This guys problem is his intellect. If you have to have all of the answers, you don't need God. There is no need for faith. I only watched the first two minutes or so and just moved on... same old arguments that I have heard all along and used to believe myself. Except, when I came to the Bible with a skeptical eye, I did it to prove how wrong it is. Then I realized how much I don't know and how, ultimately, if I have to have all the answers before I think I can prove something, I will never believe in anything.

His idea that the more "religions" there are, the lower the chances are that Christianity is correct really is unreasonable and leaves out a number of very important factors.

He said that "it takes no faith to demand evidence." That may be true... I read the other day, somewhere, that a skeptic professor pointed out that he doesn't understand why skeptics so often feel the need to proselytize skepticism...

Anyway, to answer his question, "Could you really tell a little girl that her big brother is burning in hell for all eternity and if she doesn't get down on her knees and pray then so will she?"

I have honestly been seriously considering annihilationalism... not because its easier to handle, but because it seemed to be the conventional jewish belief during the 1st century, and most of the scriptures, Old and New fit better and make more sense from a annihilationalist perspective...

with that being said, the horror of "your loved one is in hell" is still true and frightening; however, the "he's gonna suffer for all eternity" thing that makes so many people question God's goodness is no longer a problem, because annihilationalists believe that only the beast and the dragon will suffer for ever and ever... everyone else will be burned up to nonexistence...

anyway... i've probably left the realm of orthodox christianity at this point...

I did watch the whole thing. The questions aren't anything new (and I think if I had a dime for every time I heard "when they find unicorns on the dark side of the moon, I'll believe in God", I'd be a rich man)...blah, blah, blah......the problem with these arguments is that there really aren't any satisfying answers for someone who obviously believes that God should exist for him, rather than him for God.....he's not seeking.......he's cocky and bitter (likely having something to do with "where was God when his teenage brother-in-law died"?).

This is where ultimately, you just have a beer with the guy and be kind and nod your head a lot - not much else would be effective.

There are several issues I had with his video:

1. He says that there is only a .06 chance that Christianity is true based on the fact that there are 150 religions in the world with more than a million people.......he factors in no apologetic evidence making some more valid than others, and also doesn't allow for that fact that many of the 150 are talking about the same God with different theology.

2. He assumes that we (Christians) think that all of his relatives are going to hell because (according to him) they didn't "trust Jesus"......he's got to have the same amount of faith to know what was or wasn't in their hearts that he says he doesn't have in God anymore........and since I don't believe its likely that he "was" a Christian - its quite conversely possible that one of his less religious relatives might actually have known Jesus - its disappointing to me when people think I believe that all of their dead friends and relatives are in hell. That's just not true, and its a huge misconception about Christians.

3. He ridicules God for being supposedly omnipotent, yet needing to "kill himself" in order to forgive a human. Talk about missing the point completely. Forgiveness is VERY costly - so to imply that God could just waive a magic wand to forgive people is naive and really points to how much this guy likely did not understand when he "was" a Christian. There is evidence here that he never understood the gospel, even remotely.

4. Most troubling - at the very end, he uses very sensationalistic imagery to prove his point. I feel here he his exploiting the memory of loved family members who have died (watch it and see what I mean).......you watch the last two minutes and you really see that this guy is not an intellectual as much as he is just someone who has a HUGE axe to grind.

Seriously - take this guy to Starbucks for a cup of coffee and put your arm around him and tell him everything will be ok - that's really the only answer.....I prefer the sports bar venue, but I think we have more Starbucks folks here.

It's hard to even talk to people like this. It's similar to trying to explain things to rebelious teenagers (and I was one) who feel they have the world all figured out. Logic is rarely useful.

As some have already pointed out, these questions are not really that tough, and are the same old tired cliches used by people who really haven't spent the time and effort to really support either position. As CS Lewis said, if you are going to be an atheist, at least be a good one. Guys like this, as well as the pop culture atheists like Richard Dawkins, Christopher Hitchens, Bill Maher, etc. are not.

