Glimpses of the Infinite

A Trail of Clues to the Christian God

In this article, I cover a bunch of topics that I believe, when taken as a whole,
suggest the existence of the Christian God. Each section is highlighted by a clue in
bold. My intention is to propose an informal but plausible case for the existence of
the personal, moral, and loving God of Christianity.

In the Beginning...
With the almost unanimous acceptance of the Big Bang theory in the scientific
community, most people take for granted that our universe began to exist
approximately 13.7 billion years ago. Does this prove that there was some
supernatural first cause made by God? Well obviously not, otherwise science would
teach theism. However, if God isn’t in your explanation, it does beg the question
of how you can get something as sophisticated and elegant as our universe from
nothing.

Many scientists believe that the amount of (positive) energy associated with mass in
the universe is precisely offset by the (negative) energy associated with gravitation,
and hence the sum total of the universe’s energy/matter is zero. This conjecture is
still to be demonstrated but if we just assume that this is true for the moment, then
we could postulate that the Big Bang occurred from a complete absence of energy
while still obeying the laws of physics. So would this mean that something could
come from absolutely nothing? Well, it would not be scientifically viable to postulate
that absolutely nothing could produce something, otherwise it wouldn’t be absolutely
nothing. Thus, we can at least postulate that there existed a potential to create a
universe like ours.

So if we stop there, like science is currently forced to do, we are naturally left
philosophically grasping for a cause: what is the origin of this potential that produced
our universe and set it according to the laws of physics? From what I can see, you
have two options:

1) You can suppose that the underlying potential, let’s just call it the universe,
has always existed and hence is uncaused, i.e., it is fundamentally basic and
eternal; or

2) You can suppose that it is the product of a transcendent, creator God.

So, in all, it seems difficult to avoid the notion of an uncaused, beginningless,

immaterial, timeless, spaceless foundation for our universe. Sounds a lot like what
we would call God, in the broad sense, doesn’t it? At one end of the spectrum,
we can suppose a transcendent God like in the Abrahamic faiths—personal and
intentional but separate from the universe—and at the other end, we can suppose a
pantheistic God—impersonal, unintentional and inseparable from the universe.

Clue 1: When contemplating why the universe exists, it is difficult to avoid

the notion of an uncaused, beginningless, immaterial, timeless, spaceless
foundation for our universe.

Going further we can, rather philosophically, ask: why do we have something as

elegant, enormous and rich as our universe and not something smaller (or nothing
at all), which is also a plausible state according to our current understanding of the
laws of physics? This question of the appearance of extravagance in our universe
indicates that there just might be a creative and intentional power behind the scenes.
In fact, the universe is so physically immense and powerful when compared to our
relatively minuscule physical footprints that we could be excused for thinking that
we are just too insignificant for such a creator to consider us worthy of attention or
intentional in creation. However, the next clues, in the following sections, allude to a
mindful, intentional and personal God.

Life Supporting Universe

Early last century, it was discovered that if our universe had a tiny difference in
values for the observed cosmological constants (the constants of the equations that
describe the laws of physics), then it would not support life as we know it. Given the
theoretical range of possible values for these constants, it can be shown that only an
extremely small subset of the possible variations lead to a life-supporting universe.
In other words, if the Big Bang was to be “rerun” and the different cosmological
constants were reset in a random fashion, then it seems that a carbon-based life
supporting universe would be an extremely unlikely result. American Philosopher
and former Physicist R. Collins explains this astounding fine-tuning by drawing an
analogy:

“If you had a ruler stretched across the entire universe and thought of it as a
radio dial, it would have to be fine-tuned to much, much less than 1 trillionth of
an inch.” [4]

Science is still a long way off finding any verifiable answers as to why our universe
has such an appearance of fine-tuning. Many alternative theories to a fine-tuning
creator have been put forward to explain it. I mention the three most prominent
ones here: 1) our universe is but one of a plethora of multiple universes (past or in
parallel), hence you will eventually strike one that has a life-supporting configuration;
2) carbon-based life may not be the only form of life possible in a different universe
configuration, hence the range of possibilities is in fact significantly greater than we
currently think; 3) even though the cosmological constants have the appearance of
tunability, they may well not be at all, i.e., our current understanding of the laws of
physics are missing some information, hence the idea of fine-tuning is not applicable.

Given that we don’t currently have any evidence supporting any of the three
alternative theories from above, I don’t feel brash in suggesting that the simplest
solution to the appearance of fine-tuning is a fine-tuner, aka, a creator God.
Experience tells us if something goes quack then it’s most probably a duck.

