reason.cck.org.uk

If you consider yourself a sceptic about Christianity or a Christian who is looking for honest answers to some of the toughest questions, then this book was quite simply written for you. Tim Keller is a pastor in New York, who has put into writing the kinds of questions that he is asked on a regular basis about Christianity such as ‘ How can a good God allow suffering?’, ‘Hasn’t science disproved Christianity?’ and ‘How can a loving God send people to hell?’

In this book, Keller takes an unusual approach to defending Christianity, in that he essentially divides the book into two. The first half is dedicated to answering objections that are often raised against Christianity, but in the second half of the book he somewhat changes his approach. Many people often believe that the burden of proof is on Christians to show why they believe in ideas that go beyond mere naturalistic thinking. However, Keller shows very clearly through philosophy, literature and reasoning that there are in fact many assumptions made in atheistic and agnostic worldviews in practice; such as when we consider the origins of moral values, and indeed meaning in life, amongst other things that are a significant problem.

Tim Keller manages to come across as thoughtful and persuasive while maintaining an intellectually credible yet accessible work.  Overall, I would suggest that this book is a must-read for anyone, whether you consider yourself a person of faith or not. This will challenge many of your pre-suppositions to the core.

In the 19th century atheist philosophers would argue that the universe had always existed, but the discovery of the ‘big bang’ by the Roman Catholic priest and scientist Georges Lemaitre in 1927 (popularised by Hubble in 1929) put an end to this way of arguing, and atheists were now forced to admit that there was a beginning to the universe, which brought in a new line of questioning.

Argument from infinite regress

One way that we can end up at this question is through what philosophers of science call the ‘argument from infinite regress’. What this means is that if we ask the question on the origins of our universe, we may well come to the conclusion that the big bang started it. ‘Very well’ you may say, ‘but where did all the energy come from which led to the big bang?’ You may then get into various topics of discussion about different types of positive and negative matter, which again leads us to the question ‘Where did that come from?’

In the end, you logically end up at the position that something unknown created this beginning. As we have looked at in other articles the universe is extremely fine-tuned for us to exist (* See article listed below) it would seem that there are clear reasons to believe that whatever or whoever created the universe was probably quite intelligent; as a Christian I would suggest this is strong evidence for the God of the bible.

Objection, your honour

Some people object to this line of reasoning because they insist that for us to be consistent this leads us to the question ‘Who made God?’ However, although this may sound a plausible argument it is actually a fallacious one described in philosophy circles as a ‘category mistake’.

If Christians believed in a God that was created then this would be a superb argument destroying Christianity in a micro-second. However, Christians believe that God is eternal (Isaiah 26:4, Romans 16:26) and so to ask the question ‘Who made God?’ is the same as asking ‘Who made the unmade?’ This is a category mistake because it is logically impossible, in the same way that the question ‘Where is the bachelor’s wife?’ leads us to an impossible conclusion. In other words, just like the bachelor is single, the God of the Bible is eternal.

The limitations of naturalism

As humans we find it very difficult to conceive of something eternal (we live within space & time) but that does not mean that it can’t exist. God is described in the Bible as holy, which means he is ‘other’ or fundamentally different to us. He is not finite, and therefore we should not expect science (which enables us to measure the natural world) to be able to fully measure something infinite (though it does give us many clues).

Think very carefully when someone says to you, ‘You can only believe in things that are proven by science’. This statement fails to live up to its own claim as Science can’t prove the statement to be true in the first place. This is a faith assertion and is an example of the blind faith that religious people are often criticised for, whereas the idea of an eternal God remains philosophically consistent.

*http://reason.cck.org.uk/how-does-modern-science-show-that-there-is-a-god/

It is important to note that the Bible is not a science text book, instead it teaches us about God, His personality, and how we are supposed to relate to Him. The Bible does not teach us every detail about the way the physical world works.

For instance, the Bible talks of the sun ‘rising’; we know that in fact the sun does not move, but that the Earth spins causing the sun to appear in a different place. Our knowledge of the science behind this phenomenon does not remove any truth from the description that the sun ‘rises’, as this is still the apparent result.

The Bible clearly states that God created the Earth and Mankind, but exactly how this was done we are not told.

A God of the gaps?

Many people are of the opinion that a scientific understanding of the world around us and the processes involved in its formation somehow takes away from the amazing notion of a creator God. This is not the case, the more I understand about how complex the natural world really is, the more in awe of its creator I become. We should not think of a god who only creates through miracles that we cannot understand, a god that disappears when we do gain some understanding, but instead we have an ingeniously brilliant God who has set in place the physical laws that in turn lead to what we see.

