A DARK World of Deception

The one thing that I think is really dangerous in many religions is that it gives people a cold -plated excuse to stop thinking.

And the vicarious redemption by human sacrifice is a very primitive and horrible scapegoating idea that belongs to the barbaric period of humanness.

Atheism, once a tiny minority of the population, has exploded in number since the rise of the

New Atheism Movement, led by four atheists commonly referred to as the Four Horsemen.

Richard Dawkins There's something I can't stand about Christianity, which is just what I've been saying about this really obnoxious doctrine of original sin, which

I think is actually hideous and demeaning. It's a vengeful doctrine that a sin by somebody else has to be paid for by a different person, which is a horrible idea.

Sam Harris This is not a candidate book. I can go to any

Barnes & Noble, blindfolded, and pull a book off a shelf which is going to have more relevance, more wisdom for the 21st century than the

Bible or the Koran. Christopher Hitchens The vicarious redemption by human sacrifice is a very primitive and horrible scapegoating idea that belongs to the barbaric period of humanness.

Daniel Dennett The one thing that I think is really dangerous in many religions is that it gives people a cold -bladed excuse to stop thinking.

In this video, we're going to provide a Christian critique of atheism. First, what exactly is atheism?

While most people would say that atheism refers to the belief that there is no God, most atheists today would object to that definition.

Here's the thing. Classically, the definition of atheism is awe without theism, or it's a denial of the belief of God, denial of the existence of God, or more classically defined, atheism says there is no

God, period. Now, today, modern atheists, or actually many of them, say the new atheism movement will say

I'm an atheist, but it turns out really they're an agnostic as they describe themselves. There seems to be a sort of a collision of definitions happening today with atheists where they say,

I'm not saying that there absolutely is no God, I'm saying that the gods that I know about, they don't truly exist.

Atheists today generally define their atheism by saying they are unconvinced by arguments that say there is a

God. They say they would be open to the possibility of God existing if sufficient evidence were presented.

What's the difference between this form of atheism and agnosticism? Not much, really.

Almost certainly, both atheists and agnostics have a starting point that is naturalistic or empirical.

When you talk to an agnostic today, chances are they're going to buy into the neo -Darwinian, micro -mutation, macro -evolutionary worldview that we've evolved from highly evolved societies of bacteria and an ungoverned, unpurposed universe to get us to where we're at today.

That's the perspective, and so agnostics today are functionally atheists, and the worldview is essentially the same.

Because if it were different, if their view of origins was different, if they acknowledged the existence of some

God and they're worshipping that, they move from agnosticism to whatever religion or cult they're now a part of.

So you can see how there's difficulty for the agnostic at many points. But atheism and agnosticism are essentially wrapped up in the same thing.

And many today who call themselves agnostics are really ultimately just atheists, and they're just afraid to say so,

I think. Atheists today try to say that atheism isn't something that can be critiqued.

Sam Harris writes, We should not call ourselves atheists. We should not call ourselves secularists.

We should not call ourselves humanists, or secular humanists, or naturalists, or skeptics, or antitheists, or rationalists, or freethinkers, or brights.

We should not call ourselves anything. We should go under the radar for the rest of our lives.

And while there, we should be decent, responsible people who destroy bad ideas wherever we find them.

But of course, this is not at all an honest assessment of atheism. Atheism is a worldview, a system of thought, and atheism can be critiqued.

The fundamental problem with atheism is an issue with epistemology, which deals with the starting point of knowledge, intelligence, and rationality.

So the foundation is revelation. The revelational epistemology I told you guys about.

How do we know what we know? Now, epistemology, again, just a fancy word that just means the theory of knowledge.

How do you know what you know? Now, you might think, well, this just seems like highfalutin stuff, and, you know, what's the point?

Do we really get into this discussion with somebody? If you don't use the word, it doesn't matter. Everybody has an epistemology.

They have a view of how they know what they know. Whether they've thought consciously about it or not, everybody has an epistemology, and it's important to get to the bottom of how we know what we know.

We would argue that Christians have a rational epistemological foundation, whereas atheists, as well as people from every other worldview and religion, do not.

