This is the weekly Q & A blog post by our Research Professor in Philosophy, Dr. William Lane Craig.

Question

Dr. Craig, I’ve heard you offer two responses to the problem of divine hiddenness. I’d like to offer a counter-point to each, and ask you to follow up on them.

  1. Theist: “God wants a freely-chosen relationship and doesn’t want to force himself on anyone.”
    1. Counter-Point: to demonstrate one’s own existence does not violate free will.
      1. If you loved someone and wanted a relationship with them, you would start by introducing yourself to them. This makes your existence 100% obvious. But nobody complains that this violates their free will! In fact, it affirms free will, because someone cannot choose to enter into a relationship unless that person first knows the other party exists.
      2. God could easily do the same. He could personally introduce himself to each one of us, such that there would be no doubt that he exists. This would not violate our free will. We could then freely choose to pursue a relationship with him or not.
  2. Theist: “It may be that even if God revealed himself more plainly, no additional people would come to be saved, any more than under the status quo.”
    1. Counter-Point: this is not the way human belief works, relative to evidence.
      1. We know the way that human belief works, relative to evidence.
      2. As evidence becomes more plentiful and of better quality, people are more likely to believe in any given proposition X.
      3. Each person might have a different evidentiary threshold for belief in X, but as evidence is improved for X in quantity and quality, eventually that threshold is crossed.
      4. On a personal note, I can honestly attest that if I had more / better evidence, I would happily be a committed Christian. I would truly like to believe in God and am earnestly seeking, but it is very hard for me because the evidence just doesn’t seem that compelling.
      5. I am just one person, but consider the cumulative effect of this for all people, across all times. It could be an enormous effect for good and result in many souls saved if God were to reveal himself more clearly. 

Once again, having more evidence - even an overwhelming amount - for God’s existence would not violate free will. (See first argument)

Peter

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Dr. William Lane Craig's Response

Dr. William Lane Craig

While I really sympathize with your plight, Peter, the very fact that you say, “I would truly like to believe in God and am earnestly seeking, but it is very hard for me because the evidence just doesn’t seem that compelling” arouses my suspicions. Either you aren’t fully acquainted with the evidence (have you studied the evidence in, e.g., Reasonable Faith?), or else there is a lot more going on psychologically than you have let on or perhaps are even aware of. While the evidence may not be compelling, I don’t see how any informed person who sincerely desires to become a Christian can think that the evidence is insufficient for a Christian commitment. I suspect that there are deeper psychological barriers holding you back. If that’s true, then the provision of greater evidence might make no difference to your coming to trust in Christ. I’d encourage you to engage in some serious soul-searching and perhaps talk things over with a trusted Christian friend to discover what is really holding you back.

Now with respect to the two points that I supposedly make, I think it’s important to get clear on just what I’m saying.

1. “God wants a freely-chosen relationship and doesn’t want to force himself on anyone.” What I’m rejecting here is a self-revelation of God that is so attractive that it is irresistible. This is like the so-called beatific vision given to the blessed in heaven. I agree with you and have said that God’s making His existence as obvious as the nose on your face would not violate free will. But the point is that it doesn’t guarantee saving faith either (think of the Israelites during the Exodus!). So I agree that even if God personally introduced himself to each one of us, such that there would be no doubt that He exists, “this would not violate our free will. We could then freely choose to pursue a relationship with him or not.”  I affirm merely that God cannot compel faith in Him by giving a self-revelation that is irresistible.

2. “It may be that even if God revealed himself more plainly, no additional people would come to be saved, any more than under the status quo.” Right!  Think about it. God wants everybody to be saved. So, insofar as it is feasible, God will not allow a person to be lost if He knew that the provision of more evidence would win that person’s free assent. God will providentially order the world so that anyone who fails to believe in God for salvation would not have believed in Him were he to be given more evidence. Certainly, more evidence might convince such a person that God exists. But that’s no big deal.  What matters is saving faith. And it may well be the case that a loving God would not withhold from anyone the evidence that would suffice to bring him freely to saving faith. So anyone who fails to come to saving faith would not have come even if he had been given more evidence.

Your counterpoint conflates saving faith with coming to believe that God exists. So you say, “As evidence becomes more plentiful and of better quality, people are more likely to believe in any given proposition X.” But Peter, believing in God is not the same as believing a proposition! We’re talking here about a relationship of love and trust, not coming to a belief that p, where p is some proposition. You add, “Each person might have a different evidentiary threshold for belief in X, but as evidence is improved for X in quantity and quality, eventually that threshold is crossed.”  I see no reason at all to think that that claim is true. Many atheists have said, and even told me personally, that even if they knew that God existed they still wouldn’t believe in Him. To this claim, you oppose your own personal experience: “I can honestly attest that if I had more / better evidence, I would happily be a committed Christian.” I have no more confidence that that is true than I do that the atheists’ claim is true. If you trust your self-analysis, why distrust theirs? For my part, I think that the roots of decision-making are so deep that we can’t have confidence in claims about what a person would do if he had more evidence. I think God knows (I’m a Molinist), but we don’t. So I don’t think it’s true that “We know the way that human belief works, relative to evidence.” What we know is that people make up their minds for all sorts of non-rational reasons unrelated to the evidence.

Now suppose you do trust both your own self-analysis and the atheists’. Then it follows merely that you will come to believe at some point. God will not withhold from you the evidence that would be sufficient for you to trust in Him. So that should give you some hope for the future, Peter. Keep seeking; look harder at the evidence. You should find it more than sufficient for a reasonable faith.


This Q&A and other resources are available on Dr. William Lane Craig's website.