Ravi Zacharias In The Clutches Of Ungracious Christians?

            I am not going to claim that Ravi Zacharias was sinless; that he was not sexually immoral.

I am also not here to dispute the actions of various Christian leaders who responded to Ravi’s sins by either erasing his work or having disassociated with his ministry in some form or the other. That’s their call. Punitive actions may be necessary, as I said before; I am not here to dispute that.

            But I wonder and hence I request you to think if the Christian community were gracious in their action against Ravi.

At this point in time, Ravi (the sinner) has been punished posthumously. Ravi’s victims are passionately supported [maybe compensated] and being prayed for.

However, there is another entity that’s involved in this situation – Ravi’s family. How have they been treated by the Christian community?

Was the Christian community gracious in their actions against Ravi?

In other words, did Ravi’s family, in some way or the other, appreciate the graciousness of the Christian community?

To begin with, let us consider a few punitive actions taken against Ravi Zacharias:

1.      The Christian and Missionary Alliance (C&MA) which had ordained Ravi Zacharias revoked his ordination and expelled him posthumously.¹

2.      Ravi Zacharias’s books will no longer be offered by HarperCollins Christian Publishing, ““In September, when the most-recent sexual misconduct allegations against the late Ravi Zacharias surfaced, HarperCollins Christian Publishing immediately suspended all projects and shipments of his work,” said Casey Francis Harrell, vice president of corporate communications. “Following the findings in the independent report, the company will immediately take all his publications out of print...””²

3.      Christian author, Lee Strobel, announced that he would halt the printing of his book that featured Ravi. Similarly, Ravi’s forthcoming book Jesus for You will not be released.³

4.      Prominent Christian apologists who served with Ravi Zacharias at RZIM are actively erasing their association with RZIM. They want nothing to do with RZIM.

Essentially, there is a mass movement to erase Ravi and his works from the annals of Christendom.

In this very context, Philip Yancey’s quote becomes very meaningful, “Christians get very angry toward other Christians who sin differently than they do.”

The punitive actions against Ravi Zacharias seem to be a classic case in point.

Grace is nowhere to be found in and through these punitive actions. Why do I say this?

Sadly, Ravi’s son Nathan Zacharias describes the ungraciousness and the hypocrisy exhibited by the Christian community: (Emphasis Mine)⁴

Many of those remaining at RZIM, along with some former global leadership, have worked very hard to distance themselves from my dad. They’ve busted out their thesauruses and called him every name they think is appropriate. They’ve damned him, erased him, and expressed regret that they were ever involved with him in what was a very successful ministry. If they feel he should be erased and reduced to only the sum of his sins, then they have some hard questions to answer about their theology given the way God allowed his success while these things were allegedly happening. God sure is lucky to have them here to save Him from allowing Dad’s material to ever positively impact another person.

They can’t even acknowledge the reality that God blessed them (wrongly, it would seem, according to their logic) in their own ministries alongside Dad either. Of course they still benefit from the status that came as a result. 10 years ago, no one would have paid any attention to the statements of many of them. Their audience now is a result of the platform they got from their days at RZIM with Dad.

They want no piece of, him, association with him, or remnant of him. Nothing at all.

            Do Nathan’s words sound like the Christian community were gracious? Sadly, no!

            Nathan’s words reveal the hypocrisy of the Christian community.

Those who are actively erasing Ravi or disassociating with his legacy in some form or the other enjoyed [substantial] financial benefits and fame through their association with Ravi and RZIM. While they do not want to do anything with Ravi, would they, with the same intensity, return all the financial benefits they accrued over the years of their association with RZIM?

In his passionate blog to defend his father, Nathan Zacharias presents this scenario, “They want nothing to do with his ministry legacy. But they’re glad to hold on to his financial legacy.” (Emphasis Mine)⁵

Hypocrisy at its finest!

By being gracious, the Christian community could have ensured that the Zacharias family is comforted and encouraged through this gruelling period. Isn’t that the least one could expect?

Nathan’s words, showcasing the pain in his heart, reveal the ungraciousness and the hypocrisy of the Christian community.

The big question is this, how would Jesus have responded to Ravi Zacharias?

