Thursday, June 16, 2005 AD
Truth, with and without logic
So I got bored with "Here I Blog", which was only ever meant as a stopgap after the original strapline for this blog, "Knock, knock,knockin' on Wittenberg's door" got, erm, overtaken by events.
The new line is from our old friend GK Chesterton - appropriate credit to appear on the sidebar sometime soon - and featured as the strapline on the Boars Head Tavern for around, oh, eight hours at least it must have been. I love it, not only because it captures a very Lutheran tension between mistrust of reason and the glad use of it as a good gift from God, but because it perfectly matches my own experience.
Before returning to the faith in 1994, I was a very logical atheist. I'd constructed an imaginary god whom I was able to demolish with consummate logic and reason. While logical argument - for example, this guy - played a part in bringing me back to faith in Christ, for the most part it was only after I'd become a Christian, for reasons and by means that were not simply the outplaying of logic, that I could see how the Christian faith hangs together in terms of "reason".
While we're on that subject, here are three biblical texts that played a very large part in bringing me to faith:
In the case of Paul in Athens, there was the additional aspect of ancient Greece being a world in whose existence and truth I had no problem believing (not least through my lifelong interest in astronomy and mathematics). Suddenly, across this landscape walks someone from a world whose existence and truth I had spent almost a decade of my life denying. There's no logical reason why that should have made such an impact on me, but it did.
Anyway, that's enough about me: let's talk about me. :-)
Actually, no, let's talk about the Holy Spirit. Because the experience I'm describing above does illustrate the truth of Article V of the Augsburg Confession when it states that:
(Feedback on the new strapline, or appeals to restore the old one, or suggestions as to yet another alternative, etc, are invited. The context of the quote can be found in this post.)
The new line is from our old friend GK Chesterton - appropriate credit to appear on the sidebar sometime soon - and featured as the strapline on the Boars Head Tavern for around, oh, eight hours at least it must have been. I love it, not only because it captures a very Lutheran tension between mistrust of reason and the glad use of it as a good gift from God, but because it perfectly matches my own experience.
Before returning to the faith in 1994, I was a very logical atheist. I'd constructed an imaginary god whom I was able to demolish with consummate logic and reason. While logical argument - for example, this guy - played a part in bringing me back to faith in Christ, for the most part it was only after I'd become a Christian, for reasons and by means that were not simply the outplaying of logic, that I could see how the Christian faith hangs together in terms of "reason".
While we're on that subject, here are three biblical texts that played a very large part in bringing me to faith:
Pilate asked him, "What is truth?" (John 18:18)Why did those verses make an impact? Simply because, as I read them (not by any means for the first time) in early 1994, it hit me for the first time that what they were describing had actually happened. Simple as that.
Jesus said to her, "Mary!" (John 20:16)
Now all the Athenians and the foreigners living there would spend their time in nothing but telling or hearing something new. (Acts 17:21)
In the case of Paul in Athens, there was the additional aspect of ancient Greece being a world in whose existence and truth I had no problem believing (not least through my lifelong interest in astronomy and mathematics). Suddenly, across this landscape walks someone from a world whose existence and truth I had spent almost a decade of my life denying. There's no logical reason why that should have made such an impact on me, but it did.
Anyway, that's enough about me: let's talk about me. :-)
Actually, no, let's talk about the Holy Spirit. Because the experience I'm describing above does illustrate the truth of Article V of the Augsburg Confession when it states that:
...through the Word and the sacraments as through instruments the Holy Spirit is given, who effects faith where and when it pleases God in those who hear the gospel...Logic and reason don't come into it: one day you read the Bible and the whole thing is, as John Bunyan put it, "as a dry stick". The next, "where and when it pleases God", the Holy Spirit effects faith in you, and (to paraphrase Bunyan), you can see more in a line of the Bible than you can well tell how to stand under.
(Feedback on the new strapline, or appeals to restore the old one, or suggestions as to yet another alternative, etc, are invited. The context of the quote can be found in this post.)