Clue 2: Current scientific understanding suggests that a life-supporting

universe is extremely unlikely to occur by random chance. Our universe
supports life and hence the straightforward conclusion is that there is a God
who intended our universe to have life forms.

So if you are inclined, as I am, towards explaining the ability for our universe to
provide life in terms of an extremely intelligent, creative and intentional mind, then
you can fairly easily infer a God who intended that creatures like ourselves would
exist. I have obviously just made a very large jump to an intentional God, but hang in
there, we’ll see if the other clues can help patch together a bridge over the gap...

Consciousness, Rational Minds and Trustworthy Cognitive

Faculties
Not only are we able to consciously and rationally perceive and comprehend the
world and universe around us, but we are able to comprehend the laws that govern
the universe. This is truly remarkable if you think that we are made of loosely
coupled collections of atoms that were formed during the later phases of a large
star’s life. Obviously, we are an integral and inseparable part of the universe itself,
not external observers peering into a box.

Science is a tool that has helped us grow in our knowledge and understanding of our
physical attributes and the world around us. It is based on a few presuppositions that
we pretty much all take for granted, and which we certainly have no reason to doubt.
First, it assumes that evidence collected from careful observation of the natural
world can be used to learn about the causes. Hence, it relies on the presupposition
that our cognitive faculties are true and trustworthy, otherwise our observations
couldn’t be trusted nor compared. Second, it assumes that the same natural laws
and processes that operate in the universe now, have always operated in it in the
past and apply everywhere, which I will refer to as universal and temporal uniformity.
If this were not to be the case, we couldn’t build on any conclusions drawn from
experiments, as we couldn't be sure that the principles gleaned would be applicable
elsewhere and in the future (or past). For example, in an extreme case, if the
fundamental nuclear forces of the universe even slightly morphed or changed over
time and space, our bodies would literally disintegrate and hence life could not be
sustained. In general, chaos would be the norm and not what we see here...

If you believe in naturalism, then you believe that the laws of physics and their
uniformity are a given (just presupposed to exist and sustained) and that a blind
and mindless natural process can and has given us trustworthy cognitive faculties.
According to the American philosopher A. Plantinga, if human cognitive faculties
evolved by a natural process to produce beliefs that have survival value (maximizing
one's success at: finding food, fleeing from danger, fighting off rivals, reproducing,
etc.), then they do not necessarily produce beliefs that are true. He believes that,
while there may be overlap between true beliefs and beliefs that contribute to
survival, the two kinds of beliefs are not the same, and he gives the following comical
example using a fictional man named Paul:

"Perhaps Paul very much likes the idea of being eaten, but when he sees
a tiger, always runs off looking for a better prospect, because he thinks it
unlikely the tiger he sees will eat him. This will get his body parts in the right
place so far as survival is concerned, without involving much by way of true
belief... Or perhaps he thinks the tiger is a large, friendly, cuddly pussycat
and wants to pet it; but he also believes that the best way to pet it is to run
away from it... Clearly there are any number of belief-cum-desire systems that
equally fit a given bit of behaviour"[15]

So the point that Plantinga is making is that an effective belief system for maximising
survival value doesn’t necessarily require true beliefs. But just a second, isn’t
science founded on the premise that we have true and trustworthy cognitive
faculties? Isn’t it starting to look like naturalism is taking a step of faith? In fact,
wouldn’t it take more faith to believe that a blind, mindless and indifferent natural
process should somehow stumble across true cognitive perception, than it would to
believe that it was the intention of an intelligent creator? Independent of your own
point of view, one cannot help to be astonished by the ability of a bunch of vibrating
atoms to be conscious. What a miracle!?

Clue 3: Our ability to make sense of the universe around us is truly remarkable
considering that in the physical sense we are basically a collection of vibrating
molecules and that our world can be understood by studying and testing
our observations. Could this remarkable scheme be the hallmarks of an
intentional, intelligent and creative mind, aka God?

If we were to build on the first and second clues, then it would be reasonable to
conjecture that such a God could equip us with minds that are capable of inquiring,
understanding and appreciating his creation. Clearly such a proposal needs further
justification. The following clues attempt to do just that.

Moral Code of Conduct

In countless conversations every day, we invoke an unstated higher standard
of “right” behavior without realizing it. They range from the petty, e.g., “How come
you got a bigger ice cream than me?”, to a potentially fatal one for mankind,
e.g., “Should Country X be trusted with nuclear capabilities?”. Each side attempts to
appeal to an unstated higher standard of right and wrong, which is what I refer to as
moral code of conduct here. Distinguishing right and wrong behavior appears to be
universal among us all—the little voice of conscience—though its application may
result in wildly different outcomes in different people. Why are we somehow subject
to a moral code and where did it come from in the first place?

