For today’s Church of the Infinite Chasm sermonette, we’re going to add a few words to last week’s topic, which is this: religion is the #1 cause of atheism. As the faithful will recall, last week we blasted a key teaching of many churches – eternal torment in hellfire – as not only untrue [that is to say, it is not a Bible teaching] but also a teaching that defies reason and logic. In a nutshell: The devil supposedly wants us to do bad, and when we do, he’s in charge of punishing us. Say what???
Let’s address the other side of that coin: the issue from the standpoint of God. The Bible says he is a god of justice and that, in fact, he hates injustice. I ask you as a fair and decent person: do you think it’s fair and just to fry someone alive for the mistakes he has made? Worse still, you somehow miraculously keep the person alive so that he can be consciously tortured forever. Who would call that a just punishment? Maybe Adolph Hitler. But not you and me.
How does this relate to our most common sub-theme at the Church of the Infinite Chasm? Just as – let’s be honest – very few people have taken the time to examine the proof allegedly supporting evolution, it is also true that very few people have taken the time to examine what the Bible really says. The average person has been told that the God of the Bible is a God of love who will torture people eternally in fire if they don’t toe the line. And the average person has been told that evolution is an established fact with mountains of supporting evidence growing higher by the year.
Neither of these commonly held beliefs is true: hellfire is not a Bible teaching; and despite what you’ve heard, there is no general agreement among scientists – even those many who believe in evolution – about most of the basic nuts and bolts questions. Where did matter originate, for instance? If lightning struck some puddle full of primordial soup and led to the spontaneous formation of amino acids… hold on! Where did the puddle come from? What sparked the lightning? Where did the atmosphere come from? There is either silence or confusion on these and many other fundamental but important questions.
Perhaps the moral of the story is simply this: take the time to examine what the solid proof for evolution really is. This requires going all the way back, not examining what happened to finches in the 1800s. We have to go back eons earlier to determine if evolutionary science has an answer for the basic key questions. Also, take the time to examine what the Bible really teaches, not what a religion says it does. One church says the Bible teaches this; another says no, on that subject it teaches that. In such a case there are only two possibilities:
• one is wrong and other is right; or
• they are both wrong.
Have an open mind. Use reason and logic. Let the truth rule.