A Ruler Who Never Forces: Biblical Worldview

SPEAKER A 00:00:00 - 00:00:34 Most rulers use force, but the God of the Bible does something remarkable. He announces himself not as a what, but as a who— a person, someone you can be in a relationship with. And here's the paradox: this same personal God is the absolute ruler of the universe, and he never once uses coercion. So what kind of ruler is that? Welcome to Faith and Science. I'm Kaysie Vokurka. Joining me to discuss this topic is Dr. John Ashton. Welcome to the program once again, Dr. John. SPEAKER B 00:00:34 - 00:00:35 Hello, Kaysie. SPEAKER A 00:00:35 - 00:01:12 Dr. John has written this book called The Big Argument: Does God Exist? And in today's program, we are looking at chapter 13, Who Is God? What Is He Like? by Stephen Thompson, and we are discussing some very interesting questions. So this chapter describes God as taking the initiative in establishing Relationships, while always respecting the freedom of the other person to accept and walk away. So most rulers demand loyalty, but what does it mean that the ruler of the universe actually initiates relationship rather than requiring it? SPEAKER B 00:01:12 - 00:01:44 Yes, well, this is a characteristic of, of love, isn't it? So love And love underpins the essence of freedom, really. And I guess the— you know, Dr. Thompson has done a brilliant job in this chapter, and it's quite succinct, but he's drawn out some really, really interesting concepts about God that illustrate what God is like. SPEAKER A 00:01:44 - 00:01:44 Yes. SPEAKER B 00:01:44 - 00:02:01 And I guess in giving people freedom, God allowed the The possibility of evil, or possibility of selfishness, a possibility of saying, okay, these laws, God, that you've put in place, these moral laws are too restrictive. SPEAKER A 00:02:01 - 00:02:02 Yes. SPEAKER B 00:02:02 - 00:02:36 I want the freedom to be able to take something that someone else has. I want that freedom. Okay. So God has set it up. Now, hang on. Now, that is, that is stealing, and that's something that you don't do, right? And so it fits this picture again in that the converse of that is to say, okay, you have to worship me. You have to love me. SPEAKER A 00:02:36 - 00:02:37 Yeah. SPEAKER B 00:02:37 - 00:02:44 And we know from experience that if that's the case, is that truly genuine genuine love? SPEAKER A 00:02:44 - 00:02:44 No. SPEAKER B 00:02:44 - 00:03:28 Is it reflective love? You know, in other words, that person that says that they love me, in response, are they giving me that freedom as well? So it's this mutual freedom to do things, but it's freedom within limits, right? So again, God has set up the law of gravity. And of course, for a long time, men wanted to fly. They wanted to go against the law of gravity, and they had all different attempts. And of course, now we have developed planes and, you know, other devices for going up in the air. SPEAKER A 00:03:28 - 00:03:29 Mm-hmm. SPEAKER B 00:03:29 - 00:03:57 And that's okay, because when we've developed those planes and those, you know, hot air machines and these sort of things, we've been using existing laws. We haven't wanted to change the laws. But just imagine if we want— we said, well, no, we're not happy with gravity always pulling us down. We want to change that. Well, we realize that once we change that, there'd be a whole lot of consequences, right? SPEAKER A 00:03:57 - 00:03:58 Mm-hmm. SPEAKER B 00:03:58 - 00:04:38 If we removed gravity and changed its value and this sort of thing so we could leap over tall buildings like Superman fictitiously does and these sort of things. What happens is there's a whole lot of other consequences, other things that suffer as an event. So one of the amazing things that fascinates me about creation is that it all seems to work, and we have ecological systems of balance and so forth. Even the laws of chemistry and the laws of atomic physics allow the elements to form with their different properties so that we have the properties of water. SPEAKER A 00:04:38 - 00:04:38 Hmm. SPEAKER B 00:04:38 - 00:04:58 And water has these amazing properties of, you know, when it shrinks down to 4 degrees, and then as the temperature drops below 4 degrees, it begins to expand. And what this means is then that lakes, when they freeze, don't freeze from the bottom up, and hence, you know, kill all the life within the lake. SPEAKER