I want to talk about God, talk about 10 minutes, and talk about 3 men all born in the beginning of the 19^thC, and who all died towards the end. Contemporaries, but very different men.

The 19^th C was an important time. Europe was stable, there were no significant wars after 1815until 1915. The Industrial Revolution created wealth for workers and more education than ever before. Countries like Aotearoa were being colonized. The Church held power and prestige, and was unbelievably entitled and privileged. The ideas of the Enlightenment a century before were being processed, and the idea of God was on shaky ground. Some dared to disbelieve the ancient creeds.

The first of my 3 men is George Rawson. (1807 – 1889) He was an English congregational layman, a poet. He wrote our first hymn today. His antidote for disbelief is to say we just don’t know enough, - yet. Our minds are too small. God’s truth and ways are great and not yet revealed. This was a popular and acceptable liberal approach to the problems of theology. It led to agnosticism. If we can’t know, we should be neutral, uncommitted. A very popular belief.

The second of my men is Walter Smith. (1824 – 1908) He was a minister of the Presbyterian Free Church in Scotland. He had a doctorate, was minister in important parishes including Edinburgh, was a Moderator of the General Assembly. He wrote our second hymn today. Smith’s antidote to disbelief is to resort to the supernatural. God is immortal, invisible, hid from our eyes. God is not part of our natural world, he is far beyond it, in light inaccessible, pavilioned in splendour. This was the favourite hymn of Queen Elizabet II’s mother, a 19^th C woman.

Belief in the supernatural or transcendent God is a popular strategy. It sounds so good. But it’s a far cry from the God of Abraham, who visited him in his tent. And far from the God of Moses, whom you could see the back of, or was in a burning bush. For the people of Israel at one time God dwelt in the Ark of the Covenant, a holy shrine. Their God was part of the natural world, and came and went.

It was only after the Enlightenment and the discovery of science that some theologians turned to a supernatural explanation of God. When Lloyd Geering was tried for heresy in 1967, he was accused of not believing in a supernatural God. His reply was that he couldn’t find that term anywhere in the Bible, or in any of the creeds.

In the 19^th C, belief in a supernatural God led to deism. This is a belief that there is an unknowable force in the universe which gives the laws of physics and holds creation together, but never intervenes. That’s still popular today. But that sort of deity, as someone said, makes no difference to me at all.

My third man was a German, Ludwig Feuerbach. (1804 – 1872) He set out to study theology, but decided it was of dubious logic, so turned to philosophy and studied under Hegel. He was also deeply influenced by Schleiermacher. He wrote a notable book in 1841, “The Essence of Christianity”. He pointed out that the idea of the supernatural only seems to make sense because of its heavy reliance on natural things, the things of this world. Sure enough, if you look at Walter Smith’s hymn, the images areas follows: mortality, visibility, wisdom, accessibility, hiddenness, ancientness, might, victoriousness, having a name. All natural qualities. (vs1only)

What Feuerbach points out is that saying God is the opposite of everything we can know, doesn’t tell us anything. That is sophistry, nonsense.

So, Feuerbach said, God must be part of the natural world, if he is anything at all. Perhaps he is a big creature like the one Moses encountered? That’s hard to believe. In the absence of any such experience for almost all of us, there is one other possibility. It’s the human possibility. We ascribe to God human qualities, love and mercy and goodness. Maybe, said Feuerbach, we created God in our own image. God is part of the natural human world, a creation of our minds, and needs and longings.

Feuerbach said he was not wanting to destroy Christianity, but to reclaim its humanity. His ideas fell upon stone deaf ears in the church. Not so in the philosophical world, where he was deeply influential upon Marx and Engels, Nietzsche and Freud. He was one of the most influential philosophers of the 19^th C though he never held a chair at an important university. Guess why.

However, some of us in the church have taken Feuerbach seriously. He’s one of Geering’s favourite philosophers, and mine. There are some significant benefits flowing out of his insights. I want to mention three.

First, it resolves the problem of evil, why a good God allows bad things to happen. Some religions say there are two gods, a good one and an evil one. Christianity comes near to that with the idea of Satan or the Devil. With Feuerbach’s insight, the problem disappears. Of course God is both good and nasty, - as we are. As our creation he reflects our complex struggle to do justice and mercy – and not evil.

Secondly, if God is our creation, what an affirmation that is for humanity. I can almost hear Jesus saying “God was made for people, not people for God”. Our humanness can be celebrated. We are not cringing sinners, in need of help. We can help ourselves, and one another. We are good enough to create the idea of total unconditional goodness, who is God.

Thirdly, if God is made in our image, we can choose the sort of God we respect. Enough of the sort of God who drowns his children because he is such a poor parent and example. Enough of a God who gets his son killed so that his other children can be loved. We already choose the parts of the Bible we can respect. Now we have full permission to choose, and to respect, the God we follow, for that God is part of us. Our best part.

Lastly, Paul’s address to the people of Athens. Paul sees in the city a statue to an unknown god, and says he knows who this god is. You can hear the audience saying, “Go on then, who is it?” Paul says it’s the god who made the world and everything in it. Then he says it’s the god who gives life and breath to us all. Then he says it’s the god who controls everything that happens. Then he gives a little lecture about images being inadequate representations.

All of this so far is just a recital of Jewish monotheism. Athens has heard it before. But then Paul tells his new insight, his Christian insight. The unknown god is a man, whose goodness judges the world. A man who died, but is alive through those who follow his way of love.

Like Feuerbach, Paul knows the heart of belief is belief in people, and one particular person who encapsulates what it is to live a good and loving life. A costly, self sacrificing, exemplary life. This you know, this is why we are here. This is why we are Christians.

I’ve talked about God. I’ve talked about three 19^th C thinkers, and about Paul. Unfortunately, I was unable to talk about 10 minutes.

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