On being practical : A letter to my new atheist friend

A stilt house around Third Mainland Bridge. (c) Gbenga Onalaja, 2017. 

Hey, 

Hope you've been well? I'll get right to it. 

First. Being a Christian is not a burden. It's a perk. 

I would have been humble and kind to my neighbours anyway. It's simply more functional to cop the shine of a sovereign God while at it. (Call it brownie points if you like). 

You don't believe God exists. Indulge me, though, as I touch on this brownie point idea. 

It's bullcrap. 

God has mercies on those he will, and for those he doesn't, he doesn't. So yeah, my brownie points count for shit. 

His love and protection and all the unseeable little things he does are not based on anything I bring to the table. 

And I feel compelled to mention at this point that I am not a great Christian. Church isn't on my weekly laundry list. And I am one of the most creative dissemblers you'll meet. (And, of course, those are only the misdemeanors I can admit publicly.)

And on the long run, this Christianity might only be an opium - a numinous analgesic to relieve our existential pain. 

Maybe, like you said, we are a product of a random collocation of atoms. No heaven above or hell below.

But here's the rub: when we die, peek behind the curtain and find God isn't the force behind all the action, we would have lost nothing. I would have lost nothing.

Me you both will subsist in this new reality. None of us the better or worse off. 

But what if God really was there and planned to make good on all His promises from, say, the Bible? I don't have the answers to all your big question, but riddle me that.  

What if God exists and he is who says he is? 

Yours,

'Gbenga