Grosey's Messages

Ecclesiastes 3:16-4:16   Cruel Corruption and Comforting Companions

Solomon declared that God has a wonderful plan for each life. There is a time for everything: "a time to be born, a time to die; a time to weep, a time to laugh." Through that list of opposites he declared that God has a perfect plan that includes what we need, the painful as well as the pleasant. If we accept those as God's choices for us, coming from his loving heart -- not out of anger, not out of desire to punish, but out of love -- we will discover some wonderful things. First, we will be enabled to enjoy all of life, even the painful circumstances. Secondly, we will learn to know God. Jesus said, "This is life eternal, that they may know thee, the only true God, and Jesus Christ whom thou hast sent." We will satisfy the sense of eternity which God has put in each heart. That will happen when our attitude toward life changes because of our relationship with God. Then there follows immediately some frequently voiced objections that appear to contradict this idea that God has a wonderful plan for each life.  

God has a wonderful plan for your life but you still live in a fallen, sinful world.

1. The Challenges Of Cruelty

A. The Stress Of Cruel Corruption

16 Moreover I saw under the sun:  In the place of judgment, Wickedness was there; And in the place of righteousness, Iniquity was there. 

The problem here is that even "the place of justice" is unjust. The very place where we most expect and most need to receive justice turns out to be a place of unfairness. Even the court system is corrupt. This is not merely a frustration, like some of the other problems we read about in Ecclesiastes, but a manifestation of genuine evil. Innocent people are convicted for crimes they never committed. They were simply in the wrong place at the wrong time, or maybe the wrong colour in the wrong neighbourhood. Just as fre­quently, other people get away with murder. They have the money to hire better lawyers, or else they hide behind the structure of a large corporation to take advantage of people who are less fortunate.

Even worse, there is nothing that can be done about this. The Preacher's frustration is not simply that injustice is done, but that it goes unpunished. According to Martin Luther, he is "not complaining because there is wick­edness in the place of justice but because the wickedness in the place of justice cannot be corrected."3 When the halls of justice become corridors of corruption, where can righteousness be found?

Yes, there is always corruption in high places.  If you had any contact with those involved in the ICAC (The Independent Commission Against Corruption) set up to examine corruption in our society generally, and specifically in court houses and among police, you would be aware of how disconcerting it is to know that so many of those on whom we depended legally were corrupt. Solomon writes to our day, doesn't he?

17 I said in my heart,  "God shall judge the righteous and the wicked, For there is a time there for every purpose and for every work."

Our confidence does not lie in a justice system but in the Chief Justice himself, Jesus Christ. God has promised a day when his Son will judge the righteous and the wicked (Acts 17:30–31). The time for his work of divine retribution is the Day of Judgment, when he will render his final verdict on all mankind.

That is comforting. We must remember that the final recompense lies yet ahead; God has appointed a time when he will bring to light all the hidden things and straighten them out.

"I said in my heart with regard to the children of man that God is testing them that they may see that they themselves are but beasts" (Ecclesiastes 3:18).

Ecclesiastes says is also true: men are beasts. In saying this, the Preacher is not commenting on our biology but our des­tiny. He is making a specific comparison, as he goes on to explain: "For what happens to the children of man and what happens to the beasts is the same; as one dies, so dies the other. They all have the same breath, and man has no advantage over the beasts, for all is vanity. All go to one place. All are from the dust, and to dust all return" (Ecclesiastes 3:19–20).

This is one of the Bible's strongest statements of the inevitability of death. The Preacher's point is that people die, just like the animals. For all the differences between us, we do share this one thing in common: whether man or beast, we will all meet the same fate, at least with regard to our physical bodies.

Death is the great equalizer. By using this language, the Preacher is remind­ing us of God's curse against Adam's sin: dust we are, and to the dust we shall return (Genesis 3:19; cf. Psalm 90:3; 104:29). "Ashes, ashes, dust to dust." To this extent, we are no better than animals. In the words of the Psalmist, "Man in his pomp will not remain; he is like the beasts that perish" (Psalm 49:12).

What is your response to the certainty of your own mortality? Woody Allen said, "I'm not afraid to die; I just don't want to be there when it happens!"

"Who knows whether the spirit of man goes upward and the spirit of the beast goes down into the earth?" (Ecclesiastes 3:21).

He decides to throw himself back into his work: "So I saw that there is nothing better than that a man should rejoice in his work, for that is his lot. Who can bring him to see what will be after him?" (Ecclesiastes 3:22). If we are facing an uncertain future, perhaps the best thing that we can do right now is to be productive.  One of the early church fathers said, "Ecclesiastes, instruct­ing us through enigmas, guides us to the other life."

B. The Stress Of Cruel Companies

4:1 Then I returned and considered all the oppression that is done under the sun:  And look! The tears of the oppressed, But they have no comforter--On the side of their oppressors there is power, But they have no comforter. 2 Therefore I praised the dead who were already dead, More than the living who are still alive. 3 Yet, better than both is he who has never existed, Who has not seen the evil work that is done under the sun.    Oppression almost invariably preys on the helpless, the weak and the infirm, the people who cannot defend themselves.

C. The Stress Of Cruel Competition

Notice how Solomon records the anguish, the misery that it causes. He speaks of "the tears of the oppressed," the weeping, the sorrow and the brokenness which the oppressed feel over something they can do nothing about. Then he twice categorizes the awful sense of helplessness that is evoked by oppression. There is "no one to comfort" the oppressed of a world filled with this kind of thing. The hopeless and the helpless ask, "Who can we turn to? Where can we go for deliverance?" They feel that death would be preferable to what they are going through; they even come to the point where they wish they had never been born.

4 Again, I saw that for all toil and every skillful work a man is envied by his neighbor. This also is vanity and grasping for the wind.  5 The fool folds his hands And consumes his own flesh. 6 Better a handful with quietness Than both hands full, together with toil and grasping for the wind.

Sadly, those who make the greatest failures are those who are most driven for success.  And they have defined success materially. Success in a career and the material things in life can never satisfy the deep, soul-level needs of a person made in God's image  True success doesn't come from working harder and climbing higher .  I think of a few people I know who have been bank managers. One was a wheeler and dealer.  But he didn't achieve the success materially he sought after, so he broke down. He was continually grasping for money, and found himself near bankruptcy.  He felt himself a miserable failure. Another decided that financial success wasn't attainable.  So he turned to the bottle. The fool folds his hands, and eats his own flesh. {Eccl 4:5 RSV}  Both lost out badly with family and friends. Both were envious.  They were grasping for esteem through attainments and accumulations.  7 Then I returned, and I saw vanity under the sun:  8 There is one alone, without companion: He has neither son nor brother. Yet there is no end to all his labors, Nor is his eye satisfied with riches. But he never asks, "For whom do I toil and deprive myself of good?" This also is vanity and a grave misfortune.

Another decided he wasn't going to be bothered by the competitive spirit.  So he lived for himself selfishly.  Have you ever seen envy deteriorate into reclusiveness.  Recluses are the most selfish people on earth.  They live only for themselves. They seem to miss the strife of envy by their reclusiveness, but they don't.

