Sermon quotes on questioning god

Augustine of Hippo

He who denies the existence of God, has some reason for wishing that God did not exist.

 

Hosea Ballou

Doubt is the incentive to truth and inquiry leads the way.

Dietrich Bonhoeffer

A god who let us prove his existence would be an idol.

Rita Mae Brown

Whenever I doubt the existence of God or the Goddess, I look at horses. Only God could have made a horse.

 

Wernher von Braun

My experiences with science led me to God. They challenge science to prove the existence of God. But must we really light a candle to see the sun?

Jerry Bridges

Adversity is hard to endure, and can even be harder to understand. If God were really in control, why would He allow the tragic auto accident or crucial job loss? How could He permit cancer in a loved one or the death of a child? Grappling with His concern for us we ask, “Why is God allowing this?” or “What have I done wrong?

 

Thomas Carlyle

A man’s religion consists, not of the many things he is in doubt of and tries to believe, but of the few he is assured of and has no need of effort for believing.

 

John Calvin

Since no man is excluded from calling upon God the gate of salvation is open to all. There is nothing else to hinder us from entering, but our own unbelief.

Mike Fisher

Sometimes trust takes time. We all love to be in control, but when you start to give some of that up, it’s freeing. Start with some of the little things. Give those things up to the Lord.

 

Ricky Gervais

The existence of God is not subjective. He either exists or he doesn’t. It’s not a matter of opinion. You can have your own opinions. But you can’t have your own facts.

Elisabeth Elliot

There are those who insist that it is a very bad thing to question God. To them, “why?” is a rude question. That depends, I believe, on whether it is an honest search, in faith, for His meaning, or whether it is the challenge of unbelief and rebellion.

On Asking God Why: And on Other Reflections on Trusting God in a Twisted World, Revell. 

Timothy Keller

In the christian view, the ultimate evidence for the existence of God is Jesus Christ. If there is a God, we characters in his play have to hope that he put some information about himself in the play. But Christians believe he did more than give us information. He wrote himself into the play as the main character in history, when Jesus was born in a manger and rose from the dead.

The Reason for God: Belief in an Age of Skepticism

R.C. Sproul

“The main problem with those who deny the existence of God is not intellectual. It is not because of insufficient information, or that God’s manifestation of himself in nature has been obscured. The atheists’ problem is not that they cannot know God, rather it is they do not want to know him. Man’s problem with the existence of God is not an intellectual problem; it is a moral problem.” For the wrath of God is revealed from heaven against all ungodliness and unrighteousness of men – Rom. 1:18″. 

Dallas Willard

We live in a culture that has, for centuries now, cultivated the idea that the skeptical person is always smarter than one who believes. You can almost be as stupid as a cabbage as long as you doubt.

Hearing God: Developing a Conversational Relationship with God

 

Søren Kierkegaard

People try to persuade us that the objections against Christianity spring from doubt. The objections against Christianity spring from insubordination, the dislike of obedience, rebellion against all authority. As a result people have hitherto been beating the air in the struggle against objections, because they have fought intellectually with doubt instead of fighting morally with rebellion.”

Works of Love, trans. by Howard and Edna Hong (New York: Harper & Row, 1962), 11.

C.S. Lewis

When I lay [my] questions before God I get no answer. But a rather special sort of No answer. It is not the locked door. It is more like a silent, certainly not uncompassionate, gaze. As though He shook His head not in refusal but in waiving the question. Like, “Peace, child; you don’t understand.

A Grief Observed

The Serpent

Did God really say . . . ?

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Consider checking out our illustrations page on Questioning God. 

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