Apologetics 101: The folly of atheism — Michael Penfold

Now last night we looked at the folly of the Enlightenment's philosophical ramblings about truth and we looked all the way from the beginning of rationalism in the 17th century right through to our present day of post modernism.

And that journey from rationalism to post-modernism turned out to be nothing but a system of dangerous self-contradictory nonsense. What the devil caused. The wisdom of men not the wisdom of God. But tonight we're going to look at the folly of atheism which is where the Enlightenment actually ended up.

The Folly and Arrogance of Atheism

It ended up denying completely God's existence. Here's the claim. Psalm 14 verse 1. There is no God. God says a person who thinks that to themselves or expresses it out loud is a fool. Not just before looking at the folly of it I just want to think for a moment of the arrogance of it.

In 1961 there was a man from Russia. Some of you may remember this. I I wasn't born so you know I'm at least I'm less than 60 years old. There was a man in Russia. His name was Yuri Gagarin. I don't know whether you remember his name.

He did the first ever manned flight into space. Big thrilling moment. And first time in world history anybody had been outside the atmosphere into space. Now of course Russia the country he came from is a communist country.

God is outlawed in Russia. Didn't seem to help them very much if you look at them. But anyway God is outlawed in Russia. And the president of Russia at that time was a man. Some of you may remember Khrushchev prior to him just after him was Brezhnev.

I don't remember Khrushchev. I remember Brezhnev. Khrushchev said to some people that he was trying to convince about not believing in God. And I quote. Why are you clinging to God. Gagarin flew into space and didn't see.

God just boggles the mind doesn't it. I mean here's Khrushchev. I looked it up on Wikipedia today your your brain is three pounds in weight. Here's this man with with three pounds worth of brain because he doesn't think he has a soul or a spirit.

He's just got this three pound brain. He's a speck of dust on a planet which is a speck of dust in a solar system which is a speck of dust in a galaxy which is a speck of dust in this vast vast incalculably huge universe.

And he thinks that because one of his citizens popped two inches into space that they proved there's no God. The utter arrogance. The utter utter arrogance. Maybe there's a God somewhere Gagarin has never been.

I mean let's just imagine. Let's just imagine. If you could gather up in your lifetime by reading every book that's ever been written and studying everything and the you could gather up 1 of all the knowledge in the universe.

That'd be quite a lot wouldn't it if you could hold in your brain 1 of all the knowledge in the universe. Do you think it might be possible that in the other 99 there might be some evidence that God exists.

Or are you so arrogant that you would stand there and say single-handedly I have got rid of God. What a arrogant claim atheism is. But let's get into the subject directly. The big question the big question this I presume there are some atheists here this evening.

I hope there are. I meet atheists every single week on the streets of Oxford and of London and we have some very engaging conversations. So if you're here and an atheist delighted to see it the big question you have to answer is this where did everything come from.

And that's the most obvious thing staring you in the face. Where did it all come from. Now last night we divided history into the pre-modern era at the modern era and the postmodern era. In the pre modern era prior to 1600 roughly everybody believed in God back then.

The Cosmological Argument and the Beginning of the Universe

And it was an accepted fact that just as every painting needs a painter and every building needs a builder and every book needs an author somebody must have made the world. And they used to use an argument called the cosmological argument.

Christians use it Jews use it Muslims use it. Was just a standard argument for the existence of God that everything that begins to exist has a cause. Think about it. This began to exist. It has a cause.

My cuff link design to exist. This building began to exist. Try and think of something that began to exist began to exist but doesn't have a cause. Well I'm not gonna waste any time waiting because there isn't anything.

Everything that began to exist has a cause. Then the next part of the syllogism is the universe began to exist. That's what they all believe back then we said it in the Bible in the beginning God created so it began.

So if everything that begins to exist has a cause and the universe began. Hey presto we have an argument for the existence of God. The universe must have had a cause and whoever made it must be very big and very powerful and very wise.

In other words we found God and that was a well known accepted fact. And along came the Enlightenment. If you were here last night you will remember perhaps that we had a man last night called Immanuel Kant and he lived way back then 1600 1700s Immanuel Kant.

And he said no no no no not at all. Why can't we just have an unbroken line of causes and effects just going back back and back and back into infinity. Why do we have to have a beginning. I mean it says it in the Bible.