D. The Stress Of Cruel Criticism

13 Better a poor and wise youth Than an old and foolish king who will be admonished no more. 14 For he comes out of prison to be king, Although he was born poor in his kingdom. 15 I saw all the living who walk under the sun; They were with the second youth who stands in his place. 16 There was no end of all the people over whom he was made king; Yet those who come afterward will not rejoice in him. Surely this also is vanity and grasping for the wind.

Solomon draws our attention to one more scene in verses 13 to 16. It goes like this: there's a youth who started in prison. When he was released, he became king, and everyone cheered for the underdog.  But what happens when someone has been king for a while?  Everyone tires of them, and they're glad to be rid of him.  Rulers come with a wave of popular enthusiasm, but as the reign wears on, those who come later will become disillusioned and want him gone. As Bill Shorten  could tell you, the people that cheered you yesterday are the same ones who want you hanged today. Popularity is fickle. Yesterday's hero is today's zero.

Persecution is like the goldsmith's hallmark on real silver and gold; it is one of the marks of a converted man.

J. C. Ryle

 

2. The Comfort of Companionship

Select Earthly Companions

We have all heard the statement, "You can count the number of your true friends on one hand." As discouraging as this may be, there is truth and logic to this statement.  Relationships: we all have them. Bottom-line - relationships can make you or they can break you. Solomon says point-blank - How you handle your relationships will determine the kind of person you become and the direction your life takes. That's a pretty serious statement with a multitude of wisdom to back it up. How many times have you heard someone say, "Well, he/she just fell into the wrong crowd"? Peer pressure can be dangerous and it can be deadly. According to Solomon, along life's way, we are going to encounter people from every walk and sort. Some will become friends, others will become foes, and still others will prove themselves as fools. I believe the relationships that we will spend more time on in our lives and that are the most crucial of all, are the relationships with our family and friends. It is important that we learn how valuable and how rare true friendship really is. Quite frankly, none of us makes very many true friends, and no one has as many friends as they think they do. Solomon warns us in Proverbs 18:24, "A man of many friends comes to ruin." Choosing your friends can be one of the most important decisions you will ever make. When you meet someone, before you say, "I want this person as my friend", size them up. Solomon goes on to say in Proverbs 12:26, "the righteous should choose his friends carefully, for the way of the wicked leads them astray."

What is your gift? What is your role? The Body of Christ is only as strong as the participation of all its members! Unity is of the essence of the Body of Christ.  R. B. Kuiper

What can lead to unity? Service. Take the church at Corinth for example. The apostle Paul wrote stern rebukes to the church about their lack of unity. Men like Paul and Apollos came among them as servants (1 Corinthians 3:5) to build up a church characterized by unity. But the immature Corinthian believers ignored the model of servant leadership and created cliques in the church based on "envy, strife, and divisions." The other model of service they could have followed was that of Christ who came into the world to serve, not to be served (Mark 10:45; Philippians 2:7). Servants look first to the interests of others rather than their own interests (Philippians 2:4), and unity results. Unity comes when individual Christians submit their will and agenda to the Lordship of Jesus Christ—it's the best way to begin every day.  In necessary things, unity; in doubtful things, liberty; in all things, charity.  Richard Baxter

Stabilizing One Another 9,10

Again, verse 10 says : "For if they fall, one will lift up his fellow. But woe to him who is a lone when he falls and has not another to lift him up!" This is prophetic terminology. Solomon uses this prophetic terminology to emphasize the importance of spiritual partnership during time of failure. Verse 10 says, "But woe to him who is a tone when he falls and has not another to lift him up!" Solomon says you are doomed if you are alone when you fall and have no one to pick you up. This statement reveals why some fallen people never make it up again: they are alone when they fall. CHARLES SWINDOLL said it well:" Friend ships must be cultivated. They don 't automatically occur when calamity strikes. And I have never heard of a rent-a-friend business either."  You cannot be determined to walk alone and expect everyone to be running toward you when you fall. Cultivate friendships now, while you are still on your feet.

Supporting One Another

11 Again, if two lie down together, they will keep warm; But how can one be warm alone?

The assumption of the text is that a meaning full life is hard work. But the affirmation of the text is that you can accomplish more when you work together with others. The late novelists, ALEX HALEY, had a picture in his office of a turtle sitting on a fence. When someone would ask him about it, he would explain that if you ever see a turtle sitting on a fence, you know it had some help getting up there.

And when he would begin to think about how marvelous he was, he would look at this picture and remind himself how he got to where he was. And when you see someone who has accomplished something significant in life, know that they did not get there by themselves. They had some help. And Solomon declares that two are better than one when you go to work.

It's called synergy: the strength of the whole is greater than the sum of its parts. The apostle Paul didn't know American history, of course, but he recognized the synergy of the human body—individual organs and parts of the body working together to accomplish human goals no individual part could accomplish by itself. And he applied that lesson to the Church, the Body of Christ. Each Christian is given gifts by the Holy Spirit (1 Corinthians 12:11) in order to build up the Body of Christ (Ephesians 4:12).

Paul Simon gave a song in 1969 in the time of the Vietnam War when everything was disturbing and distressing. "When you're down and out, when you're on the street, When evening falls so hard, I will comfort you, I'll take your part. Oh when darkness comes and pain is all around, Like a bridge over troubled waters, I will lay me down."  He didn't say, notice, when things are tough I'll give you four quick points for getting life on the road again.  He said, I'll comfort you, I'll lay Me down. I'll be your bridge. He's talking about self sacrificial loving friendship that supports one another. In times of stress, find an eternal companion, find your earthly companions. Remember to be there for them to. That's mutual friendship and support.

Strengthening One Another

12 Though one may be overpowered by another, two can withstand him. And a threefold cord is not quickly broken.

The best definition I have ever heard that describes a true friend is this: "A friend is someone who will walk into your house when the whole world has just walked out."

Let the word of Christ dwell in you richly … admonishing one another in psalms and hymns and spiritual songs, singing with grace in your hearts to the Lord. Colossians 3:16

John D'Esterre perished in an 1815 duel, leaving behind a young widow, Jane, and two children. Jane fled her husband's creditors and grew discouraged. One day she sat by a river, contemplating suicide. On the other bank, a ploughman started his day's work. As he labored behind the animals, he began whistling Christian hymns. This young man was well known in the area of his hymn-whistling, and as Jane listened, her heart was moved. She decided to attend a church service, where she found Christ as her Savior. She went on to marry John Guinness, and later her son, Harry Grattan Guinness, helped trigger the Irish Revival of 1859, which brought 100,000 people to Christ. The influence of the hymn-whistler is still touching the world today through one of Jane's descendants, Dr. Os Guinness.

When from a joyful heart we sing or play or send forth the music of the Lord, we never know who is listening—even if we do nothing more than whistle our faith.

We are only told the names of a few dozen people associated with the apostle Paul as mentioned in his letters. Yet there must have been hundreds of people with whom he developed relationships—people with whom he shared a reciprocal ministry. These people not only ministered to Paul, but he ministered to them as well. And yet we will only learn their names and stories in heaven.

One such person who meant a great deal to Paul was Epaphroditus, a member of the church at Philippi. Paul mentions him twice by name (Philippians 2:25; 4:18), conveying his heartfelt appreciation and concern for this one he referred to as "my brother, fellow worker, and fellow soldier." Remember—Paul was in prison when he wrote to the Philippians, yet his main concern was that the Church know what a blessing Epaphroditus had been to him. Indeed, Epaphroditus had almost died while delivering a material gift to Paul. Ignoring his own suffering, Paul demonstrated his concern for his friend.

