Responding Religiously

My friend Jon once asked me, “How do you know that God exists?” “How do you know that that Christianity is true?” The most truthful answer I could give him (although I’m sure it didn’t answer what he was really asking), the truest answer I could give him, in many ways, the only answer I could give, was, God has revealed it to me. In fact, Jon said, “That’s what everybody says. I hate that answer.” Now I sound like a mystic and best, and a nutcase at worst, and many of you think those are the same thing, but I can attest to you that I have never heard the audible voice of God. Nor have I had any sort of vision of Him, or an angel. But I don’t deny the spiritual nature of this knowledge of the truth of Christianity. I remember the day I realized that it was true, that Jesus is God, and that He died for my sins, and rose again; I remember it more vividly than any other day in life, and I tell you in the same intuitive way in which women just know stuff, in that way that aggravates the more analytical male animal, I knew it was true. The only other experience I’ve had that was as spiritual as that, was the day that my soul was lit up with the sudden realization upon reading Psalm 33, that compared to the ultimate reality of God, and his omnipresent yet transcendent pervasiveness over an infinite universe, and that the glory which represents this reality, the glory which forces me to my knees, is only a representation of the ultimate reality, that compared to that I am utterly insignificant, thus, hardly worthy of claiming existence, that God considered me an existing person, and not only existing, but significant; I fell with my face on the floor, and physically could not get up. I could not move! Now I had to ask, what it was that made me realize this? It wasn’t a thought I had after a long logical and progressive line of thought. It was not induced or deduced from anything. This doesn’t mean that it might not have been just my imagination on overload. It could’ve been. The point is, if it isn’t my imagination, that is, if it is not all in my head, then it must have been God.
No doubt the skeptic will read the last paragraph and vomit. Jon is a skeptic. That’s why he was annoyed with my answer to his question. I gave him a spiritual answer to a skeptical question. So let me at least address his question skeptically. Go read the philosophy guys at Notre Dame.
I’ll say this before I completely cop out. I am not claiming that the only knowledge that someone can have to God is spiritual or anti-intellectual, or that the only path to a knowledge of God is spiritual or ethereal, that there is no intellectual realization of the truth claims of Christianity. I am not skilled enough to argue for the position in a way that would not have me merely repeating the arguments of greater men and women. Whether or not a purely intellectual approach to religion can lead one to God is a major philosophical issue in our times. My hunch is that it’s true to believe in God, and false to be an atheist. And you can get someone as far as admitting that Christianity is a coherent belief system, but as far as human persuasion is a violent endeavor, that is you cannot make people believe anything really, the Holy Spirit of God takes that role, and does it without any violence, but in the pure unutterable form of epiphany. So that when someone says that they know God, they are not talking about knowing God in a way that comforts a skeptic. Skepticism’s range in eternity is as infinite as anything. There’s always a deeper question. But if Christianity is going to be worthy of acceptance, it has to have a rational coherence. I don’t believe that any true skeptic who asks me how I know that my Christianity is true will ever be close to anything but completely dissatisfied with the answer I give.