CA- Meeting 7 6-25-08

Hey Guys & Gals,

This Month’s topic is The Problem of Evil & Suffering. Here’s the info for Meeting 7:

1. Introduction
2. Meeting Outline
   1. Opening Prayer (________________)
   2. Club Structure
   3. Creed and Forms.
   4. Open Business
   5. Lesson: The Problem of Evil and Suffering.
   6. Fellowship
3. Body
   1. Goals for the Summer & Year
      • Goals
      • New Format (Please bring binder/folder)
      • Meeting time and day: (Time: 9:30pm ) (Day: 1^st & 3^rd Wednesday, Monthly )
   2. Creed and Forms
      • Members need to sign C.A. Nicene Creed.
      • Members need to fill out Membership Form
   3. Club Structure (See Attached)
   4. Open Business
      • Member offer concerns, questions, or comments.
   5. Lesson: The Problem of Evil and Suffering.
      • Problem of Evil, Baker Encyclopedia of Christian Apologetics (Norman L. Geisler ).
        1. Problem of Evil
           1. Origin of Evil
           2. Nature of Evil
           3. Persistence of Evil
        2. The Purpose of Evil
           1. God Has a Good Purpose for Everything
           2. The purpose for much evil is known by us.
           3. Evil sometimes is a byproduct of a good purpose.
           4. God can bring good out of evil.
           5. The Problem of Physical Evil
        3. The Avoidability of Evil
        4. Conclusion
      • A Theistic Response to the Problem of Evil ( Richard Swinburne ) (E. Reading)
      • God and the Problem of Evil ( B. C. Johnson ) (E. Reading)
   6. Fellowship
      • Food, fellowship & conversation.
4. Conclusion
   1. Summary
   2. Closing Prayer (________________)

The Question: “…why should anyone assume that God was around before the Big Bang.”

The Question:

“Secondly, why should anyone assume that God was around before the Big Bang”

My Answer:

I think that would fall under the argument of cause and effect, or the idea of motion. As some philosophers argue, everything in the universe is in motion (circulation of the planets, stars, atoms, protons, etc). We understand through simple observation that in order for something to move in our physical world (exp: a ball), it must be moved. A ball sitting on an even floor does not start moving unless it is pushed (by a force, a person, the wind, etc).

With this movement (the effect) needing a push (a cause), a philosopher or Christian may come to the conclusion that the universe must have a Universal Mover/Pusher, or as some call, the First Cause.

That would be one role, and seeing that the Big Bang, if following these day-to-day observations of cause and effect, it would also need a first cause. We don’t witness anything material creating itself from non-existence into existence, so we have to assume something is causing the effect of creation. One would argue The Big Bang has a first cause; or a pusher, that isn’t material because it would be illogical for a material’s first cause to also be material, especially if we’re talking about something that’s supposed to be the beginning of all materials/matter. That material pusher would only need another pusher before that!

One argument to why a God (a Divine Being, with intellect, and not of this material world) would work as a First Cause, or the Pusher, is that this God would be all-existing and not of this world. The reason why a God wouldn’t need a first cause, is because He doesn’t exists in this material universe. God is not a product of time, matter, space, and light because He would have created time, matter, space, and light (and logically, a creator cannot be dependent on its creation in order to exist).

We Observe: Matter decays. If all things are made of matter, than all things must also one day decay (Your Chair, Your Body, The Earth, The Sun, etc).

We Observe: Things do not move on their own. If you see a ball rolling your way, you automatically assume someone or something pushed it. It’s illogical to assume the ball merely was bored and decided to roll itself.

We Observe: God is NOT of this world. God cannot be made up and subjected to matter because, if He created it, it would be illogical to assume He’s subject to it. A chef who makes a cake is obviously not made up of his cake, and so the inventor is not made up of the invention. It’s illogical to explain the chef in terms of his cake, as it’s illogical to explain the inventor in terms of his/her invention.

We Conclude: Knowing God (or The First Cause, or The Universal Pusher) is not of this world, and not made up of matter and material, we know He doesn’t need to decay like matter. Living on a plane/heaven made up of spirit, it’s understanding that He has always existed, and if this is so (not needing to be pushed and not needing to be decaying material), you would not need to assume there’s a “Big Bang” to God, or a First Cause to Him, or His own Pusher. He simply is All-Existing, All-Eternal, because he’s not subjected to his inventions (time, matter, etc). Add to that Him being Intelligent, and Him possessing Free Will, and you understand how He moves himself (as we move ourselves) and why He would create the universe to begin with (His intelligence).