But that's just the Bible. We're able to reason our way to truth. We don't need God's revelation. Perhaps the universe is eternal. It's always been here. It's self-existent doesn't need a creator. And around about that time John Isaac Newton came along with his law of gravity and everything.

And and the people in the Enlightenment the big thinkers that we learned about David Hume Immanuel Kant John Locke all those people they basically came to the conclusion that the universe consists of billions and billions of stars all suspended in a sort of tension and the gravitation between all the stars and all the planets evens itself out in a sort of balanced way so that the universe is just there.

It's just static. It just is. And it's just always been here in a steady state. And Genesis chapter 1 verse 1 was lampooned huh. You believe. You believe there was a beginning. What kind of a fool are you.

It's always been here. And that became that became the doctrine that became. You had to believe that or you're an idiot all the way through the 1600s all the way through the 1700s all the way through the 1800s to be cool and to be accepted.

You had to spout the Enlightenment doctrine that the universe has always been here. There never was a God and there never needed to be a God. And to hang on to Genesis 1 verse 1 was a bit difficult in the classroom at school and everybody else believed something different.

Then a man called Albert Einstein came along in the 20th century and he started doing all sorts of equations and things and he came up with a theory which actually contradicted Isaac Newton. He came up with a theory called general relativity.

Now the the bottom line of Einstein's theory was that the universe is not static. It's not just hanging there in perfect tension. He actually said no I think actually the universe is expanding it's getting bigger it's going out.

And it didn't take him long to think well if it's sort of expanding and going out that probably means some time ago it was so small and that's such a situation that there were zero distances between all the planets and stars and oh there must have been a beginning to all of this.

And he was so horrified and he was so shocked. And he didn't want there to be a beginning and neither did anybody else that he actually invented a way around it. He shoved something into his equations to fudge it.

Because he didn't want it he had to take that out later because what happened was a couple of decades later in the 1920s in the 1930s there was a man the other side of the world from here in California you will all have heard of him.

He's called Mr. Hubble. He had a big telescope. Hubble's telescope it's over there in Mount Wilson Observatory in California and he stuck this telescope up to the night sky the biggest telescope anybody ever seen at that point.

And he made a blindingly shocking discovery. Up to that point in time people had really pretty much used a naked eye plus simple microscopes and they'd looked up and they'd seen stars stars stars stars stars stars.

We were in a galaxy and there are all the stars. And when he put this massive telescope up he went whoops. Those little dots which they thought were single stars turned out to be galaxies each containing billions of such.

Within a moment of time the entire universe was magnitudes bigger than anybody possibly thought it could ever be. Then he noticed something else. The light that was coming from those galaxies was shifted to the red.

Now if that means nothing to you just imagine an ambulance and as the ambulance is coming to you blaring away you can hear the sound of it and it has a certain pitch. But there's a weird phenomenon when it goes by you the pitch changes you ever experienced that it sounds a certain level and then as it goes by it drops a little bit.

Now that's because the sound this is not very technical but the sound is being squished up when it's coming towards you and it's stretching out when it goes away from you. Now light behaves in a similar way and on the electromagnet spectrum light shifts and when it shifts to the red it means something is going away.

So Hubble discovered that Einstein had been correct. Einstein had this theory. The galaxies are moving away. They're not static. Now. Hubble has proved it. He's proved. He says I can see it. They're shifted to the red.

Everything is expanding. It's really true. There was a beginning to the universe. Now there's a whole lot of other stuff background radiation and a whole bunch of other stuff. I don't want to go into all the detail is but what I'm saying is this in the beginning of the 20th century science confirmed Genesis chapter 1 not the bit about God as such.

But they confirmed the first three words in the beginning and they hated it. Fred Hoyle and a whole bunch of other atheistic scientists said oh no what are we gonna do now. And they tried to come up with other ways around it oscillating universes and all sorts of things.

But now you'll find they had to accept it. In the end there was a beginning. Now here's where the folly comes in. Imagine that you're at the top of a mountain. I don't know what mountains you've got over here.

I know you got the morn mountains. Let's let's imagine we're at the top of the morn mountains. It's a clear night now. That's a rare thing in Northern Ireland. But it's a it's a clear night no clouds.

