A Defense of the Trinity

Deut 6:4 "Hear, O Israel: The Lord our God is one Lord"

Christianity is monotheistic - there is one God.  But it is also trinitarian - three persons in the Godhead (three in one, "triple unity", trinity).

Obviously, understanding the fundamental nature of God is a hard problem.  He is infinite and holy, while we are finite and not.  But God has stooped down to our level to reveal Himself, and we must try to reconcile what has been revealed.

Attacks on the Trinity usually come in one of two forms:

1. Jesus is not God (Arianism)
2. God is not three "persons", but rather, three "modes", "roles" or "forms" (Sabellianism, or modalism)

Let us address the first point first.

1. The Old Testament (Is 9:6) says the child born unto us will be called the "mighty God" and "everlasting Father".
2. Sin is an offence, and only the one offended can forgive.  When Jesus forgives sins, He is claiming to be God (the people at that time understood this, and sometimes took up stones against Him)
3. In Hebrew the term "son", in the metaphorical sense, means to have the nature and attributes ("son of destruction" is a destructive person).  We think of "son" as derivative (less than), but that is not the original meaning.  "Son of God" is claiming to be God (again, the people at that time understood this, and took up stones).
4. God is love, and love is a relationship (there must be some object for the love).  Under orthodoxy, the three Persons love each other.  Apart from that, it is hard to say what God's love is.

As to the second:

1. We see all three Persons present at Jesus' baptism.  (Also, there are two other occasions where the Father speaks from Heaven to Jesus on Earth).
2. God is love - number four above.
3. Jesus repeatedly prays to the Father.  Is Jesus addressing Himself?
4. We see the Trinity at work in many places.  The Resurrection is attributed to all three Persons.  Salvation is the work of all three.

Finally, it is good to note that no one would fabricate such a hard doctrine.  The easy way would be to support modalism or Arianism (Arianists excercised a great deal of power for a time).  But we cannot deny what the Bible teaches, God is Three in One.

Hyper-skepticism and Hyper-credulity

What is the connection between: Bart Ehrman (athiest), Paul Tsoukalos (guy from the History channel), and certain Catholic apologists on Facebook?

Their reasoning is all along the lines of:
"I can't trust the Bible, therefore X"

Where X is:

1. Mud+time equals man
2. Aliens are responsible for everything in history
3. I can only trust the Catholic Church

It's really a variant on "Anything but God" (anything but the Bible)

The Perspicuity of Scripture

It saddens me when people who call themselves Christians go on to doubt that we can understand the Bible (what is sometimes called "The Perspicuity of Scripture").

Understanding this principle is really quite simple:

1. God has chosen to reveal Himself.  This has included many different methods (Heb 1:1-2), but for us, is in the Bible.
2. God is always successful in His plans and purposes

To deny #2 is effective atheism.

But what about #1?

Some will say that God can only be known through a mediator.

However, this runs into the problem of "why can we communicate".

That is, we can only communicate clearly because we are in the image and likeness of God, and God communicates clearly.

If God does not communicate clearly, then we have no reason to believe that we can communicate clearly (or we are greater than God in this regard - and God is not God, back to effective atheism).

So, if God cannot communicate clearly, we cannot communicate clearly - and thus you cannot communicate your argument.

Hypocrisy

One of the classic complaints against Christianity is "the church is full of hypocrites".

Let's overlook the obvious problem with this statement (you are turning down God's offer of forgiveness and eternal life in Heaven - because some people who claim they will be in Heaven are jerks).

First, I must say, if a local church is full of hypocrites, you should avoid that church.

Why?

Two possibilities:

1. They say they are evil, but are actually good. I don't think anyone would have a problem with this. It'd be like super-humility.
2. They say they are good, but are actually evil.

If they say they are good, they don't have a very good grasp of the Gospel (we are evil, God is good - we can get forgiveness for our evil, and get credit for God's goodness).

Ok. But what about atheists who are hypocrites?

Atheists cannot believe in anything greater than themselves. That is because everything dies with us (entropy). There can't be anything greater than ourselves, as individuals. At most, they can sponsor some sort of utilitarianism, which sees to the maximization of utility (although that has some problems).

So, any atheist who argues in favor of their belief system over any other - "because it is true" - is a hypocrite. Truth doesn't matter (under their system). Only our own purposes - which means theists can have their own purposes, and atheists shouldn't try to dissuade them.