I like to call people like these anti-theists, rather than atheists. They are not so much people who don't believe in God, but people who are angry that other people do. Which, if they really thought about it, makes no sense in light of what they claim to believe.

I also agree the best thing you can usually do with people like this is try to love them and just listen, and pray that God's grace and maybe a little more life experience will open their eyes.

I like to call people like these anti-theists, rather than atheists. They are not so much people who don't believe in God, but people who are angry that other people do. Which, if they really thought about it, makes no sense in light of what they claim to believe.

This is a tremendously good point. The angry folks you mention would answer this by saying of course that they have a right to be angry, because of all the damage that believing in God has caused/is causing/will cause in the world.

Of course the problem is, they are therefore putting themselves in the position of defining what is good and bad by a subjective standard - the very thing they accuse us of.

I like the anti-theist tag - its a growing element in our culture though - which is scary - but which also provides great opportunity.

Hi Hobo

Thanks for commenting. A few quick points (though I will say off the top I have zero interest in getting into a back and forth debate with someone about whether Christianity is true. I did that a year or two ago with an atheist who was a friend of our site, and 100,000 words later we'd gotten no further and he started getting abusive - not that you would, but still :-) )

If you take the bible out of the equation (don't assume it to be true / pretend you have never read it) then Christian theology suddenly has the same "believability" as any other myth.

Your last sentence is an assertion that needs to be examined. Is it really true that without the Bible Christianity is just like any other myth (goddesses springing out of shells, etc)?

Many, many of the initial Christians converted from paganism were converted on one basic historical assertion: that a Jewish rabbi had died for their sins and been risen from the dead.

In short, the Resurrection is either a historical fact or it is not. But it's at least something that can be examined in that context (history) rather than mythology.

It all hinges on the Resurrection. Although I'll agree that examining the evidence for it (especially the reaction of the first believers shortly thereafter as recorded in Acts) can be difficult if you take a hard-line on excluding the Bible.

Why would an all-powerful god have to "kill" himself (death by Christian rules is more of a gateway to heaven than an end) in order to forgive these people he has created?

I'll let someone smarter than me explain that. I have an explanation, sure, but part of my problem in answering it is I can't wrap my mind around why this is such an issue. It's the most beautiful thing about the Gospel, frankly - Jesus humbling Himself, even to death. People who can't see that beauty usually fall into these kinds of legalistic, "where's the loophole" arguments. That's where they lose me.

Cheers

Bill

He's an angry elf. If this guy did believe in the existence of God he would be the first in line to tell God just what he needed to do. Get over yourself!

I never thought that God needed to prove Himself to me I always thought that I need to prove myself to Him.

Hobo,

I don't know if 'most' Christians start with deciding the Bible is true and then becoming Christians from there. Even if that were so, I'm sure you would agree it doesn't make them automatically incorrect, just as I am not incorrect doing algebra even though I never learned all the 'proofs' for why certain basic functions and operations of mathematics work. Most of us accept a lot of evidence from experts on nearly everything we believe and do in our lives.

But as in all heavily studied topics, and Christianity is definitely one of them, there are many prominant examples of people who start from a very basic level and work their way through. An obvious example here would be CS Lewis, of which this site, the Thinklings, is a reference to. Lewis was an atheist who outlined his journey from atheism to deism to Christianity in his autobiography 'Surprised By Joy', as well as describing the logic in several more of his books, including 'The Pilgrim's Regress' and 'Mere Christianity'.

Suffice it to say, there is a very strong logical case to be made for deism just from what Christians often call 'general revelation'. These are things apart from the Bible and available to all men. They are things like the existance of a natural law, the desire of humans for justice, the beauty and order of the earth and universe, the ability of humans to act against instinct, the self-consciousness of humans, the negative consequences of sin, the circular self-negating of logic in an accidental universe.

It was factors like these alone that ultimately convinced Lewis that atheism was 'too easy' and converted him to being a deist. Far too often, today's atheists never do the hard work of addressing those 'general revelation' arguments, except in very superficial ways, and instead prefer to attack the miraculous 'special revelations' of God to the Jews, and of Christ.