“Biblical miracles are those interventions of God’s grace that stand out from a backcloth of His ‘normal’ creative actions. Were it not for the consistency and faithfulness of God in creation we would be less able to recognize His miraculous interventions in the lives of His people.” (from article 1, below)

Did God create through evolution?

This topic is still a subject of debate among Christian groups, each with slightly differing interpretations of the Biblical account and even different views of what evolution entails. Should we let this become a serious issue?

I am not an expert in the field of evolutionary biology, nor will I claim to be, however there are Bible believing Christians who have worked at the cutting edge of this scientific field for decades and still hold firm to their beliefs, in some sense we must take the opinions of these people seriously.

E.g Francis Collins – Head of the Human Genome project.

(When asked, “What do you say to your fellow Christians who say, ‘Evolution is just a theory, and I can’t put that together with my idea of a creator God’?”) “Well, evolution is a theory. It’s a very compelling one. As somebody who studies DNA, the fact that we are 98.4 percent identical at the DNA level to a chimpanzee, it’s pretty hard to ignore the fact that when I am studying a particular gene, I can go to the mouse and find it’s the similar gene, and it’s 90 percent the same. It’s certainly compatible with the theory of evolution, although it will always be a theory that we cannot actually prove. I’m a theistic evolutionist. I take the view that God, in His wisdom, used evolution as His creative scheme. I don’t see why that’s such a bad idea. That’s pretty amazingly creative on His part. And what is wrong with that as a way of putting together in a synthetic way, the view of God who is interested in creating a group of individuals that He can have fellowship with — us? Why is evolution not an appropriate way to get to that goal? I don’t see a problem with that.”

E.g Denis Alexander – Molecular biologist and director of the Faraday Institute for Science and Religion at St Edmund’s College, Cambridge.

Denis Alexander has written some excellent articles on Christianity and evolution, if this is a topic you wish to find out more about please take the time to read the following:

1) http://www.bethinking.org/science-christianity/intermediate/is-evolution-atheistic.htm

2) http://www.bethinking.org/science-christianity/intermediate/is-it-possible-to-be-a-christian-and-believe-in-evolution.htm

3) http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2008/sep/12/religion.evolution

The Bible promises that anyone who searches for God will find him

You will seek me and find me, when you seek me with all your heart. (Jeremiah 29:13)

Ask, and it will be given to you; seek, and you will find; knock, and it will be opened to you. (Matthew 7:7)

This includes the search through scientific investigation, indeed there are many areas of modern science that point to the existence of the God of the Bible (some of which will be discussed below).

Can science see, detect or measure God?

Despite its great successes there is a limit as to how much science can tell us. Science is the study of the material world around us, its aim is to provide an explanation for the way the physical world works. God does not fit into the realm that science is able to directly study: for God to have created space and time, He must exist somewhat outside of it. A study of God is largely spiritual, and an exercise in faith – faith is the assurance of things hoped for, a conviction of things not seen. Belief in God and what he has done for us requires faith and trust in Him. This does not have to be “blind faith” with no intelligent thought involved, however, there is still a necessary step of faith. If a person has rejected God and hardened their heart to Him it would be difficult to change their mind based on the scientific evidence alone, but for those who are willing to look, God has left his fingerprints all over creation for us to find:

The heavens declare the glory of God, and the sky above proclaims his handiwork. (Psalm 19:1)

.. his invisible attributes, namely, his eternal power and divine nature, have been clearly perceived, ever since the creation of the world, in the things that have been made. (Romans 1:20)

In fact there are many scientists who have sought to find God through studying the world around them and come to faith in Jesus as a result (e.g. Dr Hugh Ross (Co-founder of Reasons-to-Believe)).

The discussion of science and God is such a vast one that many books continue to be written on the topic, and I’d encourage Christians and  non-Christians alike to investigate the subject. Many people have objections to faith based on the common mis-conception that science and Christianity are at odds with each other. This is not the case, areas of contention are often resolved by new scientific data or in some cases by people re-examining a poor interpretation of a passage of scripture.  

Science can give us an insight into the way God has created.

Scientific studies to date have revealed a little of just how amazingly beautiful and complex the world around us is, all of this points to an amazing God who is all the more amazing to have created it in a way that we are able to study it, and enjoy it. 