We'll leave discussion of other religions for another video. Essentially, every atheist today can probably be categorized as an empiricist, which is someone who believes that knowledge is based on experience derived from the senses.

Many today are, say, empiricists in their epistemology. They'll say something to the effect of, well,

I believe in science, whatever that means. I believe in science, as though the

Christian is the blind -faith religionist, while the atheist believes in science. What they tend to mean when they say,

I believe in science, is that they're an empiricist. What that means is they believe that you gain knowledge, you get to what is actually true, via direct experience and observation, an empiricist.

I have to see it, I have to observe it, it has to be tested, that's how I truly know.

Another category of philosophy is rationalism, which states that knowledge is based on pure reason.

But there are much fewer rationalists today than there were in the past. Someone may also be a rationalist in their epistemology.

They might be a mixed bag, they might have a couple of different ways to take a stab at this. They might say, well, how do you know something is true?

Well, you have to actually reason through it, it has to be logical, it has to be consistent.

That's how I know something to be true, it has to be logical and reasonable. In contrast to empiricism and rationalism, the

Christian worldview can be said to have a revelational epistemology. In other words,

God is the source of all knowledge, and God has revealed knowledge to the human race, specifically through the words of the

Bible. There are different epistemologies, but our epistemology as Christians is a revelational epistemology.

How do you know and have certainty about something? A truth claim, knowledge claim, how do you know?

And the answer is, I told you, God said so, because God says. The Christian critique of atheism is essentially that atheism cannot justify its epistemology, its view of knowledge, logic, science, and ethics, and that atheism is essentially stealing from the

Christian worldview when it uses or appeals to knowledge, logic, science, or ethics.

So when the unbeliever challenges us, we say, no, God has spoken clearly, is speaking clearly, and is speaking and communicating to you in all of your experiences at this very moment.

In every appeal you have right now to logic, God is speaking. Every appeal you have right now to science,

God is speaking. Every appeal you have right now to ethics, God is speaking. Of course, the

Christian argument is not merely a blind assertion that the Bible is true. So epistemology is vitally important to get.

How do we know? God says, because God says. That's where my certainty is, God says. Now, again, it's not as simple as that in terms of where we can go now in the discussion.

I'm not encouraging you to simply say, well, God says, so, hmm, right? I'm not asking you to be adolescent or elementary in that respect.

I'm telling you that that is fundamentally the basis of knowledge and certainty. The Christian argument involves both refuting other worldviews, as well as successfully defending the

Christian worldview. Now, let's examine some fatal problems with atheism.

We'll start with morality, since it's the most relatable. So one topic that comes up over and over again is morality.

It doesn't matter what topic you start discussing. If you're having conversations with believers, eventually morality is likely to come up.

I've done a number of big formal debates, some of them where morality was the designated topic, and others where it wasn't.

And in almost every single one of them, at some point, we ended up talking about morality. So what is this morality thing?

Why do we care about it? Why is it the go -to argument for so many conversations with believers?

The reason why morality is so often a central part of debates between atheists and Christians is because essentially every atheist appeals to the concepts of right and wrong, and Christians have questions about that.

As Christians, we have a foundation for saying that right and wrong exist, and that people should behave in a certain way.

They're not neutral, and we're not supposed to be. Remember that? So we over here have the biblical worldview, over here have the unbelieving worldview.

Now watch for a moment. I'll make a claim, and I want you to tell me if what's coming out of my mouth is consistent with what

I'm standing on. Do I get to say this? It is an absolute moral obligation that we love our neighbors and not eat them.

Is what's coming out of my mouth consistent with what I'm standing on? Yes. And, let's try this, do

I have certainty about that claim? Some of you did not answer, and were worried. Probably Presbyterian.

Okay, over here. I'm just kidding. Presbyterians are like my favorite. All my heroes are all

Presbyterian, and I mean that. People are like, soon, Jeff, soon, you will be. So over here, there's the biblical revelation.

I can make the claim, and it's consistent with the revelation of God. I can make the claim, and I can say I have certainty about it.

