If you talk to people about your faith, you've probably heard the question, "Why is there evil in the world?"
I believe that most Christians would at least know the simple answer: "God allowed choice in His creation."
Some thoughtful and well trained individuals could probably go into much greater depth in their answer, but when talking to someone who has no biblical standard or is, for practical purposes an atheist, are you able to make an argument for the truth objectively?
Rather than allowing a doubter or antagonist to batter you with successively more difficult questions (or their personal objections to God and the gospel) can you ask them a question that will provoke them to think about their own nature? This is what might be called diverting an attack or possibly "a redirect" of the question, as in the following response: "we can see that throughout history men have prepared themselves for "evil" works. That is, men have always busied themselves with building fortifications, walled cities, weapons to kill with, defenses to protect themselves with: Do we prepare for evil because the world is evil? Or is the world evil because we prepare for evil?"
A thoughtful person would be left wondering at cause and effect. Some might simply deny the existence of evil, but this would be hard seeing that the original question already admits to evil existing in the world.
I believe that most atheists and agnostics would probably attribute "evil" events to randomness, and evil behaviors to social malady and mental illness.
Where would you take the argument to next?
Respond any way that you want to, but please remember in the context of this exercise, scripture is the authority. B)
I believe that most Christians would at least know the simple answer: "God allowed choice in His creation."
Some thoughtful and well trained individuals could probably go into much greater depth in their answer, but when talking to someone who has no biblical standard or is, for practical purposes an atheist, are you able to make an argument for the truth objectively?
Rather than allowing a doubter or antagonist to batter you with successively more difficult questions (or their personal objections to God and the gospel) can you ask them a question that will provoke them to think about their own nature? This is what might be called diverting an attack or possibly "a redirect" of the question, as in the following response: "we can see that throughout history men have prepared themselves for "evil" works. That is, men have always busied themselves with building fortifications, walled cities, weapons to kill with, defenses to protect themselves with: Do we prepare for evil because the world is evil? Or is the world evil because we prepare for evil?"
A thoughtful person would be left wondering at cause and effect. Some might simply deny the existence of evil, but this would be hard seeing that the original question already admits to evil existing in the world.
I believe that most atheists and agnostics would probably attribute "evil" events to randomness, and evil behaviors to social malady and mental illness.
Where would you take the argument to next?
Respond any way that you want to, but please remember in the context of this exercise, scripture is the authority. B)