If it wasn't for the Stuff

I just don't have what it takes. I'm speaking of the gray matter, you know, brains. I'm trying to wrap my mind around the thought ... no ... the fact that God had no beginning. But I can't quite completely do it.

My heart says, "believe it," because the Word of God says so. But what little understanding my mind has on that thought, it says, "how can that be?" Everything has to have a beginning, right? So ... some days, my mind has a battle with my heart. So far, my heart has always won the battle.

If it wasn't for the stuff ... things like the green grass, the fluffy white clouds in the sky, the snow capped mountains and the deep blue lakes between them, I just might wonder myself if the agnostics aren't right. An "agnostic" is a person who believes that nothing is known or can be known of the existence or nature of God. Or even if God has an existence.

The agnostic then, is a person who claims neither faith in nor disbelief in God. So, since they really don't know, they too have to question ... is God really real? All they really can believe in is the material stuff they see around them. But as I have already stated, when I see the same stuff, it makes me say ... yes, there must be a God.

I say, yes ... God must be. And I say that, not necessarily because the Holy Spirit put that belief in my heart, although He may have, because it's there ... but intellectually it's because I see the stuff. Where did all this stuff come from? It didn't just happen. Study it, look at it closely and you will see evidence of an intelligent design. That means ... God.

Intelligent design holds that certain features of the universe and of living things are best explained by an intelligent cause, not an undirected process such as natural selection. Through the study and analysis of a system's components, a design theorist is able to determine whether various natural structures are the product of ... chance, natural law, intelligent design, or some combination thereof.

Honest critics of intelligent design acknowledge the difference between intelligent design and creationism. Creationism typically starts with a religious text and tries to see how the findings of science can be reconciled to it. Intelligent design starts with the verifiable evidence of nature and seeks to ascertain what inferences can be drawn from that evidence. Unlike creationism, the scientific theory of intelligent design does not claim that it can identify whether the intelligent cause detected through science, is supernatural.

But that is my personal belief. Who other than God could design such a creation and then have the power to bring it into being, materially ... so we could see the stuff.

The watchmaker argument for intelligent design ...

The watchmaker analogy was formulated by William Paley in 1802. Paley wrote that if a pocket watch is found on a heath, (an area of open uncultivated land) it is most reasonable to assume that someone dropped it and that it was made by one or more watchmakers, and not by natural forces. He wrote ...

"In crossing a heath, suppose I pitched my foot against a stone, and were asked how the stone came to be there; I might possibly answer, that, for anything I knew to the contrary, it had lain there forever: nor would it perhaps be very easy to show the absurdity of this answer. But suppose I had found a watch upon the ground, and it should be inquired how the watch happened to be in that place; I should hardly think of the answer I had before given, that for anything I knew, the watch might have always been there. There must have existed, at some time, and at some place or other, an artificer (a skilled craftsman or inventor) or artificers, who formed [the watch] for the purpose which we find it actually to answer; who comprehended its construction, and designed its use. Every indication of contrivance, every manifestation of design, which existed in the watch, exists in the works of nature; with the difference, on the side of nature, of being greater or more, and that in a degree which exceeds all computation."

Paley went on to argue that the complex structures of living things and the remarkable adaptations of plants and animals required an intelligent designer. He believed the natural world was the creation of God and showed the nature of the creator. According to Paley, God had carefully designed "even the most humble and insignificant organisms" and all of their minute features. He believed therefore that God must care even more for humanity.

Paley recognized that there is great suffering in nature, and that nature appears to be indifferent to pain. His way of reconciling this with his belief in a benevolent God was to assume that life had more pleasure than pain.

Paley and others have looked at this theory of intelligent design from most every direction and have come to the only conclusion possible, and that is ... only God ... could have placed all this stuff we see, from the smallest sub-atomic particles to the largest planets in our solar system, including the entire universe that has no end.

So ... I believe exactly what the Apostle Paul said in Colossians 1:15-17 ... "Who (speaking of Jesus) is the image of the invisible God ... For by him were all things created, that are in heaven, and that are in earth, visible and invisible ... all things were created by him, and for him: And he is before all things, and by him all things consist." ... (are held together).

Why does the Earth spin on it's axis and rotate around the Sun? What keeps the solar system from flying apart? It's not gravity. It's God and God alone. He has made the universe like a watch with different causes and movements. He has wound the main spring of time and it is winding down. It will be over some day, just like the keeper of time designed it to be.

There are no accidents. Everything that is ... is because God designed it ... as it is.



Comments welcome.