Now as Bill and others have already commented, the key 'special revelation' factor for Christians is the Resurrection of Christ, which does require you to accept the testimony of eyewitnesses. Personally I do, especially since it, along with all of Christ's teaching, explains and harmonizes with those 'general revelation' factors.

I appreciate you guys taking the time to respond. I think Christians too often interact with non-believers while straddling their own comfortable well-worn contexts, not realizing that it makes what they say almost meaningless to people who are not on that particular horse. Thanks for breaking out a little.

nhe, you wrote about forgiveness using an analogy of me and my buddy who likes to steal. You are a gifted writer, and I'd be interested in your response to this challenge:

From an outsider's point of view, god is to man as man is to bacteria or ants. When ants misbehave, only the sadistic man takes it out on the ant. Forgiveness is effortless because of the inequality of the relationship.

So: can you provide an analogy that your man in the video, or another non-believer might feel more comfortable with?

nhe-

I'm having deja-vu. I think I've asked that question before. Nevermind. Thanks for the thoughtful response; the original question "how would you respond to this guy" and the responses themselves were enjoyable to read.

Hobo wrote:

From an outsider's point of view, god is to man as man is to bacteria or ants. When ants misbehave, only the sadistic man takes it out on the ant. Forgiveness is effortless because of the inequality of the relationship.

Hobo - I don't understand why inequality negates forgiveness. A father-son relationship is certainly not equal - and sons disobey their fathers all the time, and some fathers cross the line when disciplining their sons. Why would forgiveness be effortless for that harsh father - I don't get it.

Also Hobo - if God was truly and abjectly/transcendentally to man as man is to ants, I'd choose to be an outsider too. The outsider often chooses to be outside because he denies God's imminence - he only chooses to see God from a distance as a giant bug-squasher.

I love a challenge, and would take a stab at one of hobo's questions:

1) If you take the bible out of the equation (don't assume it to be true / pretend you have never read it) then Christian theology suddenly has the same "believability" as any other myth.

In my case, I came to Christianity from AA, where you are free to believe in your own "higher power." I spent over 2 years working thru the steps - admitting powerlessness, becoming willing to admit and trust that there was something running the universe that was more powerful than me, taking my own moral inventory and confessing my wrongs, resentments, shortcomings -- all the things that were strangling the joy from my life. When I got to the step where we were to humbly ask God to remove and forgive our sins and to make us effective servants of our fellow men and women, that's where things got stuck.

None of the higher powers/gods/concepts of universal forces provided a means of redemption outside of my own work. And I felt that I had quite literally tried everything by that point - yet had no freedom, no true reconciliation and no true sense of forgiveness. "God of my own understanding" was still a distant diety who was standing off at a distance judging my every move and thought and waiting to zap me when I got too far out of line.

When I finally met Jesus, I not only knew I had found real and personal Truth, but I also felt immediately washed from the filthyness of my past and present evils.

2) Why would an all-powerful god have to "kill" himself in order to forgive these people he has created?

All-powerful and yet loving and good God.
Our all-powerful and loving God created us perfect, gave us every good thing including perfect happiness and a will to love Him back.
But ever since the beginning, we have chosen not to love Him back, being grateful and following His loving directions. Because He is so grieved over our rejection of Him, He continues to provide blessings to draw us back. Yet, we are unable to undo the consequences of our sin and rebellion. We have been stained with sin and death. God cannot abide the presence of evil and must cast it out of His presence. The consequences of sin and evil=death, darkness, and destruction, whereas God is love, light, and live eternal. If we were able to cleanse ourselves from our sin and evil, we could be forgiven without God's intervention. However, our sin and evil is greater and more powerful than we are - we are slaves and captives to our darkness. We need a rescuer. In order to be reconciled into an eternal relationship with God, the power of the bonds of sin, evil and death must be removed by someone Holy/wholly "other" - someone who has never been brought under the subjection of sin and death. God sent us Jesus to rescue us, because we cannot save ourselves. The forgiveness of our sins is not just a pardon from eternal damnation, but it is God bring us back to what we were originally created to be, because it is only He who has the power or ability to do it.

