Agnostics have various views concerning God. Selected agnostics claim that they do not know anything about God; others believe that no one can know anything about God. Of course, such a statement itself claims knowledge about God. The agnostic who arbitrarily supposes we cannot know anything about God in fact says something very important about God—that He is unknowable.

 Not only does he have no philosophical or logical basis to make such a claim, the claim self-destructs and implodes from within. The agnostic, though attempting to confess ignorance of theology, has a rather complex theology. His assertion that we can know nothing about God in fact builds a prodigious theological system. This system asserts that we cannot know that God is omnipotent, omnipresent, loving, just, and sovereign. Agnostics also presume to know that God has not revealed Himself to humanity, implying that He is either too weak in power or too indifferent in His concern for His creatures. Agnostics claim plentiful assertions regarding God; as you can see, they have an involved theological system. A system that in principle starts and ends with autonomous reason.

Open but Unconvinced

 Charles Spurgeon noted, “One day a man was walking with me observed, with some emphasis, ‘I do not believe as you do. I am an Agnostic.’ ‘Oh, I said to him. “Yes. That is a Greek word, is it not? The Latin word, I think, is ignoramus.’ He did not like it at all. Yet I only translated his language from Greek to Latin. These are queer waters to get into, when all your philosophy brings you is the confession that you know nothing, and the stolidity which enables you to glory in your ignorance.”

Another sort of agnostic admits he does not know whether God exists, but says that others might. The word “agnostic” is not a label that anyone should desire. The word comes from the Greek word meaning ignorant and without knowledge. In one sense the term is fitting.

Self-deception

 For the wrath of God is revealed from heaven against all ungodliness and unrighteousness of men, who suppress the truth in unrighteousness, because what may be known of God is manifest in them, for God has shown it to them. For since the creation of the world His invisible attributes are clearly seen, being understood by the things that are made, even His eternal power and Godhead, so that they are without excuse, because, although they knew God, they did not glorify Him as God, nor were thankful, but became futile in their thoughts, and their foolish hearts were darkened (Romans 1:18-21).

“Dare to know” is the challenge issued by Kant. The agnostic runs from this charge and remains locked into self-deception. He knows that God exists, but he does not like Him. Hell, judgment, and all those offensive doctrines are not for him. Theologically he rests on wishful thinking and misleads himself by suppressing the truth of God in unrighteousness. He is like the man who in the summer of 2001 used what Coast Guard Cmdr. Dee Norton described as “poor judgment”: He strapped on homemade “water-walking shoes” and decided to walk on the Pacific Ocean from California to Hawaii, a distance of more than two thousand miles. The amazing thing was, he did get about ten miles—until his shoes started taking in too much water. He radioed for help and was rescued. This man should be enshrined in the Self-Deception Hall of Fame. He actually believed he could cross the high seas by walking across the Pacific Ocean with extra-large “shoes.” However, the unbeliever has more reasons to trust God than a man has for realizing he cannot stepwalk across the deep blue sea.

When the non-theist is confronted with the truth, frequently he will behave like the little boy in Bahnsen’s analogy who, mad at his parents for punishing him, hides under his blanket and declares that his mom and dad don’t exist. The reality is that his parents exist, whether he likes it or not. He can attempt to deceive and lie to himself in a futile effort to make himself feel better. Bahnsen uses this analogy to illustrate that the unbeliever is doing the same thing. He is mad at God for being God. He is angry about the coming judgment of his personal sins, so he hides under his blanket of unbelief, hoping that God is not there.

Since the laws of logic (A=A; A~~A) have absolute ubiquity throughout experience as immutable universals and are necessary for knowledge, the mutable cosmos is deficient to account for them. Furthermore, since there is an utter ubiquity of mutability and particularity in the material cosmos; the cosmos lacks the ontic ability to account for the immutable and universal laws of logic. The God of scripture has the ontic credentials of immutability conjoined with His universal reach and power; thus God accounts for the laws of logic. These laws are all-pervasive concerning all thought, action, and assertion; thus to reject God leads one to fall into a system that not only lacks explanatory power; but cannot, in principle, account for anything. God is required to account for all that which is in the cosmos.

