If I'd Only Known Then . . .

I'm sure you've heard the line, or probably thought, “If I'd only known then what I know now.”

I don't know exactly how long I was caught up on trying to “reason” with atheists. 

Years, certainly. 

Reason – argue, demean, point out, destroy, explain, lay out the evidence for the existence of Creator God.

All to no avail.

If only I'd known then what Spurgeon has taught me now.

“A very great obstacle to salvation is unbelief. This evil exists in all unregenerate hearts, but in some men it takes a very pronounced form. They DO think about religion, but they do not believe in the truth of God which we preach to them. Their opinion is to them more weighty, more worthy of belief, than God's inspired declarations; they will not accept anything that is revealed in the Scriptures. These people are very hard to influence; but I would warn you not to fight them with their own weapons. I do not believe that these type of unbelievers ever are won by argument; or, if so, it very seldom happens.

The argument that convinces these men of the reality of religion, is that which they gather from the holiness and earnestness of those who profess to be Christ's followers. As a rule, they barricade their minds against the assaults of reason and if we give our pulpits over to arguing with them, we shall often be doing more harm than good.

I believe that you will rout unbelief by your faith rather than by your reason; by your belief, and your acting up to your conviction of the truth, you will do more good than by any argument, however strong it may be.”

Ah, me. What have I done? What damage have I caused? Once again my actions have been proven wrong. If only I'd known then what I know now. 

No, that's wrong, I did know that how I was speaking, the tone in which I was speaking was wrong. I simply refused to obey what I knew. If I'd known what Spurgeon knew, and if I'd let my life speak instead of my words I would have experienced far less frustration. 

Tomorrow is another day.