Because of this, she often asks really good questions from the perspective of an open, truth-seeking observer.

One such question came from something she has experienced on occasion. Something that many of us have admittedly dealt with unfortunately. Without getting into the weeds, she noted encounters with people who seem to rob you Monday through Saturday, then go to church on Sunday.

In so many words, she asked the common question:

If Christianity is truly transformative, why are many Christians hypocrites?

Don’t Blame Beethoven

The hypocrisy objection is common. And to be fair, this challenge is only merited because Christians engage in immoral behavior like everyone else.

It can be hard for people to accept the truth of Jesus if those who follow Him still fail so egregiously. But there is something that needs to be recognized when it comes to this objection.

The truth of something is not determined by those who fail to live it out.

Consider for a moment the majesty of a deep pink and orange sunset. This is something most would consider beautiful. Now imagine I come along and attempt to paint it. I am a terrible artist and would likely choose all the wrong colors, use terrible brushstrokes, and create a painting that is overall ugly and unappealing.

Seeing my finished result, you would not say, “Wow, sunsets are ugly.” You would rightly recognize that I failed to capture the beauty of it.

In the same way, there will be Christians who fail to reflect Jesus appropriately. In fact, we all fail to reflect Him to a degree. If we didn’t fail, we wouldn’t need Jesus to be our Savior in the first place.

But our failure to represent Jesus perfectly does not mean that what Jesus taught was wrong. It does not mean Jesus is not true.

Don’t Throw the Baby Out

Many are familiar with the adage, “don’t throw the baby out with the bath water.” Likewise, we can’t throw out the truth of what Jesus taught or did just because His followers don’t live out that truth perfectly.

That said, if faith in Christ is truly transformative, we do need to account for why some Christians still act so poorly. Furthermore, why is it that some non-believers act in ways that appear morally superior to churchgoers?

First: We must recognize that just because someone goes to church does not mean they are actively trusting Christ in their lives. James addresses this point head-on in Scripture when he writes, “even the demons believe-and shudder” (James 2:19).

Belief that is much different than belief in.

Simply knowing that God exists and going through the motions is not the same as placing your trust in Him and allowing Him to transform you.

Second: The Church has been responsible for revolutionary good around the world.

For example, the moral framework of Christianity was pivotal in the abolition of open slavery.1 The Church has also been instrumental in the formation of hospitals.2 Christians also consistently rank among the most charitable groups.3

Thus, it cannot be said that the Church is not engaged in transformative good, because it clearly is.

But beyond large-scale impact across the world, countless lives marked by addiction, anger, and brokenness have been radically changed through a genuine relationship with Christ.

Third: The brokenhearted often have an easier time finding Christ. In contrast, those who appear to have their lives together by modern standards often struggle to recognize their own shortcomings and needs.

But those who have hit rock bottom, who have been brought low and recognize their own brokenness, often have an easier time admitting they cannot save themselves.

As C. S. Lewis states:

God whispers to us in our pleasures, speaks in our conscience, but shouts in our pains: it is His megaphone to rouse a deaf world.4

Don’t Judge Incorrectly

I was born around the same time as LeBron James. I am a decent athlete, but I am in no way suited to be a basketball player. My hand-eye coordination isn’t great, I’m average height, and I’m not particularly fast. I can almost guarantee that if I had the best basketball coach in the world training me since age five, I would still be dominated in a game of one-on-one by LeBron.5

Despite that likely truth, no one in their right mind would say, “Well, I guess that means coaches are pointless.”

LeBron is tall, he’s fast, he has great hand-eye coordination, and more. It’s a simple fact that his natural starting point is lightyears ahead of mine.

Knowing this, it would be silly to compare me, even with phenomenal coaching, to LeBron to determine if coaches are effective. Instead, you would need to compare my efforts without a coach to my efforts with a coach. Or, at the very least, compare me to someone with a similar starting point.

Likewise, it is unreasonable to compare a non-Christian who grows up in a stable home, for example, with an orphan who had no parental direction and later turns to Christ.

If someone falls from a two-story building, we rightly recognize that they will most likely require more medical attention than someone who simply trips off a curb.

And so, we must recognize that the Church is not a country club for saints. It is a hospital for sinners who are working through different levels of brokenness. Sinners who realize they can’t heal themselves. Sinners who need a Savior to change their heart from the inside out in various ways.

Don’t Be Led Astray

Scripture makes one thing clear: there is great accountability for those who lead others astray in their walk toward Christ.

In fact, Jesus considers it so serious that He states:

“…it would be better for them to have a large millstone hung around their neck and to be drowned in the depths of the sea” - Matthew 18:6

Just because hypocrisy can occur in the Church, like everywhere else, does not mean it is condoned or simply brushed off by Christians. The damage it causes in leading others astray is fully recognized.

And when it occurs, it should be fully reprimanded.

But we must judge Jesus by Jesus, not by those who fail to reflect Him properly. And we must not let the presence of hypocrites erase the reality of genuinely transformed lives.

We are all broken vessels with different starting points, Christian or not. But sincere followers are walking in step with Christ, working toward a life that better reflects His ideal. Yes, Christians will fail at times, but the difference is that we are actively asking God to transform us from the inside out.

So when someone says the Church is “full of hypocrites,” the honest response is:

“Of course it is, because it’s full of people who know they need to change. But hey, we’ve got room for one more!”

There is a happy ending to this story, but before we get there, I want to point out something many people ask in moments like these:

Why does God seem so hidden?

We are called to trust in an immaterial God whom we cannot see, especially when we need Him most. This is one of the primary reasons many atheists object to God’s existence. They argue that if God truly exists and is all-loving, He would reveal Himself more overtly so that people would have an easier time believing.

But this objection falls flat when we apply it consistently to other areas of life.

For one, we cannot see gravity, yet we know it exists through its effects. Likewise, loving parents do not reveal everything to their young children. They often shield them from certain realities, not out of a lack of love, but an abundance of it.

Though none of us are in a position to determine how overt God should be, we can recognize that belief in God remains fully rational despite the hiddenness objection.

With that in mind, it is still wise to consider why God might choose not to reveal Himself more plainly.

Understanding the reasons for alleged divine hiddenness not only strengthens our faith, but may even make us grateful.

Clearly Perceived

The book of Romans makes one thing very clear: God’s invisible qualities, His eternal power, and His divine nature are clearly seen in the world around us.1 No one has an excuse to reject God and claim they did not know. God’s existence is evident through the effects we observe all around us.

It is through these effects, some of which I explore in other articles, that we can reason back to God. For example, if murder is always wrong, in all circumstances, then there must be a moral standard outside ourselves that grounds that truth. Thus, we can reason back to a transcendent moral standard giver.

But beyond what God reveals in nature, we also have overwhelming special revelation. These are specific moments in history, documented in Scripture, when God has revealed Himself more overtly to move forward His plan of redemption and restoration.

He Can Only Woo

Even accepting that God is perceived through nature, reason, and special revelation, we often find ourselves wanting more. We strongly desire to see God plainly for ourselves, especially in moments of suffering.

Yet here lies the challenge.

God created us not to be robots, but to love Him and to love others. But love must be given freely, or it is not love at all. Love that is forced, mandated, or coerced is a logical contradiction.

Most of us can remember times as children doing questionable things when our parents were not around. Things we would never have done if they were present. Of course, we still wanted to steal cookies from the jar, but their presence alone was enough to stop us.

How much more overwhelming would it be if an infinitely powerful God suddenly appeared before us in His full glory? What real choice would remain to freely choose Him?

Our acceptance of Him would be coerced. Our ability to freely love, which is the very thing God desires, would be removed before we even had the chance to decide whether we love Him or not.

Our finite will stands no chance against the infinite power of God.

Thus, as C. S. Lewis puts it:

God “cannot ravish; He can only woo.”2

God cannot logically overpower our free will and at the same time preserve our freedom to choose. So instead, He remains perfectly accessible, yet not overwhelmingly revealed, allowing us to examine the evidence of His glory and freely decide whether we will accept or reject Him.

But one day, just as a parent reveals more to their children when they are ready, God will reveal Himself fully to those who have freely chosen Him, sealing that choice for eternity.3

This future event is known in Christian theology as the Beatific Vision.

Divine Mercy

Though God does not overpower our free will, we must recognize that there are moments in history when He has revealed Himself more overtly than usual. These are rare times when God performs unmistakable miracles, speaks audibly, parts seas, and more. Many people ask why God does not do these same things now to make it easier to believe.

While this may sound appealing at first, it is wise to step back and consider what that would actually mean.

First, witnessing miracles does not guarantee a change of heart. The people of the Exodus witnessed astonishing miracles, such as the parting of the sea. Those alive during the time of Jesus witnessed impossible healings and even people raised from the dead. It is difficult to imagine a more overt revelation of God without crossing the line into overpowering someone’s free will.

Yet what happened after these acts of God occurred? Did everyone bow down and immediately believe?

Certainly not! The Israelites quickly forgot what they had seen and began worshiping a golden calf almost immediately. The people who witnessed the great miracles of Jesus flat out rejected and crucified Him.

Seeing miracles, no matter how extraordinary, will not ensure change in those who want to define their own gods.

Second, when people receive greater revelation of God through special acts, and still reject Him, the judgment due becomes far more severe. Their excuses diminish, and they are held to a much higher standard of accountability.

Consider these heavy words of Jesus:

“And you, Capernaum… if the miracles that were performed in you had been performed in Sodom, it would have remained to this day. But I tell you that it will be more bearable for Sodom on the day of judgment than for you.” — Matthew 11:23–24

Seek Me and You Will Find Me

A few days after our daughter’s heart stopped, we returned to the doctor for a procedure to have her lifeless body removed from my wife. But right before the operation began, I felt an overwhelming conviction that I can only describe as coming directly from the Holy Spirit. I needed to ask the doctor to check for life one last time, just in case.

