Chapter 12

The Arguments of Spiritual Denial

I mentioned earlier that denial is inherently argumentative. Denial of our spiritual needs is no different. It doesn’t necessarily offer brilliant arguments, but it does say whatever it must to avoid acknowledging the need it’s denying. Spiritual denial wants desperately for us to deny God’s existence and, if not his existence, certainly his dependability in personal relationships.

Part of our refusal to acknowledge our spiritual needs lies in our refusal to acknowledge God as a loving and dependable source of spiritual nourishment.

Many people claim to believe in God’s existence, but if he’s seen merely as some remote, disinterested, and uninvolved party, then belief in him does absolutely nothing to promote their spiritual health. Those who see him as a paranoid judge who simply uses his power to get even with those who cross him will fare no better. Unless we acknowledge him as willfully desiring to protect and to assist in the healthy growth of the totality of his creation, and further acknowledge that he can do so, then his existence or nonexistence becomes irrelevant to our spiritual health.

Following is a list of some of the more prevalent arguments raised by spiritual denial, followed by an explanation as to why they have little merit.

• “The universe simply evolved independent of any intelligent being.”

If I told people that I’d found a TV set growing in the woods, they’d think I was crazy. I wouldn’t blame them. We all know that electronic equipment is designed for a specific purpose and doesn’t simply evolve according to specifications. It requires planning. It requires molding and assembly. It requires a source of power. Let’s assume that some manufacturer designed a TV set that had seeds that could pollinate and grow into more sets just like plants do. Wouldn’t we be more impressed by that manufacturer than by the others?

There are four significant differences between what God creates and what we create. God’s creations are more complex. God’s creations are more beautiful. God’s creations are more functional. God’s creations continue to create.

If God made television sets instead of all that is and all who are, society would look at his creations and simply assume a creator. Yet this society, through epidemic spiritual denial, has taught many to believe that though God’s creations are more complex, more beautiful, more functional, and more perpetual, we ought not to assume a creator. Spiritual denial would have us believe that while something as simple as a number two pencil shows evidence of intelligent design, the universe does not. The fact that this belief is so common shows how deeply entrenched and irrational society’s denial has become.

• “If there was a loving God, he wouldn’t permit the suffering that exists.”

This argument serves three purposes for those who perpetuate spiritual denial. First, it implies a denial of God’s existence. Secondly, it denies God’s love for us in the event that he does exist. Finally, it allows us to deny our need to love by implying that God should do something about the suffering because we can’t.

A loving parent may beg, plead, and threaten a child to keep it from running into the street. If the child is ultimately hit by a car, it’s not because the parent doesn’t love, but precisely because the child refused to heed the loving parent’s advice.

The sufferings of humankind, whether individual or collective, are the inevitable result of our being both victims and perpetrators of the false beliefs. While God willfully desires to protect and to assist in the healthy growth of the totality of his creation, he can only do that if we let him. If we deny him the opportunity to give us the spiritual nourishment that can lead us to spiritual health, then we have no one but ourselves to blame for our suffering.

• “The existence of God cannot be proven intellectually.”

In order for something to be proven, the person to whom it’s being proven must be capable of understanding the proof. If the blueprints of the universe were spread out on the field house floor, how many of us could confirm their authenticity? How many of us can even read the schematic drawings inside our television sets?

Though most of us realize at an early age that we don’t have the intellectual aptitude to be nuclear physicists, the denying society teaches us to assume that we could understand the proof of God’s existence if only it was available. That denial merely refuses to accept the proof that continues to grow around us.

• “The way to have a relationship with God is by studying holy manuscripts and by participating in a religious organization.”

This is a more subtle argument of denial. It’s a fallback argument used when someone has insisted upon believing in God’s existence, blowing past the first line of society’s denial defense. The only way any of us can know anyone else personally is by having a personal relationship with them. There needs to be some personal communication. There needs to be some mutual trust. In honest relationships, we can learn more about the other party through them than we can through anyone else.

If society can keep us content with simply thinking we know something about God, it doesn’t have to worry about our knowing God and learning that he can and will give us the spiritual nourishment we need for spiritual health. The denying society desperately wants us to participate in their denial. When we question the validity of what we were taught, those around us are momentarily forced to question it, too. Our spiritual health makes us more difficult to control. They don’t like that. Martyrdom has sometimes been the result of this independence.

• “We can’t know for sure what God wants from us or expects of us because the various religious communities can’t agree about God or about our obligations to him.”