(sorry this is so long.)

However, the reality is that these are examples of what our children are getting bombarded with when they go to college and work in the secular workforce.


This is true. I'm in college right now (age 33) and it is amazing to me how many professors (within my realm of experience) not only don't believe in God, but have a mission to disabuse "young, uninformed" Christians of their faith. It is an active pursuit for these men/women, quite outside the necessary provisions of the syllabus. I would equate it to them being "pastors" of the church of atheism - quite content to proselytize without bothering with the seperation of Church/State they want to impose on Christians.
In my Psychology class, the very first day the Prof basically went on a diatribe regarding Christianity/Creationism and set out the provision that the entire philosophy of modern Psychology is built upon evolution and is completely monistic. There were a number of Christian kids (18-19) in the class who I know were believers. They never came back. I don't know what they are going to do. I stayed. (Turns out, my Prof was in seminary, dropped out and became an atheist. He has a very personal stake in this stuff) It has been hard for me, but I felt that I wasn't supposed to run away from this man. We've had a number of conversations about God, and Philosophy and the Bible. He is PhD, so much more educated than I. But I must say, the Holy Spirit is smarter than he is, and on a couple of occasions I have said things that have left him scrabbling. Praise God! It is reading week here, and I asked him to read CS Lewis's "The Abolition of Man" and to "critique" it for me. ;)

I can't wait to see what he has to say.

Respectfully Crossbow - I've heard all of them except the "Why can't God just forgive people, why does he have to kill himself to do it"? That one is a new to me.

It also indicates that true Christianity has been very misrepresented to a person who would ask a question like that.

Everyone,
I don't mean to be someone who "drops a grenade into the room and runs"...

I've been away from the computer for a couple days, so I just read all this at once...

Good stuff. Thanks to everyone, really everyone :), for the dialogue. Please keep it up.

It's hard for me to describe why I posted this. There are a lot of reasons. One reason was because some of what he said was new to me, or at least his way of doing it, especially the end. And I always want to be prepared.

Another reason is because I feel affinity for guys like this. I just really like skeptics. But whoever said that he needed someone to listen to him in a sports bar is probably right.

My opinion is that "anti-theists" like this one (good term) have a personal experience. They are mad at God for something that happened in their lives and the ultimate revenge against the God they blame is the worst thing they figure they can do to him. They can't hit him, or yell at him, or smite him or get him back so they just use what they figure is the most powerful weapon at their disposal, "I just won't believe in you anymore, so there!"

But I still think folks like this should be responded to at least personally. I don't plan on posting a youtube video to this guy or anything. But I like to picture myself across a starbucks table from him, and ask myself, "What would I say?" Because sooner or later, I will be across a starbucks table from someone just like him.

And hobo, glad you're here. ;-)

I'm not sure that I totally understand "why God had to kill himself". There are two things that help me with that:
1- I view the OT as elementary school for humanity. This is God teaching us who he is and how we relate to him. Sacrifice for sins was a HUGE part of that education. And if God exists, then he would be hugely smarter than us, so if he says, "this is how you relate to me," I think it's worth listening.

2-The possibly apocryphal story that I've heard attributed to both Billy Graham and Jess Moody, about getting a traffic ticket, and the judge declares "guilty" thus upholding justice, and then the judge comes around to the defendants side of the bench and pays the fine himself, thus satisfying both his desire for justice and his desire for mercy at the same time.

I love that. As a picture of what Jesus did for me, I think it's just beautiful. And it causes me to be thankful and to worship.

And finally, maybe that's the point. to use Hobo's question/illustration, if God relates to us as a human to ants, then to carry the analagy further, sacrifice on his part would make sense to communicate to the ants his own worth, which they must understand in order to have a real relationship with him.