The doctor, having good bedside manners, obliged us to put our minds at ease. But as he began, the ultrasound revealed something amazing.

My daughter was alive! Her heart was beating, and no one could explain it.

Maybe she was alive the whole time, and all of us looking at the original ultrasound were collectively mistaken. Maybe the first ultrasound machine glitched. Maybe she was really dead and God truly resurrected her, as I firmly believe.

I cannot know for certain. But what I do know plainly is this: I was given a clear conviction to ask the doctor to check one last time. Had I not listened, my daughter would not be getting her license right now, 16 years later.

Yet I will admit something. Even after experiencing firsthand what I believe to be the greatest act a parent could witness, the restoration of a child thought to be dead, I still fail daily. I was still a lukewarm Christian for a decade after that moment. I still did not fully recognize the depth of God’s providence in that experience.

Reflecting on this now, I consider it a mercy that I do not continually see overt acts or manifestations of God. I know I would still fail, even after such incredible revelation. I am, like all of us, absolutely hopeless without a Savior. Yet God still loves me enough not to give up on me. He loves me enough to willingly take upon Himself the justice I deserve.

That is more than enough for me now.

“Because you have seen me, you have believed; blessed are those who have not seen and yet have believed.” — John 20:29

It is interesting. So often we demand that the all-powerful Creator of the universe meet us on our terms. Yet perhaps the question is how we can meet Him on His.

The evidence for God is clear. If we seek Him earnestly, we will find Him. It may not happen on our terms or in our timing, but God desires all people to be saved and to come to the knowledge of the truth.4

So continue seeking with all your heart, and consider it a blessing when the evidence leads you to conviction, without need for overt special acts.

This is especially common when biblical passages addressing slavery are brought into the discussion. Frequently taken out of context, these areas of Scripture are used to accuse the God of Christianity of moral failure. The mindset is that because the Bible provides regulations for slavery, it must therefore endorse the American chattel version of it.

But the reality of what Scripture says is far different from what critics claim.

Punishable by Death

American chattel slavery was fueled by the Transatlantic Slave Trade between Europe, Africa, and the Americas. This global trade network resulted in the forced kidnapping and enslavement of millions of Africans, often through capture and sale by members of their own region.

It was a horrific atrocity, and one the Bible explicitly condemns. In fact, under Mosaic law, the biblical punishment for this practice was far more severe than anything that currently exists in American law today.

“Anyone who kidnaps someone is to be put to death, whether the victim has been sold or is still in the kidnapper’s possession.” (Ex 21:16)

The moral revulsion toward this practice is unmistakable in Scripture. It was not to be tolerated. By this standard, those involved in the foundation of antebellum slavery in the American South would have stood under a sentence of death.

Indentured Servitude

Though many do not realize it, we live in the richest society that has ever existed in human history. In America, those we consider below the poverty line often have shelter, electricity, running water, and even a phone. For most of human history, however, this was not the case.

During biblical times, people were often so poor that survival itself was a daily uncertainty. In many cases, the only way to eat and have shelter was to voluntarily place yourself under indentured servitude.

This is where much of the confusion around slavery begins. The Bible condemns man-stealing by making it punishable by death, yet it also regulates what appears to be slavery shortly after.

That tension feels strange largely because many modern Bible translations still use the heavily loaded word slave. For the modern American reader, indentured servant would be a more accurate term for what Scripture is often describing.

Indentured servitude was common throughout history and it was not unique to biblical times. In fact, the majority of white immigrants to the British colonies arrived as indentured servants.1 In colonial America, many people contracted themselves out to work in households for a set period of time so they could repay their debts and earn passage to the New World.

This form of servitude is often what’s referenced and regulated in the Bible, particularly in the Old Testament. While other passages do address different circumstances, such as those taken after war, these areas are meant to serve as a protection mechanism. In a world where annihilation of one’s enemies was the norm, regulated servitude functioned as a restraint on human brutality.

These regulations were meant to limit abuse and preserve human dignity in a very broken world.

They were certainly not a divine moral stamp of approval however.

Description is Not Prescription

Even with the distinction between American slavery and indentured servitude, many people remain uneasy. It still feels wrong, and the associated corporal (physical) punishment regulated by Mosaic law in the Old Testament seems harsh.

Anyone who beats their male or female slave with a rod must be punished if the slave dies as a direct result, but they are not to be punished if the slave recovers after a day or two, since the slave is their property. Ex 21:20-21.

It can be hard to stomach why God did not simply condemn the practice outright, and instead allowed Moses to regulate it.

But this discomfort usually stems from two related mistakes. First, it misses the broader point of the biblical narrative. Second, it confuses descriptive passages with prescriptive ones.

The Bible is not a moral propaganda piece. It is a historical account of humanity repeatedly rejecting God’s perfect moral standard and redefining good and evil for themselves. The Old Testament is, quite literally, a record of civilization failing again and again.

Its overarching message is that humanity is utterly hopeless without a savior.

Thus, the Bible is not prescribing how we are to accumulate or treat servants today. It is not instructing us to physically punish those we employ. Rather, it is describing how Israel governed and judged matters related to an already existing practice in the ancient Near East, at a specific moment in history, placing protections on the most vulnerable where none would otherwise exist.

That is not how the story ends, however.

It Was Not Meant to Be This Way

Any system that denigrates others is a clear violation of God’s moral standard. Jesus Himself makes this apparent when we look at how He discussed Old Testament regulations. Though often cited as a passage related to divorce, the overall weight of what Jesus is saying applies far beyond marriage.

In a discussion with the Pharisees, they attempt to trap Jesus on the subject of divorce. They ask whether it is lawful for a man to divorce his wife for any reason, hoping to force Him into misinterpreting the law of Moses. But Jesus exposes the flaw in their thinking. They were confusing civil regulation with moral approval. They were treating a concession to human brokenness as though it reflected God’s ideal.

Jesus responds:

Moses permitted you to divorce your wives because your hearts were hard. But it was not this way from the beginning. Mt 19:8

The point is unmistakable. The existence of a law regulating a broken practice does not mean God endorses that practice. Regulations exist because human hearts are corrupt. They exist to limit damage, not to declare something good. If human hearts were righteous, we wouldn’t need laws in the first place as shown in 1 Tim 1:9-10.

While it would be convenient if the Bible directly addressed every moral issue as it appears in our modern cultural context, Scripture instead reveals something deeper. It exposes the root problem beneath every age and every system.

A reckless heart, a disregard for life, and a willingness to place desire over responsibility. Scripture is aimed at the disease, not just the symptoms.

The immoral behavior may change across cultures, but our broken condition does not.

One In Christ

The Bible’s laws do not present slavery as morally good. They acknowledge a fallen reality and place restraints on a human evil at a specific point in history. From the very beginning Scripture affirms that all people possess equal dignity and worth. Not because of social status or utility, but because they are made in the image of God.

This truth stands in direct tension with every system that treats human beings as property. The Bible affirms this in the New Testament, very clearly in Paul’s letter to Philemon, where he calls for Onesimus to be received back no longer as a slave, but as a brother in Christ.

Yet even today, there are more slaves in the world than at any point in human history. An estimated 40 million people currently live under some form of it; a number that exceeds the entire nineteenth century.3

Sadly, despite the Christian West’s localized victory over slavery, the pattern continues to worsen globally. Humanity has not come any closer to morally saving ourselves.

We still need a savior and always will.

Thankfully, God did not leave us to our devices. That Savior came in Christ Jesus. And in Him, human divisions collapse because dignity is not earned, revoked, or negotiated. Dignity is in our very nature as creatures made in His image.

Through Him and Him alone, the ultimate ideal, God’s ideal, will be realized.

The discussion around biblical slavery deserves much deeper study. My goal here is not to address every specific objection or to exegete every verse often taken out of context, but to help readers understand the broader framework in which these passages appear.

For many, this is enough to reconcile the issue. For those who still struggle and wish to explore the topic further, Paul Copan writes extensively on the subject in “Is God a Moral Monster?” and its follow-up, “Is God a Vindictive Bully?”

The book pointed to the account of Zelophehad’s daughters, claiming that God changed His mind about a sexist law that was unjust. But the Bible never presents God as revising a flawed law in this narrative. Rather, it shows God giving Moses guidance on how to handle a civil matter he had little experience with.

After digging a bit deeper, it became clear that this study book was not rooted in sound theology, but instead geared toward promoting a progressive agenda influenced by process theology.

In short, process theology is the view that God changes with the times.1 It is a dangerous belief that runs contrary to the clear teachings of Scripture and thousands of years of supporting tradition.2 It is also how some justify calling biblically immoral behavior now good.

Unfortunately, process theology is easy to fall into if one is never taught about God’s unchanging nature. When we come across verses that appear to show God changing His mind, it can quickly push someone toward a process theology framework.

But consider the implication of a changing God. If God can change, then our salvation is no longer secure. God could evolve, decide He made a mistake in saving us, and instead send us to the justice we deserve.

That is a very unsettling thought.

God’s Immutability

Both Scripture and sound reasoning support what is known as God’s immutability. Immutability is the term used to describe God’s unchanging nature. It is clearly laid out in places like 1 Samuel 15:29, which states, “…for God is not a man, that He should change His mind.”

God’s immutability is also self-evident in light of His other perfect attributes. Since God is perfect and all-knowing, no new information could ever be presented to Him that would cause Him to change His mind.

That is why we must let Scripture interpret Scripture, reading more difficult passages in light of clearer ones. If Scripture plainly teaches that God does not change His mind, then when we encounter texts that seem to suggest otherwise, we should pause and examine them more carefully.

So with that, let’s unpack some of these common tension points.

