These are four questions that I feel are important enough to spend some time answering. I believe that Christianity has an answer for each of these valid inquiries on God, and over the summer I will be using this blog to write four different essay/thoughts on these challenges. I put these here for you to start thinking and wrestling out in your mind. Enjoy :)
1. Is God beneficial?
This question is at the heart of more recent secular criticism of God. The basic argument is that followers of God carry out actions they believe are ordained by God; and as of most human history, this “will” of God as expressed through believers has caused great harm in the world. The obvious question is: does belief in God provide any benefit to society greater than any harm?
2. Is God necessary?
A more primal belief at the heart of Christianity is that without God, humanity has no hope, be it for eternity or here on earth. Even if a case were to be made that belief of God serves a benefit, it stands to reason to follow that claim with a challenge of the necessity of God. To what extent does belief in God provide security more so than unbelief?
3. Is God a “god”?
Is goodness, morality, integrity and inner-peace connected with belief in God, or can these things be accomplished successfully without God? Is human accomplishment (in whatever field, be it outward or internal) the grace and gift of God, or rather the evolutionary work of humanity (or both)? Is what some claim to be God’s providence nothing more than chance?
4. Is God the God?
The most audacious claim of the Bible is not simply that God is god, but that God is the one and only God Almighty, and strict prohibition on mere acknowledgment of other gods is found throughout Scripture. But what qualifies this claim? On what justification can we say that God is God alone? Even if the case were to be made that God is beneficial, necessary and a god, what reasons (if any) can be used to say that God exists as the sole deity of the universe?