For this reason, all material things (as mentioned above), would stem from a first cause, and this first cause could understandably be a Divine Being existing on a Heavenly/Divine/Non-Materialistic heaven/plane (non-material as in not being made up of matter, which be know matter as not eternal as it decomposes and dies).

Of course this is a very brief explanation, but hopefully the point comes across.

Hope that helps explain number 2 for you.

God Bless!

-LeonardOoh

The Problem of Pain, Love, Hell and Free Will.

Pain, love, sadness, happiness…
How can a loving God allow pain and suffering, sadness and hate to go on in His world? Why would a loving God send people to Hell? Why would He send them to a place where they will be in pain forever? Why would a loving God do these things? Well…I will attempt to tackle some of these things. Now I know I am not a scholar, nor a great apologist in the ranks of Origen, Augustine, Justin Martyr, Irenaeus, or Tertullian. I’m no Lee Stroebel, nor am I C.S Lewis, and I’m not Ravi Zacarias….so if I don’t seem to have all the greatest and most scholarly and theologically sound answers…I’m still learning, I’m growing and I’m studying… Here goes:

Pain…why would God allow pain to exist in His universe? People also ask how can there be a God when there is so much pain and suffering in the world right? Well, a great writer said something on the issue of pain, in his book The Problem of Pain, C.S. Lewis said, “Try to exclude the possibility of suffering which the order of nature and the existence of free-wills involve, and you find that you have excluded life itself.” Here’s the reality of it. If we didn’t know what pain and sadness, anger and suffering was….we wouldn’t know what love, joy, peace and happiness was. It even brings to my mind the question of meaning in the universe. Love itself, is closely related to the indication that there is meaning to this universe. Another C.S. Lewis quote goes like this: “If the whole universe has no meaning, we should never have found out that it has no meaning: just as, if there were no light in the universe and therefore no creatures with eyes, we should never know it was dark. Dark would be without meaning.” If there was no pain, no sadness…love and joy would have no meaning. They would just be words without meaning. The reason we have pain, the reason we have love…is because God created us in His likeness. In Genesis 1:26-27 it says this: “Then God said, ‘Let us make man in our image, in our likeness, and let them rule over the fish of the sea and the birds of the air, over the livestock, over all the earth, and over all the creatures that move along the ground.’ So God created man in his own image, in the image of God he created him; male and female he created them.” Now again, I am no theologian, so I will let one speak better words than I could. Chuck Smith has a commentary on this verse where he discusses the image and likeness and what it means. “WHAT DOES IT MEAN IN THE IMAGE AND LIKENESS OF GOD? First of all the Bible tells us that God is a Spirit, and they that worship Him must worship Him in Spirit and in truth. God is a superior trinity, Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. Man was created an inferior trinity, spirit, soul, and body.It is in the realm of the Spirit that man meets and can commune with God. We are created in the image of God in the spiritual sense.God’s chief emotional attribute is love, so God created us with a capacity to love.God has the capacity to reason, so He created us with the ability to reason.God’s chief governing characteristic is self determination, so he created us with the capacity of self determination.God thinks, feels, wills, speaks, so He has created us with the capacity to think, feel, will and speak.” So it is in that same spiritual sense that we are like Him in the fact that we have free will. We are not robots. We have choice, we have the ability to decide and live according to those decisions. That gives everything we do so much meaning and so much profound significance. If we “loved” without free will, it would not be love. We would be robots programmed to say words without meaning. It is in the ability to choose that the word love has meaning. Love is a verb, it’s a willing action undertaken by a person. If we program a computer to say “I love you” everytime you turn it on, does it really love you? No! But if you willingly choose to love a person and give yourself to that person through trust and commitment as a friend, husband or wife, father or mother, son or daughter…and do whatever it takes to demonstrate that love to them, it is meaningful and it is real. But without pain, without the antithesis of love, we would not know what it was. Emotional pain, is just like physical pain. It is a teaching tool. When you put your hand on the stove, you learn by the physical pain that doing that is detremental to you right? It’s the same with emotional pain. In his first letter to the church at Corinth, the Apostle Paul advises the members by saying that “‘Everything is permissible for me’—but not everything is beneficial. ‘Everything is permissible for me’—but I will not be mastered by anything.” (I Corinthians 6:12) and again a few chapters later, “‘Everything is permissible’—but not everything is beneficial. ‘Everything is permissible’—but not everything is constructive.” (I Corinthians 10:23). We learn to discern what is beneficial and constructive by the Word of God, by His Spirit’s guiding us, and by the experiences we live through when we don’t listen to the Word or the Spirit. You learn by experience, and if you take each thing in stride you learn to love more profoundly by the pain.
Well you could say “what about Hell”? Why would a God who loves us so much send people to Hell? Who sends whom? Does God who gave us the free will to choose send us anywhere or do we willingly choose Hell? What is Hell to begin with? Hell is a place of total and complete separation from God for eternity. Hell is finally knowing 100% that God is real, Jesus died for you and you rejected Him, and now you are suffering because you know you could have been in eternity worshipping Him but instead you are forever separated from Him because you chose not to love Him and reject Him your whole life. Heaven is the opposite. Heaven is eternity in His presence worshipping Him and laying all down at His feet, loving Him and walking with Him forever. It is for those who in their earthly life chose to love Him and enter into that personal relationship with Him, be reconciled to God through the freedom from sin and death we have in Jesus Christ. It is the person who chose to forsake themselves and LOVE the Lord God with all their heart, soul, and mind. It is a confession of faith in Jesus Christ who died and rose again to pay the price for our iniquity, to bridge the gap between a holy God and fallen man. So…if a person spent their life choosing to reject Christ and being separated from God, how unfair would it be for God to force that person to spend eternity worshipping Him and serving Him in love? How unfair would it be for God to force a person who rejected Him for 70,80,90,100 years…to accept Him and worship Him for all eternity? It wouldn’t be, it would be forced, it would be the exact opposite of free will. If you choose to reject Him and be separate from Him in your earthly life because you refused to have faith, then you will by your choices be separated from Him for all eternity, because how easy it is to believe when you see! But to believe and love in faith through the hope we have in Christ, now that is love. It all boils back to free will, and the problem of pain doesn’t it? Well….this was all sparked in me to write about because a friend of mine put this quote and blogged about it….
“People are afraid of themselves, of their own reality; their feelings most of all. People talk about how great love is, but that’s b.s.. Love hurts. Feelings are disturbing. People are taught that pain is evil and dangerous. How can they deal with love if they’re afraid to feel? Pain is meant to wake us up. People try to hide their pain. But they’re wrong. Pain is something to carry, like a radio. You feel your strength in the experience of pain. It’s all in how you carry it. That’s what matters. Pain is a feeling. Your feelings are a part of you. Your own reality. If you feel ashamed of them, and hide them, you’re letting society destroy your reality. You should stand up for your right to feel your pain.”
- Jim Morrison