Understanding that God is holy, and that there is a huge gap between us that cannot be bridged, seems to me to be essential to having a right relationship with him.

Hobo, wouldn't you agree that a relationship with a fantasy of our own making isn't a real relationship?

Back to the video author, I wonder if anyone can help me with this:

Is his logic flawed when he takes on Pascal's wager? Of course, if I were sitting with him, I think I'd abandon Pascal's wager. I've always seen that as a last-ditch desperate attempt from a believer to an unbeliever "when nothing else works" anyway. I wouldn't use it. But hasn't he created a false multi-chotomy. There's something wrong with his logic, but I can't put my finger on it. I need y'alls help.

I think maybe it's that bringing all the other religions into it is out of bounds, when the wager has been presented between two people. In other words, I could say, "We're not talking about all these different religions. We're talking about Christianity vs. not-christianity. And you are assuming that all those other religions think they are exclusive. So many don't, so I'm not doomed with them anyway."

Or maybe we could adapt to his logic and say, "Fine, it's a three way option, Either you're right, I'm right, or we're both wrong and we both lose."

Help?

As for his last question, I'd love if I ever had a real chance to answer him. I'd put my arm around him and say, "Man, why are you so mad at God?"

Or I'd tell him that his 10 year old sister wasn't ready for that answer but that he is, and then begin where Paul begins in Acts 17. That there is a creator, that we are accountable to him, and that if he didn't punish sin, he wouldn't be just.

Anyway, good stuff everyone. Keep it up. I'm learning from y'all and I'm grateful for your time.

Shrode,

By his tone, content, and the fact that he posted his challenge on YouTube, I suspect this young man is looking more for an argument than for answers. But like you said, a variation of these same objections may one day come from someone who sincerely wants to engage.

So, with that in mind…
Indeed his logic is flawed, and lost deep in the woods of Materialism. I don’t think he has so much wrestled with the questions as much as followed blind guides there. Regarding Pascal’s Wager: the reason his pie chart misfires is that we never measure the validity of a claim simply by its relation to the shere quantity of possible alternative claims – a number that is only ever limited by the human imagination. Validity is not a mere numbers game, as I think some others have pointed out in the comments.

If you were determined to bring quantity into the dicussion, you might give it a touch more relevance by counting up the number of adherents to each religion, under the assumption that more the people who were persuaded by a particular claim, the more credible that claim must be. And of course, if we did that, we’d have to do some major redistribution of the pie chart, with Christianity and Islam owning the lion’s share. Even so, since we don’t validate claims by mere concensus, that wouldn’t tell us much.

More importantly, his exercise misses the point of Pascal’s Wager, which doesn’t gain its force by how probable either Christianity or atheism is, but by comparing what each side is putting on the line with his wager. If the Christian is wrong, what has he forfeited? A few years on this earth of unfettered self-indulgence (but not joy or love or simple everyday pleasures). But if the atheist is wrong, he forfeits all eternity. The very point is that for the atheist wager, the severity of the risk outweighs the benefit, even if the “odds” are in its favor. Personally, I’m not a big fan of Pascal’s Wager; like you said Shrode, it’s kind of an add-on.

With all that being said, I think we should be very happy if someone were to sketch out this pie chart. While it says nothing about the validity of Christianity, or any other religion for that matter, it works just fine to illustrate the unique position of the athiest. As a Christian, I’m not compelled to think that every other religion is entirely false. Even between theism and pantheism there is a shared belief in reality beyond the material, and the overlap only grows as we consider two theistic religions, and so on. (It’s all in Lewis.) It is the atheist who must dismiss every other position out of hand, as entirely bogus from the start. Amongst all the religions, the atheist finds he has the smallest piece of pie.

jez,
Good and helpful response. Thank you.

I'm a sceptic, hopefully not too angry. Is scepticism itself sinful?

Boy, I hope not. :) (Because I am one naturally.)

But in the end skepticism doesn't save. I don't think there is a Bible verse anywhere that condemns skepticism itself. But belief is certainly what is commended, and faith (in the proper object) is what saves.

