Thoughts on the Passing of Christopher Hitchens

Webcasting around the world from the desert metropolis of Phoenix, Arizona. This is the dividing line. The Apostle Peter commanded Christians to be ready to give a defense for the hope that is within us.

Yet to give that answer with gentleness and reverence. Our host is dr. James White director of Alpha Omega Ministries and an elder at the Phoenix Reformed Baptist Church. This is a live program and we invite your participation.

If you'd like to talk with dr. White call now at 602 973 460 to or toll-free across the United States. It's 1 877 7 5 3 3 3 4 1. And now with today's topic here is James White.

Christopher Hitchens, Atheism, and the Justice of God

And welcome to the program on a special Friday edition of the dividing line 8 7 7 7 5 3 3 3 4 1 the phone. Lines are open for you. 8 7 7 7 5 3 3 3 4 1. We don't have Skype up today. Sorry about that. 8 7 7 7 5 3 3 3 4 1 Open phones haven't had open phones in a long long long long in a very long time and.

So if you want to get in today, of course probably not wise to do it on a day when you've actually changed the day and people don't know when you're doing it and Some people don't don't follow me on Twitter.

And so they don't get that stuff and it is Friday Friday Friday. Yes that that horrible song. Everyone by the way, you all should be thankful that we resisted the temptation of playing the Friday song as the introduction because I don't think that we would had any listeners left if we Had done that and rich has no idea what the Friday song is.

He lives in a lead mine and we can all mock him for his absolute cultural Insensitivity at that point in time, but he's from Prescott. So what does it matter? Now you have to when you're done we're gonna have to show you the the Friday song.

But Ralph will tell you do not listen to the Friday song because you can't get it out of your out of your mind Once it's there. It's it's pretty well stuck. We're planning on having to wear a shirt, but it's cold down on this side of the Nice flannel, do you just bring the flannel shirt just just because you have to come down to my side of the office.

Is that is that what you've got that on there? Yeah, that's pretty much.

Well, actually it was a little chilly out this this morning much, you know. Well for you, I mean, you're mr. Freeze.

Well, not necessarily. I was cold yesterday and we rode Sean and I and a guy named John.

Riding out past superstitious. They were colder than you were.

Maybe I don't know.

Sean was wearing multiple layers. So yeah, it's you're the only person I know of that likes to work within a 50-degree office.

Okay, whatever you say, it's actually 61 in my office, but that's okay. Anyhow, it's seven seven seven five three three three four one want to start off. On a actually a little bit more of a sober note.

Yes, folks, we know we know you can stop sending emails. You can stop coming in the channel and telling us that Christopher Hitchens passed away we well, that was one of the first things that I noted this morning upon rising was was the passing of Christopher Hitchens and I noted on Twitter.

And if you listen to this program, you really you know, you don't have to do anything on Twitter to follow somebody on Twitter. It really is a good way to keep track of what's going on around here as I noted on on Twitter 18 months ago.

I.

Was.

Listening to His debates. I had just if I recall correctly.

I.

Forget exactly when it was that we we scheduled the debate. It was supposed to be going on in early August of 2010 and So many many months before that. I mean I've been I've listened to Christopher Hitchens for years and Interestingly enough I think as most people would have to admit in most of the debates that I have listened to him in I Have had pretty much as much criticism for his opponents as I did for him.

I mean, I certainly responded to him and responded to his assertions and things like that, but There are many times that I had to applaud Hitchens for recognizing the inconsistencies of His opponents and of course One of the more interesting Experiences we had was was playing the the audio of his debate from Biola with William Lane Craig and one of the more interesting exchanges where Hitchens asked him about false Christians and about they come up with the only thing he came up with it didn't talk about the papacy.

Didn't talk about cults. He talked about Calvinists. Yes. It was the only thing that Craig could come up with that point.

So.

I had been listening I had and I think I had just I think the day before Or maybe the day of my my hearing that He had had to cancel The debate because of his diagnosis of esophageal cancer Was the same day that his Hitch 22 Audio book arrived.

I purchased it on Kindle. But of course they had disabled the Kindle's ability to read it because they wanted to sell the audio book so I had had to get the audio book and Right as it arrived was when I heard that that debate would not be taking place and Well a debate did take place.

