Consciousness Presents a Problem for Scientific Naturalism

(The River Raisin, in our backyard)

A "recalcitrant fact," writes J.P. Moreland, is a stubborn fact that doggedly resists explanation by a theory. "No matter what a theory's advocate does, the recalcitrant fact just sits there and is not easily incorprated into the theory. In this case, the recalcitrant fact provides falsifying evidence for the theory and some degree of confirmation for its rivals." (J.P. Moreland, "The Image of God and the Failure of Scientific Atheism," in God is Great, God is Good: Why Believing in God is Reasonable and Responsible, 33)

A stubborn fact that keeps holding on, for scientific naturalism, is the nature of human persons. In this regard Berkeley philosopher John Searle writes:

"There is exactly one overriding question in contemporary philosophy... How do we fit in?... How can we square this self-conception of ourselves as mindful, meaning-creating, free, rational, etc., agents with a universe that consists entirely of mindless, meaningless, unfree, nonrational, brute physical particles?" (In Ib., 34)

Moreland answers: "For the scientific naturalist, the answer is "Not very well." (Ib.)

In fact, it was this recalcitrant fact, among other things, that led the famous philosopher-atheist Antony Flew to turn to theism. Flew writes:

"The rationality [consciousness, freedom of the will and unified self] that we unmistakably experience - ranging from the laws of nature to our capacity for rational thought - cannot be explained if it does not have an ultimate ground, which can be nothing less than an infinite mind." (In Ib.)

Consciousness presents a problem for scientific naturalism.

***
See Moreland's two books on this for more detailed reasoning:

The Recalcitrant Imago Dei: Human Persons and the Failure of Naturalism

Consciousness and the Existence of God: A Theistic Argument

***

Other blog posts on consciousness I have made...

J. P. Moreland's Argument From Consciousness for God's Existence

Self-Refuting Loops & the Mind-Consciousness-Brain Problem

Recent Resources on the "Really Hard Problem" of First-Person Subjective Consciousness

Chalmers's Nonreductive Explanation of Consciousness

First-Person Subjective Consciousness and the Existence of God

Philosophical Naturalism: Some Posts

Immaterial Consciousness Leads Me to Think About God

Consciousness as Real and Immaterial

Consciousness and Creation Out of Nothing

Stop Finding Fault with Others

                                                                         (Monroe, MI)

How far do I want to follow Jesus?

This morning I read Matthew 7:1-2:

“Do not judge, or you too will be judged. 

For in the same way you judge others, 

you will be judged, 

and with the measure you use, 

it will be measured to you.

Jesus is talking about people. My problem is that I make too many judgments about people without understanding. I know that judging without understanding is ignorant and foolish. When I do this, I am often wrong.

Sometimes, I speculate. Speculation is a form of non-understanding and, as such, usually a waste of time. I've expended a lot of time guessing about the actions of other people, sometimes forming judgments based on my predictions. 

Jesus; words are not about making judgments, but about judgmentalism. We make countless judgments every day. The lights in my room are on. Or, It's going to br cloudy today. I judge that those two statements are true. Linda and I are tired of winter. That's true, too. And, If X keeps using heroin, he could die. That's true. All these judgments involving states of affairs can be made with a good heart.

Judgmentalism, however, is about a different heart attitude. A judgmental person is a critic of others. A judgmental person is someone who condemns others.

New Testament scholar R. T. France writes: "Judge (krino) often carries the connotation of "condemn," and it is in that sense that it is used here." (France, The Gospel According to Matthew, p. 142)

France continues:

"This passage is concerned with the fault-finding, condemnatory attitude which is too often combined with a blindness to one's own failings. The least such an attitude can expect is to be judged with equal harshness by other men. But the passive [tense], as often in Matthew, probably conceals God himself as the agent. Just as he will forgive those who forgive (6:14-15), he will condemn those who condemn." (Ib.)

John Stott writes that Jesus' command "is not a requirement to be blind, but a plea to be generous." (In Leon Morris, The Gospel According to Matthew, p. 165)

Commenting on these verses, Morris writes:

"Jesus' words surely refer to the divine tribunal. To be quick to call others to account is to invite God to call us to account. That judgment of some form is required of his followers is clear from the demand that they cast not what is holy to dogs (Mt. 7:6); what is forbidden is censoriousness, the readiness to find fault." (Ib.)

Craig Keener writes that "Jesus does not oppose offering correction, but only offering correction in the wrong spirit." (Keener, The Gospel of Matthew: A Socio-Rhetorical Commentary, p. 240)

Judging others while being blind to my own faults is toxic.

