Ephesians 5:29-32 For no one ever hated his own flesh, but nourishes and cherishes it, just as Christ does the church, (30) because we are members of his body. (31) “Therefore a man shall leave his father and mother and hold fast to his wife, and the two shall become one flesh." (32) This mystery is profound (“megas”), and I am saying that it refers to Christ and the church.
This passage is the cause of much strife, though not unexpectedly, as our hearts are proud & tend to refuse submission to either God or man. But that obstinate pride should be stymied in the one who’s deepest desire is to please God, for marriage’s highest honor is to be a walking, talking, breathing metaphor of the special bond that exists between Christ & His church. Interpreting Eph. 5:22-31 in the enlightenment of verse 32 should propel married Christians to go above & beyond to better their bond, not foremost in their love each other, but foremost instead in their love for God. In the same way that David perpetrated deadly sin against man, but then claimed to have sinned against God alone (Psalm 51:4), we must understand rejecting the God-appointed spousal duties is, in the eternal, the deepest, most “profound” sense, truly rejecting Christ Himself; for Christ clearly has appointed husband & wife to model His otherwise largely ineffable union with His church. Then, contrastingly, submitting to & embracing said calling is to embrace the more “profound” sort of submission prefaced in verse 21:
Ephesians 5:21 submitting to one another out of reverence for Christ.
Once again, we see God’s calling purposed not primarily towards serving man, but God in Christ. As with King David’s confession, if we were to firstly concern ourselves with right service towards God, everything else would come into line. A King David rightly reverencing God would never want to be the cause of undue injury to Uriah, especially for the cause of coveting his wife. See, primarily, his “reverence for Christ” was lacking, which was the cause of his inability to submit to reverencing their marital covenant. What Psalm 51:4 does is push all the manifest effects of this lack of reverence aside & strike dead at the cause of the problem- a void of respect for God’s ordained order, & therefore, God Himself.
Similarly, the outlaw who rejects God’s ordained order of…
Ephesians 5:19-20 addressing one another in psalms and hymns and spiritual songs, singing and making melody to the Lord with your heart, (20) giving thanks always and for everything to God the Father in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ, (21) submitting to one another out of reverence for Christ.
…primarily rejects Christ Himself. Take note of the fact that “addressing one another” is an inherent part of “making melody to the Lord”; that “submitting to one another” is part & parcel of “reverence for Christ.” Because they are united, as in marriage, one with the other, to heap undue aspersions on the bride is insult & denigrate the Groom as well. To insult my wife is no less than, & possibly even worse than, insulting me, for love would cause me to be more quick to respond in defense of my wife’s honor than in defense of my own. We should all therefore be slow to speak against God’s church, “out of reverence for Christ.” I’m not saying that we should hesitate to call out unbiblical doctrine, just the ad hominem attacks that we sometimes add to a proper respectful doctrinal rebuke.
There are generally two types of childish believers that refuse the maturing nature of steady Christian fellowship- the steeplechaser & the lone ranger. The first hops churches like the drunk hops bars- every time he doesn’t find what his flesh craves, he simply gets in his car & drives down the street to the next venue. This infantile Christian never matures because he never stops seeking the base fleshly desire. He always has poor words for the place he just left, & arrogantly considers himself a better Christian than they. His pride is his downfall, because it precludes his humble acquiescence to authority; again, as with King David, his transgression is at the most rudimentary level, a rebellion against God’s authority instead than man’s.
One may think the lone ranger Christian- the one not regularly attending any body of believers- to be someone at the polar extreme, but actually, it’s the same type of rebel, only with an even deeper degree of arrogant insolence. The steeplechaser at least senses the need for fellowship, but the lone ranger has developed such an audacity to think he can please God & grow to maturity without anyone’s help. It’s just me & God he says, I don’t need anyone else. Where does he find this model in Scripture or even in the early post-apostolic Church?
Indeed, the arduous trail that Antioch’s early 2nd century pastor Ignatius walks tells the tale of a submissive, but also tenderly loving fellowship of churches that interact with him on the on his slow march towards a martyr’s death in Rome. No bevy of lone rangers supported him or received instruction from him, even though in that age of Emperor Trajan’s severe persecutions a Christian could easily justify such a withdrawal from Christian fellowship. True believers instead traded the lone ranger’s invisible manner of worship for a public witness that was akin to kicking sand in the face of an 800 pound gorilla. No, even in a day when it was truly dangerous for Christians to gather, they still gathered, as evidenced by the record of the seven letters he wrote as he was carried in chains to Rome. They reveal a number of local church bodies united for the cause of Christ, yet even in that day the prideful lone rangers must have existed, given Ignatius’ words to the Ephesian & Roman churches of his day:
“Let no man deceive himself: if any one be not within the altar, he is deprived of the bread of God. For if the prayer of one or two possesses such power, how much more that of the overseer and the whole church! He, therefore, that does not assemble with the church, has even by this manifested his pride, and condemned himself. For it is written, ‘God resisteth the proud.’ Let us be careful, then, not to set ourselves in opposition to the overseer, in order that we may be subject to God.”
