The Seed Blog: Telescopes & Microscopes: The Lovers, The Dreamers & Me

Christians are so often accused of being close-minded when it comes to our faith, not wanting to even consider other possibilities; and yet listen to the narrow-minded, biased, angry, and even cruel comment of one of the major supporters of Evolution today, Richard Dawkins.

This is his description of anyone who does not share his belief on the theory, not fact, of Evolution: "To claim equal time for creation science in biology classes is about as sensible as to claim equal time for the flat-earth theory in astronomy classes. Or, as someone has pointed out, you might as well claim equal time in sex education classes for the stork theory. It is absolutely safe to say that if you meet somebody who claims not to believe in evolution, that person is ignorant, stupid or insane (or wicked, but I'd rather not consider that)." "Faith is the great cop-out, the great excuse to evade the need to think and evaluate evidence. Faith is belief in spite of, even perhaps because of, the lack of evidence."

Some amazing discoveries in science and technology over the past decades have given us powerful evidences to consider, evidences which solidly, objectively point to our Creator, so much so, that it takes a conscious decision to believe against the evidence to continue an atheistic view of life. There are only two possibilities for the entire Universe's existence: 1) it has always been, and there has never been a time when there was nothing (called, "Static" or "Infinite" Universe) 2) there was a time when there was nothing, and then from nothing there was everything. Both present extreme problems for scientists today, with discoveries through advances in technology and knowledge.

Constant/Infinite Theory: favored by most scientists until recently, has been almost completely debunked by all today. The Second Law of Thermodynamics guarantees that the Universe is going from a state of order to disorder and that the Universe is running out of usable energy. If the Universe were infinite, this Law shows it would be completely disintegrated and used up; and this Law also removed the theory of an, "infinitely expanding and contracting" Universe because it would still lose the energy required. The Universe has been found to be constantly expanding.

As far back as 1916, Albert Einstein's Theory of Relativity predicted this would be the case; but Einstein considered this, "irritating", because it would take away the infinite, self-sustaining Universe. He so disliked the Theory results, which are now proven accurate to within five decimal places, that he introduced a change to the equation (later called a fudge factor by some) to keep the Universe constant. But later experiments and studies by a British cosmologist and a Russian mathematician solidly confirmed the Theory of Relativity before the, "fudge factor", showing the Universe actually had a beginning. The British Cosmologist, Arthur Eddington, agreed with Einstein's frustration over the results, "Philosophically, the notion of a beginning of the present order of nature is repugnant to me... I should like to find a genuine loophole."

In 1927, the expanding Universe was actually observed for the first time by an astronomer named Edwin Hubble. (Hubble Telescope). This observation was through discovery of a, "Red shift" in the light of every visible galaxy. This shift meant that the galaxies were moving away from us, confirming General Relativity again, that the whole Universe is expanding.

1964, two Bell Lab scientists began detecting mysterious radiation from literally any direction they turned their antenna in the skies of Holmdel, NJ. They thought it was being caused by bird droppings on the antenna; but instead of bird droppings, they'd discovered "cosmic background radiation", the afterglow of heat & light from the origin of the Universe. It won them a Nobel Prize, and pretty much solidified the proof of a beginning of the Universe.

1989, NASA launched a $200M satellite (COBE) because scientists were predicting that if this Cosmic background was from the Universe exploding into existence, it would cause very distinct ripples in the temperature of the radiation. They not only found the ripples, but the precision of the ripples show the Universe exploded and expanded into existence at a very precise rate (down to one part in one hundred thousand: faster and the galaxies would never form; slower and the Universe would have collapsed back on itself). (Astronomer George Smoot, Astrophysicist Michael Turner, Stephen Hawking): solidified the fact that our Universe had a beginning. we have solid proof the Universe was not always here, but had a beginning... (Details will surely fluctuate, but it is solid)

Why is this so powerful for the Christian?   Of course, the evidence supports the possibility for the moment of Creation; but, it goes so much deeper than that. There are only two possibilities for our existence today: Either the Universe is eternal, or Something outside the Universe is eternal. We have just shown that the Universe must have had a beginning—so something outside the Universe, must therefore be eternal.

