Why does the Bible call people who say there is no God, fools, and does this include atheists, or are fools those who seek God out?
Some claim that the Bible does not refer to atheists; therefore, when the Bible refers to fools this does not include atheists as being fools.
So what is an atheist? Is an atheist a fool?
My understanding is an atheist is someone who does not believe that God exists. Atheists say that there is no God because they prefer to think that there is no God.
Does the modern-day idea of an atheist concur with the biblical concept of a fool?
Here are three definitions:
Atheism:
Atheist:“Disbelief in or denial of the existence of God or gods.”(American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fifth Edition. Copyright © 2011)
“A person who denies or disbelieves the existence of a supreme being.”(Random House Kernerman Webster's College Dictionary, © 2010)“A person who does not believe in God or gods.”
(Collins English Dictionary – Complete and Unabridged, 12th Edition 2014)
Clearly, the current definition concurs with my understanding of an atheist: someone who does not accept that the Almighty Creator God, the Supreme Being exists.
The Bible states:
The fool says in his heart, “There is no God.” They are corrupt, they do abominable deeds, there is none that does good. The Lord looks down from heaven upon the children of men, to see if there are any that act wisely, that seek after God. (Psalm 14:1-2)In the pride of his countenance the wicked does not seek him; all his thoughts are, “There is no God.” (Psalm 10:4)
To suggest that the above verses do not describe modern-day atheists; we could say is a specious attempt by a clown trying to hoodwink the gullible.
An atheist could either be very immoral and possess no principles at all or be immoral as far as God is concerned because he or she is full of pride, has his or her own standards, and thinks to ignore the Omniscient One (by outrunning death at the final bell?).
Atheists are people whom the Bible calls, “Fools.” Some people are so precious they are offended by that. Bear in mind, offense is always taken and never given. (Since the Bible gives no person permission to take offense at what is written therein, if you do take offense, you are stealing.) The Bible records Jesus as saying that those who take no offense are blessed.
When I was a fool, I used to take offense. Now I know a fool ceases to be one when he or she becomes wise. A wise person would seek to find the reason why one is here on this Earth merely to be born, experience suffering in its various forms, then die, and yet be capable of mental torment by formulating the concept of eternity.
Atheists do not believe that God exists. Therefore, they believe they are not accountable for their actions to any Judge once they die. This is why the Bible views people as fools when they say that there is no God; especially, when they believe they will not have to give an account of their actions to a Superior Being—such as a Supreme Being with an Omniscient Mind who judges with righteousness and not with partiality as the corrupt in this world do.
If you show an atheist a video of a woman in the process of being healed from lip cancer, caught on film in real time, because of a divine pronouncement by a man, the atheist would not believe what he saw.
If you showed an atheist a fragment of bone and said that this came from a giant creature that weighed 40 ton and lived 40 million years ago, as long as you said that this creature’s existence occurred by an evolutionary process that relies upon chance, the atheist would believe you.
If you took three balls and told an atheist you are going do five things with them; he or she would at least listen to see what kind of juggling trick you proposed (James Randy would, anyway). You could tell the atheist what you are going to do along the following lines:
1. You are going to throw one ball into the air and it is going to remain stationary.2. You are going to then get a ball and cause it to spin on your finger.3. Then you are going to take a third ball and cause it to circle the one on your finger.4. Having done that, you are going to take the ball circling the spinning ball that is on your finger and toss them into the air so that together they will circle the stationary ball.5. Then this is going to continue for ten minutes without any strings attached.
The atheist would say that is impossible. If that were to happen that would be a miracle.
Yet the Creator of the Universe has the a moon circling the planet Earth that spins on its axis and together they travel at nearly 70, 000 miles around the Sun every 365.4 days and, evidently, these objects have been doing so for much longer than a mere ten minutes. However, the atheist says that this incredible marvel is merely a result of chance.
If you were to show a fool a marvel, the fool would not believe it was designed but had to happen by chance. Yet it would have to be a miracle that by chance the Earth spins on its axis and the moon circles the Earth. This is why the Bible calls people, fools, who say that there is no Creator God. Clearly an Intelligent Designer caused both the spinning Earth and its revolving moon to orbit the Sun together at close to 70,000 mph (and we have not begun to speak of the amazing reliability and uniformity of the seemingly unfathomable complexities contained within the otherwise hostile Universe in which we live).
Whichever way you look at the atheists’ dilemma, the Bible has them pegged as fools. They are either fools because they do not believe and acknowledge the Lord God Creator of Heaven and Earth (i.e. the Universe), or they are fools because they believe in the impossible: the principles of life and order in the Universe occur by chance through a series of accidental and unpredictable events.
Yet the Bible says that only a fool is wise in his own eyes. Atheists think that they are wiser than the Creator God. Instead of being full of pride, if they were humble, they would act wisely and seek after God. They would do their utmost to call God into account and find out their reason for existence; only atheists see this as the providence of fools, whereas the Bible says that is the what the wise would do. However, atheists prefer to scoff at those who testify that God lives and then warn them that He is going to judge those who refuse to reason with Him about their futile lives; but by seeking out God and securing their own assurance of eternal life while they have the opportunity, they would avoid an unfavorable eternal judgment.
Yet if an atheist went on a plane trip across the Pacific from, say, Chile to China, and if he or she were not warned that there would be insufficient fuel to fly across the ocean if the plane encounters head winds, and it does, and the plane mysteriously disappears somewhere in the ocean, there would be uproar. The families of the deceased passengers would want justice. Therefore, the Bible warns all atheists that after death comes judgment.
The Ten Commandments were given 3500 years ago. God Himself wrote them. In fact, the only words ever attested to have been written by God’s own finger. If we do not live up to them, and these are the standard to what we are going to be held account, we would expect a wise person would get to know what he or she is up against before death. And if one could not meet the requirements, at least, one could seek to discover an alternative option before time is up.
One option is you could seek Jesus Christ out, before you die. I did. I now have the personal assurance that Jesus rose from the dead, and I did not get that assurance reading the Bible. I obtained this assurance from seeking the resurrected Lord of Life who paid the price to redeem us from the futility of being born to suffer and then die, even though we have the capacity to conceptualize the possibility of eternal life. My inability to meet the required standard that would make me eligible for eternal life is no longer an issue for me and I have a personal guarantee in the form of an abiding assurance that this is so. It just so happens, the Bible instructs us to obtain this abiding assurance before we die and not to rely upon doctrines or philosophies of men, which equates to church dogma that masquerades as truth.
Hence, the Bible contrasts a fool with a wise person. A fool is someone who thinks there is no God or says that God does not exist—as an atheist thinks and says—but a wise person seeks the Creator God out. Nothing appears to have changed in this respect since the Psalms were written, except from the New Testament we learn a fool is someone like myself who has sought Lord Jesus Christ and found Him. The New Testament states that I am a fool for Christ’s sake. And all the atheists agree!!
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