But it was certainly not with with Christopher Hitchens and it was the subject was still the same as the New Testament evil, but It was with a opponent that Was very very different in his perspective and his argumentation and Christopher Hitchens.

I've said many times it is difficult not to admire elements of Christopher Hitchens Obvious giftedness. He was a wordsmith. He was an excellent writer. And He had a kind of level of humor.

That.

Just made it difficult to to be consistently angry with with Christopher Hitchens despite his Obvious desire to blaspheme. I Think it was almost something about the honesty of Hitchens detestation of God that was refreshing in a day When so many are functional atheists, but don't have the spines or the guts to be open about their blasphemy.

I Would prefer a Christopher Hitchens to a hypocritical liberal Episcopalian.

Who.

Pretends to honor the name of Christ. And yet is you know having Wiccan meetings in with some woman who calls herself a bishop in what used to be a church, you know,. I I. Would I'd prefer to deal with a Hitchens then then someone like that to be perfectly honest with you and.

And I'm not sure why line one is ringing and nothing's going on. But line one is going to mine is ring. It's on hold. Says ringing on my side. Oh. Then my side is not working anymore. Oh, that's not a good thing.

Oh. Well, just a little don't worry. We're we're. We're live here, I guess. Oh Okay. Now all of a sudden everything popped up up until then it just sit I think it now I now I see a name and everything up until then it just said ring so.

It's having it's it maybe it's cold it's Sorry.

Anyway.

You know Hitchens was a very very intelligent man a very intelligent man and yet He was a very foolish man. Very foolish knows good Christians running around. They're gonna be going. Oh. The fool has said in his heart there is no God and that's a psalm 14 one says.

But one of the problems that a lot of evangelicals have a lot of conservative Christians that they think that that term fool means foolish means stupid. And it doesn't mean stupid. Naval remember remember nabal we call him nabal.

It's it's actually naval. That's that's a term for foolish and it really It could be used in certain context of a stupid person of a person who's just not bright, okay but that's that's not what the psalmist is talking about and in fact the Greek Septuagint uses Afron as its translation of that term and it's it's one who does not utilize the capacity of understanding that is theirs have has the ability to understand but does not do so and that's the kind of atheism that Christopher Hitchens represented.

He had tremendous gifts from God. You cannot deny his capacity to speak even to reason but not to recognize the inconsistency of his own position a brilliant man widely read and Yet foolish. Foolish because he did not utilize The capacity to understand that was his the fool has said in his heart.

There is no God the one lacking understanding and and it's remember what Calvin said at the beginning the Institute's in that excellent opening section where he He raises the ages old question. Which comes first our knowledge of God our knowledge of ourselves and People have answered that in various ways.

Calvin primarily comes the answer that it is Knowledge of God that gives us the only true foundation for knowledge of ourself and of course we depend upon God's revelation for that. But Christopher Hitchens was a man who didn't know himself.

Because for various reasons and they came out in some of the things that he said.

He.

Hated. The God that he knew was there. I mean the term detestation is not too strong For the terminology that Hitchens himself uses as To his.

Dislike of.

The God of the the cosmic North Korea as he liked to express it He did not want to worship a God Who was sovereign and who was omniscient to the point of knowing even the thoughts and intents of Christopher Hitchens heart.

He might have been willing to Worship a powerful deity who is limited in some way shape or form, but he would not worship The God that he knew the scriptures represented and he was very good at recognizing when he was debating Christians who are basically wimps I mean he knew enough about the God of the Bible to know which one was which and He frequently called out his his opponents for in essence I don't know dodging Hiding the truth about the God they were supposedly defending and so here is a man who on from the from the world's perspective was wise and Intelligent and insightful and yet from the Christian perspective From God's perspective from the perspective of the Creator as he has revealed himself in Scripture He suffered from the same foolishness That all idolaters do because Christopher Hitchens was an idolater if you refuse To give the worship to God that he is due you are an idolater.

And In his sickness Christopher turned to the only God that he had. I am certain that he received the absolute best Medical treatment in the world. They were doing genetic therapy and all sorts of stuff, I mean they They he had access to treatment that many of us would not have access to but he died and We can thank God for science and we can thank God for medicine.