If we believe that there are right and wrong actions independent of public opinion
and culture, then you believe in an objective moral code. For example, most people
believe that torturing babies is objectively wrong, even if there existed no one in the
world who believed that. In this sense, right and wrong can only be meaningful when
there is an objective authority—an external and authoritative basis for defining what
it means to be good and moral: the transcendental answer to the question, “Says
who?”. Could the guilt that we feel when we do wrong, the little voice of conscience,
be uniquely the result of social conditioning and genetic endowment as it is assumed
to be in Naturalism and therefore ultimately that of an undirected natural process?
Belief in this makes it very difficult to argue for objective notions of good and evil. T.
Keller summarizes this idea:

“But the evolutionary mechanism of natural selection depends on death,

destruction, and violence of the strong against the weak – these things are all
perfectly natural. On what basis, then, does the atheist judge the natural world
to be horribly wrong, unfair, and unjust?”[9]

Say, hypothetically, if nature had dealt a different hand (which it most likely would
do if given another chance from the same starting point, according to the mechanics
of naturalism) or we had been socially conditioned from childhood by a closed
community of sadists: for example, in such a world and imagining an extreme
variation, torture, battery, sexual abuse, murder, etc. could be virtuous acts that are
seen as morally acceptable. This is so outrageous that it is absurd.

Let’s look at another hypothetical scenario: say that the Nazis won the Second
World War and they managed to eradicate all people who believed their genocidal
actions were wrong. Would that make what they did right? If you say “yes”, then
you’re saying that justice and the definition of good and evil is decided by the
majority. Under such a regime, you wouldn’t have a leg to stand on if you wanted
to stop atrocities that happen to you or anyone else if they were done in the name
of a majority. If you say “no, I think genocide is always wrong, but I believe that
because nature programmed me that way”, then why would you think that nature has
programmed you any better than another person who you disagree with? In other
words, on what basis is your definition of good and evil superior to the sadist’s one
down the road?

Alternatively, belief that there are objectively such things as good and evil, leads us
to the supposition that there is such a thing as an objective moral law and truth. And
if you suppose there is such a thing as objective moral law, then the next step is to
suppose that there is an objective moral law-giver, aka God.

Clue 4: We all seem to be subject to a moral code of conduct—an innate voice

of conscience. Looking for a source of this moral code points us either in the
direction of a God that is the objective moral authority, or in the direction of
Mother Nature that is completely indifferent to good and bad, truth and justice.

Your choice also guides your perspective in life. Polish poet and Nobel laureate C.
Milosz writes:

"Religion used to be the opium of the people. To those suffering humiliation,

pain, illness, and serfdom, religion promised the reward of an after life.
But now, we are witnessing a transformation, a true opium of the people is
the belief in nothingness after death, the huge solace, the huge comfort of
thinking that for our betrayals, our greed, our cowardice, our murders, we are
not going to be judged."[12]

The Golden Rule

Typically, the Golden Rule, which states: whatever you wish that others would do
to you, do also to them, is commonly believed to be the most basic element of the
moral code and certainly from a Christian perspective, Jesus clearly commanded it
(Matthew 7:12, Luke 6:31). It is also the basic doctrine of many, if not most, major
world religions. The Naturalists would typically declare that it’s obvious that nature
encourages this behavior trait, because symbiosis (cooperation) and altruistic
(selflessness) behavior have given us survival advantages. So even if we take that
on faith (even though some forms of altruistic behavior are far from obviously derived
from our current knowledge of the evolutionary mechanisms of natural selection and
random mutation), we could nevertheless stop there and ask: intellectually, why do
I bother to adhere to the programming of the blind and indifferent natural process
of Mother Nature? Well, the easy answer that one could give is: “I bother because
that’s how I’ve been programmed by nature”. Like Cypher, when talking to Agent
Smith, in the movie “The Matrix”, who explains why he will happily return to the
enslavement of the Matrix:

“I know this steak doesn't exist. And I know that the Matrix is telling my brain
that it is juicy and delicious. After 13 years, you know what I have learned?
Ignorance is bliss.”
The analogy between the Matrix and Mother Nature does invoke the scenario of
rebelling against the system, but unlike the Matrix, Mother Nature is neither personal
nor mindful, rather it’s blind and indifferent, and it’s not concerned by anything you
might do (and it definitely wont send smartly dressed agents to interrogate).

