Atheist Billboards pt 1

So, there's these "atheist" billboards going up around the Phoenix area lately.   http://ffrf.org/news/releases/phoenix-and-tucson-nontheists-come-out-of-the-closet/

I thought I'd type up some responses to these things from a Christian worldview, and give some ideas of how one might turn these attempted "attacks" on Christianity into an opening for sharing the Gospel.  Thanks atheists!   

Here are some examples of things we could say:

Hey, have you heard about those new "atheist billboards"?  What do you think of that?  Have you had a Christian background?

Isn't it interesting how atheists are being more evangelical in something they claim NOT to believe, while so many Christians won't talk about what they DO believe for fear of offending someone?  

Do you really think a person can be "good" and have "morals" without there being some sort of unchanging standard, such as the nature of God, to base them on?

Do you really believe that everything could have been created by random chance?  

Why are there seven days in a week?  It doesn't match up to a solar, lunar or monthly cycle of seasons in any way.  The only place a basis for it is mentioned is in the seven days of creation.

Has there ever been a code that was not made by some sort of intelligent being?  Codes don't just happen by themselves, right?  How about the DNA code?

Where do laws of science come from?  If there is no sort of Designer for them, how can they be trusted?  

Where do standards of morality come from?  If all living things are random accidents, why is there value to life other than one's own?

If survival of the fittest is true, why do we mourn the loss of a life?  

How do we all know that lying, stealing and murder are wrong?  Because it's written on our hearts by the Creator of all.  

Atheist Billboards pt2

I look at these billboards and I am not offended. They get people thinking about God, for or against, and bring the topic to the forefront of conversations, opening a door to speak to them about spiritual things. Now, don’t think that Christians hate atheists – we don’t. We’d like to see them saved. I looked at each and every one of the people in these billboards and I feel bad for them. Each of them were created in the image of God, yet they have been deceived by Satan and their own selfishness and desire for sin that they are completely lost and without hope. Please pray for them, that the Lord would work in them, convicting them in their heart, drawing them to Himself that they might experience true salvation. For such were some of us (1 Cor 6:11).

As usual, the self-proclaimed “atheist” has to borrow from Christianity. What would “heavenly” actually mean to an atheist? Does he mean the sky, or the atmosphere, or is he speaking of outer space?

Where does love come from? Of course we should think, and open minds are great, as long as you don’t let them open for so long that stuff starts to fall out. Not everything out there is something you want to let in. We have doors on our homes for a reason, and we should guard our minds even more carefully. I hope that one day, one of my daughters will meet yours, and be able to speak to them in love, that your kids will have an open mind, and realize the truth by simply thinking it through.

Ah yes, I am too old for imaginary friends as well. But look into it, study the Word of God and know the truth. Look at the archaeological evidence, the fulfilled prophecy, the science that is found in the pages of the Bible. Seek Him and you will find Him, when you seek with all of your heart, mind and soul. Eternity depends on it.

It is, but Christianity is not blind faith. There is more evidence for the authenticity of the Bible than there is for any other work of antiquity – more manuscript evidence, shorter timeframe between when it was written and when the events happened, and the fact that has never been any archaeological evidence to disprove anything written in the Bible, but there has been much that has proven the text.

“I believe in reason, not religion” I agree. Man made religion to reach to God, but it is an impossible feat. God has reached out to mankind by coming down Himself in Jesus Christ, paid for our sins by dying on the cross, then rose again on the third day. It is a relationship with the Living God, not religion that will save you.

You don’t know their deeds, and to be quite honest, you’re right about the creeds. People don’t always follow what they say they do. We are deceitfully wicked, but there is a cure. If you truly do have respect for deeds, know that there are none found good, not one, on the entire earth. God alone is good, and any good you see in mankind is purely by His common grace, no matter who you see it in.

Morality isn’t found in religion, but in the very character of God. I’ll tell you that you have no basis whatsoever for any morality in your own life if you claim to be an atheist. What would you base them on? You must “borrow” your ethics and morality from the Christian worldview, because they don’t make sense from an atheist worldview.

"Good for goodness sake"? What are you – Santa Claus? An atheist worldview makes no sense. If it’s just “survival of the fittest” then there is no right or wrong, no good or bad.
 I’d like to know how you define “good” and what standard you base that on.
I’d like to know how you think scientific laws exist, what morality is and what it’s based on, and how a DNA code just randomly created itself. There is no code of any sort that didn’t have a creator.

