Battleground God

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Battleground God: a challenging quiz game to test your consistency regarding matters of Deity. Excerpts from my results:

Congratulations! You have been awarded the TPM medal of distinction! This is our second highest award for outstanding service on the intellectual battleground…. The fact that you progressed through this activity without being hit and biting very few bullets suggests that your beliefs about God are internally consistent and well thought out….

You rejected evolutionary theory when the vast majority of scientists think both that the evidence points to its truth and that there is no evidence which falsifies it. Of course, many creationists claim that the evidential case for evolution is by no means conclusive. But in doing so, they go against scientific orthodoxy. So you’ve got to make a choice: (a) Bite the bullet and say there is evidence that evolution is not true, despite what the scientists say. (b) Take a direct hit and say that this is an area where your beliefs are just in contradiction. You chose to bite the bullet.

Interesting stuff. The parts regarding evolution jarred me a bit, as I realized just how separate we evangelicals are from the rest of the “rational” world in not regarding evolution as a proven and foregone conclusion. This despite the fact that, unlike most modern Protestant evangelicals, I am not a “young-earther.” My current outlook on creationism is a deliberate agnosticism — or more like a case of Orwellian doublethink — which hovers between “literal P.O.V. old-earthism” and plain old “theistic evolution.”

Hey, put those stones down. We’re brothers in Christ regardless of our differing creationist stands, right, fellow Christians? I said, put the stones down! No, NO!!! AUGH!!! (*repeated pelting sound*)

Related material:

– Mark Horne on the Days of Genesis 1

– Hugh Ross: Creation and Time (shameless Amazon affiliate link)

Comments

  1. Jesper says:
    2002-05-31 at 08:20

    If god is almightly, can he make a rock that’s so big he can’t lift it?

  2. dawn says:
    2002-05-31 at 08:41

    I kept being annoyed by them referring to God as “she”. I would have done much “better” if I had ignored the s. [shrug]

  3. Paulo says:
    2002-05-31 at 09:48

    On the question of God, rocks, and lifting, here’s the best answer I’ve read. (Myself, I have my own answer, which I will blog sometime. There’s some math involved. ;)

  4. Jesper says:
    2002-05-31 at 09:55

    The only thing I’m doing here, is that I’m wanting you to admit that there IS a possibility that there are no gods. I am open. I think that if there’s a god, it won’t go away if I think he doesn’t exist. Just admitting that the possibility exists, among with the thousand trillions of other possibilities not related to this, proves that you’re not a religious bigot (which you’re not), but openminded and happening to have a religion.

  5. Paulo says:
    2002-05-31 at 09:57

    I live everyday taking all things with a grain of salt — even my own faith and religion. And if I were to die and discover that God did indeed not exist, I wuld have no regrets, because this life I live as a Christian is more than I could ever ask, and is the most wonderful thing I’ve ever known.

    But if I die and it turns out that God DOES exist, then hoo boy, will I be happy. Blissfully, eternally happy.

  6. Jesper says:
    2002-05-31 at 10:02

    I live as I do. No more, no less. No evil. If there is a god, and he forgives, he will forgive me for whatever sins I’ve done, because I’ve acknowledged that there may exist a god and I haven’t sinned too much, and that’s all a god, if one exists, would ever ask for.

  7. Paulo says:
    2002-05-31 at 10:53

    The thing is, God doesn’t just ask acknowledgement of His existence — even demons know He exists. And though we may live without major sins like murder and theft, even minor sin is indicative that we are all, at our core, fallen and limited beings who fall short of God’s glory.

    Jesus Christ saw the religious leaders of his day — Pharisees, people who lived strong, moral, upright lives — and denounced them as hypocrites. Yet, as he died on the cross, Jesus also promised Heaven to a criminal.

    It doesn’t depend on our goodness or our sin. It depends solely on Christ our Lord and His mercy.

    You mentioned that God is a God who forgives, and yes, he will forgive your sins, all of them, if we only stand before Him and acknowledge that sin, sincerely repent, and accept the Savior that He has sent us, Jesus Christ our Lord, the Lamb of God who takes away our sins and washes our souls clean for all eternity.