Our true heart is revealed when we put concern for others ahead of ourselves (Philippians 2:4).

The highest honour in the Church is not government but service.   John Calvin

Sharpened by One Another

And a threefold cord is not quickly broken.   There is the necessity of helping the other stand up to the stress, that we all might hold together. Prov 27:17 As iron sharpens iron, So a man sharpens the countenance of his friend. 

Stimulating One Another

Heb 10:24 And let us consider one another in order to stir up love and good works, 25 not forsaking the assembling of ourselves together, as is the manner of some, but exhorting one another, and so much the more as you see the Day approaching.

Heb 3:12 Beware, brethren, lest there be in any of you an evil heart of unbelief in departing from the living God; 13 but exhort one another daily, while it is called "Today," lest any of you be hardened through the deceitfulness of sin.

Jesus Christ, the "friend of . . . sinners" (Matthew 11:19; Luke 7:34) Jesus said that we are not simply his servants but truly his friends.  Jesus is the friend we need most of all. Have you become his friend by putting your trust in him? Two really are better than one when one of the two is the Best One of all.

 

 

This week we commence   series entitled "I have a Friend who." Under this title we will be thinking about how we answer people who inquire about various issues regarding the validity of our Christian Faith.

 

1 Peter 3:15 says 15 but in your hearts honor Christ the Lord as holy, always being prepared to make a defense to anyone who asks you for a reason for the hope that is in you; yet do it with gentleness and respect,

 

The word defense used here is the Greek word απολογιαν.

 

Apologetics is the study of how we provide answers to difficult objections against the Christian faith.

Almost always the issue at heart is that someone has not really understood the Christian faith, and so we have the opportunity to explain to them what we really do believe as Christians.  It is how we fine tune their understanding.

However, before we consider any objections, we need to consider how we understand what we are doing in assisting their understanding.

 

We need to think.

And we need to think about how we think.

The day before I commenced theological college a friend at my home church gave me a car. Now don't think it was a great gift. It was a good gift.. but he owned a VW wrecking yard. And this is what the car looked like.

VW

I drive it the first day across Sydney to the busiest scariest intersection in Sydney where it broke down. Right in the middle of Parramatta road and Silverwater bridge road at 8:00 am exactly. It wouldn't restart.  So I pushed it through the lights into a service station there. And the service station was closed.

So I began going through in my head what was wrong with the car.  3 main things can go wrong:

1.       The radiator could overheat. I checked the radiator (yes there is none, it is air cooled.

2.       It could be the electrics. I checked the electrics .. everything seemed ok.

3.       It could have run out of petrol. I checked the gauge .. 1/3^rd full. Just like yesterday.

Just like yesterday!  So I checked the petrol tank itself! Bone dry.

When we think through a problem we go through all the alternatives and we check and recheck our evidences, and so we arrive at a conclusion.

However: what is we have to rethink how we think about our process of evidences.

And as Christians we should.

Evidences don't persuade people. Some folks think that the reasons we give are persuasive in themselves to help someone to come to a living faith in Christ.

Romans 1 Presuppositions .. what people already know.

God has made Himself known in and to them

1 Corinthians 1: 20 Where is the philosopher?⁴  Where is the scholar? Where is the debater of this age? Hasn't God made the world's wisdom foolish? 21 For since, in God's wisdom, the ^* world did not know God through wisdom, God was pleased to save those who believe through the foolishness of the message preached. 22 For the Jews ask for signs and the Greeks seek wisdom, 23 but we preach Christ crucified, a stumbling block to the Jews and foolishness to the Gentiles.⁵  24 Yet to those who are called, both Jews and Greeks, Christ is God's power and God's wisdom, 25 because God's foolishness is wiser than human wisdom, and God's weakness is stronger than human strength.

   Special electing grace

Galatians 1: 13 For you have heard about my former way of life in Judaism: I persecuted God's church to an extreme degree and tried to destroy it. 14 I advanced in Judaism beyond many contemporaries among my people, because I was extremely zealous for the traditions of my ancestors. 15 But when God, who from my birth set me apart and called me by His grace, was pleased 16 to reveal His Son in me, so that I could preach Him among the Gentiles, I did not immediately consult with anyone.

There are issues of Romans 2 common grace . conscience is a common grace. Sometimes God's  purposes are not to convert people, but rather to preserve the society through recognition of Christian beliefs in the public square.

Persuasiveness doesn't persuade people.

Our abilities and persuasiveness are not the key to persuading someone to faith in Christ.

1 Corinthians 2: 1 When I came to you, ^* brothers, announcing the testimony¹  of God to you, I did not come with brilliance of speech or wisdom. 2 For I didn't think it was a good idea to know anything among you except Jesus Christ and Him crucified. 3 I came to you in weakness, in fear, and in much trembling. 4 My speech and my proclamation were not with persuasive words of wisdom²  but with a powerful demonstration by the Spirit, 5 so that your faith might not be based on men's wisdom but on God's power.

But we are called upon to think clearly and present clearly those truths that will assist people to put their faith in the Lord Jesus Christ.

Acts 17: Then they traveled through Amphipolis and Apollonia and came to Thessalonica, where there was a Jewish synagogue. 2 As usual, Paul went to the synagogue, and on three Sabbath days reasoned with them from the Scriptures, 3 explaining and showing that the Messiah had to suffer and rise from the dead: "This Jesus I am proclaiming to you is the Messiah." 4 Then some of them were persuaded and joined Paul and Silas,

Acts 18:5 When Silas and Timothy came down from Macedonia, Paul was occupied with preaching the message  and solemnly testified to the Jews that Jesus is the  Messiah.

I Have A Friend …Who Wonders Why Bad Things Happen To Good People.

This question reminds us that every person has a hole in the heart.

Sometimes the hole in the heart is illness… My auntie was embittered against God for nearly 70 years due to a. her unhappy marriage to a man who was insane, and who for the sake of  her kids safety, she had to divorce. She then went through a further 6 years of suffering as her youngest son died of Leukaemia at the age of 12.  

Everyone has a hole in the heart: some deep hurt. A Hole that only God Himself can resolve. Sometimes these holes are problems from living in a fallen world. Sometimes they are people in a fallen world.  Lets consider the problem of people. Sometimes the people problem is a Christian not behaving Christianly. I often have people confront me on this problem. Other times it is just hurt people hurt by the falleness of humanity around them.

How do we answer this problem when it is raised? 

Don't always assume that the person is attacking us. Ask the question, "Is there something in your life that has hurt you deeply that has raised this issue for you personally?"  Asking this question will move you from being an antagonist to someone who can sympathise with others going through deep waters.

I. THE FACT IS, LIFE IS NOT FAIR.

1. Innocent and powerless people are abused by others.

* Ecclesiastes 4:1 "Again I looked and saw all the oppression that was taking place under the sun: I saw the tears of the oppressed--and they have no comforter; power was on the side of their oppressors--and they have no comforter."

