The First 3 Most Important Questions For An Atheist

Having a conversation with an Atheist is usually hard and usually scary. Talking with anybody who is totally committed to the opposite of what your life is built upon will be like that. It is especially so when they are looking at you like you are a two year old trying to play chess. In light of these realities, I want to give you some very helpful questions. Questions are so important. I learned a long time ago that the one who asks the questions, controls the conversation. Not only that, but Romans chap 1 says every unbeliever suppresses the truth and good questions allow you to expose this suppressing. The following three questions will transform the conversations and bring to light the futility of the atheist position and the moral issues involved.

Question #1

Of all the knowledge of the universe, what percent do you know with certainty?

If you would like, be generous with them and give them a whopping 5%. This question exposes the reality that we are very little people, with very little brains, who live in a very big universe.

Question #2

In the 95% that you don’t know, could it be possible that there is knowledge that would invalidate everything you think you know?

This is the question that really changes everything. If they are intellectually honest, they have to answer this in the affirmative. Now, let’s remember that the unbelieving mind is hostile to God, enslaved to sin, and committed to its own independence. Intellectual honesty is actually not possible for the atheist because Romans 1 reminds us that they are constantly suppressing the truth. However, the grace of God may allow your encounter to be the one that brings this sin before their eyes in a new way. With that said, press them with the reality that there may be adequate proof for God in the 95% they don’t know. This question is meant to show them that their foundation for knowledge is faulty. They can’t know anything with certainty due to the 95%. They have destroyed the foundation for knowledge.

Suggest to them that they are actually not an atheist, but an agnostic. An agnostic is someone who says can’t be sure about these issues. Help them realize what just happened. They moved into a totally different category of person by considering two questions.

Question #3

What kind of Agnostic are you? Do you say…

– I don’t know and nobody can know.

– I don’t know and I don’t care.

– I don’t know and I want to know.

Now we have come to the heart of the issues. Each kind of agnostic reveals something different. The first one who says no one can know is living in a contradiction. They are saying I could be wrong about everything, but I am 100% certain that every person who has ever lived is in my same situation. The second person has a moral issue exposed by saying God isn’t even worth looking into. He loves what he does and nothing else in the universe matters. The last person is the one in whom the grace of God may be working. Open up a Bible and see what the Lord will do.

Now I realize this was all clean-cut and nicely packaged. Real conversations are rarely like that. But take the basic framework and start with that. God will use what you experience to train you to become a better witness for his name.

Next week we will address what to do when the atheist turns these same questions back upon you.