Condemning others is not my responsibility.

Judging without understanding is foolish, bringing pain not only to others but to myself as well.

I agree.

"But Jesus demands more than agreement from disciples: he demands obedience." (Keener, Ib., p. 241)

Biblical Answers to Cultural Values Seminar - Live Zoominar - April 6

 

 

Renewal School of Ministry 

Biblical Answers to Cultural Values Seminar 

Time/Date: This live seminar will be held on Saturday, April 6, 2024 at 11 a.m. Eastern Time. It will last 2 - 2.5 hours. 

Content: In this course a panel of HSRM leaders will discuss several important values that are commonly held by people in our culture. We will offer a biblical perspective on these values. The panel will discuss ways to address these values as we talk with people we know. 

There is $5 fee to cover costs for taking seminars in the Renewal School of Ministry. 

Please enroll for the seminar on our website: https://hsrm.org/rsom. 

The teachers for this seminar are:

 Dr. John Piippo, Pastor at Redeemer Fellowship Church in Monroe, Michigan

Holly Collins, Director of Worship at Redeemer Fellowship

Dr. Clay Ford, retired pastor and former Director of Holy Spirit Renewal Ministries, California. 

The panel will be moderated by Rev. Ed Owens, Holt, Michigan

Inner Peace Has Power to Shape Environments

(Munson Park, across from our house.)

The more time we spend in solitude, silence, and listening in the presence of God, the more we are at peace with God, others, and ourselves. This is because peace is a fruit that is produced when we are attached, branchlike, to the Prince of Peace.

We carry this peace in our homes, and into the workplace. The peace that is ours affects the social atmosphere. 

Inner peace has power to shape environments. I know some people who carry such peace, and it affects me. 

Henri Nouwen writes about this in The Way of the Heart.

"It will be possible to move into the midst of a tumultuous world with a heart at rest. It is this restful heart that will attract those who are groping to find their way through life. When we have found our rest in God we can do nothing other than minister. God’s rest will be visible wherever we go and to whomever we meet. And before we speak any words, the Spirit of God, praying in us, will make his presence known and gather people into a new body, the body of Christ himself."

***

My books are:

Leading the Presence-Driven Church

Praying: Reflections on 40 Years of Solitary Conversations with God

Deconstructing Progressive Christianity

31 Letters to the Church on Praying

31 Letters to the Church on Discipleship

Encounters With the Holy Spirit (co-edited with Janice Trigg)

The Difference Between Anxiety and Fear

 

                                               (Downy Woodpecker in our back yard - anxiety-free.)

"What Is Anxiety? 

Anxiety is related to fear, but is not the same thing. The diagnostic manual of psychiatry (DSM-5-TR) defines fear as “the emotional response to real or perceived imminent threat, whereas anxiety is anticipation of future threat.” Both can be healthy responses to reality, but when excessive, they can become disorders."

Haidt, Jonathan. The Anxious Generation: How the Great Rewiring of Childhood Is Causing an Epidemic of Mental Illness (pp. 26-27). Penguin Publishing Group. Kindle Edition. 

An Epidemic of Mental Illness In Our Children

 

Johnathan Haidt is perhaps my favorite culture analyst. His books The Righteous Mind: Why Good People Are Divided by Politics and Religion, and The Coddling of the American Mind: How Good Intentions and Bad Ideas Are Setting Up a Generation for Failure (with Greg Lukionoff), are required reading.

Haidt is like Kierkegaard, but with data.

His new book came out today - The Anxious Generation: How the Great Rewiring of Childhood Is Causing a Epidemic of Mental Illness. I purchased it for my Kindle, and am reading.

See Saturday's article on Haidt in the New York Times. 

Easter Week - Jesus Brings In a Love Revolution

(Jerusalem)

TUESDAY, MARCH 26

During Easter Week, 2,000 years ago, Jesus was doing and saying Messianic, Kingly things in the city of Jerusalem. Tensions around Him were escalating, and would eventually lead to His crucifixion.

Certain Jewish religious leaders were confronting Jesus. In Matthew 22:34-40 some of the rules-righteousness Pharisees, who are angry about Jesus and His failure to abide by all the religious rules they have accumulated, address Him with The Big Question. Here are two translations of that text. Only one of them is accurate.