"Moreover, I saw under the sun that in the place of justice, even there was wickedness, and in the place of righteousness, even there was wicked­ness" (Ecclesiastes 3:16). As we have seen before, the phrase "under the sun" describes "the futility and meaninglessness of life lived only for self and the moment, without gratitude to or regard for God and his ways."2 What we see "under the sun" in this instance is rampant injustice — man's inhumanity to man. The problem here is that even "the place of justice" is unjust. The very place where we most expect and most need to receive justice turns out to be a place of unfairness. Even the court system is corrupt. This is not merely a frustration, like some of the other problems we read about in Ecclesiastes, but a manifestation of genuine evil. Innocent people are convicted for crimes they never committed. They were simply in the wrong place at the wrong time, or maybe the wrong color in the wrong neighborhood. Just as fre­quently, other people get away with murder. They have the money to hire better lawyers, or else they hide behind the structure of a large corporation to take advantage of people who are less fortunate.

Even worse, there is nothing that can be done about this. The Preacher's frustration is not simply that injustice is done, but that it goes unpunished. According to Martin Luther, he is "not complaining because there is wick­edness in the place of justice but because the wickedness in the place of justice cannot be corrected."3 When the halls of justice become corridors of corruption, where can righteousness be found?

The Preacher revisits this theme at the beginning of chapter 4, where he says, "Again I saw all the oppressions that are done under the sun. And behold, the tears of the oppressed, and they had no one to comfort them! On the side of their oppressors there was power, and there was no one to comfort them" (Ecclesiastes 4:1). By this reasoning, there are two kinds of people in the world: the oppressed and their oppressors. The oppressors are the ones who have all the advantages. The power is all on their side, leaving their victims with nothing but tears.

People Are Crooked

People Are Cruel

2. The wrong people seem to succeed.

* Ecclesiastes 8:14 "There's something else,... righteous men who get what the wicked deserve and wicked men who get what the righteous deserve."

* Ecclesiastes 9:11 "In this world fast runners do not always win the races...wise people don't always earn a living ... intelligent people don't always get rich ... and capable people don't always rise to high positions..."

II. THERE ARE SOME REASONS GOD IS NOT STOPPING INJUSTICE TODAY.

1.       We live in a fallen world.

Everything in the world, nature, life, people is tainted by sin and troubled by it.

Romans 8: 18 For I consider that the sufferings of this present time are not worth comparing with the glory that is to be revealed to us. 19 For the creation waits with eager longing for the revealing of the sons of God. 20 For the creation was subjected to futility, not willingly, but because of him who subjected it, in hope 21 that the creation itself will be set free from its bondage to corruption and obtain the freedom of the glory of the children of God. 22 For we know that the whole creation has been groaning together in the pains of childbirth until now. 23 And not only the creation, but we ourselves, who have the firstfruits of the Spirit, groan inwardly as we wait eagerly for adoption as sons, the redemption of our bodies.

* People are sinful by nature.  Many choices we make bring suffering.

* We don't live on an island of one. Our wrong choices hurt innocent people around us as well.

* Injustice happens

* Natural disasters are also a consequence of the fallenness of the world.

2. God sometimes allows injustice to produce a greater good in our life.

As far as he could tell, bad people seemed to have a good life. If God is just, then he ought to judge the wicked. Yet as the Preacher looked around, he saw exactly the opposite. He was like Asaph, who admitted that he was "envious of the arrogant when I saw the prosperity of the wicked" (Psalm 73:3). Asaph makes this complaint in Psalm 73, where he also writes, "They have no pangs until death; their bodies are fat and sleek. They are not in trouble as others are; they are not stricken like the rest of mankind" (vv. 4–5). In other words, God's enemies seem to get all the blessing. They make more money, have more power, and experience more pleasure than people who try to do what God says.

This is what Asaph saw, and the Preacher saw it too. Here was his epi­taph for the wicked: "They used to go in and out of the holy place and were praised in the city where they had done such things" (Ecclesiastes 8:10). It is not entirely certain which "holy place" the Preacher had in mind. Maybe he was referring to Jerusalem, the holy city of God. Or perhaps he was refer­ring more specifically to the temple in Jerusalem. This led Martin Luther to believe that the people who "go in and out of the holy place" were the priests who led worship at the house of God, in which case the Preacher was talking about Israel's religious leaders.4 But whoever they were and wherever they went, they used to come and go in freedom.

Most translations give the impression that these wicked people were popular, that they "were praised in the city" (Ecclesiastes 8:10). 

Just like Asaph, in Psalm 73 12       Behold, these are the wicked; always at ease, they increase in riches.

13 All in vain have I kept my heart clean and washed my hands in innocence.

14 For all the day long I have been stricken and rebuked every morning.

15 If I had said, "I will speak thus," I would have betrayed the generation of your children.

16 But when I thought how to understand this, it seemed to me a wearisome task,

17 until I went into the sanctuary of God; then I discerned their end.

18 Truly you set them in slippery places; you make them fall to ruin.

19 How they are destroyed in a moment, swept away utterly by terrors!

* James 1:2-4 "Dear brothers and sisters, whenever trouble comes your way, let it be an opportunity for joy. For when your faith is tested, your endurance has a chance to grow. So let it grow, for when your endurance is fully developed, you will be strong in character and ready for anything."

* We always learn more from pain than we do from pleasure.

3. God sometimes allows injustice to show us that we need a Saviour.

* Romans 3:23 "for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God."

* Jesus became our substitute so that we could go free. He died in our place, then rose from the grave and now offers to us forgiveness. That forgiveness comes when we accept Him as our Saviour.

The Cruelty of Corruption can instil humility in us

The Cruelty of Corruption can instil eternity in us

4. God allows injustice only for a season.

* Ecclesiastes 3:17 "In due season, God will judge everything man does, both good and bad."

* Romans 12:19 "Do not take revenge, my friends, but leave room for God's wrath, for it is written: "It is Mine to avenge; I will repay," says the Lord."

* Hebrew 10:30-31 "For we know Him who said, "It is Mine to avenge; I will repay,"...It is a dreadful thing to fall into the hands of the living God."

The Day of Wrath is the day when the Lord will be vindicated and righteousness upheld.

Why doesn't God judge people right away? Why does he wait until the Final Judgment? The Preacher had a good answer to this question as well: "I said in my heart with regard to the children of man that God is testing them that they may see that they themselves are but beasts" (Ecclesiastes 3:18).

Our present existence is a proving ground. It is a test, not simply in the sense of something we pass or fail, but also in the sense of something that demonstrates our true character.5 One of the purposes of life is to examine and ultimately to reveal our place in the universe and our true relationship to God. This test is not for God's benefit, as if there were anything about us that he does not know already, but for our benefit, so that we learn to recognize our mortality. Will we see ourselves for who we really are?

 

III. THERE ARE SOME THINGS WE CAN DO TO SURVIVE THE UNFAIR THINGS ABOUT LIFE.

1 Accept that unfair things are going to happen no matter what.

* John 16:33 "In the world you will have trouble."

2. Though others do wrong, choose to do the right thing.

The Cruelty of Corruption can instil humanity in us

* Romans 12:17-21 "Do not repay anyone evil for evil. Be careful to do what is right...as far as it depends on you, live at peace with everyone. Do not take revenge...On the contrary: "If your enemy is hungry, feed him; if he is thirsty, give him something to drink. In doing this, you will heap burning coals on his head."