Interesting stuff. Very passionate, very insightful. People are taught that pain is evil and dangerous said Jim Morrison right? I saw some other great thoughts on the subject and wanted to share them with you…

Mother Teresa said:
“I have found the paradox, that if you love until it hurts, there can be no more hurt, only more love.”

Unknown author said:
“Pleasure of love lasts but a moment, pain of love lasts a lifetime.”

Robert Gary Lee said:
“Wisdom is nothing more than healed pain.”

Siddhartha Gautama (the Buddha) said:
“All that we are is the result of what we have thought. If a man speaks or acts with an evil thought, pain follows him. If a man speaks or acts with a pure thought, happiness follows him, like a shadow that never leaves him.”

Bartholomew said:
“Many of us spend our whole lives running from feeling with the mistaken belief that you cannot bear the pain. But you have already borne the pain. What you have not done is feel all you are beyond the pain.”

C.S. Lewis (in his book The Problem of Pain) said:
“God whispers to us in our pleasures, speaks in our conscience, but shouts in our pains: it is His megaphone to rouse a deaf world.”

C.S Lewis said (in his book The Great Divorce):
“There are two kinds of people: those who say to God, ‘Thy will be done,’ and those to whom God says, ‘Thy will be done.’”

Gian Carlo Menotti said:
“Hell begins on the day when God grants us a clear vision of all that we might have achieved, of all the gifts which we have wasted, of all that we might have done which we did not do”

Tyron Edwards said:
“Hell is truth seen too late – duty neglected in its season”

Marianne Williamson said:
“God created the law of free will, and God created the law of cause and effect. And he himself will not violate the law. We need to be thinking less in terms of what God did and more in terms of whether or not we are following those laws.”

