Does Bill Maher Really Want Answers?

Bill Maher, the blaspheming HBO-TV commentator and comedian, continues to be in the news. His most recent tirade against God was in the context of the new Hollywood film Noah and was reported by the Washington Times:

“But the thing that’s really disturbing about Noah isn’t the silly, it’s that it’s immoral. It’s about a psychotic mass murderer who gets away with it, and his name is God,” Mr. Maher said, adding, “What kind of tyrant punishes everyone just to get back at the few he’s mad at? I mean, besides Chris Christie [the embattled governor of New Jersey].”

Mr. Maher continued: “Hey God, you know you’re kind of a [expletive deleted] when you’re in a movie with Russell Crowe and you’re the one with anger issues. […] Conservatives are always going on about how Americans are losing their values and their morality, well maybe it’s because you worship a guy who drowns babies.”

Last week I wrote a blog post about his comments, and media such as the Christian Post have reported on my statements. Now, people have said to me that we need to get Bill Maher the answers to his outlandish accusations. But does Bill Maher really want answers?

In 2007, I wrote a blog post about how Bill Maher deceived AiG and trespassed to get into our building. The museum next door was a construction zone at the time, and it was possible for him to sneak in to interview me. I thought the interview had been approved by our publicist and a staff member; and I did not recognize who Maher was. Well, portions of the interview (some segments taken out of context) ended up in his blasphemous and vulgar movie Religulous.

Let me share what happened during that interview. Maher sat in front of my desk with cameras rolling and started to ask me questions about creation, evolution, and dating methods like carbon dating. I kept giving him answers, and I could see he was getting frustrated. At one stage his producer blurted out (in an angry, frustrated tone): “Do you have answers for everything?” You see, they wanted to get a clip of me not being able to come up with answers and insert that in their horrible movie. As the interview continued, Bill Maher changed the topic from origins and claimed there were contradictions in the Bible. I then picked up a Bible from my desk, handed it to him, and asked, “Which contradiction are you talking about?”

He then changed the subject again—you see, he didn’t even have a specific supposed contradiction to bring up. Maher was just spouting off general objections, but there was no substance to them.

Because he didn’t like me giving answers and then challenging him, Maher then said to me, “You can’t say you know—you can’t know!” He made this claim a number of times, until I said something like, “By saying you can’t know, you are saying you know you can’t know—how can you even say that?”

Bill Maher did not want answers. He reminded me of the scoffers that are mentioned in 2 Peter 3—they scoff at creation, the Flood, and coming judgment. As they scoff, God’s Word tells us that “they willingly are ignorant” (2 Peter 3:5 KJV). In other words, they deliberately reject—they don’t want to know!

Bill Maher’s unbelief reminds me of a recent article on the AiG website:

After Jesus raised Lazarus from the dead, many Jews believed on Jesus (John 11:45), but the chief priests and Pharisees tried to kill Lazarus to cover up the evidence (John 12:10–11).

It is amazing that after seeing the dumb speak, the blind see, the lame walk, the sick healed, devils cast out, and the dead raised, that the Pharisees attributed Christ’s miracles to the devil (Matthew 12:24) and plotted to have Him killed (Matthew 26:4). In light of those miracles and Pilate finding no fault in Him, it doesn’t make sense that so many people cried out for him to be crucified (Matthew 27:23).

In Acts 4:16 after Peter healed the lame man, the religious leaders admitted a notable miracle had been done—they could not deny it—but they responded in continued unbelief and threatened the disciples not to preach Jesus anymore.

Yes, we need to pray for atheists like Bill Maher. But I do believe his heart is hardened like the pharaoh of the Exodus—a sad situation.

Thanks for stopping by and thanks for praying,

Ken