Depending on our place in society — the spiritual or civil authority that God has given to us — it is our responsibility to fight against oppression. As fathers and mothers, as pastors and elders, as citizens and public officials, we are called to do what is right in the home, in the church, and in society.

Yet, unfortunately, even our very best efforts will not bring an end to all oppression. There will still be violence against women and children. Police officers will still get killed in the line of duty. There will still be structures of corruption in business and government. Foreign powers will still abuse their own people in defiance of world order. But in all the situations that we do not have the power or authority or wisdom to resolve, God will see to it that justice is done.

Our confidence does not lie in a justice system but in the Chief Justice himself, Jesus Christ. God has promised a day when his Son will judge the righteous and the wicked (Acts 17:30–31). The time for his work of divine retribution is the Day of Judgment, when he will render his final verdict on all mankind. "Shall not the Judge of all the earth do what is just?" (Genesis 18:25). "God will bring every deed into judgment, with every secret thing, whether good or evil" (Ecclesiastes 12:14).

3. Allow the Lord to bring comfort and encouragement to your life.

* 2 Corinthians 1:3-4 "All praise to the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ. He is the source of every mercy and the God who comforts us. [4] He comforts us in all our troubles so that we can comfort others. When others are troubled, we will be able to give them the same comfort

God has given us."

4.       Be patient and wait for God's intervention.

As we read the Bible, we quickly discover that this is a conflict in which God chooses sides. He is not on the side of injustice but stands against it with all his power. We see this again and again in the Biblical proph­ets. Amos preached against people who "oppress the poor" and "crush the needy" (Amos 4:1; cf. Proverbs 14:31). Ezekiel warned about extortion and stealing from foreigners (Ezekiel 22:12). Zechariah listed the people who were most likely to be oppressed: widows, orphans, travelers, and the poor (Zechariah 7:9–10; cf. Exodus 22:21–22). It is not just words and actions that bring oppression but also legislation. Thus Isaiah pronounced God's woe against "those who decree iniquitous decrees, and the writers who keep writing oppression" (Isaiah 10:1). Then there is all the oppression we see around the world — genocide, terrorism, slavery, sex trafficking, street children. Oh, the injustice of it all!

When the Preacher saw what was really happening in the world, he longed for someone to comfort the oppressed and dry their tears. In a cul­ture of exploitation, he wanted to rectify wrongs and console the victims of injustice. Twice he lamented that no one was able to offer any comfort. But what the Preacher mostly felt was frustration that he could not bring an end to oppression.

"God will judge the righteous and the wicked, for there is a time for every matter and for every work" (Ecclesiastes 3:17). The Preacher does something similar in verse 17: he takes a spiritual principle that he taught earlier in chapter 3 and applies it to the issue of injus­tice. If there is a season for everything and "a time for every matter under heaven" (Ecclesiastes 3:1), then there must be a time for justice. Therefore, rather than simply getting angry and sad about all the oppression we see in the world, we can trust God to make things right in the end.

5.       Thank God everyday that He doesn't treat us as we deserve.

* Romans 6:23 " For the wages of sin is death,"

* Ephesians 2:8 "God saved you by His special favour when you believed. and you can't take credit for this; it is a gift from God."

Solomon writes about injustice in Ecclesiastes 8:14: "There is a vanity that takes place on earth, that there are righteous people to whom it happens according to the deeds of the wicked, and there are wicked people to whom it happens according to the deeds of the righteous. I said that this also is vanity."

Oh, the injustice of it all! If God is righteous, then we would expect him to reward the righteous and punish the wicked. Yet often he seems to do exactly the opposite. Good people have troubles that only bad people deserve, while bad people get what only good people deserve. Cruel dic­tators drive out free governments. The man who robs investors of their inheritance gets a huge bonus, while hardworking people lose their jobs and their homes. Suffering pastors are put in prison, while the persecutors of the church grow strong in their cruel power. To bring things down to the personal level, the student who cheated on a difficult exam gets an A, but all you get is a C-. The worker who stabbed you in the back gets the promotion, while you remain stuck at the same pay grade. Or you make a commitment to chastity, and although you are still single, the girl who throws herself at men gets a ring on her finger and a long white dress.

The Preacher is telling us that in this life there is a reversal of retribution and reward. This is not just the way things seem, but the way they actually are. So what is the use of being righteous? If bad people get a good life, then what do we gain by godliness? The Preacher called this "vanity." The Reformation theologian Theodore Beza called it "repugnant to reason."6 I would call it an absurd injustice.

"Because the sentence against an evil deed is not executed speedily, the heart of the children of man is fully set to do evil" (Ecclesiastes 8:11; cf. 7:29).

The Preacher is far more hopeful about people who lead a godly life. "I know that it will be well with those who fear God," he says, "because they fear before him" (Ecclesiastes 8:12). Usually the Preacher tells us what he "saw," but this time he chooses a different verb and tells us something that he "knows." This is not something that he has seen from a distance, but some­thing he has grasped with the rational conviction of his own mind. His reply "is not an observation, but the answer of faith."11 He believes what he cannot see — that one day all will be well for everyone who lives in the fear of God.

When the Bible talks about "the fear of God," it does not mean simply that people are afraid of God, although that may be part of it. Rather, the fear of God is what Michael Eaton calls "the awe and holy caution that arises from realization of the greatness of God."12

In this case, the realization of God's greatness also comes with a real­ization of his nearness. Those who fear God are said to "fear before him" (Ecclesiastes 8:12), meaning that they know they are in his presence. Most people, including many Christians, go through life hardly realizing that they are constantly in the presence of God. But the person who fears God knows that God is always near. He is with us when we are on our beds at night, worrying about tomorrow. He is with us when we have an opportunity for witness and are not sure what to say. He is with us when we have a sudden emergency and need supernatural help. To live a God-fearing life is to live in constant awareness of the presence of God, who is even closer than a prayer away. He is with us in the bedroom and the kitchen, in the car and on the bus, at the grocery store and at the football game. He is with us wherever we go.

The proper fear of God is an important theme throughout Ecclesiastes, but especially at the end. The Preacher has told us to fear God because he is sovereign over the times of life (Ecclesiastes 3:14) and also to fear God when we go into his house for worship (Ecclesiastes 5:1, 7). Later he will tell us to fear God by keeping his commandments (Ecclesiastes 12:13). Here he says that if we fear God, it will go well for us in days to come.

 

This promise will be fulfilled completely at the final judgment. Remember the words of the thief on the cross next to Christ. Two thieves were crucified that day, one on either side of Jesus. One of them mocked our Lord, but the other thief rebuked him by saying, "Do you not fear God?" (Luke 23:40). Then he demonstrated his own fear of God by asking the crucified Christ to be his Savior. "Jesus," he said, "remember me when you come into your kingdom" (Luke 23:42). This is the way for anyone to begin living in the fear of God: Ask Jesus to save you!

Anyone who asks for forgiveness will receive the same promise of eter­nal life that the thief received when he was dying on the cross next to Jesus. Jesus will say to us what he said to that thief: "You will be with me in Paradise" (Luke 23:43). It is for this reason, and for this reason alone, that all "will be well" for the man, the woman, or the child who fears God. It is only because Jesus died for our sins on the cross.

