Comment on Dr. Jason Rosenhouse “Among the Creationists” by Sean Pitman.
Faith, Trust, and Evidence:
by Tom Price
I’ve been trying to avoid using the word ‘faith’ recently. It just doesn’t get the message across. ‘Faith’ is a word that’s now misused and twisted. ‘Faith’ today is what you try to use when the reasons are stacking up against what you think you ought to believe. Greg Koukl sums up the popular view of faith, “It’s religious wishful thinking, in which one squeezes out spiritual hope by intense acts of sheer will. People of ‘faith’ believe the impossible. People of ‘faith’ believe that which is contrary to fact. People of ‘faith’ believe that which is contrary to evidence. People of ‘faith’ ignore reality.” It shouldn’t therefore come as a great surprise to us, that people raise their eyebrows when ‘faith’ in Christ is mentioned. Is it strange that they seem to prefer what seems like reason over insanity?
It’s interesting that the Bible doesn’t overemphasize the individual elements of the whole picture of faith, like we so often do. But what does the Bible say about faith? Is it what Simon Peter demonstrates when he climbs out of the boat and walks over the water towards Jesus? Or is it what Thomas has after he has put his hand in Jesus’s side? Interestingly, biblical faith isn’t believing against the evidence. Instead, faith is a kind of knowing that results in action. The clearest definition comes from Hebrews 11:1. This verse says, “Faith is the assurance of things hoped for, the conviction of things not seen.” In fact, when the New Testament talks about faith positively it only uses words derived from the Greek root [pistis], which means ‘to be persuaded.’ In those verses from Hebrews, we find the words, “hope,” “assurance,” “conviction” that is, confidence. Now, what gives us this confidence?
Christian faith is not belief in the absence of evidence. It is the proper response to the evidence. Koukl explains that, “Christian faith cares about the evidence…the facts matter. You can’t have assurance for something you don’t know you’re going to get. You can only hope for it. This is why the resurrection of Jesus is so important. It gives assurance to the hope. Because of a Christian view of faith, Paul is able to say in 1 Corinthians 15 that when it comes to the resurrection, if we have only hope, but no assurance—if Jesus didn’t indeed rise from the dead in time/space history—then we are of most men to be pitied. This confidence Paul is talking about is not a confidence in a mere ‘faith’ resurrection, a mythical resurrection, a story-telling resurrection. Instead, it’s a belief in a real resurrection. If the real resurrection didn’t happen, then we’re in trouble. The Bible knows nothing of a bold leap-in-the-dark faith, a hope-against-hope faith, a faith with no evidence. Rather, if the evidence doesn’t correspond to the hope, then the faith is in vain, as even Paul has said.”
So in conclusion, faith is not a kind of religious hoping that you do in spite of the facts. In fact, faith is a kind of knowing that results in doing. A knowing that is so passionately and intelligently faithful to Jesus Christ that it will not submit to fideism, scientism, nor any other secularist attempt to divert and cauterize the human soul by hijacking knowledge.
Tom Price is an academic tutor at the Oxford Centre for Christian Apologetics and a member of the speaking team at Ravi Zacharias International Ministries in Oxford, England.
Sean Pitman Also Commented
Dr. Jason Rosenhouse “Among the Creationists”
I have no fear, thanks to God and His mercy, and no one is free of bias – not even you. You’ve simply traded one religion for another. It is still possible that your current bias blinds you to what would otherwise be obvious.
Dr. Jason Rosenhouse “Among the Creationists”
No, I think science would have discredited them if their ideas were not supported by observation and experimentation.
Exactly, so why not at least try to do the same for my ideas, which are quite easily falsifiable?
I know, you can’t do it yourself, but you’re quite sure that if I publish my ideas in a mainstream science journal that someone out there will know how to shoot my theory all to shreds. Right? This sounds like a no-brainer! Why not just published my ideas and test them against the big boys? It must be that I’m afraid to get shot down! and that’s why I don’t publish… Don’t you think?
I guess that’s why I went on live radio to debate Jason Rosenhouse? – because I was afraid that he’d show me how silly my ideas are on public radio? – how the Darwinian mechanism is so clearly capable of creating all kinds of things regardless of their level of functional complexity? If I was so afraid of getting smashed to pieces by some of these Darwinian big shots, why take such public risks? – even in their own blogs and public forums? Why not just hide out in my own little ghetto?
Come on now. You have to know that I’d love to be able to publish my ideas on the statistical limits to the Darwinian mechanism in a science journal like Nature or Science or any mainstream science journal. I really would. The problem, as I’ve already explained, is that no one is going to publish, in any mainstream science journal, any argument for intelligent design or creative intelligence (even if the intelligence were a “natural” intelligence like some kind of intelligent alien life form) as the origin of various kinds of biological machines. It just doesn’t happen these days without someone getting fired over it. So, the next best thing is to take the argument directly to them and challenge them in their own blogs, on the radio, and on television, etc. There’s nothing else I can do. My hands are tied.
In any case, do let me know when you’re willing to reasonably define what it would take for you to recognize a phenomenon as a true “miracle” or when you’re able to present something, anything, that explains how the Darwinian mechanism of RM/NS can actually work beyond very low level of functional complexity.
Until then, what are you really contributing here? What are you trying to say? – that you don’t know but someone else probably does? That you’re skeptical about everything and nothing could possibly convince you of the existence of God or any other designer of life? – not even if you were to personally witness some of the most fantastic miracles described in the Bible? Good luck with that… but you’re just fooling yourself in your efforts never to be tricked by anything. You’re missing out on a great deal that life has to offer.
Still, I wish you all the best.
Dr. Jason Rosenhouse “Among the Creationists”
All the best to you… yet again 😉
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