This book is dedicated to
\nSimon Wiesenthal
\n(1908\u20132005)
\na defender of Israel
\nand to Chaplain Manuel Antonio Mencia, Jr.
\nwithout whose prayers and efforts this book
\nwould not have been published.
\nForeword<\/p>\n
A word of warning to those of you who may pick up this book by chance: you most likely will not be able to put it down for the next several hours.
\nThis is an intriguing and entertaining review of the basic teleological arguments, summarized in highly readable and uncomplicated form, to confirm and reinforce convictions about the scientific underpinnings of an unquestioning faith in God.
\nIn easy-to-read language, the authors have propounded the sometimes difficult and abstruse principles of scientific knowledge that bind together all that can be known about the truths of nature and the spiritual truths of Scripture.
\nI believe this book will go far in convincing unbelievers that there clearly is no such tenable position as \u201cscience versus God,\u201d as they are led to see the validity of the old expression: \u201cscience is the handmaiden of Christianity.\u201d<\/p>\n
D. James Kennedy, Ph.D.
\nChancellor, Knox Theological Seminary<\/p>\n
Preface<\/p>\n
The authors of this unusual book have presented an attractive message, designed especially to set forth the truths of the gospel.
\nBeginning with a fascinating account of the author\u2019s conversion, the major part of the book is a condensed and simplified summary of his doctoral dissertation. Dr. Cagan had been raised as an atheist in an atheist family, and his testimony is a wonderful indication of how God can reach even an intellectual who would have seemed a very unlikely candidate for Christian conversion. Dr. Cagan\u2019s account of his coming to Christ is a delight to read.
\nIn fact, the entire book is easy and pleasant reading. One who is not scientifically minded will not be turned off by his discussion of such key scientific subjects as thermodynamics, energy, and others. The discussions of these topics, while scientifically valid, primarily deal with their spiritual analogies in human life, making a strong appeal to the reader to believe the Bible and trust Jesus Christ as his Savior and Lord.
\nI am glad to recommend From Darwin to Design for an evening or two of pleasant and profitable reading.<\/p>\n
Henry M. Morris, Ph.D.
\nFounder, Institute for Creation Research
\nChapter One
\n\u201cWhy An Atheist Changed His Mind\u201d<\/p>\n
The Inner Struggle of Conversion
\nMy grandfather, David Kagan, was a Jew who came to Chicago from Kiev, Russia, in 1922. An immigration official made the mistake of spelling his last name with a C instead of a K, and it has been spelled that way ever since. My father was Jewish, but we did not go to synagogue.
\nI didn\u2019t believe in the existence of God. Even though I had never read the Bible I was firmly convinced that it was full of errors. I thought that Christianity was for ignorant people who needed something to believe in.
\nI laughed at the Christians who tried to \u201cwitness\u201d to me. I thought their religion was fanatical, strange, and dangerous. Christianity was not something for intelligent people to believe.
\nAs an atheist I thought that biblical Christianity was dark and medieval. I was convinced that the Catholics were especially bad and the Protestants weren\u2019t much better. After all, Protestants had killed \u201chundreds\u201d of people during the Salem witch trials, or so I thought. That was the impression I had received in my secular education. I did not know that the Salem, Massachusetts, \u201cwitch trials\u201d lasted less than a year (1692\u20131693). I did not know that a government edict, issued by the larger body of Protestants themselves a few months after the trials began, ordered the release of all prisoners charged with witchcraft. Although nothing of this nature has occurred since then, this short incident in the long history of American Protestantism was used again and again by my secular teachers to discredit all biblical Christianity.
\nThese teachers never mentioned that Darwinian humanism, which largely replaced the influence of Christianity during the twentieth century, was directly or indirectly responsible for the deaths of well over 100 million people, through the impact this philosophical system had on Fascism,1 Communism, and the abortion movement.2 Dr. Henry M. Morris, founder of the Institute for Creation Research, said,
\nUntold damage has been wrought, especially during the past century, by this dismal doctrine that man is merely an evolved animal. Racism, economic imperialism, communism, Nazism, sexual promiscuity and perversion, aggressive militarism, infanticide, genocide and all sorts of evils have been vigorously promoted by one group or another on the grounds that, since they were based on evolution, they were \u201cscientific\u201d and, therefore, bound to prove beneficial in the long run.3
\nNearly fifty million American children have died through abortion at the hands of the humanists. Another sixty million people died as a direct or indirect result of humanism in the twentieth century, through various wars and movements arising as a result of social Darwinism. Only nineteen people were victims of the zealots in Salem. The numbers show that the bad image of Salem is small in comparison. But I was not aware of these statistics because none of my secular teachers taught them to us. They also never mentioned that Baptists and modern evangelicals had nothing to do with the witch trials. My teachers gave only one side of the story.
\nAs an atheist I would have disagreed with this comparison of the Salem witch trials to the effects of humanism. I would also have pointed to the Crusades and to the Spanish Inquisition as examples of Christianity\u2019s failings.
\nHowever, the Crusades have become far more understandable since 9\/11. Militant Islam had taken the \u201cHoly Land\u201d away from the Christians, and they went to war to take back land that had been theirs. Militant Muslims had taken over 50 percent of their churches by force and turned them into mosques. Palestine was very important in the minds of the Christians, and I can understand that. It still has great significance to Jews and Christians. If Washington, D.C., were taken over by militant Muslims today, I am sure that most Americans would feel the same way the Crusaders did about getting it back. Therefore, I do not think that the Crusades would have been much of a barrier to Christianity if I were an atheist today.
\nThe Inquisition, particularly in Spain, troubled me deeply, especially because of my Jewish roots. The Jews suffered greatly during the Spanish Inquisition. But I now think that the Inquisition was a medieval Catholic aberration and had little bearing on the evangelical Christianity I became familiar with. Even though the Inquisition went on for about six hundred years, 125,000 people died. Bad as that was, it was nothing like the nearly fifty million who have died from abortion, or the sixty million who have died in other ways at the hands of humanism in the twentieth century through Communism, Nazism, infanticide, and genocide, which have their philosophical roots in humanism. But I did not know these facts then.
\nThe biased education I received on these subjects turned me against Christianity even more. I felt that the Christians were half-civilized barbarians who had nothing to say to me. Most of all, as a college student, I believed in myself.
\nMy father and mother wisely kept me from watching much television. I am thankful that they encouraged me to do a lot of reading instead. I did well in school, especially in mathematics and science. I read everything I could get my hands on, including a lot of science fiction. I thought, \u201cSomeday people are going to figure everything out and go flying to every star and galaxy and build a great new world.\u201d And I had plans almost as big for myself.
\nAfter finishing high school, I came to Los Angeles and attended UCLA, where I received a bachelor\u2019s degree (summa cum laude); a master\u2019s degree, and a Ph.D in mathematics.
\nAt UCLA I worked hard, taking five or six classes every quarter. After the first year I had to support myself. Soon I had a job. Then I had two jobs and then three jobs. I became a teaching assistant in the mathematics department. I wrote guides in math and chemistry that were sold at UCLA for twenty years. I put every royalty check in the bank and dreamed of the day when I would be rich and famous.
\nI worked very hard to reach these goals. While most people I knew at college partied as often as possible, I kept working and studying night and day. I experimented with the sins of the world, but never moved my eyes away from my goal of success. I was hoping to make a million dollars before I was thirty years old.
\nBut I was always very unhappy and empty inside. Even though I was successful in school and earning a lot of money, I wondered about the meaning of life. Who was I? Why was I here? Where was I going? I had no real answers to these questions.
\nWhen I was twenty-one years old, I met some evangelical Christians. They were kind to me, but I refused to believe in Jesus. I had my own plans. I wanted to build a big career. Jesus was not for me. I didn\u2019t want Him to interfere with my future. But I was now thinking about spiritual things. During this time I said to a friend, \u201cIf there is a God, He has to be the most important thing in the world.\u201d
\nThen in the fall of 1974 I had a very direct and sudden experience with God. I will share what led up to that crisis later in this book. The turning point came at 4:00 am one night when I cried out, \u201cGod, forgive me.\u201d That was the first time I ever prayed in my life. I had some inner relief after saying that prayer. The next day I had another experience with God that changed my thinking forever. I suddenly knew, deep down inside, that God was real. Now I had more important things to think about than mathematics and money!
\nBut I was not a Christian. The experience I had with God was very real to me, but I was not ready to believe in Jesus Christ. I was not willing to submit to Him. I wrestled inwardly with thoughts about Christ for two more years.
\nMy knowledge of God began with experience (empiricism) but was not confirmed until I dealt with God in my mind (rationalism). Experience and rationalism were fused together later, in my conversion.4 I had undergone a religious experience. I had felt the reality of the Holy Spirit. I had felt the presence of God. But I was still not a Christian. It was two more years before I was converted.
\nKnowing that there really was a God convinced me that I had been wrong all these years. I had lived as an atheist and had opposed and rejected Him. I was lost, and I knew it.
\nIt was during this time that I first studied the Bible on my own. I read it all the way through, from Genesis to Revelation. Two verses seemed to leap out of the page at me as I read.
\nRiches profit not in the day of wrath. (Proverbs 11:4)
\nAnd the world passeth away, and the lust thereof: but he that doeth the will of God abideth for ever. (1 John 2:17)
\nThat sentence from 1 John has become my \u201clife verse,\u201d the single most important Bible verse in my Christian life.
\nI went to several churches seeking answers to my questions, but the sermons I heard did not help me. I kept going to church even though no one ever spoke personally to me about becoming a Christian.
\nThen one Friday at UCLA I heard that an evangelist who preached gospel salvation was speaking that evening on campus. I went to hear this young man preach. He made it clear that I needed Christ to forgive me and save me from the penalty of sin. But I continued to fight inwardly against Jesus. I didn\u2019t want Him because I felt that He was higher and greater than me. I was too proud to believe in Him.
\nYet I felt strangely drawn to those evangelistic meetings. Each night the preacher spoke of Christ\u2019s love for us and told us that He died on the cross to pay for our sins. At the end of one sermon the evangelist invited us to pray for Christ to forgive us. During that prayer I trusted Jesus Christ once and for all. I became a Christian by a simple act of faith in Jesus Christ.
\nI can remember, down to the exact couple of seconds, when I trusted Him. It was while I was praying. It seemed that I was immediately facing Him. No, I didn\u2019t see a picture or a vision or anything like that. But I was definitely in the presence of Jesus Christ and He was definitely available to me.
\nFor many years I had turned Him away, though He was always there for me, lovingly offering me salvation. But that night I knew the time had come for me to trust Him. I knew that I must either come to Him or turn away. At that moment, in just a few seconds, I came to Jesus. I was no longer a self-trusting unbeliever. I had trusted Jesus Christ. I had believed in Him. It was as simple as that.
\nIn that short time, in a single act of trust, which was so simple and yet so profound, I \u201ccrossed over\u201d to Jesus Christ in the most important event that can happen in a human life\u2014conversion. I had been running away all my life, but that night I turned around and came directly and immediately to Jesus Christ. My journey was complete. Faith was real. It was the greatest proof of all. Now everywhere I looked I saw evidence of God. This book brings together some of those insights. However, you must not think that it will convince you unless God intervenes in your life, as He did in mine. The apostle Paul spoke of this when he said,
\nOur gospel came not unto you in word only, but also in power, and in the Holy Ghost [Spirit], and in much assurance. (1 Thessalonians 1:5)
\nThe eighteenth century Bible scholar John Gill said that the effects of Paul\u2019s preaching \u201cwere not owing to the charms of words, the force of language, and power of oratory\u2026but must be ascribed to the spirit of God, and to the power and efficacy of his grace.\u201d5
\nThe arguments I give will not help you find God unless He uses them to illuminate you, \u201cnot in word only, but also in power.\u201d Then all the seemingly disjointed pieces of the puzzle will come together, and the evidence will stand complete.
\nIntelligent Design
\nThis book comes out of my own experience. It presents the struggle I had with the argument for the existence of God given by William Paley (1743\u20131805). Like me, Paley was a mathematician. He studied mathematics at Cambridge University and later taught at Cambridge.6
\nDr. Norman Geisler, the renowned defender of Christianity, gives this summary of Paley\u2019s \u201cintelligent design\u201d argument for the existence of God\u2014sometimes called the \u201cteleological\u201d argument:
\nPaley offered what has become the classic formulation of the \u201cteleological argument\u201d [which says that the complex design of the universe shows there must be an intelligent Creator]. It is based on the watch analogy: If one found a watch in an empty field, one would rightly conclude that it had a maker because of its obvious design. Likewise, when one looks at the even more complex design of the world in which we live, one cannot but conclude that there is a great Designer behind it.7
\nGeisler points out that \u201cas late as 1831\u201d Charles Darwin was deeply impressed by Paley\u2019s Evidences. \u201cRecently Paley\u2019s thought has been the subject of a revival\u2026.\u201d8
\nThe central idea of intelligent design is that the complexity of nature demands that a thinking Being planned and devised it. This view has received a great deal of publicity in the last few years. The Los Angeles Times said,
\nIntelligent design, which started to gain notice about 10 years ago, holds that evolution alone does not adequately explain some complex biological mechanisms, suggesting that a plan by an intelligent force is behind changes in species (Los Angeles Times, August 3, 2005, p. A12).
\nIn recent years, twenty-eight states and communities have proposed initiatives to include the teaching of intelligent design along with the theory of evolution in school curriculums.
\nDr. Henry C. Thiessen, late professor at Wheaton College, Wheaton, Illinois, pointed out that the argument from intelligent design should be seen as one of many evidences of God\u2019s existence, including the evidence of fulfilled prophecy. Dr. Henry M. Morris devotes an entire chapter to fulfilled prophecy as evidence of God in his book, Science and the Bible.9 Dr. Thiessen went on to say,
\nThe evidence is cumulative, a single argument for the existence of God being inadequate, but a number of them together being sufficient to bind the conscience and compel belief.10
\nI believe that the teleological argument (the argument that the complex design of the universe shows there is an intelligent Creator), presented along with a number of other arguments, is the greatest philosophical proof of God\u2019s existence.
\nBut philosophy alone can never take the place of conversion. When you have that experience, you will say with the man born blind, \u201cOne thing I know, that, whereas I was blind, now I see\u201d (John 9:25). When Christ gives you spiritual sight and awakens you to the reality of God, then (and only then) the arguments for God\u2019s existence presented in this book will begin to take on profound meaning.
\nThis book builds on Paley\u2019s work. It is adapted from part of my Ph.D. dissertation at the Claremont Graduate School and is my attempt to show the reality of God in several basic areas of physics and astronomy. It is simplified so that a high school student or college freshman can easily grasp the ideas. The overall argument I will give is that science contains principles that point to the reality of God, that the complex design of the universe shows that there must be an intelligent Creator.
\nMany scientists today are changing their opinion, and are saying that \u201cintelligent design\u201d is the only adequate explanation for the origin of life and the complexity of nature. I have in my hand a news story about Dr. Antony Flew, of Oxford University, long considered to be the world\u2019s leading atheist. The headline reads, \u201cLeading Atheist Says Science Has Changed His Mind.\u201d The article then says,
\nA British philosophy professor who has been a leading champion of atheism for more than 50 years has changed his mind. Antony Flew, 81, said scientific evidence has now convinced him that a super-intelligence is the only explanation for the origin of life and the complexity of nature\u2026If his newfound belief upsets people, Flew said, \u201cthat\u2019s too bad\u201d\u2014but he\u2019s always been determined to \u201cfollow the evidence wherever it leads\u201d (Associated Press, December 10, 2004).
\nAlthough Dr. Flew is not a Christian, he, like many scientists today, has taken the first step\u2014the step I took back in 1974\u2014of recognizing the reality of the Creator. It is my hope that you will come to the same conclusion by reading this book\u2014and that you will go one step farther and come to know Jesus Christ as your own personal Savior.
\nChapter Two
\n\u201cHe Made Up the Questions!\u201d<\/p>\n
Precision\u2014The Laws of the Universe Are Exact, Reflecting the Faithfulness of God
\nChristianity wasn\u2019t for me. I thought of myself as a Jew, an intellectual, and a modern person\u2014an atheist. The books I read and the teachers I heard told me that human beings evolved from lower forms of life. I laughed at the Christians who talked with me about being \u201csaved.\u201d I thought they were fanatics. To me, serious Christianity was only for people who lived in run-down shacks on the wrong side of town, people who hadn\u2019t been to college, who went to storefront churches to hear a man screaming about hell. I thought that Christianity was not something an intelligent person could believe.
\nBut then one night I couldn\u2019t sleep. I had rejected everything I heard about God\u2014but was I right?
\nI had been taking a very difficult course in mathematical engineering. It was probably the hardest class I ever took. I was used to easy success in every course, but this one was different. I did poorly on the midterm, which had never happened to me before. I tried to study and understand the material, but I just couldn\u2019t grasp it. I started to fall apart as the final exam approached.
\nI spent the night before the exam in a motel room, trying to study. But I just couldn\u2019t understand the material, even though I stayed up deep into the night. I was also troubled about what my life meant and whether God was real. Christians had told me about God, but I had rejected everything I heard. That night I began to wonder if I was right. Or was I the worst fool of all?
\nI tossed and turned that night, unable to sleep. I thought about my own selfishness and how I had opposed God in deliberate unbelief. I was desperate. About 4:00 in the morning, I said out loud, \u201cGod, forgive me.\u201d That was the first time I ever prayed in my life. I didn\u2019t understand what it all meant, but I felt some relief after saying that simple prayer. Then I finally went to sleep.
\nI woke up about an hour and a half later, at 6:00 am, convinced I would fail the test that day. I tried to study for about an hour and then went to the university, telling myself that it would only be one failure and that I could go on somehow. I went into the classroom at eight o\u2019clock and the teacher passed out the examination. I looked down at it knowing that I would fail. My heart sank in despair.
\nThen suddenly I was aware of God\u2019s presence. I hadn\u2019t asked for His help with the test. I had never experienced God before. But in that moment I knew that God was real. Suddenly there was no doubt about it at all!
\nI felt a deep sense of His presence. No one else noticed what happened to me. This was all an inward experience. Yet I have never doubted that it was true. More than thirty years later I can remember that moment with vivid clarity.
\nA few days before this event, I said to a friend, \u201cIf there is a God, He has to be the most important thing in the world.\u201d Now I knew that was true.
\nI looked down at the test. Why, it was so easy! As I read the questions, the solutions came immediately to my mind, as clearly and simply as if I had been asked to add two plus three. I started writing as fast as I could. I knew that the answers had to be right. For some reason there was no possibility of doubt that morning.
\nI answered all the questions but one very quickly. The last one was more difficult. I started to sneak a look at the answer the person next to me was writing, but I stopped myself and remembered that God was holy.
\nThis examination was three hours long. In less than an hour I had written out all the questions but that one! I was sure that the solutions were right. I thought about turning the test in immediately, but instead I looked over the work before giving it to the teacher. I knew I had passed the test. God had helped me do what I myself could never have done. In fact, I received the highest score in the class and answered every question correctly but one. It was the question I had tried to cheat on! Now I was certain of God\u2019s existence.
\nHow was He able to give me those answers? Because He made up the questions! My mind went back to a story I heard about Columbus.
\nThose were days of hunger on the island of Jamaica, in the month of February, in the year 1504. Christopher Columbus and his men were dying of starvation. Their ship could sail no further so Columbus sent a canoe for help, but relief would not arrive before June. The Indians of the island had given them some food in the beginning, but they gave the explorers less and less as time went by. The men faced starvation as the weeks passed.
\nThen Columbus turned to an astronomy book he had with him, which listed the motions of the stars and planets. An eclipse of the moon was to occur on the 29th of February. Columbus warned the Indians that the moon would be blotted out that night. They laughed, but when the eclipse began, they trembled with fear and respect and brought food to Columbus and his men. They survived and returned to Spain, having remade the map of the world.
\nIt was not merely a book of astronomy that saved the life of Christopher Columbus. It was God the Designer, who not only created the heavens, but also synchronized their motion. This was God, whose faithfulness had made the astronomy book possible by His precise guidance of the planets.
\nAs Columbus relied on God\u2019s faithfulness in regulating nature, so we can trust in God\u2019s faithful revelation in the Bible. Christ said, \u201cIt is easier for heaven and earth to pass, than for one tittle of the law to fail\u201d (Luke 16:17). Christ was telling us that the Bible (which He called \u201cthe law\u201d) is completely reliable. It is as dependable as the motion of the heavens He created.
\nDr. W. A. Criswell (1909\u20132002) pointed out the reliability of the Scriptures in his landmark book, Why I Preach That the Bible Is Literally True:
\nI have the temerity to affirm that as yet the destructive critics [of the Bible] have not been able to produce a single error or discrepancy which cannot be reasonably explained\u2026In essence, these are not errors but difficulties which can be solved or explained. I read one time that in A.D. 1800 the French Institute in Paris had issued a list of 82 errors in the Bible, which they believed would destroy Christianity. Today not one of these so-called errors is received as such, for with new discoveries the difficulties have been cleared away.11
\nGod is as reliable in the words He gave in the Bible as He is in the motions of the heavenly bodies He created. An old hymn puts it like this,
\nHow firm a foundation, ye saints of the Lord,
\nIs laid for your faith in His excellent Word.
