Up@dawn 2.0

Wednesday, April 23, 2014

Post #5 (Conclusion) Final post on the philosophy of the existence of God!!

This will be my last and final post in my 5 part series on the philosophy of the existence of God. I have enjoyed writing these and I hope that all who read them, found them just as enjoyable. This post will be my conclusion and reflection over all of the material and theology that I had gone over during these past couple of days. First off, I would like to once again use John Frame’s definition for systematic theology, which is, ““any study that answers the question, “What does the whole Bible teach us today?” about any given topic.” This definition was and is crucial, both for my research and for the on going study of Scripture, and was part of the foundation for what came to follow. The second part of the foundation of my research was the Inerrancy of Scripture, which is the, “means that Scripture in the original manuscripts does not affirm anything that is contrary to fact.”(p.91) I incorporated this section into my posts, both to back up Scriptural reliability and also because it is an interesting form of systematic theology. After having both of the foundational theologies laid, I moved on to the first point made by Wayne Grudem in his book, systematic Theology, which was, “Humanity’s inner sense of God.” This point explained that the fact that all humans have this thought that there must be a God, probably because God had put this familiar thought into our minds and hearts. Romans 1:18-20 gives us evidence of that. The second point that was covered was, “Believing the evidence in Scripture and in nature.” This philosophy states that, “The evidence that God exists is of course found throughout the Bible. In fact, the Bible everywhere assumes that God exists. The first verse of Genesis does not present evidence for the existence of God but begins immediately to tell us what he has done: “In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth.” If we are convinced that the Bible is true, then we know from the bible not only that God exists but also very much about his nature and his acts.”(p.142) And finally, the last section that I had covered in my posts was the, “Traditional “proofs” for the existence of God.”
This section was one of my favorite points that are made in this particular philosophy, as you can see from my 900-word post on it. Grudem categorizes these “proofs” into four sections, which are: The cosmological, teleological, ontological, and moral arguments. Overall, the philosophy of the existence of God is explained by: our sense that there is a God, what we can and have read in scripture and what can be observed in nature, and through a series of traditional arguments known as “proofs”. I hope that those of you who took the time to read my blog series have at least considered this philosophy and I hope that it inspires some to do their own search for wisdom.
 Proverbs 4:6-7 Do not forsake her, and she will keep you; love her, and she will guard you.   The beginning of wisdom is this: Get wisdom, and whatever you get, get insight.
Colossians 2:2-3 that their hearts may be encouraged, being knit together in love, to reach all the riches of full assurance of understanding and the knowledge of God's mystery, which is Christ, in whom are hidden all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge.





1 comment:

  1. Thanks, Jacob. As I indicated in our unexpectedly-heated class discussion, the idea that "all humans have this thought that there must be a God" (etc.) strikes me as palpably false. It's an insult, intended or not, to all the atheists, agnostics, secularists, humanists, and skeptics who've pointedly observed and explained the absence of any such thought, and the lack of evidence they detect for it. And the question must also always be addressed: which God? Whose?

    Bottom line: those who lack faith still find every formal argument for the existence of god unimpressive. Those who find it impressive tend to believe already, on the basis of faith and not argument. It was ever thus.

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