Two facts upon which all clear thinking is founded. (1) There is a moral law in the universe and (2) no one can keep it.
The law is summed up as, "people ought not be selfish." Or, "do as you would be done by." This law can be called The Law of Human Nature
So where did this Law of Human Nature come from?
2. _______________
Matter has always existed and that law is just
the result of evolution in the human animal.
Science can't say "why" only "what."
This won't work because when I
look inside myself, I find I am
under a law that someone is urging
me to follow. Something like a mind
is directing or guiding me to do
right and wrong.
Religious View
There is a Something directing the universe,
urging me to do good, to be courageous,
fair, and unselfish.
Abrahamic Faiths: Jews, Mohammedans, Christians.
The problem with this is that there is
so much evil in the world. How could
this world be an expression of this
"good" God's will?
Perhaps this God gave humans freedom which necessarily will bring about choice which are not good. But this freedom enabled both evil as well as real love, not merely forced love.
Because this God wants to give us happiness and peace, he tries to bring us to himself, the source of our happiness.
Conscience
4. ___________________________
_____________________________
Jews
One Jewish man, Jesus of Nazareth, claims to be God, claims to be able to forgive sins. We must deal with him: who is he really?
5. __________________________________________________________________________
Lunatic: He genuinely thinks he's God, but he's just plain wrong.
Lord: He really is God in the flesh, come to lead his people back to himself. The Word made flesh.
His sacrifice can put us right with God if we will put down our rebel arms and surrender to him as the true King.
6. ________________________________________________________________________________
We can't truly repent--surrender, submit, and even die. We can only go through this process of repentence if God does it in us and God can only do it if he is a man like us.
So, Jesus' humanity is God meeting us where we are, helping us do what we could never do, paying our debt.
7. ________________________________________________________________________________________
Baptism
Belief
Holy Communion
Good Moral Teacher. This can't work because he doesn't say "good" things. He acts like a demagogue and makes outrageous claims that good moral teachers would never utter.
Pantheism: all the world is just an
extension of God's being.
This won't work because it eliminates
true good and evil. Nothing can be
truly evil if it's all just a part of God.
3._________________________
___________________________
This can't work because two equal
and opposite deities can't logically
exist. How would we know to call
one "good" and one "evil" unless
we had a standard to measure them
by? In which case, there must be
a real standard of "good" above them
both, who would be the real God.
And, evil is only spoiled good anyway.
Evil is only a parasite on good--it can't
have its own, independent existence.