Knowing Jesus, HIS response would have been filled with grace and mercy. Knowing Jesus, HE would not have ignored Ravi’s family, who are in pain, enduring this tribulation.

That’s the Jesus the Bible reveals. That’s the Jesus we love, believe, and worship.

Have we been Christlike through our actions against Ravi?

You decide.

But when we think of the late Ravi Zacharias, let us be gracious. May his family be blessed with comfort, encouragement, strength, and peace from our Triune God.

Endnotes:

¹https://www.cmalliance.org/news/2021/02/12/statement-on-the-findings-of-ravi-zacharias-independent-investigation/

²https://www.christianitytoday.com/news/2021/february/ravi-zacharias-books-harper-collins-lee-strobel-rzim-report.html

³Ibid.

⁴https://defendingravi.wordpress.com/

⁵Ibid.

Websites last accessed on 31^st March, 2021.

God Cannot Be Evil. Why?

            Some atheists contend that God is an ‘Evil God’ (if at all HE exists, according to their worldview). They suppose that a good God would not permit evil to occur in our world.

            Famous atheist, Richard Dawkins called God an evil God. Philosopher Stephen Law has written elaborately on the Evil God Challenge, which argues for the presence of an all-evil God.

            So, the notion, ‘God is evil’ or ‘there is evil in God’ is quite common against the presence of the all-good God. In other words, atheists contend that we, the theists, cannot establish whether God is good or evil.

            But God just cannot be evil. Here’s why:

            According to the Christian Philosopher William Lane Craig, God is a being worthy of worship. Such a being should be the embodiment of absolute goodness. If absolute goodness is an inherent ingredient of the essence of the ‘Maximally Great Being,’ then God, who by definition, is the ‘Maximally Great Being,’ cannot be evil.¹

            Do be aware that we are not ascribing goodness to God because we observe a wealth of goodness in our world. God is not good because there is so much good in our world.

            Contrarily, God is good because HE in HIS essence is good. That’s the property of the maximally great being.

            William Lane Craig takes another route to prove that God cannot be evil. So he writes that the presence of an evil God would prove the presence of the all-good God:²

Suppose we concede for the sake of argument that an evil Creator/Designer exists. Since this being is evil, that implies that he fails to discharge his moral obligations. But where do those come from? How can this evil god have duties to perform which he is violating? Who forbids him to do the wrong things that he does? Immediately, we see that such an evil being cannot be supreme: there must be a being who is even higher than this evil god and is the source of the moral obligations which he chooses to flout, a being which is absolute goodness Himself. In other words, if Law’s evil god exists, then God exists.

            Craig goes on to explain that the ‘moral argument’ for God also reveals that God cannot be evil:³

…we are to conceive of God as an ultimate standard or paradigm of goodness. Once you have that, it will determine not only what is good but also what is evil. Just as something is good insofar as it approximates the paradigm of goodness, so something is evil insofar as it falls away from that same paradigm.

For that reason I sometimes run a moral argument for God based on moral evil in the world: without God objective moral values would not exist; evil exists; therefore, objective moral values exist (some things are evil!); therefore, God exists. Evil proves God’s existence because without God good and evil as such would not exist.

…I doubt that it is even coherent to say that there is an ultimate paradigm of evil. Certainly, there could be some evil being (Satan?) who is opposed to God; but even such a being would be evil only because he fails to live up to the standard set by God. In particular, such a being would fail to live up to his moral duties; but then where do they come from?

            Thus, Craig explains that God, who is the ultimate standard or the paradigm of goodness and who is the cause of objective moral values, should be necessarily good and cannot be evil.

            We can also deal with this objection from another vantage point: the Aristotelian-Thomistic philosophy. In other words, the ‘Privation Theory of Evil.’

            Evil is the absence of good. For example, “Dogs are supposed to run, fetch, chase squirrels; they are supposed to have four limbs, be able to see, hear, smell, etc. A dog that does not have four limbs, that cannot see, etc., for whatever reason, is less than it should be, and so has suffered some evil.”⁴

            In other words, when a ‘good’ part possesses a certain defect, then that defective part is said to have suffered some evil. An eye is good when it provides sight because all its parts are functioning according to their fullest potential. If certain ‘good’ parts of an eye have defects, then an eye cannot provide sight. This defect, then, is the absence of good. Blindness, therefore, is an evil caused by the absence of good.