However, atheists simply do not have any ultimate foundation for saying something is right or wrong.

Now here's the unbeliever, the militant atheist, and they're going to make a claim. Ready? It is an absolute moral obligation that we love our neighbors and not eat them.

Now I just said something. Was what I said consistent with what I'm standing on? There are no moral obligations.

Do I have certainty about that claim? If you listen to one of the videos we have up, actually the one I pointed you to last night, it's

Jeff and Cy walking to a bar. When I talk to this atheist, or agnostic, or pagan that he became after that, when

I talk to him, I brought up the issue, because we got to near the end of the discussion, he gave up science, he gave up logic, he gave up morality, he admitted that he didn't have any of those things, and I brought up, because he brought it up, the fact that he cannot ultimately know whether he's not supposed to eat human beings.

And his response, I said, do you eat hamburgers?

He said, yeah. I said, do you eat fish? He said, yeah. I said, do you eat people?

He goes, no. I said, given your world view, why? It's a legitimate question.

There were all random results of evolutionary processes in this unguided and unpurposed universe. You eat other results of evolutionary processes, but you don't eat people.

How come? His response? They don't taste good. Of course, atheists argue against this.

For example, one common response is that morality exists because of a social contract, because humans have agreed upon what is right or wrong.

Can we not design our society which has the sort of morality, the sort of society that we want to live in?

Or, they might argue that it's inherently good to survive and flourish. When the unbeliever says, well,

I have a basis for ethics. It's what works to keep us alive. We've determined that if you murder others, then we're not going to flourish.

We've determined if you steal from others, we're not going to flourish. We've determined if you rape others, we're not going to flourish. What's the hidden assumption there, the borrowed capital from Christianity?

Human value and dignity, and that society should flourish. Because we must ask the unbeliever. We must ask them, are we stardust?

They say, oh, yes, yes, we're stardust. Like Carl Sagan said, we are stardust, right? Neil deGrasse

Tyson, he says we're stardust. Well, let me ask you a question. What makes you think stardust must flourish?

What if I want to kerosene the whole anthill? Who are you to argue with me? You're acting like stardust should flourish and should produce and should do well.

I think there's actually a lot of human suffering in the world, and if we just ended it all, we would end a lot of human suffering.

And there are actually a lot of people who think just like that. And you have no argument with them, no objective basis for morality.

However, these arguments ultimately fail. Okay, so if we grant the unbeliever the presupposition that society determines what is moral, then that means that Hitler wasn't wrong,

Germany wasn't wrong, because their society had determined by democratic votes that Hitler was in charge, and that that's not a person.

I know it looks like a person. It's not a person. It's a Jew. Simply put, atheists cannot explain why any behavior is objectively right or wrong, which means that according to atheism, there is no objective problem with murder, rape, racism, or anything else.

Now, this moral argument isn't the ultimate argument against atheism because theoretically, an atheist can simply say that nothing is objectively right or wrong, even though that atheist will never live consistently with that position.

If you like this video, a subscribe does more than you might think. Next, let's talk about immaterial laws such as mathematics and the laws of logic.

It's common for atheists to say that they are materialists, which means that nothing exists beyond the material realm.

However, the problem with materialism is that it can't explain the existence of immaterial, universal laws, such as mathematics and the laws of logic.

I start talking to the guy, and it turns out he is a math professor at a college in California.

He's an atheist. He's a naturalistic materialist. He believes that all that exists is matter in motion, and he's a math teacher.

So we're talking and trying to get to the gospel with the guy, and so I start challenging him on his position, his profession.

I said, well, you're a materialist. He says, yep. I said, so you teach arithmetic? He says, yes.

I said, have you ever seen a law of math? He said, well, yes. We write down equations on this.

I said, no, no, no. That's a representation of the law of math. I'll give you an example of what I mean here for a second.

Follow me here. This shows you in terms of knowledge and certainty in Christ. If I had a chalkboard here, and I had chalk, and I wrote, ready?

Follow me now. If I wrote 1 plus 1 equals 2 on the chalkboard.

