TRANSCRIPT
"Students come up to me all the time, after taking a semester in philosophy. There ought to be a rule: you should not be able to talk about philosophy unless you've had more than a semester of philosophy. If you haven't had any, that's fine - Talk Away! But if you've had a semester, you are messed up! You'd be better off just not taking it at all. And they'll come up and they'll say things to me and they thought these things out. And I'm on the campus to talk about these issues and dealing with apologetics, and they want to catch me alone and asking these questions. And they look at me and asked me these questions and say, "I just wanted to ask you...If you believe in a God that is omnipotent and omnibenevolent, then how do you reconcile the issue of theodicy?" To which I respond, "Took a semester of philosophy, right?" (Student) "Oh yes, how did you know?" (Speaker) "Because if you haddn't, you would just say, "Listen, God's so powerful and so good, how come bad stuff happens?" [Laughter] but I'm not going to enter the question...until you ask it correctly. [Laughs] (Student) "Worked on that all week... what do you mean ask it correctly?" (Speaker) "You're not asking the question properly." (Student) "What do you mean ask the question properly? It's my question! You can't tell me how to ask my question!" (Speaker) "I will answer your question when you ask it properly." (Student, with humble, calm voice) "How do I ask it properly?" (Speaker) "Here's how you ask that question properly. You look in my eyes and you ask me this, "How on earth can a holy and righteous God know what I did and thought and said on yesterday and not kill me in my sleep last night?" [Audence says "Hmmmmm."] You ask it that way, and we can talk. But until you ask the question that way, do you don't understand the issue. Until you ask the question that way, you believe the problem is out there. Until you ask the question that way, you believe that there are somehow some individuals who in and of themselve