Which God Is Really God?

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Everybody has some idea of some kind of god or something ultimate that takes the place of a god. But we may not be conscious or able to communicate just how we think and feel. And we naturally subscribe to what we’ve been taught or exposed to. We may feel critical, suspicious, or insecure of any new concept.

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At any rate, understanding how different people see things is an important part of education and helps us understand and relate to others. We don’t have to hate people just like us because they disagree with us--they might be right about things we’ve never considered. And since the opposite of true is false, it’s impossible opposing views can all be right or correct. The eight worldviews below is generally what people believe but may differ in details.

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No God, Only Man Himself

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Persons who say there’s no kind of God, divine revelation, or miracles can be known as atheists, humanists, socialists, naturalists, materialists, nihilists and antitheists. They believe only the material universal is eternal, that everything evolved by chance over time and that they alone are truly reasonable and scientific. They say religious belief in a personal ethical God is only a figment of human imagination.  

I have four serious problems with atheism. First, it destroys human dignity making us only evolving animals made from soulless dirt that return to dirt without dignity, rights, or accountability. If survival of the fittest is the only ultimate law, human conscience, absolute laws and guilt feelings don’t make sense. Fulfilling self-desires alone makes sense.

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Next, atheism destroys any absolute standard of morality and incentive to live what persons generally call a moral life. Theft, rape and murder can be fulfilling, can make us prosperous, and can eliminate persons we dislike or disagree with. There can be no higher ethical standard than our individual finite, fickle, conflicting desires and preferences. This leads to chaos and anarchy. The consequence is might makes right, state control and some strongman with deceptive promises and plans usurping power and deciding who lives and dies according to his arbitrary will. It results in a terrorist world.

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Third, atheists are unwarranted to deny the existence of God. Unless we have exhaustive knowledge of all space and time we simply can’t say, there’s no God. And if God were an immaterial Spirit, He cannot be seen under a microscope or viewed through a telescope. Nor can atheists logically show that existence of both God and evils are contradictory, so that if evils exist, God doesn’t. God may have reasons for allowing evils such as human freedom and dignity.

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Finally, science and reason doesn’t support atheism and in fact strongly affirms God’s existence. The law of cause and effect is that every effect must have and adequate cause and that something can’t come from nothing. So the universe must be the effect of a self-existing infinite powerful unchanging intelligence we may rightly call God. The universe’s expansion, its running down, its fine tuning, and the fact that we can’t backtrack eternally are  facts that point to a beginning and a Beginner who is a self-existent, immaterial, unchanging, infinite intelligence we may rightfully call God. 

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Pantheist God

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 Pantheists believe that the whole universe of energy is god. And this energy takes recurring cycles and every form such as galaxies, stars, gods, planets, plants, animals and man. It’s like the waves of the sea that forever rise and return and any separate thing is really illusion--all is one mass of energy. Man’s ignorance is that he doesn’t realize he is god or a part of universal energy. Thus, ultimately, sense experience, logic, life, death, pain, good, evil are all illusion. History has no meaning, and life and the world no great purpose. The pantheist’s hope is to be set free from the recurring cycles and be finally absorbed into the impersonal energy of the universe where all such illusion ceases. This is the general worldview of Hinduism, Buddhism, Taoism, New Age, Transcendental Medication, Christian Science, Unity and some philosophers in the West.

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Many difficulties confront pantheists. They claim reason cannot give us information about god but use reason to deny characteristics of god. They claim the world is illusion, but can’t explain how the illusion originated. And if it’s illusion, they don’t even exist to make the claim. Their claim they are god doesn’t make them any different, better, or more powerful than anyone else. They can’t avoid acting as though the world is real—they take baths, wear clothes, and look in the mirror and before crossing streets. They experience pain, sickness and death like everyone else. Ultimately, human life is absorbed into the energy of the universe making human dignity, compassion, ethics, and achievements mean nothing.

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Polytheist Gods

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Ancient kingdoms such as the Babylonians, Assyrians, Greeks, Romans, Norse, Hindus and modern Mormons believe in many finite gods. These gods usually have their own domain and fight among themselves to gain power and territory. They are not ultimate but derived from nature somehow. Polytheists are persons of divided loyalties and urges who may project their desires upon things of nature. They reject control of an all-embracing Creator to devise their own truth and morality. Gods and goddesses are popular in pantheistic religions among persons who want a more personal god and not just an abstract principle.