Alternatively, the Golden Rule could make objective sense. For example, the God
of the first four clues could have actually made us with intrinsic value and hence
our actions to treat others like we want to be treated could be transcendentally
meaningful. If this were to be the case, the Golden Rule would have true potency
and it would reflect the loving nature of the creator.

Clue 5: Without an objective underpinning, the Golden Rule, i.e., treating

others how you would like to be treated, loses its potency.

Obviously, proponents of Naturalism don’t usually answer the above “Why bother
with the Golden Rule?” question with flurries of unbridled lawlessness as they rebel
against the programming of Mother Nature. Their response is never just based on a
cold and indifferent intellectual response. As we all know, we all get much pleasure
and joy from helping others, watching children grow and develop, achieving fame,
etc. In my opinion and philosophically speaking, Naturalism inevitably leads to
hedonism, which basically amounts to maximizing one’s pleasure and minimizing
one’s pain. In fact, there is an obvious appeal to hedonism as it majors on the good
things and minors on the bad things. What could be better than that? Well in a later
section, we’ll see a clue that attempts an answer to that question by bringing God
into the equation of hedonism...

Desire: Beauty, Love and the Meaning of Life

In moments of emotion evoked in the presence of great beauty or love, one can
be left speechless. For a moment, it is as if we have experienced our reason for
being—our passions and desires are briefly satisfied, and then the moment is gone.
We have all experienced these moments in the presence of alluring music, art,
relationship and stunning scenes of nature. T. Keller believes that such experiences
aren’t just sourced in emotions:

“Are we, however, only talking about feelings here? What is evoked in these
experiences is, more accurately, appetite or desire... We not only feel the
reality but also the absence of what we long for... Doesn't the unfulfillable
longing evoked by beauty qualify as an innate desire? We have a longing
for joy, love, and beauty that no amount or quality of food, sex, friendship, or
success can satisfy.”[9]

I propose that joy, love and beauty are not the only innate desires of man. Man’s
search for meaning and purpose in life is also a deep-seated, innate desire. The
famous British novelist and academic C. S. Lewis writes:

“If the whole universe has no meaning, we should never have found out that it
has no meaning: just as, if there were no light in the universe and therefore no
creatures with eyes, we should never have known it was dark. Dark would be
without meaning.”[10]

Does it seem reasonable that a blind, mindless, natural process would outfit us in
such a way? Independent of how limited our current understanding of the mechanics
of evolution by natural selection and random mutation is (or whether it is actually a
true theory of how life formed), isn’t there at least a twinkle of some deeper creative
mind at work here? If man’s search for the meaning of life is engraved into his being,
could it be a trace of the fingerprints of a personal God, who made us to seek after
him?

Clue 6: Our deep felt desires invoked in strong moments of joy and wonder
speak of something more to life. These desires might just possibly indicate the
fingerprints of a God who has made us that way.

A Broken World
The evil brought about by man in this world has proved difficult to eradicate even
with better education and superior laws. With the progress that western civilization
has made over the last centuries, why aren’t we happier, more fulfilled, or on a
higher plane of consciousness? As the influential 18th-century German philosopher
Immanuel Kant puts it:

"Nothing straight can be constructed from such warped wood as that which
man is made of."[7]

But if there is a God, why would he make “warped wood”? Here’s a thought-
provoking fictional conversation between a professor and his students, which gives
some insight into this question:

The university professor challenged his students with this question. Did God
create everything that exists?

A student bravely replied yes, he did!"

"God created everything?" The professor asked.

"Yes, sir," the student replied.

The professor answered, "If God created everything, then God created evil
since evil exists, and according to the principal that our works define who we
are then God is evil."
The student became quiet before such an answer.

The professor was quite pleased with himself and boasted to the students that
he had proven once more that the Christian faith was a myth.

Another student raised his hand and said, "Can I ask you a question
professor?" "Of course", replied the professor. The student stood up and
asked, "Professor, does cold exist?"

"What kind of question is this? Of course it exists. Have you never been
cold?" The students snickered at the young man's question.

The young man replied, "In fact sir, cold does not exist. According to the laws
of physics, what we consider cold is in reality the absence of heat. Everybody
and every object is susceptible to study when it has or transmits energy, and
heat is what makes a body or matter have or transmit energy. Absolute zero (-
273°C) is the total absence of heat; all matter becomes inert and incapable of
reaction at that temperature. Cold does not exist. We have created this word
to describe how we feel if we have too little heat.

The student continued. "Professor, does darkness exist?"

The professor responded, "Of course it does".

