An Agnostic Silenced

 •  4 min. read  •  grade level: 8
 
He was well educated and very courteous, but he was an agnostic. Having private means, he did not need to practice at his profession as a surgeon. He traveled a good deal, and visited relatives from time to time. Among these was a singularly attractive Christian lady, his aunt, who welcomed him always to her home, but deeply regretted his attitude to the Word of God.
One day I had an invitation from her asking me to dinner to meet her nephew. She believed I would be able with God's Word to combat the skeptical views which he discussed with her and his cousins and which they, "poor women," were not able to answer. I gladly went, and at table found myself seated opposite to him. Very soon, looking across at me with a pleasant smile, he said, "Do you believe in THAT STORY ABOUT THE FLOOD?"
"Every word," was my positive answer.
"In that case, your God must be a demon willing to destroy men, women and children in that fashion."
"On the contrary, His destruction of them in order to save humanity proved His wisdom and His goodness," was my reply.
"You will never convince me of that," said the doctor.
"Don't be too sure," was my reply. "You are a surgeon. Suppose you had a real interest in helping men, and noticing a disease in my arm that would otherwise prove fatal to my life, amputated the limb. Would it be 'correct to describe your action as that of a demon? The antediluvians, in proportion to humanity now, were immensely smaller in their population at that time than the man's arm is to his body, and the disproportion of the spiritual realm does not affect the principle.
"Further, to remove the arm made necessary the removal of the hand and the fingers. Men when destroying themselves with vice destroy also their families, as for example in the case of 'the drunkard. The arm may represent the man, the hand his wife, and the fingers his children. Would you be a demon to take off my diseased arm?"
"Certainly not," was the doctor's somewhat startled conclusion.
"Then where is your argument?" I asked.
He very courteously and intelligently admitted defeat, but hastened to say, "You cannot, however, defend His action IN CREATING MAN if you believe in His foreknowledge of human misery."
"Here again you are mistaken," was my answer. "That act, and its gift of moral relationship, proved His goodness and wisdom."
"Impossible!" was his exclamation.
"Not so," I said. "Suppose we were twin brothers, and that our father planned to give us each $250,000 on reaching maturity.
"Suppose he well knew that I would misuse my portion, but that you would improve yours. Would it be just to deny you your happiness because of my self-imposed misery?"
"No, it would not."
"In that case you must admit that God's goodness and wisdom were demonstrated in the creation of man."
With admirable temper and intelligence he admitted the argument, but urged that it was WRONG TO ENDOW HIM WITH FREE WILL, and that such an action could not be defended.
"In that matter also," I replied, "you can recognize God's goodness and wisdom. You are a bachelor. Suppose you had to marry, and that you had to choose between two women, one having no will and the other a will in every point opposed to yours: which woman would you marry?"
"The woman with the will, of course! The other would be a lump of clay."
Warm applause from the ladies greeted this admission as I hastened to add: "Just so did God the Father desire His family to have wills to choose Him, to be able to decide between right and wrong, light and darkness, heaven and hell. To have made man without free will would be to create a robot. God wanted those whose love would respond to His own, freely and without coercion. So He made man in His own image. Heaven will be filled with God's own children who freely chose to love and worship the all-wise Creator God."
The doctor abandoned further discussion. We later became great friends when he had ceased to be an agnostic. He professed publicly his faith in 'the Lord Jesus Christ, and supported his avowed profession by consistent Christian conduct for the remainder of his life.
"For the weapons of our warfare are not carnal, but mighty through God to the pulling down of strong holds; casting down imaginations, and every high thing that exalteth itself against the knowledge of God, and bringing into captivity every thought to the obedience of Christ." 2 Cor. 10:4, 5.