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I have several problems with polytheism. There is good evidence for one Creator and Sustainer. Logically there can be only one absolute. Nothing in nature is absolute and worthy of our worshipful devotion since nature had a beginning and will end. It’s not wise to focus on present desires and ignore future realities and death’s possibility. The Ebla Tablets found in Syria show people originally believed in one personal Creator.  

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Finite God

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A finite God is limited in some way such as in power, knowledge, wisdom, goodness or love. Persons feel that if the infinite God of biblical faith existed, he would have never allowed the evils in the world. They overlook the possibility that God may have good reasons unknown to us for allowing evils. If God is infinite, it seems he would eliminate them in his way in his time. Besides, wouldn’t eliminating human evils destroy our freedom or destroy imperfect us?

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Panentheism is a new religious philosophy that follows the philosophy of Plato and Alfred North Whitehead. They’re enamored with evolution and want a more tolerant God to accommodate contemporary opinions. They assume a position between pantheism and Christianity. They imagine God has two poles with one being real and the other potential. God is the cosmic spirit that indwells the universe like a soul exists in the body. So both the world changes God and God changes the world. It’s contradictory and a changing God leaves us with no sure knowledge of God, ethics, or hope for life after death. Unfortunately, so-called open theism theologians are influenced by it.

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Deist God

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Deists believe God created the world with its natural laws and left it to work on its own. Some believe in an afterlife, others don’t. They deny miracles and divine intervention, which seems strange when creation is the greatest miracle of all. Further, if God made man a rational, moral being in his image, it seems he would want human relationship.

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Muslim God

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Islam means submission and a Muslim is one who submits to Allah (God). Like Christians, Muslims believe in an infinite, ethical, sovereign, Creator God and in angels, demons, Heaven and Hell. Islam is based upon the Quran that Muhammad said the angel Gabriel revealed to him while alone in a cave and the Hadith that is traditions about the life of the prophet. Muslims divide the world into Muslim and non-Muslim with the goal to convert the world to Islam even if by force. Muslims claim that Muhammad is the final seal or authority having come after Jesus. They believe the Christian Trinity is blasphemy and that Jews and Christians corrupted God’s Word that Muhammad corrected. Amazingly, Muhammad said that Jesus was a prophet, virgin born as Adam, the Word of God, the Jewish Messiah, without sin, performed miracles and will come again. But Jesus did not die for sinners on a cross and was not God.

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While Christians respect Muslim’s right to their beliefs, it’s difficult to see any sure basis for their beliefs. Muhammad first thought the angel a demon until his wife convinced him he was God’s final authoritative prophet. Without witnesses, can’t anyone say an angle revealed God’s Word to them? Joseph Smith Jr. in fact did later than Muhammad did. Admitting Jesus was without sin and performed miracles, Muhammad confessed he needed forgiveness and when challenged to prove himself a prophet by performing a miracle he could not. Both Jews and Christians rejected Muhammad as a prophet because he wasn’t accurate in his Bible teachings. Numerous discrepancies exist between the Bible and the Quran though Jews and Christians were extremely carefully copping their scriptures hundreds of years before Muhammad’s birth. Present translations agree with ancient copies over 90% of the time. And the Trinity of one God in three personal distinctions is mentioned in the writings of the church fathers and in three famous Christian creeds before Muhammad’s birth. Numerous evidences prove Jesus died on the cross and arose from the dead. Islam simply is without foundation.   

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The Judeo-Christian God

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There’s no good reason why a universe’s Creator cannot take on a human nature and body if he has reason to do so. Jesus is a real person of history who fulfilled a multitude of ancient Jewish prophecies with odds astronomically against it, unless he was God as he claimed. Furthermore, he showed he was Lord over sin, nature, disease, demons and death. Jesus promised to save anyone who will humbly acknowledge his or her sin and trust him for everlasting life. No other world religion or philosophy can offer forgiveness, cleansing, purity and his forever-abiding presence. Won’t you say, “Jesus I trust you as my Savior and Lord today” and mean every word?

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