Agatha Christie said:
“There’s too much tendency to attribute to God the evils that man does of his own free will.”

P.J. O’Rourke said:
“One of the annoying things about believing in free will and individual responsibility is the difficulty of finding somebody to blame your problems on. And when you do find somebody, it’s remarkable how often his picture turns up on your driver’s license.”

-DannyValentine

Thoughts exchanged between a buddhist and myself.

<font Originally Posted by Mudita Your reasoning would be 100% correct if it were not for one thing: you misunderstand anata.There is no PERMANENT self. This means that there is a temporary self (composed of many factors), but it is in a constant state of flux; it is never the same. Think of your body, your mind, and everything in between; they are always changing, from moment to moment. We hold on to self, act (kamma), get the fruit of those actions (vipaka).It is not really a self that reincarnates, but rather very strong impressions of a bunch of factors (some of the remaining khandas’ impressions, vipaka ripening, etc.) that are in a constant state of flux that reincarnate into human form, animal form, etc. We hold on to those throughout samsara because we like stability, fear fundamental (very, very deep) change and because we, as human beings, love to feel part of a collectivity and/or be an individual (in western societies, you often see a more value put on indivuality than collectivism). The need for the rebirth of an atta (skt: atman), or an unchanging soul/self, is only there when you talk about the Hindu concept of reincarnation; not the Buddhist one.If there is a permanent self, we cannot see it; no more than an eye can see itself without a mirror. It is really irrelevant to try to hold on to something we aren’t sure exists. What is important is the actions we do right now, in the present. Who cares about 20 lives ago or 20 lives from now? It’s really useless to fixate on this as it doesn’t help us act in the present moment, with what we know we have, here and now. Definitions of certain terms are quite different from dharmic religion to dharmic religion; so misunderstanding what one thing means might make us think a system makes no sense. I suggest the greatest care when you try to discredit a religion or a philosophocal system based on language and other factors that might be misunderstood. Dharmic religions aren’t the only ones that have different definitions that must be clearly understood… think of the Ancients and how they define “nature”, “the good life”, “humanity versus animality”, “the best regime”, “providence”, “virtue”, “fortune” etc.Did this answer your question? Do you have any further comments, questions, need for clarifications?Have a wonderful day!

Response by Toblvdluv:

I still feel that you haven’t responded to my post. I wrote the same thing you did: There is “no self”. Assuming that there is no permanent self, and only an impermanent illusion that passes itself of as a self….there is still “no self” to escape samsara. The more I re-read your comment, the more I realize that you speak the way I used to speak when I practiced elements of buddhism, yoga, and other new age doctrines while reading baba dam rass talking about being here now. This was before I became a christian. Before professing Jesus as Lord, I believed in an impersonal oneness (a belief brought about by reading Hindu and Buddhist texts and from personal experiences). Buddha and Jesus both talk about suffering, but both have different explanations for it…and the more I think about buddhism and christianity, the more I realize that their moral code may parallel, but their end result does not. The buddhist looks to himself and after searching and searching he looks into the middle of himself and sees there is nothing…after all he searches, he concludes that the only permanent thing is change, that he is made up of changing things, and that “he” does not exist…realizing this and then recognizing that “he” and changing things still exist, he decides to do good things because “what else is there to do?” Actually, I mean that he chooses good because good is the better option, and by searching and meditating and “reaching the end of themselves” (saying there is “no self”) they have an easier time at doing good (an easier time than, say, someone dedicated to putting “himself” first.) Christianity says the cause of suffering is sin. Sin is “falling short of the will of God.” The follower of Christ turns his eyes to God and sees his own unrighteousness compared to God’s Holiness. He looks at himself, realizes there is something, and that the something is not good. He confesses his unrighteousness to the Lord, and the Lord, who is merciful, cleanses the believer, removing the guilt of sin. The sinner then does good because God is good. The sinner loves God because God first loved the sinner, and the sinner, having been forgiven of sin, chooses to walk upright. The believer receives the indwelling of the Holy Spirit. Unlike the buddhist who looks in and finds “no self,” the christian looks in, sees himself, and also sees the Spirit of God–a very real being. The believer then lives his life striving to conform his will to the will of God. But he doesn’t need to do it alone, because he has the Spirit of God.Both buddhism, and christianity require the death of self. But I have come to think of buddhism as self-suicide, and christianity as self-sacrifice. I have understood buddhism as the dying of “self” and the gaining of “no-self” and ultimately, nothing (escape from the cycle of change); and I have understood christianity as being the denial of self, and the gaining of “true self” (in so far as the person is made perfect in christ). In buddhism there is nothing (literally), while in Christ, there is life, and life abundant. As I have understood it, the buddhist would not like the idea of abundant life because, to the buddhist, abundant life would mean abundant change and abundant suffering. But this is based on the premise that all is suffering. As a christian, I have a different reason for suffering: not doing the will of God. And I don’t mean “not doing the will of God” in the sense of Him being a taskmaster…no…I mean “not doing the will of God” in the sense of not obeying His laws–laws that stem from His character, a character which is righteous and yet love, just and yet merciful. Paul writes that there are those who have not the law and yet are a law unto themselves. He is referring to non-jews who did not have the law of God in written format, and yet have followed the law, albeit imperfectly. They may follow the law by an instinctual feel for it, or by reaching it after much rational thought, but the end result is the same: having not the written law, they have become a law unto themselves. I liken this to the buddhist who follows compassion…actually, I parallel this to any religion or philosophy which does “good,” because I see this as people being a law unto themselves even though they never knew the law of God given to the Jews. But doing good is not an ends in itself (although the ends parallel it), nor is it the adequate means to achieve a Holy end.At this point I feel like am rambling a bit. Truth be told, I have to use the bathroom and get ready to go to work. Then I must study for a test I have after work. Throw in a nap and some breakfast and I’m pretty occupied for the time being. Perhaps I’ll finish later.

