Apologetics
Where did the universe come from? When did life begin? If you ask people that question, most would shrug their shoulders, grin, and continue down life's path without giving it much thought. Why? Because to most people, that question is simply unanswerable. It's the old, “What came first, the chicken or the egg?” trick. Try it and see what happens. You will most likely get this wide-eyed stare that says, “Are you kidding me?”
You see, only great inquisitive minds ponder those kinds of deep philosophical questions, and so far, they are all batting zero; zilch. Oh, they all have their theories, the latest being that, “All things started with a big bang.” Duh! If there was nothing before the big bang, then where did all this stuff, matter, from the big bang come from? Come on, guys. You can do better than that. Oh, so you haven't figured that out yet?
Let's stay on the big bang theory for a little while, because after all, these great minds are way smarter than I'll ever be. The big bang sent all this nonexistent stuff here, there, and everywhere, creating this exquisite, complex tapestry of perfection that we refer to as our universe.
We humans live on one of the tiniest specks of this big bang debris called Earth. Earth is like none other. It is not only teeming with life, the biology of which is beyond human comprehension in its complexity, but also the complexity of its life-sustaining environment is just amazing.
Look, we all know and concede that life begets life, right? Without life, there is no life. Inanimate objects don't beget or multiply, simply because there is no life in them. Everything that has life begets its own kind. Of all that man has invented, he has never once created life of any kind from non-living things.
So, assuming the big bang happened, and I don't know why we have to, seeing no one witnessed it or recorded it, where did life come from? Life has to have a beginning, a seed from which to grow and multiply. Nothing doesn't create something, especially as complex as life.
We intelligent beings (that were supposedly once slimy little mindless tadpoles) sent men to the moon. Wow! But there was no life there and never has been. Why? Because, like the rest of the solar system, it can't support life; not even a slimy little tadpole that could someday, given enough eons of time, grow into an intelligent human being. Of course, he would have to evolve into a monkey or an ape first. Oops, we have monkeys and apes now, and no matter how much time we spend with them on earth, they will never develop into complex human beings. Duh, how did I ever get to be so clever.
Why is it so difficult for us humans, who are so intelligent, to believe in intelligent design, when everything about us and our world is so perfectly, exquisitely, intelligently designed? Because we can't see God, does that automatically disqualify Him from being a possible source of all of this amazing design? If the big bang billions of years ago is a possibility, and it's possible we evolved from slimy creature that crawled out of the sea; then why is not God a possibility, also?
Okay, okay, I know where these important men with frizzy hair and scraggly beards would go with that. Here is what they would say to dumb little ol' me. “Son, just because we don't know the answers to these complex questions of the origins of life and our universe, doesn't mean we have to bow to the notion that an all powerful deity must have created it all.”
You are quite right. But, it's a little suspicious when you don't think of Him as a possibility. Why are learned men so afraid of admitting that an intelligent designer may be responsible? Oh, I got it. That would make that intelligent designer more intelligent than they, and that would be really bad for their ego. Oops, they ain't gonna like me for saying that.
Anyone who reads the theory of evolution must admit to having to overcome and swallow an awful lot of strange thinking in order to believe its possibility. On the other hand, God's account in Genesis is perfectly in order of the realm of possibility. The only real question evolutionists should have with God's account of creation is time. Could they ever be expected to come to terms with the world and man being only six thousand years old? Probably not. For time, lots of it, is absolutely essential to the evolutionary principle that, given enough time, anything, even nothing, can someday, somehow evolve into something. Without that time, the theory of evolution simply falls apart.
So, seeing that the God of the Bible has given us His account of His creation, the big question now should be, is carbon dating infallible proof that the world is billions of years old? Every scientist should tell you, no. It is only as good as the data that is fed into the process of carbon dating, and that is open to debate by all honest seekers of truth. There are very clever, intelligent men out there who are prepared to tell the world that carbon dating is absolutely flawed, and can never be relied upon scientifically.
I want to finish off by saying that, since the dawn of time, man has tried to prove that there is no God; that His word, the Bible, is full of error and cannot be trusted. My friend. Only a fool would say in his heart there is no God. And only a man who has diligently studied the Bible has a right to an opinion as to its trustworthiness.
If you seek Him, you shall find Him, if you search for Him with all of your heart. You must first believe that He is, and that He is a rewarder of them that diligently seek Him. Without faith, it is impossible to know God. Faith is God's key that unlocks the door to knowing Him. If you search for Him as for hidden treasure, you will be rewarded. Don't take my (His word) for it. Do the above and you will find out for yourself.
Christopher Hitchins was one of my favorite atheist/philosophers. He held me spellbound many an hour while watching and listening to his debates. Though much of what he had to say at times amounted to a vicious attack on the very things I loved and honored the most, I still couldn't help liking him as a person and respecting him for his wisdom and knowledge. I honestly believe that he and I could have been friends, had we met. Yet, for all his knowledge, never once did Christopher ever offer any definitive answers to the deeper philosophical questions of where the universe came from and when life began.
You see, Christopher's knowledge was limited by the simple fact that he was human; yes, just a mere man. Much of his knowledge came by way of other mere men; because it's impossible for any one man to research and gather all of the information needed concerning our complex universe. Here is what God has to say about such men:
“I will destroy the wisdom of the wise, and bring to nothing the understanding of the prudent. Where is the wise? Where is the scribe? Where is the disputer of this age? For since, in the wisdom of God, the world through wisdom did not know God, it pleased God through the foolishness of the message (of the cross) preached to save those who believe. But God has chosen the foolish things of the world to put to shame the things which are mighty.”
And here's the clincher: “But the natural man does not receive the things of the Spirit of God, for they are foolishness to him; nor can he know them, because they are spiritually discerned.”
What this is saying is: Without God, man can never come to a full understanding of God's nature and His creation. It is simply impossible. He can only understand from within the limited realm of man's natural thinking. Man's cleverness can never come to the understanding of a God who spoke all things into existence, not can he be expected to.
So who can understand? Well, here is what His word says: “Now we (believers) have received, not the spirit of the world, but the Spirit who is from God, that we might know the things that have been freely given to us by God.”
Try as you may, you will never come to an understanding until you first come to the one who created it all, and that's a tall order for you, my learned friends. You see, that means humbling yourself before the Cross of Calvary, and humility is a God thing.
I watched my friend Christopher Hitchins lose his battle with cancer. There was such a sadness about him. He had lived all of his life denying the existence of God. His empty words of resolve masked the helplessness I heard in his voice, and the hopelessness I saw in his demeanor. I prayed, “Oh God, what a great witness Christopher would be to all the skeptics out there if You were to touch his life and heal him.”
And God said, “No, Frank. I sent my only beloved Son, who did so much more than that, and still they reviled Him, and even put Him to death.”
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