TITLE: Responding to the
Secular Myth
TEXT: Acts 1:6-8, Daniel 2:21
THEME: The believer should trust and obey
God in that He alone knows the direction of
history.
Carl Sagan on “Cosmos”
“The cosmos is all that is or ever was or ever
will be.”
An Ancient Christian doxology
“As it was in the beginning, is now and ever
shall be, world without end.”
Giordano Bruno (1548-1600)
Bruno was a renegade Dominican friar
executed in 1600 for persistently
preaching heretical theological views
about a wide variety of core Christian
doctrines. Cosmos makes Bruno out to be
a martyr who died heroically in the
defense of early modern science.
Giordano Bruno
I. The Premise: The Secular
Myth- Mankind is progressing
from oppressive religious
superstition to enlightened
freedom.
The Secular Myth
Proponents of this myth constantly remind us
that Christianity is a thing of the Dark Ages;
that "science" and "reason" have swept its
superstitions away, and that sociology,
psychology, neurology, and most of all
evolution, have delivered us from such
bondage?
Allen Chapman,“Slaying the
Dragons: Destroying the Myths
between Science and Faith.”
“This monumental double-think - a doublethink of Orwellian proportions - constitutes
one of the biggest myths of the age in which
we live: a myth that derives its style of
thinking from perversions or scientific
thinking…” pg. 10
The Story of Galileo- Allan
Chapman
“Many factors came together in the Galileo
affair, including frictional politics between the
Roman Catholic religious order…And perhaps
to top it a as Galileo's love of academic roughand-tumble, name-calling, and rival-ridiculing,
which were just about permissible when directed
against conservative Aristotelian philosophers in
Padua, but could have horrendous consequences
when indulged in throughout high ranking in
international ecclesiastical circles.” (pg. 106)
The “Flat Earth” myth- Allan
Chapman
“… let us be clear about one thing: no
medieval scholar of any worth thought the
earth was flat, and no educated person in
1492 believed that Columbus or the other
early navigators would fall off the edge of the
earth.” Virtually everyone believed the earth
was a sphere. pg. 61
The “Salem Witch Hunts”- Dinish
D’souza
“The Salem witch trials constitute the bestknown example of religiously motivated
violence. However, fewer than 25 people
were killed in the trials, falling far short of
the ‘perhaps hundreds of thousands,
perhaps millions’ that the late antitheist
Carl Sagan wrote about. (“What’s so Great
about Christianity?” p 207)
Recommended Book
“Galileo Goes to Jail and Other Myths about
Science and Religion,” by Ronald L. Numbers
(Editor).
Recommended Book
“Flight from the Absolute: A Heavyweight
Look at the Negative Impact of Modern and
Postmodern Philosophies,” by Paul Gosselin
The Danger of Historical Analogies
Historical analogies are often particularly
loaded because our age is characterized by
chronological snobbery and a selfcongratulatory sense of our maturity and
progress. Framing the church's response to
Galileo as misguided, reactionary, and
backward, does two things—before any
"evidence" is ever put on the table.
II. The Problem
A. Their historical narrative is wrong.
II. The Problem
A. Their historical narrative is wrong.
1. The church did not suppress
knowledge any more than we do today.
II. The Problem
A. Their historical narrative is wrong.
1. The church did not suppress
knowledge any more than we do today.
2. Secularists have rewritten history to
fit their narrative.
Stephen Toulmin
“Looking back at the ‘received view’ of
Modernity after fifty years my inclination is to
retort, “Don’t believe a word of it!” From the
start that story was one-sided and overlyoptimistic and veered into selfcongratulation… we need to balance these
truths against the major errors of history and
interpretation.
Stephen Toulmin
“The defects become more evident with each
year that goes by… the worst defects in the
standard account, however, are not matters of
philosophy but of straight historical fact. The
historical assumptions on which it rested are
no longer credible.” (Cosmopolis, pg. 16)
II. The Problem
A. Their historical narrative is wrong.
1. The church did not suppress knowledge
any more than we do today.
2. Secularists have rewritten history to fit
their narrative.
3. They claim credit for advancement of
knowledge which they have no exclusive claim
too.
II. The Problem
A. Their historical narrative is wrong.
B. Its own track record has significant issues.
C. There is no place for God in this secular
narrative.