Abraham’s Intercession

A friend on Substack recently pointed to Genesis 18 as a good example of God appearing to change His mind. In this narrative, Abraham pleads with God to spare Sodom from judgment. God tells Abraham that if he can find just 50 righteous people in the city, He will spare it. What follows is a back-and-forth negotiation in which Abraham appears to convince God to spare the city if he can find just 10 righteous people.

But given what we know about God’s immutability, we should ask: why does this read as God changing His mind, if God’s mind cannot change?

If we continue into the next chapter, the answer becomes clearer. There are not even 10 righteous individuals in Sodom. Instead, we find an entire town intent on sexually violating the guests of Abraham’s cousin Lot.

Unfortunately for Sodom, Lot’s guests were actually God’s angels. Judgment soon follows, and God rains down burning sulfur, destroying Sodom.

God, in His perfect knowledge, already knew Sodom’s fate. He was not changing His mind from persuasion by Abraham. Rather, the dialogue serves as a means by which God reveals both His justice and His mercy. It draws Abraham into an intercessory relationship with Him.

God could have simply stopped the conversation and said, “I will spare the city if you find even one righteous person.” But instead, God chose to graciously engage Abraham in a way that unfolded on Abraham’s terms, revealing His character along the way.

God’s Regret

Another example that causes confusion is when Scripture describes God as expressing regret. In Genesis 6:6–7, God regrets making man on the earth before bringing judgment through the flood. God also expresses regret over making Saul king after Saul turns his back on Him in 1 Samuel 15:11.

It is important to recognize that regret (or sorrow) does not necessarily mean a change of mind. Regret can reflect grief over the outcome without implying that the original decision was wrong.

I used to compete at a higher level on American Ninja Warrior and I continue to hold the world record for most rope skips on a slackline as of this writing. But those achievements came at a cost. It took a lot of falls and injuries to get there.

While I certainly regret the lingering physical pain I now endure, I would not change the decisions that led to it. They were the necessary means to achieve the goal I had set.

God is governing a world filled with free agents who often reject Him. In His perfect knowledge, He is bringing about the best possible outcome despite our failings.

So nothing about God expressing regret or sorrow when we reject Him, indicates that He has changed His mind about us.

Repentance and Divine Relenting

In the book of Jonah, we see a declaration that God’s judgment is coming upon Nineveh. But when the Ninevites hear this, they repent and turn from their violent ways. God then relents from the disaster He had declared, and He spares them.

This may be the strongest example of what appears to be God changing His mind, but it misunderstands our relationship to Him.

God does not change His mind, but He does change His treatment of people as they change in relation to Him. When we move from rebellion to repentance, our position before God shifts from justice to grace.

The change is in us though, not in God.

Imagine a fixed pillar. If you walk from one side of the pillar to the other, the pillar has not moved. You have. Likewise, if it is raining outside and you step under cover, the rain did not stop or change. You simply placed yourself in a new position of protection.

In the same way, God remains constant in His decree while our standing in relation to Him changes due to our own choices.

The Ninevites, by repenting, moved themselves from a position of justice on one side of the pillar to a position of grace on the other.

God is perfectly just and must punish evil. But He is also perfectly merciful and saves us when our hearts truly turn toward Him. Thus, when we place our trust in Jesus’ sacrifice, we voluntarily move from being under God’s justice, which we deserve, to being under God’s grace, which we do not.

It is not that God’s mind has changed about our sin. It is that our hearts and minds have changed toward Him, allowing us to receive His grace.

The Challenge is Our Perspective

Our finite minds are limited. We have no way of fully comprehending the infinite glory of God. Because of that, when we speak about Him, we use comparative language we can understand.

When Proverbs 15:3 speaks of the eyes of the Lord, we know this does not mean God has physical eyes. It is language accommodated to our understanding.

Likewise, when Scripture describes what appears to be God changing His mind, we must remember that these narratives are written in ways we can grasp. Because of this, they need to be interpreted in light of the clearer passages that explicitly reveal God’s unchanging nature.

God knows the end from the beginning. He stands outside of time. What appears to us as change from our vantage point has been eternally known and decreed by Him from eternity.

God cannot change in His perfection, His nature, or His mind, for change would imply that He lacks something. But God lacks nothing.

And because of that, when God decrees a promise from eternity, such as our salvation in Christ, we can have confidence that it will stand forever despite our own brokenness.

He is our solid foundation. For that, I am deeply grateful.

What best explains this pattern?

Did rushing water randomly arrange the rocks during a heavy rain? Did an animal somehow stack them just right? Or is the most reasonable explanation that another hiker deliberately placed them there to create something meaningful?

Most people do not hesitate. You likely reached a conclusion the moment you saw it.

You did not need a geological survey or scientific analysis to form your conclusion. You identified instinctively that a clear and meaningful pattern points to a mind, and most likely determined a person arranged the rocks. This is how we naturally reason. When we encounter complex and recognizable arrangements, we recognize intention.

We see evidence of intention everywhere. Cities, buildings, artwork, finely crafted watches, and even simple arrangements of stones all point back to a mind behind them. This matters, because if the universe itself is the product of a mind, then we should expect to see similar clues at a much greater scale.

What we find is surprising. The universe is structured with an extraordinary level of exact precision that far exceeds anything humans are capable of. The deeper we look, the clearer it becomes that this kind of precision is not what we expect from chance alone. It looks far more like the work of an immensely powerful architect.

The Fine-Tuning of the Universe

Spacecraft navigation is absolutely incredible. Human minds have figured out how to launch technology from one moving object in space toward another millions of miles away. The precision involved is so tight that even a tiny fraction of a degree can cause a spacecraft to miss its destination by thousands of miles. But while that level of exactness is impressive, it does not even come close when compared to the precision required of the universe itself to harbor life.

Scientists over the years have identified roughly 140 principles, sometimes called anthropic or fine-tuning principles.1 These are conditions, many of them built into our universe, that if even a hair’s breadth different would render life impossible. Many of these values are set with such an extremely low tolerance that they are difficult to fathom.

Let’s take a look at just a few of these principles to demonstrate just how fine-tuned our universe is to allow for life.

Force of Gravity

Apart from keeping us grounded to the Earth, gravity governs how matter pulls together to form stars and galaxies.

If gravity were slightly stronger, stars would be too hot and would burn out too quickly. But if gravity were slightly weaker, stars would never ignite at all, and heavier elements could never be produced. In either case, life would be impossible.

The force of gravity has a precision of just 1 part in 10^34. That’s a huge number representing a 10 followed by 34 zeros. This tolerance is equivalent to adjusting gravity by less than one inch on a ruler the size of the entire universe.2

Strength of the Strong Nuclear Force

The strong nuclear force holds atomic nuclei together. It must be exactly 10^40 times stronger than gravity.3

If this force were any stronger, hydrogen could not exist in the universe. But if it were any weaker, only hydrogen could exist. In either case, the chemistry required for life would be impossible.4

For comparison of the size of this number, only ~10^20 seconds have elapsed since the universe began.5

The Cosmological Constant

The cosmological constant governs the rate at which the universe expands. It has an even more impressive precision of 1 part in 10^120.6

If this value were slightly larger, the universe would expand too rapidly and matter would never clump together. If it were slightly smaller, the universe would have fallen in on itself. In either case, no structure and no life could exist.

For perspective on the size of this number, there are only ~10^70 atoms in the entire known universe.7

Initial Entropy of the Universe

Initial entropy describes how evenly energy was distributed at the very beginning of the universe. If it were even slightly different, the universe would either be too chaotic or too uniform for stars, galaxies, or life to form. In either case, a life-permitting universe would be impossible.

It has an unfathomably low tolerance of 1 part in 10^10(123).8

Math isn’t for everyone, so to help visualize this number, imagine every atom in our universe represents a trillion trillion trillion entire universes the same size as ours. Now imagine being blindfolded and selecting one specific atom on your very first try among those many universes.

That is the impossible level of exactness involved.

Clearly Perceived

For many, the evidence of design is undeniable. Atheist astronomer Fred Hoyle even noted that the facts suggest “a super intellect has monkeyed with physics, as well as chemistry and biology, and that there are no blind forces worth speaking about in nature.”9

Even pop culture is beginning to reflect these principles. In the sitcom Young Sheldon, the boy-genius Sheldon draws on them in a heartfelt exchange as he tries to help his mother with her faith during a season of doubt.

I highly recommend watching the 3-minute clip if you have a few minutes.

CREDIT: Warner Bros. Television (WBTV)

Romans 1:20 tells us that God’s eternal power and divine nature are clearly perceived through what has been made, so that no one can honestly say they did not know. The discovery of our fine-tuned universe is simply one more example of this truth.

While the fine-tuning of our universe may not stand on its own as direct evidence for the God of Christianity, it certainly corroborates the broader case. As Young Sheldon says, it “makes it logical to conclude there is a creator.” This shows, once again, that faith in God is not based in a blind belief, but a deeply reasoned trust.

God is the best explanation of why anything exists at all.

What makes the fine-tuning of our universe especially striking is how it puts human achievement into perspective. We marvel at the things humans build. Advanced technology, engineering, and design often leave us impressed with our own abilities. Yet even our most exact creations operate within margins that are laughable compared to the razor-thin tolerances built into the universe itself.

The deeper we look into our universe, the clearer the contrast becomes. What we create reflects limited minds working within an already prepared world. What the created universe reflects is a level of precision, order, and intentionality that points beyond us entirely.

Not to blind luck, but to a mind far greater than our own.

When discussing the truth of Jesus, many skeptics will state that “the Bible is full of contradictions.” This charge is aimed squarely at the credibility of Scripture itself. If the Bible cannot be trusted, then the primary source through which we know Jesus is called into question, possibly weakening one’s faith.