SCRIPTURE READING - MATTHEW 22:34-40 - TWO VERSIONS

Version 1:

³⁴ Hearing that Jesus had silenced the Sadducees, the Pharisees got together. ³⁵ One of them, an expert in the law, tested him with this question: ³⁶ “Teacher, which is the greatest commandment in the Law?” 
³⁷ Jesus replied: “‘Turn off your cell phone." ³⁸ This is the first and greatest commandment. ³⁹And the second is like it: ‘Turn off your neighbor's cell phone as your own.’ ⁴⁰ All the Law and the Prophets hang on these two commandments.”

Version 2:

³⁴ Hearing that Jesus had silenced the Sadducees, the Pharisees got together. ³⁵ One of them, an expert in the law, tested him with this question: ³⁶ “Teacher, which is the greatest commandment in the Law?” 
³⁷ Jesus replied: “‘Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind.’ ³⁸ This is the first and greatest commandment. ³⁹ And the second is like it: ‘Love your neighbor as yourself.’ ⁴⁰ All the Law and the Prophets hang on these two 
commandments.”



WHAT’S HAPPENING IN THESE VERSES?

The correct translation, from the original Greek text (which, BTW, and contra KJV-only worshipers, we are very close to having), is Version 2. Version 1 is false for the following reasons:

1.             There were no cell phones in the first century.

2.             Even if there were cell phones in the first century Jesus would not have needed one, since the Father in Him knows the hearts and minds of people.

3.             Version 1 is too legalistic-Pharisaic sounding. Jesus would never have said such a thing; i.e., Jesus would never have singled out a human-made unwritten rule as the greatest rule of all.

4.             Jesus wouldn't turn and give someone the evil eye if, while He was speaking, their cell phone went off.

Behind the Pharisees' question and Jesus' response lies the ongoing "Sabbath Controversies." I'm going to illustrate this by using an example that happened to me recently.

I was driving in downtown Monroe, stopped at a light, when a car pulled up behind me. The driver appeared angry - at me! He honked his horn, drove next to me, and gave me "The Look." It was not the look of love. Something about my driving had not been pleasing to him. I have no idea what it was. But I knew that, in his mind, I had violated one of his rules of driving. As a result I received The Look, not of love, but of condemnation.

"The Look" is what happens in a rule-governed world, where following a set of rules is the means of acceptance and social righteousness. The prevailing mood is judgment and condemnation, because rules get transgressed. While it is polite to silence my cell phone in a Sunday morning worship service, it is not a Jesus-thing to give someone The Look when their phone goes off. Because love is patient, love is kind, love is not easily angered, and love keeps no record of wrongs.

Jesus was constantly breaking religious rules. In Mark 2:22-28 some rule-watching Pharisees address Jesus about the behavior of His disciples on the Sabbath. Contrary to Exodus 16:25-26, which rules out gleaning and plucking grain on the Sabbath, Jesus allows His disciples to do so. For this he gets "The Look."

Jesus' response is to reinterpret the Exodus passage, placing it in the greater context of God's overall purposes for humanity. Ben Witherington writes: "Jesus' point of view seems to be that human beings do not exist for the sake of the law, but rather the converse. The function of the Sabbath is to restore and renew creation to its full capacity, just as leaving the land fallow for a sabbatical year might do. The disciples' eating was a means of renewal and restoration for them. Thus, they should be permitted to eat, even at the expense of specific, clear prohibitions in the law. In short, Jesus sees it as part of his mission to interpret matters according to their true or original intention, no longer making allowances for the hardness of human hearts." (Ben Witherington, The Christology of Jesus, 68)

If the love of God was abundantly poured into my heart (Romans 5:5) I would not need rules like "You shall not steal," or "You shall not commit adultery." That's why Jesus said that all the Law and prophets hand on the two Love-Commandments.

Jesus' revolution is, essentially, a Love Revolution. He was bringing in a love and grace environment, rather than a rules-environment. That's why Paul wrote, in Romans 5:2, that "we have gained access by faith into this grace in which we stand." "Gained access" is Temple language; meaning we who trust in Christ are ushered into the fields of God's grace.

Love, not law, wins. Mercy triumphs over judgment. (James 2:13)

REFLECTION

1. Thinking of Romans 5:5, ask God for a fresh outpouring, a fresh deluge, a "rainstorm" of God's love to be poured into your heart today.

For My Former students of Payne Theological Seminary

 

What a privilege for me to have taught at one of the nation's oldest black theological seminaries, Payne Theological Seminary 

Here are some of my Payne spiritual formation classes.