\nWhat more can He say than to you He hath said,
\nTo you who for refuge to Jesus have fled?12
\nThe Laws of the Universe Are Exact, Reflecting the Faithfulness of God
\nThe scientific laws of the universe are exact. Every atom, every rock, and every animal in the universe is required to obey the laws God laid out for them in the smallest detail. Only God, who made the laws in the first place, has the freedom to change them or to make exceptions\u2014which are called \u201cmiracles.\u201d
\nWhen I was studying at UCLA, I saw a physics student wearing a T-shirt with an equation on it giving the speed of light and then the words, \u201cThat\u2019s the Law.\u201d The T-shirt message was right. God has ordained that light must move through space at a certain speed. This law is so exact that when the Apollo astronauts traveled to the moon, they left behind reflectors so that scientists could measure the distance to the moon from the time it took a beam of light from earth to reach these reflectors and bounce back. God\u2019s laws are so exact that we now know the distance to the moon within a few feet! \u201cThat\u2019s the Law\u201d\u2014God\u2019s law. Men can break the laws of human courts and congresses, and they often do. But no one can break God\u2019s laws and make light move faster or slower than it does.
\nThe exactness of scientific laws points to the faithfulness of God. When He makes a promise, you can be absolutely sure that He will fulfill that promise in every detail. Scientists can send a robot to Mars and know precisely what day it will arrive there, because God\u2019s laws of motion are exact.
\nWhen God makes a promise, we can trust that He will do exactly what He says. Hundreds of years before Jesus was born, God promised that He would send the Messiah, to be born of a virgin (Isaiah 7:14) in the town of Bethlehem (Micah 5:2). And it came to pass exactly as He said.
\nWhen God promises in the Bible that \u201cwhosoever believeth in him [Jesus] should not perish, but have everlasting life\u201d (John 3:16), you can be sure that God\u2019s Word is true. If you will put full trust in the Lord Jesus Christ Himself, you will not perish, but have everlasting life. It would be easier for the entire universe to fall into chaos than for God\u2019s promise to fail.
\nThe Lost Asteroid
\nIt might seem strange that an asteroid could be lost and then found, but that is exactly what happened to the biggest one of all. The first asteroid that man discovered was named Ceres. It is a big rock about five hundred miles long that orbits in space around the sun.
\nScientists discovered this giant asteroid with their telescopes, but they lost sight of it when it passed behind the sun. They wondered where it went.
\nThe answer came from a young mathematician named Karl Friedrich Gauss (1777\u20131855), who was only twenty-four years old in 1801. Gauss was already well known for his mathematical abilities, for he had been doing amazing feats since he was a child.
\nWhen Gauss was a small schoolboy, his teacher decided to keep the students occupied while he rested. The teacher asked the boys to add up the numbers from 1 to 100 (1 plus 2 plus 3, all the way up to 100) on their own blackboards. Of course, the boys had no calculators in that day, and they had to keep erasing their chalk arithmetic on their small blackboards. The teacher was safe for a good long time\u2014or so he thought!
\nWithin a few minutes Karl Gauss walked up to the front of the room, put his blackboard upside down on the teacher\u2019s desk, and said, \u201cLet it sit.\u201d The teacher was astonished when he turned the blackboard around and saw the correct number, 5050.
\nWhat was even more surprising was that Gauss had not added up the numbers! Rather, he had discovered by himself the formula for adding up a chain of numbers like this. He could have added the numbers from 1 to 10,000 in the same length of time. When it became known that Gauss was a genius, he was given special training in mathematics and physics.
\nLater, it was the twenty-four-year-old Karl Friedrich Gauss who found the \u201clost\u201d asteroid Ceres. Without a computer (which wouldn\u2019t be invented for two more lifetimes), he solved the mathematical equations of astronomy and figured out where the asteroid was located. Following laws set down by the intelligence of the Creator, Gauss told the astronomers where to point their telescopes to find the missing planetoid\u2014and there it was! The laws of the universe are exact\u2014reflecting the faithfulness of the Creator.
\nPraise the Lord! for He hath spoken;
\nWorlds His mighty voice obeyed;
\nLaws which never shall be broken
\nFor their guidance He hath made.13
\nGod Knows What He Is Doing
\nThe more research that scientists do, the clearer it becomes that the Creator is precise. He knows exactly what He is doing. Even the so-called \u201ctheory of relativity,\u201d conceived by Albert Einstein (1879\u20131955), is built on one exact and precise premise that is not \u201crelative\u201d at all: the speed of light in a vacuum is always a constant. Today we know that the speed of light in a vacuum is 299,792.458 kilometers per second. The fact that this number is known with such precision reflects a Creator of immense intelligence and exact precision.
\nGod always knows what time it is, even if people don\u2019t. Today time is measured with \u201catomic clocks.\u201d The basic unit of time, a second, is defined in terms of a certain exact number of multiples of a particular transition of a cesium atom. How can we trust that time will always be the same when it is measured this way? Because God\u2019s rules for the atoms never change! Today it is possible with atomic clocks to measure time accurately within one part in 100,000,000,000,000 (one second in 3 million years), and plans have been made to build clocks that are 10,000 times more accurate than that. God\u2019s time is so exact that scientists have defined distance in terms of time: a length of distance is defined as the distance covered by light in a certain exact fraction of a second. God measures time and distance very precisely. He never changes His rules. God always knows what He is doing, even if people don\u2019t. God never loses track of a single atom, nor does He miss the tiniest fraction of a second.
\nMoreover, God always knows exactly what you are doing. To the Christian this is an encouragement. Jesus said that a sparrow cannot fall to the ground without God knowing (see Matthew 10:29; Luke 12:6), and that \u201ceven the very hairs of your head are all numbered. Fear not therefore: ye are of more value than many sparrows\u201d (Luke 12:7).
\nGod\u2019s immense knowledge is a warning to every unconverted person. The Bible says, \u201cGod shall bring every work into judgment, with every secret thing, whether it be good, or whether it be evil\u201d (Ecclesiastes 12:14). Jesus told us, \u201cEvery idle word that men shall speak, they shall give account thereof in the day of judgment\u201d (Matthew 12:36). God knows every sin and every word you say. He keeps a perfect and precise record of them in His books:
\nAnd I saw the dead, small and great, stand before God; and the books were opened: and another book was opened, which is the book of life: and the dead were judged out of those things which were written in the books, according to their works. (Revelation 20:12)
\nGod will judge you correctly and precisely, unless those sins are washed away by the blood of Jesus Christ.14
\nThe World\u2019s Greatest Scientist
\nProbably the greatest scientist who ever lived was an Englishman named Isaac Newton. He was born in 1642, so his youth was lived out during Puritan times. He died in 1727, eleven years before John Wesley was converted and the Great Awakening of Protestant Christianity began. There has never been a scientist greater than Isaac Newton. Albert Einstein was not nearly as ingenious or creative.
\nWhen Newton was twenty-two years old, with only pen, paper, and his own mind, he invented calculus. That achievement alone would have made him one of the greatest mathematicians of all time. Over three hundred years later, I had to sweat to learn what Newton figured out for the first time on his own. I marveled at the beauty of calculus and later had the opportunity of teaching it to others.
\nUsing the mathematics he had invented, Isaac Newton derived both the law of gravity and the mathematical motions of the planets, the moon, the comets, and all moving terrestrial objects. He did this with only pen and paper, with all the computations figured out in his own mind. He didn\u2019t have a calculator, a computer, or an Internet connection. Isaac Newton had to think for himself. He wrote his scientific findings in his book, Principia.
\nIn the conclusion to this book, he wrote:
\nThis most beautiful system of the sun, planets, and comets, could only proceed from the counsel and dominion of an intelligent and powerful Being…This Being governs all things, not as the soul of the world, but as Lord over all, and on account of his dominion he is wont to be called Lord God Pantocrator, or Universal Ruler; for God is a relative word, and has a respect to servants; and Deity is the dominion of God not over his own body…but over servants. The Supreme God is a Being eternal, infinite, absolutely perfect…And from his true dominion it follows that the true God is a living, intelligent, and powerful Being; and from his other perfections, that he is supreme, or most perfect. He is eternal and infinite, omnipotent and omniscient; that is, his duration reaches from eternity to eternity; his presence from infinity to infinity; he governs all things, and knows all things that are or can be done. 15
\nThat sounds like conservative Christian theology, but it was written by Sir Isaac Newton, in the conclusion of one of the most important scientific books of all time. Newton had the wisdom to study the heavens and believe in God.
\nThe heavens declare the glory of God; and the firmament sheweth his handywork. Day unto day uttereth speech, and night unto night showeth knowledge. There is no speech nor language, where there voice is not heard. Their line is gone out through all the earth, and their words to the end of the world. (Psalm 19:1\u20134)
\nNo Excuse for Atheism
\nI am now convinced that there is no real excuse for atheism.
\nFor the invisible things of [God] from the creation of the world are clearly seen, being understood by the things that are made, even his eternal power and Godhead; so that they are without excuse. (Romans 1:20)
\nHow can anyone look up at the stars and fail to believe in God? Yet many do just that. It isn\u2019t because they are intelligent. None of them are more intelligent than Sir Isaac Newton! It is usually because they really don\u2019t want to find God, and instead \u201chold [literally \u201chold down\u201d or \u201csuppress\u201d] the truth in unrighteousness\u201d (Romans 1:18). The reason many people don\u2019t believe in God is because they \u201chold down\u201d and \u201csuppress\u201d His truth\u2014so they can live out their lives in rebellion against Him. \u201cTherefore they say unto God, Depart from us; for we desire not the knowledge of thy ways\u201d (Job 21:14).
\nToday many of these people feel that it is \u201cunscientific\u201d to believe in the God of the Scriptures. They think that science has disproved the Bible. They say that the Red Sea couldn\u2019t have been divided when Moses raised his rod, a virgin couldn\u2019t give birth without a man, and Jesus couldn\u2019t rise from the dead. After all, they say, the laws of science forbid such things.
\nThey don\u2019t want to admit that the God who made the rules can make exceptions to them. True, He doesn\u2019t do this very often\u2014that\u2019s why the exceptions are exceptions, and that\u2019s why they are called \u201cmiracles.\u201d But God can make an exception to His rules when He chooses.
\nNow that isn\u2019t so hard to understand, is it? As the father in my home, I am the head of the family and make the rules there. One of these rules is that our two small boys have to hold on to the banister when they walk up and down the stairs. That\u2019s a rule in our home. But the person who made the rule can change it. Sometimes, late at night, the boys are asleep, and I have to carry them up the stairs. But isn\u2019t it a rule that they have to hold the rail when they go up the stairs? Well, yes, it is\u2014but it was Papa who made the rule, and he can make an exception when he needs to. Papa can carry the boys one by one up the stairs as they sleep, and they don\u2019t have to hold the rail. This isn\u2019t wrong; it\u2019s just an exception to the rule. And it\u2019s the same way with God, who created and governs the universe. God is the person who made the rules and He has the right and the power to change them through miracles.
\nJohn W. Wenham of Oxford University wrote Christ and the Bible. This book shows that Christ had full confidence in the miracles recorded in the Old Testament. Wenham said, \u201cCuriously enough, the narratives that are the least acceptable to the so-called \u2018modern mind\u2019 are the very ones that he seemed most fond of choosing for his illustrations.\u201d16
\nGleason L. Archer pointed out that \u201cA careful examination of Christ\u2019s references to the Old Testament makes it unmistakably evident that He fully accepted as factual even the most controversial statements in the Hebrew Bible pertaining to history and science.\u201d17 Christ\u2019s complete confidence in the Old Testament record shows that He firmly believed that God can intervene in the order that He created.
\nThe world around us points to the Creator, but many people turn away from Him. One man who did this was a scientist named Pierre Simon Laplace (1749\u20131827). He lived in France about one hundred years after Newton. Laplace wrote a complicated book of mathematics that analyzed the movements of the heavens. But unlike Newton he gave no credit to God.
\nOne day Laplace had a conversation with Napoleon Bonaparte (1769\u20131821), shortly before he became the Emperor. Napoleon had read Laplace\u2019s book. The Emperor told Laplace that he had built his scientific system without referring to God. Laplace answered, \u201cMonsieur (sir), I had no need for that hypothesis!\u201d Laplace said that this perfectly precise universe, with all its mathematically elegant forms and laws, simply existed by itself, for itself, on its own\u2014without God.
\nI have come to believe that it is actually much harder to hold on to that idea than to believe in God! To think that the incredibly huge and complicated universe governs itself with mathematical perfection as if there were an intelligent Creator\u2014but in theory without any creator\u2014now seems incredible to me. The thought of this complex universe existing by itself and running perfectly without God now seems harder for me to believe than to simply accept the idea of a Creator.
\nSo why did Pierre Laplace refuse to believe in God? I think that his problem was not intellectual, but moral. I think that he wanted to live his life as though God did not exist, rather than obey Him.
\nAldous Huxley (1894\u20131963) was an atheist who spent his life trying to undermine the faith of many, and was hailed as a great intellectual, but toward the end of his life, Huxley admitted that his views were biased, based on a rejection of biblical morality. He said, \u201cFor myself, the philosophy of meaninglessness was essentially an instrument of liberation, sexual and political.\u201d18 That\u2019s what Pierre Laplace did as well\u2014and he became what the Bible calls a \u201cfool.\u201d
\nThe fool hath said in his heart, There is no God. (Psalm 53:1)
\nThey glorified him not as God, neither were thankful; but became vain in their imaginations, and their foolish heart was darkened. Professing themselves to be wise, they became fools. (Romans 1:21\u201322)
\nIn his book, Intelligent Design: The Bridge Between Science and Theology, Dr. William A. Dembski said,
\nThe revelation of God in creation is typically called general revelation, whereas the revelation of God in redemption is typically called special revelation. Consequently theologians sometimes speak of two books, the book of nature, which is God\u2019s self-revelation in creation, and the book of Scripture, which is God\u2019s self-revelation in redemption. If you want to know who God is, you need to know God through both creation and redemption.19
\nNewton Never Became an Orthodox Christian
\nAlthough Isaac Newton believed in the existence of God, he never became a Christian. He remained like I was when God first became real to me, two years before I was converted. Yes, I believed in God, but I did not know Jesus Christ personally\u2014and neither did Newton.
\nAfter his death, it was discovered that he spent time with the Puritans as a young man, in 1662, when he was twenty years old. The Puritans spoke to him about his soul and attempted to convert him. Newton even wrote out a list of his sins and thought deeply about salvation. For the rest of his life he retained a curiosity about the Bible. But at some point, in that year with the Puritans, he rejected conversion to Christianity. From then on, he no longer spoke to them about his salvation. While he believed in God, it was a mental and mathematical God and not the personal God of Scripture. Although he believed in a Creator, Newton denied the deity of Jesus Christ. Others followed his ideas, using his mathematical ability as a refuge for their rejection of orthodox Christianity. Some of those who were influenced by Newton\u2019s ideas became known as \u201cdeists.\u201d
\nAlthough he was academically far more intelligent than you or me, and although he believed in the existence of the Creator, Newton died without experiencing Christ personally. For all his scientific abilities, he did not come to know the Savior.
\nWill you be like him? Or will you be saved through faith in the Son of God?
\nBelieve on the Lord Jesus Christ, and thou shalt be saved. (Acts 16:31)
\nChapter Three
\n\u201cTwo Years of Mental Agony\u201d<\/p>\n
Complexity\u2014The Creation Is Intricately Complex, Reflecting the Existence of an Intelligent God
\nI wrestled through sleepless nights for many months after God became real to me. I can only describe this period in my life as two years of mental agony. I was pulled one way and then the other during this time of confusion and inner struggle. Although I wasn\u2019t converted, I knew in my heart that I was supposed to go to church. So I went to a church where the pastor gave a pleasant little talk that didn\u2019t have much to do with me. I didn\u2019t go back.
\nThen I was invited to a conservative evangelical church to hear the pastor teach. I went back there on my own for several months and learned a lot of details about the Bible and ancient history. I learned about circumcision and the city of Corinth. I learned about ancient cultures and religions. But the sermons did not move me to seek salvation.
\nIt wasn\u2019t completely the pastor\u2019s fault that I remained unconverted. It was also mine. I didn\u2019t want Jesus. My plans were incompatible with His. I still wanted to become rich and important and enjoy as much pleasure as possible\u2014at the same time that I was reading the Bible and going to church! I fought against God, inwardly.
\nCan a person spend two years going through a religious struggle like this? Can a person go to church, read the Bible, grudgingly reform himself here and there, and yet all the while remain unconverted? I have come to believe that an experience like this is quite common, just as the man in Bunyan\u2019s Pilgrim\u2019s Progress passed through many struggles before his conversion.20
\nLater I was invited to a liberal Protestant church, which I attended for over a year. I almost lost my soul there. I remember the pastor saying from the pulpit, \u201cIf someone asks you, \u2018Are you saved?\u2019 tell him, \u2018That\u2019s none of your business.\u2019\u201d I thought, \u201cThat couldn\u2019t be right. Why is he saying that?\u201d I now realize that this minister was wrong. But God spoke to my conscience, and I knew that I was a sinner. So I decided at last to become a real Christian. I read the Bible and prayed. I made a commitment to give financially to the church at the highest level they had proposed\u2014and kept it.
\nFinally, early in 1977, I thought I had better do something else if I wanted to become a Christian. I had seen the minister put a drop of water on a baby\u2019s head. I filled out a little card saying I wanted to be baptized. I thought that would complete the process of making me a Christian. I couldn\u2019t think of anything else to do. After two or three months, I got a letter in the mail in reply to the card. The minister didn\u2019t try very hard to baptize me. But thank God he didn\u2019t, or I might have joined that church unconverted. I might still be in that confused state today!
\nIn the meantime, God had stepped in again. One Friday night at UCLA, I was walking alone through the student union building when my eyes fell on a sign announcing an evangelistic meeting. It looked interesting, so I went to it.
\nThe service was led by an evangelist who preached salvation through the blood of Christ. He made it clear that we needed to come to Christ and trust Him and be converted. But I was still fighting against Jesus. I didn\u2019t want to come to Him. I was just too proud. But I knew that the evangelist was preaching the truth from the Bible.
\nI began to understand that I had heard two religious alternatives. In the liberal Protestant church I was told that I could become a Christian by cleaning up my life, being good, and finally being baptized. That was what I had signed up for, but it wasn\u2019t doing me any good.
\nThe evangelist had a message that was new to me. He said I was a sinner who had broken God\u2019s laws and deserved judgment. In His love, Jesus had come to die for me on the cross. If I trusted Him, He would forgive my sins and save my soul once and for all. All I had to do was trust Jesus in a single act and He would perform all the saving work.
\nI went back many times to those evangelistic meetings, knowing that I needed to trust Jesus. Finally one Friday night I came to the meeting thinking, \u201cI must either trust Jesus tonight or forget about being a Christian and go back to my old way of life.\u201d Then I began thinking, \u201cNo, I\u2019m not going to go back to a life of sin. I\u2019m going to trust Jesus tonight.\u201d And that\u2019s exactly what happened!
\nIt may surprise you that my conversion took place after two years of struggle like this. It may seem strange that my story took so many twists and turns\u2014and was so complicated. And yet God\u2019s creation itself is intricately complex. The complexity of conversion and the complexity of creation both point to the existence of an intelligent God.
\nBuilding Blocks
\nThe ancient Greeks thought that everything consisted of four basic substances, which they called elements\u2014earth, air, fire, and water. Most Hindu philosophy says that physical matter is only an illusion called \u201cmaya.\u201d What are things made of? There have been many theories as there were people to invent them.
\nThe first man who was close to being scientifically correct was a Greek philosopher named Democritus (460\u2013370 BC). He believed that all physical matter was made up of very small particles called atoms. The word \u201catom\u201d in Greek means \u201cthat which cannot be cut\u201d (\u201ca\u201d = negation and \u201ctomo\u201d = cut; \u201ca\u201d + \u201ctomo\u201d = \u201catom\u201d). Democritus taught that all matter could be cut, or broken down into smaller and smaller pieces, until the smallest pieces were reached, which he called \u201catoms.\u201d Democritus said that these pieces could not be divided any further.
\nDemocritus was basically right, but no one could prove it for two thousand years because scientific experiments weren\u2019t advanced enough to test his theory. It wasn\u2019t until 1819, less than two hundred years ago, that the English chemist John Dalton (1766\u20131844) again brought up the idea of atoms and had experimental evidence to back it up. He firmly established the theory that matter is made up of atoms.
\nDalton couldn\u2019t see atoms. They are far too small to see with the human eye, or even with an ordinary microscope. It is only in recent years that scientists have been able to observe atoms with highly specialized instruments.
\nDalton argued that matter is made up of atoms because chemical substances always react in definite and fixed proportions and weights. This could only happen if basic building blocks\u2014atoms such as hydrogen, carbon, oxygen, and nitrogen\u2014existed. These building blocks had fixed weights of their own and combined with other atoms according to definite rules, which explained the proportions and weights that he was measuring.
\nScientists spent many decades discovering the different kinds of atoms. The elements can be arranged in an ornate pattern called the periodic table. The usual form stops with 92 elements, from hydrogen to uranium, although other elements have been discovered.
\nAtoms combine into molecules. There are uncounted millions of different varieties. The most well known molecule is made from two hydrogen atoms and one oxygen atom, which is why chemists refer to it as H2O. Everyone else calls it water.
\nMolecules combine into many complex structures, which, in turn, are built up into the cells that form the bodies of plants, animals, and people. Each human body contains uncounted billions of cells too small to see with the naked eye. Each cell contains uncounted trillions of atoms. All of these atoms and molecules move together in an incredibly complex structure according to definite laws and rules. We are \u201cfearfully and wonderfully made\u201d (Psalm 139:14).