            So evil per se has no ontology.

            Evil, in a metaphysical sense, is parasitic on good.

            According to the Christian philosopher Edward Feser, God cannot be necessarily evil, since evil is parasitic on the good. Therefore, God, in HIS being, has to be necessarily good, “…evil is metaphysically parasitic on good, and thus…on being, in such a way that whatever is Being Itself would have to be Goodness Itself and therefore in no way evil. Hence, since God is Being Itself, the claim “If God exists, then He is good” is metaphysically necessary, while the claim “If God exists, He might be evil” is necessarily false.”⁵

Endnotes:

¹https://www.reasonablefaith.org/videos/other-videos/could-god-be-evil/

²https://www.reasonablefaith.org/writings/question-answer/the-evil-god-objection/

³https://www.reasonablefaith.org/writings/question-answer/ultimate-evil/

⁴https://aquinasonline.com/nature-of-evil/

⁵http://edwardfeser.blogspot.com/2010/10/laws-evil-god-challenge.html

Websites last accessed on 13^th March 2021. 

God Will Not Heal Everyone! Why?

             The ‘Problem of Evil’ is a significant factor for apostasy in Christianity. It is more often an unanswered prayer or an unrealized hope in the context of much-anticipated healing and deliverance that prompts a [so-called] believer to recant his faith in the Lord Jesus.

            The Bible assures believers of healing (Exodus 23:25; Jeremiah 30:17; Matthew 4:23-24; James 5: 14-15 etc.). The same Bible also assures us that God will not always heal (2 Corinthians 12:7-9; Hebrews 11: 35b-40; 1 Timothy 5:23; 2 Timothy 4:20; Jesus did not heal everyone during HIS ministry on earth.).

            So if we expect healing or deliverance with certainty from a particular sickness or a problem, we expose our ignorance of the Biblical teaching in this context.

            Gotquestions.org highlights Joni Eareckson Tada’s testimony in this context: (Emphasis Mine)¹

Often, Christians have an over-simplified idea of healing. They think that, if they are sick, they have only to ask God to heal them and, because God loves them, He will heal them straightaway. Healing is seen as proof of a person’s faith and of God’s love. This idea persists in some circles in spite of the truth that every mother knows: a parent does not give her child everything he asks for every time, no matter how much she loves him.

Joni Eareckson Tada struggled with this issue for a long time. As she recounts in her book Joni, she sought physical healing of her quadriplegia. She prayed and fully believed that God would heal her. In her words, “I certainly believed. I was calling up my girlfriends saying, ‘Next time you see me I’m going to be running up your sidewalk. God’s going to heal me’” (quoted in an interview with Marvin Olasky, January 17, 2013). Yet Joni is still in a wheelchair today. Forty-five years after the accident that left her paralyzed, God has still not healed her. Her perspective is one of great faith: “God may remove your suffering, and that will be great cause for praise. But if not, He will use it, He will use anything and everything that stands in the way of His fellowship with you. So let God mold you and make you, transform you from glory to glory. That’s the deeper healing” (quoted on Grace to You, October 16, 2013). Some feel that God will never heal anyone miraculously today. Others feel that God will always heal a person if he or she has enough faith. But God will not be put into either box.

            At the same time, it is incorrect to blame the believer for lack of faith or accuse him of being in sin when sickness or problems persists in his life.

            Ironically, the Bible reveals healing in people who did not exhibit faith in God. The sick man in the pool of Bethesda did not have faith in Jesus that HE could heal him (cf. John 5:1-5). Nevertheless, Jesus healed this man, who was sick for 38 years.

            Sin need not necessarily be the sole factor for sickness or troubles in our life. The Bible affirms this fact, “Or those eighteen who died when the tower in Siloam fell on them—do you think they were more guilty than all the others living in Jerusalem? I tell you, no! But unless you repent, you too will all perish.”” (Luke 13: 4-5, NIV).

