WEEK SIX PRESESSION NOTES -- PP. 143-173

CHAPTER 9 -- THE KNOWLEDGE OF GOD

1. "It's almost like their moral intuitions are free-floating in midair -- far off the ground" (p. 145). To whom/what does that statement refer. It refers to all who have adopted the moral values of the current Western culture. Because there is no sense of ultimate reality (for instance, God) which undergirds a sense of morality, the passion with which moral positions are promoted/ defended really don't make sense.

2. Some philosophers (such as poet Czeslaw Milosz -- p. 145) believe that people in earlier times believed in God and consequently in human dignity and that people now in the current (and future) scientific-technological world will discard religion as a basis for a concept of human dignity. So there will no longer be a belief in the dignity of human beings. Tim Keller disagrees and has a "radical thesis" (p. 145-146) which causes him to think we may yet encounter a future where there remains a sense of human dignity. What is his radical thesis? "I think people in our culture know unavoidably that there is a God, but they are repressing what they know." Surely this means that even as we deny (through our practices if not our language) human dignity by countenancing aboriton, euthanasia, etc. we'll not be able to avoid the nagging, haunting sense that we're doing something terribly wrong.

3. Moral relativism is a belief that "no one should impose their moral views on others, because everyone has the right to find truth inside him or herself" (p. 146). It's a commonly heard assertion. But ........ "Why is it impossible (in practice) for anyone to be a consistent moral relativist even when they claim that they are" (p. 146)? What's Keller's answer? How do you feel about it? It is impossible simply because we all have a code of conduct that we not only attempt live by ourselves, but also to impose on others. That is even true when we insist that a primary tenet in our morality is that everyone should be allowed to live by their own code of conduct, however different it may be from others.

4. What is "cultural relativism" (p. 149)? A view that all moral beliefs are culturally created -- we believe them because we are part of a community that gives them plausibility. There are no absolutes except those imposed by a community.

5. "There is no way to derive the concept of the dignity of every individual from the way things really work in nature" -- natural law (p. 151). Why? (Hint: "There is no basis for moral obligation unless we argue that nature is in some part unnatural. We can't know that nature is broken in some way unless there is some supernatural standard of normalcy ..." (p. 155). Nature thrives on violence and predation, not on a sense of the dignity of the individual. If one argues that what is meant is that "human nature" instills a certain moral code, the question then becomes where that code comes from.

6. "Without God (man) can't justify moral obligation, and yet he can't not know it exists" (p. 154-155). That statement summarizes the cultural/moral relativist conundrum. Think about it and restate it in street language. Back to Keller's "radical thesis" -- We know what we know -- that there is a God and that we are liable to him -- even when we deny that we know it.

7. What should you do with a premise which leads to a conclusion "you know isn't true" (p. 156)? What powerful point is Keller making? You must either change the premise or the conclusion. Or in this case, with no code of ethics rooted in something absolute (God) you cannot argue against the statement, "Napalming babies is culturally relevant." Your premise doesn't allow it.

8. What does the phrase "pointless litigation of existence before an empty bench" (p. 157) mean? Why is it another way of saying ...... "despair" (p. 157)? It's from playwright Arthur Miller's play, AFTER The FALL. The character, Quentin, as he gradually loses his faith in God arrives at a point of despair in which he can give no reason for living according to a code which can't really exist because there's no one (God) in the judge's chair.

9. When a person gets to the point of philosophical despair (as mentioned in the previous discussion point) he has "two options" (p. 157). What are they? 1. Just don't think about it. Eat, drink and be merry with no thought about consequences. But don't allow yourself any time when there's quietness and reflection or the despair will return. 2. Yield to that which you really do know, but which you've suppressed. Yield to God.

CHAPTER 10 -- THE PROBLEM OF SIN

1. Why is it "hard to avoid the conclusion that there is something fundamentally wrong with the world" (p. 159)? There is a pulsating sense that we are not what we are meant to be -- individually or corporately.

2. What did Keller mean in sayng to a distraught young man that "the good news was -- he was a sinner" (p. 160)? (Hint: "........ I achieved low self-esteem" -- p. 161. Further hint: "The Christian doctrine of sin, properly understood, can be a great source for human hope ...... -- p. 161). The realization that we are sinful is requisite to a change that can bring us to God who can redeem us. As long as we wallow in the pig pen, unaware of the reality of our condition, we'll have no sense that we need to turn to God.

3. Sin is not simply doing bad things. It's more profound than that. "It is seeking to establish a sense of self by making something else more central to your significance, purpose, and happiness than your relationship to God" ( p. 162). What does that mean to you?

4. "An identity not based on God also leads inevitably to deep forms of addiction" (p. 165). What does that mean? (Hint: "One has only the choice between God and idolatry ..... p. 166). We will live (controlled by) for something.

5. "A life not centered on God leads to emptiness. Building our lives on something besides God not only hurts us if we don't get the desires of our hearts, but also if we do" (p. 166). Elaborate on that thought. Nothing other than God can satisfy the deepest longings of the human heart. We are obviously disappointed when we don't get that which we desire. It's less obvious, but nonetheless true, that the things we desire and pursue other than God cannbot but disappoint if we do get them.

6. The wonderful Hebrew word "shalom" (peace) describes not the absence of conflict so much as the absolute presence of all that is good (the creation as God made it in Genesis). "The devastating loss of shalom through sin is described in Genesis 3" (p. 170). "Human beings are so integral to the fabric of things that when human beings turned from God the entire warp and woof of the world unraveled" (p. 170). How does this explain our broken, decaying world which is "in bondage to decay" and which is "subject to futility" (Romans 8)? Please share some things you've seen which illustrate this.