An Example from Astrophysics:

An obvious place where religion and science do overlap, is the question of creation itself: “Where did the universe come from?”. Until the mid 1900’s much of the scientific community believed that the universe was static and eternal, clearly in disagreement with the account in Genesis. In 1916 Einsteins theory of General Relativity highlighted the theoretical difficulties with this view of the  universe, and indicated an expanding universe with a beginning. In 1929 Hubble provided observational support for this new model. Measurements of distant galaxies show that they are receding from us with increasing speed the further away they are. If everything is moving apart, things must have been closer together in the past. Taking this idea back far enough leads to a very dense and energetic beginning to the expansion- An event now known as the Big Bang.
 
Many independent observations of the Cosmic Microwave Background, and chemical abundances in the universe have resulted in the Big Bang model being almost universally accepted. The model very successfully describes the history of the universe back as far as the first 10-43 seconds, but as far as the absolute beginning goes, modern science can say nothing. It appears to be creation from nothing, with a cause that may be outside the view of scientific study. A Nobel Prize winning physicist Arno Penzias said of the Big Bang: “The best data we have are exactly what I would have predicted had I nothing to go on but the first five books of Moses, the Psalms and the Bible as a whole.”    

In the beginning, God created the heavens and the earth. (Genesis 1:1)

It also appears that the universe we live in is incredibly fine tuned in order to exist for any length of time let alone to support life (known as “The Fine Tuning Problem”). There are a vast number of physical parameters (the speed of light, the strength of gravity and various aspects of electromagnetism to name a few) that all have to be precisely the value they are, or else we would not exist. There is no reason to suggest that these values should all arise naturally, in fact it is highly unlikely, many people see this as very strong evidence for design, and therefore an intelligent creator.

Suggested books to start with:

The case for a Creator -   Lee Stroble
The Language of God: A scientist presents evidence for belief -   Francis Collins
God’s Undertaker: Has science buried God? -  John C. Lennox

How did God create the world from nothing?

Is this not worthy of praise unto God? How much more then should we stand in awe of Him who made the starry hosts by the breath of His mouth (Psalm 33:6).

Creation reveals what God can do and has done.

“Never show anyone. They’ll beg you and they’ll flatter you for the secret, but as soon as you give it up … you’ll be nothing to them.” – Alfred Borden, The Prestige (2006)

A quote from one of my favourite movies which features two illusionists trying to out do each other’s brilliant tricks as they vie to be the world’s greatest. Now the difference between God and illusionists is that while an illusionist seeks to charm the audience by deceiving the eye into believing an object has evidently defied the laws of physics that the system, in which we live, is subject to, God does the real thing! God glorifies His Name through His creation. As Borden puts it, there’s nothing great about an illusionist whose tricks the mind has comprehended. However, I am quite confident that our limited minds would never be able to fully grasp the unlimited magnificence of God. But when we do glimpse even just a shadow of His glory, He’ll become everything to us. To Him be all praise and honour and glory and power, for ever and ever!

I would like to begin by saying that Genesis was not written with the intention of being a scientific textbook. Rather, it is a theological narrative written to reveal the God of creation, which means its emphasis is on God and not creation.

The Scientific Approach

Naturalism is the worldview which believes that matter comes forth from natural processes, without aid from any supernatural entity. In this system of belief, matter and life are created by chance. This leaves us with an infinite regress of cause and effect, or the incredulous teaching that everything we see came out of nothing with no causal force or purpose. Evolutionary theory recognizes that man came from matter already existent on the earth, but it is unable to determine how that process took place.

To take a more scientific approach, particle physics and quantum chemistry define ‘matter creation’ as a process inverse to particle annihilation (“total destruction” or “complete obliteration” of an object). It is the conversion of mass-less particles into one or more massive particles.  By the law of conservation of momentum (The total momentum of any group of objects remains the same unless outside forces act on the objects) and the law of conservation of energy (the total amount of energy in an isolated system remains constant), in a system that is un-acted upon, energy and momentum cannot be altered or created. By Einstein’s famous equation, E = mc2 (E – Energy; m- mass; c – speed of light), only if a force is applied to an object in the direction of motion, will the object gain momentum and energy.   Hence, even if we want to convert matter from one form to another, a proportionate force is required.

To put in simple terms, it is impossible to make anything that has mass and occupies a position in space, by just saying so! (Imagine if we could!)

That pretty much leaves the question of creation unanswered.

The Biblical Approach

Biblically, we realize that God’s power was able to do what is naturalistically impossible: bring forth life from lifeless matter. God created the substance (matter) of the universe out of nothing.

The biblical creation story tells us that an eternal, necessary first cause (God), created the universe and all that is in it. The law of causality demands that all effects (matter) need a cause, and that these changes take place in the current space dimension in which we live. God is eternal (Psalm 90:2) and is subsequently apart from His creation as the necessary first cause.