            Why does God not heal everyone? If God heals everyone then people will flock to God for healing instead of flocking to God to love HIM for who HE is.

            Jesus came to make dead people live (i.e. spiritually dead people). HE did not come to make bad people good or to heal all the sick people in our world.

            So should we hope and pray for healing or deliverance? Yes, by all means! That’s the most appropriate action of a believer. Pray for God’s will to happen in our lives.

            When we learn that God will not heal everyone, it’s not that God does not heal at all. God still heals and delivers us even to this day, it’s just that healing and deliverance need not be for all who ask.

            God may not heal us, but HE will offer us peace, strength, power, and wisdom to navigate through all our trials and tribulations: “When life-threatening illness strikes, by all means pray for healing if the Spirit so moves you. But also pray that, if cure is not according to God’s will, he might equip you and your loved ones with strength, clarity, and discernment. Pray he might grant us all peace to endure — through the pain, through the infirmity, with eyes cast heavenward even as fear drives us to our knees. Pray that as the shadows encroach, and the light within us dwindles, that the light of the world might illuminate our minds and hearts, drawing us toward himself in our final moments on this earth. Pray we would know in our hearts that our end on this earth is by no means the end.

            However dark death seems, it is fleeting and transient, a mere breath before the eternal life to come.”

Endnotes:

¹https://www.gotquestions.org/God-heal-everyone.html

²https://www.desiringgod.org/articles/if-god-doesnt-heal-you

Websites last accessed on 8^th March 2021. 

Could God Create Another God? If Not, Why?

             Omnipotence is commonly defined as “all powerful.” God, as a maximally great being (the greatest conceivable being), is omnipotent. In fact, omnipotence is an ontologically necessary attribute of the maximally great being.

            However, God’s omnipotence is, occasionally, characterized fallaciously. One such characterization is this: “If God can do anything, can HE create another God?” The illogical entailment of this characterization is that if God cannot create another God, then God cannot be omnipotent. Thusly, HE cannot be God or there is no God. 

            A brief basic understanding of God’s omnipotence is necessary.

            Although omnipotence is defined as an ability to be all powerful or the most powerful, there are certain things that God cannot and will not do. For instance, God cannot contradict HIS own nature and God will not contradict HIS own Word. E.g. God cannot perform evil acts or God cannot cease to be God.

            In a previous blog, I have detailed a few things God cannot do, here’s an excerpt:¹

            (1) God cannot sin or be evil.

            (2) God cannot be unholy.

            (3) God cannot stop loving us.

            (4) God cannot be partial.

            (5) God will not save everyone.

            (6) God will not heal everyone.

            (7) God cannot abandon us.

            So can God, because HE is all powerful, create another God?

            No, God cannot create another God. In other words, a maximally great being cannot create another maximally great being, for to be able to create another maximally great being is a logical contradiction or a self-defeating assertion.

            There cannot be two maximally great beings!

            Let’s examine this from another vantage point. God, by definition, is uncaused. God did not begin to exist. There is no beginning or an ending to God. HE exists eternally and necessarily.

            If the maximally great being ought to be uncaused, then it entails that a maximally great being cannot be created.

            Let’s now consider a variant of this question: Could God create a morally perfect being?

            Christian apologist, William Lane Craig, in an answer to this question, says that moral perfection is an attribute of God, hence God will not create morally perfect beings: “My reply is based on the idea that moral perfection is a uniquely divine property. To be morally perfect is to embody goodness itself, to be maximally good…the Supreme Good makes a being worthy of worship, then it immediately follows that that being is God. For by definition God is a being worthy of worship. Nothing else but God is worthy of worship (as opposed to just admiration). So if a being is morally perfect and therefore God, it must have all the essential properties of God, including omniscience, omnipotence, eternity, necessity, and so on. My answer implies that a human person cannot be a morally perfect being, or he would be God.”²

Endnotes:

¹http://rajkumarrichard.blogspot.com/2015/02/things-god-cannot-do-can-god-do-anything.html

²https://www.biola.edu/blogs/good-book-blog/2019/could-god-create-a-morally-perfect-being-revisited

Websites last accessed on 5^th March 2021.