    My testimony’s back up, by the way, thanks to the Wayback Machine.

  8. ganns says:
    2002-06-01 at 04:14

    i’m a little disturbed by my results. =(

  9. Jesper says:
    2002-06-01 at 06:02

    You mentioned that God is a God who forgives, and yes, he will forgive your sins, all of them, if we only stand before Him and acknowledge that sin, sincerely repent, and accept the Savior that He has sent us, Jesus Christ our Lord, the Lamb of God who takes away our sins and washes our souls clean for all eternity.

    I also said that I live as I live. More or less. In fact, I live as most people do. If most people don’t murder or do major sins, and most people won’t end up in hell, that means most people end up in heaven.

    If there is an almighty god, and I’d stand before him on a day of judgement, do you really think I’d look into his eyes and say “Screw you, I’m outta here!”? However, I think I should not be punished because I am a special way, that’s just me. That’s called personality, and I’d think a god would want his heaven to be diverse, and a god would not be judging people based on their opinions (except in extreme cases, the extreme right for example) but instead based on how they are as people. Would they help an unknown person cross a road, for example. Are they non-evil, essentially.

  10. Jesper says:
    2002-06-01 at 06:30

    Just FYI:

    “You have reached the end!

    Congratulations! You have made it to the end of this activity.

    You took zero direct hits and you bit zero bullets. The average player of this activity to date takes 1.33 hits and bites 1.07 bullets. 55485 people have so far undertaken this activity.

    Click the link below for further analysis of your performance and to see if you’ve won an award.”

    [click]

    “Battleground Analysis

    Congratulations!

    You have been awarded the TPM medal of honour! This is our highest award for outstanding service on the intellectual battleground.

    The fact that you progressed through this activity neither being hit nor biting a bullet suggests that your beliefs about God are internally consistent and very well thought out.

    A direct hit would have occurred had you answered in a way that implied a logical contradiction. You would have bitten bullets had you responded in ways that required that you held views that most people would have found strange, incredible or unpalatable. However, you avoided both these fates – and in doing so qualify for our highest award. A fine achievement!”

    Rules

    As I said, just FYI.

  11. Paulo says:
    2002-06-01 at 12:52

    Like I said, it’s not a matter of sin as much as it is a matter of God’s mercy. Most of the Pharisees didn’t do major sins like murder or theft, and most of us probably live our lives with great levels of philosophical consistency — but do most people enjoy a personal loving relationship with God through faith in Jesus Christ?

    The Scripture tells us clearly that our salvation is not by works but by faith. This is a principle to which I have devoted my entire life, and at the final judgment, I will stand with an ambivalent joyfulness, both wretched before God for my sin — yes, even minor sins, not necessarily murder or theft — yet still joyful, that He has washed me clean of sin through the sacrifice of Christ.

    Don’t fall into the trap of thinking that just because you have no “major sin” in your life and you maintain relatively consistent beliefs regarding God, you are assured of redemption.

    “Teacher,” said the young man, “I have kept all these commandments since I was a boy.”

    “One thing you still lack…” said Jesus…

  12. Paulo says:
    2002-06-01 at 12:55

    Ganns – Don’t be disturbed by your results; these are philosophical standards, not those of God or Scripture. I’ve always accepted with a grain of salt just how crazy and philosophically inconsistent Christianity is in comparison to the world of mainstream intellectualism. That’s why we bite those bullets. :D

  13. rowster says:
    2002-06-02 at 04:33

    hey ordo! the link to “here’s the best answer i’ve read” doesn’t link.

    anyway, i took the test sometime ago. i bit a bullet on one of the atheist questions when i took it.

  14. rowster says:
    2002-06-02 at 04:35

    doesn’t WORK. i meant, the link to “here’s the best answer i’ve read” doesn’t WORK. :)

  15. Paulo says:
    2002-06-02 at 09:19

    Row – The answer is quoted in full in the same comments box where I linked it. Darn, I can’t remember the link anymore; it was an obscure Geocities page.

  16. Paulo says:
    2002-06-02 at 09:20

    Oh, wait, here it is…

    http://www.geocities.com/Heartland/Prairie/2621/question7.html