No one in the final analysis really fails to become a Christian because of lack of arguments; he fails to become a Christian because he loves darkness rather than light and wants nothing to do with God.
Interpretation
People do not reject Christianity due to lack of evidence, but rather due to a preference for sin over righteousness.
This quote by William Lane Craig emphasizes that the rejection of Christianity is not primarily an intellectual issue involving logical arguments or evidence, but instead a moral one. It suggests that individuals choose to remain in spiritual darkness because they are unwilling to confront their flaws and seek a relationship with God, indicating a deeper alignment with their desires rather than a genuine search for truth.
In practice
This quote can be used in a sermon to highlight the moral choices people face regarding faith.
Therefore, when a person refuses to come to Christ it is never just because of lack of evidence or because of intellectual difficulties: at root, he refuses to come because he willingly ignores and rejects the drawing of God's Spirit on his heart. No one in the final analysis really fails to become a Christian because of lack of arguments; he fails to become a Christian because he loves darkness rather than light and wants nothing to do with God.
The Christian faith does not call for us to put our minds on the shelf, to fly in the face of common sense and history, or to make a leap of faith into the dark. The rational person, fully apprised of the evidence, can confidently believe.
Our churches are filled with Christians who are idling in intellectual neutral. As Christians, their minds are going to waste. One result of this is an immature, superficial faith. People who simply ride the roller coaster of emotional experience are cheating themselves out of a deeper and richer Christian faith by neglecting the intellectual side of that faith.
It's no longer enough to teach our children Bible stories; they need doctrine and apologetics.
Scepticism, ironically, draws its life's blood from claims to have a good deal of knowledge. For example, your friends claim to know, 'Since every possible option has not been explored, nothing can be said for certain.' That statement is itself a claim to knowledge!
He spent a lot of time flying. He learnt to communicate with birds and discovered that their conversation was fantastically boring. It was all to do with wind speed, wing spans, power-to-weight ratios and a fair bit about berries. Unfortunately, he discovered, once you have learnt birdspeak you quickly come to realize that the air is full of it the whole time, just inane bird chatter. There is no getting away from it.
Many people believe that our lives end not when we die but when the very last person who knew us dies. Memory is part of it, yes, but I think it's much more than memory.
If you look at all the notions we accept about who we are, you find that they are all based upon our perceptual experiences.
I will rejoice the day when they say: This is right whether we all rot on top of each other or not, dear children, as we certainly may. Either practice restraint or be prepared for crowding.
In most of mankind gratitude is merely a secret hope of further favors.
All true theology has an evangelistic thrust, and all true evangelism is theology in action.
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