The thoughts I offer in this post are nothing new. I remembered a talk by Rob Bell almost a year ago and wanted to capture it for my own sake. But to do so I also had to write the previous post with which this one nicely dovetails.

I would like to take us back to the ancient gods of the past once again. There is a paradox that I want to outline which exists for any supernatural being that humans have known. To demonstrate a clear example of this consider the goddess Demeter – “the goddess of grain and bread, the staple food of the ancient Greeks. She was also, by contrast, the goddess of starvation and hunger. When the crops failed, hunger would quickly follow. Like most of the Greek gods, she represented a force of nature, which in its dual nature could bring either blessing (a bountiful harvest) or curse (crop failure).”

The description above is very interesting because it exemplifies the duality of most gods (including the Christian God). There is always a benevolent and nurturing side that is closely mirrored by an angry and cursing side. While this is nothing new, let us look at the consequences of this duality.

Imagine a farmer worshiping Demeter in 800 B.C. This farmer plants a crop and in due time reaps a bountiful harvest with which he can feed his family for many months. Naturally, he feels compelled to thank Demeter for such good fortune and offers a small amount (let’s say 5% of his entire yield) as a sacrifice. He praises the goddess and prays that next year she would bless him with an even better harvest.

Everything goes well as the farmer plants his next set of crops but as they begin to take root a strong ice storm falls upon the land and the crops perish. Horror! The farmer has clearly upset Demeter with his puny and inappropriate sacrifice and is now reaping the wrath of an angry goddess!! How may he appease the deity and repair his good standing? Clearly, Demeter deemed his sacrifice too low and is demanding that the farmer demonstrate his devotion to her by offering a more substantial quantity of his grain from the dwindling reserves that he has kept from the previous year. The farmer has no choice but to oblige.

What happens the next year? Well, if Demeter sends the farmer a bountiful harvest then she will seem to have been appeased. But if Demeter was appeased with a small dosage of grain from the previous year (as compared to this year’s generous harvest) then this year the farmer better sacrifice and even larger portion to the goddess. After all, it is only fair to exuberantly worship a goddess who is responsible for such riches. And what happens when Demeter is again displeased with him the year after? Clearly the previous sacrifice was not pleasing enough and farmer must give up more than ever before to repair his standing!

In essence, this is a doom loop. No matter whether Demeter is appeased or NOT appeased, the farmer must keep sacrificing more of his crop because he never knows where he stands with Demeter. At a moment’s notice the goddess can decide to be angry and the poor farmer must continue providing increasingly more demanding sacrifices. He sacrifices his crops at first, but when that proves to be insufficient he resorts to cattle, and eventually, in the most dire situation even his own children.

But will the goddess EVER have her fill? In one word: NO.

This doom loop has horrible consequences and a few things that need to be learned from it. The first thing is that sacrifices are never enough to appease a god. The ritual of sacrificing as a means of gaining standing with a god is a downward spiral that ultimately destroys lives. By the way, you don’t have to think of sacrifices in material terms. Many people who do not understand Christianity have tried to argue that they deserve good standing with God because of their good deeds or good thoughts. But that is not true. There has been only one and ultimate sacrifice to God… a God himself – Jesus Christ. Recognizing that only an infinite sacrifice is pleasing to God and that the price of their freedom has been paid in full, Christians are free of the doom loop. We worship God for his greatness and not to gain any standing with him. Nobody can “earn” his way to heaven. St. Francis De Salles has a great quote to capture this idea:

1. Consider that it is strictly true that you stand between heaven and hell and that each of them lies open to receive you according to the choice you make.
2. Consider that the choice of one or the other of them that we make in this world will last eternally in the world to come.
3. Also, that although each of them is open to receive you in keeping with your choice, yet God, who is prepared to give you hell by his justice or heaven by his mercy, desires with an incomparable desire that you choose heaven.

This is why the concept of Christianity makes perfect sense. It is not the law that keeps us bound to God, it is our own choice. We desire to maintain and grow a relationship with God free from the moral and physical obligations of payment or sacrifice. So as it turns out, the one true God is not angry. And that is a great reason to rejoice and praise Him for his love and benevolence as well as for his justice.

What I wish to talk about today are the gods of the past. Before many knew the one true God, people on Earth have worshiped countless others. There were the Sumerian gods, the Egyptian gods, the Greek gods, the Roman gods, the Chinese gods, the Indian gods and so on and so forth. Perhaps looking at this multitude one might become confused and say: “Well… where are all of these gods now? Aren’t they “dead”? How is the Christian God any different then?”

Implied in these questions is a statement about the nature of gods in general. Because we have so many gods that have been imagined, worshiped and ultimately forgotten, one might consider that our current “fad” with Christianity is just another echo of the distant past. This is the type of statement I frequently see on popular atheist websites, or in some of the more recent peer-produced media. Typically, it is thrown out as a challenge… to show that the Christian faith does not stand up to even the simplest of tests.

Fortunately, this question is not difficult to answer – it is a simple exercise in logic. Let’s walk through it then…

Many people think of the spiritual world as a bi-polar entity. There either is one or there isn’t. Either there are gods or there are no gods. From this perspective, the conclusion about Christianity seems obvious. We observe that Christianity involves a God; We also observe that there have been many gods in the past and that they are all dead; thus we conclude that the Christian God is just a figment of imagination and will “die” with the rest of the gods. Simply put – there is no God!

But let’s look at what we just said more closely. Many people might be convinced by the logic of the argument and I agree that the logic is correct. However, the problem is not with the logic… it is with the assumptions that we set up to derive our conclusions. What is wrong is the statement: Either there are gods or there are no gods. This statement actually does not encompass Christianity! Everything we know about Christianity says: There is ONE God. And this quantity qualifier matters! So the correct statement about the world should instead read: Either there are many gods, or there is only one God, or there are no gods.

Now that we have teased out this subtle difference let’s look at the huge impact it has on the conclusions we draw about our world. From the onset the Jewish and Christian God has claimed to be the only one. If this is to be true, then all other gods must be ‘dead’. If even one single god of the past is true, Christianity would be false. What do we observe? Every other god is indeed dead! Does this prove that Christianity is true? No, certainly it is not enough to prove Christianity. But in no way can we conclude that the imagined gods of the past disprove Christianity. On the contrary, it goes hand in hand with claims by the Christian God about His being – He claims to be the one (and only) unchangeable I am!

In conclusion, this is a very good example of how starting with incorrect assumptions and then using flawless logic will still lead us to incorrect results. We can arrive at disparate conclusions given even one false statement. I think, in general, it is good to consider such exercises in logic as they also strengthen the faith once we determine where such statements fall short.