Apr 26 2010
Can I ever know for sure?
Are you asking whether you will ever know for sure whether or not God exists? Well, when you die, it seems that one of two things, at least, could happen. One is that you will just cease to exist. The random meaningless matter that was “you” will just disintegrate away, and the “you” that you know, will never have a chance to find out “you” were right or wrong.
Let’s consider the other option however. Suppose you die and suddenly find yourself before God, who has existed all this time even though you never acknowledged him. What kind of God will he be? Will he be a nice, Santa Claus-like Grandpa-in-the-sky who will hug you and let you in because, for the most part, you’ve been a nice person? Or maybe, just maybe, will he be angry with you for your stubborn unbelief and your arrogant rebellion?
You might not be satisfied with the preceding arguments and you might demand other grounds for believing in God. Or, you might suggest that there are no grounds for believing in the existence of God. If you are in this camp, ask yourself if you are being like the stubborn wife, masking your unwillingness to believe in God on the grounds of “too little evidence.”
Is it possible that your argument that there is too little evidence is really a smokescreen to hide the truth that you don’t want there to be a God. Because if there is a God, then you are accountable to him. He made you and so it is his right to determine your purpose for existence and what is best for you. If you have ignored him and done and thought and said things in your life that make you feel guilty (where did that conscience thing come from anyway?), then you may want to ignore or explain away the possibility that there is a God.