A Review of the God Delusion (Part 10)
Where Values Come From
As we continue to review The God Delusion, we note that the atheist author labors diligently to explain why religion is so popular and universal. “Where does the idea of ‘goodness’ originate?” he asks. The reason he goes to such lengths to answer this question is that he does not believe in God and therefore cannot agree that values come from God. They must have arrived some other way. If he believes matter is eternal, he must figure out how it came to life. Then he needs to explain how matter possesses values rather than just remaining impersonal. He struggles to find ways to explain these things, but the truth is set forth below.
God created us, as the Scriptures teach (Gen. 1:1, 26-28). He taught man what He wanted him to know—concerning right and wrong. The first human beings chose to sin—not because they did not know what was right or wrong—but because they ignored what they had been told. They disobeyed God. One would think those punishments (Gen. 3:14-19) would have been sufficient to show that God ought to be obeyed.
But, no. Mankind continued to sin—to such an extent that God regretted having made human beings (Gen. 6:6). Even the righteous became evil. They intermarried with the ungodly seed line and soon became as bad as those they wed (Gen. 6:1-4). In fact, the world became so thoroughly corrupt that God determined to destroy it: “Then the Lord saw that the wickedness of man was great in the earth, and that every intent of the thoughts of his heart was only evil continually” (Gen. 6:5). How could it have been worse?
God commissioned Noah to build an ark, which resulted in saving eight human beings and numerous animals. When the waters subsided, the survivors went forth into a fresh world, eradicated of sin. And they possessed crucial knowledge with respect to the world.
They knew that God created it. The lifetimes of Adam and Methuselah (Noah’s ancestors) overlapped. (Adam lived 930 years, and Methuselah 969, dying in the year of the Flood. The Flood was 1,656 years from the Creation; so, the two men lived at the same time for 243 years.) Even if they never personally conversed, God still spoke to Noah and could easily confirm what he might have learned from his grandfather.
Noah and his sons lived through the Flood. Thus, they knew that God punishes sin and that He is serious in His demand for obedience.
They would, therefore, be able to teach future generations that God had both created and destroyed the world with a Flood. Everyone knew these facts at the time the Tower of Babel was under construction.
Implications and Conclusions
Atheists would have us believe that whoever wrote the Bible copied from other sources of the day, such as the epic of Gilgamesh, which contains a universal flood story. But the fact is that there are numerous flood stories in the history of many cultures. Now, which is more likely: that the Bible copied from all these cultures—or that when nations were scattered all over the earth after the flood, they each retained a version of what actually occurred in the days of Noah? Over decades of time, the details changed in each isolated culture, but God had Moses record the truth of the original event.
Speaking of truth, it was not the case that the world did not know about God—either His Creation or the Flood. Paul wrote that they “exchanged the truth of God for the lie, and worshiped and served the creature rather than the Creator, who is blessed forever. Amen” (Rom. 1:25).
But why would anyone do that? Paul wrote previously, in the same text, that they “changed the glory of the incorruptible God into an image made like corruptible man—and birds, and four-footed beasts and creeping things” (Rom. 1:23). So, they gave up the truth concerning man’s origin, and instead of worshiping their Creator, they made up gods and goddesses to worship. Again, however, why would anyone do that?
The answer is that they did not appreciate God’s moral values. Instead, they wanted to walk in “uncleanness, in the lusts of their hearts, to dishonor their bodies among themselves” (Rom. 1:24). God did not stop them; He allowed them to use their bodies in sexually perverse ways. Surely, no one would give up the truth of God just to be sexually permissive, would they? Yes, and many still do. (Dawkins’ readers will recall his complaints about God’s concern with sexuality.)
One might also take note that when Dawkins takes issue with Noah and the Flood, he is also attacking Jesus and the rest of the New Testament. Jesus mentions Noah as a literal person in Matthew 24:37-38. He refers to the ark and the Flood. The writer of Hebrews also cites Noah’s preparing of the ark, declaring him to be a man of faith. The apostle Peter mentions Noah and the ark, too, plus the fact that eight souls were saved through water (1 Peter 3:20).
In 2 Peter 2:5, the apostle is making the point that God punishes sin. After pointing out that God did not spare the angels who sinned (and just prior to pointing out the sins of Sodom and Gomorrah), he adds that God also
did not spare the ancient world, but saved Noah, one of eight people, a preacher of righteousness, bringing in the flood on the world of the ungodly.