\nThe Creation Is Intricately Complex, Reflecting the Existence of an Intelligent God
\nIf there were no God, if the universe simply existed by itself with no one to govern it, it would be a very disorderly place. Atoms and particles would shuffle about at random with no particular pattern and with no definite purpose. They would move in a \u201csloppy soup\u201d forever and would not form intricate structures able to carry out complicated actions.
\nThe British philosopher William Paley (1743\u20131805) explained complexity as evidence of intelligent design in his \u201cteleological\u201d argument for the existence of God. Here are his own words:
\nIn crossing a heath…suppose I had found a watch upon the ground, and it should be inquired how the watch happened to be in that place…For this reason, and for no other, viz. that when we come to inspect the watch, we perceive…that its several parts are framed and put together for a purpose.21
\nAtoms could never assemble themselves into a working watch by random and purposeless motion. The watch requires a watchmaker, an intelligent designer.
\nIn the same way, the complexity of the creation points to the existence of an intelligent God. If you found an old-fashioned mechanical wristwatch on the ground, you would know that a watchmaker existed. If you found a modern digital watch, powered by a tiny battery, with a calculator built in, you would know it that it was designed by intelligent minds in a civilization capable of building machines of great complexity and detail. Yet there is more complexity in the smallest animal than in a million digital watches. This points to the intelligent mind of God, who designed and built such intricate work!
\nThe magnificence of physics and chemistry, so elegantly simple and yet so fruitful and complicated, gives testimony to the existence of God. Like a beautiful symphony that gathers many instruments to play a single theme, God\u2019s creation follows basic rules to build a great and complicated universe, God\u2019s cosmic symphony, which performs its music through nature to the glory of His name.
\nReductionism and Other Theories That Reject God
\nBut sinful people have perverted God\u2019s gifts and God\u2019s truth. Many unbelieving scientists have studied God\u2019s creation while pushing away the God who made it. No doubt you\u2019ve heard some of their thoughts in a classroom or on a television program. One of the scientific names for their rejection of God is reductionism. This means that everything is merely a collection of atoms. According to this idea, you and I don\u2019t actually exist as separate entities. We\u2019re simply a cluster of atoms, moving around aimlessly. According to this idea, the important things that make life worth living are all false. When two married people say to each other, \u201cI love you,\u201d there is nothing real called \u201clove\u201d that they have for each other. It\u2019s simply the atoms in their bodies moving in certain patterns\u2014and nothing else.
\nClosely related to reductionism, and almost as restrictive, is materialism, which teaches that there is more than just atoms, but nothing on a spiritual level and nothing outside of the physical universe.
\nI believe that these ideas are wrong. Just because something is built from simpler pieces doesn\u2019t mean that there\u2019s nothing to examine but the pieces. A house is built from wood, glass, nails, and other materials. But if you noticed only the pieces and not the house itself, which was designed by intelligent minds for people to live in, you\u2019d miss the whole point! A painting isn\u2019t just a few splatters of paint on a canvas (unless the painter was Jackson Pollock)\u2014no, it is designed to portray something and express a meaning, and the paint is a tool used by an intelligent and artistic mind to that purpose. Beautiful classical music is not just random noise\u2014no, it is a collection of notes produced by instruments arranged in a harmonious pattern. Good music is not simply noise, and a good painting is not just a splatter on the wall.
\nWhat about \u201cmodern\u201d art and \u201cmodern\u201d music? By the term \u201cmodern art\u201d I am not referring to all art in the modern world, but to Expressionist art beginning with Picasso. Such art has often become just a splatter of paint. But that\u2019s usually because there was no purposeful mind behind it. Late in life, Pablo Picasso (1881\u20131973) admitted that his paintings were merely a scam to make money from the rich. He said, \u201cI am only a public clown who has understood his period and has exploited as best he could the imbecility, the vanity, and the cupidity of his contemporaries.\u201d22 And \u201cmodern music\u201d is often a series of noises, such as the dissonant orchestral pieces by the modernist musician John Cage, or worse. It is often simply a series of filthy words, as in much of today\u2019s rap music. Dr. Francis Schaeffer wrote about the breakdown of Western art and music in his landmark book, How Should We Then Live? (Crossway Books, 1976).
\nThe disconnected wording of James Joyce\u2019s novel, Finnegans Wake, illustrates this confusion coming over into modern literature. It is impossible to understand it! If you think I\u2019m wrong, try reading it! Albert Camus and Jean Paul Sartre were famous examples of modern writers who portrayed life as meaningless\u2014with \u201cno exit.\u201d The Pulitzer Prize-winning novelist Ernest Hemingway (1899\u20131961) expressed this existentialist message repeatedly in his stories and novels. It is reflected in these lines: \u201cIt was a nothing that he knew too well. It was all a nothing and a man was nothing too.\u201d23 Hemingway and other existentialist writers often portrayed life as an absurdity. Many other painters, poets, and authors did the same thing because there was no Christianity behind their art, music, and literature, just a human being producing his art without thinking about God.24 Near the end of his life, Hemingway said, \u201cI live in a vacuum that is as lonely as a radio tube when the battery is dead and there is no current to plug into.\u201d25
\nShould this evaluation of \u201cmodern\u201d art, music, and literature be toned down? I don\u2019t think so. For a deeper understanding of what I am talking about, please read How Should We Then Live? by Francis A. Schaeffer (Crossway Books, 1976). Schaeffer gives a full treatment of this subject, based on years of research and reflection.
\nIt should not be hard to see that we are more than a cluster of vibrating atoms living in a jumbled and meaningless world. So, then, why do people teach such ideas? The answer is simple: When people want to break God\u2019s law, they invent an excuse for doing so.
\nThe courts have heard it\u2014and taught it\u2014thousands of times. The idea first put forth by the agnostic attorney Clarence Darrow (1857\u20131938) went like this: \u201cThey couldn\u2019t help it; it was in the genes; it was because of the environment; it was the fault of society\u2014why, you can\u2019t put a murderer to death because it was all the fault of his genes, his social environment, the chemicals in his body, and there was nothing he could do about it!\u201d Well, I live in inner-city Los Angeles, and I can\u2019t walk on the street at night because somebody might follow his genes or his atoms and jump on me. I believe that Darrow\u2019s argument is hollow and untrue to the real nature of man.
\nBack in the twentieth century, the Fascists and Communists used the same excuse. \u201cThere is no God,\u201d they said. \u201cPeople are only material objects and nothing more.\u201d They said this so it wouldn\u2019t sound so bad when they killed millions upon millions of people to stay in power. These ideas didn\u2019t help anyone. They left nothing behind them except piles of bones. Today, in the twenty-first century, most of the world no longer believes in Fascism or Communism. These totalitarian regimes only survive in a few countries and on American college campuses, where the professors are so controlled by outdated doctrines that they are unwilling to examine alternate viewpoints.
\nThese same professors still teach the dated ideas of Jackson Pollock, Pablo Picasso, John Cage, James Joyce, Ernest Hemingway, Jean Paul Sartre, Albert Camus, and Clarence Darrow, as though these \u201chollow men\u201d (to use T. S. Eliot\u2019s famous term) had something of value to teach the new generation of the twenty-first century!
\nThe German philosopher Friedrich Nietzsche (1844\u20131900) was the first intellectual to say in a modern way that \u201cGod is dead,\u201d in his book, The Gay Science. In this book Nietzsche set forth his idea that the orthodox Christian God of Europe is no longer believable and that man must find a way to live without Him.
\nNietzsche pictured a madman going through the streets of a village crying out: \u201cI am looking for God! I am looking for God!\u2026Where has God gone?\u201d he cried. \u201cI shall tell you. We have killed him\u2014you and I\u2026God is dead. God remains dead. And we have killed him.\u201d It has been further related that on that same day the madman entered several churches and there sang a requiem. Led out and quieted, he is said to have told them each time: \u201cWhat are these churches now if they are not the tombs and sepulchres of God?\u201d26
\nIn relating the above story, Nietzsche put forth his belief that rationalism and science have killed the idea of God in the hearts of modern men. Nietzsche suggested that the acceptance of the death of God would also involve the ending of accepted standards of morality, purpose, and the meaning of life. Without God, society is threatened by nihilistic situations where people\u2019s lives are not constrained by thoughts of morality or faith. Dostoyevsky (1821\u20131881) reflected the same thought when he said, \u201cIf God is dead, all things are permissible.\u201d
\nNietzsche understood very well where the \u201cdeath of God\u201d left him\u2014in an empty, sterile world without hope. Nietzsche lost his mind while searching for the meaning of life without God.
\nThe reason more people don\u2019t go insane thinking of a godless world is that they are not as honest with themselves as Nietzsche was.27
\nSplitting the Atom
\nFor many decades, scientists thought that the atom was the smallest building block of matter. But at the beginning of the twentieth century, striking evidence emerged that the atom could be split. Solid matter in one element decayed into atoms of another element through a process called radioactivity. As the years went by, scientists found that atoms could be split in what is called atomic fission. This is the basis for nuclear reactors and the original atomic bombs. Atoms could also be smashed together in what is called atomic fusion, which is the basis of the most destructive type of atomic bomb, and also explains the fire of the sun. The smashing and combining of atomic nuclei inside the sun produces energy, which shines out as light in all directions.
\nDuring the twentieth century thousands of scientists tried to find out the basic building blocks of the universe. First, they thought that every atom was made of only three basic parts: the proton, the neutron, and the electron. These particles moved and interacted with each other and a few other things such as light to produce the universe we live in.
\nBut as scientists experimented they only became more and more perplexed. They found dozens of other particles, such as muons, neutrinos, W and Z particles, and many others. In fact, there was almost a new particle for every letter in the English and Greek alphabets! And they reacted together in extremely complicated ways.
\nThe scientists tried to arrange this complex \u201calphabet soup\u201d of particles in different arrangements. One generally accepted theory says that almost all matter is built out of six different kinds of particles called \u201cquarks.\u201d These quarks are about as strange as their name, which comes from James Joyce\u2019s existential, nihilistic novel Finnegans Wake.28
\nThe latest idea that scientists have come up with is called the \u201cstring theory,\u201d which says that everything is built out of little rings called \u201cstrings\u201d that are far too small to see or measure. And that\u2019s not all\u2014they say that we really don\u2019t live in three dimensions of space and one dimension of time. Rather, many of today\u2019s scientists think we may actually live in ten or eleven dimensions, but the extra dimensions are curled up into little circles that are too small to see. At the present time, it looks like the quarks are real, but no one knows for sure about the little strings and the extra dimensions.
\nOne thing is certain, however: analyzing how the universe is put together requires all the intelligence of thousands of the best minds the human race has to offer from one generation after another\u2014and even then they can only guess, because the universe was designed and built by a God with a mind infinitely greater than theirs.
\nHow Big Is God?
\nOur earth is 25,000 miles in circumference around the equator. About 240,000 miles away, the moon revolves around the earth and causes the tides of the oceans. Our sun is 93,000,000 miles from the earth. It would take a jet plane many years to fly that distance! It took an all-powerful God to make the universe as grand as it is.
\nBut the sun is just one of many stars. The nearest star is about 24,000,000,000,000 miles from us, so far that it takes light about 4 years to reach us from there. This star, Alpha Centauri, is said to be four light-years away. There are about 100,000,000,000 stars in our Milky Way spiral galaxy, and many of them have planets going around them. Our galaxy is just one of about 100,000,000,000 galaxies, and the farthest galaxy is about 10,000,000,000 light years away. How many stars did God make? Only He knows for sure. Musician Stuart Hamblen described this in one of his most popular songs:
\nThough man may strive
\nTo go beyond the reef of space,
\nTo crawl beyond the distant glimm\u2019ring stars,
\nThe world\u2019s a room so small
\nWithin my Master\u2019s house,
\nThe open sky but a portion of His yard.
\nHow big is God!
\nHow big and wide His vast domain,
\nTo try to tell these lips can only start,
\nHe\u2019s big enough to rule His mighty universe,
\nYet small enough to live within the heart.29
\nThe Andromeda Galaxy
\nOn a cold night in January, while driving through the Georgia countryside, my wife Judith and I stopped our car and looked out at the stars. Without air pollution and city lights we could see a lot more of God\u2019s creation than we could in Los Angeles, including thousands and thousands of stars. We looked in towards the center of our galaxy and saw a band of stars too far away to discern individually\u2014but all together they painted the sky with a beautiful band the color of milk.
\nUsing a telescope, I have seen even more of God\u2019s glory. Some stars are bound together in clusters, others in pairs or triplet arrangements. Some are red and some are blue. Once I saw the Andromeda galaxy through a telescope. Though it is as big as our own galaxy and has as many stars, it is so far away that it was just a small white cloud when seen through the telescope I was using.
\nHow great is the universe! How great is the God who made it!
\nO Lord my God, When I in awesome wonder
\nConsider all the works Thy hand hath made,
\nI see the stars, I hear the mighty thunder,
\nThy pow\u2019r through the universe displayed.
\nThen sings my soul, My Saviour God, to Thee,
\nHow great Thou art! How great Thou art! 30
\nThe Computer and the Creation
\nI am typing this manuscript on a computer, the kind that can be bought in stores for a few hundred dollars today. Sixty-five years ago, when my father was a teenager, an electronic computer like this didn\u2019t exist. When they were finally invented, they cost millions of dollars and were many times less powerful than the machines that are sold for a small amount of money in any office supply store today.
\nWhen I went to college, it took a specialist to use a computer. I did a little programming at that time, but I never became an expert at it and chose to study mathematics instead. Today modern computers can be operated by almost anyone\u2014even a child\u2014with just a slight bit of pressure exerted by a finger to click a mouse button.
\nWhy are computers so simple now? Uncounted thousands of intelligent minds have been at work. Scientists have done the research to make these computers possible. Engineers have figured out how to build the computers to very exacting specifications. Programmers have written millions of lines of commands in computer code to tell these machines what to do.
\nYou would never say that a computer somehow created itself out of nothing. No, it is clear that it took the thinking of thousands of people to design it and to put it together. It\u2019s the same with the universe\u2014only a billion times over. The structure of the universe is much more complicated and requires far more intelligence than any computer. Only a fool would say that a computer came into being by chance without anyone designing it. Only a fool would say that the universe came into being by chance\u2014without anyone creating it. \u201cThe fool hath said in his heart, There is no God\u201d (Psalm 53:1).
\nDarwin and Evolution
\nCharles Darwin (1809\u20131882) published his landmark book The Origin of Species in 1859. Every copy was sold the first day it came out in the bookstores\u2014largely because people wanted to believe it. They chose Darwin\u2019s theory instead of Christianity.
\nToday, evolution is taught as an unquestioned truth in classrooms across the land. According to this theory, the atoms and molecules of an ancient \u201csoup\u201d bounced against each other for millions of years. By a combination of random chance and scientific principles, they arranged themselves in more and more complicated ways until simple organisms were formed. These organisms competed and only the \u201cfittest\u201d survived. Mutations and asteroids crashing into the earth produced changes in the blueprints of plants and animals, until we arrived at the world as we know it today.
\nThere\u2019s one thing wrong with the theory of evolution\u2014it isn\u2019t true! The simplest organism is far too complicated to arise without a Designer, even after allowing for all scientific principles of material organization, complexity theory, and the preferred arrangements of molecules.
\nMolecular biologist Michael Denton explains that even a single cell is an extremely complicated construction, which could not possibly have risen from random interactions of atoms and molecules. In his book, Evolution: A Theory in Crisis, Dr. Denton tells us that one cell resembles a huge automated factory, larger than a city, carrying out hundreds of different functions. Remember that it is just a single cell he is writing about! The human body consists of uncounted billions of cells of different types, organized in incredibly complicated arrangements. The complexity of one cell, not to speak of the human body itself, is impossible to understand in terms of simple molecular motion and random or semi-random combinations. The amount of information required is simply staggering, which points to an intelligent Designer.31
\nPerhaps you have read of man\u2019s attempts to decode the human genome and understand the genetic blueprints of the body. Scientists have devoted countless hours to work on understanding human genetics. And even when they finish their task, they will still know very little about how each piece works with all the other pieces to make life function.
\nLet us suppose that someday scientists are able to build a living cell. Would this disprove the existence of God? By no means! The construction of a living organism from the elements is not possible now, with today\u2019s level of knowledge. If life were to be synthesized in the future, it would require much greater knowledge, built up by thousands of intelligent humans working with computers and other tools over many years. In other words, even the simplest form of life requires a very high level of knowledge and intelligence and is not simply an accident. There can be no life\u2014even in its simplest form\u2014without a Designer! And the far greater complexity of advanced life, and of the universe itself, indicates the existence of an intelligent God.
\nBiology God\u2019s Way
\nBefore I became a Christian, I believed in evolution. I thought that an intelligent person was compelled to believe it because it was \u201cscientific.\u201d But I changed my mind when I was confronted by the evidence for creation.
\nA few weeks after I was converted, Dr. Duane Gish and Richard Bliss, of the Institute for Creation Research, came to UCLA for three days to give a series of presentations on the scientific evidence for creation. I attended all of these seminars. Dr. Gish and Mr. Bliss showed how the fossil record had many gaps, indicating that evolution could not explain how one type of animal had evolved into another. They showed that the changes described by evolution were impossible according to the mathematics of chance. They described specific animals that, if they had evolved through a series of intermediate steps, would have quickly died out, because they could only be viable life forms if they were built as complete organisms.
\nOn the last meeting of their presentation, Dr. Gish and Mr. Bliss passed a paper through the audience and asked each person to mark what they believed. They asked each of us to write our names and then to mark with an \u201cx\u201d whether we accepted evolution or creation. When the paper came to me, I wrote my name. Then I paused for a second or two. I thought, \u201cI\u2019m a Christian. I have heard the scientific evidence for creation. If I believe in Jesus Christ and the Bible, I have to accept the view of these creationists.\u201d I put an \u201cx\u201d after my name in the column which indicated that I accepted creation. That was the end of the matter for me. I have believed in biblical creation ever since.
\nMichael Denton is a medical doctor and scientist who lives in Australia, where he is currently doing research in molecular biology. Dr. Denton does not write Christian books. He writes from a secular viewpoint, but he shows the lack of evidence behind Darwinian evolution in his writings. For instance, Denton said,
\nThe overriding supremacy of the myth [of evolution] has created a widespread illusion that the theory of evolution was all but proved one hundred years ago and that all subsequent biological research\u2014paleontological, zoological and in the newer branches of genetics and molecular biology\u2014has provided ever-increasing evidence of Darwin\u2019s ideas. Nothing could be further from the truth\u2026His general theory, that all life on earth had originated and evolved by a gradual successive accumulation of fortuitous mutations, is still, as it was in Darwin\u2019s time, a highly speculative hypothesis entirely without direct factual support and very far from that self-evident axiom some of its more aggressive advocates would have us believe.32
\nIn view of the fact that there is very little real evidence for evolution, Dr. John R. Rice asked a probing question and gave a simple answer:
\nAll the real evidence is on the side of creation by a supernatural God instead of evolution by inherent forces. Why, then, do the mass of people believe in evolution? Of course, the mass of people who believe it do so because they are taught to believe it and they want to believe it. But why do [many] scientists, educators, believe in evolution? The answer still is that they want to believe it.33
\nDuane Gish and Richard Bliss convinced me that the Bible presents a more plausible scientific picture than Charles Darwin or those who followed him. When I was presented with the arguments for creation, I gave up my belief in evolution. It was as simple as that.
\nThe Bible says that God performed His creative work in six days. On the third day, God said, \u201cLet the earth bring forth grass, the herb yielding seed, and the fruit tree yielding fruit after his kind, whose seed is in itself, upon the earth: and it was so\u201d (Genesis 1:11).
\nOn the fifth day, God said, \u201cLet the waters bring forth abundantly the moving creature that hath life, and fowl that may fly above the earth in the open firmament of heaven. And God created great whales, and every living creature that moveth, which the waters brought forth abundantly, after their kind, and every winged fowl after his kind: and God saw that it was good\u201d (Genesis 1:20\u201321).
\nOn the sixth day, God did two things. First, He said, \u201cLet the earth bring forth the living creature after his kind, cattle, and creeping thing, and beast of the earth after his kind: and it was so\u201d (Genesis 1:24). Then, God said, \u201cLet us make man\u201d (Genesis 1:26).
\nThe Bible says, \u201cCasting down imaginations, and every high thing that exalteth itself against the knowledge of God, and bringing into captivity every thought to the obedience of Christ\u201d (2 Corinthians 10:5). When the Bible is believed and obeyed, the false theories of evolution and reductionism are brought into question. The verses that I have given from Genesis, chapter one, shed light on both of these errors.
\nFirst, these verses from Genesis unmask the theory of evolution as a falsehood. Over and over the Bible says that each living creature brings forth descendants \u201cafter his kind.\u201d Variations are possible within the boundaries of what the Bible calls \u201ckinds.\u201d If people bring red-haired dogs together for generation after generation, the result will be a purebred line of red-haired dogs. If these dogs are then allowed to mix with dogs of other colors, all sorts of mixtures and combinations will result. But these dogs will always stay within their own biblical \u201ckind.\u201d They will never produce birds, fish, or people. Those creatures can only arise from their own \u201ckinds.\u201d
\nSecond, these verses from Genesis show the fallacy of reductionism, which is the idea that nothing exists except a collection of atoms and particles; and everything above that is just built on theory. These verses in Genesis say that God set up the world of plants, water creatures, birds, land animals, and humans in four creative acts, on three of the six days of creation.
