Thoughts With Dalt

Week 4, we made it! As we wrap up this series, I would like to ask if you would mind sharing this with someone. It is posted on my Facebook, so there are a few helpful things you can do. Liking, commenting, or sharing that post will help get it out to more people. If you aren’t on Facebook, would you text/email to someone you think would benefit from this series? Thanks! Last week I ended on “time and space”. We talked about their creation and dependence on a creator. Lets talk about “matter” similarly, and wrap it up! If you are new here, please go back and read 1.01, 1.02, and 1.03 to understand where we are today.

Matter

We will spend a little more time on this final category. There are many layers of proof for a Creator in the many substances (matter) we have in our universe. So far, we have time created by a Being outside of time. Time allows for space to have a time to exist within. Space was created inside of a time to allow for matter to exist. Time as a concept is singular in nature. We experience it as it happens. However, God was before time and He is after time, so He sees it all together as a singularity. Space is infinitely whole, so it is also singular. Matter as a concept is singular, but there is a plurality of types of matter. Dirt, Water, Glass, Stone, Plastic, Bone, Skin, Blood. Your science book condenses all matter into three categories: Solid, Liquid, Gas. Either way, we understand there are multiple types of matter.

In the order of creation, we see a particular order in which different types of matter were created. As stated above, first came the heavens (space) then Earth (matter). Light, which is not matter, but a product of matter, came next. Here is a thought to scratch your head about: Per scripture (Genesis 1:3), light was created before the Sun/Moon/stars. I believe God Himself lit the universe prior to creating the Sun. This will be reality again one day as Revelation 21:23 states, “the city has no need of sun or moon to shine on it, for the glory of God gives it light, and its lamp is the Lamb”.

Next, we have water being gathered into a single location, or locations, and dry land appearing. This would allow for vegetation (trees, shrubs, grass) to spring up. Next in line comes the new sources of light. The Sun, Moon, and stars were created on day 4 to light the Earth. Yes, the Moon only reflects light from the Sun. It still gives light from our perspective. Now that the sky is visible and vegetation is nourished by the light of the Sun, the birds are created. Sea animals are placed in the water that is gathered to its boundaries that were defined by God. (Job 38:11) Land animals now have food and controlled water boundaries, so they are created. Lastly, God would place man (Adam) on an Earth designed to serve him and be subdued by Him. To assist in doing so, God would also create Adam a helper and partner, Eve.

Intelligent Designer

Personally, I enjoy order and loathe chaos. Reading the biblical account of creation is very satisfying. Everything is created in the correct, perfect order. The matter created on day X is dependent on the matter created the day prior. This is where the term “intelligent design” is derived from. The intelligent Designer intelligently designed it all in an intelligent order. Don’t spaz out as you read this next sentence, I will explain it soon after. The best part about this order is that even if you can take God out of the equation, it is the only option/order that works. Any other order would not sustain and produce what we have today. That said, I reject that it could have happened without a Creator, as does science… well, actual science. The chance of a random big bang & evolution bringing us to our current state is not even calculable, let alone feasible. A choir requires a director, an meal requires a cook, and Creation requires a Creator.

In an effort to close the book on an alien ran simulation theory from earlier, someone would still have had to create the “aliens”, or they arrived through big bang evolution. So, either you affirm a God like character that created, or affirm big bang evolution which has been rationally and fully debunked by many common people for many years, and now slowly by many scientists. So, let’s put that in the hole we have dug and move on.

Precision of Operation

One last conscience dig. Let’s think on just how precisely matter exists and operates within the time and space God created it in. This is another area we may affirm to understand (accept) but not quite understand (grasp).

Let’s start with the temperature of the matter we live on (Earth) and its surrounding environment. The precision of the range of temperature we experience is no mistake and is certainly not a product of chance. Earth is heated by the sun as we rotate and spin around it, proven simply by the temperature drop when a cloud covers the Sun as you stand outside. Fight me. Anyone that has stood by a fire will agree that your physical proximity to that fire dictates your perception of its heat. Too far away=cold. Too close=hot. Just right=just right. All of this is to point out the following: The Sun has been placed exactly where it needs to be in order to warm our planet for life, while not burning it to a crisp. Go sit in a sauna or ice bath to get a taste for what a small fractional movement of the Sun would do to our planet. I can understand this on a conceptual level. What I can’t understand is how chance directed by chaos could ever produce this circumstance. Hint: It couldn’t!

Do you ever think about the renewable resources on our planet? What about water? Water is essential to our existence. The Earth is about 71% water. The human body is composed of 45%-75% water, depending on many variables. We would dehydrate without it, as would the planet. I am no scientist, so I won’t tarry long. Earth produces new water through natural processes. The term to research here is “primary water”.  Natural springs and hydrothermal vents in the ocean provide virgin water and/or naturally filtered water constantly all across the globe. We couldn’t run out of water if we tried. It is no coincidence that our planet naturally produces our most essential resource. 

Trees and plants filter carbon dioxide and produce oxygen as they grow to provide us shade and building material. Earth supports and maintains animals and insects that do their jobs in supporting and maintaining the Earth. Forests nurture new trees and bushes with dead trees and bushes. The list goes on. There are entirely too many natural, perfect processes instituted in this universe to believe that chance and chaos brought us to this point. There is a plan that has been set into motion, and a Creation that is functioning exactly as it was told to function. 

Let’s Wrap It Up

In conclusion, I’ll use one last form of math for comparison. I love geometry and get to use some forms of it often in my lines of work. Specifically, I enjoy proofs and theorems (If this, then that). Logic and reason tell me that if there is a functioning Creation, then there must be an intelligent Creator that is not bound by time, space, or matter. I am convinced of this truth as it seems to be the only way I could currently be pressing buttons on a keyboard that is recording each keystroke on the screen in front of me so that you could read my thoughts. Creation cannot preexist its Creator. Matter could not have been self-existent. Chaos could not get us here. Our beginning required intelligent instruction to commence. It took an uncreated Creator. The Bible tells us of this God, of his origin, his characteristics, and His love for that Creation. I pray you know Him.

A Small Favor To Ask

Forgive me for asking again, but would you mind sharing this in some form or fashion if you found it beneficial? I would sure appreciate it!

See you next week… on to the next topics under a series about mishandled and misunderstood Bible verses!

–Dalton

Ephesians 3:14-21