ab·surd

adjective

    wildly unreasonable, illogical, or inappropriate.

   “the allegations are patently absurd”

    synonyms:      preposterous, ridiculous, ludicrous, farcical, laughable, risible, idiotic, stupid, foolish, silly, inane, imbecilic, insane, harebrained, cockamamie;

It just does not make sense.

I am a man without parents.  They are both deceased. I am an orphan. But, you would say, “most people out live their parents.”  Sure, but it is more than that.  I am an orphan in other ways. To my knowledge man, (and I use that as a generic term for human kind), is the only creature in the universe who asks, “Why?” Other animals have instincts to guide them, but man has learned to ask questions. “Who am I?” man asks. “Why am I here? Where am I going?” Generations have come and gone. There have been repeated efforts to eliminate anything that would amount to authority. More and more are trying to throw off the metaphorical shackles of religion.  But the questions still exist.  If there is no God, “Shy am I here? And Where am I going?”  still need answers.

If we take God out of the answer, if we try to answer the questions of life without reference to God we are faced with dismal answers. The answers are not hopeful, helpful, encouraging, but dark and terrible. Without God in the answer then man is nothing more than the accidental by-product of nature, a result of matter plus time plus chance. There is no reason for your existence. All you face is death.

Modern man thought that when he had gotten rid of God, he had freed himself from all that repressed and stifled him. Instead, he discovered that in killing God, he had also killed himself. For if there is no God, then man’s life becomes absurd.

The absence of God means that both man and the universe has but one end.  And that end is death.  Man like a bug hiding under a rock, must die. Without a hope for immortality there is just bleakness and despair.  Might as well “eat, drink and be merry, for tomorrow die.” Like Shakespeare said in Macbeth:

To-morrow, and to-morrow, and to-morrow, Creeps in this petty pace from day to day To the last syllable of recorded time, And all our yesterdays have lighted fools The way to dusty death. Out, out, brief candle! Life’s but a walking shadow, a poor player That struts and frets his hour upon the stage And then is heard no more: it is a tale Told by an idiot, full of sound and fury, Signifying nothing.

Without God we are just food for the worms, a flash amid the thousand stars, lost amid the blackness. If you push out God you also push out eternity.

Call me absurd but, for me there has to be more than that.

I know not why God’s wondrous grace to me he hath made known,

nor why, unworthy, Christ in love redeemed me for his own.

But I know whom I have believed, and am persuaded that he is able

to keep that which I’ve committed unto him against that day.

I know not how this saving faith to me he did impart,

nor how believing in his word wrought peace within my heart.

But I know whom I have believed, and am persuaded that he is able

to keep that which I’ve committed unto him against that day.

I know not how the Spirit moves, convincing us of sin,

revealing Jesus through the word, creating faith in him.

But I know whom I have believed, and am persuaded that he is able

to keep that which I’ve committed unto him against that day.

I know not when my Lord may come, at night or noonday fair,

nor if I walk the vale with him, or meet him in the air.

But I know whom I have believed, and am persuaded that he is able

to keep that which I’ve committed unto him against that day.

Words: Daniel W. Whittle

Music: James McGranahan