I actually agree with your questions, but not your conclusion. That is, the first thing form me is that, as mentioned, I do believe there had to have been at some point an uncaused cause. This I label as 'God' and go from there. The next step is figuring out whether this God is personally involved in His creation, and if so how he relates to us. The short answer is, I believe that the Bible is reliable enough to establish God IS the personally involved in His creation and the redemptive work of Christ is His most important interaction with us.

The thing is, I am not at all confident of my ability to understand and comprehend the world around me on my own. I require outside help if I am to truly get what this life is all about. While there are logical and intellectual reasons I trust in scripture, I do believe that it is only by the drawing of the Spirit that I have come to faith, and that faith is all about trusting in the Creator of all things and understanding His relationship to us.

I think this is an attitude many atheists take, but.I don't think it is that accurate. Looking back at the great philosophers in the last two thousand years there have been thinkers on both sides of the line, and it seems somewhat arbitrary who was in the faith and who was not. Often if you compare the intellectual prowse of the great thinkers they are equal in their levels of intelligence. The determining factor appears to be not the intelligence of man, but the drawing of the Spirit. I do think it is flawed to consider that existential humanism is the great evolution of thought of recent times. These issues have been wrestled with many times throughout the ages, and by people much smarter than you or I (in fact, the book of Ecclesiastes deals with the same concepts 19th century Existentialism would focus on centuries later).

As far as being at ease with your significance in the world, this is equally true of many believers. You see it as a step forward to not find you worth in an external being, but many believers would say exactly the opposite. Who is to say what is right?



Well first off, obviously the notion of the universe as god is not something I accept. But to your point, I do agree that the more shifting you have to do to make things fit, the more difficult it is to accept the system overall. However, I find that no matter what view of the world I take, I end up having to deal with pieces that don't seem to fit right. I admit this I true of a faith based on scripture, but it is also true when I consider a world where scripture is not true. I have experienced too many things that confirm the accuracy of scripture to feel denying it would be intellectually honest. I am not without my faith struggles, but at some point I have to move beyond what I can understand and trust in something, and the most honest thing for me to trust in based on my experience of this life is the teaching of scripture.