Sooner or later a drowning man has to acknowledge whether or not he's drowing, and that he should grab the rope being extended if he's going to be rescued.

So no, I don't think there's anything (inherently) sinful or wrong with being a skeptic, but in my belief system it's dangerous to stay there too long. :) I love the cry to Jesus of one man in the Bible who said, "I believe, Lord. Help my unbelief."

Is faith over-rewarded?

Depends on your perspective I guess. :) Faith in the wrong object can be dangerous. Faith in the right object is quite commendable, and I'm not sure how it could be "over-rewarded".

I've responded to him directly on YouTube. My username is southasiaonfaith.

JamesR, wow, I never expected that. :)

Elizabeth, he apologizes for the music, it certainly does distract. I'm sure lots of things change once one decides they are no longer a Christian.

I prayed for your child just now. I look forward to the day with you when he/she comes to himself/herself and comes back to the father only to find the father running to meet him/her with open arms.

Sorry. Been away, wanted to respond a direct question.

nhe you wrote I don't understand why inequality negates forgiveness. .. and you compared god->human as father->son. I think the disparity between a human and an ant is a far better comparison than father->son. Dad is just like me in that he has the same mortality, genetic makeup, limitations - in terms of physics and species, etc. God has so many attributes that are beyond our comprehension much less ability to imitate or recreate. Just like our ability to recognize ourselves as "self" is beyond an ant's abilities.

I can see why someone might (did) say that ants can't "sin". But they could - if I decide the rules. I could decide that ants are not supposed to crawl northward. Then some ants would sin and others would not. There is a flaw of course - Christians would say we were provided the rulebook. But we do have ways to communicate with ants; we can set up barriers or some kind of carrot-stick system to try to educate them about what they should and should not do. Maybe science would come up with more direct communication in the future. But this flaw is just another way that God is "more" than we are. That doesn't negate the model; it reinforces it.

Ok - thanks for running with this, Jared. I'm with you on the exoskeleton. And I see that the offer for something better for the ants is a good analogy for salvation.

So here I am with my basket of superior little ant-skins, hoping my ants will line up for the offer. So here's the kicker. If little joey-ant does NOT take my new ant-skin, how much effort does it require of me to forgive this decision? Or if little mary-ant was confused about the offer and thought the message was "hold onto your exoskeleton for all you are worth" - how hard is it for me to forgive that particular ant?

Because the line of thought has been here - that it's really difficult (emotionally???!?) for God to forgive us. And my pont, with my ants, is to say - based on the whole Christian model - I don't see it. It should be easy. Effortless. We are far less than ants to a God that knows every atom in the universe. We might be important ants to him, but still- in comparison... far less than ants.

Jared

Thanks for the conversation. I realize that ultimately most conversations eventually filter down to the fact that we are starting in two very different places. For me, it matters very much (in this thread) whether forgiveness is easy or hard - because if it is easy, then it calls into question why the whole judgment/sacrifice thing is/was required. This is only one piece of the puzzle, which was addressed by the youtube video.

Once you start questioning the basic Christian precepts, or at least view them from a neutral position (as the youtube guy has done), the story tends to fall apart.

I heard anger in his voice and I understand it. You would be angry, too, if one day you realized this thing you spent so many years and so much energy with, was not what you thought it was.

But I hope my occasional posts here are not angry - I really do enjoy hearing the perspective from the "other" side of the fence.

On a (very) side and very personal note:

"I heard anger in his voice and I understand it. You would be angry, too, if one day you realized this thing you spent so many years and so much energy with, was not what you thought it was."

This guy's pretty young. I don't know how many years he actually devoted to Jesus.

I've got anger too. I've worked with young people in church for years. Many of them turn out fine, but I get a deep sense of sadness and even anger when some of the ones who expressed, outwardly, the most devotion to Jesus end up discarding him like yesterday's gum-wrapper as soon as they face a little opposition or ideas they hadn't thought of before. He's the one who saved them, and they drop him for - what? Living how they want, chasing after what the world says they should chase after, living for themselves. Jesus died for them, and offers them every spiritual blessing in the heavenly places, adoption, redemption, forgiveness, hope, peace, love. And they know it, and they discard it all with very little struggle.