The moment can quickly become unsettling if a skeptic follows up by confidently citing a specific example. If you are unprepared for such an encounter, you will be left humbled.

For that reason, this objection is a favorite tactic among those seeking to deconstruct people’s faith. It exploits a real imbalance as most people have not been taught how the Bible was transmitted, how to evaluate these alleged contradictions, or how to respond when left unsure.

Yet, while such challenges sound decisive upon first hearing, they become less impressive, and sometimes even humorous once you understand the problems with them. What initially appears forceful usually collapses under basic historical awareness, literary context, and a clearer understanding of how Scripture actually functions.

Nothing New

Before responding to this challenge, it is important to keep a couple of things firmly in mind. Christianity has endured nearly two thousand years of criticism. When someone like an online influencer claims to have found an alleged contradiction in Scripture, they are not uncovering some new or profound discovery. The collective mind of the Church has been engaging these challenges to Scripture far longer than any of us have been alive.

It is also important to recognize that you are not a human search engine. You will not be able to immediately answer every specific example someone throws at you. That is okay. A momentary inability to respond does not mean an objection is valid, nor does it mean the issue has never been addressed. In most cases, such challenges have been examined and answered multiple times throughout history by people far more capable than we are.

That said, by understanding a few foundational facts as well as how alleged contradictions are evaluated, you can be far better prepared to engage these challenges with confidence.

Typically when one launches a contradiction claim, it focuses on one of two areas.

Manuscript Variations

One type of contradiction claimed is that there are variations in the Biblical manuscripts. This objection does not attack what the Bible says, but rather the differences found among the thousands of early manuscripts we use to translate and construct our modern Bibles. Before the printing press, scribes copied texts by hand so they could be distributed throughout the ancient world. Anything handwritten is obviously more prone to copyist error.

Because of this, you may hear the claim that there are over 400,000 contradictions in the New Testament manuscripts alone. The goal of this statement is to pressure someone into concluding that we cannot know what the biblical authors originally wrote, because there are too many errors among the copies. While the variation claim itself has a basis, the conclusion of unreliability that follows has no merit.

Consider this adapted demonstration from Don Stewart and Joseph M. Holden.1 Read the two sentences below and note their structural differences

• YOU HAVE WON A MILLION DOLLARS

• THOU HAST WON $1,000,000

In terms of raw text comparison, these sentences share a very low similarity score of about 10%. Every character that does not match between sentences is a difference. Yet everyone immediately understands that while the physical text is dissimilar, they communicate 100% of the same message. Textual discrepancies are not the same as meaning discrepancies.

Biblical manuscript copies face a similar situation. Scribes copying texts, often in low light conditions, were bound to make spelling and punctuation mistakes. This accounts for the vast majority of copyist variations. In addition, because we possess an enormous number of manuscript witnesses, we should actually expect a higher total variation count. This truth is not an argument against reliability; it is an argument for it.

Because so many copies exist, errors are far easier to identify. A mistake in one manuscript typically stands out when compared with the wide range of other manuscripts available to us. This abundance of evidence is what allows Bible scholars engaged in textual criticism, the discipline devoted to reconstructing the original wording of a text, to work with exceptional confidence.

Even in the small number of passages where scholars do continue to debate the precise original wording, no essential Christian doctrine rises or falls on the outcome. Moreover, most modern Bibles will actually note these areas for you with phrases such as “some early manuscripts do not include.”

As Stewart and Holden note:

Greek scholar A. T. Robertson pointed to a preservation accuracy of approximately 99.9% for the New Testament, a rate unmatched by any other document from antiquity.

Bart Ehrman, a New Testament scholar who rejects Christianity, even acknowledges that the vast majority of manuscript variations have no meaningful impact on the overall message of the text.

That level of reliability is remarkable.

Narrative Contradictions

Another type of claim often raised involves narrative details. These are usually harder to address on the spot because they tend to rely on very specific examples, often ones you may be hearing for the first time. Most people will not be able to answer these immediately, and that is okay.

A common example is the account of the angels at the tomb of Jesus in the Gospels. John 20:12 describes two angels at the tomb, while Matthew 28:2–5 describes only one. At first glance, this can appear to be a contradiction. However, Matthew never says there was only one angel present. He simply centers the narrative on the angel who speaks. Moreover, it never fails that where there are two of something, there is always at least one. This is not a contradiction, but a complementary difference in narrative focus, where Matthew is simply focused on the angel who spoke.

We should actually expect such differences if the accounts were not the product of collusion. Independent sources, shaped by different backgrounds, audiences, and literary purposes, naturally recount the same events from distinct yet complementary perspectives.

In other cases, objections rely on passages being lifted out of their proper context. The differing genealogies of Jesus in Matthew and Luke are a popular example of this. Skeptics often point to the two differing lineages as if they represent an error, without first considering that genealogies can be traced in more than one legitimate way. Each of us has more than one ancestral line, after all. We all have two parents, four grandparents, and so on. The line you choose to trace depends on the purpose you have in view.

While the historical details are certainly worth examining, the widely held view is that Matthew, writing to a Jewish audience, emphasizes royal succession through David’s kingly line, whereas Luke, writing with a broader Gentile audience in mind, traces physical descent to underscore Jesus’ connection to all humanity.2

Differences in emphasis are not contradictions. They reflect distinct purposes meant to convey different aspects of the account. What is often labeled contradictory evidence is in fact complementary evidence that provides a fuller picture of the events.

Scripture Cannot Be Broken

It is important to remember that we can be confident in our Bibles. Jesus Himself affirmed that “Scripture cannot be broken” (John 10:35). The fact that it has stood victorious through two thousand years of scrutiny, criticism, and attempted dismantling supports just how right Jesus was.

Even with that confidence, it is wise to continue studying so that we are better prepared to respond to criticism. At the same time, we must remember that none of us is all-knowing, and we will not have an answer ready in every moment.

But if you are willing to put in a bit of work, and build a basic understanding of how the Bible functions, its historical context, and the common misunderstandings behind many alleged contradictions, you will find that your confidence grows rather than shrinks. A little effort goes a long way.

But either way, you can stand firm in your faith, not because you have mastered every objection, but because the foundation it is built upon is solid.

Note: Trusted study Bibles and commentaries are excellent tools for addressing challenges in Scripture, as they supply the broader historical, literary, and theological context surrounding the text.

Many of us have been there. Maybe it’s an argument, and three hours later you’re replaying it in your head, finally coming up with the perfect rebuttal on the drive home. Or maybe you’re twenty comments deep in a back-and-forth with a stranger online. You know it isn’t a productive use of your time or energy, yet your desire to defend truth keeps pulling you in. Instead of walking away, you let it consume you, distracting you from weightier matters.

This is honestly a major flaw of mine, and it’s why I have deleted most social media apps. I struggle to resist returning every arrow that’s fired my way. Instead of stepping back to assess the battlefield, I fixate on each individual shot, reacting rather than advancing.

Asking For Help

I recognized long ago that I cannot overcome this flaw on my own. For some time now, I have been asking God to help me shed this weakness, so that I may be more effective in my service to Him.

Thankfully, an “aha” victory moment came when I engaged with an article written by Darwin to Jesus (DTJ). DTJ is a Christian apologist who had just published a strong rebuttal to an atheist on the subject of morality.

After publicly commenting to let him know I found his argument well-articulated, I somehow got pulled into a back-and-forth with the very people DTJ had been addressing. The exchange eventually became unfruitful, and though I wisely stepped away, my mind continued to ruminate for hours afterward, right on cue.

So, I reached out to DTJ to ask how he deals with it, especially given his growing audience and the constant arrows aimed in his direction. I wanted to know how he remains engaged without appearing like he’s avoiding criticism. How does he successfully refuse to be pulled into endless exchanges?

To my surprise, he responded quickly.

When you have a family like I do and you are making content, you cannot be sucked down into the weeds with people all the time. You have to know when to cut the bait... If I engaged with everyone simply because they disagreed with me, I would have no time for anything else.

He was exactly right, and I appreciated being reminded of this bluntly. Then he offered a simple piece of advice that revealed something important.

It is okay to let them have the last word.

After chewing on this, I soon realized that when I don’t have the last word, my mind continues engaging an imaginary opponent. But when the last word is mine, and there are no objections left to answer, I find peace. That was the insight I needed.

My battles for truth are quietly morphing into battles to calm my mind. Continued disagreement is no longer about defending what is right, but a search to quiet my own discomfort with what feels unresolved and beyond my control.

DTJ pointed me in the right direction, but I still had work to do. I needed to understand how to break this cycle, which I could now see a bit more clearly.

After some time in prayer, I was led to explore the writings of Augustine, who also seemed to wrestle with mental rumination.

Augustine’s Restless Mind

St. Augustine of Hippo, who was foundational in the early church, wrote his work Confessions around 400 AD. When he wrote it, he was not a young convert still sorting things out, but a brilliant and mature Christian leader reflecting honestly on his inner life. His tenth book is a beautifully woven confession about restless memory.

During his confession, Augustine makes several profound conclusions that directly address the tension I have been feeling.

Why seek those to hear from me what I am: who will not hear from You what they themselves are?

They love truth when she enlightens, they hate her when she reproves.

These words capture the fallen human condition with remarkable precision. I am certainly guilty of hating hard truths in the moment. Often, I simply need time to reflect and allow the seed to germinate before I am willing to concede that I was wrong.

But still, even knowing that the seeds I plant may take time, I couldn’t understand why those unresolved moments left me with an immediate sense of moral discomfort. I did my duty after all, defending truth to the best of my ability.

In the words of Augustine:

Woe is me! Lord, have pity on me. My evil sorrows strive with my good joy, and on which side is victory, I know not.

I was comforted reading his struggle, and seeing myself in it. But I still needed answers. Thankfully I was tipped off to see what Thomas Aquinas had to say on the subject next.