And you're on the top of the morn mountain and you look up and you're amazed at what you see. Just well I don't know whether you've ever done this but it is wonderful. If you get a clear night you lie on your back and you just look.

And there is this the utter magnificence of the night sky the sheer size of it all the sheer sense of awe that you have as you look at it the current estimate is two trillion galaxies not two trillion stars.

The galaxy is a whole bunch of stars. You think of the Milky Way galaxy. That's that spiral thing full of stars. Two trillion trillion is a lot of noughts. Is it nine now. That's a billion. Must be 12 12 noughts is a trillion galaxies.

This is the current estimate. In October 2016 it was ten times less than that in 2015. They keep getting more. The Bible says you can't count them. So anyway this is what they're saying. Two trillion.

Now they reckon that the average galaxy has 400 billion stars. So you do the maths. Two trillion times. 400 billion. Well I'll just tell you what it is. It's nearly a septillion now each one of those stars is a gigantic hot ball of burning gas.

Our Sun is a star and it's quite small. And each one of those hot burning balls of gas a septillion of them. Each one is trillions of miles from the next one. And when I look up at that I say to myself Psalm 19 verse 1 the heavens declare the glory of God and the firmament showeth his handiwork.

Or Psalm 8 when I consider thy heavens this is David thousand BC looking up into the sky looking after the sheep. When I consider thy heavens the works of thy fingers the moon and the stars which thou hast ordained.

What is man. This isn't Gagarin went up didn't find God is it. This is what is man. But you see when the atheist looks up he can't say that because he doesn't believe in God which leaves him with a massive problem.

You see there are really only two options either God made it or it made itself. Can you think of any other options. I mean there is a third option that it's all really not here. It's an illusion. But I hope there's nobody in the building that believes that God made it or it made itself.

Do you think that phone could have made itself. You see to make something you need to exist but you don't exist until you've been made which means it is impossible to make yourself. So they don't believe God made it.

It's logically and physically and philosophically impossible for something to make itself. So what do they believe. Well I'll tell you what they believe. I've got one two three. I had loads but I thought I wouldn't bore you with them.

Nothing Cannot Cause the Universe

All these are top what. The first one is a man called Arno Penzias. He is a Nobel Laureate. He's clever guy. Quote. Astronomy leads us to a unique event a universe which was created out of nothing. Here's another one a physicist very famous physicist Paul Davies.

He said the Big Bang which is what they call it. It represents the instantaneous suspension of physical laws the sudden abrupt flash of lawlessness that allowed something to come out of nothing. It represents a true miracle transcending physical principles that was published in a book by Simon and Schuster very well-known publisher.

One more quote. This is a book very humbly called a short history of nearly everything by Bill Bryson. This is the best one of all which I have. Why I saved it to last. And so from nothing our universe begins.

It may seem impossible that you could get something from nothing but the fact that once there was nothing and now there is a universe is evident proof that you can. Which is why I call this talk this evening the folly of atheism.

Oh the folly of it. First of all there was nothing. Then it's exploded time energy matter and all the laws to control the whole thing popped into being out of now. I've often wondered how they got away with this.

And a while ago there was one of their number a man called Lawrence Krauss K-r-a-u-s-s. He goes by the name of Larry. He wrote a book called the universe from nothing and I thought I'm gonna read this book.

Now on the back there was a very glowing quote by somebody saying this book will do for cosmology what Darwin's origins of species did for biology. I thought well that's pretty pretty big praise. This is gonna be some book.

So I read chapter 1 2 3. Waffle waffle. What. The where is he gonna explain how the universe came from nothing. And I got to chapter. I think it was chapter 7. If you're gonna check me up on this it may be 5 6 or 7 somewhere around there but I don't remember the exact chapter I got to let's say it's chapter 7.

And here's the heading of chapter 7. Nothing is really something. It turns out that what he really believes is that it wasn't really sort of nothing. It was kind of a positive and negative energy that perfectly balanced out each other and then popped into something else.

He was trying to slip something under the carpet by really calling it nothing. But then that's not nothing. And we're back to zero again because at the end of the day if they were to do that they were proposing an effect without a cause.

They're bluffing you. But you say when I talk to atheists and I say to them you know where did the universe come from. They just say the Big Bang. They tell me that all the time especially young people meet young people and say are you a Christian.