The student replied, "Once again you are wrong sir, darkness does not exist
either. Darkness is in reality the absence of light. Light we can study, but not
darkness. In fact we can use Newton's prism to break white light into many
colors and study the various wavelengths of each color. You cannot measure
darkness. A simple ray of light can break into a world of darkness and
illuminate it. How can you know how dark a certain space is? You measure
the amount of light present. Isn't this correct? Darkness is a term used by man
to describe what happens when there is no light present."

Finally the young man asked the professor. "Sir, does evil exist?"

Now uncertain, the professor responded, "Of course as I have already said.
We see it every day. It is in the daily example of man's inhumanity to man.
It is in the multitude of crime and violence everywhere in the world. "These
manifestations are nothing else but evil."

To this the student replied, "Evil does not exist sir, or at least it does not
exist unto itself. Evil is simply the absence of God. It is just like darkness and
cold, a word that man has created to describe the absence of God. God did
not create evil. Evil is not like faith, or love, that exist just as does light and
heat. Evil is the result of what happens when man does not have God's love
present in his heart. It's like the cold that comes when there is no heat or the
darkness that comes when there is no light."[2]
Clue 7: The problem of evil seems insurmountable for belief in a good and
powerful God: why would God create evil? But wait a second, maybe evil isn’t
his creation but rather his absence.

So if we were to further develop the conclusion of the story, we could infer that one
of our greatest problems is our separation from God.

Are we able to somehow arouse God from his apparent slumber in our regard? Even
if we could, would he listen? One thing is clear, after many millenniums of effort, it
doesn’t seem like we are able to address this problem through our own efforts. As
such, it seems the initiative would need to come from God’s side, a God as alluded
to in the previous seven clues, for example.

Coming to Grips with the Infinite

Explaining the difficulty in comprehending an unbounded God, J. Stott states:

"Man is an insatiably inquisitive creature. His mind is so made that it cannot

rest. It is always prying into the unknown. He pursues knowledge with
restless energy. His life is a voyage of discovery. He is always questing,
exploring, investigating, researching. He never grows out of the child's
interminable 'Why?' When man's mind begins to concern itself with God,
however, it is baffled. It gropes in the dark. It flounders helplessly out of
its depths. Nor is this surprising, because God, whatever or whoever he
may be, is infinite, while we are finite creatures. He is altogether beyond
our comprehension. Therefore our minds, though wonderfully effective
instruments in the empirical sciences, cannot immediately help us here.”[18]

Is there therefore any hope of finding an infinite God? J. Stott continues:

“They cannot climb up into the infinite mind of God. There is no ladder, only
a vast, unmeasured gulf... And so the situation would have remained if God
had not taken the initiative to remedy it. Man would have remained for ever
agnostic, asking indeed with Pontius Pilate, "What is truth?" but never staying
for an answer, because never daring to hope that he would receive one...
But God has spoken. He has taken the initiative to disclose himself... God
has "unveiled" to our minds what would otherwise have been hidden from
them. Part of his revelation is in nature:

‘The heavens are telling the glory of God; and the firmament proclaims
his handiwork.’[16]

But this is not enough. It certainly makes known his existence, and something
of his divine power, glory and faithfulness... The way in which the Bible
explains and describes [the other part of his] revelation is to say that God
 has ‘spoken’... Man comes to know God not through his own wisdom but
through God's Word (‘what we preach’), not through human reason but
through divine revelation. It is because God has made himself known in Christ
that the Christian can boldly go to the agnostic and the superstitious and say
to them, as Paul did to the Athenians on the Areopagus,

‘What therefore you worship as unknown, this I proclaim to you.’[1]

Much of the controversy between science and religion has arisen through a
failure to appreciate this point. The empirical method is largely inappropriate
in the sphere of religion. Scientific knowledge advances through observation
and experiment. It works on data supplied by the five physical senses. But
when we inquire into the metaphysical, no data are immediately available.
God today is neither tangible, visible nor audible. Yet there was a time when
he chose to speak, and to clothe himself with a body which could be seen and
touched.”[18]

But how could we believe that God really did speak through a man: Jesus of
Nazareth? Before we attempt to answer that one, in the next section, let’s look
at why an infinite God might want to incarnate himself as a man. I propose an
explanation using an illustration made by P. Yancey:

“Every day the master sticks his hand in the tank to feed the fish, but each
time he does the fish frantically swim around the tank as though the master
has come to kill them. He wonders why the fish never figure out that he is not
there to hurt them, he is feeding them. But the fish never get it. The master
realizes that he is just too big and mysterious for the fish to ever understand
him. The only way he could ever actually communicate to them how much he
cares would be to actually become a fish so he could relate to them on similar
terms.”[18]

So the illustration points out that God could choose to communicate with us as a
man if he really wanted to connect with us at our level and show us the real meaning
of his intention for us.

