I do not know what has happened to our friend Andrew. I have been waiting for him to respond to my last post, and nothing has happened. As a result, I want to continue the theme of my last post and address you atheists again.
The first thing I want to say, is that I overstated it in my last post. There are such things as atheists. Some of you may have been put off by the overstatement, and missed the point. That is why I want to revisit this idea.
I know that some of you do not believe in a god. Thus, you are by definition atheists. Still, here is the important point. We all worship something. Stop and think about that for a moment. It is impossible not to worship something. I suppose I should first define what I mean by worship. I suppose what I mean by worship is "adoring reverence or regard." You may not give reverence to God, but I am sure you give reverence to something or someone. It may be yourself. It may be science. It may be a relationship. It may be your work. It may be money or fame or success. The point is that everyone worships something.
I believe that the measure of a man lies not in his wealth, his abilities, or his success. Rather the measure of man is the object of his worship.
And here is the key. We Christians believe that if you worship anything less than God (and everything is less than God), you will always ultimately be destroyed by the thing that you love. The worship of money...I do not need to tell you where that can lead. How about success? What happens once you have succeeded? What is next? How about relationships? I think we know that even the most cherished relationships can cause deep heartache and do not often last forever.
Examine your life. At some point in your life, if you are not worshiping God, the thing that you are worshiping will hurt you badly. At that time, I hope you will remember these words, and remember how ready God is for you to accept Him.
What do you have to say about that?
The first thing I want to say, is that I overstated it in my last post. There are such things as atheists. Some of you may have been put off by the overstatement, and missed the point. That is why I want to revisit this idea.
I know that some of you do not believe in a god. Thus, you are by definition atheists. Still, here is the important point. We all worship something. Stop and think about that for a moment. It is impossible not to worship something. I suppose I should first define what I mean by worship. I suppose what I mean by worship is "adoring reverence or regard." You may not give reverence to God, but I am sure you give reverence to something or someone. It may be yourself. It may be science. It may be a relationship. It may be your work. It may be money or fame or success. The point is that everyone worships something.
I believe that the measure of a man lies not in his wealth, his abilities, or his success. Rather the measure of man is the object of his worship.
And here is the key. We Christians believe that if you worship anything less than God (and everything is less than God), you will always ultimately be destroyed by the thing that you love. The worship of money...I do not need to tell you where that can lead. How about success? What happens once you have succeeded? What is next? How about relationships? I think we know that even the most cherished relationships can cause deep heartache and do not often last forever.
Examine your life. At some point in your life, if you are not worshiping God, the thing that you are worshiping will hurt you badly. At that time, I hope you will remember these words, and remember how ready God is for you to accept Him.
What do you have to say about that?
Rhetorical Question: What percentage of all humans that have ever lived on the Earth as we know it have not been ‘destroyed’ either emotionally/psychologically or physically?
ReplyDeleteObvious Answer: 95% with a 5% margin of error? Or is that a little too much?
Observation: Under your definition of ‘worship’ it is implied that said individual will spend a probably significant to majority of their time, thus the probability of them ‘meeting their destruction’ while engaged in this worship is statistically the most likely to happen.
Hypothesis: Most people encounter their ‘destruction’ while within the object of their ‘worship’?
Scientific study to follow once a grant is obtained.
The fact is that everyone suffers lose and destruction, another of those items that come with being human. This comes to everyone, even those that ‘put God first’. To expect otherwise would be to, well, expect a miracle. Everyone lives, everyone loves and hurts and aches and rejoices, and everyone dies.
Much like you Tim, I believe there is something that can be used to measure a man. And that is not his object of worship, but how he treats his fellow man. Who is the greater person, he who worships and does not help others in need, or he who does not worship but helps others in need? I’ll leave you all reading to draw your own conclusion there.
Andrew is currently busy studying for finals. Andrew will return to this blog, hopefully next week, when he will no longer type in the third person.
ReplyDeleteThanks for the explanation Tim. I would agree that all men worship. I would go even further and say that it is an innate desire for all men to worship, even if our atheist comrades might scoff at the idea. I look forward to reading more from you and Andrew when finals are over.
ReplyDelete@ rayzor:
You are right to see Tim’s argument heading in the direction of what is sometimes termed "the health and wealth gospel". I don’t think he means to do it but it is a slippery slope. If Christians seek to convince atheists of some point by saying that non-Christians (people who don’t worship the one true God) suffer, they overlook the obvious- that suffering is universal, as well as the fact that the Christ suffered a great deal and he worshiped correctly.
Tim probably wants to say that the atheist’s “gods” (that which he worships, honors, reverences, etc.) will never satisfy his good and natural desires while the Christian God is not only able but willing to do so. To put it briefly, a man’s life without the Divine is lower than it could be, nothing more than a passing of days. Man comes, he sees, and then he goes. I however think that man’s incessant need to understand, to know, to be certain of, Truth is a good sign that the passing of our days do lead to something. It’s too bad that some people give up even bothering seeking higher things because they are too infatuated with the lower things or they are so disturbed by the unpleasant things.