Oh mate I don't believe in God. So where did the universe come from. Big Bang. It's just like you put the slot in the machine and out comes the result Big Bang. But the Big Bang is an effect. That's not the cause.

I'm asking you for the cause. Don't say Big Bang. That's the effect. I want the cause. Let's just imagine. Let's just imagine you hear a small bang and you say to yourself what made that bang. And I say to you nothing.

And you say oh come on. You can't get a small bang without some sort of cause. Now if you need a cause for a small bang would you agree with me that you need a cause for a big bang. But they want us to think that the biggest bang that ever happened just happened.

No cause nothing before it. No explanation needed. What's the problem. The problem is they're trying to avoid God. Desperately desperately desperately trying to avoid God. Even when it's obvious in fact this is what they do next when you pin them to the floor on this issue they immediately say if you say well God must have made it there.

Rather than say okay now we found God we better deal with God. They immediately say oh who made God move the gold purse. Now we've proved to you that there must be this all-powerful all-wise being and made the universe.

You don't want to know about him. You're not interested. Shift the conversation. Well who made him then. Well how do you answer that. Well Genesis 1 verse 1 says. In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth.

What that verse is saying is that God was there before the start. The Bible reveals that God is an eternal self-existent uncaused cause. You say you've just told us that the universe can't be uncaused.

How can you now posit an uncaused cause. Well you see at the moment in which the world was created it wasn't just a matter of energy being created and matter being created. It was also a situation where time was created.

There was no time before Genesis chapter 1 time energy and matter all were created. Which means that whoever existed before then and made that happen is outside of time is timeless is causeless and it has to be.

So let me just put something to you. If there ever was a time when absolutely nothing existed now just imagine this try. And this is very important. They're very difficult to imagine that just just for a moment try and imagine a time when there was nothing zero no sky no earth no God no laws no gravity absolutely and totally zilch nothing.

Imagine that time. If there ever was a time like that there would still be nothing. If there ever was a time when there was absolutely nothing there would still be absolutely nothing. Do you know why.

Because out of nothing nothing comes. And the fact that we are all here today is evidence that there is somewhere back there an uncaused cause a primal cause a first cause. And the Bible reveals this first cause to us.

God created the heavens and the earth. And isn't it a wonderful thing that having been criticized and lampooned all the way through the 1600s in the 1700s in the 1800s in the 1900s Christians were ultimately vindicated in their simple trust in what the Bible says that there really was a beginning.

Fine-Tuning and the Design of Life

But the Bible not only says that God made the world it says it made it to be inhabited. There's a verse in in Isaiah 45 which says this. For thus saith the Lord that created the heavens God himself that formed the earth and made it he's established it.

He created it not in vain. Listen to this now he formed it to be inhabited. You say oh so what. What's the big deal. Oh this is a very big deal. Because in the last 50 years we actually do live in a very exciting time in relation to discoveries.

In the last 50 years an amazing fact has come to light. Scientists have produced this not produced it. They have discovered this fact. The fact is this that to have or to produce a universe which can sustain life is nothing short of a miracle.

I mean look what's happening at the moment. We have extinction rebellion rebellionites sitting in the streets of London stopping the traffic. Because our temperature is going up two degrees and because our temperature is going up two degrees we are facing extinction.

What does that tell you. If that's true or even remotely true this planet is on an absolute knife edge. Where you move it that way or that way a few degrees and we're finished. Turns out that we actually are on a knife edge.

Our planet is no ordinary place. You often hear on the news that oh or even on a science program. Oh there's probably life all over the universe. Anybody that says that hasn't learned these facts. Everything about the world everything about the solar system everything about the universe has been crafted and designed so that this planet that you're sitting on tonight can be inhabited.

Now let me give you some examples. The most basic thing you need for life on a planet is liquid water. That's why there's no life on Venus. Venus is too near the Sun it's 900 degrees. There you would all burn up.

No liquid water no life. That's why there's no life on Mars even though you keep hearing that there is there's no life possible on Mars. It's too cold for liquid water. But we have something called an atmosphere.

It's a tiny little blanket. If you look at the diameter of the earth it's 1 a little ring called the atmosphere. It's made up of 78 nitrogen 1 carbon dioxide and 21 oxygen. That's what's in this room.

Did you hear that 21 oxygen. If it was 25 oxygen fires would instantaneously break out and we'd all burn up. If it was 15 oxygen we'd all suffocate and die. So we are exactly where we need to be.