Looking a Horse in the Mouth

Today, I met one of the "four horsemen" of the New Atheism (Dawkins, Harris, Hitchens, and Dennett) - Christopher Hitchens. He was debating Douglas Wilson (of Blog and Mablog fame) at Martin's Tavern in DC.

First impressions: Doug seemed like a very down to earth guy. Hitchens was more aloof, sitting by himself at the bar, and drinking (a lot!). He was drinking before the debate, finished a snifter (brandy? whiskey?) early, and I saw him drinking a glass of wine before the end. Doug got through about a half a pint of beer in the same time...

On the topic, they largely talked past each other. Hitchens brought up the old complaints about "how can any intelligent person believe this stuff", while Wilson hammered away at Hitchens foundations (specifically, the lack thereof). That is, Hitchens has only himself to declare acts good or evil. When someone else (Hitler, Stalin, etc.) uses those same criteria and acts differently, by what authority is Hitchens superior?

I did respond to Hitchens directly at one point. He asked if anyone knew God's truth (or will, I forget the exact phraseology). I raised my hand, and he looked at me. I said, "the Bible". Wilson quipped, "There you have it." (or the equivalent)

I thought the crowd would be about 50/50 (atheist/Christian). It certainly felt stacked in favor of atheists. My table had three atheists and me. I stayed about three hours after, giving a good defense for the faith.

Book Review

"In My Place Condemned He Stood" (J. I. Packer and Mark Dever) - This is a collection of essays concerning substitutionary atonement, the doctrine that Jesus' death on the cross was in place of the just punishment we deserved - and His death satisfied God's wrath at our sin, permitting us to enjoy eternal life with God.


The essays are:
The Heart of the Gospel - J.I. Packer (1973)

What Did the Cross Achieve? The Logic of Penal Substitution - J.I. Packer (1973)

Nothing But the Blood - Mark Dever (2006)

Saved By His Own Precious Blood: An Introduction to John Owen's The Death of Death in the Death of Christ - J.I. Packer (1959)

The last section is an overview and recommendation of the work of John Owen, who apparently wrote a lot of excellent material on this subject.

After becoming a Christian, substitutionary atonement has never been a problem for me. But it is a topic always worthy of study. These articles are excellent, both as polemic against alternative proposals, and apologetics for the orthodox doctrine.

How Do You Know?

I will continue to challenge the foundations of atheistic arguments. Most will argue that we can only know what we perceive through our senses. In that light, I found an interesting article on tactile illusions.

This describes an experiment on touch, modeled after the visual illusion where our eye interprets motion backwards and forwards (somewhat like the wheel caps on a car appear to move forward at low speed, but backward at high speed).

"When volunteer subjects were given the diagonally alternating [tactile] stimuli, they perceived them as moving smoothly back and forth--and just as with the visual illusion, the direction of apparent motion flipped back and forth from vertical to horizontal, on average about twice per minute, even though there was no change in the stimulus itself."

That covers vision and touch. I will have to dig up an analysis of "phantom sounds" (common for cell phone uses). Then there will just be smell and taste!

Presuppositions

The term "apologetics" comes from the Greek word apologia. It is translated 'answer' in 1 Peter 3:15: "But sanctify the Lord God in your hearts: and [be] ready always to [give] an answer to every man that asketh you a reason of the hope that is in you with meekness and fear".

This "answer" is a logical and reasoned response to justify our trust in God. We are reasonable and logical, because we are created in God's image, and God is reasonable and logical (Isaiah 1:18 "Come now, and let us reason together, saith the LORD").

There are two main approaches to apologetics: "evidential" and "presuppositional".

Evidential apologetics focuses on archaeological and documented evidence that supports the Bible.

Presuppositional apologetics simply says, "What is your foundation?" The atheist (or humanist) stands on his own support - "I am the judge of truth". The theist says, "I am insufficient to determine truth, God is the giver of truth".

That's it.

Isn't this circular?

Yes it is, both are circular...

The humanist says:

• I am the sole judge of truth
• I do not need God
• Therefore, there is no God

The theist says:

• I need God to determine truth (special revelation: the Bible)
• The Bible describes God, and declares that it is God's truth
• God is as described in the Bible

You can have a circle centered on fallible, limited, lying self; or a circle centered on the all knowing, infallible God.

