made complicated by smart people, I simply want to ask why we are so prone to make the leap of faith from what is observable to what is unobservable and still call it fact?

I think the answer ultimately comes down to confirmation bias. We use whatever evidence there is to support our own hypotheses even if the evidence doesn’t go that far. Everyone does this. It is why two people can observe the same mountain of evidence and derive two very different conclusions. Inductive reasoning (Philosophy) is good, but we conflate it too often with deductive reasoning (Science).  We invent narratives that we call facts even though those narratives cannot possibly be proven by plain observation. So, most “science” we see is not actually science. It is conjecture or assertion. It may be an educated conjecture or assertion, but it is not science. Such is true even with what you will see at the Creation Museum or with the articles available through organizations like Answers in Genesis. This is the primary contention I have with the work of men like Ken Ham. Christians should be better scientists than non-Christians. Yet, we do the same thing non-believing people do—assert things as fact even though they are not observable or repeatable. I ultimately think this does more long-term harm than good. As a result, most of our apologetics resources confuse us more than they bring any clarity to the Christian position or reasonable faith. Because people have done this for so long, the general population has not learned how to reason well—which is why we struggle as much as we do when it comes to the Bible. Ultimately, we have to have a conversation centered on faith rather than mere science. Conversing about metaphysical realities comes down more to evaluating the presuppositions of our worldviews than it does evaluating evidence that we will interpret according to our presuppositions anyway.

We are obsessed with how things came to be. So, we will go into Genesis and try to explain how every little event might have occurred and the plausibility of the red sea being stopped by a gust of wind or calculate the volume of water on the Earth’s surface to show that a flood is possible or explain that the Star of Bethlehem might have been some kind of astral alignment or Sodom was burned as the result of some natural eruption of burning sulfur in that part of the world. Never mind that these tendencies are counterproductive to apologetics. After all, where is God’s divine action if we explain everything He did by naturalistic means as if we needed to appease the materialists? Here we are trying to prove the Bible true and, all the while, explaining away what makes the Bible so wonderful. Most modern-day apologetics has failed. Most apologetics courses are filled with information and complex philosophical arguments, but are necessarily void of proof. A search for “Apologetics” on amazon.com renders more than 10,000 results. There is an unbelievable amount of information on a topic that can’t prove or disprove God anyway. Some concepts in modern apologetics are useful, but most of the time people are simply arguing in circles showing off their intellect while never really providing a reason for the hope we have.

In 1 Corinthians 1:27, Paul wrote,

God has chosen the foolish things of the world to shame the wise, and God has chosen the weak things of the world to shame the things which are strong (cf. 1 Corinthians 3:18-23).

The world considers certain things characteristic of superior people. Super-human intellect and the ability to debate philosophically are two of those things. They were in Paul’s day as well. Here, the Bible tells us God does not use what is wise in the world’s estimation to put the things of the world to shame. Instead, He uses what the world considers to be foolish—the weak things. So, if you feel confused or unable to keep up with the smart people, you are in a good place, and God says He will use you to actually shame what worldly people consider to be intelligent. Apologetics is a discipline for normal people according to Scripture. Paul clarified what he meant.

And when I came to you, brethren, I did not come with superiority of speech or of wisdom, proclaiming to you the testimony of God. For I determined to know nothing among you except Jesus Christ, and Him crucified. I was with you in weakness and in fear and in much trembling, and my message and my preaching were not in persuasive words of wisdom, but in demonstration of the Spirit and of power, so that your faith would not rest on the wisdom of men, but on the power of God (1 Corinthians 2:1-5).

When the world relied on the superiority of speech and intelligence, Paul limited His speech to the bare essentials so that by simplicity the complex arguments of the world would be put to shame. In the modern day, when people practice apologetics, they typically feed the world’s furnace instead of speaking simply. Paul did the same on Mars Hill in Acts 17. He did not go to each one and try to philosophically disprove all the claims people were making and prove his own claims using the world’s method of argumentation. Instead, he talked to them about their own idol to an unknown god. As I read these chapters in the Bible, I begin to think that maybe we have gone about apologetics all wrong in our own time. I think I find two principles in the text:

1. From 1 Corinthians 1-2; The simplest explanation is usually the best. Philosophy has come to call this very Christian idea by the name Occam’s Razor.
2. From Acts 17; If people don’t believe the Bible, they can’t reasonably argue against the logical outcome of their own beliefs or actions. From this, I gather that it is always better to build bridges than walls.

Proper apologetics is presuppositional and expository. It is more socratic and less scientific. It is more about worldview than factual knowledge. We easily get these things mixed up because we get entrapped by someone who tries to talk circles around us using data analyses and philosophical language. But apologetics is simple, and we don’t have to fear antagonists who make themselves appear to be intelligent in their writing or on social media.

Consider the creation account, the very foundation of the story we love. If the creation account is fictitious, then our entire belief system as Christians comes unhinged. So, opponents of the Christian faith expend much energy attacking the creation story. Well meaning Christians react by developing arguments meant to directly address the accusations made and usually create more philosophical problems than they try to solve. Let’s consider some of those accusations against the creation account.

1. It is silly to believe there was light on the earth, day and night, and plant life before the sun and stars formed (cf. Genesis 1:3-19).
2. It is also silly to believe God created the earth before creating a sun to keep it in orbit (cf. Genesis 1:1, 16).
3. The idea of a giant dome around the earth holding back the waters in the sky sounds ridiculous in light of modern science and the space age (cf. Genesis 1:6-7).

Essentially, opponents of Christianity claim Genesis 1 presents an origin story that disagrees with some modern historical claims some who practice the scientific method make concerning how physics worked at the inception of the cosmos. First, we realize history is a different type of discipline than science. History, especially prehistory, is much more difficult to figure out than science. Science deals with things that are observable, demonstrable, and repeatable. History does not. History is difficult to nail down. The only sure thing we can know about history, what happened before we were here, is by eyewitness testimony. History cannot be known using the scientific method. Concerning history, I am more likely to believe testimony than a practitioner of the scientific method who steps outside of his discipline to make claims about what he did not in fact observe.

I do understand that there are some who speak of reasonable belief, scientists who understand their belief about origins equates to faith and believe that their faith is reasonable based on what they can currently observe. I can have a reasonable conversation with this type of scientist because we are talking about the reasonable faith we have concerning the origin of our cosmos—not about our dogmatic assertions we blindly call fact. Every single person, no matter his worldview, believes what he does about the origin of the cosmos by faith. His faith may be informed by scientific inquiry or the testimony presented in a book like the Bible, but it is still faith. People are fighting over a matter of faith on both sides, not falsifiable fact. It’s only difficult to respond to people who assert these “facts” because their assertions being presented as fact have no reasonable basis to which we can reasonably respond. The key to having reasonable faith, then, is humility and sincerity, not the pride of “scientific” debate as if any of us were present when the universe formed and transcended it in order to observe it at its inception.

So, we require humility and sincerity. It is pride that says, “I won’t believe the Bible’s account because of science.” The Bible is not a scientific account. It makes historical claims. When we measure the veracity of someone’s testimony, we use laws of logic. Until we can prove a testimony wrong by observation of the truth, we are not justified in our cynicism. This being said, I want to look at Genesis 1 with you. I believe Genesis 1 even accounts for the opponents of Christianity who say, “The God of the Bible does not exist,” which supports our reasonable belief in the veracity of Genesis 1.

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