But it is all Under the authority of the very God that Christopher Hitchens even Worried himself That he might give in to at the end. One of the things we noted in the articles that Hitchens wrote shortly after his after he began chemotherapy and his voice began to fail and and his appearance began to change.

One of the things we noted was There seemed to be a fear on his part That he might give in and so one of the first things he said was well If you ever hear that Christopher Hitchens called out to God Right toward the end Just chalk it up to the disease or the medicine.

He was trying as best he could To not let the home team down Because they were pretty much all he had. When you think about it now will there be stories circulating. I'm sure there will be because the Inevitable desire of the Christian is well, you know, I hope right at the end.

But the fact is we we have here a man Who dedicated a major portion of the last years of his life. He didn't realize they were going to be the last years of his life, but the last years of his life to a campaign Against the Creator himself and it might be easier for a lot of folks to say well, you know I'd rather see I'd rather see a hypocrite punished than an honest rebel and I guess in a sense you could at least say that in Many ways Christopher Hitchens was more honest about his rebellion than most people are that's for sure.

But once again When we are faced with the death of the ungodly We are faced with the Need To look at our priorities and to not allow our priorities to be determined by emotional feelings and I think many evangelicals fall into that Particular area of problem and that is well, you know He said he's gonna stand before God someday if he if he stands for God's amazing, why didn't you make it easier?

Why didn't you make it clear? Why didn't you and the reality is Christopher Hitchens heard more of the truth Than the vast majority of mankind if Christopher Hitchens cannot be justly punished who could be.

Who could be I mean.

When major portions of the world's population has lived and died without even being literate. Depend upon hearing a message from somebody else. When most people in Europe in the medieval period that didn't move more than seven miles in a place.

They were born in any one direction. Here's a man who traveled the world was fully literate widely read and had tremendous access to the truth. A.

A.

Brightness of light. Beyond compare on apologia without An apologetic without a defense and knowing all of that. Remained adamant as far as we know. Even in the face he had to know. He had to know that his death was inevitable.

Now, of course, it was complications from the cancer and treatment of the cancer pneumonia very frequently one of the things that is involved.

That.

Took him but the fact the matter is he knew. And. What does this show us that no matter how much light one has unless? Unless there is grace If any mind should have been capable of turning itself wouldn't have been Christopher Hitchens.

How many how many arguments were presented to him? How many people looked him in the eye said I'll pray for you. But no matter how intelligent you are no matter how Convinced you are of the coming of your own demise.

Yet there was this.

Insistence.

Upon remaining a rebellion and so I am saddened in the in the sadness of the prophets when they spoke of Why will you perish? Why will you perish? Really did pray that God would be merciful to Christopher Hitchens.

But at the same time at the same time I must recognize that God's purpose and Christopher Hitchens Will be fulfilled. You look at Pharaoh. You look at Nebuchadnezzar. How many examples do we need from Scripture? to be convinced that God even has a purpose in the ungodly.

And do we.

Value our.

Emotional feelings about a fellow creature above the very honor and glory of our Creator Sustainer and Redeemer. And I would suggest to you that if we succumb the temptation to Whitewash the reality of the judgment that is justly due to Christopher Hitchens and to every single one of us.

Then we do so because we really truly do not have a godly set of priorities as.

To.

What is really important for a Christian it should be our desire. It should be our desire. That God's name and God's glory God's power be made known and in fact, this is the radical element of it. Our lives Should be laid upon the line Because our lives are not our own.

We've died. Our life is hidden with Christ and God. God can do with us as we would as he wishes and If he so wishes to use us in that way To bring about his honor and glory then that should be our desire.

And so Christopher Hitchens Has passed from this world and I do not know what conversation Took place upon Christopher's recognition that there is more to man than Well as Douglas Wilson so often said to him.

Adams baying around. But something tells me.

That despite the bravado.

The Christopher Hitchens offered so often during his life despite that brave claim to stand before God and say I I Refused to submit to you because you didn't make your revelation clear enough and you didn't do this the way I thought and and I Will not submit to these celestial North Korea.

Something tells me that when any creature No matter how inveterate they are in their detestation of.

God.

When they see their Creator in his glory. Knowing now. Truly who they are and who he is. I don't Think that that bravado is going to last very long. I Think it will be removed immediately. Much more that could be said about Christopher Hitchens, but.