And, if you are interested, click the link below to see books that have helped me understand black spirituality. 

African, and African-American Spirituality: A Select Bibliography

Here are some of my former classes - blessings to you all!

Easter Week - The Cursing of the Fig Tree Is Really About the End of the Temple

 

(Woman praying in Jerusalem)

MONDAY, MARCH 25

This is Easter Week - the days leading up to Good Friday and the cross. After Jesus rode into Jerusalem on a donkey to the shouts of "Save us now!" ("Hosanna!"), he did some radical and revealing things in the city. One of them was His "cursing of the fig tree."

SCRIPTURE READING - MATTHEW 21:18-22

¹⁸ Early in the morning, as Jesus was on his way back to the city, he was hungry.¹⁹ Seeing a fig tree by the road, he went up to it but found nothing on it except leaves. Then he said to it, “May you never bear fruit again!”Immediately the tree withered. 
²⁰ When the disciples saw this, they were amazed. “How did the fig tree wither so quickly?” they asked. 
²¹ Jesus replied, “Truly I tell you, if you have faith and do not doubt, not only can you do what was done to the fig tree, but also you can say to this mountain, ‘Go, throw yourself into the sea,’ and it will be done. ²² If you believe, you will receive whatever you ask for in prayer.”

WHAT’S HAPPENING IN THESE VERSES?

Jesus and his disciples are walking up Mount Zion, upon which Jerusalem is seated. On top of the mountain is the Temple. The Temple was in full view as they ascended. It's probable that the fig tree was higher up on the road, between Jesus and the Temple. As they walk to the Temple, Jesus see the fig tree ahead.

As He points to the fig tree, he is really pointing to the Temple. The barrenness of the fig tree is a visual analogy for the barrenness of the presence of God within the Temple. God is no longer showing up in the Temple. The religious leaders, instead of welcoming God's presence and introducing people to that presence, shut the door of heaven in people's faces and themeselves do not enter in. (Matthew 23:13) Their "religion" was rule-based and filled with self-centered pride.  Nothing worse could be said of a religious leader; viz., that they do their religious thing and bar God from the activities.

In the case of the Temple, God himself exited. How sad and worthless this is, since what people need is God and His manifest "with-us" presence.

When Jesus curses the barren fig tree and talks about "this mountain" being thrown into the sea, he's not referring to just any mountain, but to Mount Zion. Some people talk about a faith that can move mountains and use this passage as an example, but Jesus was really talking about a new kind of faith that would exist without the Temple. The Temple, where God had showed up for hundreds of years, was going down, never to be inhabited by God again. The day was near when true worship will not happen on this mountain or any mountain. Thus, "this mountain" (Mt Zion) can be cast into the sea.

Later, as Jesus and his disciples are walking down Mount Zion from the Temple area, his disciples came up to him to call his attention to its buildings. ² “Do you see all these things?” he asked.“Truly I tell you, not one stone here will be left on another; every one will be thrown down.” (Matthew 24:1-2)

With the Temple now God-less, where will God manifest Himself? The answer, as the disciples will realize on the Day of Pentecost, is that the dwelling place of God will be in His people, both individually and corporately. The great, revolutionary new truth of Jesus in this story is that if you are a Jesus-follower then you are a temple of the presence of God. You are, as Richard Foster has written, a "portable sanctuary."

You host the presence of God.

REFLECTION

1. Consider ways in which you will welcome God's presence in your life today, ways in which you will welcome his presence.

Less of Self, More of Jesus

(Staircase, University of Michigan)

One theme in my spiritual life is the diminishing of self so as to gain Christ. God has told me, "John, learn the joy of living in the background."

It happened recently at Redeemer, as we were worshiping. We were singing "From the Inside Out." One of the lines talks about "the art of losing myself." I pulled out a 3X5 card and wrote those words down.  And added: This is it, the key to whatever Christ-effectiveness I shall have in this life.

Theistic philosopher Roger Scruton, in The Soul of the World, writes:

"If there is anything that could be called progress in the religious history of mankind, it resides in the gradual preference for the self over the other as the primary sacrificial victim. It is precisely in this that the Christian religion rests its moral claim." (Scruton, 2)

I pick up my journal. I'm looking for what God told me a few weeks ago. "Be content to stay in the background. Prepare for how I will use you in the end."

This is good, because a sign of progress in spiritual formation is growing self-recession. God will gift me with a ministry of absence.

In the spiritual life smaller is better. This allows God to be larger, and magnified, and glorified.