For the last few weeks we’ve been looking at common objections to Christianity. This week I want to look at the objection that there is definitely no God, thus Christianity is false.

Some people will claim to be atheists and assert that there is definitely no God. This objection to Christianity is gaining ascendancy. People who call themselves atheists were once rather rare. And while they still do not make up the majority of the population, atheists are certainly more common and more vocal than they used to be.

But definite atheism is logically impossible. No one can say with absolute confidence that there is no God. To be able to clearly determine that there is no God would require omniscience (absolute knowledge) – you would have to know all things and know that there is no God. To be able to clearly determine that there is no God would also require omnipresence (being everywhere at once) – you would have had to be in every part of the universe at the same time so that you could conclusively say God is not there. To be able to clearly determine that there is no God would also require omnipotence (absolute power) – you need to be able to say that there is nothing stronger than you that may have blinded you to their presence. Clearly no one can make any of these claims. Thus no one can be a complete atheist without looking like a fool. And this is backed up by the Bible: ‘The fool says in his heart, “There is no God”’ (Psalm 14:1).

The best that an atheist can say is that they believe there is no God. With the finite knowledge that they have, they have come to the conclusion that there is probably no God. They cannot be 100% certain but the evidence tips them toward no God. In the end, an atheist has to trust their evidence that there is no God, like a theist trusts their evidence that there is a God.

But the evidence for the truth of Christianity is abundant, particularly the historical evidence contained in the Bible. In my experience, the problem with atheists is that they simply do not want to examine the evidence. Probably because they know that if they do, it means they have to submit to a higher being and stop living their lives their way. And this scares them.

Are you an atheist? Do you admit that there is a possibility that there is a God? And are you willing to examine the evidence for Christianity?

Joel Radford.