\nIf at any point God had seen fit to stop His work, nothing more would have been created. If God had stopped after the third day, there wouldn\u2019t be any animals or people, just plants. If God had stopped part of the way through the sixth day, there would never have been any humans. The different kinds of creatures are not mere reductions to the basic atoms from which they were built. They required a separate command from God in order to exist. Each of the creative acts was a separate and individual act of God, in which He formed living creatures and defined them as existing. So, God looks upon you as a person, a human being, not as mere atoms and chemicals. God created mankind from the dust of the earth, but the creation of mankind did not end there. He breathed the breath of life into the first man and defined Adam as a living soul (see Genesis 2:7), with a separate identity from the dust of which his body was made. God looks upon you as a living soul. That\u2019s why He sent Jesus Christ to redeem you. (See Romans 5:6, 8.)
\nDogmatic Evolutionists
\nJosh McDowell asks the question, \u201cWhy don\u2019t more scientists accept creation?\u201d Here is his answer:
\nStudents no longer are taught that there is any evidence which contradicts evolution. Evolution is taught in the universities as though it were a proven fact. Anyone who questions the validity of evolution is automatically suspect in the eyes of the evolutionists. Teilhard de Chardin, an evolutionary philosopher, stated, \u201cExcepting a few ultra-conservative groups it would not occur to any present day thinker or scientist\u2014it would be psychologically inadmissible and impossible\u2014to pursue a line of thought which ignores the concept of a world in evolution.\u201d34
\n…Thus, in looking at what de Chardin said, we find that he called creationists \u201cultra-conservatives.\u201d And obviously no one wants to be that. He also said that you can\u2019t be a thinker or a scientist if you don\u2019t believe in evolution. These arguments are psychologically powerful and therefore sway a number of people, but they have little to do with whether or not evolution [is true].
\n…E. Peter Volpe wrote, \u201cIt scarcely seems necessary to debate the fact that evolution, as an event, has occurred. It is in the explanation of evolution that differences of opinion have arisen. One may challenge an interpretation, but to contest the interpretation is not to deny the existence of the event itself. A wide-spread fallacy is to discredit the truth of evolution by seizing upon points of disagreement concerning the mechanism of evolution.\u201d35
\nWithout presenting any evidence whatsoever that what he says is correct, Volpe has informed his students that: (1) evolution is a fact, and (2) contradictions to evolution can\u2019t be used to disprove [it] since these are only disagreements about the mechanism.
\n…Notice the utter disregard for any alternate position as well as the dogmatic affirmation of the evolutionist position in the following statements:
\n\u201cNo considerable Christian body, indeed, now insists upon the exact and literal acceptance of the Bible narrative…\u201d36\u2014H. G. Wells, committing the logical fallacy of the band-wagon argument.
\n\u201cThe idea of the earth\u2019s going round the sun was considered to be just as impious in its time as was the idea of evolution by the Fundamentalists of the backward States today.\u201d37\u2014H. G. Wells, Julian Huxley, G. P. Wells, doing some name-calling. Who wants to be backwards?
\n\u201cToday of course, the belief that living things were especially created for an earth prepared to receive them finds no scientific support.\u201d
\nA student confronted with such opinions is hard pressed to contradict his professor. Since most scientists receive training that ignores any alternatives, is it any wonder that few [of them] accept creationism?38
\nWas William Jennings Bryan a Fool?
\nWilliam Jennings Bryan (1860\u20131925) has been portrayed as a half-wit by the secular media for defending the Bible against evolution. But Bryan was no fool. He was the Democratic Party nominee for President in 1896, 1900, and 1908. And history shows that the first man he ran against, William McKinley, did not have Bryan\u2019s ability or character. Even Clarence Darrow, Bryan\u2019s antagonist in the Scopes Trial, admitted he had voted for him twice because of Bryan\u2019s progressive ideas in politics. President McKinley is hardly remembered today, while Bryan is discussed in every college classroom when the subjects of the gold standard or evolution are brought up.
\nBryan was Secretary of State under President Woodrow Wilson from 1913 to 1915. He had the moral courage to resign rather than back the administration as it plunged our nation into World War I, \u201cthe unfinished war,\u201d which history shows did not make \u201cthe world safe for democracy.\u201d Bryan had the foresight to see this error. America should have stayed out of World War I and let the European nations settle it by themselves. World War II might never have occurred if Wilson had listened to Bryan. Bryan was right. Wilson was wrong.
\nBryan\u2019s arguments on the subject of creation and evolution are solid and convincing. Those who have only been exposed to the Scopes Trial through the Hollywood propaganda film, Inherit the Wind, should read the masterful arguments of this great American. Bryan said,
\nThere never was a time when we needed religion [i.e. Christianity] more than today. We need it in the world; we need it in this country. Look at the sin and crime in our own country…There are [thousands of] college men in our prisons; how much good has education done them? The country spent its money to educate them, but their hearts went wrong, and their hearts took their brains with them. Brains that are trained for the good of the country were turned to the plunder of society and there is no hope unless we can get back to a religion that makes men believe in God and a future life and gives them a sense of responsibility. The world needs Christ.39
\nThe cold, lonely, meaningless society of our day proves that Bryan was right\u2014and his opponents were wrong. Read the newspaper. One news event after the other shows that our society has gone wrong, and reveals that Bryan was one of the few men in his day with the insight to see that a belief in evolution would produce a world without love, without meaning\u2014without God!
\nJ. Gresham Machen (1881\u20131936) was a professor at Princeton Theological Seminary for twenty-three years, and went on to found Westminster Theological Seminary in 1929. He voiced a profound thought in these words:
\nOur salvation depends squarely upon history; the Bible contains that history, and unless that history is true the authority of the Bible is gone and we who have put our trust in the Bible are without hope.40
\nThose who reject the message of the Bible have \u201cno hope, and [are] without God in the world\u201d (Ephesians 2:12). Without God there is no real hope for mankind.
\nThe Dilemma
\nMichael Behe is associate professor of biochemistry at Lehigh University in Pennsylvania. In his book, Darwin\u2019s Black Box, Behe shows how science became hardened against God through clashes with Christianity, epitomized by the Wilberforce\/Huxley debate and the Scopes trial. Behe goes on to show the dilemma scientists face today.
\nOver the past four decades modern biochemistry has uncovered the secrets of the cell. The progress has been hard won. It has required tens of thousands of people to dedicate the better parts of their lives to the tedious work of the laboratory. Graduate students in untied tennis shoes scraping around the lab late on Saturday night; postdoctoral associates working fourteen hours a day seven days a week; professors ignoring their children in order to polish and repolish grant proposals, hoping to shake a little money loose from politicians with larger
\nconstituencies to feed\u2014these are the people that make scientific research move forward. The knowledge we now have of life at the molecular level has been stitched together from innumerable experiments in which proteins were purified, genes cloned, electron micrographs taken, cells cultured, structures determined, sequences compared, parameters varied, and controls done. Papers were published, results checked, reviews written, blind alleys searched, and new leads fleshed out.
\nThe result of these cumulative efforts to investigate the cell\u2014to investigate life at the molecular level\u2014is a loud, clear, piercing cry of \u201cdesign!\u201d The result is so unambiguous and so significant that it must be ranked as one of the greatest achievements in the history of science. The discovery rivals those of Newton and Einstein, Lavoisier and Schrodinger, Pasteur, and Darwin. The observation of the intelligent design of life is as momentous as the observation that the earth goes around the sun or that disease is caused by bacteria or that radiation is emitted in quanta. The magnitude of the victory, gained at such great cost through sustained effort over the course of decades, would be expected to send champagne corks flying in labs around the world. This triumph of science should evoke cries of \u201cEureka!\u201d from ten thousand throats, should occasion much hand-
\nslapping and high-fiving, and perhaps even be an excuse to take a day off.
\nBut no bottles have been uncorked, no hands slapped. Instead, a curious, embarrassed silence surrounds the stark complexity of the cell. When the subject comes up in public, feet start to shuffle, and breathing gets a bit labored. In private people are more relaxed; many explicitly admit the obvious but then stare at the ground, shake their heads, and let it go at that.
\nWhy does the scientific community not greedily embrace its startling discovery? Why is the observation of design handled with intellectual gloves? The dilemma is that while one side of the elephant [the big issue facing the scientific community] is labeled intelligent design, the other side might be labeled God.41
\nScientists who are embarrassed by the idea that intelligent design shows there is a God should ponder this thought by J. Gresham Machen: \u201cA thing cannot possibly be true in religion and false in philosophy or in science. All methods of arriving at truth, if they be valid methods, will arrive at a harmonious result.\u201d42
\nChapter Four
\n\u201cYou Can\u2019t Change the Rules of the Game!\u201d<\/p>\n
The Anthropic Principle\u2014 Numbers in the Creation Cannot Vary, Reflecting the Wisdom and Purpose of God
\nWhen I was a child, I learned to play chess, checkers, and many other games. Playing alone, taking all the players\u2019 parts one after another, I was soon changing the rules to see how a game would come out and what the best strategies would be if the rules were changed this way and that. Most of the time there wasn\u2019t much of a challenge to it. In fact, with some of my rules changes, there wasn\u2019t much of a game left. Only certain combinations of rules made up a real game.
\nWhen I tried to change the rules and become a Christian without coming to Christ, it simply didn\u2019t work. I found that this principle applies throughout creation\u2014you can\u2019t change the rules of the game!
\nThen I read about the anthropic principle. It said that the scientific universe was a much more advanced version of what I had learned about changing the rules of a game. Changing one or two of the basic numbers that define the universe by even a small amount would mean there was no game at all\u2014no stars, no atoms, and certainly no life as we know it.
\nThe universe is adapted to man! That is the essence of the anthropic cosmological principle. It means that the universe was designed for man to exist. This principle is discussed in technical detail by John D. Barrow and Frank J. Tipler in The Anthropic Cosmological Principle.43 They show, with many equations and references, that the scientific organization of the universe is not coincidental, but appears to have been chosen in order to make human life possible.
\nThe anthropic principle means, in simple terms, that the universe was designed for the existence of human life, and this is apparent even in the details of the numbers found in science. If the numbers for the representing the mass (weight) of elementary particles, the numbers for the energy levels of the atom, and the numbers for the strengths of the gravitational, electrical, and other forces that bind particles together were to vary by even a very small amount, life as we know it would not be possible. Thus, these numbers appear to have been chosen in a special way by an intelligent Creator.
\nDr. John C. Whitcomb said,
\nThe overwhelming evidence of design throughout the entire universe as well as the solar system and our own planet has never been more obvious than now. The perfect mass of the proton, and the exact factor of 2 in gravitational and electrical force equations demand a supreme Designer. So remarkable are these universal mathematical proportions that the term Anthropic [Human] Principle is being widely used among astronomers to describe the \u201cneat and tidy\u201d cosmic mathematical formulas which are independent of the human mind and yet seem to be in beautiful harmony with the way we think. The more we learn of the astronomic universe, the more we realize that evolution, even theistic evolution, offers no rational answers.44
\nThe scientific philosopher Paul Davies illustrates the complexity of design when he answers the question, \u201cIs there a meaning behind existence?\u201d
\nIt is interesting to ask just how improbable it is that the laws of physics permit complex structures to exist. How finely must these laws be \u201ctuned\u201d?…British astrophysicists Bernard Carr and Martin Rees concluded that the world is extraordinarily sensitive to even minute changes in the laws of physics, so that if the particular set of laws we have were to be altered in any way the universe would change beyond recognition.
\nCarr and Rees found that the existence of complex structures seems to depend very sensitively on the numerical values that nature has assigned to the so-called fundamental constants, the numbers which determine the scale of physical phenomena. Among these constants are the speed of light, the masses of the various subatomic particles, and a number of \u201ccoupling\u201d constants such as the elementary unit of charge, which determines how strongly the various force fields act on matter. The actual numerical values adopted by these quantities determine many of the gross features of the world, such as the sizes of atoms, nuclei, planets, and stars, the density of material in the universe, the lifetime of stars, and even the height of animals.45
\nRichard D. Meisner gives a popular summary of the astonishing \u201ccoincidences\u201d in the scientific universe. Meisner points out the exact values of the numbers that define the fundamental particles of the universe, and the laws that they follow, seem deliberately chosen to make human life possible. If these numbers were to be changed by even a tiny amount, life would not merely be different, it would be utterly impossible. The physical laws of the universe are not random. The Anthropic Cosmological Principle points to the fact that they were designed by an intelligent Creator for the support of human life.46
\nSome unbelievers accept the overwhelming evidence of the anthropic principle and still deny the existence of the Creator. They say things like this: \u201cIt doesn\u2019t mean anything that the basic numbers of the universe are perfectly set up to make life possible. There is nothing interesting in that. There is no intelligent design in it. If there were uncounted millions of other universes, each with the numbers a little bit different at random, one of them would have the right numbers, and that\u2019s our own universe. The other universes would be dead, with no life in them, and no one would be there to ask questions. We just happen to be in the right place.\u201d
\nThis is simply another way that people take the gifts of God and refuse the Giver. It is the same attitude as that of many people born in the United States of America who do not thank God for all the blessings He has given to their country.
\nImagine someone seeing the faces carved on Mount Rushmore and saying, \u201cThat\u2019s just the way the mountain is. There\u2019s no special reason for those faces being there.\u201d Such a statement would defy logic. When people think that the far greater complexity in the laws and particles of nature shows no evidence of a Creator, they are just as illogical.
\nSome unbelieving scientists have said that the special numbers in the universe will all be explained some day. These men say, \u201cNew theories will be worked out that will explain all of these minute coincidences. So there\u2019s no need to give honor to God. We will explain it all in a few years without any reference to God.\u201d
\nBut if such a theory were constructed and proved true, it would be an even greater reason to give glory to the God who designed it. If it could be shown that there was only one possible way to put the laws of physics together, the greater question remains, \u201cWhy physics at all? Why is there a universe at all?\u201d That question cannot be answered by physics alone, for it is outside the realm of science. Someone may say, \u201cThe universe doesn\u2019t need any reason or purpose. It simply exists.\u201d But this is a greater act of faith than anything required of a Christian.
\nWhich is harder to believe: that the universe exists as it is because of an almighty and intelligent God who designed it, or that the universe with all of its mathematical completion and faultlessness, and with all of its basic numbers perfectly set up in favor of life, came into being all by itself, with no cause or meaning or reason\u2014not at the beginning, not now, and not ever? To deny God in this way, and accept a universe with no ultimate purpose, actually is much more difficult and less reasonable than to affirm God as the Creator and Designer of it.
\nYet many people refuse to acknowledge their Creator because they don\u2019t want to admit that He has authority in their lives and is the Judge whom they must face some day. That would be too unpleasant and would interfere with their lives.
\nTherefore they say unto God, Depart from us; for we desire not the knowledge of thy ways. (Job 21:14)
\nThe evidence of the anthropic principle shows that the universe was carefully designed, that its scientific numbers and laws were chosen to make life possible. Every man and woman ought to thank God for this. Unbelievers today would do well to learn from the attitude of a teenage Jewish girl named Mary. When she heard that she was the mother of the Messiah, she said:
\nMy soul doth magnify the Lord, and my spirit hath rejoiced in God my Saviour. For he hath regarded the low estate of his handmaiden: for, behold, from henceforth all generations shall call me blessed. For he that is mighty hath done to me great things; and holy is his name. (Luke 1:46\u201349)
\nMary was not like the atheists and agnostics of our day. She didn\u2019t say, \u201cThere\u2019s nothing special in this. There\u2019s no reason for me to thank God for His favor toward me.\u201d Instead, Mary worshipped God. I wish more people had the understanding to do that.
\nChapter Five
\n\u201cThere\u2019s No \u2018Free\u2019 Lunch!\u201d<\/p>\n
Conservation of Energy\u2014The Books Have to Balance, Reflecting the Justice of God
\nWhile I was studying at UCLA, I knew two white students and one Asian student who received new cars paid for by \u201cgovernment\u201d money. While I walked to school or took the bus, they partied every night, driving \u201cfree\u201d cars. I wasn\u2019t considered one of the \u201cneedy,\u201d so I had to sweat forty or fifty hours a week, usually working past midnight to pay my own way through college. I also paid taxes on every penny I earned. But the students with \u201cfree\u201d cars had their education paid for by \u201cthe government.\u201d I knew that their tuition, food, apartments, and cars were not really \u201cfree.\u201d The money for these things was taken from those of us who paid taxes. Through this experience, I saw the law of the conservation of energy in practice. In this world you can\u2019t get something for nothing. The books have to balance. Somebody has to pay.
\nThe First Law of Thermodynamics
\nThe law of the conservation of energy is also called the First Law of Thermodynamics. Dr. Henry M. Morris defined energy as \u201can entity which does, or has the capacity to, do work.\u201d47 The First Law of Thermodynamics simply states that, in a closed system, the total amount of energy neither increases nor decreases, but always stays the same. Energy does not disappear or appear in the normal course of affairs. This law says, \u201cYou can\u2019t get something for nothing.\u201d
\nIsaac Asimov (1920\u20131992) described the First Law of Thermodynamics as follows:
\nTo express all this, we can say: \u201cEnergy can be transferred from one place to another, or transformed from one form to another, but it can be neither created nor destroyed.\u201d Or we can put it another way: \u201cThe total quantity of energy in the universe is constant.\u201d
\nThis law is considered the most powerful and most fundamental generalization about the universe that scientists have ever been able to make. No one knows why energy is conserved, and no one can be completely sure it is truly conserved everywhere in the universe and under all conditions. All that anyone can say is that in over a century and a quarter of careful measurement scientists have never been able to point to a definite violation of energy conservation, either in the familiar everyday surroundings about us, or in the heavens above or in the atoms within.48
\nAsimov pointed out that science has never found a violation of the conservation of energy, even on the smallest scale. In accounting for energy, the books must balance. This is why scientists were compelled to search for something called a \u201cneutrino,\u201d until they found it. The books had to balance\u2014and they did!
\nSearching for the Smallest of All Particles
\nScientists spent twenty-five years searching for a mysterious particle that the physicist Enrico Fermi (1901\u20131954) called a \u201cneutrino.\u201d He chose that name because in Italian it means \u201clittle neutral one.\u201d This describes what a neutrino would be like\u2014if somebody could only find one!
\nA neutrino was supposed to be among the smallest of all particles and almost undetectable. Billions of neutrinos supposedly passed through our earth every day, without reacting with a single atom in the planet. In fact, a neutrino could pass through thousands of light-years of lead before it was stopped.
\nYou might think that it isn\u2019t very important to search for something as small and inconsequential as a neutrino. After all, they don\u2019t have very much impact upon you and me, or upon anything else! But scientists all over the world spent twenty-five years diligently seeking their existence. The idea of the neutrino was first suggested in 1931, and the search began. Physicists were not content until they finally detected the missing particle a generation later, in 1956.
\nHow did this search get started? In a certain nuclear reaction called \u201cbeta decay,\u201d there was a tiny bit of energy that was missing. No one knew what happened to it or where it had gone. But everyone believed that it had to go somewhere. Energy didn\u2019t just disappear! Scientists thought there had to be a very tiny and weak particle that carried off the energy, so elusive that it had almost no interaction with ordinary matter and could pass through endless miles of material without being found. Here was born the idea of the neutrino. And the scientific community searched without rest and without peace until they found the particle twenty-five years later.
\nWhat drove an entire generation of physicists to search for a particle so small and seemingly unimportant? The answer is philosophical in nature. Without the neutrino, the law of the conservation of energy would have been violated!
\nNo, It\u2019s Not Free
\nIn simple language, the conservation of energy principle says, \u201cYou can\u2019t get something for nothing.\u201d Or sometimes it\u2019s expressed in the saying, \u201cThere is no such thing as a free lunch.\u201d
\nMany people in Los Angeles say, \u201cIt\u2019s free.\u201d They get \u201cfree\u201d food and \u201cfree\u201d places to live, often more comfortable places than working people can pay for. They get medical insurance, which many working people can\u2019t afford. After all, \u201cit\u2019s free.\u201d During the riots in 1992, people of many different races ran into stores and took whatever they wanted, shouting gleefully, \u201cIt\u2019s free now!\u201d
\nBut are these things really free? Do they appear out of nowhere? As the expression goes, \u201cNo way!\u201d Other people who are working have to give up much time, money, and energy to support a large government structure at federal, state, county, and city levels. The politicians who run this government structure use some of this money to pay themselves and then give much of it away as \u201cfree\u201d benefits, so they can boast to the public how compassionate \u201cthey\u201d are and how generous \u201cthey\u201d are. But someone else did the labor. Doctors and nurses worked hard to give \u201cfree\u201d medical care. Someone put out the taxes that paid the welfare checks and all the other benefits. These things are not really \u201cfree.\u201d They are paid for by someone else, someone who worked.
\nI\u2019m not saying that there is never a situation where people need help. There are people who are elderly and sick and cannot help themselves. But even when those people get the help they legitimately need, there are others who produced the things they receive. Actually, those who receive help do so because of the concern of others who gave, not as a \u201cfreebie\u201d that costs nothing and comes from nowhere. Good things must come from some place. In the final analysis, all these things come directly or indirectly from God (James 1:17).
\nI have met many people who hoped to become rich through some foolish scheme rather than hard work and study. They remain poor because there is no such thing as a \u201cfree lunch.\u201d In science the conservation of energy principle says the same thing: \u201cYou can\u2019t get something for nothing.\u201d Energy has to come from somewhere, and the Bible teaches that \u201csomewhere\u201d is God.
\nThe validity and strength of the energy principle in science is described by David Halliday and Robert Resnick:
\nTotal energy\u2014kinetic plus potential plus heat plus all other forms\u2014does not change. Energy may be transformed from one kind to another, but it cannot be created or destroyed; the total energy is conserved.