The phones are open. Eight seven seven seven five three three three four one. Eight seven seven seven five three three three four one. Your thoughts on Christopher Hitchens and Bart Ehrman or Dia Mohammed or whatever else it might be at eight seven seven seven five three three three four one.

Simple Foreknowledge and the Sovereignty of God

Let's go ahead and take our first call and talk with Tom. Hi, Tom. My interface is not working unable to bring it up. Hello Tom. Our phones are having problems, I guess we need to use there we go. I there he is.

Hi Tom. It's really really sorry Tom. It's really really delayed. I'm noticing about a 10 to 15 second delay between when I tell. I Think I just plugged in a 386 386 SX with about 640 K of RAM.

Anyway, what can we do for you today? All right. Well, thank you very much for taking my call. Uh-huh, Mike. My question is on. I don't know if you're familiar with the simple for knowledge of you. Yeah.

Yeah, David David Hunt. Not Dave Hunt, but David Hunt a philosopher over in California's probably. Best known for his promotion of the simple for knowledge view. I know he was the one that represented it in the 2001 book for views that included Greg Boyd and William Lane Craig, so.

Okay, I was. Actually I haven't read This book myself, but I understand that Roger Olson defended the view in a book called perspectives on the doctrine of God.

Well, no, no see that's interesting because.

I.

Was left wondering What Olson Roger Olson's view was? upon reading his against Calvinism because while he.

Certainly.

It seemed like he was ascribing a foreknowledge view to God. But then after I talked about Olson's book I had And I can't bring it up right now. It's on my computer in the room but I had someone send me a Graphic of a page not from an Olson book but from someone who is referring to Olson and Quoting Olson saying something that sounded very molinistic a middle knowledge perspective.

Now I haven't heard Olson do that so. Good question. I'm I will not claim any expertise on Exactly where Olson comes down on that on that particular topic. Hmm, I'm just I'm just not sure.

Okay.

Would you be able to tell me how. I guess how you would argue against the Simple foreknowledge of you as it was told to me is that basically God doesn't know counterfactuals and they happen.

I don't know how you would refute that from the Bible or I'm not. It would depend on how the person is is. Presenting it the question if you if you're simply saying that if you're trying to simplify the nature of God's knowledge and say that and removing the concept of quote-unquote.

Counterfactuals.

First of all from I think a Historic position that that is much more Orthodox, and I think biblically substantiate able God's knowledge the reason I reject middle knowledge is because I see no room for it.

I don't see anything between his free knowledge. And his natural knowledge that is God has knowledge has perfect knowledge of himself and then because God chooses to create. Then he has complete knowledge of that which he creates.

So when someone tries to squeeze middle knowledge in and I'll do this and then we can talk about simple foreknowledge when someone tries to squeeze middle knowledge in between they're basically Introducing a second creator in the sense that if you say that God would have knowledge of what? Creatures would do in given circumstances what I will do in given circumstances is Based upon my nature as a created being.

To say that God has a passive knowledge of what I would do in Certain circumstances that precedes his decree to create me means that my nature is no longer determined by God and That's the real problem.

That's why I Sort of had a cow last week when William Lane Craig on his podcast said well you just need to understand. That's that's the hand God has been dealt with and he's got to play with the hand he has.

So I'm like who dealt him this hand where did this come from there? There's there's another creator out there all of a sudden that is determining these things. And then God just the God of the creation then does the best he can with the hands that he has been given so I can understand why people just want to get away from that and my understanding is that the simple foreknowledge view is Based upon the idea that God is is eternal and hence does not Experience a progression of time and therefore has perfect knowledge of everything takes place within time.

But the real issue again You can call that simple foreknowledge all you want. You still have to answer the question. How does God have knowledge of? Those future events. How does this relate to his decree to create and if he decreed to create.

Then is.

Not his knowledge of those future events. Dependent upon his creative act. And they would say no. But then that would in essence I suppose one of the positions they could take is that would in essence reduce God's knowledge of future events to a merely passive knowledge.

That is he basically tosses the cosmic dice and Hey, cool. I win. Look, I came out good in the end. Well, what if he tossed the cosmic dice and he doesn't. Does he just scrap it and start all over again until he gets the right toss the dice, I I don't know but it's it.

It's a little bit like.

The.

