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A spate of letters appeared in the Daily Telegraph following the suggestion that atheism should be taught in our schools. I was particularly impressed by one from the Rev. Stephen Fawcett. He wrote:
‘Reason cannot prove a Christian God, but it can prove a God. If you were watching television and saw a line of dominoes falling over without seeing how the first visible domino fell you would rationally conclude that, although there may be any number of dominoes off screen that have fallen, first something - a finger, a gust of wind - must have started the process off. Otherwise the dominoes would still be standing up. That "thing" must be something other than a stationary domino. Similarly, looking at the physical universe, we must logically conclude that something started it, and that that something must be other than physical. We call that thing God. Next day there was a letter from a man accusing Stephen Fawcett of making a false analogy! It is very rare for anyone to become a Christian through reasoned argument about the existence of God. Indeed, if recent surveys are to be relied upon, 70% of the population believe that God exists anyway. Many months ago there appeared in a corner of my kitchen ceiling a black patch. For weeks I ignored it. Eventually I gave it closer inspection. It seemed to be a patch of mould. I wiped it off. But eventually it reappeared. I wiped it off again, used some Polyfilla on a crack or two and slapped a little emulsion on that part of the ceiling where the mould had been. After a few weeks the black patch was back. I knew that something was wrong. I put off doing anything about it until at last I could stand it no longer and went up to my bedroom, rolled back the carpet and levered up a floorboard. There was the tiniest leak in a central heating pipe. I sent for a British Gas Engineer. He looked at the problem, groaned and said, "I was having a good day ‘till now." I said, "I’ll leave you to it." I believe that there are many signs that all is not well with us. We may ignore those signs or try and cover them up but that does not alter the fact that something is wrong. Our apathy, indifference, coldness or even hostility towards God is damaging our lives. The Christian turns to one who repairs the damage. Just as I had to put my trust in the engineer from British Gas so the Christian puts his trust in Jesus. Many people become Christians because they want to change. They are dissatisfied with themselves as they are. They are like the former English football hooligan who gave his testimony on Songs of Praise. He was in Sweden with his mates when they attacked a rival supporter, knocked him to the ground and put the boot in. The former hooligan realised he needed to change! He knew very, very little about Jesus but just enough to cry out, "Jesus, change me." It was enough. Jesus did change him. He repaired a damaged life. I have a friend who does not approve of my efforts to persuade others to become Christians. She tells me that people should be left to admire and emulate the example of Jesus. If all I had was the example of Jesus I would be very miserable because there is no way I can live up to it. I am a Christian because I need saving. I need saving from all that distresses and disgusts God. I believe that Jesus died on the cross and there made a peace offering to God on my behalf. By putting myself in the hands of Jesus I am assured of salvation and eternal life.
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