We’ve had a beautiful December this year—with snow either falling or fallen since the first day of the month. I say, “If we have to have winter, let’s have it with snow!” Some of the snowfalls have been of the mesmerizing sort: the air filled with giant flakes ambling downward tipping and twirling slow enough that you can follow one flake from sky to touchdown.
It was during just one of those snowfalls several years ago that a thought suddenly overwhelmed me: materiality is the miracle. What I was blessed to understand is that we are living in the miracle. If God is all, is spirit, did create and is creating and sustaining, then the ultimate reality that makes our existence possible is the spiritual realm, which we cannot see. The material world that we do see—feel, hear, smell, taste—is God’s persistent miracle. Hence for a material being to ask if miracles are possible is really a ludicrous question. Our senses are the material gift of our Creator that allows us to know in a limited way just one small part of a reality so far beyond comprehension that our reactions to it must chiefly be humility and wonder.
It’s this truth that is the motivation for this blogsite and the chief reason we don’t get into the debate on how and how long ago God created the material world. For more that forty years I argued and debated and debated and argued—mostly with other Christians—about what the Genesis account of creation was telling us about the scientific fashion of God’s creation work. I was convinced, of course, that when the arrogant and self-centered ungodly person denies the Creator but is awestruck by His cosmos, he is led, as Paul tells us in Romans 1, into idolatry—to worshiping the creation instead of the Creator. What I didn’t see, however, is that when Christians pretend that we know how and how long ago our Creator did it, we too are proud and can easily fall into a sort of “righteous idolatry” of the material world.
Frankly, I believe if anyone, Christian or non-Christian, ever claims he knows anything more than an inkling about God’s creation miracle, he ends by adding speculation to ignorance and calling it knowledge. For that reason I’m not much interested anymore in the “Great Creation Debate.” I’m just going to be content to merely celebrate the miracle and wonder of His Creation and follow William Blake’s advice:
To see a world in a grain of sand
And a heaven in a wild flower
Hold infinity in the palm of your hand
And eternity in an hour.
See you outdoors!
Dean
December 15th, 2008 at 6:29 am
Yes, I’ve thought that, as well. But your words clarify and confirm that. Certainly creation and the sustaining of creation are both acts of God and dependent on him.
As to the science debate, I do think there’s a place for it, though where I go and land is probably different than many of my fellow believers. But your point is so well taken. We need a lot of humility in any statement concerning creation, and it’s best to leave a lot unsaid, I’m sure. More wonder and awe over the Creator because of the creation than any of our thoughts to supposedly explain it. Does remind me of God’s tact with Job.
And yes, Dean. What a beautiful Winter it has been.
December 15th, 2008 at 6:31 am
God’s tack, I think I mean, or the way God took with Job is what I actually do mean.
December 15th, 2008 at 10:18 am
I made a change to my last paragraph this morning. I originally said, “I believe if anyone, Christian or non-Christian, ever claims he knows anything more than an inkling about God’s creation miracle, he ends by adding ignorance to ignorance and calling it knowledge.”
What I meant was adding “speculation” to ignorance and calling in knowledge.
This was jarringly illustrated about a month ago on a PBS “Nature” program on monkeys which “demonstrated” with outrageous speculation and clever video editing how monkeys are just like us—hence “proving” that we descended from them.
Even an honest humanist who believes that monkeys are our ancestors would have, or should have, been embarrassed by such arrogant propaganda.
Since I was watching the program alone, I said to the TV at the end, “No wonder the majority of Americans don’t buy the Darwinian theory of human evolution.” Even a sophomore could tell that most of the program was a wild stretch of speculative imagination, not science.
December 15th, 2008 at 12:34 pm
Yes, I wonder why this invasion into science of naturalism and atheism, but reading Romans 1, I shouldn’t wonder at all!
December 15th, 2008 at 2:35 pm
I used to get annoyed when folks would say it took eons for God to create everything, so the wording of Genesis is really figurative, when I was convinced that the word day meant 24 literal hours. Then I was talking with a Christian brother who had a phd in some field of science who had changed to the long period of creation, and his ideas made sense to me. Then later, I reverted back to 24 literal hours.
What I am convinced of now (here is what everyone wants to know, I am sure) is that God didn’t tell us. He probably knew that since we cannot fathom what He does anyway, there was no use to tell us in detail what He did and how long it took.
I am beginning to learn in my mid 60′s that I don’t need to know everything (as if I could), and I don’t need to understand much either. God has complete knowledge and total understanding, and He says to trust Him. I’m glad He didn’t say “Understand and comprehend all about Jesus and you will be saved”. He said just to trust Him.
OK, I give up. I surrender. He knows and I don’t but that is good enough for me. He reveals all I need to know.
I’m not sure, Dean, if I understood what you meant about holding infinity in my hands, and that the material part of creation is the persistent miracle, but I do agree that the spiritual element is the main reality and it sure is difficult for most of us to grasp. But you know what, God has spoken these things to us in His written word, and as you have so ably shown, that He speaks really clearly through the things He created.
December 15th, 2008 at 3:07 pm
To rdrcomp:
Since William Blake is not an easy poet to read and understand, I’m not sure I can fully explain what he might have meant about holding infinity in your hand. What I take it to mean is that the awesome material world is from God who is spirit and is infinite. So to hold in my hand a beautiful material flower and recognize and acknowledge it as the handiwork of a good, loving, and eternal God could be considered “holding infinity in your hand.”
Poets have the advantage over philosophers in that they don’t have to explain what they mean!
The material world’s being a “persistent miracle” relates to how we might define a miracle: God causing something unique and beyond material explanation to occur in our presence. Ultimately the cosmos itself is beyond material explanation—making all a virtual miracle. Moses’ rod becoming a snake was a singular miracle for a specific divine purpose. But all other snakes exist as our Creator’s persistent miracle for general divine purposes.
Dean