Thomistic Wisdom

Thomas Aquinas is arguably one of the most brilliant theologians and Christian apologists to have ever lived. I was thrilled to discover that he wrote extensively on the subject of correcting and engaging with others. Was I finally on to something?

What I uncovered was a brilliant distinction between matters of justice and matters of charity. I learned we often feel that every injustice or bad take demands a personal response, as if doing nothing would be morally wrong. But in some cases, that is simply not true.

Consider the following example.

As a parent, if my child is caught doing something wrong, justice demands that the behavior be addressed, and that responsibility falls squarely on me. Correction is not optional because I have both authority and obligation.

But if I see a video of another child doing something wrong in another state, justice still recognizes that a wrong has occurred. What changes is my role. I am not the parent. I do not have authority, and I am not responsible for that child’s formation. In that case, correction is no longer a demand of justice placed on me. Any response I offer would be an act of charity, not obligation.

And charity must always be exercised wisely. As Aquinas observes, there are times when refraining from correction is the wiser course, especially when acting would cause more harm than good.

Using our parenting example above, imagine if I spent my mortgage payment on a plane ticket to travel across the country and correct the child in the video. Setting aside the likelihood of the police being called on me, I would also be neglecting the family I have a primary responsibility to care for.

Scripture is clear that our love must be ordered. In fact, Scripture teaches that failing to provide for one’s own household places a person in a position worse than an unbeliever.

In reading this, I came to understand why we often feel so passionate about defending truth. We have a God-given moral obligation to bear witness to it. But that obligation is not universal. It does not mean we must engage every person in every forum imaginable at the detriment of our primary responsibilities. That obligation must be governed by careful judgment.

And sometimes that means recognizing that someone is morally wrong, while being at peace with silently stepping away to higher priorities.

There it was, the key I had been missing for so long. I had felt unsettled by what remained unresolved in the battle for truth, because I was treating charitable corrections as matters of obligatory justice. It carried the crushing weight of a false moral demand I could never hope to fulfill.

Once I understood this, my outlook changed. Charity, by its very nature, must be given freely and wisely. We are called to give joyfully, with purpose and thanksgiving. We are not called to give destructively or recklessly.

Rules of Engagement

To be clear, I am not advocating that we stand down in the fight for truth. On the contrary, I believe it is the most important thing worth fighting for. But learning discernment allows us to fight more effectively.

It ensures we don’t miss the forest for the trees.

I will be honest, I still have work to do. I will likely always struggle with mental replay to some degree, relying on God to overcome my shortcomings (as He often intends). Like Augustine, I am helpless without Him. But learning from those far wiser than myself has made one thing clear: if I am to grow and become more effective as a warrior for truth, I must learn to discern when action is required as a matter of justice and when it belongs to charity, given freely when it serves a wise purpose.

When that distinction is clear, the weight lifts. I am free to act decisively when justice demands, and equally free to remain silent when charity would be wasted.

If you read Does the Big Bang Replace God?, then you already know where this reasoning leads. If the universe itself had a beginning, what caused it?

This line of thinking is commonly referred to as the Cosmological Argument for God. In its simplest form, the argument looks like this.

1. All things that begin to exist require a cause.

2. The universe has a beginning.

3. Therefore, the universe has a cause.

But this conclusion alone only gets us so far. While it shows that the universe has a cause outside itself, how do we know a single personal God is that cause? What if some impersonal natural force is responsible?

This is where the Cosmological Argument truly begins to shine. Not only does it point to a personal God as the beginner of the universe, it also leads us to conclude that God must be one. And while Scripture certainly affirms this conclusion, we can arrive at it entirely through reason alone.

The Chain Must End

We know through scientific discovery that the universe had a beginning, often called the Big Bang. Interestingly, thinkers from antiquity, such as Saadia and Al-Ghazali, were able to reach this same conclusion long before modern science existed.1 They did so by identifying a logical problem known as infinite regress.

An infinite regress is simply the idea of an endless chain of past events. The problem is straightforward. You cannot cross an infinite distance. For example, if time had no beginning, then an infinite amount of time would have had to pass before reaching the present moment. But if that were the case, we would never arrive at now, because infinity has no starting point.

To help visualize this, consider the following demonstration. Imagine a vertical tube. The bottom of the tube represents the beginning of time. The top of the tube represents this exact moment. Each ball dropped into the tube represents a unit of time. It could be a minute, an hour, or an eon. The length does not matter.

As the balls are dropped, they fall to the bottom of the tube where time begins and stack on top of one another. Over time, the stack grows higher and higher until it reaches the top of the tube, which represents this exact moment.

Pretty simple right?

But here is the problem. If the tube had no bottom, and time had no beginning, then the balls would never reach the top. The stack would never form. The present moment would never arrive.

Yet here we are. That tells us something important. Time did not go on forever into the past. It had a starting point.

This challenge is not limited to time alone. It applies to all events, reactions, and motion. We can see this clearly in human birth. Every person comes from someone else. You have parents, who had parents, who had parents before them.

But no matter how far back you trace your family tree, it cannot go on forever. If there were no first humans, then no humans would exist today. Each generation depends on the one before it, and that dependence exists all at once.

The point is not just that things began long ago, but that what exists now depends on something else right now as well. In the same way, the universe cannot be explained by an eternal chain of dependent events, nor by an endless sequence of universes popping into existence.

Eternally Frozen

If an endless chain of events is impossible, then there must be a first cause that initiates everything, one that is by necessity eternal and uncaused. But how do we know this uncaused first cause is God, rather than some impersonal natural force?

The answer is simple. Nothing without a mind can set itself into motion.

To help visualize this, imagine a long line of dominos, perfectly stacked and ready to fall. They have been sitting there for all eternity, completely still. No matter how long they sit, nothing happens. They remain frozen until something outside the chain acts on the first one. Unless one of the dominos has a mind and decides to topple itself over, it is clear they cannot start themselves.

So even if all the matter around us were eternal, motion itself must have had a starting point. Mindless forces cannot initiate motion on their own. They only act when conditions already exist.

If you are not convinced, feel free to look at this picture of eternal dominos and wait for them to move on their own. You may be waiting a while.

God Is Both Personal and One

The above examples show that there must be an uncaused first cause that both starts everything and does not depend on anything else. This is because an endless chain of events (infinite regress) is impossible. We have also seen that this cause must be personal (with mind), because mindless things do not act and start motion on their own.

Now, for some, it might be tempting to imagine multiple gods working together as the eternal first cause. But that idea quickly runs into trouble. If one god has something another lacks, then none of them is truly ultimate. And if none of them is ultimate, then the explanation still isn’t complete. At some point, reality requires a single source that lacks nothing and depends on nothing else.

Think about this in sports terms. If one athlete is better than another, it is not just a brute fact. There is an external standard of performance that both athletes are measured against. Perhaps its a low time, a high score, or even the most knockouts. The better athlete is always the one who more closely meets that external standard. But the standard itself is never the athlete. It stands above them, as the higher measure by which all athletes are judged.

The sum of this reasoning leads us to a single, ultimate source of all reality. One that does not lack love, power, justice, knowledge, or anything else. One that depends on nothing outside itself. One whose very nature is existence itself, and who stands as the final explanation for why anything exists at all.

What we find at the end of this reasoning is not an abstract force or an impersonal mechanism. We find a single, personal source behind everything that exists. One that lacks nothing and depends on nothing. This is exactly the God Christianity proclaims. Not some impersonal force or a god among others, but the one true God from whom all things come.

“For by him all things were created, things in heaven and on earth. All things have been created through him and for him. He is before all things, and in him all things hold together.” Colossians 1:16–17

It’s a memorable illustration. But because it resonates so well, skeptics love to use it as a quick objection to the Bible, often stating things like:

The Bible has been translated and re-translated through multiple languages over thousands of years, so the original message is inevitably lost.

Many devout Christians even share this concern. I have seen plenty of people cling to older Bible translations, such as the standard King James Version (KJV), which was released in 1769.1 They often do so in the hope that it is better preserved, even though the archaic wording can be challenging for most modern readers.

No offense to my KJV lovers out there.

The desire is certainly noble, as every believer should want a Bible that reflects what the original authors actually wrote. However, the telephone sentiment comes from a misunderstanding of how reliable modern translations are made and the incredible manuscript evidence behind them.

Modern Bible Translation

Contrary to popular belief, our Bibles are nothing like a game of telephone. While it’s true that newer translations often consult older ones, any translation worth its weight works directly off the original written languages and the oldest manuscripts available.

Take the New Testament, for example. It is the most well-attested collection of ancient documents in existence, with over 5,700 Greek manuscripts alone that scholars can reference when producing a translation.2 To put that into perspective, much of what we know about Julius Caesar comes from The Gallic Wars, which is preserved in roughly 250 manuscripts.3

No other ancient document even approaches the Bible’s level of textual preservation and reliability.

When translators create a modern Bible, they are not relying solely on the accuracy of previous English or near language versions. They are examining the ancient manuscripts written in the original languages themselves.

Why Are There So Many Versions?

Even knowing that our Bibles are made using ancient manuscripts, many Christians still naturally wonder why we have so many English versions available. The simple fact that we have so many options certainly fuels the telephone accusation.

This confusion arises, because most of us are not taught translation philosophy.