1 plus 1 equals 2 on the chalkboard. Now, if I pointed to this number 2, and I said, is this 2?

You would say, okay. Now, if I took my hand, and I wiped off that 2, and I said, all right, 2 is gone now.

You can no longer use 2 in your thinking. I've taken it away. It now doesn't exist. You said it was 2, and I took it away.

No more 2. You would immediately say, no. You took away a representation of the universal truth of 2 -ness.

That's true. You see the point? The physical representation only represented the immaterial, universal, unchanging law of 2 -ness.

Now, that law cannot be seen, cannot be touched, cannot be weighed. There is no color to it. It is a universal, abstract, necessary, invariant, unchanging law.

Now, this unbeliever, as I'm talking to him, he's a math teacher, remember. I start challenging him on his materialism.

You're an atheist. You believe you live in an unguided, unpurposed universe. It is time and chance acting on matter.

It is just stuff happening, like Shakespeare says. It is sound and fury signifying nothing.

All that exists is the material, right? He says, exactly. I said, okay. Have you ever seen a law of math?

Well, no. So I start getting to the bottom of it, and I start challenging him. In your world, you cannot account for universal, abstract, invariant laws of any sort, whether they're logic, arithmetic, or, say, physical laws.

In your world, you can't account for it. And he ultimately grants it and says, well, yeah. And so I said, okay, here, ready?

Is 2 plus 2 4? And he knew what I was doing. And he goes, well, maybe not.

And so what I said to him, I said, here's where the wheels come off. Here's where you won't live consistently as an atheist.

I said, because you'll say as a strict materialist that there are no universals, there are no abstract laws, there's no invariant laws.

All it is is sound and fury signifying nothing, just matter in motion. You'll say that, but if your students do their tests that way, you will fail them.

And I said, you act like a Christian and an image -bearer of God every single time you teach your students.

In contrast, Christians have a foundation for believing in immaterial, universal laws, such as mathematics and the laws of logic.

You cannot do math. You cannot do science. You cannot do logic without Jesus Christ.

Christians have a basis for universal, immaterial, invariant laws. It should be obvious to us.

As Christians, we believe that God is spirit. God is eternal. God is unchanging.

And the laws of this universe reflect the order that God actually gives to the universe.

Our thinking is to be like God's thinking. God cannot lie. God cannot engage in logical contradictions.

All of us are to essentially have our thoughts come into conformity with God's thoughts. Christians do not believe that the universe is strictly matter in motion.

We believe that there are immaterial aspects to our being. Amen? We believe that it's possible to have immaterial laws, unchanging laws, in God's governed universe.

We don't run into the problem that the materialist does in terms of the laws of math. Now, let's point out that, of course, atheists use mathematics, and they use laws of logic.

What we're saying is that they can't ultimately justify their use of these laws.

But listen, atheists do math! And here's what we're not saying.

We're not saying, we are not saying, that unbelievers, because they don't have Jesus, can't do math!

And Van Til has a famous saying, he said it often, or at least said about him often, that atheists can count.

Sometimes they can count very well. Sometimes they can count better than Christians. But listen, atheists cannot account for their counting.

They cannot justify it. And their unbelieving perspective, they cannot account for mathematics, laws of logic.

Christians have certainty. And our knowledge is wrapped up in our knowledge of Jesus Christ.

He is the source. He is the one in whom we find our resting place for salvation.

And he is the source of all of our certainty. In whom are hidden all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge.

Now, atheists usually object that when Christians argue like this, they are using the

Bible to prove the Bible, which is circular reasoning. However, Christians would respond by saying that all people must, in the end, appeal to their ultimate authority.

Christians readily admit that their ultimate authority is the Bible. And atheists, though they may not realize or admit it, must also appeal to their ultimate authority.

For example, if knowledge comes from sense experience, they must appeal to sense experience to prove this, which is impossible.

This is why Christians should not set aside the Bible to argue any neutral common ground with atheists.

Because this neutral common ground ultimately does not exist. But what if you're talking about somebody who doesn't believe the

Bible? Then you've got to prove what you believe without using the Bible, because they don't believe the Bible. Says who? Says who?