Not as near as Venus not as far away as Mars. We are in a sweet spot where it's not too hot and it's not too cold. We have an atmosphere which has exactly the right amount of oxygen to sustain life. The earth is revolving on its axis once every 23 hours and 56 minutes around which a moon orbits once every 27 days 7 hours 43 minutes and 11 .6 second both of which orbit the Sun every 365 .2536 days.

That's not to scale by the way the real size of that Sun wouldn't even fill this room. If the earth rotated slightly slower the variations between how hot it was in the middle of the day and how cold it was in the middle of the night would be too great for us to be alive.

Aren't you glad when the Sun goes down. Sometimes if the earth rotated a little bit faster wind speed would be too great for life. Now I'm not going to go through them all because there are about a hundred and fifty of these finally tuned parameters.

The tilt of the earth is just right at 23 .5 The crust of the earth is just thick enough for tectonic plate activity. We have just the right kind of Sun. We have just the right kind of galaxy. We are sitting in one of the spiral arms of the galaxy.

If we were too near the middle we'd be finished. If we were too near the edge we would be finished. And all the fundamental laws and constants of the universe are just perfect. There's something called the gravitational force.

If it was altered minutely to one part in 10 to the 49th power the Sun would not exist and the moon would crash into the earth. The strong nuclear force which holds protons and neutrons together. If it was altered ever so slightly no atoms would be able to stay together.

And the list goes on. The proton mass electron mass the electromagnetic force. This has been called the fine-tuning of the universe. I spoke to an atheist in Oxford about a month ago who's no longer an atheist and I said to him he was about to give a lecture at Pembroke College in Oxford and he stood and listened while we're preaching in the open air for about 15 minutes.

And I went over to him at the end and I said what do you think of the message. And we got tacked talking about the gospel and so on. He says I used to be an atheist. I said well what convinced you not to be an atheist.

He said the fine-tuning argument. The argument that I've just given you for the last 10 minutes convinced him he's not that he's not saved. You're not Christian. At least it convinced him that there is a God.

Someone has likened it to this is just a random machine with a man twiddling nose. But just imagine that was a universe making machine. And to get a universe you got a hundred and fifty dials. One of them is the strong nuclear force.

One of them is a weak nuclear force. One is the distance from the Sun. The other one is how quickly the earth rotates and so on and so on. None of them are preset. And you've got to go and get a universe by chance.

Go on. Then go and start twiddling the knobs. If you're slightly to the left or to the right on one knob there's no universe. Keep twisting keep twisting keep twiddling keep playing with all the dials.

It's been calculated there's one chance in a hundred thousand trillion trillion trillion trillion trillion trillion trillion that you'll ever get a planet to support life. So let me summarize two facts before we start winding down.

The existence of the universe demands an all-powerful creator. Number two. The nature of the universe fit for life demands an all-wise creator an omnipotent God and an omniscient God. You say what do atheists do with that.

Well the one that I met in Oxford he was convinced you know what most atheists do. They've come up with a new theory. It's called the multiverse. Well you say what's a multiverse. Because they know this is impossible.

They've come up dreamed it up. We're not a scrap of evidence that there's probably billions of universes and we just happen to live in the one that's perfect for life. You say what's wrong with these people.

Romans 1 and the Suppression of Truth

Well what's wrong with these people is what we read in Romans chapter 1 at the heart of things is a bias. I often say to atheists when I meet them why don't you want to believe in God. What is your problem.

At their heart is a bias. Romans chapter 1 analyzes mankind's attitude to God. And it sort of goes through a step by step process. Step number one suppress the truth. I many many times have met people who say I believed in God when I was 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 and a half.

And then what happens. Well you see then they want to go to the disco. Then they want to go to the pub get a bit older. They want to drink. They want to snort snort cocaine. They want to sleep around.

They want to watch stuff that. Well the mom and I wouldn't want to watch. And suddenly it's like if I'm gonna live like this it's very inconvenient for there to be a God. So let me say there is no God.

And they go from their childlike simplicity to this cool dude of an atheist. They suppress that inner knowledge that there really is a God. And they said oh no they can't be. And then in verse 21 is that they become futile in their thinking.

