About a month ago a friend of mine told me about Anthony Flew’s abandonment of atheism. I was pleasantly surprised. I first heard of Anthony Flew several years ago when he debated Professor Gary Habermas on the topic of the resurrection of Christ. That was a particularly peculiar debate since it seemed Dr. Flew was unaware of what was taking place. After two hours of debate, where Gary Habermas presented the resurrection of Christ from both a historical and textual perspective, Professor Flew seemed struck by the presentation as the cameras zoomed in to find a face perturbed by the facts. I recall saying to my friend after the debate that this man seems to be in doubt and perhaps open to Christianity. At that time I knew little about Professor Flew. I did not know that he was one of the most reputable atheist scholars alive; I did not know that every introductory philosophy book dedicated large portions to the ideas of Anthony Flew and I did not know how well-known he was in England’s universities.
Recently Dr. Anthony Flew made public the end of his atheistic journey. Unfortunately, he does not embrace the triune God of history and the Bible. Rather, he is comfortable with the god of Thomas Jefferson, who does not interact with creation. Of course, my prayer is that he would realize that the God he must embrace is the God that not only created this universe but controls it second by second.
A few hours ago Professor David Snoke (University of Pittsburg) e-mailed me his brief analysis of Flew’s new perspective on nature’s designer. He said:
This is a really big story, in my opinion. Anthony Flew is (was) a very well-known atheist who has written numerous books arguing against the existence of God. I have read some of his stuff and he has always struck me as carefully reasoning, not rabid and hate-filled. He now says that the evidence of intelligent design has convinced him there must be a God. He is not claiming to be a Christian, but we can pray for him. C.S. Lewis started out the same way, with just acceptance that there must be some kind of God.
Once there was an atheist named Flew.