I get angry too.

Thanks Hobo, and I definitely share your happiness that we can talk to each other with respect.

One correction. You wrote: Everyone sees their viewpoint as the center one, the correct one, and other viewpoints would be non-neutral or skewed in some way away from the "truth"

I may have written something that gave you the impression that I feel that way about my viewpoint, but I can assure you that I know I am one big messy bundle of biases. I think the only Person who sees anything as it really is is God. I don't claim to be unbiased (and I hope nothing I wrote made that claim). I don't even claim to be correct, and I expect that many of my closely held opinions will be corrected and discarded when I stand before the Truth. We look through a glass darkly.

I was just arguing that the chap in the video isn't "neutral", as you suggested. When it comes to the subject of God/Jesus, the most non-neutral person you can find is the angry atheist (my opinion, of course).

Shrode, amazing job.

I think one area where the entire analogy (which, as analogies go, I think is pretty good) kind of falls short is this: we can argue that there is an even greater distance between God and us versus us and ants, and, as Hobo has said "poor ants". They don't know any better.

Here's the problem. We are made in the image of God. We did know better. We understand what it means to obey or not obey. We have "the knowledge of good and evil". Which might be true if we are just dumb animals. But we're not. We're made in God's image, and in that way we are closer to him than ants are to us.

I'm not sure if I'm on to something here or not. I understand Hobo's argument (I think). Correct me if I'm wrong, Hobo, but I think it boils down to "God is unfair/too harsh". I understand that sentiment, but I believe that if we understand our relationship to God and our sin, we can begin to wonder how he can possibly be so gracious to us.

Shrode/Jared/others - what do you think?

Dave B -

I think this thread is about to hop off the page :). But here's my response:

Your question is framed in the wrong way. If I ever have an ant farm, I'm not going to "demand" they kiss my ring. And if I did for some odd reason, request this, I would not actually expect a response. They're ants!! The whole point of the metaphor is to point out that every creature (including man) has a nature, and that someone as vastly superior and powerful as god is to us must have an easy time "forgiving us" because of the vastness of that difference - which includes a complete and total understanding of that nature.

But to answer your question - I wouldn't do anything. The ants are just ants. Why would I expect more out of them?

By the way, it might be hard for you to believe this, but non-Christians are not putting huge energy into rebelling against the Christian message. They don't sit around (most of them) and think, "I know God wants me to do X and Y, but gosh darnit I'm gonna live my own selfish way!". I only see non-Christians act and think like that in Chick tracks; it's not reality at all.

Bill,

I guess I often see non-Christians depicted by Christians as being rebellious - and often it is intention, not behavior, that drives that depiction.

I was just pointing out that while their behavior (ie not following the Christian "way") may seem rebellious to Christians, it in fact is no more rebellious to them than, say, your not following the teachings of Mohamed would be to you. In your mind, you are not actually rebelling against Mohomed in your daily decisions - although a Muslim might think otherwise. The Muslim might actually think that every non-muslim has been confronted by Allah and purposefully chose rebellion instead of worship or service... but you know in your own life that this choice was never actually made. Probably (maybe you were but most were not).

Bill,

I think I could write a long paper trying to answer the question "Do you think there is one truth?"

I think if you are asking about human history, the story of Jesus, there is one truth: what happened in the past did happen. You and I might not agree on what happened, but our understanding of history is either closer or farther away from a "real" truth - what actually happened.

However, theology truth I think is more relative. Take for instance the statement "there is only one god". I die, I come face to face with this entity. He says he is the one and only god. Behind him are 1000s of entities wandering around doing god-like things. What about them? - I ask him. He says - oh, those are not gods.

Maybe that's dumb, but it is my attempt to show that people can be right and wrong about theology at the same time. I think it's more slippery, in terms of "truth".