Welcome!

I would like to warmly welcome both members and guests to our new apologetic initiative. If you are wondering, we are a group of multi-denominational Christians, ranging from multiple fields of study (Religious Studies, Political Science, Asian Studies, History, Writing, etc), focused on combining our intellectual strengths in the defense of the body and the word of God.

We focus on aiding the Body of college believers in defending their Christian faiths. In addition to building up the Body, we aim at fulfilling the First and Second Great Commandments and the Great Commission through our intellectual and faith-driven endeavors.

Some say that the purpose of life is knowing and loving God. That’s exactly what we’re here to do: Know Him, love Him, share Him, and defend His word. Our apologetic purpose can be found in Peter:

15 But in your hearts set apart Christ as Lord. Always be prepared to give an answer to everyone who asks you to give the reason for the hope that you have. But do this with gentleness and respect, 16 keeping a clear conscience, so that those who speak maliciously against your good behavior in Christ may be ashamed of their slander. (1 Peter 3:15-16)

Our purpose, as Christians, is also found in First and Second Great Commandments:

29 ‘Hear, O Israel, the Lord our God, the Lord is one.^[e] 30 Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind and with all your strength.’^[f] 31 The second is this: ‘Love your neighbor as yourself.’^[g]There is no commandment greater than these.” (Mark 12:29-31)

And the Great Commission:

18 Then Jesus came to them and said, “All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me. 19 Therefore go and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in^[a] the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, 20 and teaching them to obey everything I have commanded you. (Matthew 28:18-20)

So if someone were to ask us, what purpose does College Apologists serve, we can simply say:

1. To fulfill the First Great Commandment by loving God. (Mt. 22:36, Dt. 6:4, Dt. 6:6)
2. To fulfill the Second Great Commandment by loving one another, and our neighbors. (Mt. 22:36, Lv. 19:18)
3. To fulfill the Great Commission by sharing his word, baptizing in His name, and raising disciples. (Mt. 28:16-20, Mk. 16:14-18, Lk 24:44-49, Acts 1:4-8, Jn. 20:19-23 )
4. To defend His word apologetically, and to prepare answers in His defense. (1 Pt. 3:15-16, 2 Pt. 3:18)

What Exactly will this website include?

1. 1. A Blog style format where every member will have access to post entries.
   2. A section with biographies of each of our apologist.
   3. A link to our own forum where we can have discussions in a forum like manner.
   4. Our Statement of faith upon completion.
   5. A database where visitors can simply search by topics certain things they need answers to or are interested in (Trinity, Sabbath, Suffering, etc).

Hello world!

Welcome to WordPress.com. This is your first post. Edit or delete it and start blogging!