Translating the Bible can be challenging, because ancient words and ideas don’t always convert well into modern language. Thus, different translations aim to accomplish different goals.4

• Formal Equivalence Translation
  This method focuses on word-for-word accuracy from the original languages. The tradeoff is wording that may be slightly less smooth, but more closely reflects the structure of the text.
  Examples: NASB, ESV, LSB, NKJV

• Functional Equivalence Translation
  This method focuses on conveying thought-for-thought what the original authors meant. The tradeoff is less adherence to the original linguistic structure, but smoother and more natural flow for today’s reader.
  Examples: NLT, GNT

• Balanced Approaches
  These translations aim to strike a healthy balance between formal and functional translation methods.
  Examples: NIV, CSB

Each Bible translation accomplishes something unique, which is why it is generally wise to consult multiple translations when working through challenging passages. If you’re ever unsure about a particular version, here’s a neat open secret most people don’t know: if you flip to the first few pages of a printed Bible, you’ll usually find a preface explaining the translation philosophy used. This is the why and how behind that translation.

And if the printed preface doesn’t give the full picture, nearly every major translation has a website that goes even deeper, detailing the specific manuscripts used, the translation committee involved, and the guiding philosophy behind their work.

Which Version Should I Read?

Choosing a Bible translation can feel overwhelming, especially since people tend to be very opinionated on the topic. A helpful rule of thumb is not to limit yourself to just one translation. Different translations emphasize different aspects of the text, and comparing them can often bring clarity. That said, there is nothing wrong with having a preferred version for daily reading.

If you’re unsure where to start, your pastor is one of the best people to ask. They know you, your stage of spiritual growth, and how Scripture is taught in your church.

If you don’t yet have a church, I strongly encourage finding one. In the meantime, the free YouVersion Bible app is a great tool for exploring and comparing reliable translations in one place.

A Word of Caution

Be on guard against unorthodox versions, such as the Watchtower Organization’s New World Translation (NWT). This version, used by Jehovah’s Witnesses, was not produced using standard scholarly methods and intentionally alters key passages to diminish the deity of Jesus.5 Such translations are often easy to identify. Their advocates typically claim that all other Bible translations are corrupted, rejecting the broader field of biblical scholarship which encourages comparing multiple versions.

Your Bible is Trustworthy

Whichever version you prefer, the important thing is this:

You can trust that modern Bible translations faithfully reflect what the original authors wrote. The Bible you hold today is not the product of a confused game of telephone, but a carefully preserved document. One that God has guarded for millennia so His Word could reach you and millions of others.

What versions do you prefer to read?

This conclusion rests on an assumption rather than discovery. It maintains that only natural explanations can be trusted. But when that assumption is set aside, a very different picture emerges.

Advances in science continuously point toward the God of Christianity, not away from Him.

One clear example of this is the discovery of the Big Bang. In short, the Big Bang theory holds that the universe had a beginning.1 Multiple lines of evidence support this conclusion, such as the Second Law of Thermodynamics, expansion of the universe, cosmic background radiation, and Einstein’s theory of general relativity. Taken together, these discoveries strongly indicate that the universe is not eternal, but had a definite starting point.2

In The Beginning God Created

I will admit something that still embarrasses me. In my youth, I rejected the Big Bang outright. I assumed that if the Big Bang caused the universe, then God must not have.

By rejecting the Big Bang, I thought I was protecting my faith, but in reality I was shielding it from evidence. I was operating from fear rather than confidence. As I grew older, I began to recognize a simple truth. If God is real, then the natural world He created will ultimately point to Him, even if some aspects remain mysterious. I should not run from reason, but toward it.

That realization became especially powerful in light of the very first words of Scripture.

“In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth.” Gen 1:1

If this statement is true, then a universe with a beginning is not a problem for Christian belief. It is exactly what we should expect. Science did not uncover a contradiction to Scripture. It uncovered something remarkably consistent with it. How did I not see this sooner?

What surprised me most was discovering how many others share my earlier misunderstanding. Many have been led to believe that the Big Bang somehow disproves God, when in fact it does the opposite. Rather than explaining God away, it corroborates the Biblical account and continues to raise the very question modern science cannot answer on its own.

Why does anything exist at all?

The Law of Causality

According to the law of causality, nothing can be its own cause. Everything that has a beginning requires an external cause outside itself.3 This principle is largely self-evident, which is why I would venture to say you have probably never witnessed someone giving birth to themselves.

When we apply the law of causality to our universe, some important conclusions follow. These takeaways help make up what is known as the Cosmological Argument for God.4

The Universe Requires a Beginner

1. All things that begin to exist require a beginner.

2. The universe has a beginning.

3. Therefore, the universe has a beginner.

The Beginner is Beyond Space, Time, and Matter

1. The universe is space, time, and matter.

2. Nothing can be the cause of itself.

3. Therefore, the cause of the universe must exist beyond space, time, and matter.

The Beginner is Powerful

1. Causing an entire universe requires immense power.

2. The universe exists.

3. Therefore, whatever caused the universe must be immensely powerful.

The Beginner is Supernatural

1. The universe is what we call nature.

2. Nothing within nature can cause nature itself.

3. Therefore, whatever caused the universe must exist beyond nature. That is what we call supernatural.

What, or who, does a spaceless, timeless, immaterial, powerful, supernatural cause sound like to you?

For Christians, the discovery of the Big Bang aligns remarkably well with what Scripture has always claimed about God.

But What Created God?

At this point, a common question is often raised. “If nothing can cause itself, then what caused God?” This question, however, is a category mistake.

The law of causality does not show that everything needs a cause. It shows that anything which begins to exist requires a cause. If something does not have a beginning, the law of causality does not apply to it.

The God of Christianity is described as the uncaused, first cause. He is the source from which all things come and the one upon whom all things depend. Scripture affirms this clearly. Hebrews describes God as existing before creation and remaining unchanged, while Revelation declares Him to be the one who is, who was, and who is to come.

In Exodus, when God speaks to Moses from the burning bush and declares, “I AM WHO I AM,” He is revealing His eternal and uncreated nature. God does not come into being. He simply is. He depends on nothing outside Himself for existence.

Einstein’s Blunder

Albert Einstein, like many scientists of his time, believed the universe was eternal. The universe itself was thought to be the uncaused eternal reality. God was unnecessary.

When Einstein’s own equations began pointing toward a universe with a beginning, he introduced a mathematical constant which preserved the idea of an eternal universe. The constant later proved to be incorrect, and Einstein eventually abandoned it. The ordeal is now famously referred to as his “greatest blunder”.5

This episode illustrates an important truth. Even brilliant minds do not always follow the evidence wherever it leads. Often, evidence is filtered through deeply held assumptions about what is and is not allowed to be true.

As further discoveries continued to support the Big Bang, scientists were forced to confront a profound implication. If the universe had a beginning, then it could no longer be the ultimate explanation for our existence.

One prominent scientist captured the moment with remarkable clarity.

While reflecting on the implications of modern cosmology, Robert Jastrow, a religious agnostic, astrophysicist, and the founding director of NASA’s Goddard Institute for Space Studies famously wrote:

But as the child grows, something changes. They begin to reason more clearly about the world. They notice that their choices have real consequences, and that understanding what’s true matters if they are to make good decisions. Trust without some understanding is no longer enough. They want good reasons for their choices.

Christian faith often develops in a similar way. Many people come to faith because they are convicted that life points beyond itself, even if they cannot yet explain why. That kind of journey into faith is not invalid, but if faith is never explored, it can feel shaky when hard questions come.

Such hard questions often push us to search for answers, yet each answer can open the door to new questions. This is where many people find themselves asking something deeper and more personal. “How can I be sure God exists?”

Give Me Proof

It is important to begin by saying this clearly. Faith in Christ is not blind or irrational. Christianity is supported by substantial evidence from history, archaeology, science, and philosophy—evidence we will examine here over time. It is hands down the best explanation for reality given the evidence. Whether or not you are personally familiar with these powerful arguments, they exist, they are accessible, and they deserve serious consideration.

Yet for many, even after they encounter the strongest evidence for God, a lingering doubt often remains.

“But how can I be 100% certain?”

What many people are really asking for is technical certainty. They want absolute proof where every possible doubt is removed, every objection is answered, and no unanswered questions remain. In other words, they desire perfect understanding.

Some desire perfect understanding to quiet the doubts they feel guilty about, while others demand it before they’ll admit to what is plainly true: that God exists.

The problem is that this standard is neither realistic nor practical to live by. We do not use it anywhere else in life, and if we tried, we would be unable to make even the most basic decisions. Total proof is not how rational belief works.

We Don’t Base Our Lives on Proof

If you read What Is Truth?, you may remember the idea of the radical skeptic. This is the person who is never quite satisfied, no matter how much evidence is offered. There is always another question to ask, another doubt to raise, another reason to hold back.

But here is the problem. No one actually lives this out.

Even the most skeptical person still gets up in the morning, eats food, drinks coffee, and makes decisions that assume certain things are true. Moreover, they always seem to be very certain about their own skepticism. In practice, complete skepticism is impossible.

That is because none of us base our lives on proof. We base our lives on evidence.

Before you eat a meal, do you stop and prove that your food is not poisoned or that your water is not tainted? Of course not. Sure, it is possible that someone could poison your food, but you eat without checking because the evidence of past experience has shown the people who prepared it to be trustworthy.

This kind of trust is not foolish or blind. It is how human beings were designed to make decisions. If we demanded absolute proof for everything, we would never act at all. We would test our food in a lab to see if it was poisoned, then test the lab itself to be sure it was accurate, then test the test that tested the lab, and so on without end until we died of starvation.

At some point, we must stop testing and start living.

Where Reason Leads and Faith Begins

None of us can achieve technical certainty or perfect understanding. That is simply part of being human. And because of that, every decision we make rests on some degree of faith. We all look at the finite evidence available and choose how to respond.

This is important to remember, because if you demand absolute proof before believing or acting, you will never be satisfied. That does not mean we should avoid hard questions or stop seeking honest answers. On the contrary, Christianity invites scrutiny. We should absolutely build a rational and well reasoned case for Christ. But we must also be careful not to let unanswered questions become an excuse for paralysis.