\nThis statement is a generalization from our experience, so far not contradicted by observation of nature. It is called the principle of the conservation of energy. Often in the history of physics this principle seemed to fail. But its apparent failure stimulated the search for the reasons. Experimentalists searched for physical phenomena besides motion that accompany the forces of interaction between bodies. Such phenomena have always been found…The energy concept now permeates all of physical science and has become one of the unifying ideas of physics.49
\nAs Halliday and Resnick point out, energy is found in many forms. The energy in an object\u2019s motion is called kinetic energy, while the energy in an object\u2019s position is called potential energy. Think of a pendulum swinging back and forth. At the bottom of the swing, the pendulum is moving the fastest, and its energy is in the form of motion or kinetic energy. At the top of the swing, the pendulum is not moving at all, so there is no kinetic energy. The energy is now in what is called potential energy, which is the energy involved in raising the pendulum from the bottom to the top of its swing. Then, when the pendulum swings down, the potential energy converts back to kinetic energy so that the pendulum moves again.
\nPotential energy is not something that is realized immediately, but it is there all the same! Imagine a lake of water piled up high behind a dam. That water can turn a wheel or a turbine to generate electrical power as it moves downwards. The potential energy of the water being at a high elevation is converted into kinetic energy to turn the wheel, and that can be converted into electrical energy and sent through wires to light up our homes. Some of the energy is consumed as friction and makes the wheel and the water warmer. But the account books of energy must always balance. Even the energy \u201clost\u201d to heat through friction does not cease to exist, it is just converted into a different form that is much less useful to us.
\nWe could pump the water back up behind the dam through a pipe, but it would require a lot of energy to do this. This energy would then be stored in potential form, in that the water would be high above the dam again, and the energy could be released once more by having the water turn a wheel as it flowed down.
\nThe First Law of Thermodynamics has predictive force in many situations. It can tell us how high a rocket will rise, and help to predict the motions of the planets. It can calculate the speed of each planet in terms of its distance from the sun.
\nThe energy law is valid not only for mechanical motion but in all of physics. It operates constantly in our daily lives. When you drive an automobile, chemical potential energy in the fuel is converted into the expansion of gas in the cylinders. The resulting mechanical energy is passed to the axles and wheels, accelerating the car. Along the way, some energy is converted to heat in the form of heating the engine (requiring a cooling system), friction with the air and road, and hot gases out the exhaust pipe. When the car comes to a stop, the energy of the motion of the car is converted to heat through friction in the brakes. In the meantime, some of the energy is converted through a generator to electrical form to recharge the battery and power electrical accessories such as the radio, whose speakers then produce mechanical energy in the form of sound waves in the air. By the way, the initial spark in starting the car was provided by stored electrical energy in the battery. Without this the car cannot start. Thus, an everyday activity such as driving a car relies upon the law of conservation of energy.
\nEinstein\u2019s theory of relativity does not overthrow the First Law of Thermodynamics. Under relativity theory, the First Law remains valid, with the extension that energy can be converted to mass (matter) and back again.
\nThe most famous equation in relativity is e = mc2, where e is energy, m is the mass or amount of matter in an object, and c is the speed of light. Because \u201cc,\u201d the speed of light, is so large, a small amount of matter can be converted into a very great amount of energy. The conversion of mass into energy is what keeps our planet alive, and it is what makes the atomic age possible.
\nEnergy Makes the Sun Shine
\nWhat makes the sun shine? The heat and light of the sun are generated by nuclear fusion reactions. Inside the sun, four hydrogen nuclei (four protons) form, through a series of steps, a single helium nucleus (two neutrons and two protons), two positrons, and two neutrinos. The initial energy is the mass-energy of the four protons. The final energy appears to be the mass-energy of two protons, two neutrons, two positrons, and two neutrinos. Since a neutron is more massive than a proton, it appears that energy has been somehow added from outside for this reaction to proceed. The missing energy appears in the form of the binding energy of the helium nucleus. A helium nucleus weighs less, has a lesser mass, than the sum of two protons and two neutrons. The whole weighs less than its parts! This difference, this binding energy, reveals that to separate the helium nucleus, with two protons and two neutrons together, into its component particles, two protons and two neutrons separately, requires a major input of energy. To assemble such a nucleus produces a corresponding release of energy. This difference is more than enough to carry the day. The actual end product is a helium nucleus (two protons and two neutrons together, not separately), two positrons, and two neutrinos. This set of end products turns out to have less mass-energy than the original four protons. The extra energy available, the difference between the initial energy and the final energy, is tremendous, and results in the great power of hydrogen fusion.
\nThis is the major source of energy that makes the sun shine. It is also the reaction that provides the explosive energy for the most destructive kind of atomic bomb, called the hydrogen bomb. Thus, the interchange of mass and energy both provides life for all the earth, and threatens the life of millions of people at the same time.
\nHow does a nuclear reactor generate electricity? Not through fusion, or pushing atoms together, but through fission, the splitting of atoms. In a typical fission reaction, a nucleus of Uranium-235 plus a single neutron produces three neutrons and two smaller nuclei, one of Krypton-94 and one of Barium-139. The law of energy conservation again applies, and this reaction yields a tremendous amount of energy. This sort of fission or atom-splitting reaction can be controlled, as in a nuclear reactor, or uncontrolled in an atomic bomb. Once again, nuclear physics can produce great good or great evil.
\nIn every kind of transaction, whether it be swinging a pendulum, letting water flow downward over a wheel, driving a car, running a nuclear reactor, or the burning of the sun, the total amount of energy is always conserved. The books always have to balance. Scientists have come to believe this so strongly that it has been described as \u201ca faith\u201d rather than a theory. Robert L. Forward points this out:
\nIn 1956 neutrinos were first experimentally observed…Until that time, scientists had been assuming the existence of the neutrino on faith alone. They were so sure that the laws of conservation of angular momentum and mass\/energy were obeyed, that they preferred to believe in an \u201cunobservable\u201d particle rather than give up their beliefs in the conservation laws.50
\nIsaac Asimov was an atheist. He said that no one knows why energy is conserved. But the Bible tells us that energy is conserved because of the law and justice of God.
\nOn the first day of creation, God made matter and energy that had not existed before. \u201cIn the beginning God created the heaven and the earth\u201d (Genesis 1:1). But on the seventh day God ended His creative work. The Bible says:
\nAnd on the seventh day God ended his work which he had made; and he rested on the seventh day from all his work which he had made. (Genesis 2:2)
\nBeginning with the seventh day, there was no more energy put into the universe, except for special miracles\u2014which God can perform when He chooses (the virgin birth and the resurrection of Jesus Christ were two of these special miracles). On the seventh day, the law of conservation of energy began its normal workings in our universe, except when overruled by God when He performs a miracle. God keeps track of every piece of matter in the universe. As Jesus told His disciples, \u201cThe very hairs of your head are all numbered\u201d (Matthew 10:30).
\nIn science, the conservation of energy is a principle that reflects the law and justice of God. The First Law of Thermodynamics states that the total energy of a system cannot change. Energy cannot come from nowhere, and it cannot disappear into nowhere. And when energy is transferred from one place to another, or from one form to another, this must be done according to definite rules, which state that energy is not gained or lost in the end. This scientific principle points us to the law and justice of God, who keeps track of everything in the universe\u2014and who will judge and punish all actions that violate His moral law and His justice. The conservation of energy is the scientific expression of the fact that God is just, that He does what is right. It points to the justice of God.
\nApplying this scientific principle to practical life, God says, in the eighth commandment, that you must not take what you did not work for: \u201cThou shalt not steal\u201d (Exodus 20:15). In the New Testament, Paul said, \u201cIf any would not work, neither should he eat\u201d (2 Thessalonians 3:10).
\nApplying this scientific principle to God\u2019s judgment, the Bible says, \u201cFor God shall bring every work into judgment, with every secret thing, whether it be good, or whether it be evil\u201d (Ecclesiastes 12:14). The Bible says, \u201cEvery idle word that men shall speak, they shall give account thereof in the day of judgment\u201d (Matthew 12:36).
\nMany people think of God as a jolly old fellow who will let everyone (or nearly everyone) into heaven because He is a nice guy. They feel that a God of love wouldn\u2019t punish anyone. But they are wrong.
\nOne attribute of God (His love) cannot cancel another (His justice). All the attributes of God exist together in His nature, and operate in harmony and agreement, whether our limited human minds understand this or not. Because God is just, He cannot simply overlook sin. God must judge sin. Every sin must be paid for. Even a \u201cgood person\u201d by normal standards deserves judgment many times over for his sins.
\nIs There Any Way Out?
\nIn this universe there is no way to break the law of conservation of energy. After all, it\u2019s the law.
\nAnd, similarly, there is no way that a sinner who has broken God\u2019s law can escape from judgment without paying for his sins. God\u2019s law is inescapable. Sin requires a punishment. \u201cThe wages of sin is death\u201d (Romans 6:23). Punishment for sin is eternal. Is there any way to escape? In both science and salvation, the answer lies outside of the physical universe\u2014and outside of the sinner himself.
\nGod does not live \u201cinside\u201d the physical universe as you and I do. He lives \u201coutside\u201d of His creation. He existed before the creation, from eternity past. God decreed the creation of the universe, and so it was created. He did not form it from preexistent matter. In the creation, the infinite and almighty God made material things from nothing. The theological term for this doctrine is \u201cex nihilo,\u201d literally, \u201cfrom nothing.\u201d As an act of His will, He ordained that the universe should exist. He produced something that wasn\u2019t there before. Once created the universe, as an entity, had to obey God\u2019s law of the conservation of energy. But God has the right to intervene inside the universe from the outside, in the form of occasional miracles.
\nOne great intervention from \u201coutside\u201d happened when Christ was raised from the dead. Both the disciples and the enemies of Jesus thought He would stay in the grave once He had been crucified. But He rose from the dead. Within the physical scientific universe there was no possible explanation. The resurrection happened because God intervened from outside His creation. Jesus rose from the dead and triumphed over sin and hell because God stepped in and raised His physical body. The resurrected Christ said, \u201cHandle me, and see; for a spirit hath not flesh and bones, as ye see me have\u201d (Luke 24:39).
\nIt is the same with God\u2019s remedy for human sin. God intervenes from the \u201coutside\u201d to save us. \u201cHerein is love, not that we loved God, but that he loved us, and sent his Son to be the propitiation for our sins\u201d (1 John 4:10). The first part of this verse tells us that God loved us even when we didn\u2019t love Him. The second part of the verse shows that God\u2019s love comes without denying His justice, because God provided a sacrifice, paying for sin and appeasing the righteous demands of His law for the punishment of sin, by pouring out punishment upon Jesus Christ on the cross. That\u2019s what \u201cpropitiation\u201d means.
\nYet it pleased the Lord to bruise him; he hath put him to grief: when thou shalt make his soul an offering for sin. (Isaiah 53:10, emphasis added)
\nFor God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son\u2026 (John 3:16, emphasis added)
\nChrist Jesus: whom God hath set forth to be a propitiation through faith in his blood\u2026 (Romans 3:24\u201325, emphasis added)
\nHow does God\u2019s love operate? He cannot simply say, \u201cI love everyone, so everyone can go to heaven no matter what they have done.\u201d The love of God cannot operate apart from His justice. No characteristic of God exists in contradiction to the others. All of His attributes exist together. He is a God of both love and justice.
\nThe Bible describes how the love of God comes to sinners when it says, \u201cFor God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have everlasting life\u201d (John 3:16). God in His love could not ignore or deny His own justice. The only way that a loving and just God could let any sinner into heaven is to have that person\u2019s sins paid for, atoned for, through the sacrifice made by Jesus, the sinless Son of God. In this way, and only in this way, can God be both \u201cjust, and the justifier of him which believeth in Jesus\u201d (Romans 3:26). Both the justice and the love of God are seen in the sacrifice of Jesus Christ on the cross.
\nDr. B. B. Warfield (1851\u20131921) of Princeton University said:
\nThe elements of the plan of salvation are rooted in the…nature of the Godhead [the Trinity], in which there coexists a trinal distinction of the persons with absolute unity of essence; and the revelation of the Trinity was [necessary for] the execution of this plan of salvation, in which the Father sent the Son to be the propitiation for sin, and the Son, when He returned to the glory which He had with the Father before the world was, sent the Spirit to apply His redemption to men.51
\nOur Unseen Hope
\nThe physical concept of potential energy shows how \u201cfaith\u201d operates in Christianity. Potential energy does not exist as the motion of objects. Potential energy is not always seen, yet it exists. The energy stored in a battery is potential energy. We can\u2019t see it. Our senses do not perceive this potential energy. But we can use the battery to start a car, which proves the energy was really there all the time\u2014and we see it working visibly when we start the car.
\nThe idea of potential energy is a scientific analogy to Christian faith. The Christian believes in a reality that is not visible to the human senses now. Our eyes and ears do not directly perceive heaven, or God, or the resurrected Christ. The atheist laughs at heaven and hell because he cannot see them with his eyes. He does not understand that \u201cfaith is the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen\u201d (Hebrews 11:1). But the Christian believes in the reality of heaven and hell without seeing them with his physical eyes.
\nThe unbeliever sees and trusts only the immediate and physical: money, pleasure, friends, family, and the things of this world. The unbeliever thinks that it is foolish to lose riches or sinful pleasures in the service of Jesus Christ. The unbeliever has no time to serve God faithfully and regularly in a local church\u2014because he has many other \u201cimportant\u201d things he would rather do with his time. He sees no reason to deny himself the pleasure of sexual activity outside of marriage. He has his \u201cunderstanding darkened\u201d (Ephesians 4:18) and does not see that God, the Bible, and the local church are important.
\nOn the other hand, the Christian is called to \u201ccount all things but loss for the excellency of the knowledge of Christ Jesus\u201d (Philippians 3:8). The Bible says:
\nBy faith Abraham, when he was called to go out into a place which he should after receive for an inheritance, obeyed; and he went out, not knowing whither he went…For he looked for a city which hath foundations, whose builder and maker is God. (Hebrews 11:8, 10)
\nThe Christian does not live his life for selfish pleasure or for money, because he has seen by faith the reality of God. Moses \u201cendured, as seeing him who is invisible\u201d (Hebrews 11:27). The true Christian will, if necessary, give up his very life rather than deny God, because he values God as infinitely more important than any passing pleasure or possession to be enjoyed \u201cfor a season\u201d (Hebrews 11:25). The Christian has \u201cseen\u201d God with his spiritual understanding, and can say with the apostle Paul, \u201cI know whom I have believed, and am persuaded that he is able to keep that which I have committed unto him against that day\u201d (2 Timothy 1:12). Seeing the reality of God through spiritual understanding is the essence of faith.
\nOne day the unseen \u201cpotential\u201d of God\u2019s reality will be seen and felt by every human being, Christian and unbeliever alike. The potential, unseen energy in a battery is manifested openly when the battery starts the car. And one day the things that Christians now see by spiritual faith will be visible by physical sight, when Jesus returns \u201cin the clouds of heaven with power and great glory\u201d (Matthew 24:30) to set up His kingdom on earth.
\nAlso, everyone, Christian and unbeliever alike, will experience the reality of God when they die. Jesus said, \u201cThere was a certain rich man, which was clothed in purple and fine linen, and fared sumptuously every day\u201d (Luke 16:19). This rich man paid great attention to his clothes and his fine food\u2014things that he could physically see and feel. But he had no time for God. Yet when he died, \u201cin hell he lift up his eyes, being in torments\u201d (Luke 16:23). This man had ignored God\u2019s warning and promises. He was more interested in his clothes and his food. But when he died he was forced to physically experience the reality of judgment. Then he cried out, \u201cI am tormented in this flame\u201d (Luke 16:24). The reality of God\u2019s justice, which he had ignored on earth, was forced upon him after death.
\nThe First Law of Thermodynamics (the law of the conservation of energy) says that the record of energy must always balance. You can\u2019t live\u2014or do anything else\u2014without energy. And every bit of that energy must come from an outside source. None of it appears freely. All of it must be paid for.
\nThis shows that God\u2019s justice demands a strict reckoning and an exact payment for all of our sins. God cannot overlook sin without a sin-payment. If He did so, He would not be just. The justice of God requires that you suffer for every sin of thought, word, and deed you have ever committed. If you have no sin-payment from Jesus Christ, you are bound to suffer eternally. But God provided a payment for your sin through the blood sacrifice of His Son, on the cross\u2014if you will trust Him.
\nFor God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him [the Son] should not perish, but have everlasting life. (John 3:16, emphasis added)
\nChapter Six
\n\u201cNothing Gold Can Stay\u201d<\/p>\n
Entropy and Endunamy\u2014The Principles of Decay Within and Input From Without Reflect the Presence of Sin in the Creation and God\u2019s Provision of Grace
\nI studied the existentialist philosophers in high school and college. Their writings didn\u2019t appeal to me. I didn\u2019t want to believe that life was meaningless. Instead, I hoped and planned to become a great mathematician, a successful businessman, and an important person. That was enough meaning for me\u2014then.
\nBut I really wasn\u2019t being honest and consistent. I wasn\u2019t dealing intellectually with atheistic existentialism, so I held conflicting opinions. I believed \u201cwhen you\u2019re dead, you\u2019re dead.\u201d And no matter whether I became rich and famous or not, one day my life would end and there would be no purpose to it. Even if other people remembered me for a time, someday they would be gone too. Since I had no God I could not escape from the hopelessness of life. But I avoided facing these thoughts. By doing that I was avoiding and denying the consequences of the law of entropy.
\nThe four-time Pulitzer Prize-winning poet Robert Frost illustrated entropy perfectly in his poem, \u201cNothing Gold Can Stay.\u201d
\nNature\u2019s first green is gold,
\nHer hardest hue to hold.
\nHer early leaf\u2019s a flower;
\nBut only so an hour.
\nThen leaf subsides to leaf.
\nSo Eden sank to grief,
\nSo dawn goes down to day.
\nNothing gold can stay. 52
\nThis is a poetic description of entropy, the Second Law of Thermodynamics\u2014the relentless and unending loss of energy and of life itself. Simply stated, the entropy law, or the Second Law of Thermodynamics, says, \u201cIn a closed, isolated system, the amount of usable energy in the universe is decreasing.\u201d The principle of entropy in the Second Law of Thermodynamics shows that sin and death have passed upon the entire universe (Romans 5:12\u201314; 8:20\u201323).
\nGod alone remains untouched by the law of entropy. He alone provides endunamy, power from outside the cosmos. The word endunamy comes from the Greek word dunamis, which means \u201cpower.\u201d It means that God is the source of all energy. Without God\u2019s power, we live in a doomed universe. \u201cNothing gold can stay.\u201d
\nWhat Drove Ludwig Boltzmann to Suicide?
\nLudwig Boltzmann (1844\u20131906) was a German physicist who spent decades studying the statistical mechanics of thermodynamics\u2014how molecules move when they are hot or cold, and the different ways in which they are likely to move. He came to the conclusion that the universe was doomed to a fate he called \u201cheat-death.\u201d Boltzmann\u2019s thesis is now accepted by many scientists.
\nIn his research on thermodynamics, Boltzmann had to deal with the principle of entropy, the Second Law of Thermodynamics, which says that the entire universe is running down\u2014and there is no way to reverse this tendency. Boltzmann concluded that some day there will be no available energy left in the cosmos. All the stars will be burned to nuclear ashes and life will be impossible. The whole universe will be empty space, containing only a very sparse sprinkling of dead matter and drifting particles. This lifeless state will continue forever, because nothing will be able to survive in its empty, ashen mist.
\nThe end of the universe is called \u201cheat death\u201d because all temperatures will reach a very cold equilibrium, from which no improvement will be possible. All human beings will have disappeared long ago\u2014and the dead cosmos will drift on forever. Since the Second Law of Thermodynamics (the law of increasing entropy) is irreversible, there is nothing anyone can do to change this destiny. It will all come to nothing in the end, according to the Second Law of Thermodynamics.
\nSince Boltzmann was not a Christian, he saw no way to escape from the principle of entropy. He saw no hope in his own time, and no hope for the ages to come. He became so depressed over this that he finally committed suicide.
\nLudwig Boltzmann believed in the scientific equivalent of atheistic existentialism, a philosophical system that says that there is no meaning to life. Some atheistic existentialists believe that the only valid philosophical question is whether to commit suicide or not, since life is meaningless and absurd.
\nThese ideas have now entered our culture. It is common to hear that there is no meaning in life except the meaning you give it\u2014and that there is no real or objective truth\u2014and that what\u2019s right for you may not be right for me. I have met many young people who hold existential attitudes without ever having heard of existential philosophers like Albert Camus, or Jean Paul Sartre. They are victims of existentialism without knowing it. This is certainly not true of all young people, but it is the way many of them react. Their hopelessness is the end product of atheistic existentialism. They have been cheated out of a joyful life by the negative, nihilistic ideas passed down to them from unbelievers in my burned out generation.
\nIf there is no God, all of us will pass into oblivion, without sense or significance. That is why I am asking the young people of today to turn away from the hopeless existential philosophy of the twentieth century, and come back to the God of George Washington, Abraham Lincoln, and the forefathers of America.
\nThere is a God, and that changes everything. A living and infinite God exists outside of our universe\u2014and He is not subject to the law of entropy because He is utterly without sin. Through Jesus Christ, God offers \u201cendunamy,\u201d power and grace from outside the system, to those who trust Christ.
\nYou Can\u2019t Break Even
\nThe First Law of Thermodynamics, the conservation of energy, says, \u201cYou can\u2019t win. There is no such thing as a free lunch.\u201d The Second Law of Thermodynamics, the law of the increase of entropy, adds to the first law by saying, \u201cYou can\u2019t break even. You\u2019re bound to lose.\u201d That is what drove Ludwig Boltzmann to commit suicide.
