The God Question

by J.P. Moreland

A leading evangelical thinker offers this brand€“new way of addressing life€™s most important Does God exist, and can we know Him? J.P. Moreland, distinguished professor of philosophy at Talbot School of Theology, abandons traditional didactic apologetics and entices skeptics and dissatisfied believers into a conversation about the emptiness and anxiety so many feel today. He invites them to the abundant life Jesus offers but that so few seem to be experiencing. Moreland shows that people are created by a benevolent God and given a life€“enhancing purpose. He empowers readers to... overcome obstacles to faith, including questions about science and religion embrace an enticing view of Jesus and the kingdom of God replace unhelpful images of God with the truth Readers will find practical and effective ways to experience intimacy with God, an effective life of prayer, and a confident hope in life after death.

Genres: Philosophy, Christian Non Fiction, Christian, Theology, Religion, Nonfiction

272 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 2009

About the author

J.P. Moreland is the Distinguished Professor of Philosophy at Talbot School of Theology, Biola University in La Mirada, California. He has four earned degrees: a B.S. in chemistry from the University of Missouri, a Th.M. in theology from Dallas Theological Seminary, an M. A. in philosophy from the University of California-Riverside, and a Ph.D. in philosophy from the University of Southern California.

He has co-planted three churches, spoken and debated on over 175 college campuses around the country, and served with Campus Crusade for Christ for 10 years. For eight years, he served as a bioethicist for PersonaCare Nursing Homes, Inc. headquartered in Baltimore, Maryland.

His ideas have been covered by both popular religious and non-religious outlets, including the New Scientist and PBS’s “Closer to Truth,” Christianity Today and WORLD magazine. He has authored or co-authored 30 books, and published over 70 articles in journals, which include Philosophy and Phenomenological Research, American Philosophical Quarterly, Australasian Journal of Philosophy, Metaphilosophy, Philosophia Christi, and Faith and Philosophy.

Reviews

[Sam · Rating 4 out of 5]