The immaterial laws of logic are intrinsically connected to all agents, objects, and ideas; this is a basic actuality of human experience; moreover the material mutable cosmos fails to account for the immutable immaterial laws of logic; theism accounts for these laws. Agnosticism that reposes upon the cosmos has not the resources to account for human experience forasmuch as it rests on a mutable material cosmos; it fails as an ultimate explanation for immutable universals.

There is a real ontic chasm between hard physical objects and the non-physical laws of logic. How do concrete objects in our space-time world relate to non-tangible laws? There seems to be no acceptable way to envision particular concrete objects producing and accounting for non-concrete universal laws; immaterial universal laws seem to cry out for God as the only plausible ultimate explanation. A hard object or group of objects cannot magically produce or transform into laws inasmuch as laws are non-physical and universal in contrast to the concrete object as a physical non-universal.

God is Required

The ultimate norms for human knowledge are found not in any human mind or minds, or anywhere else in creation, but in the mind of God (James Anderson: Speaking the Truth in Love).

A governing approach to avert skepticism via agnosticism is to have an unchanging, infinite, infallible, and exhaustive authority. The God of the Bible has these attributes. God is required because He is immutable (unchanging), universal in knowledge, timeless, transcendent, and immaterial; in addition the laws of logic are immutable, universal, timeless, transcendent, and immaterial. The material cosmos is in constant flux (it’s a mutable definite particular), thus it lacks such ontic necessities required to account for the laws of logic (also known as the laws of reason and the laws of truth: A = A: the law of identity & A ~~A: the law of non-contradiction). The laws of logic are necessary for all assertions, investigations, evidence, and knowledge; hence God provides necessary a priori truth conditions to make sense of our world and experience; and an agnosticism that rests upon the material cosmos (plus its content in motion) is devoid of a source to account for these immutable universal necessities. Therefore it is devoid of the explanatory power to succeed as a coherent worldview.

Witnessing to Agnostics

Since some agnostics are apathetic regarding truth and many do not care that their worldview lacks explanatory power, the Christian should patiently remind them of their sin and its consequence.  The truth of man’s rebellion against God’s holy law should be brought before the eyes of the agnostic to both convince and convict him of his sins. Using clear, specific and particular commandments, in asserting the sinner’s ungodliness before a holy God, is the first stage of faithful witnessing. This is the instrument we should use to humble him, and provoke a sense of misery and wretchedness that will drive him to Jesus for cleansing, forgiveness, and redemption. Iain Murray quotes Nathan Bangs, who reported that the preachers during the Great Awakening  “disturbed the false peace of the lukewarm, awakened the conscience of the sleeping sinner, and gave him no rest until he surrendered to Christ.” Our goal should not be to have people like us at the cost of truth. Our duty is to speak the truth, even if this results in people disliking us. Yes, our witness must be filled with grace, patience, and compassion, but these virtues should never dislodge our call to stand for the truth and righteousness.

Repentance is necessary: “Except ye repent, ye shall all likewise perish” (Luke 13:5).

Patient Concern but Do Not Hold Back

We should never be combative in our witness. We must try to avoid provoking a hostile response from the unbeliever. We are called to invoke the truth of God’s law with kindness and patience, not forsaking our duty because of fear. If you are derelict in your duty of sharing the law with the unbeliever, you may reduce your chances of persecution, but you may also miss numerous opportunities to see the lost, found.

M’Cheyne offered this inspiring quote: “If the mercies and if the judgments do not convert you, God has no other arrows in His quiver.” The terror and thunder of Sinai will invoke fear and holy fright in the sinner. Then if God changes the sinner’s heart through the gospel, the convert will flee God’s judgments and hurl himself upon Christ and His eternal mercy.

The Law also shows us our great need—our need of cleansing, cleansing with the water and the blood. It displays to us our filthiness, and this naturally leads us to feel we must be washed from it if we are ever to draw near to God. So the Law drives us to accept Christ as the only person who can cleanse us, makes us fit to stand within the veil of the presence of the Most High. The Law is the surgeon’s knife that cuts out the proud flesh… The Law kills, the Gospel makes us alive; the Law strips, and then Jesus Christ comes in and robes the soul in beauty and glory… All the commandments… direct us to Christ, if we will but heed their evident intent (Charles Spurgeon).

see my New Book Truth, Knowledge, and the Reason for God HERE