“The fool has said in his heart, ‘There is no God.’ They are corrupt, and have done abominable iniquity; there is none who does good.”

— Psalm 53:1

The statement “Atheism is the religion of fools” may make some people angry, but let’s examine its veracity. First of all, we know atheists are fools because God says so in His Word (see today’s text). Second, reason confirms the irrationality of atheism. For an atheist to prove that God does not exist, he or she would have to explore every corner of the universe. Logic calls this the “fallacy of the universal negative.” You cannot prove a “universal no” because you cannot “know” everything. You cannot know for sure that no little green men inhabit the universe because you cannot visit every planet and every star. In the same way, you cannot prove that God doesn’t exist. Third, experience demonstrates that atheism is foolishly destructive. The twentieth-century atheistic philosophies of Nazism and Communism have butchered some 170 million people. This total tops the sum of all those who died in all the preceding wars in history. As well, atheism has in some cases led to hopelessness and insanity. Nietzsche, founder of the “God is dead” movement, went stark raving mad during the last eleven years of his life.

Only a small number of Americans label themselves as atheists. In fact, many consider themselves Christians. Some attend church on Sunday, but the rest of the week they ignore God, so in reality these people are “practical atheists.” Others who might, in past years, have called themselves atheists now hide their true identities under the names of humanism or secularism. The atheist says, “Down with God.” The humanist says, “Up with man.” These are seemingly opposite statements, but they communicate the same thing.

The good news is that atheism is not accomplishing its goals. Today more people believe in God than at any other time in history. So even when Christians appear as fools in the world’s eyes, we know that God has chosen the “foolish” to shame the “wise.”

Today pray for your atheist friends. Pray that they would join you as followers of Christ. Pray that they may experience God in such a powerful way that they can never again doubt His existence.

“The greatest question of our time is not communism versus
individuality; nor Europe versus America; not even the East
versus West. It is whether men can live without God.”
Will Durant