\nOne way of describing the entropy principle is to say that in a closed system, the amount of available, useful energy always decreases. Energy still exists (the conservation of energy principle demands that) but it degrades into useless forms. Another way to describe the entropy principle is to say that things move from order to disorder.
\nHere is an illustration. You need some gasoline in the tank to drive an automobile. (An electric car needs electricity in the battery\u2014the idea is exactly the same). The molecules of the gasoline have chemical energy in the way the atoms are bonded one to another. Burning this gasoline inside the engine releases this chemical energy, and it is now used to move the car and power its accessories. By the time you reach your destination, your car has used a lot of chemical energy and there is less gasoline in the tank.
\nWhat happened to the energy in the gasoline? Where did it go? It still exists, but it is of no use to you. It has been converted into heat. The engine is hotter\u2014that\u2019s why the car needs a radiator and cooling system. The brakes are hotter, and the air on the road is hotter, because of the hot gases that have come out of the car\u2019s exhaust pipe. But this scattered heat is useless. The journey started with energy available in the gasoline. It ended with the engine, the brakes, and the air being hotter than before\u2014but what can be done with that?
\nFurthermore, things have moved from order to disorder. In the beginning the energy was located in a single place, the gasoline in the tank. The energy was available to perform useful work. In the end the energy was scattered through the air over miles of road, in the form of heat. Even the heat energy in the engine and the brakes soon dissipates into the air and the dirt. It will be no help to anyone then. And the entropy principle goes on further, because within a few years the car itself will decay into useless material unless it is constantly maintained.
\nThe entropy principle is described by the following quotations from Jeremy Rifkin:
\nThe second law, the Entropy Law, states that matter and energy can only be changed in one direction, that is, from usable to unusable, of from available to unavailable, or from ordered to disordered.
\nIn essence, the second law states that everything in the entire universe began with structure and value and is irrevocably moving in the direction of random chaos and waste.
\nEntropy is a measure of the amount of energy no longer capable of conversion into work…every time energy goes from one level to another, it means that less energy is available to perform work the next time around. For example, water going over a dam falls into a lake. As it falls, it can be used to generate electricity or turn a water wheel or perform some other useful function. Once it reaches the bottom, however, the water is no longer in a state to perform work. Water on a flat plane can\u2019t be used to turn even the smallest water wheel…An entropy increase, then, means a decrease in \u201cavailable\u201d energy. Every time something occurs in the natural world, some amount of energy ends up being unavailable for future work. 53
\nAs Rifkin implies, the entropy principle is true in all branches of science. In biology it signifies that any living thing will quickly die without the input of food and energy from the outside\u2014and will die in any case as it becomes older and weaker. Our earthly ecology could not function without energy from the sun, because light from the sun makes it possible for plants to grow. Today, the human race faces unavoidable doom: the scarcity of oil and other resources, the destruction of the rain forests, the extinction of thousands of species of plants and animals, and the general destruction of the creation that God has made, because entropy is at work through the Second Law of Thermodynamics.
\nThe entropy principle is the scientific expression of the principle of sin and death. When Adam and Eve were first made by God, they had no sin. If they had not disobeyed God, they would have lived forever. But when our first parents brought sin into the human race, they also brought physical and spiritual death to themselves and to all of their descendants.
\nThe entropy principle of disorder and death is found everywhere that sin is found. In one age after another the human race sinned against God until judgment came.
\nToday we live in the church age. Even a good church with lively Christians in it will eventually run down into formality, disorder, and finally death, unless it receives energy and life from outside\u2014from God Himself. For this reason Christians must always be seeking God in prayer, must always be seeking illumination from the Bible, and must always be attentive to the preaching they hear. Even then, the general state of religion in a church will decay over time, with fewer and fewer people converted\u2014unless God intervenes in the form of revivals or \u201cawakenings.\u201d
\nThings don\u2019t get better by themselves\u2014they get worse! That\u2019s the law of entropy. That\u2019s the Second Law of Thermodynamics. That\u2019s why we need God!
\nUnpleasant and grim as the law of entropy is, it has been proven in science on a very general level. Arthur Eddington (1882\u20131944) wrote:
\nThe law that entropy always increases\u2014the Second Law of Thermodynamics\u2014holds, I think, the supreme position among the laws of Nature. If someone points out to you that your pet theory of the universe is in disagreement with Maxwell\u2019s equations\u2014then so much the worse for Maxwell\u2019s equations. If it is found to be contradicted by observation\u2014well, these experimentalists do bungle things sometimes. But if your theory is found to be against the Second Law of Thermodynamics I can give you no hope; there is nothing for it but to collapse in deepest humiliation.54
\nEddington observed that the entropy principle is moving the universe relentlessly toward destruction. Without God\u2019s grace, every star, every living creature, every man and woman, every society, and every church will sooner or later \u201ccollapse in deepest humiliation.\u201d
\nEntropy, through the Second Law of Thermodynamics, is one of the greatest arguments against evolution. Evolution teaches that species become more complex with the passage of time. But the Second Law of Thermodynamics shows that this is impossible. Things break down. They don\u2019t evolve upwards!
\nWhitcomb and Morris say, \u201cThe almost infinite accumulation of improbabilities in the theory of total evolution is nothing less than an absolute denial of the second law of thermodynamics\u2014despite the fact that it has always been verified experimentally whenever tested.\u201d55
\nYou\u2019ve Got to Get Out of the Game
\nAny closed system will sooner or later run down, according to the Second Law of Thermodynamics. To avoid disaster, in common language, \u201cYou\u2019ve got to get out of the game.\u201d The only way to avoid the bad implications of the entropy principle is to seek new energy from outside the system.
\nAfter a stream has gone over a waterwheel and rests in a flat pond it is no longer able to do any more work, although it still exists. Jeremy Rifkin says:
\nThe flat water [is] no longer able to perform useful work. [The] energy is bound energy or unavailable energy. Now that doesn\u2019t mean that the water can\u2019t be lugged up to the top of the dam again in buckets and dropped over…But it means that a new source of free or available energy has to be used up in the process.56
\nEvery living thing needs energy from outside of itself. Plants need sunlight, water, and nutrients. Animals must eat food and drink water. On a larger scale, human societies face disaster as resources become exhausted. They must discover new resources, acquire new land, or achieve technological progress to survive. Rifkin writes, \u201cHere on earth there are two sources of available energy: our terrestrial stock and the solar flow from the sun.\u201d57 If the sun stopped shining, life on earth would quickly end as plants died from lack of light energy.
\nThe input of energy into a system from outside I call \u201cendunamy.\u201d I have coined this word. It comes from the Greek word endunamaoo, which can be translated \u201cto strengthen\u201d or \u201cto endue with power.\u201d58 This Greek word is translated \u201cstrengtheneth\u201d in Philippians 4:13: \u201cI can do all things through Christ which strengtheneth me.\u201d While a Christian will often find himself without strength, he can turn to Jesus Christ, who has infinite power and is not subject to the law of entropy. Christ can give new energy, new endunamy, to a failing, faltering Christian.
\nThe first act of endunamy occurred when God created the world from nothing. He made the world with a great deal of available energy and resources, but it has been running downhill ever since man sinned. The world would have ended long ago if it had not been for God\u2019s gracious intervention.
\nPeople turned away from God before the Great Flood, but He gave salvation from the \u201coutside\u201d to Noah, who \u201cfound grace in the eyes of the Lord\u201d (Genesis 6:8). Through the ministry of Noah, eight people entered into the ark and were saved from the Flood. After the Flood the human race multiplied, but again turned away from God.
\nThrough an extended ministry of intervention from \u201coutside,\u201d God raised up the nation Israel as a \u201clight to the Gentiles\u201d (Isaiah 49:6). But most of the Hebrews had no interest in their God, even though He sent them many prophets, and finally Israel was judged.
\nIntervening again from the \u201coutside,\u201d God sent His Son to provide salvation and to build the churches. Christian history has been blessed with many revivals, when God\u2019s Holy Spirit came down in a special way and multitudes were converted. This happened in the book of Acts, the Reformation, the Great Awakenings that occurred from 1735 to 1859, and many other times. However, without God\u2019s help, even powerful revivals come to an end, and churches fall into declension in doctrine and practice. The Bible teaches a time of \u201cfalling away\u201d or \u201capostasy\u201d at the end of this age (2 Thessalonians 2:3). But God will again intervene from the \u201coutside\u201d when he resurrects true Christians (1 Thessalonians 4:14\u201317), sends the great end-time awakening (Revelation 7:4\u201314) and, finally, sends Jesus Christ to set up His kingdom on earth (Revelation 19:11\u201316).
\nA Life of Endunamy
\nJesus taught His disciples to practice lives of endunamy toward others, strengthening and helping them. In the Sermon on the Mount, He said:
\nYe have heard that it hath been said, Thou shalt love thy neighbor, and hate thine enemy. But I say unto you, Love your enemies, bless them that curse you, do good to them that hate you, and pray for them which despitefully use you, and persecute you. (Matthew 5:43\u201344)
\nHe taught Christians to repay evil with good, thus expending energy to provide endunamy to others. Christ commanded us to walk the extra mile, involving a literal energy expenditure (Matthew 5:41), and to give away economic goods, which require energy to obtain (Matthew 5:40, 42). The ultimate gift of endunamy is that of life itself. Jesus said, \u201cThe Son of man came not to be ministered unto, but to minister, and to give his life a ransom for many\u201d (Mark 10:45).
\nThe opposite of endunamy is sin. It robs and destroys and weakens. That is how sinners treat other people, by robbing, destroying, and weakening others, and it is also how they respond to God. But God does not return evil for evil. \u201cHe is kind unto the unthankful and to the evil\u201d (Luke 6:35).
\nThat ye may be the children of your Father which is in heaven: for he maketh his sun to rise on the evil and on the good, and sendeth rain on the just and on the unjust. (Matthew 5:45)
\nThis is an illustration of the endunamy of God\u2019s grace in nature. The physical act of grace is the input of energy from the sun. In Christ\u2019s exhortation to love, He used God\u2019s gift of endunamy from the sun as an illustration of the life of giving, that He called His disciples to practice\u2014and that He lived himself in His ministry on earth.
\nMost of all, endunamy is given to us by His sacrificial death on the cross.
\nHerein is love, not that we loved God [we did not], but that he loved us, and sent his Son to be the propitiation for our sins. (1 John 4:10)
\nWe should also thank God for the endunamy that raised Christ physically from the dead.
\nJesus said\u2026I am the resurrection, and the life: he that believeth in me, though he were dead, yet shall he live: and whosoever liveth and believeth in me shall never die. (John 11:25\u201326)
\nChapter Seven
\n\u201cWere the Beatles Right?\u201d<\/p>\n
Quantum Theory Reflects God\u2019s Freedom to Observe and Control His Creation According to His Nature
\nThe first science books I read presented the universe as a great machine. These books said we could improve our lives by learning how the machine works. But even then I saw a contradiction. If we are only \u201cmachines,\u201d with everything in us rigidly determined by physical laws, how can we improve our lives? Why should we improve them? What lives do we really have to improve in the first place?
\nLater, I read books about quantum theory that said those mechanistic ideas had been overthrown and everything was simply the motion of a wave, with random changes occurring from time to time.
\nIt wasn\u2019t until I read the Bible that I saw the truths and limitations of both points of view. I discovered that the Bible presents the best science of all, because it actually explains quantum theory.
\nThe physicist Niels Bohr (1885\u20131962) said, \u201cAnyone who is not shocked by quantum theory has not understood it.\u201d Indeed, quantum physics is a strange discipline of science. In quantum theory almost nothing is what it seems to be. In this discipline everything that exists\u2014every bit of light, every electron, even gravity itself, is partly like a discrete particle and partly like a wave\u2014both at the same time! In quantum theory, reality is never quite certain, and it is impossible to separate the observer from the thing being observed, since everything is tied up with everything else. Albert Einstein (1879\u20131955), who conceived the theory of relativity, was never fully comfortable with quantum theory. It was too odd and mysterious for him! But one experiment after another has verified its accuracy.
\nWere the Beatles Right? Does Quantum Theory Teach Hinduism?
\nAs Western culture has moved away from its Christian heritage, the doctrines of Hinduism have infiltrated popular thinking. Many people practice yoga or some other form of Hindu meditation. It is common to hear people speak of previous jobs, or previous relationships they have abandoned, as \u201cpast lives,\u201d without realizing that this is a Hindu thought-form. The songs of the Beatles included many Hindu expressions such as \u201cNothing is real,\u201d \u201cSurrender to the void,\u201d \u201cInstant karma,\u201d \u201cTurn off your mind, relax, and float downstream,\u201d and even \u201cHare Krishna.\u201d
\nHinduism teaches that everything is part of a single floating vibration. In Hinduism, reality is an illusion that they call \u201cmaya.\u201d Many of those who are influenced by Hindu thinking turn to physics for support. They claim that quantum physics, with its \u201cwave-particle duality\u201d of matter, verifies the Hindu idea that everything is part of a universal cosmic vibration.
\nActually the quantum theory fits Christian theology better than Hinduism. Quantum theory gives us concepts that point to the greatest theological issues of the Bible.
\nWhat Is Light Made Of?
\nIs light made of particles or waves? In most situations light behaves as though it were made of particles. If you stand in an open courtyard on a sunny day a shadow will fall behind you. The sun shines, sending out uncounted billions of light particles. Some of the light particles hit your body, and this is why there is a dark shadow behind you. The light didn\u2019t get there.
\nExperiments show that light exists in the form of waves of electromagnetic energy. If you shine light through a barrier with two very narrow slits, and place a white screen in the background, you will see a pattern of lighter and darker stripes, exactly what would be expected from two sets of waves reinforcing and canceling each other. In quantum physics this is called the \u201cdouble slit experiment.\u201d It shows that light behaves like an ocean wave, and also functions like a particle. Other more advanced experiments also prove that light consists of waves of electromagnetic energy.
\nElectromagnetic waves have different lengths, although they all move at the same speed of 186,000 miles per second, called \u201cc,\u201d the speed of light. The human eye can view electromagnetic waves of certain lengths, and these types of electromagnetic waves are called \u201cvisible light.\u201d Red light has a longer wavelength than violet light. Waves that are shorter than violet light are called \u201cultraviolet\u201d light. The X-rays used by doctors and dentists are even shorter. The shorter the wavelength, the more energetic is the electromagnetic wave. Some very short and energetic waves are called \u201cgamma\u201d rays, and they are part of what makes atomic energy so dangerous. Waves that are longer and weaker than red light are called \u201cinfrared\u201d waves. The human eye cannot see them, but they are associated with heat because molecules absorb them and get increasingly hotter as they vibrate. Still longer wavelengths are used for radio, cellular telephones, and television.
\nWaves can spread out over very large regions, while particles do not. Waves can pass through each other, which is why many radio stations can broadcast at the same time without losing their signals. The different stations send out radio energy of different frequencies and lengths.
\nHow Einstein Won the Nobel Prize
\nAlbert Einstein did not receive his Nobel Prize for conceiving the theory of relativity. He won it for his work on the Photoelectric Effect. This occurs when a beam of light of the correct frequency shines on metal, and the energy of that light kicks electrons out of the atoms of the metal. When this happens light has been converted into electricity, which is why this effect is called the \u201cPhotoelectric Effect.\u201d
\nWhat can cause the electrons to fly out of the metal with greater speed and energy? The first answer is to shine more light on the metal. But making the light brighter and more intense does not make the electrons leave the metal more vigorously. This happens only if you change the frequency (the color) of the light. Shining light of higher frequency on the metal makes the electrons fly out with greater energy.
\nEinstein explained this phenomenon by theorizing that light exists in discrete particles called photons. Each photon has a definite level of energy. Light photons of long wavelengths have low energy. Photons are absorbed by atoms one at a time if they are absorbed at all, and so low-energy photons cannot kick the electrons out of the atoms vigorously even if there are many of them. Photons of short wavelengths have high frequency and high energy which, when absorbed by an atom, can propel electrons out of the atoms rapidly and vigorously. Einstein received the Nobel Prize in physics for this work.
\nDoes light consist of particles or of waves? Quantum theory gives the revolutionary answer\u2014\u201cboth.\u201d Every bit of light is like a wave and like a particle at the same time. This surprising discovery in quantum theory is called the \u201cwave-particle duality\u201d of matter.
\nThe same duality applies not only to light but to all matter. One of the simplest particles is the electron. It has a very small mass and carries a tiny but definite electrical charge. In the 1920s, scientists shot a beam of electrons at a crystal and found that the electrons were bent into wave patterns, just as a light beam would. Even a simple particle such as an electron acts like a wave at the same time that it acts like a particle. In quantum theory, all of matter has this duality of wave and particle at one and the same time, to one degree or another.
\nNo Excuse for Striking Out
\nThe effects of quantum theory were not known earlier because quantum effects are far too small to see in everyday life. When a baseball player swings his bat he aims it toward the place he thinks the ball should go. He will either hit the ball or miss it. If he hits the ball slightly, he will get a \u201cfoul tip.\u201d But no one expects a baseball to flow around the bat like a wave of liquid flows around a pole that is stuck in the water. Anything even one-millionth the size of a baseball will behave just like an ordinary object in motion. A baseball player who has struck out can\u2019t say, \u201cI swung the bat in the right place, but the baseball flowed around the bat like a radio wave and went past me. It wasn\u2019t my fault. I didn\u2019t really strike out. It was all a matter of quantum theory.\u201d Quantum effects show up only for the very tiniest bits of matter and energy. A baseball will always behave like a round object in motion. And when the umpire says, \u201cYou\u2019re out,\u201d he has a right to say it. No ballplayer has ever appealed to quantum physics to stay at the plate.
\nGod is the Author and Designer of quantum physics, just as He is the Author and Designer of all of the laws of science. When He designed the quantum wave-particle nature of matter, He had His own reasons for doing so. One of these reasons is that quantum theory gives Him the possibility of working behind the scenes and exercising His free will without breaking any of His own scientific laws. Quantum theory makes room for free-will actions within its own framework.
\nI have already demonstrated how God can make exceptions to His own scientific rules by setting them aside in special situations. These exceptions are called \u201cmiracles.\u201d For instance, God caused an axe head to float when it fell into a river. This miracle is recorded in 2 Kings 6:6. The ordinary scientific laws of the universe say that iron is heavier than water. That\u2019s why the axe head sank in the first place. No one expected it to float. According to the laws of science, it was lost forever. But God made an exception to His own scientific laws, and the axe head floated.
\nMiracles like that are rare. They are, after all, exceptions to the normal rules. A Christian can pray for a miracle but should never presumptuously assume that the miracle will happen. The devil tempted Jesus in the wilderness by suggesting that He leap from the top of the temple and let God save Him (Matthew 4:5\u20136). Jesus responded, \u201cIt is written again, Thou shalt not tempt the Lord thy God\u201d (Matthew 4:7). Jesus did not listen to the devil. He knew that miracles could happen and that the law of gravity could be set aside. He Himself walked on water (John 6:19). But He also knew that miracles are special exceptions made for special reasons and that no one should automatically summon a miracle for selfish reasons.
\nQuantum theory reflects the way God exercises
\nHis free will and intervenes in the universe without having to make an exception to His rules\u2014
\nbecause the \u201crules\u201d themselves have room
\nin them for the actions of free will!
\nIf the universe were composed only of cosmic waves, without any particle aspect, there could be no real interaction. All the waves would simply pass through each other instead of sometimes acting as particles. Radio waves from different stations can travel through the same space without interfering with each other. Together with visible light, infrared rays that will heat up whatever they hit, and other kinds of electromagnetic waves, these radio waves all travel without blocking each other. If everything were made up only of waves\u2014even waves of definite lengths and energies\u2014the whole universe would be like ripples floating back and forth on the surface of the ocean.
\nBut reality is much richer than that. When quantum wave-particles get close together, they often react to each other. One particle or group of particles disappears (and their waves simply cease to exist\u2014the scientific word is that the waves \u201ccollapse\u201d) and other particles are created and their waves abruptly come into existence and flow out from there. Scientists cannot completely explain the creation and disappearance of particles. They can only say that total energy is conserved as one set of particles is replaced by another. Science can give probabilities for different interactions; some of these transactions are quite likely and others are very unlikely. But quantum physics has no explanation for the collapse of one quantum wave and the creation of another. It is one of the great mysteries of physics. Scientists and engineers can make use of the mysteries of quantum physics in building lasers and atomic bombs, but they have never been able to completely understand why quantum events happen.
\nThe fact that these quantum reactions may happen, but do not have to happen, reflects the freedom God has to act without having to set aside His own scientific rules. He can decide whether a radioactive atom decays or not. He can decide whether or not a nuclear fusion reaction will happen\u2014which means He can decide whether the sun should shine brightly enough to burn up the earth, or whether it should stop shining altogether.
\nThe Bible tells us that someday the sun will scorch men with fire (Revelation 16:8). It also teaches that someday the elements themselves shall \u201cmelt with fervent heat\u201d and the earth will be burned up (2 Peter 3:10). The present heavens and earth will pass away, to be replaced by \u201cnew heavens and a new earth, wherein dwelleth righteousness\u201d (2 Peter 3:13). The Bible tells us that God will work many miracles in the future, and make many exceptions to His rules, as He did when He stopped the motions of the earth and sun in answer to Joshua\u2019s prayer (Joshua 10:12\u201313). God can set up new and different scientific rules, as He will do when He makes new heavens and a new earth. He can also change the heat of the sun, without breaking His rules, by making choices of how nuclear particles react.
