Everyone Gets the Same Question

 

Question Mark Trio

Recently on X a member continued a conversation with me after an exchange about Pascal's Wager. I've written about it before, so you can either do a search here or Google if you are not familiar with it. 

Everyone answers the question "Does God exist?" Even if it is a lower-case deity, humans choose to believe, or not, in their own mind. 

What I do not understand are those who accept the outward signs of belief - marriage, funerals, Christmas, Easter - and participate in those out of civic duty. 

One sweet mother describes her own mother as being in heaven. It gives her a sense of peace. But she has denied believing in the one book that uses that word for a specific place. How does she think her mother got to heaven, and what did she teach her own children for their comfort. 

Lots of questions - but every individual who lived or is now living on this planet faces it because we all know death comes to each one of us. 

For believing Jews and Christians the question is answered in:

In the beginning God created the heaven and the earth. (Genesis 1:1)

Simple - belief in this verse to be considered either a believing/practicing Jew or Christian. You see, anyone can take the title, but the Bible decides whether they are telling the truth. When a person tells someone else they are a Jew or a Christian, the assumption should be they believe in God, YHWH, LORD, the most used names applied to the deity we worship.

To be considered a Christian, it is necessary to add:

In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. The same was in the beginning with God. All things were made by him; and without him was not any thing made that was made. (John 1:1-3)

Christians do not believe in multiple Gods - there is  only one and we see that deity in many ways - one of which was when He became human, and there is much to learn from that. Our reference is called a Bible. It contains books the Jews consider scripture, plus the writings of Jesus' apostles who worked directly with Him while He was here on earth, then returned to the heaven we all wish to see.

The question about God's existence isn't new, and the relationship between God and mankind goes back to the oldest book in the Bible - Job.

How then can man be justified with God? or how can he be clean that is born of a woman? (Job 25:4)

Yes - even though it isn't one of the first books, it has been studied and is believed by scholars to have been written about the same time of Abraham, introduced to us in the book of Genesis. Reading Job takes time and study. It is his friend Bildad speaking in Chapter 25. Bildad and Job's three other friends never questioned the reality of God, nor the need to do right and not wrong. Their ethics are clear throughout the book. Even Job asks:

For what is the hope of the hypocrite, though he hath gained, when God taketh away his soul? (Job 27:8)

Which Jesus rephrases:

For what shall it profit a man, if he shall gain the whole world, and lose his own soul? (Mark 8:36)

Please - if you chosen there is not a deity, reconsider. Then add the Bible to your reading. Never leave the life of Jesus out of your life without being able to explain the reason for your choice. Some day, an explanation will be required. That's a promise.

Pascal's Wager does not go beyond deciding whether or not a deity exists. When a person make the choice that one does, it is necessary to be certain you have chosen wisely. There is a huge difference for the Christian believer, given in John 3:16-18:

For God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have everlasting life. For God sent not his Son into the world to condemn the world; but that the world through him might be saved. He that believeth on him is not condemned: but he that believeth not is condemned already, because he hath not believed in the name of the only begotten Son of God. (John 3:16-18)

I started this subject, and was interrupted. Didn't get back to it until today. Good thing! Our lesson was on Job, which gave me the Job 25:4 verse. Then the sermon this morning gave me the next blog.