Christian Assurance and the Traditional Arguments for the Existence of God

[Calvinist4Him]

This thread comes out of seer's apologetics thread from a conversation I'm having with my friend Spiderman&Co. Here is a recap of our conversation to get you up to speed...

Calvinists have varied in terms of their approach to apologetics. Following Calvin the so-called Scholastics began a much more systematic, logical, and philosophical presentation of theology which I think naturally spilled over into apologetics. Some Calvinists have held strongly to the traditional "proofs" of God's existence, while others, like Cornelius Van Til have rejected the proofs in favor of alternative approaches. (In my humble opinion these projects have been unsuccessful in the ultimate aim.)

Actually, Dr. Van Til didn't reject the traditional "proofs", he rejected the methods by which those proofs are argued, and he rejected the notion of merely proving the possibility of God's existence. He recognized something I began to recognize through informal debating, being a Christian is not a half-hearted commmitment, and none of the writers of Scripture, write anything to the effect of "God probably exists, it's more likely that He exists than that He doesn't exist." The writers of Scripture do not question the existence of God. None of the traditional arguments are bullet proof, none of them prove the existence of God leaving no room for doubt, or a backdoor exit. So, epistemological assurance can only be held by presupposing the axiom (God) of Christian faith, the 'object' of Christian faith (God), because other methodologies are autonomous in assuming a neutral ground (human reason or sense perception) and therefore rooted in subjectivism. Listen to the Greg Bahnsen/R. C. Sproul debate and tell me you don't agree.

At the moment, I do not have time, but when I get back from work I will respond to Spiderman&Co.'s response. But I wanted to get this thread started and ready. "I'll be back"

[Calvinist4Him]

Sorry for the delay...I've been rather busy. Here is my response...

You are correct. But in reading Van Til and Bahnsen it is obvious that they don't put much apologetic stock in the proofs. They use them under the umbrella of the transcendental argument, which, in my opinion is not the same thing. They call it a different "formulation." I call it an entirely different argument. Hence I do not usually hesitate to say that they "reject" the traditional proofs.

They should be proposed (by Christians) under the umbrella of Theonomy (the Lordship and authority of Christ)...as opposed to the umbrella of autonomy (the Lordship and authority of self), they should be proposed (by Christians) under the umbrella of objectivism, as opposed to the umbrella of subjectivism. They should not be proposed under the illusionary umbrella of neutrality, because such an umbrella does not exist. The classical arguments silently presuppose the existence of God, or else surrender the necessary pre-conditions of intelligibility which are presupposed before uttering or writing the first word of an argument. In other words, it is immoral, intellectually dishonst, and dishonoring to God to claim to be neutral, when in fact nobody is neutral. Jesus said in Matthew 6:24 "No one can serve two masters; for either he will hate the one and love the other, or he will be devoted to one and despise the other.”

I suppose that if we’re to look over everything I want to present over the next three days…we might call our conference “Jesus is Lord over all”. I think that’s the unifying theme for all of the presentations, I’m going to be giving to you. The Lordship of Jesus Christ in every area of life….Now the other side of the coin might be put this way: then neutrality is a myth. If Jesus is Lord over all, then there can be no place, no time, no area of life, where we are allowed as His people to be neutral with respect to His Lordship, His requirements in our lives. When we own Him as Lord, we own Him completely. He now owns our lives, and we cannot be neutral about this, in anything we do, in any of our thinking, in anything that we say. Jesus said in Matthew 12 verse 30 “He who is not with me is against me”. And you’ll have occasion to hear that as we make these presentations over these three days. Because Jesus calls us to follow Him with an unswerving allegiance, a consistent allegiance, an allegiance that pertains to everything (that) we do or say. If we are not with Him in any area of our life, then at that point we are opposing Him, and His Lordship. In Matthew 4:10 Jesus responded to Satan; “You shall worship the Lord your God, and Him only shall you serve…Him only. Jesus calls for exclusive loyalty to His Lordship and prerogatives. He is the only Lord we serve and we serve Him everywhere.”

So??? This is an argument from silence. Just b/c the Bible does not use the traditional proofs says very little about their apologetic validity. Also, it says even less about their philosophic legitimacy.

So their apologetic validity and philosophical legitimacy exists in a vacuum, apart from presupposing the existence of the God of the Bible? I didn’t argue from silence, I argued for doing apologetics in a biblical way in a God glorifying way.

First, how is "epistemological assurance" gained by "presupposing" anything? Least of all God?

I don’t know, how is epistemological assurance gained by presupposing infallible objective eternal laws of logic which exist in the mind of an infallible objective eternal God? One cannot have epistemological assurance of anything if the basic laws of logic exist as a human convention, only in the minds of human beings. But your questions ring of irony, because whether spoken or not, everyone has presuppositions which guide their interpretation of reality.

Epistemological assurance is gained in many, many ways. These range from strong to weak probability. I have an eye appointment in about an hour. I have epistemological assurance of this b/c I spoke to a doctor at the office. But I don't have absolute certainty. Just a strong probability based upon the validity of testimony, the validity of my memory, etc.

So how do you make the epistemological leap from an agnosticism which is more in favor of Christianity, to unwavering faith in Christ? How do you make the epistemological leap from autonomy in favor of Christianity, to Theonomy which acknowledges Christ as Lord over every area of life? How can one love the Lord with all of their mind, if there is room for (reasonable) doubt?

”This last weekend I used as an analogy, many people seem to understand it, pick up on it, you’ve noticed how the president of the united states, it’s not just the sitting one, all presidents do this (at least in my lifetime), but the sitting president of the United States like others, (you know), when a problem, some criticism, some accusation, have a tendency to decide whether it’s important or not or credible or not, on the basis of, whether it advances their particular political cause. You know…are we supposed to believe that all the democrats on one side of an issue or all the republicans on the other side of the issue, that only rationality applies to one of those groups? And the group that say’s that’s not really an important issue, you know, and the other groups say’s, no that’s a very important issue, that it’s rationality that separates them?

…that their arguments show very probably that Jesus rose from the dead, but you see, if what you say to someone is that He probably rose from the dead, you’re also saying what? There’s some minimal probability…that He didn’t. So what you’re saying is, we think most of the evidence shows that He rose from the dead, but we’re conceding that some might show that He didn’t. Now given the choice, what do you think the unbeliever is going to stand with? You think he’s going to go with what you think is most probable, or is he going to say “hey if there’s any way out, I’m taking it, so I’m out that back door, yes I grant that you've got some interesting arguments for the resurrection, but it’s also, there’s some probability that He didn’t, and it’s THAT probability that I think is the most important.”

Second, how is autonomous human reason a subjective root? Perhaps the more important quesiton is this: Is all use of reason autonomous?

No, the use of reason which acknowledges Jesus Christ as Lord of reason is not autonomous. The use of reason which presupposes the laws of reason in the mind of God is not autonomous.

P.S. – I’ve been thinking about this response for two days and wish I could have recorded all of my thoughts. Maybe I’ll remember some of them in my next response. I would have responded sooner, but I’ve been watching roughly four hours of Smallville season 4 every night. Last night I watched the final 3 episodes.