Do not use the delay of judgment as an excuse for not repenting of your sins or trusting in Jesus. According to Ecclesiastes 8 — as well as what we read everywhere else in the Bible — there are only two kinds of people: those who fear God and those who don't! The Bible is equally clear that things will only go well for those who do. It may not always seem that way in this life. In fact, in all honesty sometimes it seems exactly the opposite, as Solomon tells us. But there will be final justice. The wicked will be buried, and after that they will be punished for their sins. As for the righteous, they will be vindicated by the grace of God. Justice is coming; it is only a matter of time.

 

 

 

 

Apologetics

1 Peter 3:15 but in your hearts honour Christ the Lord as holy, always being prepared to make a defense to anyone who asks you for a reason for the hope that is in you; yet do it with gentleness and respect,

Evidences don't persuade people.  1 Corinthians 1:18-21, 2:1-5.  Romans 1:18-20

We don't persuade people. Galatians 1:13-16.

We do speak to people persuading them. Acts 17:1-4, Acts 18:5.  Romans 2:1-16.

I Have A Friend Who Wonders Why Bad Things Happen to Good People:

Everyone has a hole is the heart:  Problems, People.

Sympathise with people.

THE CRUELTY OF CORRUPTION CAN INSTIL HUMILITY

Innocent and powerless people are abused by others. Ecclesiastes 3:16-4:1

The wrong people succeed  Eccl 7:14,15. 8:14. 9:11.

We live in a fallen world. Romans 8: 18 For I consider that the sufferings of this present time are not worth comparing with the glory that is to be revealed to us. 19 For the creation waits with eager longing for the revealing of the sons of God. 20 For the creation was subjected to futility, not willingly, but because of him who subjected it, in hope 21 that the creation itself will be set free from its bondage to corruption and obtain the freedom of the glory of the children of God. 22 For we know that the whole creation has been groaning together in the pains of childbirth until now. 23 And not only the creation, but we ourselves, who have the firstfruits of the Spirit, groan inwardly as we wait eagerly for adoption as sons, the redemption of our bodies.

THE CRUELTY OF CORRUPTION CAN INSTIL ETERNITY

God allows injustice only for a season

Ecclesiastes 3:17 The proper fear of God is an important theme throughout Ecclesiastes, but especially at the end. The Preacher has told us to fear God because he is sovereign over the times of life (Ecclesiastes 3:14) and also to fear God when we go into his house for worship (Ecclesiastes 5:1, 7). Later he will tell us to fear God by keeping his commandments (Ecclesiastes 12:13). Here he says that if we fear God, it will go well for us in days to come.

THE CRUELTY OF CORRUPTION CAN INSTIL HUMANITY

Though others do wrong, choose to do the right thing.  Romans 12:17-21 "Do not repay anyone evil for evil. Be careful to do what is right...as far as it depends on you, live at peace with everyone. Do not take revenge...On the contrary: "If your enemy is hungry, feed him; if he is thirsty, give him something to drink. In doing this, you will heap burning coals on his head."

How Can I Know God Really Exists?   (Romans 1:18-20)

Romans 1:18 Ἀποκαλύπτεται γὰρ ὀργὴ θεοῦ ἀπ' οὐρανοῦ ἐπὶ πᾶσαν ἀσέβειαν καὶ ἀδικίαν ἀνθρώπων τῶν τὴν ἀλήθειαν ἐν ἀδικίᾳ κατεχόντων, 19 διότι τὸ γνωστὸν τοῦ θεοῦ φανερόν ἐστιν ἐν αὐτοῖς, ὁ ⸂θεὸς γὰρ⸃ αὐτοῖς ἐφανέρωσεν. 20 τὰ γὰρ ἀόρατα αὐτοῦ ἀπὸ κτίσεως κόσμου τοῖς ποιήμασιν νοούμενα καθορᾶται, ἥ τε ἀΐδιος αὐτοῦ δύναμις καὶ θειότης, εἰς τὸ εἶναι αὐτοὺς ἀναπολογήτους, 21 διότι γνόντες τὸν θεὸν οὐχ ὡς θεὸν ἐδόξασαν ἢ ηὐχαρίστησαν, ἀλλὰ ἐματαιώθησαν ἐν τοῖς διαλογισμοῖς αὐτῶν καὶ ἐσκοτίσθη ἡ ἀσύνετος αὐτῶν καρδία· 22 φάσκοντες εἶναι σοφοὶ ἐμωράνθησαν, 23 καὶ ἤλλαξαν τὴν  δόξαν τοῦ ἀφθάρτου θεοῦ ἐν ὁμοιώματι εἰκόνος φθαρτοῦ ἀνθρώπου καὶ πετεινῶν καὶ τετραπόδων καὶ ἑρπετῶν.

Romans 1:19 For what can be known about God is plain to them, because God has shown it to them. 20 For his invisible attributes, namely, his eternal power and divine nature, have been clearly perceived, ever since the creation of the world,7 in the things that have been made. So they are without excuse.  And, Romans 2:14 For when Gentiles, who do not have the law, by nature do what the law requires, they are a law to themselves, even though they do not have the law. 15 They show that the work of the law is written on their hearts, while their conscience also bears witness, and their conflicting thoughts accuse or even excuse them.

Psalm 19:1-6 The heavens declare the glory of God, and the sky above proclaims his handiwork. 2 Day to day pours out speech, and night to night reveals knowledge. 3 There is no speech, nor are there words, whose voice is not heard. 4 Their voice goes out through all the earth, and their words to the end of the world. In them he has set a tent for the sun, 5 which comes out like a bridegroom leaving his chamber, and, like a strong man, runs its course with joy. 6 Its rising is from the end of the heavens, and its circuit to the end of them, and there is nothing hidden from its heat.

Just like the sun shines on all, all know, and there are none hid from the responsibility of their knowledge of God.

Isaiah 40: 25-31 To whom then will you compare me, that I should be like him? says the Holy One. 26  Lift up your eyes on high and see: who created these? He who brings out their host by number, calling them all by name, by the greatness of his might, and because he is strong in power not one is missing. 27 Why do you say, O Jacob, and speak, O Israel, "My way is hidden from the LORD, and my right is disregarded by my God"? 28 Have you not known? Have you not heard? The LORD is the everlasting God, the Creator of the ends of the earth. He does not faint or grow weary; his understanding is unsearchable. 29 He gives power to the faint, and to him who has no might he increases strength. 30 Even youths shall faint and be weary, and young men shall fall exhausted; 31 but they who wait for the LORD shall renew their strength; they shall mount up with wings like eagles; they shall run and not be weary; they shall walk and not faint.

Psalm 14:1 The fool says in his heart, "There is no God." They are corrupt, they do abominable deeds, there is none who does good.

 

1.       God has placed within our understanding the knowledge of Himself.

It is to be noted that there is a difference in English translation; ESV and NIV do not make apparent the two-fold revelation, "in them" and "too them" i.e. ESV Romans 1:19 "For what can be known about God is plain to them, because God has shown it to them." NASB Romans 1:19 "because that which is known about God is evident within them; for God made it evident to them." My own translation of verse 19 would be "because that which is known of God is manifest in them, for God manifested it to them."

This speaks of an inward sense of the divine.

This is both a presuppositional argument and also a rational argument at the same time.

