Atheistism #1: Context Fail

25 Apr 2011

One of the things we are taught about good Bible study, is that we need to keep things in context and while atheists are particularly bad at it, they are even worse at keeping the Bible, as a whole, in context. Atheists present Biblical stories as impossibilities, but they’re looking at it through their own worldview instead of that of the Bible.

An atheist can claim all sorts of impossibilities when discussing Bible writings, but by placing those writings in his definition of real world, one without God, he has taken those writings out of context. After the atheist has taken the Biblical narratives out of their context, they then proceed to make claims such as: we know people don’t rise from the dead, people aren’t born from virgins, and people don’t get swallowed by whales. While these statements make perfect sense in a world without God, that is not the world within the Bible. The stories are recorded in the Bible where God does exist, and in that world, where God is capable of creating the universe, these so-called impossibilities are not problematic.

Where the Christian and the Atheist differ, is that the Christian sees the world we live in and the world of the Bible as one as the same. God exists in the Bible, and God exists in the real world, therefore, God can raise a man from the dead and God can produce a Son from a virgin. Jonah spent three days in the belly of a whale/fish in the context of a world created by God. In the context of this world, it is not unreasonable to think that a being big enough to create the universe would have the ability to stuff a man in the belly of a fish for refusing to follow his instructions.

While it would seem unreasonable if this world were different than the one portrayed in the Bible, it is not unreasonable when the two are the same. Atheists pride themselves on their education. Too bad their education didn’t teach them about context.

Tagged: atheism