“Remember in your prayers the church in Syria, which now has God for its pastor, instead of me. Jesus Christ alone will oversee it, and your love [will also regard it]…. My spirit salutes you, and the love of the churches which have received me in the name of Jesus Christ, and not as a mere passerby. For even those churches which were not naturally on my route at all came and escorted me from one city to the next.”
Hi-ho Silver, away- with the utterly unbiblical notion of a believer maturing in Christ, or fulfilling his “part” in God’s church apart from being in submission to & showing love towards a local fellowship.
To reject Christ’s body, pictured in its present form as a bride preparing for her blessed day, is to reject the Groom as well, for they are truly destined to become united as one. (Matt. 25:1-13)
Saturday, October 30, 2010
Sunday, October 3, 2010
The Steeplechase & the Lone Ranger (part 1)
Church attendance & membership is a biblical given for all believers until Christ returns. Though some would like to contend otherwise, they have no Scriptural basis for such a claim. The whole of the New Testament record of the universal Christian body points towards the Apostles’ primary work of propagating & prospering the individual church bodies. Romans, Corinthians, Galatians, etc. were not individuals, but church bodies that Paul addressed. Moreover, the Lord Jesus Himself targeted His words in Revelation 2 & 3 not to individual Christians, but Christian assemblies.
There is no support to the idea of an insular Christian being accommodated by the apostles, while in contrast, there is much substantiation for the idea of all believers belonging & submitting to a local fellowship. Possibly nowhere else is this more addressed than by Paul’s first letter to that most dysfunctional of churches- the Corinthian. After a brief initial greeting, he immediately launches into a stiff censure of their “divisions” & “quarreling”, which was causing them to fail in the goal of being “united in the same mind and the same judgment.” Everybody was doing their own thing, as they each thought best, never instead acquiescing to the greater good of Christ & His earthly body. Yes, Paul addressed them as one body, but in reading chapter after chapter of their predilection towards self-centeredness, one can only conclude this manner of address to be purely nominal in nature. They selfishly only considered themselves- in regards to following various shepherds (ch. 1-4), sin & righteousness (ch. 5-8), the communion (ch. 10-11), & their spiritual gifting (ch. 12-14). It is here, as Paul begins to call out the irony of God’s gifts being used to feed man’s arrogance, that the apostle gives a most poignant presentation of the need for a humble & submissive fellowship of Christians:
1 Corinthians 12:4-30 Now there are varieties of gifts, but the same Spirit; (5) and there are varieties of service, but the same Lord; (6) and there are varieties of activities, but it is the same God who empowers them all in everyone. (7) To each is given the manifestation of the Spirit for the common good. (8) For to one is given through the Spirit the utterance of wisdom, and to another the utterance of knowledge according to the same Spirit, (9) to another faith by the same Spirit, to another gifts of healing by the one Spirit, (10) to another the working of miracles, to another prophecy, to another the ability to distinguish between spirits, to another various kinds of tongues, to another the interpretation of tongues. (11) All these are empowered by one and the same Spirit, who apportions to each one individually as he wills. (12) For just as the body is one and has many members, and all the members of the body, though many, are one body, so it is with Christ. (13) For in one Spirit we were all baptized into one body- Jews or Greeks, slaves or free- and all were made to drink of one Spirit. (14) For the body does not consist of one member but of many. (15) If the foot should say, "Because I am not a hand, I do not belong to the body," that would not make it any less a part of the body. (16) And if the ear should say, "Because I am not an eye, I do not belong to the body," that would not make it any less a part of the body. (17) If the whole body were an eye, where would be the sense of hearing? If the whole body were an ear, where would be the sense of smell? (18) But as it is, God arranged the members in the body, each one of them, as he chose. (19) If all were a single member, where would the body be? (20) As it is, there are many parts, yet one body. (21) The eye cannot say to the hand, "I have no need of you," nor again the head to the feet, "I have no need of you." (22) On the contrary, the parts of the body that seem to be weaker are indispensable, (23) and on those parts of the body that we think less honorable we bestow the greater honor, and our unpresentable parts are treated with greater modesty, (24) which our more presentable parts do not require.
