Practical Atheists
Pastor Jack Miller once said about his own church, “Practical atheists abound in conservative churches as well as liberal ones. These folks attend church and honor the Bible, not because they are there to submit everything to the authority of the Father of the Lord Jesus Christ, but because of the emotional need that is met by traditional religious order and moral structure. One man put it like this: ‘Even if I didn’t believe God existed, I’d fight for Him all the way. I’d never miss church and would always insist that my family come too. We need religion in our lives. Otherwise the bottom would fall out of everything.’”
There is a lot of truth in the notion that religion provides structure to life. We can observe that truth by looking around at the various world religions and to some degree affirm its veracity. But we also observe the emptiness that exists for those who only look to religion for structure. In the case of our practical atheist above, there is no relationship, no friendship, no sense of awe or true humility, no forgiveness, no atonement; there is only form, only structure.
Jesus encountered similar attitudes during his sojourn on earth. We will meet one such person this Sunday when we look at Jesus' encounter with Nicodemus in John 3. While Nicodemus may not be exactly like our practical atheist above, he shares a Venn diagram of form, structure and little relationship. The beautiful thing about this story for all of us that fall into the "religion" trap, is that Jesus knows what is in our hearts just as well as he knew what was in Nicodemus' heart. And just as he invited Nicodemus to a way of life, a way of seeing, that is so much more than religion, so we are invited as well.
Photo by Vlad Shalaginov on Unsplash