Well, I’d agree with this guy, that the Mormon god is fictional. There is a lot of incorrect theology that disagrees with the Bible in Mormon doctrine. However, being mixed up in a cult for a while shouldn’t cause you to throw out all belief in God. You just need to search for the truth.

I don’t know what sort of “Christian indoctrination” you received, but as a doctor, how can you look at life, at the human body, and think that it all just fell together by some sort of random chance? You’ve really got to jump through some hoops and have some strong faith in nothing to deny the God who created you.

Planes fly because of the laws of aerodynamics. I’d just like to ask you exactly where and how scientific laws came into being?
As an atheist, you cannot accept that God created them, but as a thinking, rational person, you must realize that these scientific laws don’t just create themselves, right?

Choices

I would say that I am "pro-choice"  Choices are good, right?  Are they always good?  Maybe someone chooses to shoot someone else on the freeway – good choice or bad one?  Are we now “anti-choice” because we don’t condone that?  How about rape – good choice or bad one?  I wouldn’t want to infringe upon the rights of a rapist, would I?  Choices.  So, let’s get down to the real issue – the choice to have an abortion.  

First of all, I’d like to point out that if you're reading this right now, you’re probably quite relieved that your mother made the choice not to kill you before you were even born.  Yes, that’s right, I said “kill” because every abortion stops a beating heart.  It’s not a “parasite” or a “blob of tissue” or some “cluster of cells”, it’s a human being at the time of conception.  By the time the mother is even aware that she’s pregnant, there is a beating heart of a human being inside of her, with his or her own blood type.  So, if we want to talk about rights - where are that baby's rights?

If a person were to cause a pregnant woman to miscarry, it is considered murder in a court of law, but if that same woman goes to Planned Parenthood to have an abortionist kill her child, it's perfectly legal?  Does anyone else notice something wrong with this scenario?  Either way, a life was ended, a heartbeat stopped, yet why such drastically different results to the one who caused it?  

Oh, I’m all for a woman’s right to choose, I just feel that the choice should be made earlier – perhaps the choice to abstain from sexual relations prior to marriage – there’s a choice that doesn’t involve murder.  Or, maybe there are some who would like to take it further in the other direction.  I mean, why limit the killing to the pre-born?  What if, within a couple of years, we decide we don’t really want a kid – should the mother still have the right to kill it?  What age should the limit be?  5?  Maybe 10, or better yet, let’s see how many would survive the teen years if it’s legal to kill your own children.

You see, every human life is important – every human being is made in the image of God, and we have no right to kill, simply out of convenience.

You can call me “pro-life” or “anti-abortion”, but to say that I am “anti-choice” is simply not true.  We would all disagree with certain choices, wouldn’t we?  Isn't that a choice in itself?

Saturday 11-19-11

Tom, Marcus, Alex and I met Alan out on Mill Ave on Saturday night.  It was really crowded out there with the ASU - U of A game going on.  It took us a while to find a place to park and we had to walk for a few blocks to get to our usual place.  We met a Wildcats fan who asked, “Ready for what?” in response to the cross we were carrying with the question, “Are You Ready?” on the cross bar.  I said, “Ready to stand before the Lord Jesus Christ and give an account for your life.”  Another guy said, “but not today” as he kept on walking past.  I explained to the first one that we were talking to that 150,000 people die every day, and we never know when death might come upon us.  Most people don’t see it coming, but we are not guaranteed another day. 

He took an “Are You Good Enough To Get Into Heaven?” tract with him as he left. 

We eventually got to our spot where Alan was already handing out tracts.  There was an artist selling his drawings there, so I talked to him for a while.  His name was Ron, I took him through the Good Person Test and we found that he wasn’t so good when held to God’s standards. 

Please keep him in prayer, he had some erroneous ideas of God, but was willing to check out a couple of tracts I gave had given him and he said that he would definitely read the Bible that Alan had given him earlier. 

Later on, the guy who claims to be a Satanist hung around for a while with a friend of his, attempting to disrupt Tom as he was doing some Open Air.  We had a few more really rowdy guys who were very hateful towards the Gospel, but they didn’t hang around too long.  

 Two policemen on bikes stopped nearby to talk with some guy.  Apparently, things weren’t going well with that conversation, as he turned, hiked up his pants and ran.  The police tackled him to the pavement just a few feet from where he had started from.  I’m not sure what he’d done, but he was going to jail for sure now. 