But God has so composed the body, giving greater honor to the part that lacked it, (25) that there may be no division in the body, but that the members may have the same care for one another. (26) If one member suffers, all suffer together; if one member is honored, all rejoice together. (27) Now you are the body of Christ and individually members of it. (28) And God has appointed in the church first apostles, second prophets, third teachers, then miracles, then gifts of healing, helping, administrating, and various kinds of tongues. (29) Are all apostles? Are all prophets? Are all teachers? Do all work miracles? (30) Do all possess gifts of healing? Do all speak with tongues? Do all interpret?
From here, of course, Paul enters in to chapter 13, closing there with the inference that the “greatest” gift is the one that ends in the display of love for another. Indeed, as Ignatius of Antioch (2nd century) states on his road to martyrdom:
“Wherefore none of the devices of the devil shall be hidden from you, if, like Paul, ye perfectly possess that faith and love towards Christ which are the beginning and the end of life. The beginning of life is faith, and the end is love. And these two being inseparably connected together, do perfect the man of God; while all other things which are requisite to a holy life follow after them.”
What brother can the insular Christian reach with this “greatest” gift if he remains an island unto himself? If the end goal of God’s working within us is love for another (instead of the heretofore Corinthian model of self-love), then should it not be concluded that the Christian can never be brought to maturity insofar as he continues his rejection of Christ’s earthly body? For it is only in His body that God refines us into the likeness of Christ. That is one way that God brings honor to Christ’s only current tangible presence on earth. Witness Jesus’ call to minister as a community in His absence to the same degree as one would minister unto Him in His presence:
Matthew 25:31-40 "When the Son of Man comes in his glory, and all the angels with him, then he will sit on his glorious throne. (32) Before him will be gathered all the nations, and he will separate people one from another as a shepherd separates the sheep from the goats. (33) And he will place the sheep on his right, but the goats on the left. (34) Then the King will say to those on his right, 'Come, you who are blessed by my Father, inherit the kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world. (35) For I was hungry and you gave me food, I was thirsty and you gave me drink, I was a stranger and you welcomed me, (36) I was naked and you clothed me, I was sick and you visited me, I was in prison and you came to me.' (37) Then the righteous will answer him, saying, 'Lord, when did we see you hungry and feed you, or thirsty and give you drink? (38) And when did we see you a stranger and welcome you, or naked and clothe you? (39) And when did we see you sick or in prison and visit you?' (40) And the King will answer them, 'Truly, I say to you, as you did it to one of the least of these my brothers, you did it to me.'
To disparage Christ’s body on earth, however flawed & weak it may be, is to disparage Christ Himself. To slander the former is to slander the later, for biblically, they are inexorably linked:
Ephesians 5:29-32 For no one ever hated his own flesh, but nourishes and cherishes it, just as Christ does the church, (30) because we are members of his body. (31) “Therefore a man shall leave his father and mother and hold fast to his wife, and the two shall become one flesh." (32) This mystery is profound (megas), and I am saying that it refers to Christ and the church.
There is no support to the idea of an insular Christian being accommodated by the apostles, while in contrast, there is much substantiation for the idea of all believers belonging & submitting to a local fellowship. Possibly nowhere else is this more addressed than by Paul’s first letter to that most dysfunctional of churches- the Corinthian. After a brief initial greeting, he immediately launches into a stiff censure of their “divisions” & “quarreling”, which was causing them to fail in the goal of being “united in the same mind and the same judgment.” Everybody was doing their own thing, as they each thought best, never instead acquiescing to the greater good of Christ & His earthly body. Yes, Paul addressed them as one body, but in reading chapter after chapter of their predilection towards self-centeredness, one can only conclude this manner of address to be purely nominal in nature. They selfishly only considered themselves- in regards to following various shepherds (ch. 1-4), sin & righteousness (ch. 5-8), the communion (ch. 10-11), & their spiritual gifting (ch. 12-14). It is here, as Paul begins to call out the irony of God’s gifts being used to feed man’s arrogance, that the apostle gives a most poignant presentation of the need for a humble & submissive fellowship of Christians:
1 Corinthians 12:4-30 Now there are varieties of gifts, but the same Spirit; (5) and there are varieties of service, but the same Lord; (6) and there are varieties of activities, but it is the same God who empowers them all in everyone. (7) To each is given the manifestation of the Spirit for the common good. (8) For to one is given through the Spirit the utterance of wisdom, and to another the utterance of knowledge according to the same Spirit, (9) to another faith by the same Spirit, to another gifts of healing by the one Spirit, (10) to another the working of miracles, to another prophecy, to another the ability to distinguish between spirits, to another various kinds of tongues, to another the interpretation of tongues. (11) All these are empowered by one and the same Spirit, who apportions to each one individually as he wills. (12) For just as the body is one and has many members, and all the members of the body, though many, are one body, so it is with Christ. (13) For in one Spirit we were all baptized into one body- Jews or Greeks, slaves or free- and all were made to drink of one Spirit. (14) For the body does not consist of one member but of many. (15) If the foot should say, "Because I am not a hand, I do not belong to the body," that would not make it any less a part of the body. (16) And if the ear should say, "Because I am not an eye, I do not belong to the body," that would not make it any less a part of the body. (17) If the whole body were an eye, where would be the sense of hearing? If the whole body were an ear, where would be the sense of smell? (18) But as it is, God arranged the members in the body, each one of them, as he chose. (19) If all were a single member, where would the body be? (20) As it is, there are many parts, yet one body. (21) The eye cannot say to the hand, "I have no need of you," nor again the head to the feet, "I have no need of you." (22) On the contrary, the parts of the body that seem to be weaker are indispensable, (23) and on those parts of the body that we think less honorable we bestow the greater honor, and our unpresentable parts are treated with greater modesty, (24) which our more presentable parts do not require.
