My tennis team is preparing for the north county league championship on April 9th. After completing our season undefeated with an impressive 21 wins and 0 losses in match play, we face another undefeated team for the overall north county bragging rights.
One of the players on my team has agreed to debate me on my blog with "point-counterpoint." He is much smarter than me and loves to have "spirited" discussions about religion. We are worlds apart as far as our beliefs.
I responded this morning to my friend's email he sent to my team yesterday concerning God. Since my friend has previously agreed to debate me here, I am posting my email response for my readers in order to officially introduce Mr. "Counterpoint."
Unfortunately for my readers, his business start-up is consuming all of his time and he is not yet able to appear on "point-counterpoint."
Here is my email response for your review. Feel free to comment or email me with questions. Hopefully, my friend will be appearing here soon. Enjoy:
Mikey's response to O:
Let me begin by saying I know you are much smarter than me and I am no match for
a battle of wits. You are well educated and have an amazing perspective as an
immigrant, the foundation of this great country. The question I pose is, "who
will be the winner of this challenge you have thrown down?"
In my humble opinion, there are winners and losers, it's a choice given to us as
human beings, created in the image of an all-powerful, all-knowing and
all-loving God. We are not robots who are forced to behave a certain way or
worship in a controlled fashion.
Your statement that God knows what's in my book is correct. I will go a step
further and add that God knew what was in the book before he made you and me.
He knew some would choose to follow Him while others denied His very existence.
Part of the problem I see here has to do with a third group, those who believe
there IS a God, however, choose NOT to follow Him. They believe they are more
powerful than God and want others to follow them. They are clever. Somehow,
they have splintered believers into thousands of separate groups, each one
believing they have all the right answers. In other situations, they have
convinced humans there can't be a God because the world is full of evil and a
REAL God would not allow this.
I disagree with this and so does your fellow countryman, Rene Descartes, who
once wrote, "Cogito ergo sum." Descartes loved a good fight and challenged
everything, even the belief that he actually existed. I wrote a college paper
on the existence of evil using some of his ideas.
I think both of us agree that evil exists in the world, correct? So, the next
question is, "where does evil come from?" You argue that evil's existence
trumps any notion there is a God, because God would not allow innocent people to
be hurt or killed. The Evil One has been very good at tricking people into
believing there is no evil. All you have to do is look around and you see evil
everywhere. Agree?
So, you and I are thinking, therefore, we exist. We see evil in the world, so we
agree evil is present. Right?
That leaves one more piece of the puzzle....God. Does He exist? If He does, is
He all-powerful, all-loving, and all-knowing?
For the sake of our discussion, let's say, "no, He does not exist."
If this is true, then, when you and I die, it's all over...done. Poof, we are
done. End of story.
Now, let's say, "yes, there is a God." Let's say that everything we know about
Jesus is true....He is God who became man. He came to die for you and me
because our ancestors decided to turn away from God and do things their way.
God loves us so much that He sent His only son to die for us so that a door
could be opened for us to go back to the Father. I can't think of any greater
love than to die for another or to create a creature with the power of free
will. To create a robot that is forced to follow God is not an act of love. To
create a human with the ability to accept God or walk away, that's true love.
So, if there is a God, and He created us with free will....what happens when we
die? If we accept that Jesus conquered death, we can believe death has no power
over us, hence, we have eternal life.
The last question is "how do I want to spend my eternity? With God or without
God? It's your choice. I don't think it's working out too well for the angels
who went out on their own. The real battle is now centered on you.
I am willing to bet you $1 that God exists. If He doesn't, you can go spend
your dollar and gloat over your victory knowing that eventually you will get
old, sick and die. Then it's all over.
If He does exist and you accept Him, we can spend eternity together on other
subjects. If He does exist and you choose not to follow Him, I still get my
dollar why you spend your eternity in a "warm weather" climate. The rest of us
will miss you dearly.
Do you want to wager one dollar on the existence of God?
See you on the courts.
By the way, I am posting this on this mornings blog. I will leave your name out
to protect your privacy and this gives me the opportunity to kill two birds with
one stone.
Have a great day!
Mikey
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