Clue 8: A God that creates the universe is formidably powerful. A God that
incarnates himself as one of us is accessible and is manifestly interested in
us.

Explaining the Events Succeeding Jesus’ Death

It’s common to hear the following argument: “It’s outrageous to think that anyone
could believe in miracles. Any supernatural occurrences and experiences are in
any case extremely rare and can either be explained by natural laws or they will be
explainable with new and coming advances in science. It is just irrational to think
that the natural order could ever be broken. There is just no proof that this could or
would ever happen. So all this talk of Jesus being resurrected from the dead is just
ridiculous and pure fantasy; it is quite simply a legend originating from remote and
primitive first century Palestine.”

Now clearly you don’t need to be a 21st century intellectual to be skeptical of a 2000
year old story about a person who rose again after Roman executioners had violently
beaten, lashed and then brutally crucified him, who left his tomb, guarded by Roman
solders, by somehow moving a stone weighing probably well over a tonne, and
then went around making various appearances to people, even to a crowd of 500
people without the look or manner of someone who had just been crucified. In fact,
back in those days, any Jews or Greek would have found the whole story equally
dubious and difficult to take seriously. In fact, considering they understood better the
conditions under which someone was crucified by the Romans perhaps they were
in an even better situation to be skeptical. So where does that leave the accuracy of
the account of a resurrected Jesus of Nazareth? And as a consequence, where does
this leave the plausibility of Christianity? T. Keller states:

“If Jesus rose from the dead, then you have to accept all that he said; if he
didn't rise from the dead, then why worry about any of what he said? The
issue on which everything hangs is not whether or not you like his teaching
but whether or not he rose from the dead.”[9]

So we have come to a decisive moment—a single claim that if true validates Jesus’
claims and hence Christianity and if false puts it definitively into the annals of ancient
near-east religious mythology and hearsay. Obviously, it’s not possible to prove
without a doubt that an event that happened 2000 or so years ago truly occurred
or not. So it’s manifestly not so clear-cut. However, advances in modern historical
methods allow us to get a more objective view of the claims and historical evidences
and then make an inference to the best explanation, which means favoring the
hypothesis that best explains the relevant historically established facts. So in the
following, my goal isn’t to prove historically the resurrection, but rather to show
that the best explanation of the historically established facts, when combined, is a
resurrection.

In the following, I point to the work of G. Habermas, a distinguished American

professor of Apologetics and Philosophy at Liberty University. He proposes
the "Minimal Facts Approach" to this end, which involved the analysis and
compilation of more than 2,200 sources in English, French, and German in which
experts have written on the resurrection from 1975 to the present. He has identified
minimal facts that are strongly evidenced, which means they satisfy most or all of
the criteria used in textual criticism to establish historical probability (e.g., multiple,
independent sources, enemy attestation, principle of embarrassment, eyewitness
testimony, early testimony, etc.) and which are regarded as historical by a large
majority of scholars, independent of whether the scholar was atheist, skeptic, liberal,
or conservative. He gleaned 12 facts that he proposes as historically sound, where 7
facts, within those 12, are almost unanimously accepted by all reputable scholars. As
the complete explanation can be found elsewhere (see the book: G. Habermas, M.
Licona, "The Case for the Resurrection of Jesus", Kregel, 2004), I mention just four
facts here:

1) Jesus died by Roman Crucifixion

Most scholars will agree that Jesus’ death is one of the most well-attested
events of ancient history. According to J. D. Crossan, a liberal scholar who
doesn’t believe in the bodily resurrection, “That he was crucified is as sure as
anything historical can ever be.”[5]

2) Jesus’ tomb was empty

There are 3 main arguments for believing that the tomb of Jesus was empty:
○ Jerusalem factor
The early Christian movement was established in Jerusalem, which
was the scene of the crucifixion. It would have been almost impossible
for Christianity to begin in Jerusalem if the body were still in the grave.
Also, early church fathers spent very little effort on trying to prove that
the tomb was empty, making one believe that there was very little
contention on this point.
○ Independent and Enemy Testimony
Jewish and Roman sources both testify to an empty tomb. According to
some of these sources, the Jewish authorities at the time accused the
disciples of stealing the body.
○ Testimony of women
The New Testament accounts declare that women were the first to
discover the empty tomb. As the testimony of a woman was not as
highly regarded as a man, especially with the more serious the issue,
it would have been a very odd invention for the writers of the New
Testament to make women the first witnesses, that is, unless it was a
true account.