Conviction of truth does not require omniscience (knowing everything).

We are not infinite beings. Only God is omniscient. Our lives are not long enough to eliminate every remaining doubt, and waiting for that level of certainty would prevent us from ever committing to anything that truly matters.

So how can you be sure God exists when doubts arise?

Lay your doubts out to God as they come. Then examine the evidence honestly and carefully. Follow reason where it leads without fear, because if God is real, then truth will always lead to Him. Having done that, recognize that belief ultimately involves a final step of reasoned trust, guided by a conviction that God Himself gives when you earnestly seek Him (Isa 1:18; Jer 29:13; Jn 16:5-11).

We all battle with doubt at times. For that reason, one of my favorite Bible verses comes from a distraught father asking Jesus to help his son. It sums this whole struggle up perfectly, because of how relatable it is.

When Pilate questioned Jesus, it became clear He was not seeking to overthrow the government. Jesus told Pilate that His purpose was to testify to the truth, and Pilate openly acknowledged that he found no guilt in Him.

Yet Pilate was trapped between truth and convenience. He knew Jesus was innocent, but he also understood his responsibility to Rome. He was tasked with keeping the occupied Jewish population under control, even as they aggressively demanded Jesus’ blood. Confronted with that tension, Pilate chose a familiar path.

He asked Jesus a simple question: “What is truth?”

Without waiting for an answer, Pilate turned and walked away. He publicly declared Jesus innocent, yet still handed Him over to be brutally executed by crucifixion.

Like so many today, Pilate asked a question not to discover truth, but to avoid knowing it and the accountability that follows. Instead of choosing what was right and accepting the personal cost, he stepped away from truth altogether and the responsibility that knowing it demands.

Evading the Obvious

Truth, properly defined, is not mysterious or elusive. Truth is simply that which matches reality.

Truth is not complex, profound, or hidden behind layers of abstraction. And yet, like Pilate, many in our modern age engage in forms of false intellectualism. Forms that sound sophisticated on the surface, but function primarily as a way to avoid accountability to what matches reality.

One common example is the belief that “truth cannot really be known.”

This mindset, known as radical skepticism, typically does not lead people toward truth, but away from it. No matter how much evidence is presented, there is always another question to ask, another doubt to raise, another way to evade what is plainly before them.

Anyone who has spent time with a young child has experienced this. The child asks what is initially believed to be a sincere question. You provide an answer, only to be met with “Why?” You answer again and are met with another, “Why?”

You explain again. “Why?”

At some point it becomes obvious that the child is no longer seeking understanding. The repeated “Why?” questions are not leading anywhere; they are simply delaying accountability (or trying to annoy you).

Captives of Bad Philosophy

Such mindsets do not arise from careful reasoning. Rather, they are rooted in bad philosophy that does not clarify truth, but instead obscures it. Scripture actually warns against this:

“See to it that no one takes you captive by philosophy and empty deceit, according to human tradition…”

Paul is not condemning the pursuit of wisdom or rational thought. Both Jesus and Paul were masters of reason. A healthy degree of skepticism, for example, is necessary otherwise we would fall victim to every scam on the internet. What Paul warns against are extreme mindsets that sound insightful but quietly sever truth from reality and accountability.

And this warning matters, for if Jesus really is the way, the truth, and the life, then rejecting the very meaning of truth is not merely philosophical—it carries eternal implications.

When Ideas Defeat Themselves

The good news is that you don’t need a philosophy degree to spot bad worldviews. Most of them collapse on their own once you learn to recognize self-defeating beliefs.

Self-defeating beliefs are ideas that fail by their own rules. They can be tested by asking simple questions that reflect the claim back on itself. If answering the question creates a contradiction, the belief defeats itself and should be rejected.

Examine how easily the dominant bad philosophies of our culture unravel when they are tested against their own standard.

Skepticism

Skepticism is the view that no one can really know what is true.

Claim: “There is no truth.”
Response: “Is that true?”
Result: If the claim “there is no truth” is true, then at least one truth exists. The claim collapses and should thus be rejected.

Claim: “We can’t know what’s true.”
Response: “Can we know that claim is true?”
Result: If we can know that claim is true, then at least one truth is known. The claim again collapses.

Relativism

Relativism is the view that truth is just a matter of each person’s opinion.

Claim: “Everyone has their own truth.”
Response: “Is that true for everyone?”
Result: If yes, then there is at least one shared truth, which defeats the claim. If no, then the claim doesn’t apply to me.

Claim: “You shouldn’t judge others.”
Response: “Is that a judgment?”
Result: Saying someone “shouldn’t judge” is itself a truth judgment.

Note: Everyone makes judgments daily, though not all people judge honorably.

Materialism

Materialism is the belief that only physical matter exists. Materialists deny that non-physical aspects of reality exist, such as a soul.

Claim: “Only what you can touch or measure is real.”
Response: “Can you touch or measure that belief?”
Result: The claim cannot be touched or measured, and thus contradicts itself.

Scientism

Scientism is the belief that science is the only way to determine what is or isn’t true. If we can’t scientifically test it, it’s not valuable.

Claim: “Only science can tell us what’s true.”
Response: “Can science prove that claim?”
Result: No scientific test can show that science is the only way to know truth. Such a claim is philosophical, not scientific, thereby failing its own standard.

Claim: “Only claims that can be scientifically tested and falsified are meaningful.”
Response: “Can that claim be scientifically tested and falsified?”
Result: The claim cannot be scientifically tested or falsified, so by its own standard, it has no merit.

Note: Science is an excellent tool for discovering truths about the natural world, but as demonstrated, it is not the only test for truth.

The Truth is Knowable

Like Pilate, many today cloak their avoidance of truth behind what appears to be honest inquiry. Whether to satisfy a sense of intellectual sophistication or to unwittingly avoid accountability to what is plainly clear, the result is the same. Truth is often questioned in various forms, not to be discovered, but to be evaded.

Yet once we acknowledge that truth exists and that it can be plainly known, our posture changes. Questions are no longer used as shields, but as tools to better understand reality. Rather than hiding behind doubt, we are free to seek, examine, and ultimately respond to what is true.

The real question, then, is not whether truth can be known, but whether we are willing to live in light of it.

Evil and suffering in this world can challenge the most faithful among us. The sheer pain of watching a loved one endure hardship, such as the frightening reality of a cancer diagnosis, can shake our foundations. In moments like these, it is natural to ask a deeply personal question:

If God is truly loving, why does He allow us to suffer?

Before asking why God allows suffering, we must first recognize that evil is not a thing that exists on its own. Rather, it is a corruption of good. In other words, calling suffering evil only makes sense in a world where objective goodness already exists. This is why the existence of evil, far from disproving God, actually requires a God given moral standard grounded beyond ourselves, a point we explored more fully in Can God Exist in a World Filled With Evil?

With that foundation in place, the question before us is not whether God and evil can coexist, but whether our experience of present evil is compatible with a God who is both all loving and all powerful.

The Consequence of Love

God created us with the capacity to love Him and one another (Gen 1:27, 1 Jn 4:8, 19). Nearly everyone would agree that love is a good thing, yet embedded within love is a necessary condition. Love must be freely given. If God forced us to love Him, that would not be love at all. That would be something else entirely.

To help illustrate, consider this analogy often expressed by Frank Turek. Imagine a young woman being pursued romantically by a young man. In time, she makes it clear that she is not interested in a romantic relationship and assertively says, “I like you, but only as a friend.”

Many of us understand the brutal feeling of that moment.

Now imagine if that same young man responded aggressively saying, “Well…I love you so much that I am going to force you to love me back and spend eternity with me.”

No one would call that love. We would rightly call that sinister.

Here we begin to see the consequence of God creating us as creatures capable of genuine love. Because love must be freely given, it must also be allowed to be freely withheld. We are therefore able to freely reject God, to turn from Him, and to refuse His ways. Tragically, this is precisely what humanity has done since the beginning.

Rather than submitting to God as the true standard of goodness, we attempt to define good and evil for ourselves. The result is a world marked by corruption, conflict, and suffering. As we separate ourselves from God’s goodness, that separation spills outward into our relationships, our societies, and even the natural world itself.

If God Is All-Powerful, Can’t He Just End Evil?

God is fully capable of ending evil at this very moment. Scripture records multiple instances of such divine judgment, including the flood, the destruction of Sodom and Gomorrah, and the exile of Israel. In each case, God acted decisively against widespread corruption, demonstrating that He is neither indifferent to evil nor powerless to stop it.

But there is an often-overlooked implication behind this question. If God were to eliminate all evil immediately and completely, He would not begin with abstract forces or distant villains. He would begin with you, with me, and with everyone we know.

None of us are free from wrongdoing. We all participate in evil, whether through direct action, neglecting someone in need, or the silent ill intentions of the heart.

God is indeed all-loving and all-powerful. Yet He is also perfectly just, gracious and merciful. It is therefore consistent with His character to delay righteous judgment if His purpose is to bring about a greater good. Rather than destroying a broken world outright, God allows evil to persist for a time while working toward redemption and restoration.

God’s Redemptive Purpose

If we truly want to understand love, we must look at what God has done for us. Though we reject Him daily, God does not respond by wiping us out, even though justice would demand it. Instead, He chose a far more costly path.

God the Son took on human nature, entered a broken world, and willingly humbled Himself. He allowed Himself to be rejected, abused, and ultimately killed by the very people He came to save. In doing so, Christ chose to bear the judgment that justice requires in our place. The wrath that should fall on us was voluntarily taken upon Himself.

God, in His mercy, offers us a choice. We may one day stand before Him on our own and receive the justice we are due, or we may accept the grace He offers, allowing Christ to take that judgment on our behalf.

