In The Marketplace

In the marketplace of ideas, it's wise to be a smart consumer. In our open and free society there is no shortage of ideas and if you continuously evaluate all that's available, you might find yourself being a bit overwhelmed and even confused by all of them.

This is just as true for religious beliefs. For example, I struggle with the idea of evolution. Ultimately, whether evolution is true or not doesn't really challenge any basic Christian beliefs, but I still find myself questioning. It seems to me that the Bible tends to imply that God actively created everything rather than just starting certain mechanisms and watching them unfold. If not, then it seems that the biblical account would mention such a process. For that reason, it matters to me on a personal level as I continue to evaluate other things the bible claims.

The idea of macro-evolution seems pretty far fetched to me and to buy into it, I think, takes more faith than to believe that God just created everything. But there are some troubling aspects to this. If we didn't evolve then why do we have things like body-hair on our arms and legs? It doesn't seem to serve any useful purpose, yet there it is. Why is it that we have an appendix? Or how about those creatures that have both lungs and gills? These kinds of things can be troubling to a creationist. (You might want to check out Joe Carter's excellent posts on the topic of evolution, Hothouse Science... and My Remedial Education.... The comments are very thought-provoking too.)

Other arguments for evolution, like the fact that our DNA is very similar to that of other animals, aren't quite as compelling to me. I don't see why it would be odd for God to use the same types of building blocks for all living creatures, especially when they need similar mechanisms to survive in their environment. As someone with computer programming experience, making things modular and extensible makes good sense.

It's easy to get confused and misled by the marketplace of ideas if you don't keep the basic foundation of your beliefs in mind.

For me, these come from the gospel accounts of Jesus Christ. The accounts make it clear that Jesus disciples weren't naive followers. It took some convincing for them to follow him. They had to see with their own eyes that he was supernatural. Even then, they assumed that he was a political messiah sent to throw off the bonds of Roman oppression. It wasn't until the end that they realized he was a spiritual messiah. The bible doesn't gloss over these misunderstandings but lets them unfold naturally, as if the story really happened. (it did) It doesn't offer easy answers to problems and even many of the things Jesus did still mystify to this day.

The fact that the bible doesn't explain everything helps me to see it as credible. If I were to make up my own religion I know the tendency would be to try and hide the inconsistencies and difficulties, but the bible does none of that. It just lays everything out there and asks for you to believe at face value.

The disciples and early church fathers weren't following a "health and wealth" gospel. They were looked upon as being losers and knew they would most likely forfeit their lives for their beliefs yet they chose to continue. The most basic truth of Christianity is that a man existed who claimed to be the Son of God. He did various miracles as part of showing his disciples that he was indeed who he claimed. He came as a fulfillment of ancient prophecies, predicting he would die and be raised from the dead. After his death, he appeared to these disciples and encouraged them to share his teachings with everyone.

These disciples, knowing full well that what they said would most likely lead to their own deaths, continued to claim that Jesus was the Son of God who rose from the dead. They wrote about these events and distributed their writings to others who believe. From those early writings and the early believers, I have received the same information. It's my choice to choose to believe it or not. I choose to believe.

There are many things I don't understand, but this core belief is constant and fundamental to everything else. In the marketplace of ideas, it's wise to be a smart consumer.