Euthyphro's dilemma

(I need a break from Russell, and I've meant to cover this topic for some time...)


Wikipedia describes this logical problem as "Is what is moral commanded by God because it is moral, or is it moral because it is commanded by God?"

This is partly misstated (logically self-contradicting) and partly a false dilemma (not either/or but both/and). At the same time, I believe I can avoid the tautology cited ("God is good, and good is God").

The first part is that "morality" is too vague a term. Modern man has divorced himself from morality, and thinks only in terms of legal and illegal. A more simple term is "good" (which I believe maintains the original argument).

So "Is what is good commanded by God because it is good, or is it good because it is commanded by God?"

The opposite of good is evil. But what is evil? Is killing evil? What about self-defense? Murder is killing, misused. Is sex evil? Rape is sex, misused. Is speaking evil? Lying is speech misused. Etc.

The notion of evil exists only as compared to what is good. That is, good exists. Evil cannot exist on its own. It exists only as a twisting or perversion of what is good. God is good, God exists. We exist, and demonstrate evil by disobeying God.


God's commands are good. Not just because God says so, or because they exist outside of God, or are the totality of God. The Law (the Ten Commandments) reveals God's nature. "Thou shalt not lie", because God is truth. "Thou shalt not murder", because God is life.

But God is more than the moral law. The law demands payment for infractions. God is merciful, in delaying punishment. God is gracious and loving in providing payment on our behalf.


In summary, "good" (or "moral") is what it is because it is a part of God (not all of God).

Further, without a notion of an absolute good (God), the notions of "good" and "evil" are meaningless.

A Foundation of Sand

When I talk with an atheist, I don't start by challenging their logical assumptions. Not because the assumptions are solid and valid, but because I don't want to sound like a five year old ("Are too!" "Are not!" "Are too!")...

But, given the persistence of a certain commenter, let us consider the foundations of atheistic logic.


The atheist believes that the human brain (the center of logical reasoning) has arisen through the process of natural selection. That is, a process without the oversight of any intelligent, logically reasoning being.


Perform the following experiment:

1. Place both your index fingers pointed towards each other, where you can see them, just above the bridge of your nose.
2. Move your fingers towards each other, and then away from each other.

When the tips of your fingers reach a certain point (right inside the area between your eyes), you should see a little "floating hot dog". It's the two tips of your fingers, floating, disconnected from your fingers, and connected back-to-back.

You see, our brain "edits" our senses for its own (undirected/genetic -- according to the atheist) purposes (without our awareness or approval). This is the foundation of all optical illusions.

Now, how does the atheist know his brain is not "editing" his logical processes to yield the results most beneficial to his brain-genes?


He doesn't.

The Myth of Progress

Perhaps the greatest damage from Darwinism has been the widespread adoption of the myth of progress. That is, the idea that things are always getting better. For an excellent (non-religious) examination of this, read "Lies my Teacher Told Me".

This myth is generally understood in the form of an exponential curve:


This shows three different exponential curves, with slightly varying rates. Even a small change in the rate has huge effects over time. Curves like this have been made popular by the success of computer companies, like Intel. Many aspects of computer power (or at least transistors per die) are doubling every eighteen to twenty-four months.

Seeing these sorts of curves can cause one to discount the value of the past. And provides plenty of stress, worrying about the future (heat and power consumption, population).

Let's look at another curve:


This is a sigmoid (specifically, the inverse tangent). Just before the midpoint, it looks like an exponential curve. Living through it, it's impossible to tell if the curve is an exponential, or a sigmoid. The future outcomes are radically different (first world population has turned out to be more sigmoid, where exponential predictors forecast doom).

My point is, people make claims of progress through evolution:
1e9 Evolution of stars
1e8 Evolution of life
1e7 Evolution of mammals
1e6 Evolution of humans
1e5 Evolution of language
1e4 Evolution of culture
1e3 Evolution of civilization
1e2 Evolution of modern technology
1e1 Human lifespan


This is an exponential curve. Curves like this were the basis for belief in future utopias (in a few generations, humans will "evolve" into a better state).

Of course, any student of Santayana knows that the history of human nature looks more like this:


Of course, you could just read the Bible: "[there is] no new [thing] under the sun." (Ecclesiastes 1:9c - Solomon about 3,000 years ago...).