The Old and the New Testaments alike treat Noah as a literal (rather than a figurative or symbolic) person and the Flood as a literal event. Mankind did not stay obedient to God for long, however, and the situation described in Romans 1 developed. Mankind chose to depart from God even though they knew the truth. People were without excuse in those days—and still are without excuse (Rom. 1:18-20).
Chapter Seven: The Assault on the Scriptures
No alternatives to evolution have any merit—except the Bible. Therefore, one would expect Satan to assault it in every way possible. Those who promote the devil’s cause, like Dawkins, do precisely that. He charges that God’s morals are “obnoxious.” Apparently, he is using his own standard to make such a judgment, since millions of people would disagree with him. This is the problem that atheists have. Without objective values, how can anything be good or bad, wonderful or obnoxious? He has no standard but his own.
Dawkins refers to Bishop John Shelby Spong as saying that those who base their morality literally on the Bible “have either not read it or do not understand it” (269). What does Spong believe? He advocates the opposite of the moral teachings in the Scriptures. He defends fornication and homosexuality. (See the five-part series of articles concerning his bizarre views, beginning in May of 2007 on spiritualperspectives.org.) Even Dawkins says that he “is a nice example of a liberal bishop whose beliefs are so advanced as to be almost unrecognizable” (269). But Spong challenges the morality set forth in the Scriptures, which is the reason he is cited.
Other theologians take the approach that Genesis should not be taken literally. Dawkins protests that view as “picking and choosing” what is literal and what is allegorical (269). So do we. As shown above, the entire Bible regards Noah as a real person and the Flood a literal event. That is not to say, however, that figurative language is not employed at times in the Bible—because it is. But Bible students do not pick and choose; the context usually makes it obvious.
The description of the Scriptures’ account of Noah and the Flood is hilariously slanted. Below is his description; the reader may well ask, “Who is deluded?”
The legend of the animals going into the ark two by two is charming, but the moral of the story of Noah is appalling. God took a dim view of humans, so he (with the exception of one family) drowned the lot of them including children and also, for good measure the rest of the (presumably blameless) animals as well (269).
This is akin to saying that the world ganged up on Hitler because he found fault with a few Jews. First, the animals going into the ark two by two is factual—not just a charming legend. It shows that God was in control and that the boarding of the ark was orderly rather than chaotic (Gen. 7:9).
God taking “a dim view of humans” is a slight understatement of the truth that the thoughts of man’s heart was thoroughly and continually evil (Gen. 6:5). It also ignores the fact that the earth was corrupt and filled with violence (Gen. 6:11). Also overlooked is the fact that Noah preached a hundred years to get people to repent of their sins; Peter records that he was a preacher of righteousness (2 Peter 2:5). Dawkins makes it sound as though God was just mildly annoyed.
Third, God did select one man and his family to preserve the human race from the impending destruction. The point is that He invited others, but they refused. Dawkins thinks it was wrong that children and animals drowned. Older children and animals can be perverted. Besides, the younger children were not lost eternally—like their parents. They perished in their innocence; so, they are safe—just as David’s son was (2 Sam. 12:23).
God’s Advisor?
Should God find fault with man’s sins? Dawkins advises that He should not care. Below are statements that reflect this view.
Why should a divine being, with creation and eternity on his mind, care a fig for petty human malefactions? We humans give ourselves such airs, even aggrandizing our poky little ‘sins’ to the level of cosmic significance (270).
Further, Dawkins wants to know “why evangelical Christians were so obsessed with private sexual inclinations such as homosexuality, which didn’t interfere with anybody else’s life” (270).
The problem with this atheist is that he understands nothing of the holiness of God. The Lord possesses no corruption in Him whatsoever (Isa. 6:3). Our Creator could demand anything and insist upon it—no matter how bizarre, but He does not do so. He gave commandments to Israel that were for their good (Deut. 10:12-13).
He created us (mankind) in His image (Gen. 1:26-27). Since He is holy, we are to be holy (Lev. 19:2; 1 Peter 1:15-16). Yes, He cares about our behavior. Our poky little sins are big enough to separate us from His fellowship. They are big enough to require Jesus to die on the cross, that we might become the righteousness of God in Him (2 Cor. 5:21). Sin is as much a cosmic event as the Creation, the crucifixion, and Christ’s second coming.
Are we obsessed over private sexual inclinations? No, but we do object to them being flaunted in public and the public being forced to accept and praise such relationships. Could it be that Dawkins has never heard of Gay Pride Parades, which often involve behavior that is lewd and crude? How “private” are those? And how does Dawkins know that homosexuality does not interfere with other people’s lives? He later references Sodom and Gomorrah—cities entirely given over to the sin of homosexuality. Apparently “private” escaped and was running rampant!