The problem we had about let's see 2003 be eight years ago when I was on a particularly well-known national broadcast and The illustration of God's knowledge of future events was presented. That we all know that Sonny and Cher got divorced, but just because we all know it doesn't mean we caused it and What that is presenting is a passive concept of God's knowledge.

He takes in knowledge when he creates but what he creates that the decree of his creation does not actually determine what takes place in time and And evidently that's that's the simple foreknowledge view.

But it doesn't really in my perspective answer the big question. And when you ask how would I respond to that biblically? Isaiah 41 the challenge to the false gods not only tell us what is going to happen.

That's that the simple foreknowledge view would well God knows what's gonna happen the future but but Tell us what happened in the past and why it happened and that can't be answered because if it's simple foreknowledge, then there isn't a purpose for what happens in the future and Therefore you can't answer the why question.

There is no like answer but God has the why answer because God is sovereign over events in time, so It also raises the conundrum of so which I find to be Reprehensible and that is the idea that God created and at the moment is creation.

He knew all of this evil that was to come about as a result of his creating and Yet he had no purpose in all of that evil and Yet he created anyways I think that's a theodicy is next to impossible to actually defend.

But there are certainly people who who will go that direction.

Hmm from what I've heard of it the way they defend against that is that. He didn't know what was going to happen until he Made the decision to create and then at that point it was too late for him not to create once he realized that.

Evil was gonna happen so so created anyway, okay, so he he couldn't he couldn't stop himself. I mean what. So so once the once the dice left his hand. Then all of a sudden he knew. But it's too late to grab them before they land.

A type of a situation I mean again it it it presents God as passively taking in Knowledge and Doing so in such a way that He is not in control of it, so if he is not in control of the evil Why do we glorify him for the good if he's not if he's not in control the evil?

And this doesn't make any sense as far as. Again God is active in time. From from a reformed perspective God has a decree that decree includes his activity in time which includes his Restraining of evil.

His giving of common grace is giving a special grace is bringing about all the good that happens in the world and everything Else. All that is a part of his decree it It actually is the the foundation of the reality of his interaction with us in time.

But if You don't have a divine decree like that, and you simply have an act of creation and.

The.

Resultant form of creation and activities of in time of creation are in essence random or are determined by man.

Well.

Why why should God be Anything but blamed for all the senseless evil, and why should he why should he be glorified for any of the good? I mean it all it all ends up on man at that point or creatures or and that doesn't really then deal with natural evil.

Because I mean when he created He couldn't like stop tsunamis or earthquakes or stuff like that. Again, if there's no purpose for these things. Why are they a part of the creation? Did he not see they were coming?

I mean, that's why I've always said the only the only really consistent Arminian is an open theist. I mean, you've just you've got to get rid of this foreknowledge idea or you're always stuck with the the question of meaningfulness in the creation itself and.

So.

Does that help you.

It does. Thank you very much. I will I'll look over as a a 41 and I think that makes a lot of sense. And I also wanted to thank you very much for your work with explaining reform theology and then also your work with Islam that's been very helpful in email.

I witnessing here, so. Even up there in the in the frozen tundra, huh? That's right. Yeah, there's a lot of.

Muslims. Oh, well, I then I I probably need to get back up there to to Omaha sometime. I don't think I've done my Muslim My Muslim presentations up there in Omaha, so maybe we can. Maybe we can get back up there.

It's been a number of years since I was there last so look forward to it.

All right, sir. All right. Thank you very much. Thank you. God bless.

Hey there it worked. Yeah Yeah, I know. I know I don't know what's I had trouble logging in and and then it just doesn't doesn't want to I kept Hitting I hit error three times and then about I don't know ten seconds later.

It's like oh Would you like me to put them on air? Okay, never seen that happen before. It's it's what? It's no it has nothing to do with that. It's it's on the other side's fault. And I'm sure you eight seven seven seven five three three, three, four one eight seven seven Seven five three three three four one is the phone number if you want to get involved with the program today.

I realize it is a Friday. I realize it is the It's not the last Friday before Christmas, but it's getting close and so I understand that There are probably a lot of folks if they if they are not working at this time of day There are they're out doing stuff that you're supposed to be doing At this time of year, which I I fully Understand, but if you'd like to get in eight seven seven seven five three Three three four one is the phone number.