Evidence

Is there evidence for God and supporting Christianity? A lot of people say there is no evidence, and that you must have "blind faith". Oddly, people both for and against Christianity often say this...

First we must keep in mind the difference between scientific evidence and historical evidence.

Scientific evidence is subject to logic, and is repeatable. It forms the basis of the "hypothesize and test" methodology.

Historical evidence is something from the past. It may be nanoseconds or centuries, but by the time you know about it, it's past. As such, it is subject to witness. Until modern times, that witness was largely human. And the most durable witness was the written word (verbal tradition being subject to drift). Human witness is flavored by the individual. Written documents are fragile, and must be copied from the depths of time to be available to us today.

First let us brainstorm some possible sources of evidence for God and Christianity:

1. The Bible
2. Miracles
3. Creation
4. Changed lives
5. Religious experiences

These are some quick and easy topics. There may be more...

In my opinion, number 1 is the most convincing evidence. I read a lot. Mostly science fiction. Science fiction covers a wide array of settings (one of the reasons I like it). You'll find mysteries, romance, and adventure stories. Really good sci-fi will create a subtle and intriguing universe by presupposing one or more changes in society (usually technological). It is then up to the author to apply these changes in a consistent manner. The best books will be fairly successful in this attempt. The best of the best will write several books.

What does this have to do with the Bible?

The Bible also presupposes a change from most people's point of view. The idea that there is a God who created everything, and who has interest in what we do (as opposed to a deist notion of God). The Bible contains history of God's interaction with people, and people succeeding and failing in obeying God. The New Testament is a particularly powerful set of stories detailing the life of the God/man - Jesus Christ. And letters circulated in the early church.

Then consider that the Old Testament was written over the period of hundreds of years, and the New Testament over several decades. The total number of authors is in the dozens. Different cultures and languages. Yet one coherent story.

No single book can compare with the Bible (in terms of units sold, interest, secondary material generated, etc.). The closest thing would be to compare a series of books, ideally a series with multiple authors (since the Bible has many authors). Most series just aren't that good. Tolkien's famous Lord of the Rings trilogy is honored for making fantasy popular. It reads like a linguist creating characters and a plot for people to speak his invented language. Rowling's Harry Potter series has managed to come close to rivaling sales of the Bible. We'll see how popular it is in a generation or two...

Those series have a single author. The only series I am familiar with that have multiple authors are the Star Wars and Star Trek franchises (not counting the romance lines). These series are pretty bad. Fans tolerate them because they are hungry for material. The Star Wars books are particularly bad (except for Zahn), because Lucas cares so little about canon. I remember a particular ordeal where a series of comic books made huge impact on the canon. Zahn then had to try and reconcile some of this silliness into his own books. I'll only mention the Star Trek television programs.

These are teams of people working together to create coherent content in a short period of time. When multiple authors are involved, there is at least some communication; and often a "lead architect" or content gatekeeper.

Yet these people can't create a coherent story.

Why the Gospel does not make sense

I spent some time working in the field of apologetics, making arguments for the existence of God. It was very frustrating to see this having little effect on people. At the time, I thought perhaps I just wasn't convincing enough, or people are just stubborn.

But recently, I have learned from the Bible, that this will always be the case. That God actually blinds some people to the truth, when it is clearly before them! But why is this?

First Corinthians, chapter one, from verse seventeen has an excellent summary.

• v18 - "For the preaching of the cross is to them that perish foolishness". That gives the fact.
• v22 - "For the Jews require a sign, and the Greeks seek after wisdom". This is an interesting side note. How many people say, "God should give me a sign" or "Prove it to me".
  
• v25 and 29 give the reason - "Because the foolishness of God is wiser than men" and "That no flesh should glory in his presence".

Verse 29 gives the ultimate reason. Salvation is a free gift from God, totally unearned. Our good works do not make us eligible for salvation. Similarly, our understanding of the Gospel is a gift from God as well. So that none should boast (Ephesians 2:8,9).

Is there no hope for the unsaved to come to a knowledge of the Good News? Not at all. The Bible makes it clear that those of humble heart, turning away from sin, and trusting in God can be saved (1 Peter 5:5c - "for God resisteth the proud, and giveth grace to the humble", and 1 Timothy 2:4 "Who will have all men to be saved, and to come unto the knowledge of the truth").