An 11-Day Study On Challenges To Biblical AuthoritySample

IS THE BIBLE UNSCIENTIFIC?

A DIVINE REVOLUTION: RENEWED ARGUMENTS FOR GOD’S EXISTENCE

It may have seemed acceptable in the mid-1960s to argue that religious people were irrational and clinging to blind faith. The now-famous Time magazine cover of April 1966 with the headline “Is God Dead?” certainly captured the spirit of the age. Philosophers and liberal theologians celebrated the “death of God” movement and believed that Western culture was permanently leaving behind its theistic roots. Yet as philosopher William Lane Craig pointed out in a Christianity Today article titled “God Is Not Dead Yet,” the news of God’s passing was premature. In fact, at the very time theologians were proclaiming the death of God, a new generation of philosophers (like Alvin Plantinga) were launching a quiet revolution in Christian thought. This philosophical revolution over the past few decades has led to the strengthening of the traditional arguments for God’s existence with new insights and evidence. Here is a brief summary of just a few of the scientifically oriented arguments that have revitalized Christian theism.

The Cosmological Argument

This argument begins with the observation that the universe had a beginning, which is demonstrable by science and philosophy. Given that something can’t begin to exist without a cause, it seems eminently reasonable to believe that a transcendent cause (outside of the universe) is responsible for its existence. Since space, time, matter, and energy simultaneously came into existence at a finite point in the past, the cause is plausibly timeless, immaterial, intelligent, powerful, and personal. Simply put, the beginning of the universe points to a Beginner.

The Design Argument from Physics

Scientists have learned that the laws of physics that govern the universe are exquisitely fine-tuned for the emergence and sustenance of human life. The universe seems to be uniquely crafted with us in mind. If there were the slightest changes in any number of physical constants, our universe would quickly become inhospitable. The most compelling and reliable explanation for why the universe is so precisely fine-tuned is because an Intelligent Mind made it that way. Simply put, the fine-tuning of the universe points to a Fine-Tuner.

The Design Argument from DNA

Since the discovery of the structure of DNA in 1953, scientists have learned that cellular organization and the development of living creatures are orchestrated by genetic information. Human DNA, for example, contains the informational equivalent of roughly eight thousand books. Natural forces such as chance and necessity have overwhelmingly failed to explain the origin of biological information. In our everyday experience, we attribute the origin of information to a mind. Simply put, the vast amount of information contained in living organisms points to an Information Giver.