Paul Johnson: Why I Believe in God

Last week Paul Johnson passed away. In my opinion he was the greatest intellectual of the past 50 years. He wrote more than 50 books and countless magazine columns. I assigned his book Modern Times in my Western Civ classes. It was a brilliant assessment of the 20^th century and I recommend it to everyone. He also wrote a history of Christianity, a history of the Jews, a history of art, a history of the American people, and countless other subjects. I am astonished at the breadth of his learning; the insights his study of history gave him.

Johnson was an outspoken Christian with deep insights into the faith. But in an essay he wrote a number of years ago he explained why he believed in God. He admits that his reasons are not philosophical or intellectual. But his answer was unique and different from almost any reason I have ever heard.

He gives, basically, two reasons.

The first reason for faith is communal. The tremendous strength he draws from other Christians. He attends a church with many working class people and immigrants. Here is one of the greatest intellectuals who has ever lived being encouraged by simple, humble, ordinary people. His habit was to go to church each Sunday and then afterwards sit and have coffee with these folks. He reminds us that the early Christians drew strength from each other. And they needed it. At any time they could experience a horrific and public death.

Johnson reminds us that we live in the midst of a pagan and materialistic world. And that world is constantly trumpeting its pursuit of pleasure in every form of media. This world does not comprehend our faith and subjects it to ridicule and hostility. So Christians need each other. We draw strength from each other. This communal spirit demonstrates the reality of God.

Johnson then turns to his other reason for believing in God. 

“I have known some giants of certitude, rajahs of reason, leviathans of logic. Three in particular pop up to remind me of the fallibility of the human intellect — Bertrand Russell, Jean-Paul Sartre and A.J. Ayer. Wonderful entertainment value, brilliant, sparkling…but one would not turn to any of them, let alone all three together, for practical advice on a serious problem. And the existence of God is a serious problem, in the end the only one that matters.”

Johnson admits, what deters most sensitive and intelligent people from believing in God, or undermines the faith of those who once did, is their inability to vindicate the notion of divine providence in a world full of evil…. 

He admits that an innocent child dying in agony is a potent argument for atheism. The world is replete with horrible monsters and evil, unpunished crimes, cynical success stories.

So what is Johnson’s answer to this objection from the problem of evil? It is remarkably similar to Job’s. “None of us, with our enormous, rapidly expanding but still minute knowledge measured against the mysteries of the universe, can have the temerity to question God’s wisdom. Divine providence is a colossal fact which is indefinable, immeasurable, and beyond our powers even to conceive in its potency.”

Then Johnson poses an objection of his own and with it his main proof for the existence of God. “The world we inhabit is an enormous and complex combination of good and evil, and all of us are under a moral compulsion to strive so that the balance rests, however precariously, on the side of good. All of us feel this compulsion: why? If there is no God, who or what is compelling us?” Johnson argues that this compulsion is a powerful proof for the existence of God, and one that is very difficult to explain apart from God’s existence.

Johnson does not argue that this is a logical proof of God’s existence. The answers to most of life’s important questions are not subject to logical proof. But the presence of our desire to do good has to be explained, and the presence and existence of God is the best way to explain it.

“I am content to go to my grave with many mysteries unsolved. Indeed I am not unhappy with mysteries, confident we now see through a glass darkly but ultimately will be face to face with the truth of all things. The most valuable of virtues, I increasingly feel, is patience.”

Isaiah said much the same thing 2700 years ago. “Wait on the Lord, and He will renew your strength.”

I pray that Almighty God, will this day, increase your strength.

More: Johnson’s original essay(may require a subscription, but try it): https://www.spectator.co.uk/article/reason-to-believe/

Another great intellectual addresses this question: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PhMrySSH34Y

You will find a number of videos here that will be helpful: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YvWozzFznzs&list=PLkHlTST983SoyO674yIugUXV1lLjm-oeM