Lesson Overview
This is a clip from one of the most important videos I’ve made. CLICK HERE for the FULL video.
Christopher Hitchens is an icon to many atheists. He was an entertaining mix of brilliant, snarky, irreverent, and British. One thing he is well-known for is debating theists and making fools of them, at least from the perspective of some people. I was always struck by this particular challenge that he threw out regularly in debates. Hitchens was so proud of it that I once heard him encouraging crowds of atheists to use this challenge, as well. He felt that it really proved something, and I dare say many atheists agreed.
What’s really odd to me is that none of his debate partners (to my knowledge) ever offered a good response to his challenge. This is odd because the primary moral of loving God with all our heart, mind, soul, and strength answers this atheist dilemma quite well. It not only answers the question, it gets right to the heart of what an atheist has lost when they have sadly embraced a false worldview which rejects God’s existence.
To any atheists that have read this far, I’d like to say that this isn’t meant to be a smackdown or a slap in the face. Rather, this is meant to open a door to the possibility that the most important thing in life is being robbed from you, and your atheism is the robber. After I uploaded this video, a friend sent me a clip of William Lane Craig answering this challenge 10 years ago! I was surprised to see how similar his answer was and now I’m wondering how much my own answer may have been influenced by Craig’s but without me remembering it. Obviously we are both influenced by the teaching of Jesus, but still, It seems likely that I heard this somewhere along the way and forgot. Anyhow, click here to watch Craig’s answer (he is always brilliant).