If not, I still have all my Debates lined up and queued up so we could still make some some progress. But I will stretch here for just a moment to see if anybody else wants to get in today at eight seven seven seven five three three three four one LaShawn in in channel is Threatening to I should call and ask doc a really tough question.

Well that last one was Was you know involved some some depth I would imagine so Possibility, I suppose that'd be good. Just don't ask me anything about the upcoming NBA season. Please don't ask for my picks for well, can Tim Tebow beat the beat the Patriots in Denver?

I.

Don't know but it has been very very interesting to watch the cultural response. To Tim Tebow. It really has been and I think it is. I Think it is illustrative personally. Someone well well put it and I think there is secular.

If Tim Tebow was a Muslim Would you have would you have linemen Mocking him after sacking him. By maybe pretending to put out a prayer rug and bowing on it now. They didn't ask that but I'm I know something about Islam.

So can you imagine what would happen? Honestly, honestly if a linebacker Sacked a Muslim quarterback. I don't know of any Muslim quarterbacks. There might be one. I don't know are there if there are they don't make A noise about it, but if there was a Muslim quarterback, let's say that went on Hajj or something like that.

Okay was well known for being a practicing Muslim and.

A.

Linebacker. Somebody comes through sacks him and then pretends to roll out a prayer rug and bows on it. How long would he even be in the league? I? Mean. Minimum massive fine minimum massive fine, but I think I think he'd be gone.

I think he'd be history. I really do.

But.

You can you can pretend you're praying after sacking a Christian and when the Christian quarterback doesn't. Respond in the sense of oh, hey, you know, you made a group, you know, Tim was a class act that points I made a good made great play just just sloughed it off.

That's the only way you can do it. But what a massive difference there would be. What a massive difference there would be. There's no no question about it. So it is interesting to look at the way the culture is in the United States and.

I.

Have no earthly idea what that means but We'll go ahead and and go for it. Anyways, let's let's go back to the phones and Go back down to st. Kitts and talk with Gregory. Hi Gregory. Yes, sir.

Yes, yes, I'm calling on a cell phone. Okay. Yes. Right. And that is used. That is used by. How do you. How would you go about explaining it?

Saul’s Death and the Use of Speech in Scripture

Oh, he's not a contradiction. Okay. Are you listening? Are you listening online? So you could. Yeah. Okay, so we I'll go ahead and answer offline if you want. So your your your call will be less than Less than expensive.

Okay.

I would I would need to know what reference referring to there because I am NOT familiar with any reference where it said the only place that David turned away from God was in regards to Bathsheba. I mean certainly Psalm 51 is connected with that but there are many other places where We're Saul, I'm sorry where David sinned so I'm not familiar with any text that says that was the only place.

Okay, well maybe someone could suggest it in channel or something, but Without without a reference I I would just simply say I while while the sin of David with Bathsheba and the murder of Uriah and the Hittite and so on so forth was a Tremendous sin.

It was certainly was not the only time David sinned. I mean David sinned in the census as well. So I just don't know of any text that makes that claim at all.

All right, okay.

I'll get I'll get to your first question.

Okay, all right, okay, but the first question I'll get to I'll get to it. All right. Thank you very much. Thank you very much. All right. Thank you. All right, brother.

Yeah, I know when you're on a cell phone from st. Kitts. It's probably costing legs. So we'll get through that. In regards to the issue of the death of Saul I think this this is a pretty straightforward alleged contradiction which again It was very common.

For.

Those who were military leaders. Kings, of course, but also for those who would be very high up.

In.

Eastern warfare.

To.

Not allow themselves to be profaned In being killed by those who have taken them. For example, you may recall that when Joshua Defeated many of the kings there in the Holy Land as they as they moved into that we call today the land of Israel those kings would be brought before him and and very often, you know, the the foot placed upon their neck and and remember some of the kings of Israel were taken into captivity blinded and naked and Paraded through the streets and this was this was a mechanism of Denigrating the people that you have conquered and so very often the general or the king or whoever else it might be.

Did not want that to happen. Would not allow that to happen if they're going to desecrate my body. There's nothing I can do about that, but I'm not going to give them the satisfaction of taking me and so they would fall upon their sword and This is what Saul does.