A few days ago I saw a story. Three atheists gathered together to prove that God does not exist. An old lady said to them:" I am a Christian. If God really does not exist, I won't have any loss when I am dead. You are not Christians. If you find that the existence of God is true when you are dead, you will suffer a great loss. " Three people were speechless.
The old lady in this story actually used Pascal's Wager. Pascal is a French ideologist. He wrote a book named Thoughts. The book includes such words: "I don't know whether God exists. If he does not exist, an atheist won't have any benefits. If he exists, as an atheist I will suffer great loss. So, I would rather believe that God exists." This sentence is called Pascal's Wager.
The theory of Pascal's Wager is widely used in daily life. I still remember the first time someone asked me why I choose to believe in Jesus instead of Buddhism. My answer is as follows: Christianity tells us that a man can only choose his life once. If he regrets, there will be no remedy. You can do nothing but go to hell. However, people can have several choices in Buddhism. If I have chosen a wrong life, as long as I don't do bad things, I can be a good person next life. In fact this is also a kind of Pascal's Wager. So can Pascal's Wager be used to preach gospel?
This strategy doesn't convince people according to gospel but from the nature of people. Since people always draw on the advantages and avoid disadvantages. However, if people hold such an attitude towards God, they are not welcome by the God. Because the bible says people with double minds don't expect to get anything from God.
Some will argue that that we just use this method to attract people to the church. The first logical loophole in Pascal's Wager is: Who is God? We can't figure out that since there are so many religions in the world. If I bet that God exists, then I need more initiatives to bet how many merits can send me to the heaven? A gambler won't stop betting. Pascal's Wager can only lead to merits instead of grace.
Jesus teaches us to preach gospel from the heaven instead of deceiving people to believe a bet. Such gamblers won't truly repent in front of God. Faith was born from inner desires. If a person is forced by external factors to believe God, he will easily lost his belief.
1 cor. 2:1 - section 5: "Brothers, your faith should rely on the power of God instead of thoughts of common people."
(The author is a preacher in Henna Province.)