A 00:04:58 - 00:04:58 Yes. SPEAKER B 00:04:58 - 00:05:42 They just freeze over and insulate it and allow it. And so it is, to me, there's so many systems like this that are particular constructs, but they're based on laws. They're based on laws of what we call the laws of physics, the laws of chemistry that always run the same. So we have a God that we talked about previously that has created these laws, but also wants to give us freedom, but freedom within those laws to operate. And the Bible clearly paints a picture that there was a being who chose to want to develop a new type of creation outside this creation with different laws. SPEAKER A 00:05:42 - 00:05:43 Hmm. SPEAKER B 00:05:43 - 00:05:59 And in actual fact, it says that he wanted to be Like God, take God's place. And God gave that freedom. And so the Bible describes the situation that we're in, it's called sin, where— and sin is really opposing God's laws. SPEAKER A 00:05:59 - 00:05:59 Yes. SPEAKER B 00:05:59 - 00:06:14 Wanting to make a different law to God's law. And we largely see, you know, people say, why do bad things happen to so-called good people? And it really all boils down to the consequences of sin. SPEAKER A 00:06:15 - 00:06:15 Hmm. SPEAKER B 00:06:15 - 00:06:27 And the fact that there are, in other fact, and the Bible also talks about that there are other beings that operate outside our space-time system, which we call either angels or demons. SPEAKER A 00:06:27 - 00:06:27 Yes. SPEAKER B 00:06:27 - 00:07:30 Now, again, this is something that is hard for a lot of people to accept. But again, going to many primitive cultures and talking to missionaries that have been involved in this, there seems to be, again, overwhelming evidence for demons. And again, we have many accounts recorded in the Bible of angels and also post in Christian literature as well. And so again, we have this picture explaining that God has given that freedom for people to make a choice, but only so far. And I think to me, it's as Dr. Thompson points out, God has accepted or allowed people to do bad things, hoping, in my view, and my view isn't— it seems that He's hoping that they will learn and make a choice and recognize that His original system is best. SPEAKER A 00:07:30 - 00:07:31 Is best, yes. SPEAKER B 00:07:31 - 00:07:57 To make that choice. So He's not forcing them. He's allowing them to do whatever, but He's hoping that as they see the consequences of their decisions and of different systems, that they will ultimately choose So that would be why God, as a ruler, is tolerant of evil rather than eliminating it immediately. SPEAKER A 00:07:57 - 00:08:06 Because most rulers, if there's opposition, they'll just cut it off straight away. Like, that's how we understand it from an earthly point of view. But God has not done that. SPEAKER B 00:08:06 - 00:08:07 No. SPEAKER A 00:08:07 - 00:08:16 He's let the alternative view manifest itself fully. To make a choice, right? Is that— that's how we would explain that? SPEAKER B 00:08:16 - 00:08:20 And we see this today, actually, in the rise of cancel culture. SPEAKER A 00:08:20 - 00:08:21 Okay. SPEAKER B 00:08:21 - 00:08:25 If you disagree with me, sorry, I'm going to eliminate you. SPEAKER A 00:08:25 - 00:08:26 Yeah. SPEAKER B 00:08:26 - 00:09:04 And also we see this with the development of laws against free speech as well that eliminate— well, you can't say that or you can't talk about these things. And so this represents the opposite to God. God and that tolerates people's rights to be free. And this is why in Christian countries, for example, in Christian democracies, people have the right to protest. They have the right to oppose different laws. They have the right to express these things. In totalitarian systems, this is closed down. SPEAKER A 00:09:04 - 00:09:04 Yeah. SPEAKER B 00:09:04 - 00:09:57 This freedom is removed on the basis of what a particular group perceive Mmm. The Christian worldview is that we— the Christian worldview is that the laws that were set by the Creator of the universe, who created us, are the best set of laws. But what has happened, of course, is that as people have said, well, we don't necessarily believe in a Creator, they've essentially come and developed then laws that we believe are better, are more appropriate. And it's interesting how, in my view, as I observe what is happening, these laws are gradually