It is for this reason that God allows evil to persist for a time. In His patience, He grants those who are lost the opportunity to turn to Him. He gives the spouse, the parent, the child, and the friend additional time to accept truth and freely receive His offer of grace. A gift that costs us nothing except humble trust placed in Christ alone.

Real Freedom

Final justice for the countless evils committed throughout human history will not be delayed forever. When that day finally comes, every person will face judgment for their actions in this life. Those who have entrusted themselves to Christ will stand covered by His righteousness, while those who have rejected Him will bear that judgment themselves.

But it is during this present time that God may be accomplishing something deeper. Through a world marked by suffering, He may also be forming in us a greater and more enduring kind of freedom.

We have the freedom to love, and we have the freedom to do evil. Yet ultimate freedom is not merely the ability to choose between doing good or evil. Ultimate freedom is the ability to choose good without being enslaved by the desire to do evil. Scripture teaches that this is how it will one day be. And it may be in this life that we are being prepared for that freedom.

• One cannot learn forgiveness without first being wronged.

• One cannot learn courage without first experiencing fear.

• One cannot learn generosity without first knowing sacrifice.

• One cannot learn real love without first choosing it when it is difficult.

Perhaps then, beyond giving us ample time to come to saving faith and lead others toward it, God is also shaping higher attributes into our character. He is forming in us deeper virtues, not merely by showing us the cost of evil, but by steadily transforming our hearts toward what is good. In this way, when we one day stand in His presence, we will retain genuine free will, never again drawn back into evil, because goodness has fully taken hold of us.

We will not be coerced into goodness, but absolutely transformed by it.

And in that light, the existence of evil for a time does not stand as evidence against an all-loving, all-powerful God. Rather, it serves His redemptive purpose. By giving us time to freely respond to His grace, we can become permanently transformed by it.

Theological Footnote:

The question of why a good and powerful God allows evil has occupied some of the greatest philosophical and theological minds for centuries. The formal study of this issue is known as theodicy. This is a deep subject that cannot be fully explored in a couple short articles.

It is my hope that these writings have provided a helpful starting point. For readers who wish to explore the topic more deeply, I recommend “If God, Why Evil?” by Norman Geisler and “Why?” by Adam Hamilton.

Finally, it is worth remembering that when someone raises questions of evil and suffering, it is often not merely an intellectual exercise. They may be carrying real pain or walking through real suffering. In those moments, what they likely need most is not a philosophy lesson, but compassion, presence, and comfort.

For Christians, we know that God ultimately overcomes evil, but that does not remove the need to answer honest questions about its presence in the world today. And these answers must be formed before tragedy strikes. If we wait until we are in darkness, we risk being tossed around by our pain wondering whether God exists at all.

Because the problem of evil takes many forms, it helps to begin with the one that strikes the human heart hardest: the suffering of a child. If any example seems to challenge the existence of God, it is this one.

If God Exists, Why Do Innocent Children Suffer?

Children are the most innocent among us, and their suffering strikes us at the deepest emotional level. It is understandable why tragedies involving children are often used to object to the existence of God altogether. While entire volumes have been written to address this objection, sometimes the best place to begin is with a simple question:

Why is a child’s suffering evil?

At first, the question seems almost offensive, because we all know intuitively that a child’s suffering is wrong. But very few people ever stop to consider why it is wrong. Yes, suffering harms the child. Yes, suffering causes physical and emotional pain. Yes, suffering is needless. But these answers only describe what suffering does—they don’t justify why suffering is wrong.

And here’s the critical point: If God does not exist, then we are nothing more than molecules in motion. We are simply products of a blind, unguided evolutionary process. Everything that happens is simply the result of physics playing itself out since the universe began.

In such a belief system, a child’s suffering is not justifiably wrong. A child’s suffering simply is. How depressing of a worldview…

You may feel that it is wrong; you may even be horrified by it, but feelings alone cannot ground moral truth. If they could, then the serial killer who enjoys murder would be as justified in calling his actions “good” as you are in calling them “evil.” Emotion cannot carry that weight.

What is Evil?

To understand why something is actually evil, we must first understand what evil really is.

Evil is not an equal opposing force battling against God. Nor is it something God causes. Scripture consistently shows that evil is a corruption of God’s good creation, not a creation itself (e.g. Eccl. 7:29).

Think of a brand-new shirt. When you first buy it, it looks clean and feels great. But if you’re clumsy like me, you’ll spill ketchup on it within a week. The stain is a corruption of the shirt, but it cannot exist apart from the shirt. A stain without a shirt is nothing at all.

In the same way, evil is a distortion of good. It is a tearing, twisting, or staining of what God made right and beautiful. But it cannot exist on its own; it only exists by corrupting something that was first created good.

Why Evil Actually Points to God

C. S. Lewis said it best in Mere Christianity:

“A man does not call a line crooked unless he has some idea of a straight line.”

God’s moral law is our straight line. It is the recognizable standard of goodness written on every human heart. It is how we are able to justify why things can be truly wrong, and not just a matter of opinion enforced by the loudest or the strongest.

Just as a shadow is only visible because light reveals it, we recognize things as evil because we possess a real, knowable standard of what goodness should be.

The Proper Question

Evil cannot exist apart from a standard of goodness beyond ourselves. Natural processes cannot explain morality, for if morality is nothing more than a product of evolution, then nothing is universally right or wrong. It simply becomes whatever the strongest can enforce.

But nearly everyone recognizes that the suffering of a child, slavery, and genocide are truly wrong. Wrong for all people, at all times, in all places, no matter what the strongest say. That instinct only makes sense if there is a real moral law grounded in a real moral Lawgiver beyond ourselves.

So the proper question is not: “Can God exist in a world filled with evil?”

Without God, there is no justification to call something evil to begin with.

The proper question is: “If God is all-loving and all-powerful, then why does He allow evil?”

There is a clear answer to this question. An all-loving, all-powerful God can permit evil for a limited time in order to bring about a greater good. We’ll explore this challenge more next week.

For now, reflect on this:

Our outrage at evil is not random. It is a cry for justice. It is a recognition that the world is not as it should be. And it is an emotion that only makes sense if there is a recognizable standard of goodness beyond ourselves to compare it to. A standard that must come from somewhere.

Evil does not disprove God. It requires Him as the ultimate standard of goodness.

So when skeptics throw out quips like “faith is believing without evidence,” it’s understandable that Christians may feel a moment of uncertainty. One of my personal favorites comes from pop-culture astrophysicist Neil deGrasse Tyson, who famously claimed, “This is why religions are called faiths, because you believe something in the absence of evidence.”

These statements are punchy, memorable, and confidently delivered, but are they accurate descriptions of what Christians mean by faith?

When discussing whether Christian faith is reasonable, it’s important to recognize two truths:

1. Everyone has faith in something.

2. Faith in Christ is not blind belief, but reasoned trust.

Everyone Has Faith in Something

Let’s go back to Tyson for a moment. If he rejects the existence of God, then by necessity he must believe that life arose naturally. There is no third option.

But here’s the problem: abiogenesis (life coming from non-life) has never once been observed in nature. It has never been replicated in a lab. And even if one day scientists could manufacture life under controlled conditions, that would only demonstrate that intelligent agents can produce life, which is precisely what believers in God argue.

Worse for the naturalistic view, the mathematics are brutal. With what we currently know about the complexity of even the simplest cell and the limited time available in the early earth, the odds of life forming spontaneously are astronomically low—so low that many scientists describe it as effectively impossible (a discussion for another day).1

Tyson therefore places his faith in an unproven, unobserved, mathematically improbable process and trusts that science will eventually figure it out.

That’s not meant to be an insult, it is simply a recognition of reality:

Even the most brilliant minds eventually reach a point where their worldview still depends on faith.

This is not an argument against science or searching for answers that have natural explanations. Nor is a lack of evidence for abiogenesis proof of God’s existence. Rather, the point is this:

No worldview operates without faith.

Faith in Christ Is Not Blind Belief, but Reasoned Trust

While some place their trust in unproven natural processes, Christians place their trust in a personal, all-powerful Creator. And only one of those options has historical, philosophical, and scientific evidence pointing in its direction.

It is simply false to claim that Christian faith is belief without evidence. Beyond the countless testimonies of Christians transformed by Christ, the Christian worldview is supported by multiple lines of objective evidence.

Here are a few examples:

1. Science shows the universe had a beginning → therefore a Beginner.

   
   Cosmology, physics, and astronomy all agree: the universe had a beginning. And everything that begins to exist requires a cause (the law of causation). Since the universe is made of space, time, and matter, its cause must be beyond space, beyond time, and beyond matter. In other words—a spaceless, timeless, immaterial cause.
   

2. The universe is fine-tuned → therefore a Tuner.
   
   Over 120 physical constants are set at precisely the values required for life. Even tiny changes would render the universe lifeless. Much like a finely tuned watch or engine, precision points to purpose, not accident.
   

3. DNA contains complex information → therefore a Writer.
   
   DNA is not random chemistry; it is coded information—mathematically identical to highly compressed digital language. Information always comes from a mind.
   

4. There is an Objective Moral Law → therefore a Moral Lawgiver.
   
   Across cultures and time, certain moral truths, like the wrongness of murder, or the valor of dying for loved ones, are universally recognized. A universal moral law requires a universal source.
   

5. The New Testament is historically reliable → therefore worth trusting.
   
   The 27 books of the New Testament are the best-attested documents in ancient history, confirmed by thousands of manuscripts and multiple non-Christian sources. To reject its historical value is to reject the entire field of ancient history.

Now it’s true that none of these points alone “proves God” in a courtroom sense. But taken together, they form a powerful cumulative case that faith in Christ is not blind, but the most reasonable conclusion from the evidence.

I would argue, much like Dr Frank Turek does, that it ironically requires much more “blind” faith to be an atheist.

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