Even more powerful: the overwhelming evidence is that all space, matter, and even time is intertwined & began the moment of the supposed, "Big Bang"—meaning all laws of science were part of that bang, and were only valid, after that moment. The First Law of Thermodynamics, essentially says that energy can never be created or destroyed, it can only change form—meaning the amount of usable energy in the Universe has been set, and never can be added to or taken away. This Law was obviously not present before the big bang, was it?

The Law of Causality, which is the fundamental principle of science, states that everything that has a beginning, has a cause—to deny this Law is to deny rationality. This Law is the whole basis for why we have science; to discover what causes things to happen.  The Universe had a beginning, therefore it had to have a cause—but there cannot be one in the natural world, because nothing was before the Big bang. So, according to our own Laws of science, and our own solidly observed evidences in the Universewe can walk  backwards through what these discoveries say happened.

The Universe becomes smaller, closer, more energized; not until it is a thousand miles wide, a mile wide, or even a foot wide, but until it disappears completely—leaving absolutely nothing (no Time, Space, or Matter; no Laws of Science) Can you even imagine literally, absolutely nothing!?! Now press the, "forward" button again—and something begins to work; something outside of Time, Space and Matter; something outside the Laws of the physical world; something that must have more energy than the entire Universe It caused; something with the intelligence to bring time, space, and matter into existence in such an unfathomable perfection that it could sustain galaxies, worlds, and life itself; something that did all of this in one moment of instantaneous Creation—from absolutely nothing: Genesis 1:1, Hebrews 11:3.

This is called the, "Cosmological Argument" - Everything that had a beginning had a cause.  The Universe had a beginning, therefore it has a cause. (Dr. Robert Jastrow, George Smoot, III, Robert Naeye, Dr. George Will). This explosion that produced everything, yet came from nothing, with no guidance, no purpose, no design, just happened to produce the right scientific laws and constants in the whole Universe to support life. Most have no idea just how incredible that really is, as astounding as the evidence is for the beginning, the Creation of the Universe.

Anthropic (human, man) Principle: the universe appears to have been fine-tuned for our existence; not just a few common factors that must be met in order for life to exist; all of the conditions necessary for our existence in this Universe are so unimaginable that they are well beyond scientific reason or mathematical probability. (galaxy size, type, location, sun’s location, color & composition, earth’s location, number of moons, etc.) The actual laws of physics and the physical properties of the Universe have even been minutely fine-tuned. If even one of the many laws and properties that create the Universe were slightly different, life would be impossible. (Anil Ananthaswamy). (ratio of electrons and protons, ratio of electromagnetic force to gravity, Universe expansion rate, gravitational force of Universe, etc.) Psalm 19:1-4, Isaiah 45:18. Sir Roger Penrose did an in-depth calculation of the possibility of life originating in the Universe, and according to one of the most respected, and contributory mathematical physicists of our day, who is a self-proclaimed atheist, the chance of life without a Creator is mathematically an absurdity.

With all of this evidence, why are there still many scientists who will NOT embrace the solid proof of our Creator God? (Dr. Robert Jastrow) Based upon all of this information (and more to come): Who seems to be walking by shear faith, in spite of and, in the lack of evidence today? ["Faith is the great cop-out, the great excuse to evade the need to think and evaluate evidence. Faith is belief in spite of, even perhaps because of, the lack of evidence."] : "Believing without observation is exactly what atheists accuse 'religious' people of doing.  But ironically, it's the atheists who are pushing a religion of blind faith. Christians have a good reason based on observation (such as the Big Bang and the Anthropic Principle) for believing what they believe. Atheists don't. That's why we don't have enough faith to be atheists." Romans 1:18-22. Don't be fooled or intimidated; you are not the ones holding onto faith against reason & evidence. These things had to be accepted, because man will find anything he can grasp at, to discount God in these last days. If you don't believe, it is not a head problem, but a heart problem.