evolving into what we call the cancel culture. So if you now disagree with these laws, you're eliminated, or you can't practice and so forth. SPEAKER A 00:09:57 - 00:09:57 Mm. SPEAKER B 00:09:57 - 00:10:30 So I think it's a beautiful picture that does explain that the God that the Christians Praise. And the God, the Kingdom that God wants people to choose, His Kingdom is a Kingdom of freedom based on God's laws. Freedom within God's laws. And it's a choice that we make. But ultimately, because if God then just eliminated that originally, there'd be a doubt all the time. Maybe there was a better way. SPEAKER A 00:10:30 - 00:10:30 Yeah. SPEAKER B 00:10:30 - 00:10:56 God has allowed all this system that clearly shows it's not a better way. It's not a better way. We people, so many people I know long for God to put an end to all the bad things that are happening in the world and that have happened down through the ages. And God says, yes, that is going to happen. I am going to return. There will be a judgment and this whole world will be made new again. Perfect. SPEAKER A 00:10:56 - 00:10:57 Hmm. SPEAKER B 00:10:57 - 00:11:12 Where that sin, where that evil, that choice to be evil won't be there because all the people in it are people that have said, hang on, I don't like this. I want to choose to be in a kingdom that's good. SPEAKER A 00:11:12 - 00:11:48 Yeah. So he's not— in doing that, he's not eliminating the freedom to choose. He merely has given a clear demonstration of the results of both ways of life. And anyone who is retained in the future kingdom are there simply because they've chosen that that's the kingdom and way of life that they want to live, isn't it? Yes, that's right. That God's laws, his ways of operating, are ones that are Fair and just and foster a sense of freedom and love with everyone, and therefore the people want to live in that environment. SPEAKER B 00:11:48 - 00:11:49 Yes, yes, very nice. SPEAKER A 00:11:49 - 00:12:10 So that is very interesting to see how God has dealt with a real serious threat to His authority in that sense, but He has maintained it through transparency And opportunity for people to see things clearly as they are and make a choice. SPEAKER B 00:12:10 - 00:12:30 And make their own choice. They have freedom to make that choice. They're not cajoled into that. But as with all choices, there are consequences. You know, I think back, you know, being an older person, when I was at school, there was, you know, very strict discipline. But we felt very safe. SPEAKER A 00:12:30 - 00:12:31 Mmm. SPEAKER B 00:12:31 - 00:13:45 At school. And again, most of us walked home from school, you know. We felt safe in our communities. And the way I see it is that the consequences of evil have been diminished. The consequences of doing bad things have been greatly diminished. And so people now have greater confidence to do, to make their choices, to do what I perceive in terms of God's kingdom are bad things. But at the same time then, we've seen our freedom diminished. Yeah, that's interesting. Of what we can do. And so the freedom of good people seems to be diminished, but the freedom of people that the community at large recognizes as bad has been So to me, this is, again, all points to we must have been created. This system hasn't evolved. The life isn't morally neutral. It's interesting that Dr. Thomson trained at St. Andrews University in Scotland. SPEAKER A 00:13:45 - 00:13:45 Yes. SPEAKER B 00:13:45 - 00:14:42 And I remember one of the former heads of the university, the chancellor or whatever they're called, was Well, from memory, it was Dr. Frode. I think it was James Frode. There were 2 famous Frodes, spelled F-R-O-U-D-E. And one of his famous sayings is that man is the only animal that hunts for sport, or kills for sport. Other animals only kill for food, largely. Oh, that's good. That was one of the things he was saying. So essentially what he's saying Is that there is this sense of morality. There's a deeper moral aspect to ourselves. And we've made choices to do things. We've made choices to— we've made moral choices. SPEAKER A 00:14:42 - 00:15:00 Very interesting things to consider. Thank you for sharing. Have you ever struggled with doubts about God's existence or known someone who has? What helped you through it? Share your thoughts and stories in the comments because we'd love to hear about your journey.