Why I Wrote The Beauty of God

According to pollster George Barna about one in every eight American adults is an ex-Christian. These are people who once identified themselves as Christians but now call themselves atheists, agnostics, or something else. I wrote The Beauty of God for a Broken World, because of an ex-Christian who sat one day in my office. At one time he was part of a young adults Bible study I led. I baptized the lovely young lady who became his wife, and I married them. Some time after that they moved out of the area. When I caught up with them again, he had become an ex-Christian. He told me that if he ever decided to believe in God, it would not be the God of the Bible because he God of the Bible is ugly. Ex-Christians are frequently troubled by suffering in the world and by specific teachings of the Bible. For example, they object to the idea that a serial rapist and murderer like Ted Bundy might go to heaven, simply by believing in Jesus, while some of his helpless victims might end up in hell. The kinds of questions ex-Christians ask cannot be answered in 30 seconds. They require a thorough, thoughtful response, and that is what I have tried to provide.