3) The disciples had experiences they believed were the literal

appearances of the risen Jesus

Nearly all scholarship agrees that the disciples believed that they had
experiences of the risen Jesus that transformed their lives. As a result, the
disciples transformed from frightened, hiding individuals to bold witnesses
of the resurrection. They were willing to endure suffering, persecution, and
martyrdom (it is widely believed that all but one disciple was martyred). Luke
 Johnson, a New Testament scholar at Emory University, writes, “Some sort
of powerful, transformative experience is required to generate the sort of
movement earliest Christianity was”.[6]

We are all familiar with plenty of zealous supporters of various causes,

religious or political, willing to die for their beliefs. But this doesn’t begin to
approach what we have with the early followers of Jesus. They were willing
to die over an empirical claim, having insisted that they had seen Jesus alive
after he had died by brutal execution. They pointed to many “infallible” proofs
and were willing to endure martyrdom over their eyewitness testimony.

4) A skeptic and a foe had experiences they believed were the literal
appearances of the risen Jesus

Both Paul, Saul of Tarsus, a Pharisee, and James, Jesus’ brother, were
unbelievers before the resurrection of Jesus. They both became believers
after separate experiences that they believed to be the risen Jesus, following
Jesus’ crucifixion. Neither one had good reason to convert!

There are of course many different ways to explain the established historical facts,
and many skeptics have tried, from grave stealing, faked death, and hallucinations,
but none of the alternative explanations sufficiently account for all established
historical facts (see Habermas and Licona’s book, referenced above, for a
discussion). So until there is an alternative theory to the events surrounding the
alleged resurrection that provides a better explanation, the best explanation remains
a literal resurrection.

Clue 9: The resurrection of Jesus may be extremely difficult to explain in

natural terms, but it nevertheless seems to be the best explanation of the
historical evidence. Couldn’t the God of the first 8 clues be sufficiently capable
of such a feat?

So now that we have presented a case for the resurrection of Jesus, it seems logical
to ask: Why would God use such a gruesome symbol of sacrificial love? T. Keller
explains:

“The Cross is not simply a lovely example of sacrificial love. Throwing your
life away needlessly is not admirable—it is wrong. Jesus’ death was only a
good example if it was more than an example, if it was something absolutely
necessary to rescue us. And it was. Why did Jesus have to die in order to
forgive us? There was a debt to be paid—God himself paid it. There was
a penalty to be born—God himself bore it. Forgiveness is always a form of
costly suffering.”[9]

Explaining the role of the Cross further, T. Keller writes:

 "Christianity not only leads its members to believe people of other faiths have
goodness and wisdom to offer, it also leads them to expect that many will live
lives morally superior to their own. Most people in our culture believe that, if
there is a God, we can relate to him and go to heaven through leading a good
life. Let’s call this the “moral improvement” view. Christianity teaches the very
opposite. In the Christian understanding, Jesus does not tell us how to live so
we can merit salvation. Rather, he comes to forgive and save us through his
life and death in our place. God’s grace does not come to people who morally
outperform others, but to those who admit their failure to perform and who
acknowledge their need for a Savior."[9]

Beauty of God and Happiness of Man

In a previous section, we briefly mentioned the appeal of hedonism from a
Naturalistic worldview. The influential 17th Century French mathematician, physicist
and philosopher Blaise Pascal summarizes our innate drive to be happy:

"All men seek happiness. This is without exception. Whatever different means
they employ, they all tend to this end. The cause of some going to war, and
of others avoiding it, is the same desire in both, attended with different views.
The will never takes the least step but to this object. This is the motive of
every action of every man, even of those who hang themselves."[13]

This article has methodically developed, what I hope is, some plausible pointers to
the existence of the Christian God. However, if we are built with an innate drive to be
happy, where is God in the picture? C.S. Lewis proposes that self-seeking hedonism
is only half the story. He speaks of something more and something that goes way
beyond the all too commonly projected label of dogmatic, stoic and self-righteous
Christianity:

