There are many reasons for why Christians believe in God. Firstly, some Christians believe that the Bible itself is from God, from himself and it is the revealed word of God. Christians believe that what is in the Bible must be true as it is there in the first place. Some, Christians are literalists who take what is in the Bible word for word, however, some are liberalists and understand what is in the Bible as a metaphor, however, still proves that God exists. Additionally, some Christians believe in the ontological argument by St Anselm, which suggests that God cannot not exist and so that it is logical to believe.
17/09/14 - homework Explain the view that the conscience is the voice of God. In order to fully explain the view that the conscience is the voice of God one must first define what is meant by ‘voice of God’. It has been defined as the ‘heavenly or divine voice which proclaims God’s will or judgement’, however, in my opinion the ‘voice of God’ definition should also include divine guidance as the original definition leaves out the idea of God as a guide without his actual voice telling a person the idea. The argument of ‘is the conscience the voice of God?’ often runs into difficulties; this is due to the fact that if the conscience is not the voice of God then what is it? This may also be a problem for Christian thinkers as, if the conscience is not the voice of God it gives moral authority to something outside of God.
However, it has been argued by some Christians that this rationalistic approach does not consider revelation that comes directly from God. It is possible to argue that Butler suggested similar ideas to Aquinas as he also believed your conscience can help you decide what is right and wrong and therefore is a voice of reason. However, he believed conscience is not just the voice of reason, but that this voice comes from
Absolute Law comes from God and has been set so that we all may follow. They are unchanging and this is what makes us the perfect Christians. Duty to God comes first then the Duty to others before duty to property. This will be the way to make decisions if there is an absolute conflict. But also Absolutism does not take other situation into consideration, things change and people change, so should the rules change as well?
In the Dialogues of Concerning Natural Religion by David Hume, he explains his thoughts concerning God and the higher power that in his opinion should not be accepted. “There is no ground to suppose a plan of the world to be formed in the Divine mind…”(Hume, 714). From this we can concur Hume is no full hearted believer that he considers God knows and will know what has to come. From his distinctions, there is no good reason for a designer, and to think that God is an all-powerful being that also is subject to human like or materialistic traits should not be looked upon as valid. From his theories the only way we can know things for sure is through cause and effect.
To have faith in someone on past knowledge, according to McCloskey, is reasonable however; it is unreasonable to have faith in God as we have no past knowledge of God. Theists base their knowledge of God on the revelations that He has given us, the Bible, and the
If God did create the difference between right and wrong then that means that for God, initially, there wasn’t a difference between to two. With that being said, it follows that it is not possible to say whether God is good or not. This is due to the fact that if right and wrong were God’s creation, then prior to his conception of the two ideas, they did not exist or apply to him. The writer then determines that it is unreasonable to assume that God has any relation to the creation of right and wrong while also saying that God is good. If God is assumed to be good, then all of his actions are good, and this would include the creation of right and wrong.
Kant proclaims “the belief that we have cognition of something through experience which we in fact cannot accept as happening according to objective laws of experience (faith in miracles)”(p.185). He credits faith's mass appeal and staying power as the main reason for the growth of corrupted notions of miracles and saving grace. Kant was not a believer that accepting Jesus Christ as our savior would be all that is needed in Christian grace to free oneself from sin. Kant says “It is totally inconceivable, however, how a rational human being who knows himself to deserve punishment could seriously believe that he only has to believe the news of satisfaction having been rendered Page 1 for him, and accept it utiliter, in order to regard his guilt as done away with” (p. 123). These ideas of Kant seem to imply he is not a believer of Jesus or that miracles have never happened, the idea Kant is developing that miracles are not necessary for us to develop moral
Backus and Chapian (2000) discuss how the fruit of a person stems from what they believe, so if a person believes an error the actions and behavior will be based off what he believe. According to Backus misbelief is the self-talk, the stinking thinking that people have. The thoughts that people tend to dwell on and relive constantly in their mind is misbelief the concept of self-talk. Dr. Adams approach to counseling is founded on the word “of God”. Adams references scripture throughout the process of his theory but he specifically references 2 Timothy 3:14-17 pertaining to change.
God’s attributes are typically broken down into two categories: Incommunicable (not shared) and Communicable (shared). Some of God’s incommunicable attributes are (taken from Doctrine: What every Christian should believe by Mark Driscoll and Gary Breshears): 1. Independence – God does not need us, or the rest of creation, for anything yet we, and the rest of creation, need him and can glorify him and bring him joy. 2. Unchangeableness – God is unchanging in his being, perfections, purposes, and promises, yet God does act and feel emotions, and he acts and feels differently in response to different situations.