\nWho\u2019s Watching the Tree?
\nWhat decides the outcome of a quantum event\u2014determining exactly what happens to a set of particles, or where a particle is, or how fast it is moving? Quantum physicists tell us we can\u2019t quite know. Quantum theory says that everything is more or less uncertain until it is observed, and the very act of observation changes that reality\u2014by the fact that it is observed.
\nThis seems deep and mysterious, and causes many people to respect science almost to the point of worship. Without understanding science at all, many people reject Christianity by saying, \u201cIt\u2019s all been proven false by scientific research.\u201d Statements like this are neither biblical nor scientific.
\nThe concept of quantum uncertainty illustrates one of the oldest questions in philosophy\u2014if a tree falls on a desert island and no one is there to see or hear it, did it really fall? Did the tree ever exist if no one saw it or touched it?
\nOn a simple level, everyone knows that the tree either remained standing or fell. But in quantum physics, it\u2019s a little more complicated, and there\u2019s always a little uncertainty (called the \u201cHeisenberg uncertainty principle\u201d). In quantum physics you can\u2019t completely know what these particles and waves are doing without looking at them.
\nThere is one simple answer to this that takes care of the quantum particles and the unseen tree. That answer is God Himself. Although you and I may not know everything about the tree\u2014or about a quantum particle\u2014God does. God observes everything whether we see it or not. The Bible teaches that God is omniscient. That means He knows everything. So the whole philosophical question is resolved by the fact that God was there to see the tree fall.
\nThe Materialism of Carl Sagan
\nToday it is popular to say that the Bible is a simplistic book, suitable only for the uneducated. Many people think that we must leave the Bible behind and turn to modern secular thinkers and philosophers. But I have come to believe that the Bible is quite profound on many subjects, including philosophy.
\nNon-Christian philosophers have sought out \u201cmany inventions\u201d in their rejection of biblical revelation (Ecclesiastes 7:29). Their concepts have appeared in popular form on television. The idea that there is nothing beyond this physical universe is called \u201cmaterialism.\u201d Simply stated, materialism teaches that nothing exists but matter and energy. Carl Sagan (1934\u20131996) presented this thought when he said, \u201cThe cosmos [the universe] is all there is.\u201d
\nBut the Bible gives a different view. It says, \u201cIn the beginning God created the heaven and the earth\u201d (Genesis 1:1). Before the universe came into being God existed. He lives outside of the physical universe, outside of space and time, from eternity to eternity. God\u2019s existence does not depend on anyone believing in Him. He simply exists in Himself. He said to Moses, \u201cI am that I am\u201d (Exodus 3:14). This means that He is self-existent.
\nThe Bible teaches that the universe and its inhabitants are created beings. \u201cCreated\u201d implies that the universe is subordinate to the Creator\u2014under Him, both in time and in order. There was a time when none of us lived and the universe did not exist. If God hadn\u2019t created it, nothing in the universe would be here. But God said, \u201cLet there be light\u201d (Genesis 1:3), and there was light. God said, \u201cLet us make man\u201d (Genesis 1:26), and He made the first man out of the dust of the ground (Genesis 2:7). And all of us depend upon God to sustain our lives. The Bible tells us that in Jesus Christ \u201call things consist\u201d or hold together (Colossians 1:17). Jesus Himself sustains and holds together the creation, until the day that God destroys the heavens and earth as they are now and makes new heavens and a new earth (2 Peter 3:13).
\nOur life on earth is temporary. And while we are here we depend on God for everything. No one should act as though he deserves what he has. The Bible says, \u201cWhat hast thou that thou didst not receive?\u201d (1 Corinthians 4:7). Most people take their material comforts and possessions for granted. But the Bible says, \u201cIf riches increase, set not your heart on them\u201d (Psalm 62:10). God warns us not to think, \u201cMy power and the might of mine hand hath gotten me this wealth\u201d (Deuteronomy 8:17). When Nebuchadnezzar, the king of Babylon, said, \u201cIs not this great Babylon, that I have built for the house of the kingdom by the might of my power, and for the honour of my majesty?\u201d (Daniel 4:30), God judged him with insanity for seven years.
\nWhy George Berkeley Rejected Idealism
\n\u201cMaterialism\u201d is the philosophical idea that the physical world is all that exists. On the other hand, \u201cidealism\u201d teaches that there is no physical reality, and that what we know consists only of ideas in our minds. Certain philosophers think that quantum theory supports their \u201cidealism,\u201d that everything is part of a universal cosmic wave.
\nBut the Bible teaches differently. It indicates that God is separate and distinct from His creation. Again, if God had not said, \u201cLet there be light\u201d and \u201cLet us make man,\u201d neither light nor man would exist. God is not the same as His creation. To say that a tree or an animal, or any other part of creation, is a part of God, or can put us in touch with God, is an old theory that the Bible calls \u201cidolatry.\u201d
\nAlthough this universe is not God, and is separate from God, it does have real existence. It is not an illusion (what Hindus call \u201cmaya\u201d), not a dream or a mere idea. The created things in this universe, whether rocks or people, whether particles, waves, or a duality of both, have real existence in themselves.
\nAnyone can verify the true existence of physical reality in a simple way. About three hundred years ago, an English philosopher named George Berkeley (1685\u20131753) was walking alone, questioning whether the physical world around him had any reality. He came upon a large rock and wondered if it really existed. Finally he kicked the rock with his foot. The pain in his toe proved to him that the rock was actually there! Thus, Berkeley rejected idealism. Things have real existence.
\nThe existence of the universe makes temptation a real event. Adam and Eve were told not to eat of the fruit of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil (Genesis 2:17). This was not symbolic or allegorical. There was a physical tree with literal fruit in the Garden of Eden. It tasted good (Genesis 3:6). Our first parents put that fruit in their mouths and enjoyed eating it. That fruit, like other created things, was real.
\nIn the same way, when King David looked across the rooftops of Jerusalem and saw Bathsheba bathing, his physical desires were awakened. He invited Bathsheba into his private quarters and experienced physical pleasure with her for a short time. His temptation was real, and the pleasure of his sin was real. It is dangerous to pretend that temptation does not exist and that we can somehow sail through it without having to either embrace it or deny ourselves. I have met people who think that when they become Christians they will never have to face temptation again, that they will simply pass through all the problems and temptations of life unscathed. But it was not so for Adam and Eve, nor for David.
\nEven Jesus Christ experienced actual temptation in the wilderness (Matthew 4:1\u201311). He was a physical man in addition to being the divine Son of God. When He was in the wilderness, He was physically hungry. If He had listened to the devil and changed stones into bread, He could have satisfied His hunger by eating the bread. But Jesus put His consecration to God above what His physical body desired when He said, \u201cMan shall not live by bread alone, but by every word that proceedeth out of the mouth of God\u201d (Matthew 4:4). The challenges of putting God first are authentic, and there is no getting around them.
\nAlthough the pleasures of sin are real, they are temporary. Moses put God first and forsook Egypt, its power and wealth and its false gods, choosing to suffer rather than enjoy the pleasures of sin for a time (Hebrews 11:25). Everyone is called upon to choose between the temporary pleasures of this world\u2014wealth, diversion, sexual pleasure, recreation\u2014and to prefer the eternal over the temporal, the Creator over the creation.
\nIn facing temptation, we experience the fact that the creation is real and that both it and ourselves are subordinate to God, and we should put Him first. The person who resists temptation in order to obey God refutes some of the great human philosophies of the ages, overcoming materialism and idealism by a simple act of the will.
\nJoseph fled from Potiphar\u2019s wife rather than commit sin with her. He said, \u201cHow then can I do this great wickedness, and sin against God?\u201d (Genesis 39:9). He recognized that the woman\u2019s offer was genuine and that he could experience pleasure for a time if he sinned with her. But he also realized that God was there, outside of the physical world of Egypt. He knew that God was more important than sensual pleasure, that what God thought about sin would count in eternity. So Joseph did something that many people would laugh at today. He ran away from the woman and the temptation she offered, and did not sin with her. Many people today would see only the beauty of the woman and the pleasure they could experience for a few minutes. But Joseph remembered God\u2014and that made all the difference in his life.
\nThe reality of the creation was affirmed by the incarnation and crucifixion of Jesus Christ. He did not come as a spirit, did not live as a spirit, and did not rise from the dead as a spirit. Instead, He was physically conceived in the womb of a virgin, was physically born in a humble manger and died physically on a cross, with nails hammered through His hands and His feet. The material blood of Jesus flowed from His wounds. Why such an ugly event? Because there was no other way for God to save sinful men and women. It was necessary for the Son of God to be born physically into a real world to live and die within it. And why such a bloody and humiliating death? Because nothing else could redeem us. The ugly sin of the human race demands an equally ugly sacrifice, not the mere words of a religious teacher giving us ethical instructions. The Bible teaches that God sent a real Savior to die a real death in payment for our real sins. He arose from the dead physically and materially because He was not a spirit (Luke 24:39).
\nGod Knew It All Along
\nAs mentioned earlier, quantum theory teaches that there is a connection between the observer and that which is observed. In quantum physics the act of observing something helps to determine what that object does. Many scientists portray this as a great mystery without realizing that the God of the Bible has resolved this \u201cdeep\u201d philosophical matter by observing everything Himself.
\nGod does not live within time as you and I do. He is outside of time and knows the end from the beginning. His ways are not our ways and His thoughts are not our thoughts (Isaiah 55:8). Yet in the Bible He uses human words to describe His thoughts and actions.
\nThe Bible says that God foreknows all things. The Greek word is proginosko, which means \u201cto know before.\u201d59 God knows ahead of time who will be saved: \u201cElect according to the foreknowledge of God the Father\u201d (1 Peter 1:2).
\nThe Bible also teaches that God sovereignly controls all things in His creation. He foreordains what will come to pass. In speaking of the people of God, the Bible tells of His foreknowledge (proginosko) and predestination (prooridzo, to ordain before) in Romans 8:29. There is a connection between what God knows and observes ahead of time and what He affirmatively foreordains. There are deep relationships between human free will and God\u2019s foreknowledge of our choices, and God\u2019s predestination of His own plan and will. We can\u2019t understand this completely. We can only \u201csee through a glass, darkly\u201d (1 Corinthians 13:12), since we live in space and time.
\nSometimes the Bible uses the language of free will as the most appropriate way of describing an event. Elisha told Joash the king of Israel to strike the ground with his arrows (2 Kings 13:18\u201319). Joash could have struck the ground five or six times, instead of striking it only three times. God told the prophet exactly how it would have turned out if the king had done that. The option was truly available. Joash could have struck the ground five or six times as easily as three times, since the king\u2019s mind and will were not mechanically controlled. God certainly knew from eternity past what the king would do, but did not force his choice. Joash could have hit the ground more times than he did.
\nThe Bible tells us that a different action on the part of Joash would have led to the utter defeat of the nation of Syria. If Joash had hit the arrows against the ground five or six times, instead of three times, a different path of history would have resulted. Historians call these different paths \u201calternate histories.\u201d Philosophers call them \u201ccounterfactuals.\u201d We do not know what might result from a different choice of action. King Joash certainly did not. The \u201cprinces of this world\u201d did not know the future, \u201cfor had they known it, they would not have crucified the Lord of glory\u201d (1 Corinthians 2:8). But the Bible teaches that God is aware of all possible branches in history and all of their immediate and ultimate results.
\nWas History Split in Two?
\nMany physicists who have studied quantum theory have no explanation for why one quantum event should happen and not another. For instance, they don\u2019t know why a particle decays into pieces at a certain time instead of not doing so. Quantum theory does not say whether the particle is forced to decay or not. It only offers probabilities for one event or the other. God can exercise His free will and choose either of the two options without abolishing His own rules.
\nThe unexplained optional nature of quantum theory perplexed twentieth-century scientists. In 1957, a physicist named Hugh Everett III (1930\u20131982) suggested that with every quantum event (with every option) the universe splits in two\u2014one universe going one way and another going the other way. According to Everett\u2019s theory, both options really happen. If a particle has the chance to decay into pieces or not decay into pieces, we don\u2019t have to resolve the choices according to Everett\u2019s thinking. The universe simply divides into two universes. In one of the universes, the particle decays. In the other universe it does not. In this theory there are uncounted billions upon billions of optional universes, according to what might or might not have happened.
\nFollowing this theory, in the time of Elisha the universe split into two lines\u2014one where Joash hit the ground three times and one where he might have hit the ground five or six times, with different consequences following from both. That fits right in with the Bible. Physics, in its advanced form of quantum theory, actually brings out a biblical truth by speaking the way the Bible does.
\nBut in the Bible, both alternatives were not equally authentic. In the Bible there are living moral agents, including God, angels, demons, and human beings, who make choices. King Joash chose to do one thing rather than the other, and God knew it and observed the event and the entire historical time-line.
\nThe Bible presents a reasonable view of science and philosophy in this event. God knows all possible lines of events and their consequences. So, God knows what will happen, and yet human choice is a real one and not an illusion. Joash could have hit the ground more times. God didn\u2019t stop him. It was not God\u2019s fault that Syria wasn\u2019t completely defeated later. It was Joash\u2019s fault. But, in a sense, God also foreordains all of history. He observed and foreknew all possible lines of history and chose one of them as actual, not hypothetical, without obliterating human will or making it an illusion cloaking a mechanical reality, in the profound interrelationship of His sovereignty and His gift of free will to human beings. When compared to God\u2019s dealings in human history, quantum physics is as elementary as adding one plus one to make two.
\nWhy Pharaoh Had No Liberty
\nSometimes the Bible uses the language of sovereign and absolute control, even in reference to human decisions and actions. God told Moses, \u201cGo in unto Pharaoh, for I have hardened his heart\u201d (Exodus 10:1). The heart of the king of Egypt was hardened by God. At first the Pharaoh could choose to harden his heart. But by the time of Exodus 10:1, he could no longer make the right decision in response to the words of Moses, because his heart had been \u201chardened\u201d by God.
\nThe tenth chapter of Exodus does not display an alternate path of history. Although it is true that Pharaoh acted according to his own evil will, and bore the responsibility for refusing to let the Hebrew people go out of Egypt, it is also true that Pharaoh no longer had a viable option of doing the right thing, because his heart had been hardened by God. The king of Egypt had no possibility of changing by then, because he had been turned over judicially to a reprobate mind (Romans 1:24, 26, 28). The Bible does not represent God as a mere observer of the choice Pharaoh made between different alternatives. God hardened the heart of Pharaoh. This hardened Egyptian king was dead while he lived, fit only for God\u2019s judgment and wrath, because God had given up on him.
\nPhysics Is Consistent with the Bible
\nQuantum physics speaks of a duality between waves and particles, between the act of observing and the object that is observed. In quantum physics the act of observing affects and changes the thing that is observed. There is an unbreakable connection between the observer and the observed.
\nThis connection is a simple picture of the relationships between God\u2019s determination and His foreknowledge. God knows all that will happen and all that might have happened. God does not inhabit time and space in the way that we do. Some things we understand better in terms of human will observed by God, others as unconditionally predestined and controlled by Him.
\nSpeaking to us in human language, the Bible presents deep relationships and \u201cinterplay\u201d between free will and sovereignty. The Roman emperor Augustus issued a decree that all in his empire should be taxed at their ancestral homes (Luke 2:1). Augustus acted according to his own motives, and his own thinking, and yet God moved him in his decision, for the only truly important result of his tax decree was that Jesus was born in Bethlehem, to fulfill the prophecy of Micah 5:2, that the Messiah would be born in Bethlehem. First Corinthians 2:8 tells us that the princes of this world crucified Jesus, the Lord of glory, without understanding the consequences of what they were doing. Yet God had determined the death of His Son from eternity past (Revelation 13:8).
\nWe cannot follow God\u2019s thinking perfectly with our finite human minds. We inhabit time, while God lives outside of time, and sees all of history, past and future, in a single glance. Sometimes God speaks to us with a description of human free will and the observation of different options, as in the case of King Joash. At other times God speaks to us in the language of absolute control, without option, as in the case of Pharaoh. At still other times God presents a deep interplay, where both human will and sovereignty are displayed without contradiction.
\nThe different facets of quantum physics are really quite simple compared to the interplay of will and sovereignty presented in the Bible. Quantum physics only hints at the various ways God relates to His universe and the people who live in it. Quantum physics is deep, and it is consistent with the teaching of the Bible, giving a small glimpse of God\u2019s wondrous ways.
\nYou and I don\u2019t understand things the way God understands them. God is sovereign and \u201cworketh all things after the counsel of his own will\u201d (Ephesians 1:11). He foreknows and determines every detail, and yet He has granted the faculty of will to human beings and holds them responsible. By His grace He extends to sinners the offer of salvation, although He knows that most will reject it. We cannot understand the depths of the mind of God on this subject, just as we cannot fully understand the depths and subtleties of quantum physics.
\nO the depth of the riches both of the wisdom and the knowledge of God! how unsearchable are his judgments, and his ways past finding out! For who hath known the mind of the Lord? or who hath been his counsellor? Or who hath first given to him, and it shall be recompensed unto him again? For of him, and through him, and to him, are all things: to whom be glory for ever. Amen. (Romans 11:33\u201336)<\/p>\n
Chapter Eight
\n\u201cTurning Points in History and in Life\u201d<\/p>\n
Chaos Theory Reflects the Providence of God
\nI remember when I heard about the Cuban Missile Crisis. Some of our neighbors built bomb shelters. My mother thought nuclear war was about to begin. My father thought he might have to go back into the Army. If the Communists had launched missiles against the United States from Cuba in the fall of 1962, world history would have been completely different.
\nI was on the playground at school when the word came that President Kennedy was shot. A teacher screamed. Others were crying. I felt that my world was falling apart. If President Kennedy had let them put a bulletproof bubble up on his limousine, as he normally did, history would have been completely different. What happens on a single day can change the course of world events for years to come.
\nDuring the last generation a new branch of mathematics arose that crossed all subdivisions of science. It is called \u201cchaos theory.\u201d The mathematics of chaos shows that tremendous consequences can come out of exceedingly small changes in initial conditions, changes that are too small to notice at the time. This illustrates the providence of God, showing that He is able to provide for His people and frustrate the devices of those who resist Him.
\nI listen to the news on the radio several times a day. The news always includes a weather report with predictions for the week ahead. I have heard reports of clouds and rain, but sometimes sunshine came instead. I have heard predictions of warmth and light, but it turned out to be cold and damp. Were the forecasters dishonest or inexperienced? Not necessarily. In fact it is almost impossible to foretell weather conditions more than two or three days in advance, even with the best knowledge of science and the use of the latest computer technology.
\nIn weather prediction, scientists measure the atmosphere by analyzing small pockets of air with different pressure, humidity, and velocity (wind speed and direction). When scientists study a large number of these pockets of air the computations become so involved and complicated that even the best computers can\u2019t make perfect weather predictions very far in advance.
\nBut the problem isn\u2019t just the complexity of the atmosphere. The real issues lie in the structure of mathematics itself. Even a very simplified \u201cmodel\u201d weather system may very quickly become impossible to predict.
\nIn 1961, a meteorologist named Edward Lorenz made a simple computer program to model the weather. He found that very tiny changes in initial conditions (such as the temperature or humidity of the air) soon led to ever-greater changes in the weather, to the point that true prediction became impossible after a short length of time. Small changes and differences at the beginning cause larger differences as time goes by. We can never know the exact behavior of every pocket of air or of every cloud, and so little things we don\u2019t know about at the beginning produce increasingly greater consequences, until it\u2019s very difficult to know what the weather will be like a week later. We can know the general characteristics of the climate\u2014for example, that it is cold in Alaska in January and hot in the Sahara Desert in July\u2014but within the overall boundaries of the climate, the weather will vary in different ways, and these variations are unpredictable.
\nThe Butterfly Effect\u2014Big Things Can Have Small Beginnings
\nIt has been said that a butterfly beating its wings could cause small motions in the air that might build up and lead to a major storm in another part of the world. This wouldn\u2019t happen every time, with every butterfly, but the possibility would exist. Big changes can start with small beginnings. The scientific name for this is the \u201cButterfly Effect.\u201d It is an important part of a major discipline of science and mathematics called \u201cchaos theory.\u201d
\nChaos theory does not mean that all scientific laws are unreliable. It does not mean that science is random and has no regularity to it. It simply means that small changes in initial conditions can lead to tremendous variations later on. As a result, the future can be difficult to predict, because no one can know what implications lurk in the tiny details of the present. This magnification from small to large happens within the context of the other scientific rules that are in operation. That is a basic part of the mathematics of nearly all scientific systems. The Butterfly Effect of chaos theory reflects the providence of God.
\nChaos theory and its \u201cButterfly Effect\u201d have been found in almost every aspect of science and human life, including the motions of the planets in the solar system and the rising and falling of prices in the stock market. Astronomers can predict the movements of the planets accurately for quite a long time, but there is no way to be certain that their motions might not become more erratic, perhaps leading to a planet flying away from the system. Analysts have tried to predict the stock market, but there is irregularity here as well. Sometimes the market becomes overextended and it can go on being overexcited until some event, perhaps quite small, brings the system crashing down.
\nThe Bible gives many examples of the Butterfly Effect. What if Abraham had not left Ur of the Chaldees in response to God\u2019s call? There would have been no nation of Israel\u2014or God might have moved history in an entirely different way. If Rebekah had not offered to water the camels of Abraham\u2019s servant (Genesis 24:46) she might not have married Isaac. If Boaz had not obeyed God\u2019s commandments and left handfuls of grain in his fields (Ruth 2:2\u20133), he might have missed meeting Ruth, his future bride, and an ancestor of Jesus the Messiah. If Saul of Tarsus (later known as the apostle Paul) had turned away from Jesus on the road to Damascus the consequences would be incalculable. You might not be reading this book, for instance. I am not saying that God couldn\u2019t have used someone else to spread the gospel to the Roman world, but things would certainly have been very different. The United States, as we know it, might not exist if Paul had not been converted.
