This week Ricky Gervais wrote an op-ed article in the Wall Street Journal about why there is no God. It was not persuasive or well thought out to say the least. I think it is so funny how we think our belief in Him or not changes anything. Celebrities tend to become quite full of themselves as evidenced when, Kirk Cameron, a Christian actor, tried recently to debate the existence of God with men who had many credentials and initials behind their names. It didn't go so well for Kirk. Why? Because Kirk's heart got ahead of him. They were speaking different languages. So, what brought this all to mind for me? This week, my friend Alicia told us in a note that her son Ewan stopped believing in Santa while her son Vaughn believes with great devotion. Ewan has autism and a critical and questioning, concrete thinking mind. He will do great things in this world, while Vaughn will probably run Disney and Industrial Light and Magic. All of this made me think this morning when I should be cleaning my house and getting ready for Christmas Eve. This life is full of questions. It may start with the end of Santa belief to some serious questioning about a carpenter from Nazareth who was born of a virgin, performed miracles, took the sin of the world upon himself, died on a cross and rose to life again. So death comes for us but it does not win. The soul lives on in Heaven.
Is our faith a fairy tale like our treasured Santa legend? Does little Ricky have the answers? Is Kirk a fool because he believes?
No Ricky does not have the answers and Kirk is not a fool. He is just a wee bit arrogant.
I will, for now, pass over the facts about science. Science supports creation and if you want to get into that debate with me, feel free to at length at a later date. I have a ton of data and facts that I can throw your way. That is not what this note is about and the facts and data are not why I believe. The facts and the data only show me that He is so much more than my human earth-bound mind can ever fathom.
I Believe with a capital B.
I believe with every fiber of my being. This is the only certainty in my entire life. The Only One.
Jesus Is, was and always will be.
He did what He said He would do. He created the Way for everyone. Everyone. What else in life is accessible to everyone that ever drew breath? He put down His life to save mine. Literally. My name is engraved on the palms of His hands. Loving Him is not a guarantee of anything except that nothing in heaven or earth will ever separate us again. I don't get a free pass on pain or suffering. He is not telling me that I will skate through this life with my heart intact or with perfect health. He does not promise me the easy way; He promises me that He will be with my along the Way. So, my belief is not based on Him doing something for me or shielding me or giving me good things. He already has done that.
No Ricky, I base my faith on knowing Him. Personally, deeply, intimately as Counselor and Friend. That is why I think it is hard to explain Him to those who don't know Him. Once He is in your heart, the created recognizes the Creator in a way that cannot be experienced by anyone else. It is individualized and personal and beautiful and Holy. It is a snowflake experience, a gift made just for You. He comes in to your life and He fills the spaces that need to be filled in our hearts. He sees YOUR pain and weakness and He heals it in based on who you are and what you need. So your relationship with Him is different than mine.
Because it is personal, for that reason it is hard to jump into listing the facts about someone you love and adore. We are not high on emotions either. He is not Santa. To know Him is to love Him. It is so intense that the feelings and the love come first to our minds. Like lovesick kids, we go to the heart of the matter because He is in our hearts. He gives us something that no one else can or ever will.
The scientific part of my mind is clouded by the love, but the scientific part of my mind still functions. I am glad that the love comes first. Just as I don't love Randy because the facts show that he is a good life partner for me; I love Randy because he is Randy. Describe your best friend, what words do you start with? You start with the words in your heart. But it does not end there.
The bible tells us that "man's wisdom is foolishness in the eyes of God". I love God because I have eyes that see. That is a big statement. So when we talk a bit about science and facts, we can also see. So, just for the wow factor of it all, let's shift scientifically... I know that my eyes are the most miraculous and awesome parts of my body. The facts about how my eyes work blow my mind. Let me share this with you just because I love reading it and seeing how big my God really is. This author, Randall Niles, describes the human eye related to his belief in God. Randall Niles was described as "the definitive skeptic, critic, and cynic. He was forged in the fires of Georgetown, Oxford, and Berkeley and his peers knew him as a "practicing atheist." Then, in what seemed to be overnight, people witnessed a dramatic shift in his life and he now believes. The facts brought him to faith because the facts are there too.
"The human eye is enormously complicated, it is a perfect and interrelated system of about 40 individual subsystems, including the retina, pupil, iris, cornea, lens and optic nerve. The retina has approximately 137 million special cells that respond to light and send messages to the brain. About 130 million of these cells look like rods and handle the black and white vision. The other seven million are cone shaped and allow us to see in color. The retina cells receive light impressions, which are translated to electric pulses and sent to the brain via the optic nerve. A special section of the brain called the visual cortex interprets the pulses to color, contrast, depth, etc., which allows us to see "pictures" of our world. Incredibly, the eye, optic nerve and visual cortex are totally separate and distinct subsystems. Yet, together, they capture, deliver and interpret up to 1.5 million pulse messages a milli-second! It would take dozens of Cray supercomputers programmed perfectly and operating together flawlessly to even get close to performing this task.
That's so powerful to me! Obviously, if all the separate subsystems aren't present and performing perfectly at the same instant, the eye won't work and has no purpose. Logically, it would be impossible for random processes, operating through gradual mechanisms of natural selection and genetic mutation, to create 40 separate subsystems when they provide no advantage to the whole until the very last state of development and interrelation. How did the lens, retina, optic nerve, and all the other parts in vertebrates that play a role in seeing suddenly come about? Because natural selection cannot choose separately between the visual nerve and the retina. The emergence of the lens has no meaning in the absence of a retina. The simultaneous development of all the structures for sight is unavoidable. Since parts that develop separately cannot be used, they will both be meaningless, and also perhaps disappear with time. At the same time, their development all together requires the coming together of unimaginably small probabilities.
The foregoing represents the core of "irreducible complexity." Complex organs made up of separate but necessary subsystems cannot be the result of random chance. Or, using the above language, such development could only result from "unimaginably small probabilities." For me, this means "statistical impossibility."
That is just the beginning of the fact debates. The tilt of the earth perfectly to support life and on and on and on. I see the stars and the heavens and I know the incredible mathematics behind the heavens defy chance. I agree with Randall about the stats, and I believe not because of the science, but because of Who He is and how I love Him.
The debate makes me weary, the debate pales in comparison to the wonders of knowing Him. The debate is tiny foolish human minds trying to comprehend the incomprehensible, the divine. That is why believers, who are blessed to know Him, always go back to the heart side of the matter.
I believe because I know Him and because we love each other.
I hope you know Him too.
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