Catholic philosopher Charles Taylor and Reformed scholar Deane-Peter Baker (2007)[i] both develop a concept of the sensus divinitas the inward sense of the divine that Paul expresses. This inward sense of the divine is thought to be a properly basic belief, something that is imbedded within the consciousness of every person, a Grundnorm. This sense of the divine is thought to be an incontestable understanding of the existence and being of God; a sense that there is a God who is there. Being "properly basic" means that this understanding is part of a person's ontology understood both rationally and supra-rationally. Because people are created beings they are aware of their creation and their Creator. The apostle Paul in Romans 1 expresses the concept that God has made Himself known to all people in two ways; firstly by an inward sense of himself (the sensus divinitas), and secondly by observation and interaction with the created things around them that provide rational support to the inward revelation of the sensus divinitas. The concept of a sensus divinitas carries with it the attendant concepts of:

the possibility of relationships with both the Creator and the creation;

the possibility of achieving that relationship;

the possibility of purpose and meaning for life;

the possibility of a sense of a higher good in life;

the possibility of a sense of the possibility of fulfilment as these are achieved.

Many theologians and philosophers throughout the ages have articulated this concept in terms of a "natural theology."

The Westminster Confession of Faith makes the distinction between autopistia (self-authenticating knowledge) of the divine, or the divine nature of scripture and the rationally authenticating nature of the evidences that affirm and confirm this innate knowledge:

Westminster Confession of Faith [ii]

1.1. Although the light of nature, and the works of creation and providence do so far manifest the goodness, wisdom, and power of God, as to leave men unexcusable;….

1:4. The authority of the Holy Scripture, for which it ought to be believed, and obeyed, depends not upon the testimony of any man, or Church; but wholly upon God (who is truth itself) the author thereof: and therefore it is to be received, because it is the Word of God,

1:5 . We may be moved and induced by the testimony of the Church to an high and reverent esteem of the Holy Scripture. And the heavenliness of the matter, the efficacy of the doctrine, the majesty of the style, the consent of all the parts, the scope of the whole (which is, to give all glory to God), the full discovery it makes of the only way of man's salvation, the many other incomparable excellencies, and the entire perfection thereof, are arguments whereby it does abundantly evidence itself to be the Word of God: yet notwithstanding, our full persuasion and assurance of the infallible truth and divine authority thereof, is from the inward work of the Holy Spirit bearing witness by and with the Word in our hearts,

1:6 The whole counsel of God concerning all things necessary for His own glory, man's salvation, faith and life, is either expressly set down in Scripture, or by good and necessary consequence may be deduced from Scripture:

The Knowledge of God is  both something we have as an internal thing that God has put in us, and also a rational agreement of that inward sense of the divine with the outward senses and rationality.

Antony Flew, former atheist, There Is A God: How The World's Most Notorious Atheist Changed His Mind "I have said from the beginning that I would always move to where the evidence was and now the evidence is overwhelming that God must exist.  So, I have changed my mind." 

GOD HAS DEMONSTRATED HIS EXISTANCE AS THE UNCAUSED FIRST CAUSE.

Lincoln Barnett, The Universe and Dr. Einstein. "The inescapable inference is that everything had a beginning: somehow and sometime the cosmic processes were started, the stellar fires ignited, and the whole vast pageant of the universe was brought into being." [iii]

The 1^st Law of Thermodynamics implies that matter cannot just pop into existence or create itself.  Therefore, if the universe had a beginning, then something or someone external to the universe and unbound by its laws must have caused the universe to come into existence.

Paul Davies "(The origin of the universe is) the one place in the universe where there is room, even for the most hard-nosed materialist, to admit God."  

So, what does creation tell us about God?  He is transcendent, meaning He stands apart and separate from His creation; He has unimaginable intelligence and power and He intended to reveal Himself to His creation. That is the point of Romans 1:20  For since the creation of the world God's invisible qualities–His eternal power and divine nature–have been clearly seen, being understood from what has been made, so that people are without excuse.

 GOD HAS DEMONSTRATED HIS EXISTENCE THROUGH THE ANTHROPIC PRINCIPLE.

When the first spacecraft landed on the moon this picture became burned into our memory.   The beautiful blue and alive earth seen just above the horizon of the barren, lifeless moon.  The Anthropic principle states that in our own universe, there are an overwhelming number of seemingly arbitrary and unrelated values in physics that have one common denominator: They are precisely the values needed to produce a universe capable of supporting life.  Together, they demonstrate that the earth was fine tuned for life just as the Bible says.  We are here on purpose not by accident.

Dyson Freeman "The more I examine the universe…the more evidence I find that the universe in some sense must have known we were coming." [iv]

Francis  Crick "An honest man, armed with all the knowledge available to us now, could only state that in some sense, the origin of life appears at the moment to be almost a miracle, so many are the conditions which would have had to have been satisfied to get it going."[v]

Heinz Pagels, physicist   "If the universe appears to be tailor-made for life, the most straightforward conclusion is that it actually was tailor-made, created by a transcendent God." 

Patrick Glynn, Director at George Washington University,  "The mainstream scientific community has in effect shown its attachment to the atheistic ideology of the random universe to be in some respects more powerful than its commitment to the scientific method itself." [vi]

What does Patrick Glynn's statement mean?  When the evidence disagrees with the atheistic ideology, many atheistic scientists will ignore the evidence.

GOD HAS DEMONSTRATED HIS EXISTENCE THROUGH THE AMAZING DESIGN OF DNA.

Stanley Miller "Computers are being programmed to simulate the whole process Darwin described and they are finding that no matter how much time is given, the chance that what is now being discovered to be the complexity of the single cell just happening, is essentially zero." [vii] 

 Antony Flew, There Is A God "The DNA material has shown by the almost unbelievable complexity of the arrangements which are needed to produce life, that intelligence must have been involved in getting those extraordinarily diverse elements to work together.  It's the enormous complexity of the number of elements and the enormous subtlety of the ways they work together…(that demonstrates intelligence)." [viii]

Fred Hoyle was an English astronomer who recognized that mere chance cannot be the answer to the existence of life Astronomer Fred Hoyle compares the chance of life just "happening" to be equal to 10 to the 50^th power number of blind people, (ten with fifty zeros after it)  all being given a scrambled Rubik's Cube, and finding that they all solved the cube at the very same moment.[ix]

Paul Davies remarks that  "Doing science means figuring out what is going on in the world – what the universe is "up to," what it is "about." If it isn't "about" anything, there would be no good reason to embark on the scientific quest in the first place, because we would have no rational basis for believing that we could thereby uncover additional coherent and meaningful facts about the world. So we might justifiably invert Weinberg's dictum and say that the more the universe seems pointless, the more it also seems incomprehensible… It seems to me that there is a genuine scheme of things – the universe is "about" something. But I am equally uneasy about dumping the whole set of problems in the lap of an arbitrary god or abandoning all further thought and declaring existence to be a mystery." [x]

Davies acknowledged a "nostalgia for a theistic worldview in which humankind occupies a special place." "Yet", he writes, "I do believe that life and mind are etched deeply into the fabric of the cosmos, perhaps through a shadowy, half-glimpsed life principle, and if I am to be honest I have to concede that this starting point is something I feel more in my heart than in my head. So maybe that is a religious conviction of sorts."