You see when you reject truth you actually go dark on the inside. You start to become blind to obvious things. Oh yes they're very clever people. But the Bible says professing themselves to be wise they became fools.

And then the next stage in verse 23 they they downgrade the glory of God and they make a God in their own image. They fashion a God like themselves. You might even meet someone or say yeah. Well I believe there's some kind of force out there.

Yeah I believe there's some sort of you know some ultimate something. But not not the God of the Bible. Oh no not the God of the Bible. They make a God in their own image. If they have to have any kind of God at all.

And the rejection of God according to this passage leads to moral breakdown. We're seeing that in our society today. Then you get to stage three where they actually exchange the truth of God for a lie.

They say I don't believe that anymore. And they swallow the entire Enlightenment pill. But according to Romans chapter 1 you shouldn't feel sorry for them because they are without excuse. Everybody should know.

In fact I believe everybody does know that there is a God now granted. Romans 1 is talking about metal idols. I'm talking about mental idols where God has been replaced with rationalism with empiricism with atheism.

Tomorrow night we'll see Darwinism. And you do have to ask yourself why would anybody believe that stuff. Because once you reject God and receive the lie any lie especially this naturalistic lie where it's all got natural explanations.

What are you left with. Well let me quote you what you're left with. Let me quote you Bill Provine. Bill Provine is a biologist at a famous University in America Cornell University. He declares that if you're an atheist there's no life after death.

No ultimate foundation for ethics no ultimate meaning for life no free will. So the love of your wife is merely the random firing of neurons in her brain. Nothing you've ever accomplished in your life has transcendent significance.

Beauty and love and mercy don't really exist. They have no objective existence. A rainbow is not beautiful it just is DNA is not designed. It just is death ends everything. Why would you want to believe that.

I can think of a very good reason why you want to believe that the man who let the cat out of the bag is a man who since died a man called Christopher Hitchens. His brother writes in the Daily Mail on a Sunday called Peter Hitchens who's a professing Christian.

But Christopher his brother was the polar opposite. He was an atheist. He one day said that he didn't want there to be a God and didn't believe in God. And this is what he called God a celestial North Korea.

Now North Korea is a communist state and in North Korea they know what you're doing all the time they watch you and they put you in prison. If you disagree with them he says I think God is a celestial North Korea.

In other words I don't want a God who can read my thoughts. I want to be able to think whatever thought I want to think without anybody knowing what it is. I wonder why I want to be able to do what I want.

He experimented with homosexuality when he was at university. He spent his life drinking and smoking. He actually gave himself cancer through smoking died dropped into an early grave. He's a reprobate sort of a fellow Christie.

Very very intelligent along on a certain level very lucid at writing and speaking well-spoken. But he didn't want someone knowing what he was doing. That's the reason this is Roman 128. They did not like to retain God in their knowledge so that they could get on with their life even though they knew the judgment of God.

I was reading a book in preparation for this meeting by a man called RC Sproul or Sproul. I'm not sure I pronounce it. He's a theologian from America. Very interesting book. He has a little chapter in it called the psychology of atheism.

And I'll just quote you one little paragraph from it. Those who deny God have an enormous vested interest in their denial. Because simply put if the biblical God exists then an infinite obstacle stands between them and their own autonomy.

Men cannot be the ultimate creator of their own destiny. If the sovereign God of the universe exists we know we are in trouble if we acknowledge the existence of the sovereign God. See that when he says autonomy what he's saying is this.

The average person out there just wants to do what they want to do. When they want to do it how they want to do it. They don't want you telling me what to do. That's the human heart. All of us like sheep have gone astray.

We have turned every one of us to our own way our own way. The most famous song sang at funerals in England is not amazing grace. It's not the Lord is my shepherd. It's not all things bright and beautiful.

It is I did it my way by Frank Sinatra. Why does everybody want to sing that at their funeral. Because that's the human heart. That's Genesis 3. The problem with Adam and Eve was not stealing an apple.

The problem was that in stealing the apple they were saying we want to do it our way. We don't want to follow God and God's rules. God is not the king of the universe. We are not responsible and accountable to him.

We make our own truth. We carve out our own path. We follow our own heart. That's the very essence of sin. God is a big problem if you want to do like that and you want to think like that. It was Malcolm Muggeridge who said men do not believe lies because they have to but because they want to.