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This is why I am atheist. I don’t mean to offend anyone, but I found this video very compelling, and watched it all the way through.
The only reason that I am putting this here is because I have some VERY christian friends and they, well, might hate me forever if I put this on Facebook >_>
I get why you like this video. For starters, it’s calm, respectful, and level-headed — the way we should all try to be when we tackle difficult subjects. But once this video gets past the pleasantries, the problems begin.
The narrator reads a statement from Christianity.com linking God’s love and faithfulness to … wish-granting.
Now, I’m not criticizing you or the makers of this video for the entirely reasonable assumption that, if it’s on Christianity.com, it must be based on Scripture. But, sadly, your assumption is incorrect.
Doesn’t Jesus say, “And I tell you, ask, and it will be given to you; seek, and you will find; knock, and it will be opened to you. For everyone who asks receives, and the one who seeks finds, and to the one who knocks it will be opened,” In Luke 11:9-10.
Yes, and He makes it clear what He’s talking about in verse 13: “If you then, who are evil, know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will the heavenly Father give the Holy Spirit to those who ask him!”
Doesn’t Jesus say, “And whatever you ask in prayer, you will receive, if you have faith,” in Matthew 21:22 — and in the context of a crazy miracle, too?
Yes, but the Bible is not just one verse (a mistake that’s made by Christians and non-Christians alike); it’s an entire book. And in that book, we learn that God is just not some divine ATM machine.
Sure, He accepts us as we are if we turn away from our sins and confess our belief in Jesus. But, contrary to popular belief, His love, loyalty, and support all come with conditions, and people who only read the Bible they want to read get a distorted picture of Him.
What conditions, you ask.
In John 14:15-17, Jesus says, “If you love me, you will keep my commandments. And I will ask the Father, and he will give you another Helper, to be with you forever, even the Spirit of truth, whom the world cannot receive, because it neither sees him nor knows him. You know him, for he dwells with you and will be in you.”
So, to receive the Spirit of truth — to know what the truth is — we have to keep Jesus’ commandments.
Jesus goes on in John 15:12-14, “This is my commandment, that you love one another as I have loved you. Greater love has no one than this, that someone lay down his life for his friends. You are my friends if you do what I command you.”
So, if we’re not laying down our lives in faith — our dreams, our desires, our bucket lists — then, no Spirit of Truth, no crazy answered prayers.
What if we are doing all that? What if, as Paul writes in Romans 12:1-2, we “present [our] bodies as a living sacrifice, holy and acceptable to God, which is your spiritual worship. Do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewal of your mind, that by testing you may discern what is the will of God, what is good and acceptable and perfect.”
If we do that, our prayer life changes. We stop seeing God as some scary/benevolent Santa, and start seeing Him as someone whose primary goal is to set up His Kingdom in His time and in His own way. And we start to pray in that context.
When we pray that way, we don’t “have to trust that He knows what’s best” because we’ve seen it at work in our own lives, and we know it for certain.
We’ve seen that our suffering and sacrifice can produce faith, hope, and love where it never existed — yes, even if we’re saddled with the addiction, the obsession, the unemployment, the crummy marriage, the crummy singlehood, the crummy paycheck, the frenemies, the less-than-fabulous life.
See, our job isn’t to get what we want at the expense of the other guy, as Paul explains in I Timothy 2:1-4, “First of all, then, I urge that supplications, prayers, intercessions, and thanksgivings be made for all people, for kings and all who are in high positions, that we may lead a peaceful and quiet life, godly and dignified in every way. This is good, and it is pleasing in the sight of God our Savior, who desires all people to be saved and to come to the knowledge of the truth.”
That’s the job: If we love God, we work for all people to be saved and to come to the knowledge of the truth.
Can we do all that and still marry the hottie, throw the best parties, get into the right college, land the enviable job, live in the best house on the block, retire with a pile of money?
Maybe. In Matthew 19:23-26, Jesus says, “And Jesus said to his disciples, “Truly, I say to you, only with difficulty will a rich person enter the kingdom of heaven. Again I tell you, it is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle than for a rich person to enter the kingdom of God.” When the disciples heard this, they were greatly astonished, saying, “Who then can be saved?” But Jesus looked at them and said, “With man this is impossible, but with God all things are possible.”
But then, in Matthew 6:19-21, Jesus says, “Do not lay up for yourselves treasures on earth, where moth and rust destroy and where thieves break in and steal, but lay up for yourselves treasures in heaven, where neither moth nor rust destroys and where thieves do not break in and steal. For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also.”
Huge, huge wind-up, I know, but do you see how the whole argument that this video presents is based on a faulty syllogism? Do you see how God does what He needs to do to bring His Kingdom about, and that He allows our problems to continue if and only if that will help bring His Kingdom about?
Here’s how Paul explains it in Romans 8:26-28, “Likewise the Spirit helps us in our weakness. For we do not know what to pray for as we ought, but the Spirit himself intercedes for us with groanings too deep for words. And he who searches hearts knows what is the mind of the Spirit, because the Spirit intercedes for the saints according to the will of God. And we know that for those who love God all things work together for good, for those who are called according to his purpose.”
“All things work together for good” does not mean we will get our “happy ending”. It’s true that God answers prayers in the form of “yes,” “no,” and “wait,” but it’s also true that if — repeat if — we listen and obey, the indwelling Holy Spirit guides us so that we often know the answer to a request before we make it.
The distance and the futility that are (correctly) inferred here do not have to be the case if we set our hearts on what God — who cannot be evil — wants instead of what we want.
Speaking of our wants and needs, this video cites several studies debunking the efficacy of prayer. I’m not surprised at the results, but the video’s narrator says, “You might say to yourself, ‘God cannot be tested’ … But these are rationalizations, nothing more.”
I respectfully disagree. God is a Being. All beings — whether our pet, a stray grizzly bear, our significant other, or God Almighty — will only put up with so much from us. When we make the relationship exclusively and/or forcibly about our values, our perceptions, our wants and needs, we shouldn’t be surprised when we’re charged or ignored. That’s no rationalization, no coincidence; that’s reality.
But again, you’re right about one thing: If we have our minds set on what we want to the exclusion of what God wants, we might as well be praying to a jug of milk.
Excuse me for going on about it. This is less about convincing you that atheism is wrong than about demonstrating that the argument presented in this video is based on a false perception of true Christian principles.
If you got to the end of this, congratulations — and thanks for hearing me out.