They don't believe the Bible, so I don't use my Bible? That sounds like their rule. Why would I do that? You know what that sounds like to me?

You know, I'm a knight in medieval times, and I walk up to my opponent, unsheathe my sword, and he looks at me and says,

I don't believe in your sword. Allow me to speak to thee about the science of metallurgy, so that thou mayest believe in my sword.

No! I don't believe in your sword. Either he starts believing, or you just win.

In fact, when we are arguing biblical truth with someone who doesn't believe the

Bible, if we give up the Bible, they've just won. Because we've agreed with them that there is a source greater than the

Bible, and that we don't need the Bible for truth. The last thing you do is give up your Bible. Why on earth would

I allow that person to dictate how God's truth is communicated? It's alive, it's active, and it's sharper than any two -edged sword.

So whatever I'm going to use that's not the Bible, is not as authoritative or powerful as the

Bible. Therefore, I do not relinquish it. The way I like to describe this is think about it in terms of the

Christian, you in this case, and say the atheist at sea. You're at sea, and the

Christian is in an impenetrable ship. You are in this steel ship, it is floating, it is watertight, solid.

It is a beautiful ship, really. It's an amazing ship, it's a big ship, plenty of space, lots of room, plenty of space to relax.

It is doing well. A massive storm comes, and it is barely moving, this thing.

This thing is built for sea, it is fantastic, and again, it is unsinkable. And along comes the unbeliever, the atheist, in this storm.

And they're in a broke -down, teeny little wooden raft. And there are holes in this little boat they have, and it's taking in water.

And this is often how the conflict happens between the atheist and the Christian. The atheist comes up to the

Christian ship, which is not taking in water. He stands up in his little boat, taking in water, and he yells up to the

Christian, Hey! Your boat is stupid! You're an idiot for being in that boat!

You're ignorant! Your boat is dumb, and you're dumb for being in the boat! And what Christians often do is when the atheist attacks us in that way, what we do is we get, you know, all, oh no.

And, okay, maybe I should step into your boat, and see how things are going. When in reality, we need to realize, don't answer the fool according to their folly.

Don't take on their position. Don't pretend neutrality when you're in this ship that cannot be penetrated.

At the same time, there is value in stepping into the atheist's own faulty worldview, and refuting it from the inside.

For example, this might involve demonstrating that science and history do indeed support the

Christian worldview. But, there's a second part of this apologetic method. And that is to step into the unbeliever's little boat, to take them by the head, and to gently show them that they're sinking.

Step into their position. Do an internal critique. Show them how their worldview is foolishness.

Show them how their abandonment of God and rejection of God has led them to embrace folly and, ultimately, destruction.

We need to check the holy books and see if we can't find a book that is accurate. That is historically accurate, morally accurate, and that is scientifically accurate when assessed by true science.

But, wherever it intersects with science, wherever it intersects with scientific reality, it must be completely true and accurate.

True science, the way things really are, can have no argument with the scripture written by the one who made things the way they really are.

The creator is the author. He knows the way it is. And if this is his book, it will stand every test.

Next, let's talk about the uniformity of nature, or the principle that the future will be like the past.

Atheism can't ultimately justify belief in the uniformity of nature. The unbeliever says, the physical constants that we see around us in the world today came about by sheer accident.

Get that for a moment now. The physical constants that we see around us in the world today came about by sheer accident.

You know who said that? Physicist Lawrence Krauss, alongside Richard Dawkins while at Gammage at ASU.

Now, isn't it amazing that a professor of physics, physical laws, said publicly with a smile that the physical constants that we see around us came about by sheer accident.

And this is a man that teaches people laws of physics. Let me just say this. If they're sheer accidents, that means they cannot be dependent upon now or in the future.

There is no ability to appeal to induction that the future will be like the past if all of it is sheer accidents.

The unbeliever says, Science! Science! We've got to observe it! We've got to see it! In contrast,

Christians can justify belief in the uniformity of nature because there is a God who has instituted physical laws in creation.