3 causes for epidemic of anxiety/depression: pace of modern life, loss of sense of community, deep connectedness with others beyond superficial, and emergence of moral relativism. It takes a lot of mental and emotional energy to stuff our problems and manage anxiety by the hurry and worry strategy. Given the 3 cultural patterns, we have a dangerous situation. To live the way many of us do takes a lot of energy, so we are vulnerable to addiction, some form of relief, and offer some reward in satisfying bodily desire, but all addictions obey the law of diminishing returns.
Social recognition, sexual stimulation, substance abuse, eating, acquiring goods, we become less and less authentic persons in touch without ourselves, and we must project a false self, collage of parental messages, strategies for remaining safe and hidden, and behaviors that avoid shame and guilt. We become enslaved. Americans have become 10x more likely to be depressed and anxiety filled than others generations.
Choose to think different thoughts. (OCD behaviors, pretend to be paramedics, anxiety center remained calm by changing the way we think and adjusting our perspective) By exerting free will, The mind can change the physical structure of the brain. People who see the glass half full regarding their lives are healthier, happier, and more functional than people who don’t.
The question, What/who made God? Is a pointless category fallacy, the mistake of ascribing the wrong feature to the wrong thing. What color is the note C? The question, What made X is only asked if X is makeable?
There at least 30 basic independent constants in the universe that have been discovered that are scientifically speaking facts for which there are no further explanations. The force of gravity, charge of an electron, rest mass of a proton, rate of expansion resulting from big bang. If any one of these, had been slightly larger or smaller to the billionth of a percentage point no life could have appeared in the universe.
All you need to do is figure out what a moral relativist deeply values and treat that issue as if it were arbitrary and relative, and you will see an absolutist come out of the closet every time! (Killing fish with sulphuric acid for guy who cared about the environment)
According to the Bible, certain things will be central to human flourishing, daily gratitude to God for the things of life, learning to give and receive love, seeking and learning to give forgiveness, and seeking to find ultimate purpose in life according to why we were put here. According to scientific naturalism, human flourishing comes through power, sexual attraction, social position and wealth.
Gratitude has one of the strongest links to mental health and satisfaction with life of any personality trait more than optimism, hope, and compassion.
Rather, God is about the project of forming a community of people who freely chosen to enter his kingdom from now to eternity. In that kingdom, people will learn to imitate the love that characterized the relationship among the members of the Trinity, and direct this love towards God and each other. They will co-labor and co-explore with God he work he has set before them and creation he made. To accomplish this, God hides himself so people have the distance to make the choice to enter that kingdom and grow in it. There is evidence if we really want to know it.
God is establishing a community of people, its members join voluntarily, its center is the Triune God, it will progressively experience the kind of wise, loving. creative relationship s towards God, each other, the creative world that take place among the Trinity, and will together with God, defeat evil, and rule over creation, by creatively producing and finding truth, beauty, and goodness. Result, God will receive honor and our affection directed toward him. This is our life our destiny.
Confession of sin/forgiveness. 1 John 1:9, Two approaches. If you do something wrong, you confess it as soon as recognize what you did. This cleanses you afresh and you can enter into God’s presence. 2 problems, You subtly believe that your confession (how earnest, felt sorrow, ready to acknowledge, how well you’ve done since the last time) earns you the right to walk with God again. This is surface treatment of what’s causing you to sin, what’s going on in your heart. As a result, you’re more likely to engage in the sin repeatedly. By contrast, here’s more helpful, When you sin and become aware of it, you immediately run to him and invite him into your situation. You ask God to search your heart and show you what’s going on in the depths of your soul. 2 things, it’s the practice of NT teaching as clothed with Christ’s righteousness, it’s based on grace and mercy, it celebrates the unconditional love God has for you. Second, it’s the opposite of hiding. Instead of running or hiding, you invite God to search you and reveal to you more deeply what is going on. Then you are more adequately able to confess your sin to God and agree with him about it. When you become aware of sinning, you cling to the cross, run to God, invite him to search the depths of your heart, and agree with him about what you see. Don’t offer a quick confession to assure yourself your worthy of working with God.
R. T. Kendall: Total Forgiveness. It is act of and process of growing in not holding things against people. We prove that we have forgiven when we honestly ask God to let the people who have harmed us, off the hook.
Life in Jesus kingdom is deeply liberating as we increasingly become unified persons who live for a cause bigger than ourselves. Living in intimacy with God and others, and honoring God by reflecting his good nature are the goals of this good life. We seek the power to live as we ought, and not preoccupied with the right to do what we want.
Self denial can be a way of hiding because you don’t like others to focus on you. If that’s your problem, then real self-denial for you might be engaging in the difficult task of letting others focus on and value you.
Fasting. When learning to fast, go without food when you are busy with other things. Don’t start off thinning you should fast and pray, or fast and seek solitude. Why? It will drive you nuts. Learn to fast first, later you can graduate to fasting and praying.
Jesus is my very life, closer to me than my next breath, my purpose, job, dearest friend, master, my everything. I am his disciples at my core. Colossians 3:1-4 My life is hidden in him. I think this means I am protected in him, but more importantly that my true self (not my false fabricated projected self), First, is so deeply interwoven with Jesus’ own life, so pervasively connected with what Jesus is doing in me, so wrapped up in Jesus’ purpose for and calling upon my life, that where I end and he begins is fuzzy. Our lives interact together so closely. I can’t imagine doing anything without acknowledging that he goes with me. Second, what he is doing ion me, the person I’m becoming, and the person I will eventually be is not clear yet. No one has a right to condemn or look down on me. I’ve got to get out of the comparison game. My goal is to get good at being who I am in Christ. Most of that is hidden. I must be grateful for where I’m at, not get discouraged if things move slowly, and draw comfort that I will one day not recognize who I am now, nor believe it if it were told to me. By way of application, I must let go of fear of failure, the need to succeed. If you get recognized, be grateful for a time, receive it gladly, then let it go and move it. The same goes for failures!
What would you do and not do. How would you view your work as an expression to discipleship to Jesus?
I lay on my bed 45 min before I need to sleep. I invite God’s presence. I express my love for God and recall my day and concerns while asking him to search my heart and to consider my petitions. I express a half-full perspective on my next day, by thanking him what I am grateful for, by giving thanks for the things I look forward to, and telling him how glad I am that he will walk with me tomorrow. This is the very substance of my life.

