The God Who is There (Francis A. Schaeffer)

It's funny what you stumble across when combing through old PC files.  In 2007, five years before I started this blog, I created a document to review books I read.  I used it only once, for the subject of today's review.  The below words are reprinted without modification; interesting how my writing has changed over the years.
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“The God who is There” by Francis Schaeffer deals with the main theme of the 20^th century secular philosophy and how, by following the thoughts presented therein to their conclusion, man is in despair.  Schaeffer puts forward that there are two ways unbelievers look at life:

1. the rational and logical; no higher meaning, no point to life, etc.
2. the non-rational and non-logical; existentialism, leaps of faith to believe in something

He argues that modern thought is either “contentless faith (no rationality) or rationality (no meaning).”  To further clarify, he contrasts them as “a blind optimistic hope of meaning, based on a non-rational leap of faith” vs. “the rational and logical which gives no meaning.”  He begins by showing how these ideas showed up in art, music, literature, theology, etc.  He gives examples of different artists, and he shows how, as a whole, society has drifted away from any absolutes.  This drift has forced us into a bind- if there really are no absolutes, then there must be no meaning or point to life.  However, rather than accept this, we as humans make (Schaeffer contends) a non-rational leap of faith, hoping for meaning, yet finding none when we look rationally at things.  Essentially, we as humans live with both of these ideas, rational/logical vs. meaning.  These two ideas are at constant odds with each other- one cannot have one and the other, yet this is what society does.   It is in fact forced into this position, because we know as humans that there must be meaning somewhere.  Yet, we reject absolutes, and thus are left with a dilemma.  Schaeffer illustrates throughout his book that non-Christians are somewhere on a line between these two contrasting ideas, and that our job as believers is to lead them to the logical conclusion of their worldview.  In so doing, the hope is that they would see that only Christianity can adequately satisfy both the rational/logical side of life and the inner personality and meaning we as humans know we have.  To illustrate this, Schaeffer claims the Church needs to reflect the truth of Christianity both in personal righteousness and community healing.  The fall separates us; Christ brings us back together.  In this life, we should see substantial healing and relationship.  Not perfect, but substantial.  “They do not expect perfection, but they do expect reality;”  how true.  We need to be honest with nonbelievers about our struggles to attain this ideal, but our own failures cannot sway us from the fact that there is an ideal, and we need to live as such.

In short, Schaeffer shows that Christianity is the sole worldview that is based in history and is provable, and in addition gives real meaning to man.  It’s a good book, but his prose is frequently hard to understand; use of seldom-used words and unfamiliar philosophical terminology makes the book at times arduous, yet in the end, rewarding.

Rating: A