The Bible teaches that God made creation out of nothing. In Hebrews 11:3, “By faith we understand that the universe was formed at God’s command, so that what is seen was not made out of what was visible.” This teaching negates the possibility of evolution and an eternal universe, or some form of matter out of which creation was made. Also, it means that the state of creation was “formless and empty” in Genesis 1:2 cannot refer to some matter that God used to make creation out of, but rather that “formless and empty” simply means that the earth was created from nothing but was not yet formed in such a way that it could sustain human life and was therefore empty of human life.

So then where did creation come from?
Genesis 1:1 portrays God creating all of creation from nothing. Therefore, creation came not from pre-existing matter but rather out of nothing.

What God had made from nothing was then prepared for human habitation by the powerful spoken word of God. (Gen 1:3, 6, 9, 11, 14, 20, 24, 26).

Genesis 1 portrays God’s word as the most powerful force in all of creation. Therein, God’s word brings order, makes things good, creates an environment in which life can exist, separates things, comes with unparalleled authority, and accomplishes exactly what God intended it to. God brought creation out of nothing and prepared it for us because He cares for us. The final act of creation in Genesis 1-2 is the making of our first parents, Adam and Eve (Genesis 2:7, 22). Genesis artfully paints the creation of the man and woman who are God’s image-bearers on the earth as a very special and personal event done by God’s metaphorical hands as He was intimately and delicately involved in the knitting together of human life. Psalm 139:13 echoes the sanctity of human life made by God’s hand, saying, “For you created my inmost being; you knit me together in my mother’s womb.”

The Implications

The question of origins has implications for everything else. For example, Genesis says that there was a beginning to history which means there will be an end. Genesis says that creation comes from God which means it belongs to God. Genesis says that people come from God which means that people will stand before God in the end.

Furthermore, the Bible adds, creation leaves man without an excuse to doubt the existence of an eternal God. (Rom 1:20)

The danger of this question is the emotive response that it may provoke. I think it’s important to argue for morality on the basis of God’s Word rather than on subjective feelings.
 
In response to the question, yes, the whole human population has spawned from Adam and Eve because Cain married his sister as did his other brother Seth. (Gen 4:28)
 
The Bible is very clear that all other people are descended from Adam (Acts 17:26), and Adam is called ‘the first man’ in 1 Cor. 15:45. Eve was so named because she was ‘the mother of all living’ (Gen. 3:20). If Cain married a woman not descended from Adam and Eve, it would imply that God made her as He did Eve (from Adam’s rib). But the Bible simply does not say this and if this were true then she would have been a sinless woman not descended from Adam and therefore she would have never died and would be alive and well today to tell us exactly what happened!
 
Even Abraham testified that he married his half-sister (Genesis 20:12), and this was a marriage blessed by God, and led to the Messiah. It wasn’t till the time of Moses that God forbade the Israelites from brother-sister marriage (Lev. 18–20).
 
Mutation & Genes

There is a logical explanation for why God waited till Moses to outlaw this practice, when he didn’t with Abraham. Originally, there would have been no risk of this causing harmful deformity in the offspring. There is a problem today, because all of us have inherited copying mistakes in our genes, called mutations, which are usually harmful. Mutations are one effect of God’s curse on the entire creation because of Adam’s sin (Genesis 3:19, Romans 8:20–22).
 
Fortunately, we carry two copies of each gene, one inherited from each parent (called alleles). Usually we inherit mutations in different places, so usually the mutated gene’s effect is fully or partly masked by the ‘good’ gene. But if close relatives marry, then there is a one-in-four chance of a child inheriting mutant alleles in the same place (locus) from both parents. This one-in-four chance applies to each mutation, of which there are thousands, so the chance of some deformity is great.
 
But Adam and Eve were created ‘very good’ (Genesis 1:31) — the Hebrew ‘meod tov’, in the context of a finished creation which God had already called ‘good’ after most creation days, indicates physical perfection without any blemishes. So they would not have had copying mistakes, so brother-sister intermarriage would not have had the problem it has today. Harmful mutations would take many generations to accumulate to levels where close intermarriage would be dangerous for the offspring. 
 
But as many centuries passed, many harmful, degenerative mutations accumulated in the human gene pool. This is probably a major reason for God giving laws to the Israelites through Moses against intermarriage between close relatives (Leviticus 18–20). Today, there would be even more chance of deformity/disease in the offspring of such a union than in Moses’ time —consequently, even first cousin marriages are outlawed in many countries.