Bertrand Russell, the 19th century British atheist philosopher, mathematician, and Nobel laureate was once asked what he would say if he found himself standing before God on the judgement day and God asked him, “Why didn’t you believe in Me?” Bertrand, without blinking an eye blurted out this response: “I will look God in the eye and tell him that he did not give me enough evidence. Not enough evidence, God! Not enough evidence!” What is interesting about Bertrand’s response is his sheer audacity to think that he can look God in the eyes. “God is like the sun,” G.K. Chesterton asserted, “You cannot look at it, but without it, you cannot look at anything else.”
Bertrand’s admittance that he chose the atheistic path because he couldn’t get enough evidence to the contrary is most unjustifiable and unfounded. My people have a maxim that challenges the tenets of this assertion. To wit: “One does not teach a child the nature of God.” Even people in the secular realm, without prior knowledge in scriptures know for sure that there is a God. Like other religions, their only shortcoming is the means by which they reach God. Jesus stated emphatically: “I am the Way, the Truth, and the Life. No one comes to the Father except through me” (John 14:6).
The Psalmist declares: “The heavens proclaim the glory of God. The skies display his craftsmanship. Day after day they continue to speak; night after night they make him known. They speak without a sound or word; their voice is never heard. Yet their message has gone throughout the earth, and their words to all the world” (Psalm 19 : 1 – 4, NLT). That is why the Apostle Paul, through the inspiration of the Holy Spirit stated in no uncertain terms that, no single human being has an excuse for not knowing God: “But God shows his anger from heaven against all sinful, wicked people who suppress the truth by their wickedness. They know the truth about God because he has made it obvious to them. For ever since the world was created, people have seen the earth and sky. Through everything God made, they can clearly see his invisible qualities – his eternal power and divine nature. So they have no excuse for not knowing God” (Romans 1:18 – 20, NLT).
As a result, it can be stated unequivocally that, it is not the absence of evidence that is causing some to doubt the existence of God but rather the suppression of it. I am a lover of science (especially biology), though I did not read science in high school. I believe one’s study of science and other body of knowledge should not lead one to think that all the wonderful things one sees in the world just happened with a big bang. That man evolved from apes, or amoeba or some primordial slime. Our study of science and nature should rather hold us spellbound about the nature of God and deepen our reverence for God. The hymnist could not have expressed this sense of wonder any better:
There is, beyond the azure blue, a God, concealed from human sight,
He tinted skies with heav’nly hue and framed the worlds with His great might
There is a God, He is alive, in Him we live, and we survive;
From dust our God created man, He is our God, the great I AM.
A. W. Dicus