To Know God is to Love Him?
Christians in American commonly think that the reason people don’t love God is because they don’t know him. Many who are “spiritual but not religious” seem to feel similarly. Such a god is a universally positive, universally lovable, universally tolerant being that is only not worshiped or obeyed or sought after because of human ignorance. What this implies is that evil is more a lack of information, communication and understanding than rebellion.
This idea is attractive because it assumes that as we learn more and know God better then conflicts will melt away and finally one day heaven and earth will be one with no lives lost. That’s a very nice idea, but it isn’t one that the Bible seems to embrace.
That idea also runs up against the problem that personal beings make choices and these choices matter. One way to eliminate the problem of God caring about our choices is to have a god who makes no choices, therefore he won’t cross any of our decision. The downside of such a god would of course be that this god could not in any way critique any human choice or partake in history which is full of choices. Such a god couldn’t say “killing your neighbor is wrong and I won’t tolerate it”. For such a god something that we see as evil would be not be to he-she-it.
While I understand that this view has its adherents, I do wonder about how faithful it can be lived. I know no one who doesn’t actually believe that good and evil exist on at least some level. Having a will seems to entail taking a position on not only what is good or evil for oneself, but what is good or evil in general.
Thomas Nagel, an atheist philosopher today in fact owns this view. For any of us who have opinions, which is all of us, the presence of any god who picks and chooses is a threat.
Thomas Nagel “The Last Word” pg. 130
In speaking of the fear of religion, I don’t mean to refer to the entirely reasonable hostility towards certain established religions and religious institutions, in virtue of their objectionable moral doctrines, social policies, and political influence. Nor am I referring to the association of many religious beliefs with superstition and the acceptance of evident empirical falsehoods. I am talking about something much deeper– namely the fear of religion itself. I speak from experience, being strongly subject to this fear myself: I want atheism to be true and am made uneasy by the fact that some of the most intelligent and well-informed people I know are religious believers. It isn’t just that I don’t believe in God and, naturally, hope that I’m right in my belief. It’s that I hope there is no God! I don’t want there to be a God; I don’t want the universe to be like that. This cosmic authority problem is not rare and I doubt that there is anyone who is genuinely indifferent as to whether there is a God.
When God Shows Up
The story of the book of Exodus is a story of Yhwh revealing himself in an increasingly intrusive manner. Some people will like this god, and others will hate him. In Exodus 8 we have a story of Pharaoh being increasingly exposed to Yhwh and the dynamic that is involved.
In Exodus 6 Pharaoh said “who is Yhwh that I should obey him”. Chapter 8 will be his progressive introduction and it is an introduction that Pharaoh will not appreciate. In fact repeatedly during the interchange Yhwh states that the reason for all of this will be that Israel, Egypt, Pharaoh and the world may know that Yhwh is the creator God who makes demands on the entire world. This was as shocking and offensive a statement for the ancient world as it is today. Continue reading