"The New Testament has lots to say about self-denial, but not about self-
denial as an end in itself. We are told to deny ourselves and to take up our
crosses in order that we may follow Christ; and nearly every description
of what we shall ultimately find if we do so contains an appeal to desire. If
there lurks in most modern minds the notion that to desire our own good
and earnestly to hope for the enjoyment of it is a bad thing, I submit that this
notion has crept in from Kant and the Stoics and is no part of the Christian
faith. Indeed, if we consider the unblushing promises of reward and the
staggering nature of the rewards promised in the Gospels, it would seem that
Our Lord finds our desires, not too strong, but too weak. We are half-hearted
creatures, fooling about with drink and sex and ambition when infinite joy is
offered us, like an ignorant child who wants to go on making mud pies in a
slum because he cannot imagine what is meant by the offer of a holiday at the
sea. We are far too easily pleased."[11]
Christianity hence makes the extremely bold claim that God made us with an
insatiable desire for more of Him, to find our contentment and joy in Him. To desire
after anything else is to confuse the beauty of the creation with the magnificence of
the creator. J. Piper clarifies this point:

“God means for us to be stunned and awed by his work of creation. But not
for its own sake. He means for us to look at his creation and say: If the mere
work of his fingers is so full of wisdom and power and grandeur and majesty
and beauty, what must this God be like in himself!”[14]

We may have lost all interest in worshipping the creator, and even acknowledging
his existence, but we can’t shake our innate vocation to be glory seekers and
admirers of things, just look at the way our society is attracted to and celebrates the
famous, talented, and attractive. T. Keller even goes as far to say that we are all
worshipers:

“Our need for worth is so powerful that whatever we base our identity and
value on we essentially 'deify.' We will look to it with all the passion and
intensity of worship and devotion, even if we think ourselves as highly
irreligious.”[9]

Clue 10: A God that gave us deep desires intends for us to fulfill them but
through and by him...

Final Word
Hopefully you have found the combination of these clues to be thought provoking
and it has helped you ask some of the big questions of life that we are often too busy
to contemplate. The goal of this article is to point out that there are plenty of good
reasons to believe that the God of the Bible is plausible. As R. Brault says:

“If Creation were a crime, would not God be the prime suspect?”[3]

It’s important to note however that these clues are really just pointers to God (and I
certainly wouldn’t argue that they constitute anything close to irrefutable evidence).
As T. Keller states:

“Reason can get you to probability, but only commitment can get you to
certainty.”[8]

Intellectually coming to terms with the existence of a Christian God is an important

step, but it is not the essence of Christianity. Christianity in essence is centering your
life on Christ -- trusting, relying on and treasuring him. This comes through realizing
that you are ignorant of his ways, turning from that which has hurt others and that
resists and rebels against his sovereign rule in your life, receiving Jesus as your
Lord and Savior, and then letting him slowly but surely transform you into something
beautiful in his eyes, which is developed in intimate relationship with him. Let me
finish with a quote from R. Harding Davis:

“For, after all, put it as we may to ourselves, we are all of us from birth to
death guests at a table which we did not spread. The sun, the earth, love,
friends, our very breath are parts of the banquet... Shall we think of the day as
a chance to come nearer to our Host, and to find out something of Him who
has fed us so long?”[17]

Bibliography
1. Acts 17:23, New Revised Standard Version Bible, 1989.
2. Author unknown, circulated in an email.
3. R. Brault; Thoughts on the Existence of a Creator; http://www.robertbrault.com/2009/
04/thoughts-on-existence-of-creator.html
4. R. Collins interviewed by R. L. Kuhn in “Does a Fine-Tuned Universe Lead to
God?”—the 15th episode of the "Closer To Truth" TV series.
5. J. D. Crossan; Jesus: A Revolutionary Biography; HarperOne 2009.
6. L. T. Johnson; The Real Jesus; HarperSanFrancisco, 1996.
7. I. Kant; Kant: Political Writings (Cambridge Texts in the History of Political Thought);
Cambridge University Press; 2nd edition, 1991.
8. T. J. Keller; "Reasons for God" lecture; Authors@Google; 5 March 2008.
9. T. J. Keller; The Reason for God: Belief in an Age of Skepticism; Dutton, 2008.
10. C. S. Lewis; Mere Christianity; HarperSanFrancisco, 2001.
11. C. S. Lewis; The Weight of Glory; HarperOne, 2001.
12. C. Milosz; Discreet Charm of Nihilism; The New York Review of Books, 45, 18,
November 19, 1998.
13. B. Pascal; Pensées; Nabu Press, 2010.
14. J. Piper; The Pleasures of God; Multnomah Books, 2000.
15. A. Plantinga; Warrant and Proper Function; New York: Oxford University Press,
1993.
16. Psalm 19:1, New Revised Standard Version Bible, 1989.
17. Quote attributed to Rebecca Harding Davis.
18. J. R. W. Stott; Basic Christianity; Inter-Varsity Press, 2008.
19. P. Yancey; The Jesus I Never Knew; Zondervan, 2002.