Spewing Venom at Religion

Stuff like this makes me pretty angry. First of all, the premise is that Christians are delusional. The video says that it will prove that Christians are delusional. Then it points to Mormonism and Islam and says that it is about to prove religion is delusional. Then it explains that because Mormonism and Islam tell delusional stories, Christianity must be false. Does anybody else see a flaw in the logic of this?

Listen.

There are a host of people using this kind of reasoning, mostly famously perhaps are Richard Dawkins and Sam Harris. They say that religion is not only false, but harms the human race and should be eradicated. They attack Christianity in particular, but use the flaws it other religions to prove Christianity false.

Look at it this way. Some parents abuse their children. Does this mean that my parents are abusive and should not be trusted? Does the fact that some people abuse mean that everyone is guilty of child abuse? Obviously not. The same thing goes with religion. Just because there are false religions in the world does not mean that there is not a true way to know God. Just because Mormonism and Islam have holy books that are not really from God does not mean that the Bible is not from God.

Another thing that bothers me about this video is the website that it came from. The site asks they question that if God answers prayer then why doesn’t he heal all the amputees in the world, and because God does not heal all the amputees in the world, he must not be real. Another flaw in logic, putting human expectation on God and saying that if he doesn’t live up to what I think he should do then he must not exist. In actually, this site is worse than even that, because it does not seek the truth, only to attack the notion of God, a la Dawkins, et al.

This kind of logic is quickly becoming known as militant atheism. I think this is an accurate term. Creating all sorts of accusations about God and Christianity because some people have misrepresented them, these atheists sound more like little children than reasonable thinkers and scholars. They criticize Islam for killing scores of innocent people in the name their ideologies, and then spew venomous words at anybody who believes in anything supernatural, as if it is the same thing.

Christianity Falsely Represented

Many, if not all of us, have encountered those so-called evangelists and missionaries knocking on our door and trying to sell us on their religion. And for many, this is the only encounter they may have had with someone professing to be Christian.

This was the case for the well-known Christian apologist Ravi Zacharias. When he was a boy, Jehovah’s Witness missionaries came and taught he and his siblings for a year and a half. Then they hit a hitch in their theology, and thus rejected it all. In his autobiography Walking From East to West, Zacharias says, “At that stage, I told myself, ‘I don’t much care for this. I’m done with Christianity.’ I didn’t know that it wasn’t Christianity that I was rejecting, but I had no idea how to distinguish one sect from another.”

Listen.

Zacharias was right in rejecting the teachings of the Jehovah’s Witnesses. But, as he now knows, he was wrong in rejecting Christianity altogether because of their teachings. He makes a great point here, that he didn’t know the difference between the sects.

There are many false teachers out there, claiming to be Christian, but teaching lies. Some of these belong to cults such as the Jehovah’s Witnesses and Mormons (Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints). Others belong to movements such as the Word of Faith movement, and teach a Prosperity Gospel instead of the Gospel of Jesus Christ.

Do NOT reject Christianity because someone has misrepresented it!

First of all, these false teachers are misrepresenting Christianity. You may rightly reject their teachings, but Christianity does not resemble them. Do not be deceived into thinking that because someone claims Christ and teaches a lie that all Christians believe that or are like that.

Secondly, I understand that many of you have had bad experiences in the church. I myself am one of them. But this is no grounds to reject the God of the Bible and his good news to us. The gospel remains true, and God remains unchanging, whether people shame his name or not, and whether people teach false doctrine or not.

God is still God, and he is still speaking to this world. And we might even hear his awesome voice if only we could get over the garbage heap that is falsely being called Christianity and around the jargon of those tougue-waggers. To get to the core is to really hear from God.

If you are unsure of what someone is telling you, open the Bible and find out if it is true. If someone professes Christ but misuses, distorts, changes or outright rejects the Bible, they are not Christian. Do not reject Christianity on account of them, for they are not Christians in the first place.

Don’t forget that just as there are false teachers, missionaries and evangelists, there are also true, God-sent ones, who are grounded in the Truth. And the Word of God remains true forever. So keep seeking after the one true God. You will find him in the pages of Scripture.