IT BEGINS IN YOUR HEART
“The fool has said in his heart, ‘There is no God’” (Psalm 14:1; 53:1). This text emphasizes the importance of man’s relationship to God. Our relationship with God is allimportant. We are to love God with the totality of our being (Matthew 22:37). Man’s relationship with God is the vital matter of all matters as our eternity depends upon it.
Consider the psalmist’s statement, “The fool has said in his heart, ‘There is no God’” (Psalm 14:1, emp. added). The heart refers to our inner self, our mind, our seat of responsibilities, our soul. Our life is determined and governed by our heart. “Keep your heart with all diligence; for out of it are the issues of life” (Proverbs 4:23). The conclusion is obvious, the man who says “there is no God” does so by his own choice, his own desire, and by a misguided heart! In each man is an innate sense of God’s existence (Romans 1:22); yet, many who do not believe in God and do not want to believe in God think in their hearts they can explain God away. They cannot! Anthropology—the study of ancient civilization—has shown no past civilization existed without a sense of God. It may not be God Jehovah, but all have gods of their own making. This affirms the truth of Romans 1:18- 22 of the innateness of God within each. To say, “There is no God” is to contradict man’s inner voice.
What is the fool in Psalm 14:1 governed by? There are only two ways of life—the godly and the ungodly! The godly life cannot deny God is! The ungodly life may deny God’s existence. The fool looks at the ungodly life and desires to live that kind of life. He does two things. First, he denies, against abundance evidence, that God is. Second, he violates his conscience, his inner man. The fact that all mankind has a conscience is unexplainable! Where did our conscience come from? Why is it alive? The fool rejects his own understanding. You argue that this oversimplifies the matter. Me thinks not! Consider the continuing words of the psalmist, “The LORD looked down from heaven upon the children of men, to see if there were any that did understand, and seek God. . . . Have all the workers of iniquity no knowledge?” (Psalm 14:2, 4, emp. added).
Modern-man turns the Scripture around. He argues that it is not the lack of understanding that produces unbelief, but rather it is because of their great understanding that they don’t believe in God (Lloyd-Jones 12). It is argued that Psalm 14 was written centuries ago, long before our present accumulation of knowledge. So? Bad argument! In the abundance of our knowledge, no knowledge exists that proves God does not exist! I feel pity, in one sense, toward those who believe that the only people who believe in God, the Bible, and Jesus Christ are primitives in their thinking and have not come to know that God does not exist! Bad reasoning! In the abundance of our knowledge, no knowledge exists proving God does not exist!
Is unbelief, atheism, agnosticism, or any other ism conferred on the learned who reject the knowledge of God’s existence? If this argument is correct, then all the ignorant of the world would believe in God’s existence; likewise, there would be no people of knowledge—scientists, philosophers—who believe in God. Neither argument is correct! There are many educated people who believe God is! It is the fool who says, “God is not.
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