What do I do if someone asks me, "How do you know God created the world?" or "How do you even know there is a God?"
Universe in a Box
Sometimes we are asked, "When did God begin? How can God not have a beginning?"
The answer is that God is outside of time. Think of the universe as a box. Contained inside are height, depth, and width (what we call the three dimensions) - but God stays outside the box. God can't be measured - he does not have a height, or depth, or width. The 4th dimension inside the universe is time - but God is outside of time. He does not age, and he does not have a starting point - all of time is contained in the universe, and God is not contained by the universe.
Rolling Ball
If I see a ball rolling, what do I know had to have happened to it? That someone or something acted on the ball to start it rolling. In the same way, I can look at the universe, which exists, and know that something had to be the "first cause", coming before it.
The Watchmaker
If I see a watch on the ground and pick it up and examine it, does it cause me to think, "These parts must have come together by accident"? No - I automatically assume someone was behind the design of it. It is simply too complex to be an accident. We can look at the universe and all things that live in the same way. It is too complex to have come together by accident.
Who Wrote the Rules?
There are always "rules behind rules" ... and it usually comes down to: it's wrong to hurt other people, wrong to hurt yourself, wrong to take what doesn't belong to you, wrong to be selfish, etc. Who wrote those rules? Are those human-invented rules? Could the rule-maker - the parent, the teacher, the principal - re-write the rule and suddenly it would become ok to hurt others? Or to take their things? No...and that's an argument that moral truths came from something other than humans, making them up.
1 Peter 3:15 - In your hearts, set apart Christ as Lord. Always be prepared to give an answer to anyone who asks you for the reason for the hope that you have. But do this with gentleness and respect.
Why should we answer questions with gentleness and respect?
1. People belong to God - to speak harshly to them is to disrespect them
2. If you are rude, they will stop listening to what you say
3. You want people to continue asking questions - a conversation is better than an argument
Sunday, March 28, 2010
Sunday, March 21, 2010
March 20-21: Created or Evolved?
Does nature and the complexity of organisms point us toward a creator? Or did everything we see in the world come from Evolution?
"Evolution" can have two meanings:
"micro"evolution refers to changes or variations within species. Example: parents with blond hair can have a child with dark hair; certain tendencies for diseases can be "carried" in certain people; short parents can have kids who grow up to be tall...BUT two parents with arms will not have a child who has wings.
"macro"evolution refers to the change of one species into another. This is what is often meant by "evolution" as a way of explaining where all life came from...that it started simple and then became more and more complex.
From last week: if a certain species evolved into (branched off into) different, other species, we would expect to find lots of "in-between" fossils in the ground - we don't.
Let's say all of the complex life we see today came from one, simple, single-celled creature...which evolved into higher and higher forms of life: the question still has to be asked - Where did that first living thing come from?
Two scientists - Miller and Urey - set out to answer that question by combining a mixture of gases in test tubes and sending an electric charge through them. By doing this, they produced amino acids, which strung together make proteins. They said this simulated what happened at the beginning of the universe. But - did they use the right chemicals? Were the gases they used really the ones present at the beginning of the universe? And in what amounts? If you use different starting products, you get different results. (For instance, many models of the early earth contain cardon dioxide and nitrogen which would form nitrates, and nitrates destroy amino acids, which are the building blocks of proteins.)
But suppose the amino acids did form that way...couldn't they have come together to start life? NASA has found that the simplest protein that could be considered "life" is a string of 400 amino acids in a specific sequence. So, to come together by accident would be like blindly drawing the numbers 1-400 out of a bag, one by one, and getting them in perfect order.
Moreover, there are structures in complex living things that couldn't have evolved. (This is called the problem of "irreducible complexity".) One example is your eye. Every part is necessary - missing one structure, the whole eye fails. Think of your eye as being like a mousetrap: without any one of the parts, the mousetrap is of no use. For eyes to have evolved piece by piece would have meant some creatures had useless eye-parts-that-would-become-eyes...so these parts would have evolved (because they were necessary) - even though they were worthless.
Where did cells get the information to "know" what to become? Cells have "information" in them that tell them how to function and what to be...where did this "intelligence" come from if the first single-celled organism came together by accident?
Does all of this point to a Creator?
We can't "prove" that God was the originator of life. But neither can a person who believes evolution is the answer "prove" that life came from non-living things, or that one species turned into another, or that amino acids arranged themselves into proteins, which led to cells, which led to organisms...anytime someone concludes that something "probably" happened, it's a statement of faith.
Where will you put your faith? In the idea that living things all came from chance, randomly as chemicals came together, and that all living things we see today, in all their variety, started out as the same single-celled creature? Or that living creatures came from the mind and will of God?
"Evolution" can have two meanings:
"micro"evolution refers to changes or variations within species. Example: parents with blond hair can have a child with dark hair; certain tendencies for diseases can be "carried" in certain people; short parents can have kids who grow up to be tall...BUT two parents with arms will not have a child who has wings.
"macro"evolution refers to the change of one species into another. This is what is often meant by "evolution" as a way of explaining where all life came from...that it started simple and then became more and more complex.
