The Power of Awe | Apologetics pt. 1
Photo by Joshua Earle on Unsplash
So I've already covered in my intro to this Apologetics series that I'm approaching this with a blank slate. Minimal assumptions. Just experience. Anything more has to be meticulously examined before it can be brought into the discussion.
What I've failed to cover is why the examination of God's existence matters - indeed, it matters above everything else; here's why. Your opinions about God are (or ought to be) the cornerstone of your worldview. Your belief in God's existence inform pretty much every other decision in your life. Is abortion wrong? Should I get a divorce? How should my kids be educated? Should gender roles exist? What about government or my own personal responsibilities? All these questions hinge on what your perspective of God is. Really every philosophical discussion I've ever had has come back to the question of God, from love to dualism (What's Dualism? See the all mighty Wikipedia and an excellent book).
Now that I've just breezed over that topic, let's get into the first argument. One of the major things that led C.S. Lewis to faith was awe. He called it Joy. Call it what you like, but I feel that awe is one of the most accurate words in my vocabulary for the feeling. It's that uncontrollable buzz you get when you watch Interstellar and "get it" or when you fall so deeply in love with a painting that you feel like you could literally sit there staring for an hour and still feel just as strong of a buzz. It's a pure, unadulterated, appreciation of beauty.
Honestly, I don't think I can describe it any better than that. It's such a visceral, instinctive, feeling that I don't know how to give it justice in words. In fact, I can't. But that's okay because Dr. A.J. Drenth over at Personality Junkie has a much better grasp. He writes about Carl Jung, the mental precursor to all things Myers-Briggs. Basically the emotion I'm describing relates closely to a concept called "extroverted sensing" and you can read more here. The fact that awe is so undeniably present in my life (and honestly, any strong emotion applies here, my argument works as well with grief and heartache, as it does awe) is really what assures me beyond a shadow of a doubt of God's existence. This is why:
I cannot explain such a spiritual emotion without utilizing just that: the spiritual. Could these emotions simply be the firings of electrons in response to certain stimuli? Yes, it certainly could be. But the argument here relies more on the association between the subject of sensation and the emotion you feel. Why can all of human-kind agree that a sunset is beautiful? What makes those scarlet hues awe-inspiring or the mystically hypnotic glow of a campfire comforting and the bright red of blood so repulsive? If it were simply the stimuli, wouldn't the brain perceive all red light waves the same way? Why don't we find most red things scary? Yes, there's context, but if you took a photograph and Photoshoped out everything but a sunset, a campfire, and some gore, I think you would still have very different reactions to each. I can find no explanation for this that does not include God.
But I really don't want to jump to a conclusion, so what are some alternative explanations for these strong emotions? The first is behavioral or evolutionary programming. Could we have simply evolved to feel these strong reactions? Well, think about it for a minute. Where is the value in an appreciation for a sunset? Could it help us survive? No! If anything, it would get someone mauled by an animal if they stopped to watch a sunset in the wild. Well, might there be some value in the repulsion one feels when seeing gore? Obviously not. Just think about the TV series The Walking Dead. Most of the characters who are killed die because they can't take their eyes off some horrific scene or are suffering from trauma relating to the gruesome death of another.
All that is to say, I cannot think of any evolutionary benefit that awe or horror provide in a survival setting. But is there a societal benefit? People come together around beautiful things. They may disagree about how beautiful something is, but most of the time people can agree that something is, to some extent, aesthetically pleasing. There may be something there, but I still don't think this can fully explain it.
Ultimately, I realize that this argument is a personal, experiential one, so it is far from objective evidence. If you read back through my introduction, you'll see why I'm interested in such subjective experiences. Now, the topic of God is far more vast and nuanced than any number of blog posts could ever encompass. So I encourage you to do your own thinking, and your own reading. Get Surprised by Joy or Mere Christianity by C.S. Lewis. Or find The Reason for God by Tim Keller. Just do something to think about this stuff. It's important and I hope, if I've communicated nothing else, I've gotten that through to you.
