Switching Off

Last night I got into the bath at about 1am with a nice glass of The Balvenie 12 year old single malt after a long day. The combination of hot water, strong alcohol and reading really helps me switch off. I decided to peruse my bookshelf for an interesting read for the bath. I'm pretty good at starting Christian books but by the time I get to the last 100 pages I can never be bothered to finish them. So I decided to start yet another book. My mate (who I respect philosophically) had recommended me The Reason for God by Tim Keller a while ago so I bought it and never started it. So I sat in the bath and started to read. The introduction is really good.

One thing he said particularly stuck with me: "I urge sceptics to wrestle with the unexamined 'blind faith' on which scepticism is based, and to see how hard it is to justify those beliefs to those who do not share them. I also urge believers to wrestle with their personal and culture's objections to the faith. At the end of each process, even if you remain the sceptic or believer you have been, you will hold you position with both greater clarity and greater humility."

That's really a challenge that I think we need to take to heart if we want to do 'mission', if we want to share faith with those who have doubts. All too often we take a dogmatic line to faith; I have the right answer & anyone's objections must be wrong on these grounds. Or sometimes we don't really engage with people- we construct a straw man opponent; all atheists must be as aggressive and closed minded as Richard Dawkins. In my experience most atheists are well thought out, intelligent people who would love to believe in God if he existed. They just don't think he does.

I think it is easy to be dismissive of doubt and of genuinely well thought out sceptical arguments. But unless we really engage with doubt, unless we understand the perspective of the sceptic and identify with why they believe what they do we can't expect them to really listen to us.

And after all I'm not a blind follower of Jesus Christ- I'm a seeker of truth. I just believe that Jesus Christ offers me a true fulfilment of truth. If something I believe isn't true, I want to root it out. I think it's a real challenge for how we do mission.

Do we believe the truth? And on what grounds? Unless we're prepared to properly engage and understand scepticism and disbelief I think we are in danger of alienating a whole generation of people who just can't believe.