SETI (Search for Extra Terrestials
Biosphere 2
Biosphere 2
II. The Problem
A. Their historical narrative is wrong.
B. Its own track record has significant issues.
C. There is no place for God in this secular
narrative.
D. Chronological Snobbery
C.S. Lewis "chronological
snobbery"
“the uncritical acceptance of the intellectual
climate common to our own age and the
assumption that whatever has gone out of date
is on that account discredited. You must find
why it went out of date. Was it ever refuted
(and if so by whom, where, and how
conclusively) or did it merely die away as
fashions do?”
C.S. Lewis "chronological
snobbery"
“If the latter, this tells us nothing about its
truth or falsehood. From seeing this, one
passes to the realization that our own age is
also "a period," and certainly has, like all
periods, its own characteristic illusions. They
are likeliest to lurk in those widespread
assumptions which are so ingrained in the age
that no one dares to attack or feels it
necessary to defend them.”
II. The Problem
A. Their historical narrative is wrong.
B. Its own track record has significant issues.
C. There is no place for God in this secular
narrative.
D. Chronological Snobbery
E. The secular narrative cannot provide a
basis for objective morality.
Question
Is it wrong for a 40 year old man to rape a 12
year old boy? If there is no God then it is
simply a subjective feeling, or it is the societal
evolution that creates the instinct of morality.
But why should I care what society or
evolution or you or anyone else “feels” what is
wrong
Problem:
We have rejected the foundation for the
values of the past with nothing to replace it
with. In the framework of this secular myth
history has nothing to teach us unless it can be
confirmed by modern methods.
William Tammeus
“You don’t really understand human nature
unless you know why a child on a merry-goround will wave at his parents every time
around—and why his parents will always
wave back.”
Plaque
“Christ is the head of this house,
the unseen guest at every meal and
the silent listener to every
conversation.”
III. The Biblical Response: Daniel
2:21, Romans 8:28, Acts 1:7
A. God is in control of the course of history.
Daniel 2:21
Daniel 2:21
“He changes times and seasons; he deposes
kings and raises up others. He gives wisdom
to the wise and knowledge to the discerning.”
III. The Biblical Response: Daniel
2:21, Romans 8:28, Acts 1:7
A. God is in control of the course of history.
Daniel 2:21
B. God assures the believer that he has our
ultimate good in mind. Romans 8:28
Romans 8:28
“All things work together for good for them
who love God and are called according to his
purpose.”
III. The Biblical Response: Daniel
2:21, Romans 8:28, Acts 1:7
A. God is in control of the course of history.
Daniel 2:21
B. God assures the believer that he has our
ultimate good in mind. Romans 8:28
C. It is best to trust and obey God since the
future is His to direct- Acts 1:7-8
Acts 1:6-8
“6 Then they gathered around him and asked
him, “Lord, are you at this time going to
restore the kingdom to Israel?” 7 He said to
them: “It is not for you to know the times or
dates the Father has set by his own authority.
Acts 1:6-8
“ 8 But you will receive power when the Holy
Spirit comes on you; and you will be my
witnesses in Jerusalem, and in all Judea and
Samaria, and to the ends of the earth.”
Robert
“I listened intently and followed every single
instruction as carefully as I can. My life
depends on it.”
Imagine what would take place in
our lives; we listened to and
obeyed the Word of God with the
same earnestness. Blessings and
our life depends on it.
APPLICATION
The popular secular myth that history is
moving in the direction of enlightened
freedom and that if you don’t go with it you
are on the wrong side of history.
Don’t Believe It. Obedience to God can never
be on the wrong side of history.
Robert P. George
"I do not believe in historical inevitability ….
No good cause is permanently lost. So my
advice … is to stay the course. Do not be
discouraged. Do what the pro-life movement
did when, in the 1970s, critics said, 'The game
is over; you lost; in a few years abortion will
be socially accepted and fully integrated into
American life ….' Speak the truth in season
and out of season …..”
Robert P. George
"civility, always in a gracious and loving spirit,
but firmly. If you are told that you are on 'the
wrong side of history,' remember that there is no
such thing. History is not a deity that sits in
judgment. It has no power to determine what is
true or false, good or bad, right or wrong.
History doesn't have 'wrong' and 'right' sides.
Truth does. So my message to everyone is that
our overriding concern should be to be on the
right side of truth.”