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Ligonier Conference (VI)
- 03/16/07
- 5
Until today I had never attended a conference featuring Ravi Zacharias. I know a fair bit about the man as his reputation precedes him, but had never sat under his teaching. Now that I’ve done so I can affirm that I have never been and will never be a philosopher. I am a simple guy I guess. While I enjoyed his discussion on the existence of God, a whole lot of it went right over my head. This made it, understandably, I’m sure, quite difficult to encapsulate. Furthermore, he does much of his teaching in the form of stories and anecdotes and it is awfully difficult to quickly and neatly type these up in the heat of battle. So with great shame I admit that I’ve got no liveblog of this session to share with you.
What I do know is that his speech answered three questions: What are the intense philosophical problems arising from denial of God’s existence? How do we demonstrate God’s existence? How is the Christian faith unique in portraying God? To answer the first question he said that a denial of God’s existence presents a problem with defining or arriving at morality, that it removes any way of positing meaning, and that it takes away all hope. To answer the second question he, well, he just made it even more difficult for me. So tell you what. How about you just download the audio when it is available. I’m sure you’ll find it beneficial. And I dare you to try to take good notes while listening the first time! Even if my pride is damaged, I am at least comforted by the fact that he said the session would be very difficult for note-takers…
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Comments (5)
I think Ravi’s talk was absolutely amazing. The high point for me was when he pointed out that the ultimate cause in the cosmological argument for God cannot be a physical cause.Ravi just brings something that no one else brings: experiences outside of the church in culture (R.C. touched on it a bit in his introduction). His stories that you mentioned are always the highlight of his talks.$.02 from one of the few Orlando natives at the conference.
Ryan - I quite agree that he brings something the others don’t and I think you’re right that it is a basis of interacting with the culture. And he seems to always have some great stories to tell…
I had some time this morning to watch his talk via the livestream Ligonier is offering this year. I really enjoyed it, but, like you, find it difficult to explain. I actually wondered as I was listening how in the world you were going to liveblog it. (Better to take the humble road rather than make a feeble attempt and botch the whole thing). My fingers just couldn’t keep up, and I was only trying to take some notes! In the end I decided it would be best to just listen. He’s quite brilliant, and I’m so thankful God creates men like him for us to learn from, aren’t you? Although I’m not sure I learned anything other than I need to avoid discussions with physicists and philosophers. I did think the comment about physicists sovereignly selecting their own targets for extrapolation pretty funny. Questions are so much easier when you already know and approve what the answers are going to be.
I realized today that there are 2 things I never want to encounter in this life:
One, debate Al Mohler. He could argue my preferences better than I could.
Two, live-blog (or interpret for the deaf) Ravi Z. I think this man makes up about half of his words.
Just some conference musings…
Tim, thanks for all your dedicated work on these sessions.
I tried to take notes here at home while listening and like you, found it nigh unto impossible.
One bit I did manage to snag was (paraphrase coming) that if there is a physical quantity, X, and X’s existence is contingent upon the existence of an infinite number of other, previous physical quantities, X will never exist.
For a physical quantity to exist at all demands the presence of a non-physical something or other, meaning the Big Bang explains absolutely nothing. It cannot be the first cause of the universe, since it was itself dependent upon a pre-existing physical quantity.
Obviously I’m no Tim Challies. ;^)