The Clues and the Knowledge of God Message 1 in our series called The Reason for God

1. The Clues and the Knowledge of GodMessage 1 in our series called The Reason for God Sunday, March 14, 2010 Speaker: Dave Brereton

3. God Exists…and we know it! • “If one puts aside the existence of God…There is no meaning for life, and thus life has no meaning” • Somerset Maugham – The Summing Up • "Meaningless! Meaningless!"        says the Teacher.        "Utterly meaningless!        Everything is meaningless.“ • King Solomon – The Bible

4. Only $10.00!  • The seven part series we are beginning today is based on “The Reason for God” by Tim Keller • Books are available for $10 at the back. Pick up a book and if you remember, give me or Phil Hainaut your $10. • When you have read the book, pass it on to a colleague at work…good discussion will follow

5. The Clues/Fingerprints of God • The Big Bang. “Almost everyone now believes that the universe, and time itself, had a beginning at the big bang” Richard Dawkins • The Cosmic Welcome Mat. “It looks as if it knew we were coming.” - Francis Collins - The Language of God • The Regularity of Nature. “We don’t know why it is happening now…nor that it will continue tomorrow” – David Hume and Bertrand Russell – secular philosophers • Beauty and Love. “When you get the feeling that whatever note succeeds the last is the only possible note that can rightly happen at that instant, in that context, then chances are you are listening to Beethoven.” – Leonard Bernstein

6. We really know God exists! • “It is wrong to trample on someone’s rights” • “No one should impose their view on others, because everyone has the right to find truth inside her or himself.” • Why?

7. Where do these Rights come from? • God – then we are sacred and have rights • Nature – then violence …especially toward the weaker is ok...and very practical • Ourselves – then if the majority decides that it is not in their interest to grant human rights? “there is a clear religious ground for the morality of human rights…it is far from clear that there is a non-religious ground” • Perry – “Toward a Theory of Human Rights”

8. Acts 17:22 22Paul then stood up in the meeting of the Areopagus and said: "Men of Athens! I see that in every way you are very religious. For as I walked around and looked carefully at your objects of worship, I even found an altar with this inscription: TO AN UNKNOWN GOD. Now what you worship as something unknown I am going to proclaim to you.  24"The God who made the world and everything in it is the Lord of heaven and earth and does not live in temples built by hands. And he is not served by human hands, as if he needed anything, because he himself gives all men life and breath and everything else. From one man he made every nation of men, that they should inhabit the whole earth; and he determined the times set for them and the exact places where they should live. God did this so that men would seek him and perhaps reach out for him and find him, though he is not far from each one of us. 'For in him we live and move and have our being.' As some of your own poets have said, 'We are his offspring.'  29"Therefore since we are God's offspring, we should not think that the divine being is like gold or silver or stone—an image made by man's design and skill. In the past God overlooked such ignorance, but now he commands all people everywhere to repent. For he has set a day when he will judge the world with justice by the man he has appointed. He has given proof of this to all men by raising him from the dead."

9. Let’s debate! • Dave.brereton@yfccanada.org • Text me at 514-705-6823 • I don’t do Facebook! • Have a great week