Thomas Nagel writes quite similarly:

"The world is an astonishing place. That it has produced you, and me, and the rest of us is the most astonishing thing about it. If contemporary research in molecular biology leaves open the possibility of legitimate doubts about a fully mechanistic account of the origin and evolution of life, dependent only on the laws of chemistry and physics, this can combine with the failure of psychophysical reductionism to suggest that principles of a different kind are also at work in the history of nature, principles of the growth of order that are in their logical form teleological rather than mechanistic "[each] of our lives is a part of the lengthy process of the universe gradually waking and becoming aware of itself. I am not confident that this Aristotelian idea of teleology without intention makes sense, but I do not at the moment see why it doesn't."

In Mind and Cosmos Thomas Nagel argues that the widely accepted worldview of materialist naturalism is untenable. The mind-body problem cannot be confined to the relation between animal minds and animal bodies. If materialism cannot accommodate consciousness and other mind-related aspects of reality, then we must abandon a purely materialist understanding of nature in general, extending to biology, evolutionary theory, and cosmology. Since minds are features of biological systems that have developed through evolution, the standard materialist version of evolutionary biology is fundamentally incomplete. The phenomena of consciousness, cognition, and value, lead to the conclusion is that physics cannot be the theory of everything.[xi]

The New Yorker summarises Nagel's position: "Since neither physics nor Darwinian biology — the concept of evolution — can account for the emergence of a mental world from a physical one, Nagel contends that the mental side of existence must somehow have been present in creation from the very start. But then he goes further, into strange and visionary territory. He argues that the faculty of reason is different from perception and, in effect, prior to it — "an irreducible faculty." He suggests that any theory of the universe, any comprehensive mesh of physics and biology, will need to succeed in "showing how the natural order is disposed to generate beings capable of comprehending it." [xii] And this, he argues, would be a theory of teleology — a pre-programmed or built-in tendency in the universe toward the particular goal of fulfilling the possibilities of mentality. In a splendid image, Nagel writes, "Each of our lives is a part of the lengthy process of the universe gradually waking up and becoming aware of itself."

Nagel affirms that a non-theistic teleological view would allow for "a more unifying explanation than the design hypothesis" because it does not appeal to anything beyond nature. Nagel's attempts to provide "an alternative to the consolations of religion… Having, amazingly, burst into existence, one is a representative of existence — of the whole of it — not just because one is part of it but because it is present to one's consciousness. In each of us, the universe has come to consciousness and therefore our existence is not merely our own."[xiii]

However, one might question whether such a universe coming to consciousness or rather having consciousness does not of itself constitute some form of theism, albeit panentheism. Alasdair MacIntyre (1998, 2011) warrantably asserts that "The only type of teleologically ordered universe in which we have good reason to believe is a theistic universe."[xiv]

2. God has placed a God-informed moral conscience in each person.

It is not surprising that Taylor (1989) expresses his hunch that the most illusion-free moral sources involve a God.

Mulhall concludes: "If secular moral sources are parasitic on theistic ones and incapable of bearing the burden of empowering the full range of modern moral ideas, whereas theistic sources can bear this burden and can also acknowledge versions of the sources on which secular moral visions exclusively rely, then we have strong reason for thinking that the cultural transition away from theistic sources amounted to a significant epistemic loss. In short, theism is our best available moral account." [xv]

Taylor and his critics acknowledge that the strong evaluations and hyper goods necessary for a robust morality are found primarily in theistic sources. Or as Preece asserts "The secular is parasitic on the theistic and cannot bear the full burden of modern moral ideas."

Taylor informs us that with the disenchantment of the secular age, there has been a consequent loss of the pre-modern idea of a publicly available cosmic moral order in which individuals found their place and function, and that there is subsequently a corresponding loss of a sense of a higher and larger purpose for human life linked to "a centring on the self."[xvi]

This centering on the self devalues relationship with God, others and the universe. Among non-theist philosophers, this purposive relationalism may not be recognised. Williams asserts that the "first and hardest lesson of Darwinism" is "that there is no such teleology at all, and that there is no orchestral score provided from anywhere according to which human beings have a special part to play."[xvii]

And such non-religious ethics seem to lack the intensity of feeling that allows such ethics to be a moral force in the community. Phenomenlogically it doesn't cut it. Or as Bix notes "legal rules do not make the same sort of (implied or express) claims as do moral rules: that they reflect universal and unchanging moral truths, and that they are integral aspects of the Good.

The consequences of violating this 'sensus divinitas', whether it is a true representation of reality or not, is seen in the poverty of our social relations and in our confusion over moral values. Taylor asserts that there is in our post-modern age a cognitive dissonance between moral ontology and moral phenomenology, a dissonance which proceeds with a similar cognitive dissonance affecting the sense of purpose that pervades the human predicament. Rather than just experiencing the outcome of fuzzy thinking when ontology and phenomenology conflict, Taylor asserts that there is a problem of greater consequence that arises as a sense of 'melancholy', 'ennui', or 'spleen' in which "we lose a sense of where the place of fullness is, even of what fullness could consist in; we feel we've forgotten what it would look like, or cannot believe in it any more. But the misery of absence, of loss, is still there, indeed, it is in some ways even more acute." We are "spiritually out of joint."[xviii] The most extreme sense of this loss of purpose and meaning in life is seen in the completely disenchanted life. Not only is it perceived that without God all things are permissible (in the moral realm): without God nothing is meaningful in the existential realm.

Jean Paul Sartre (1957)[xix] expresses this existential distress: "The existentialist, on the contrary, thinks it very distressing that God does not exist, because all possibility of finding values in a heaven of ideas disappears along with Him; there can no longer be an a priori Good, since there is no infinite and perfect consciousness to think it. Nowhere is it written that the Good exists, that we must be honest, that we must not lie; because the fact is we are on a plane where there are only men. Dostoyevsky said, 'If God didn't exist, everything would be possible.' That is the very starting point of existentialism. Indeed, everything is permissible if God does not exist, and as a result man is forlorn, because neither within him nor without does he find anything to cling to. He can't start making excuses for himself." "We point out that man will fulfill himself as man, not in turning toward himself, but in seeking outside of himself a goal which is just this liberation, just this particular fulfillment."[xx] From the secularist position, Sartre recognises the deep values, the cry for meaning and the urge towards fulfilment: "That God does not exist I cannot deny; that my whole being cries out for God I cannot forget."

Atheists Are Angry Because Their Arrogance Is Diminishing Them

Atheists Are Angry Because Their Advocates Are Deserting Them

Atheists Are Angry Because Their Arguments Are Dividing Them

Atheists Are Angry Because Their Adversaries Are Defeating Them

Atheists Are Angry Because Their Amnesia Is Discrediting Them

Atheists Are Angry Because Their Assessments Are Deceiving Them

From an evangelical Christian perspective, Alister McGrath describes his experience of conversion in similar terms: "At Oxford — to my surprise — I discovered Christianity. It was the intellectually most exhilarating and spiritually stimulating thing I could ever hope to describe — better than chemistry, a wonderful subject that I had thought to be the love of my life and my future career. I went on to gain a doctorate for research in molecular biophysics from Oxford, and found that immensely exciting and satisfying. But I knew I had found something better — like the pearl of great price that Jesus talks about in the Gospel, which is so beautiful and precious that it overshadows everything. It was intellectually satisfying, imaginatively engaging, and aesthetically exciting."[xxi]