… but became futile in their imaginations, and their foolish hearts were darkened.

— Romans 1:21

One of the consequences of modern unbelief and the failure of rationalism is that modern man has been plunged into an irrational worldview that now dominates the culture all about us. This can be seen very clearly in the development of painting. If you go from Rembrandt, for example, to modern times and to Cezanne, the cubists and all other forms of modern art you will find that paintings become more and more incomprehensible.

How many people have stood in modern art galleries looking at a painting one way and another, sideways, and sometimes almost standing on their heads, ultimately concluding that it must have been hung upside down.

What are these artists doing? They are very sensitive to current philosophies, so what they are doing is portraying through their art the world as they see it. These modern artists show us in their pictures a worldview which has left God out. Their paintings reflect a world without meaning, full of sound and fury, signifying nothing.

The next time someone tells you that unbelief gives you a rational, intelligible view of the world, think of the last modern painting you looked at and puzzled over.

Question to ponder:
If our rational God made a rational universe, why can people no longer see it?