\nThe Butterfly Effect Is Experienced in Everyday Life
\nEvery human being experiences seemingly small events that lead to larger consequences. When I was seventeen years old, I had to decide whether I would attend college at the University of Oregon or at the University of California at Los Angeles. I took an all-night bus ride from my home in the San Francisco Bay Area to Oregon and found it cold and wet. I flew to Southern California and found it warm and attractive. I saw opportunities in the great city of Los Angeles. So I attended UCLA, where I became a Christian. If I had gone to Oregon, I might never have become a Christian\u2014and in any case, my life would certainly have been quite different. I would not be married to my wife, Judith, and I would not be the father of our two boys, John Samuel and David. And I would not have written the book that you are reading.
\nIn Los Angeles, at the age of eighteen, I was walking south on Vermont Avenue and crossed an intersection. The light was green. I had the right to cross the street at the crosswalk, but from the side of the intersection a car came speeding by. I saw it coming at me and thought, \u201cIt\u2019s the hospital for sure.\u201d Somehow I pulled my body backward, and the car swished past, just a few inches in front of me. I shouted at the departing car, \u201cYou missed.\u201d A matter of a few inches saved my life and kept me from dying without becoming a Christian.
\nBut I am certainly not the only one who has experienced such things. Almost every person on earth has had narrow escapes from death, usually more than once. And certainly you who are reading these pages can remember small things that turned out to be major turning points in your life\u2014how you first met your husband or wife, where you decided to live, and things that led up to you becoming a Christian, or not becoming one.
\nThis is also true of the temptations that come into everyone\u2019s life. In John Bunyan\u2019s The Pilgrim\u2019s Progress, the principal character took a slightly wrong turn in the road. The two paths stayed very close together for quite a distance, and it looked as if there was no difference between them. But gradually the roads got increasingly farther apart, and the man got into trouble, far away from where he was supposed to be.60
\nAnd so it is with everyone. A \u201csmall\u201d decision in youth can determine the course of one\u2019s entire life. When he was thirteen years old, the coauthor of this book, Robert L. Hymers, decided to go to a Baptist church with the people who lived next door. As a result, he is a Baptist pastor and author over fifty years later. Most people don\u2019t realize that the outcome of their choices can be very great, but the consequences come all the same. For both young and old, a choice to steal, to engage in sex, to seek after money rather than God, or to leave a church, can change the entire course of one\u2019s life. A person may not see it that way at the time, but looking back years later it becomes evident that taking the wrong fork in the road made all the difference. As the poet Robert Frost said:
\nI shall be telling of this with a sigh
\nSomewhere ages and ages hence:
\nTwo roads diverged in a wood, and I\u2014
\nI took the one less traveled by,
\nAnd that has made all the difference.61
\nHow can you know which small decision will lead to larger consequences and which will never amount to much? Usually you don\u2019t know. The only sensible thing to do is to decide to follow the Bible, and then live that way. It is foolish to follow your heart because \u201cthe heart is deceitful above all things, and desperately wicked\u201d (Jeremiah 17:9). You can\u2019t trust your heart, although modern society tells us repeatedly to do so. The Bible says, \u201cHe that trusteth in his own heart is a fool\u201d (Proverbs 28:26). If you follow your heart you will go wrong nearly every time. Instead of following the feelings of your heart, follow the Bible. Become a Christian and plant yourself firmly in a Bible-believing church. Read the Scriptures daily and obey them, especially when it seems hard to do. Listen to the preaching and counseling of your pastor, and other church leaders that God has put in your life. In this way you will be able to find the right path through the many difficult trials of life.
\nThe Butterfly Effect Is Seen in History
\nChaos theory may seem too simple to discuss, but it is actually an extremely deep and important branch of mathematics. The effects of chaos theory can be illustrated by many events in history. For instance, if Columbus had not insisted on sailing west across the Atlantic Ocean, would the Aztec and Inca empires of Mexico and Peru have been conquered by the Spaniards a generation later? Or would they have remained independent? Would Europeans have come to America at that time? Or would they have only done so a hundred years later with different consequences? If the Pilgrims had not sailed from Holland to America in 1620, or if they had sailed and reached their intended goal of Virginia, instead of being blown off course to Massachusetts, the history of the American colonies, and our nation itself, would have been incredibly different.
\nColumbus crossed the Atlantic Ocean to the New World for the first time in 1492, seeking to reach China. But it almost happened the other way around! Through the first part of the 1400s, Chinese ships were sailing to India, Africa, and the islands of the Pacific Ocean. The most famous Chinese explorer was a man named Cheng Ho. If the Chinese had kept on exploring, they would have eventually sailed around Africa to discover Europe a half-century before the Spanish and Portuguese reached their land. In that event, Europeans might have learned to speak Chinese, with that language becoming the leading speech in the world, instead of the other way around.
\nBut this interesting line of alternate history never happened. The government of China simply wasn\u2019t interested in anything very far away from their empire. They thought that China was the center of the world. So the Emperor of China and his government forbade these voyages, and China became isolated until the Europeans arrived.
\nHundreds of years later, Napoleon said, \u201cChina is a sleeping giant. Let her sleep. When she wakes up, she will shake the world.\u201d Now China is waking up, experiencing economic and military power, and China may well shake the world in the near future. If Jesus does not return soon, and if American society continues to decay, by 2100 China may well be the leading country of the world, and Chinese might yet become the leading language. As Patrick J. Buchanan put it, \u201cAbsent divine intervention, or a sudden desire on the part of Western women to begin having the same size families as their grandmothers, the future belongs to the Third World.\u201d62
\nI will give you another example. In the summer of 1940 it seemed that Adolf Hitler would conquer Europe. He had already taken Poland, Denmark, Norway, Belgium, Holland, and France in a series of lightning military campaigns. The German dictator thought that England would soon knuckle under to him.
\nIn fact Hitler might well have been victorious in the Second World War had it not been for Winston Churchill (1874\u20131965), the new British Prime Minister. Historian John Lukacs said of Churchill, \u201cThere had been one man in Hitler\u2019s way of winning the kind of war he had intended.\u201d63
\nWith all military odds against England, Churchill refused to surrender to Hitler or even negotiate with him, although London and other English cities were heavily bombed by the Nazis during the early years of the war. Under Churchill, England never surrendered. America joined England to liberate Europe in 1945. Hitler\u2019s dream of conquering the world was broken, and the German dictator shot himself in an underground bunker in Berlin during the closing days of the war.
\nBut what if the sixty-five-year-old Churchill hadn\u2019t been in office\u2014or hadn\u2019t been alive at all? A weaker English Prime Minister (almost every other British politician of that time) would probably have surrendered to Hitler, or at least have cringed in fear and negotiated a submissive peace. Hitler would probably have conquered Russia and then have gone on to further conquests\u2014no doubt back to England after Russia was subdued. Hitler might well have become the master of all Europe. With the advent of the atomic bomb, which he might have obtained through espionage by that time, he could possibly have become the master of the world, perhaps even the final world dictator, known in the Bible as the Antichrist. But this horrible line of alternate history never came to pass. Why not? Historians like John Lukacs, William Manchester, and Sir Martin Gilbert tell us that Churchill, more than any other leader, was responsible for stopping Hitler in his tracks.
\nThus, one of the great turning points of history took place in 1931 on a street in New York City. Winston Churchill was visiting there when he stepped out into the street one day. Being an Englishman he was used to cars driving on the left side of the road instead of the right side, as we do in the United States. He walked into the street and didn\u2019t see a car coming. It struck him and threw him violently to the pavement. Martin Gilbert says, \u201cChurchill was crushed by the impact, dragged along by the car for some yards, and then thrown into the road, badly injured both in the head and the thighs.\u201d64
\nChurchill spent some time in the hospital, but survived, and nine years later became the greatest Prime Minister in the history of England. He stood against Hitler and his military machine, and became more responsible than any other single person for saving Western civilization from Fascism.
\nBut what if the car had been driving faster and Churchill had been killed that day? There would have been no Prime Minister in London in 1940 with the courage, character, and intelligence to withstand Hitler. The Nazi swastika might well have flown in rage and hatred all across the continent of Europe, England, and perhaps the world.
\nThe accident that happened in New York City was the kind of \u201cordinary\u201d event that has occurred thousands of times since that day in 1931. Neither Churchill nor the driver knew at that time that the world would be in great peril, and need Churchill\u2019s leadership, only nine years later. But the outcome of that collision made all the difference. World-shaking consequences hung in the balance that day, and only God knew it.
\nBut God did know it, and without lightning or thunder, He arranged for Winston Churchill to be spared on that New York City street. God did not split the earth or the sea that day, although He had the power to do so. Instead, God moved through ordinary events to bring about His intended purpose. God, in His providence, saved Winston Churchill, and with him our civilization.
\nScientifically speaking, the New York accident was a case of the Butterfly Effect of chaos theory. Historically and theologically, it reflects the providence of God. Chaos theory in history exhibits God\u2019s providence through His unseen hand, how He brings about His purposes and intentions without splitting the earth or performing any other major miracle. In this way, God can frustrate even the most careful plans of a wicked man like Hitler. As the old saying goes, \u201cMan proposes, but God disposes.\u201d
\nChaos theory in history exhibits God\u2019s providence through His unseen hand, how He brings about His purposes and intentions without splitting the earth or performing any other major miracle.
\nAnother illustration of the Butterfly Effect can be seen in the attempted assassination of President Reagan in the early days of his first term in office. If the bullet had been a little closer to his heart, would Communism have fallen in the former Soviet Union? Would Central America now be under Communist rule? We can say for certain that the bullet was about a half inch away from Reagan\u2019s heart. He lived\u2014and Communism fell. No one can refute those basic facts. Scientifically, this was a case of the Butterfly Effect, and theologically it was another example of the providence of God.
\nThe Butterfly Effect Is Seen in the Bible
\nAlmost 2,500 years ago, the Jewish people were nearly destroyed by an evil Persian man named Haman, who was the Hitler of his time. Most of the civilized world, including Israel, was governed by Persia under the rule of their king, Ahasuerus. Haman was the king\u2019s closest advisor. Haman became angry at a Jewish man named Mordecai because he would not bow down to Haman with the rest of the people to show him the honor he deserved as the king\u2019s servant. So Haman insidiously persuaded the king to order the extermination of the Jewish people throughout the Persian empire.
\nThere was only one possible way that Mordecai could cause a change in the king\u2019s mind, and it didn\u2019t look very promising at that. The wife of King Ahasuerus was a young and beautiful Jewish girl named Esther. Queen Esther was a relative of Mordecai, and Mordecai had adopted her as his daughter. Mordecai persuaded Esther to approach the king on behalf of her people, although she had to risk her life to do it, since it was against the law to approach Ahasuerus when he hadn\u2019t requested the meeting. Mordecai sent this message to Esther:
\nThink not with thyself that thou shalt escape in the king\u2019s house, more than all the Jews. For if thou altogether holdest thy peace at this time, then shall there enlargement and deliverance arise to the Jews from another place; but thou and thy father\u2019s house shall be destroyed: and who knoweth whether thou art come to the kingdom for such a time as this? (Esther 4:13\u201314)
\nEsther replied, \u201cSo will I go in unto the king, which is not according to the law: and if I perish, I perish\u201d (Esther 4:16). Mordecai was exactly right. God had placed Esther as Ahasuerus\u2019 queen in precisely the right place so that she could intercede with him for her people. Esther spoke to the king at a banquet and accused Haman of conspiracy. God\u2019s people were rescued and Haman was executed. Esther was in the right place at the right time, placed there by the providence of God.
\nWhat many people don\u2019t know is that Esther became queen through a subtle series of seemingly ordinary events. Before he married Esther, King Ahasuerus had another queen, a woman named Vashti. But she disobeyed her husband, refusing to appear at a party he had given, and was removed for her disobedience. Then the king and his associates set up a beauty contest to find another queen. Esther won the contest, became queen, and later rescued the Jews from destruction.
\nGod was already operating in His providence long before Esther approached the king on behalf of her people. God arranged for Vashti to be removed from her royal position, which opened that place for Esther. If Vashti had been obedient and remained as queen, Esther would have had no way to get near the mighty ruler.
\nGod\u2019s providence was evident in placing Esther as queen \u201cfor such a time as this\u201d (Esther 4:14). The disobedience of Vashti was not what people would call a \u201cmiracle.\u201d It was an ordinary happening in human life. Events like that had happened many times before, and would happen many times afterwards, to common people as well as royalty.
\nFurthermore, no one knew that the long-term results of Vashti\u2019s act and the king\u2019s reaction would lead to the rescue of the Jewish people from death. But God knew what would happen. And God, in His providence, moved through the ordinary events of life and history to provide for His people.
\nEsther was God\u2019s instrument in preserving the Jews. Yet, even though He used her, God was not dependent on Esther. Mordecai knew that God had chosen the Jewish people for Himself. That\u2019s why he said that deliverance would come to the Jews from \u201canother place\u201d if Esther failed (Esther 4:13). God is clearly the only Person who could have saved the Jews in a different way and from \u201canother place.\u201d God moves in His providence and uses human instruments, and His promises never fail. If one person refuses God\u2019s call, He will carry out His purposes in another way. The interplay between God\u2019s purpose, His providence, Esther\u2019s own will, and God\u2019s determination to save His people with or without Esther, shows how the different aspects of God\u2019s nature and His relations with people work together in the events of life and history\u2014without contradiction and without failure.
\nSome non-Jews understood that God could move providentially through human events. Haman\u2019s own wife warned him that his evil purpose would surely be frustrated, since he had opposed the Jewish people. She spoke to him of \u201cthe seed of the Jews, before whom thou hast begun to fall\u201d (Esther 6:13).
\nThough God\u2019s name is not mentioned in the book of Esther, the providence of God is definitely present throughout the book. Haman made his plans, but God worked through human events to defeat them. \u201cMan proposes, but God disposes.\u201d As William Cowper put it:
\nGod moves in a mysterious way
\nHis wonders to perform;
\nHe plants His footsteps in the sea,
\nAnd rides upon the storm. 65
\nSeveral hundred years before Jesus was born, the Hebrew people lived in their land, but they were divided into two kingdoms, the northern kingdom of Israel and the southern kingdom of Judah. The king of Israel was a wicked man named Ahab. The king of Judah was a godly man named Jehosaphat.
\nAhab asked Jehosaphat to help him in a battle against the Syrians. Jehosaphat unwisely agreed to join the battle, although the prophet Micaiah warned him of defeat. The crafty Ahab disguised himself, but asked Jehosaphat to put on his own royal robes, so the enemy soldiers would aim their arrows at Jehosaphat rather than him.
\nThe king of Syria ordered his men to fight against king Ahab. During the battle they realized that the man in royal robes was not Ahab. The fighting then became very confusing. In the midst of the noise and confusion, \u201cA certain man drew a bow at a venture, and smote the king of Israel between the joints of the harness\u201d (1 Kings 22:34).
\nThat Syrian soldier did not know the consequences of his act. He hadn\u2019t planned it in advance. Instead, in the heat of the battle, he drew his bow \u201cat a venture\u201d and shot it into the crowd. The arrow struck King Ahab and killed him.
\nThe man who shot that arrow hadn\u2019t planned to do so. He simply acted on the impulse of the moment. He didn\u2019t know he was the instrument of God\u2019s judgment against the king. Ahab himself had no idea that he would be slain by such an ordinary, seemingly random event. In fact, Ahab had set up a careful plan to escape by disguising himself and setting up Jehosaphat to receive the enemy\u2019s attention. But God was wiser than Ahab and his plan. God used an arrow shot into the air at random to cut off the life of the evil king. \u201cMan proposes, but God disposes.\u201d
\nWhat happened in that battle is an illustration of what science calls \u201cchaos theory.\u201d The battle was certainly chaotic. Soldiers were moving from place to place, and arrows were flying everywhere. No one could predict in advance exactly where an arrow might fly.
\nMost of the arrows had no lasting effect. But one of them struck King Ahab, as an example of the \u201cButterfly Effect.\u201d That single arrow killed King Ahab, changed history\u2014and the event is forever recorded in the Scriptures.
\nThe Bible record gives many examples of people who thought they were wiser than God, men who made their plans and came to ruin in the end\u2014men like Haman, Ahab, and countless others. I have known people who thought they could succeed while living in rebellion against God. They made their plans, but over the course of the years both they and their plans have come to nothing.
\nDon\u2019t be one of them. Live a humble and obedient life.
\nHumble yourselves therefore under the mighty hand of God, that he may exalt you in due time. (1 Peter 5:6)
\nThe Bible also says,
\nGod resisteth the proud, and giveth grace to the humble. (1 Peter 5:5)
\nWhich will you be\u2014one of the proud or one of the humble? Will you obey God, or will you proudly cling to your own devices and plans? If you trust your own heart and follow your own way, God will cast you down sooner or later.
\nHe, that being often reproved hardeneth his neck, shall suddenly be destroyed, and that without remedy. (Proverbs 29:1)
\nThe choices you make today will determine your entire future, both on this earth and in eternity. It may seem like a \u201clittle\u201d thing for you to decide to come to church on Sunday. But it could very well determine whether you get saved, live a Christian life, and go to heaven when you die. It may seem like a \u201csmall\u201d thing for you to come to Christ and be converted, but it could have great consequences for you and many others, both in time and in eternity.
\nChoose you this day whom ye will serve\u2026but as for me and my house, we will serve the Lord. (Joshua 24:15)
\nIf you are not a Christian, I encourage you to read two books by Robert Hymers and myself, Today\u2019s Apostasy and The Church That Will Be Left Behind. These books can be ordered by writing to me at P.O. Box 15308, Los Angeles, California 90015, or telephone (213) 744\u20139999. These and other books can be ordered from our website at www.historicalrevival.com. Hundreds of Dr. Hymers\u2019 word-for-word sermon manuscripts are also posted on this website as a free service in English and several other languages.
\nSeek Jesus until you find Him. Don\u2019t let anything else distract you or pull you away from seeking for Him. There is nothing more important in life than finding Jesus Christ!
\nAnd ye shall seek me, and find me, when ye shall search for me with all your heart. (Jeremiah 29:13)
\nThe Divine Symphony
\nIn a musical symphony all the instruments perform together in harmony around a single theme. Some parts of the orchestra use strings, such as violins; others are built on percussion instruments, such as drums; while others use horns, such as trombones. Some instruments are prominent while others play in the background. At times a sound will rise in volume until it commands the listener\u2019s attention and then recedes. Each instrument performs according to its own characteristics, and yet they all work together in harmony around the central theme, guided by the conductor.
\nAnd so it is in the physical sciences. Many important principles, such as the conservation of energy, the increase of entropy, quantum theory, chaos theory and others, all operate together, without disorder or contradiction, to produce the symphony of the scientific universe\u2014under the guiding hand of its Composer and Conductor, God.
\nAnd so it is in Christianity. Many important themes unite together in a way that we cannot fully understand, because God is infinitely higher than we are. The human mind cannot fully comprehend how God\u2019s sovereignty, love, justice, wrath, grace, intelligence, trinity, unity, and many other attributes can all coexist together consistently in His Being. And yet it is so.
\nIf someone were to ask me, \u201cWhat is God\u2019s great theme?\u201d I would answer, \u201cJesus Christ.\u201d The Bible says that \u201cby him all things consist\u201d (Colossians 1:17). The Greek words in this verse could be translated, \u201cin Him all things hold together.\u201d Jesus Christ is God\u2019s great theme. Deity and humanity appear together through the incarnation of Christ. The justice and love of God appear together in the atoning work of Christ. Life and hope become reality through the resurrection of Christ. Salvation comes by trusting Christ.
\nJesus Christ is the beginning and the end, the Alpha and the Omega, the A and the Z. Without Him there is nothing but sin and hell, chaos, ruin, and a hopeless eternity. But with Him there is forgiveness of sin and eternal life.
\nWhile studying God\u2019s divine symphony in science and the Bible, I felt as Handel did when he wrote his masterpiece, \u201cThe Messiah.\u201d To some extent I can take his words for my own.
\nI think I did see
\nall heaven before me, and
\nthe Great God Himself.
\n\u2014George Frederick Handel (1685\u20131759)
\nI realize that the arguments presented in this book will not persuade you unless you are \u201crenewed in the spirit of your mind\u201d (Ephesians 4:23). Only then will you be able to say that \u201cour gospel came not unto you in word only, but also in power\u201d (1 Thessalonians 1:5). Only then will you come to Christ, experience conversion, and become a productive instrument in the divine symphony.
\nDr. Werner von Braun was a Nazi during World War II. After the war he came to the United States and became the father of space science, which led to man traveling to the moon. Dr. von Braun also became a Christian. It was later that he said,
\nThe vast mysteries of the universe should only confirm our belief in the certainty of a Creator. I find it as difficult to understand a scientist who does not acknowledge the presence of a superior rationality behind the existence of the universe as it is to comprehend a theologian who would deny the advances of science.66<\/p>\n
title From darwin to design: the journey of a mathematics professor from atheism to faith<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
This book is dedicated to Simon Wiesenthal (1908\u20132005) a defender of Israel and to Chaplain Manuel Antonio Mencia, Jr. without whose prayers and efforts this book would not have been published. Foreword A word of warning to those of you who may pick up this book by chance: you most likely will not be able … <\/p>\n