This is another fallback argument that is used to discourage those who believe that God exists. If society can convince us that we can’t really ever know God’s will, then we’ll eventually quit seeking it.

If people are convinced the path to God is through religious conformity, but find that the various religious organizations can’t agree with each other, they may just throw up their hands and forget the whole thing, continuing to participate in society’s denial.

While God alone can reveal to each of us precisely what he wants each of us to do and to believe, he can only do that if we willingly enter a personal relationship with him. In our other relationships, we have different expectations of different people. We don’t want, expect, or get the same things in each of our relationships. Nor are we expected, demanded, nor do we give the same things in each of our relationships. This argument of denial maintains that if there was a God, he would demand, expect, and get the same things from each of us. By denying God’s recognition of each of us personally, we deny him the opportunity for personal relationships with us. This prevents the possibility of either spiritual nourishment or spiritual health, but perpetuates denial.

• “With respect to spiritual health, it doesn’t matter what you believe as long as you believe something.”

This argument has become trendier in recent years. It fits into the “I’m Okay—You’re Okay” society. It even subtly implies that we do need something to satisfy some unspecified need. While respecting the rights of all individuals to make their choices concerning what they believe, it subtly implies that all beliefs are equally valid. This does two things. First, it diminishes any sense of urgency about having our needs met. If virtually any belief structure can satisfy our needs, then our needs can’t be very significant. Secondly, it opens the door for any belief structure as an alternative to the truth, further watering down the options that must be considered by those who seek a path to God.

• “People who participate in organized religion know and love God.”

This is perhaps the most prevalent, subtle, and damaging message we can receive with respect to satisfying our spiritual needs. If society can teach us to believe that religious conformity is evidence of even knowing God, let alone loving him, then those who deny their spiritual needs can satisfy religious society without satisfying any of their spiritual needs in the process. There will always be those who participate in organized religion grudgingly, not wanting to give much money, not wanting to give much time, not wanting to be too inconvenienced. Those things they do give can sometimes be viewed as being similar to premiums that insure that God will be there when they need him.

This argument, especially when it’s even tacitly accepted by religious leaders, can do great harm by actually discouraging people from knowing God. As long as people depend on religious leaders more than on God to tell them what God wants, they will not only be subject to control and manipulation by those leaders, but they’ll also believe they’re satisfactorily conforming to God’s desires. What they won’t know, because they’re not being told, is that they’re receiving none of the spiritual nourishment which only God can provide.

• “If we refuse to believe in God and obey his laws as we understand them, he will punish us with death.”

Societal denial can dissuade people from seeking God if it can convince them he’s someone to fear. If any of us told others we’d kill them if they refused to do what we said, they’d probably avoid us, too. Death is the consequence of starvation, whether it’s physical or spiritual. Because he loves us, no one grieves more over our deaths than God does.

If we are taught to view him as a jealous, easily threatened, and insecure being that is quick with his judgments and severe sentencing, we’ll never be inclined to want to know him and we’ll never learn to love him. We’ll also never get spiritual nourishment nor achieve spiritual growth. The society of denial couldn’t be happier about that.

A frightful effect of this argument on people is that they can be so preoccupied with the Day of Judgment that they live in anxiety completely unaware that God can give them nourishment now. Their image of God as only a petty judge prevents them from accepting his love, his nourishment, and the spiritual health that only he can provide.

The arguments of denial are not compelling. In the absence of denial, they’d be ludicrous. Yet they persist, even within religious organizations.

Not one of us can ever be spiritually healthy unless we give God a chance to show his dependability to us personally in a personal relationship. If we give God that chance, we’ll see how miraculously he works and we’ll learn to trust his wisdom more than the foolishness of denial.

Does God love us? Look at the world around you. Not at what we’ve done to it or what we’ve done and do to each other, but at what he created for us. Do the beauty and the functionality look like the work of someone who doesn’t love us? Of someone who wants to harm us? Of someone who is petty, easily threatened, and insecure? God is not going to think less of himself if we question his identity. Nor is he going to feel unlovable if we question his worth. Nor can we threaten his sense of security. God is perfectly healthy spiritually. He’s incapable of becoming defensive. If we were perfectly healthy, we’d be incapable of defensiveness as well. But we’re not, though we can get healthier.

God loves his creation collectively and each of us individually. Because of that, he willfully desires to protect and to assist in the healthy growth of the totality of his creation. We’re taught to not let him.

We have been both victims and perpetrators because of our false beliefs about who we are, what we’re worth, and in what our security lies. It happens again as we first learn and then give others false messages about God.