The game got over as we were deciding to pack up, so it took us a while to get out of the area through all the traffic.  We hung out at Taco Bell while waiting for the crowds to thin out before heading home.  

Soli Deo Gloria

Saturday 11-12-11

We saw an angel out on Mill Ave this last Saturday.  I've seen a lot of interesting things on Mill Ave over the years - a guy walking his wolf, girls parading around in their underwear, various atheists attempting to prove ... well, nothing I guess.  I've seen people who call themselves "Christian" and then curse at us with language that would make a sailor blush.

I've even seen people who claim to be angels (one told us he could kill us), but this is the first one that I saw with wings and a halo.  I went over to find out what he was doing out there and took a picture.

It turns out that his name was Javier, and he was out there with a young girl named Anna.  They had come out to recite something that he had written, and she had a snare drum with her.  They were bringing a message of love, and asking people to put aside political differences in the name of peace.
After we listened to their message, I told them that we were taking a slightly different view, that the greatest problem in the world today is sin.
I asked Anna and Javier if they would consider themselves to be "good" people, and they said, "yes, pretty much."  So I took them through some of the Ten Commandments.  We found that they both admitted to being lying, coveting thieves and adulterers-at-heart.  They both agreed that, judged by this standard, they would be found guilty by the Almighty Judge of the universe and would be destined for hell.  I explained the Gospel to them, how God had made a way to keep all of us out of the hell that we deserve by paying the fine for us and the two things we must do in order for that sacrifice to pertain to us.  We must repent of our sins, turning away from them, stop committing them.  We should hate those sins we once loved as much as God has always hated them.  Then we trust in Jesus Christ alone for the payment of our sins, submitting our lives to Him.

They understood, and I gave them each a tract to take with them and maybe check out the Living Waters website for more witnessing tools.  
Other than that, it was a pretty average night on Mill Ave.  We distributed some tracts and talked to a few others, planting seeds of the Gospel.






Soli Deo Gloria

Saturday 10-29-11

Halloween weekend on Mill Ave is always interesting. It was packed out there the entire time we were there.

We had a couple of Catholics that came out to try to persuade us not to talk to anyone who professed to be a Catholic. I explained that I could not make that promise. The lady, Jo Anne, walked around praying as we talked with different people, but she would speak out against us if we touched on anything about any errors in the Catholic church - such as ideas about purgatory, Mary worship, or praying to the saints - all false doctrine.

The guy kept Brandt busy discussing the differences between Protestants and Catholics, and anytime that I went over to try to get him free to talk to others, Jo Anne would come over and engage me in conversation. They were nice enough people, but wasting our time when there were plenty of others to talk to.

A woman named Keisha stopped to look at the illusion board, I took her through the Good Person Test (GPT) and gave her a tract to take with her.

Jordan, one of our friendly neighborhood atheists, was there with a rubber demon mask. Since there has been no real atheist presence lately, he was kind of bored, but hung around for a while. Every once in a while, he would bring someone he knows over to talk with me.

He brought a guy named Daniel over, and I took him through the GPT. He seemed to have a lot of knowledge on Christianity, listened to what I had to say and took a tract when we were finished. He seemed receptive.

A couple others came by to look at the illusion board, but got away when Jordan asked me a question. They had been drinking and I suppose they just took the opportunity to escape.

Another lady and her friend stopped to look at the illusion board, but took off before going through the GPT. I think at least one of them had taken it before, and they didn't want to hang around. They wouldn't take a tract, either.

Jason and Artie went through the GPT, and Jason asked a couple of questions later, like why would God condemn people when He loves everyone, so I explained that, in addition to being loving, God is also holy, righteous and just. In order for justice to be satisfied, the fine must be paid, and the wages of sin is death. This is what is so lacking in churches across America today, who only preach half the Gospel, only about love, when that is not the only attribute of the God revealed to us in the Bible.

I also explained how the same crime committed against different levels of authority will result in heightened levels of punishment in direct proportion to the level of the one it is committed against.

Jordan sent a couple more of his friends over (I don't know why he does this), but these were pagans and didn't really have any interest in a discussion on spiritual things. One of them did take a tract later on, though, so who knows how the Lord will work in them.

Some guy pushed Brandt, so I took his picture. He didn't like that much, but he wandered away after a little while, attempting to look cool and leisurely, but making sure he was out of there before any police came by.

We distributed a lot of tracts and planted seeds of the Gospel with many who were out for a Halloween weekend on Mill Ave.

Soli Deo Gloria