Is there enough evidence for God?

In our Year 12 Christian Studies seminars that run fortnightly, our students get to choose a topic that they feel hasn’t quite been answered on their faith journey. Our most recent topic was: there just isn’t enough evidence for God.

I began with a question – “What evidence would be sufficient for you to believe in God?” As you can imagine, the responses varied, but there were a few commonalities:

• I would need to see him
• I would need to see a miracle
• I would need to see more than one miracle
• Whatever I received, I would just need a little more
• I don’t know

Some hadn’t thought through the question before, and it was a great opportunity for honest reflection. I had a follow up question that turned out to be equally as difficult – “Imagine you received the sufficient evidence and God was real. Would you then believe and follow him?”

To most people’s surprise, the hands did not shoot up. In fact, most people still wouldn’t follow, despite having the evidence they asked for. Naturally, the next question had to be, “Why wouldn’t you follow?” And this is where many were stumped. In fact, many stayed that way and couldn’t come up with a response. But it did reveal something: evidence cannot be the only problem to following God. The thing we thought would get us over the line, was not the thing after all.

And that’s how we left it for the week.

Some students realised their scepticism ran deeper than they thought. Others figured out that evidence was not the issue, but they did have other issues with following God (such as the problem of evil and suffering; and the apparent contradiction between science and religion). Still, others had an honest moment of realisation that they just wanted to do what they want in life, without the interference of another being or authority.

We will look at the evidence for God over the coming weeks, particularly surrounding the resurrection of Jesus. But for now, how do you respond to the questions that Year 12 were asked? What evidence do you need to believe in God? And if you got it, would you follow Him?

Damien Whitington
NBCS Senior Chaplain