Non-Believers Often Believe Anyway

Spirituality Column #20 - March 27, 2007
Current! In Carmel newspaper

Non-Believers Often Believe Anyway
By Bob Walters

Major media and government programs aside, American culture has an entrenched, pervasive and utterly unique Christian worldview that is our strength and hope as a nation.

Though shocking, here are some exclusively Christian ideas embraced by “believers” and many non-believers.

Freedom – Christ freed us from death and from bondage to sin. Our culture gets up in the morning trusting freedom, whether or not a particular individual knows or understands Christ. See Galatians 5.

Heaven – Mention is usually made at funerals that the deceased, regardless of faith, is in heaven – “a better place” of immediate yet eternal rest and reward in the company of God. Christianity is the only religion that discusses that kind of Heaven. Christ, the Only Way to that Heaven, may not even be mentioned but Heaven is nonetheless, albeit errantly, assumed.

God as Father – Only in the New Testament does Christ, as God’s son, turn God into an actual Father figure for humans. Fatherhood implies a loving, personal relationship with God found nowhere but in Christ. Christ is the only One who ever even brought it up.

Child of God – Ditto. This is a personal, Jesus thing; totally a Christian concept.

God is Love – 1 John 4:8,16. No other God except the Triune God (Father, Son, Holy Spirit) has been described this way. Ever.

Holy Spirit – Not ghosts and goblins; this is the real deal; how God talks to us; our mediator with Christ.

Faith – Christ is the only One ever Who said “Faith” is enough.

Hope – Who doesn’t have or want hope? Another total Jesus thing.

Love – John 3:16. Even the hippies understood this one.

Grace - Ever hear a non-believer say "Help me, God"? That's asking for grace, and the person of Christ is why we can ask God for help.

Repentance – We all learn to say we’re sorry.

Forgiveness, Salvation and Eternal Life are among other uniquely Christian concepts – real blessings from a real God – that much of secular culture widely accepts.

Sin? Oh yeah. Sin. Now there is something everybody understands

Believers and non-believers alike have plenty to talk about.

Walters (rlwcom@aol.com), a Carmel resident, decided specifically and with a forgiving heart not to pick on non-God liberals … today.