Do Non-Believers Willfully Refuse to Believe?

One contention that many Christians make about nonbelievers in general and ex-Christians like us in specific, is that we have hardened hearts. We refuse to believe because we rebel at the notion of obeying the commands of a righteous and holy God. It’s not the truth we seek, for we know the truth, it’s claimed. It’s that we reject the truth because of willful ignorance. We simply refuse to believe. They will quote some passages in the Bible like Romans 1 to reinforce this belief of theirs, and nothing we can say will change their minds on this issue. My attempt at answering such a contention will probably be received no differently, but I like to try. So here goes.

Christians who have not yet accepted the idea that “all truth is God’s truth” will believe what the Bible says, regardless of what I say here. But they fail to understand two things. In the first place, they fail to understand that not all Christians think this way because those Bible passages can be legitimately interpreted differently. I’ll not go into this here, but their whole contention is built, not on what God says, but how they interpret what God says, if he said it at all. In the second place, whenever exegetes have tried to interpret the Bible, those who accept that “all truth is God’s truth” will interpret the Bible in keeping with what we learn from science, philosophy and experience, for these things are a check on proper Biblical exegesis. Experience, for instance, has always been a check on exegesis, whether it comes to Wesleyan perfectionism, perseverance of the saints, second coming predictions, Pentecostal miracle workers, understanding marriage, parenting, ministry, and so on. The whole science/religion discussion is an attempt to harmonize the Bible with what scientists have experienced through empirical observations of the universe. While experience is not the test for deciding what the Bible says, the Christian understanding of what the Bible says must be able to explain personal experience.

So here we are as former people who lived and breathed the Christian way of life and faith. We claim we left because the reasons to believe simply were not there. This should be a check on the Biblical exegesis of the relevant texts, rather than forcing Christians to claim we rejected the Christian faith because we are in rebellion against God.

That being said, consider too that people sincerely and honestly disagree over almost everything that we can disagree about. Name it and there is probably a disagreement about it. Which diet is the most effective for losing weight? Which sports player was the greatest in his or her sport? I could go on and on, about some scientific results, politics, ethics, economics, anthropology, and history. From the scholarly level to the peon level we disagree about everything there is to disagree about. And this goes for religion as well. There so many religions and sects within them that if each one was a person we’d be able to fill up the largest stadium in the world with them.

I’m not saying that of all the religious and non-religious views that none are correct, only that it reveals an incredible amount of chutzpa to claim with complete assurance that he is not only correct, a large claim in and of itself, but also that the others know the truth and willfully reject it. The Christian had better be absolutely sure his Biblical texts say exactly what he claims them to say before making such a wildly implausible contention.

Undismayed, the Christian will claim as evidence for their interpretation of the relevant Biblical texts that the claims of the gospel are unflinching and absolute, demanding a complete surrender and commitment such that people who know the truth and don’t like it will rebel against it. But is this really true? The Greek word for repentance, metanoia, means a “change of mind.” That’s what it means. Of course, implicit in the meaning of the word is that a change of mind leads to a change of behavior, and that is true, such that if there is no change of behavior then it’s clear there was no change of mind. But think about this. If someone was really convinced of the truth of the gospel then he has already changed his mind! One cannot change his mind and also refuse to change his mind. His mind has already been changed. And if changed he would change his behavior in keeping with what he believes. It cannot be otherwise. And what exactly is the gospel that he changed his mind about? That God loves him, died on the cross to save him, will bring him into the eternal pleasures of an eternal bliss which avoids the eternal pains of hell. All God asks is to obey him in return, although such obedience doesn’t actually save us. If someone actually believed this he would willingly obey God. This would be a no brainer. If someone accepted this as the truth he would surrender to God in obedience. It’s the least he could do, especially since this God will also help him, grant him answered prayers and forgive him when he falls.

Futhermore, if people do reject the truth of the gospel because it demands too much of them, then how do these Christians explain militant Muslims who reject the gospel? They are willing to fly planes into the World Trade Centers for what they believe. And while I think such obedience is immoral and misguided, I don’t see very many Christians with that same kind of commitment, say for just one example, when it comes to selling all and giving to the poor, or at least, giving till it hurts. There are Tibetan Monks who sacrifice everything for what they believe too, or a Mother Teresa, if she was all that, anyway. To say people reject the Protestant gospel (since I mentioned Mother Teresa) because they reject the demands of the gospel, is simply ludicrous.

We nonbelievers and former Christians do not believe because we do not think the evidence is there, period. To say otherwise one would have to deal with my arguments here. And if you cannot reconcile the relevant biblical texts to these arguments and our testimonies, then perhaps you too should consider that the Bible is not the word of God like we do. The relevant Biblical texts were written in an ancient era which is unlike our democratic free speaking era, where we’ve learned that sincere and honest disagreements are a part of daily life, and acceptable. In the ancient era (and during the Inquisition) people were killed for believing differently, because people who believed differently were considered evil in a collective society which demanded unity on such matters. We still find the barbaric notion of the “thought police” in Muslim countries today. But it is barbaric, and this same kind of barbarism is reflected in certain interpretations of the relevant Biblical texts about those who don't believe.