[Dave Courtney · Rating 2 out of 5]

Felt like a blast from the past for anyone who grew up in the world of Christian culture of the 70s, 80s and 90s. Just with a greater commitment to philosophical integrity. It represented a fascinating mix for me personally, as the strength of Morelands larger body of work on philopshical grounds gets married to what is at its core a personal autobiographical take on his own experiences, values and beliefs. He is, for lack of a better word, the classic conservative Christian in many senses, and yet in his own way he also seems to defy such categories.

Which is to say, much of this becomes a statement about why he believes in God and what those beliefs entail, using simple Nd surface level appeals to his philopshical arguments to draw this out. It ends up philopshocally light and heavy on the evangelical, which I imagine will render this a hard sell to those coming in to the conversation from the outside.

If nothing else it's a doorway into his larger body of work at least.

That's not to say that criticis should or can dismiss this as simple and tired Christian cliche. Sure, it carries that characteristic, but embedded within that are experiences and ideas that can't simply be explained away without proper discourse and response. This is as true for his philosophical arguments as it is for his retelling of his personal experiences. Whatever one wants to say about his embrace of christian cultural norms, there is little doubt that the experiences he shares are genuine and capable of shaking up ones worldview if we were to receive them honestly, and that his philosophical arguments have some weight should we not take the easy road and justify glossing over them.

There definitely is an audience for whom this book will work really well. In some ways I would argue its more pastoral than apologetic. And that's perfectly fine. I came into this as a Christian who stands a bit on the outside of Morelands own leanings on theological and cultural grounds, but I can certainly respect where he's coming from. It just means I wasnt the precise audience for the book.

[Ian · Rating 3 out of 5]

Overall this is a good book, helpful in its apologetic approach to the Christian faith. The section on hell near the end, in my opinion, puts too much emphasis on man’s free will to the point of constraining God in His options for the created world. This left a sour taste in my mouth, wondering why the author spent so much time guiding the reader towards the Almighty God only to start cutting off His legs at the end.

[Brandon Autry · Rating 4 out of 5]

Really two books in one, the first half being apologetics and the latter half being exhortation and theology. The points made are made comprehensively and effectively, even sufficiently addressing common counterarguments to each point. I just wish some sections like near death experiences had been shortened or left out to make room for the much more compelling points that Moreland states he had no room for.

[Brandon · Rating 4 out of 5]

Pretty good example of classical apologetics. Well-written.

Note: Moreland holds to middle-knowledge and seems to be Arminian.

[Steve · Rating 4 out of 5]

Great book on the reasonableness of theism and Christianity.

[Daniel · Rating 1 out of 5]

Ok, so, non-believers do not believe because they are either sexually deviant or have Daddy issues. And they definitely cannot be moral. And demons are real and move crap around to prove it! And wanna know about one of Moreland's proofs of god? Well, his daughter was sad, so he prayed for a play date... And guess what!!! She got a play date! Case closed! Oh, you may like the part where he describes snuggling with God. For realz. God's a snuggler! This may all sound perfectly reasonable to some. But... Well, I'll just leave it at that.

[Stinger · Rating 4 out of 5]

I really enjoyed this book by Dr. Moreland. I felt I was being taught by a warm, encouraging spiritual father. The arguments for the existence of God were nothing new to me, but I loved all the practical insight into the kingdom life that he provided. The warnings about spiritual warfare were immediately beneficial to me. Love this guy! I certainly recommend it.

[William Dicks · Rating 2 out of 5]

I definitely expected more from Moreland on a book like this. I felt that the book was very light and didn't really get to the core of things as I expected it to.

[Jeffrey · Rating 4 out of 5]

A collection of Morelan'd thoughts on living a life of true happiness, the existence of God, and discipleship.

[Vincent · Rating 4 out of 5]

Really helpful book.

[Per · Rating 3 out of 5]

Standard evangelical apologetics with a personal touch. Not bad, but not the best I've read either.