Wayne's World: Atheism: A Leap of Faith

by Wayne Geiger

The celebration of Easter is upon us. Easter means a lot of different things to a lot of different people. To some, it means the changing of the season and the celebration of new life.

To others, it means the changing of the clothes. I remember being forced to dress up on Easter and wear my fancy, new “Easter clothes” as my mom called them. I wasn’t allowed to play football in them either.

Easter also means tradition. Out and around, we see bright colors, cuddly rabbits, colorful eggs, and lots of candy. Some of our Easter traditions are a little strange and demand explanation. Take the Easter bunny and Easter eggs for example.

The origin and usage of bunnies and eggs is a bit of a mystery, but most sources agree that these symbols have pagan origin and represent fertility and the arrival of spring.

Personally, I found the Easter bunny frightening growing up. As an adult, however, I do appreciate seeing the photos of terrified children being forced to take their picture with the furry beast.

As a kid, my favorite part of Easter was the candy. Peeps, the little marshmallow chicks that come in various, bright colors have been around for about sixty-years. Peeps are the most popular, non-chocolate Easter candy, selling more than 1.5 billion each season.

And if you like to bite the heads off first, you’re in the majority. About twothirds of people eat the head first. Perhaps this is our small way of getting back at the Easter Bunny.

Naturally, Easter is a religious holiday. It is the day when Christians celebrate the resurrection of Christ from the tomb. The Bible says early in the morning, as the sun rose, the “Son” rose.

He emerged victorious from the tomb on Sunday, “the first day of the week.” This indicated not only chronology, but theology.

Jesus was resurrected on the first day of the week to close and securely lock the door of death behind him and become the path to eternal life.

Although countless theories abound as to “when” the first Easter was, no one knows for sure. The traditional celebration of Easter is dependent, not upon the season, but upon the lunar cycle. According to TimeandDate.com, “since Easter happens on the Sunday following the Paschal Full Moon, it can fall on any date between March 22 and April 25.” With the focus on the lunar cycle, I wonder why retailers haven’t ditched the Peeps and chosen to go with Moon Pies. You heard it here first.

The celebration of Easter is a polarizing event. “I’m an atheist” said someone proudly in a conversation recently. I was a little taken aback by his passion. I certainly don’t mind anyone sharing their opinion, as I often do, but as he continued, he seemed to suggest that atheism was the product of a superior knowledge or enlightenment. I got the feeling that he may have felt that Christianity was an ignorant, uninformed “leap of faith.”

I guess he was partly correct. I won’t argue that Christianity is a leap of faith. But, if you really think about it, so is atheism. In simplistic terms, a theistic view suggests that God created something out of nothing. That’s a huge leap. An atheistic view (often called “big bang”) suggests that there was nothing, but then out of that nothing something was created and then it morphed into what we have today. That’s a gargantuan leap.

But Christianity is not a blind leap. It comes from an informed position. Many of our greatest scientists, mathematicians, philosophers, and artists like Copernicus, Galileo, Sir Isaac Newton, Johann Sebastian Bach, J. R. R. Tolkien, Michelangelo, and so many more, were dedicated Christians.

Christianity is also transformative. Followers of Jesus Christ have sought to change the world. I am ashamed of those who have used religion to manipulate or cause pain. I am keenly aware of times in history when this was true. However, these atrocities were done in the name of religion, not in the name of Jesus. Perhaps a discussion for another time.

It was Christians in our country who recognized the need for education. Early schools were not products of the state but were started by the church. The same is true in higher education. Harvard University, for example, considered to be one of the most elite and prestigious universities in America, was founded by Christians in order to promote Christian education.

Christians also worked diligently to transform society. During the industrial revolution, children worked in factories alongside adults. It was the church that led the way to ensure human rights and the protection of children. It was also the church that established early hospitals, cared for the poor, the disadvantaged, and the dying.

My own personal faith journey is an informed journey. I have studied the claims of Christianity and world religions for almost twenty years and found the evidence for the claims of Christ overwhelming. Some of that evidence has been erased from our modern history books.

In 2015, the Barna Research Group reported that 13-percent of millennials did not believe in a historical Jesus. The survey was not about faith, but whether Jesus was a “real person” that actually lived. Thirteen-percent felt he was a mythological figure, like the Easter bunny.

It seems in an attempt to separate church and state, our educational system has erased foundational truths. Quoting the late, Dr. Billy Graham, “There is more evidence that Jesus rose from the dead than there is that Julius Caesar ever lived, or that Alexander the Great died at the age of 33.”

If you’re intrigued or want to study deeper, I would recommend a book by Lee Strobel. Strobel, who has a law degree from Yale, worked as a journalist for the Chicago Tribune as an investigative reporter. As an adamant atheist, he decided to use his journalistic and investigative training to disprove Christianity. I won’t spoil the ending. His book is called “A Case for Faith.”

In addition, to reading, I would like to invite you to investigate the claims of Christ personally. There are many great churches in the Grain Valley area and surrounding communities. Isn’t it worth an honest evaluation? If it’s true that Jesus is the Son of God who died for the sin of the world, was buried, and rose again three days later, that has major implications, doesn’t it?

For me, it’s a win-win. If there is no such thing as God, no judgment, and no eternity, then I will have lived a wonderful life of happiness and contentment while trying to make a difference in this world. In the end, they will put me in the ground just like everyone else, and I will be no more.

However, if the claims of Christ are true, then I have wisely invested my life in following him and laying down a solid foundation for eternal life. I will live forever in eternal bliss one day. And, what’s more, on Easter, I still get to eat moon pies.

Wayne Geiger is the Pastor of First Baptist Church Grain Valley, an Adjunct Associate Professor of Speech at Johnson Country Community College, and a freelance writer.