From last week: if a certain species evolved into (branched off into) different, other species, we would expect to find lots of "in-between" fossils in the ground - we don't.
Let's say all of the complex life we see today came from one, simple, single-celled creature...which evolved into higher and higher forms of life: the question still has to be asked - Where did that first living thing come from?
Two scientists - Miller and Urey - set out to answer that question by combining a mixture of gases in test tubes and sending an electric charge through them. By doing this, they produced amino acids, which strung together make proteins. They said this simulated what happened at the beginning of the universe. But - did they use the right chemicals? Were the gases they used really the ones present at the beginning of the universe? And in what amounts? If you use different starting products, you get different results. (For instance, many models of the early earth contain cardon dioxide and nitrogen which would form nitrates, and nitrates destroy amino acids, which are the building blocks of proteins.)
But suppose the amino acids did form that way...couldn't they have come together to start life? NASA has found that the simplest protein that could be considered "life" is a string of 400 amino acids in a specific sequence. So, to come together by accident would be like blindly drawing the numbers 1-400 out of a bag, one by one, and getting them in perfect order.
Moreover, there are structures in complex living things that couldn't have evolved. (This is called the problem of "irreducible complexity".) One example is your eye. Every part is necessary - missing one structure, the whole eye fails. Think of your eye as being like a mousetrap: without any one of the parts, the mousetrap is of no use. For eyes to have evolved piece by piece would have meant some creatures had useless eye-parts-that-would-become-eyes...so these parts would have evolved (because they were necessary) - even though they were worthless.
Where did cells get the information to "know" what to become? Cells have "information" in them that tell them how to function and what to be...where did this "intelligence" come from if the first single-celled organism came together by accident?
Does all of this point to a Creator?
We can't "prove" that God was the originator of life. But neither can a person who believes evolution is the answer "prove" that life came from non-living things, or that one species turned into another, or that amino acids arranged themselves into proteins, which led to cells, which led to organisms...anytime someone concludes that something "probably" happened, it's a statement of faith.
Where will you put your faith? In the idea that living things all came from chance, randomly as chemicals came together, and that all living things we see today, in all their variety, started out as the same single-celled creature? Or that living creatures came from the mind and will of God?
Saturday, March 13, 2010
March 13-14: The Beginning - Investigating the Theory of Evolution
Where did the world and everything in it come from? It's natural for people to be curious about this and to try to form answers.
Charles Darwin was a zoologist who traveled the world and observed different species of animals. He observed that most animals had similar body types. He also believed that animals adapted to their different environments, in ways that helped them survive. Those that couldn't adapt didn't survive. He called this idea, "Survival of the fittest."
But, he also believed that all living things could be traced back to one common ancestor. When we talk of "evolution", this is what is usually meant - that one type of animal turned into another type of animal.
However, the Bible says that God created living things "according to their kinds". The variety of species that we see today is not the result of one species turning into another. Why?
For one thing, it would've taken a very long time for all species to have evolved from the first organism (or "common ancestor"). How long? No one knows, because evolution takes so long it cannot be observed. If it can't be observed, it can't be studied in a lab. But, it could well have taken longer than the earth has even existed.
For another, you would expect to find lots of fossils representing the "in-between" forms of animals - the "ancestor" of the two modern animals. But you don't see that. What you see instead is a number of new species showing up, fully formed, in the fossil record at one time. Remember that Genesis says God created living things "according to their kinds".
Charles Darwin was a zoologist who traveled the world and observed different species of animals. He observed that most animals had similar body types. He also believed that animals adapted to their different environments, in ways that helped them survive. Those that couldn't adapt didn't survive. He called this idea, "Survival of the fittest."
But, he also believed that all living things could be traced back to one common ancestor. When we talk of "evolution", this is what is usually meant - that one type of animal turned into another type of animal.
However, the Bible says that God created living things "according to their kinds". The variety of species that we see today is not the result of one species turning into another. Why?
For one thing, it would've taken a very long time for all species to have evolved from the first organism (or "common ancestor"). How long? No one knows, because evolution takes so long it cannot be observed. If it can't be observed, it can't be studied in a lab. But, it could well have taken longer than the earth has even existed.
For another, you would expect to find lots of fossils representing the "in-between" forms of animals - the "ancestor" of the two modern animals. But you don't see that. What you see instead is a number of new species showing up, fully formed, in the fossil record at one time. Remember that Genesis says God created living things "according to their kinds".
Saturday, March 6, 2010
March 6-7, 2010: The Beginning - Theories
A theory is an educated guess about how something happened or happens.
A theory is a combination of two things:
The Theory of Evolution is a theory about how the world came to be and where nature - plants, but especially animals and humans - came from.
The Bible teaches that God made the world and everything in it. Before God moved, the earth was without form and empty. (Gen. 1:2)
A theory is a combination of two things:
- Things we know to be true
- Things we suppose to be true.
The Theory of Evolution is a theory about how the world came to be and where nature - plants, but especially animals and humans - came from.
The Bible teaches that God made the world and everything in it. Before God moved, the earth was without form and empty. (Gen. 1:2)
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