The Christian believes that the all -powerful, personal, loving God has revealed to us,

Hebrews chapter 1, that He carries the universe along to its intended destination.

That Jesus upholds all things by the word of His power. That means that He carries it to its intended destination.

That God is sovereign. He gives to the universe a fixed order. David Hume, a famous and respected atheist, recognized the atheist's problem concerning the uniformity of nature.

The validity of scientific laws were undermined by Hume when he contended that we have no rational basis for expecting the future to be like the past or, if you will, to be types of events so that one event happening can be understood as a type of event so where it seems happening somewhere else, the same consequence can be expected from similar causation.

Hume suggested that there was no rational basis for expecting the future to be like the past in which case science is based simply on convention or, if you will, habits of thought.

Similarly, Bertrand Russell, another well -known and respected atheist, also recognized the atheist's problem concerning the uniformity of nature.

Bertrand Russell, one of the most famous atheists in history, he wrote about this problem in a book called

Problems in Philosophy. Listen closely, this is devastating. And he said this, Problems in Philosophy. He said, we need a basis for the uniformity of nature.

He says this, everything we do, literally everything we do is based upon the uniformity of nature.

Logic, language, science, everything's based on uniformity of nature. And he says this, he actually asks an imaginary opponent.

He says, give me a basis for the future being like the past. I need to know. Everything in our experience is based on this.

I need to know we have a basis for the future being like the past. And he goes, and if you say to me, well, it always has been, he goes, that is a refutation of itself because nobody's asking you what the past was.

We're asking you, how do we know the future will be like the past? And the moment you appeal to the past to do it, you are refuting yourself.

You need something better than, well, it always has been. What this means is that the big difference between Christians and atheists is that whereas Christians have a rational basis for their faith, atheists must have a blind faith in the uniformity of nature.

I said, give me a basis using your atheistic worldview, not mine, your atheistic worldview for the future being like the past.

Give me a basis. And he says this, well, it always has been, and so I said, so you live by faith.

And he goes, well, no. I said, well, do you know the future will be like the past? He goes, well, no. I said, so you live by faith.

He didn't like that. Do you see? It is a faith commitment, though. The atheist has faith, but it's a blind faith in chaos.

I really hope so. The Christian also has faith, but it's not a blind faith. Next, let's talk about laws of logic, which we mentioned before.

Again, atheists ultimately can't justify their belief in and use laws of logic. Do you believe there are laws of logic, then?

Absolutely. Are they universal? They're agreed upon by human beings. They aren't laws that exist out in nature.

Are they simply conventions, then? They're conventions, but they're conventions that are self -verifying. Are they sociological laws or laws of thought?

They are laws of thought which are interpreted by men and promulgated by men. Are they material in nature?

How can a law be material? That's the question I'm going to ask you. I would say no.

Dr. Stein has mentioned logical binds and logical self -contradictions. He says that he holds that the laws of logic are universal, but, however, they are conventional in nature.

That is not at all acceptable philosophically. If the laws of logic are conventional in nature, then you might have different societies that use different laws of logic.

It might be appropriate in some society to say both, my car is in the parking lot and it's not the case that my car is in the parking lot.

That is law of certain societies that have a convention that says, go ahead and contradict yourself.

And again, in contrast, Christians have a rational foundation for laws of logic which reflect the mind of God.

From a Christian standpoint, we have an answer. Obviously, they reflect the thinking of God. They are, if you will, a reflection of the way

God thinks and expects us to think. But if you don't take that approach, you want to justify the laws of logic in some a priori fashion that is apart from experience, sometimes that suggests to me since these things are self -verified, then we can ask why the laws of logic are universal, unchanging, and invariant truths.

Why they, in fact, apply repeatedly in the realm of contingent experience.

What all of this means is that the knowledge, logic, science, and ethics atheists use every day come from the

Christian worldview. But atheists don't submit to the God who is the source of all these things.

You're an atheist. You live in a universe that doesn't care. There's no justice ahead of any of us. That's all you've got.

And the reason you construct this system and yet behave like a Christian is because you know the God that I'm talking about.