But God has so composed the body, giving greater honor to the part that lacked it, (25) that there may be no division in the body, but that the members may have the same care for one another. (26) If one member suffers, all suffer together; if one member is honored, all rejoice together. (27) Now you are the body of Christ and individually members of it. (28) And God has appointed in the church first apostles, second prophets, third teachers, then miracles, then gifts of healing, helping, administrating, and various kinds of tongues. (29) Are all apostles? Are all prophets? Are all teachers? Do all work miracles? (30) Do all possess gifts of healing? Do all speak with tongues? Do all interpret?
From here, of course, Paul enters in to chapter 13, closing there with the inference that the “greatest” gift is the one that ends in the display of love for another. Indeed, as Ignatius of Antioch (2nd century) states on his road to martyrdom:
“Wherefore none of the devices of the devil shall be hidden from you, if, like Paul, ye perfectly possess that faith and love towards Christ which are the beginning and the end of life. The beginning of life is faith, and the end is love. And these two being inseparably connected together, do perfect the man of God; while all other things which are requisite to a holy life follow after them.”
What brother can the insular Christian reach with this “greatest” gift if he remains an island unto himself? If the end goal of God’s working within us is love for another (instead of the heretofore Corinthian model of self-love), then should it not be concluded that the Christian can never be brought to maturity insofar as he continues his rejection of Christ’s earthly body? For it is only in His body that God refines us into the likeness of Christ. That is one way that God brings honor to Christ’s only current tangible presence on earth. Witness Jesus’ call to minister as a community in His absence to the same degree as one would minister unto Him in His presence:
Matthew 25:31-40 "When the Son of Man comes in his glory, and all the angels with him, then he will sit on his glorious throne. (32) Before him will be gathered all the nations, and he will separate people one from another as a shepherd separates the sheep from the goats. (33) And he will place the sheep on his right, but the goats on the left. (34) Then the King will say to those on his right, 'Come, you who are blessed by my Father, inherit the kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world. (35) For I was hungry and you gave me food, I was thirsty and you gave me drink, I was a stranger and you welcomed me, (36) I was naked and you clothed me, I was sick and you visited me, I was in prison and you came to me.' (37) Then the righteous will answer him, saying, 'Lord, when did we see you hungry and feed you, or thirsty and give you drink? (38) And when did we see you a stranger and welcome you, or naked and clothe you? (39) And when did we see you sick or in prison and visit you?' (40) And the King will answer them, 'Truly, I say to you, as you did it to one of the least of these my brothers, you did it to me.'
To disparage Christ’s body on earth, however flawed & weak it may be, is to disparage Christ Himself. To slander the former is to slander the later, for biblically, they are inexorably linked:
Ephesians 5:29-32 For no one ever hated his own flesh, but nourishes and cherishes it, just as Christ does the church, (30) because we are members of his body. (31) “Therefore a man shall leave his father and mother and hold fast to his wife, and the two shall become one flesh." (32) This mystery is profound (megas), and I am saying that it refers to Christ and the church.
Sunday, August 22, 2010
Reason upon Faith, part 1
The Christian is often accused of using invalid reasoning in using Scripture to prove Scripture; e.g., using nothing more than 1 Thess. 2:13, 2 Tim. 3:16, etc. to validate the idea that God’s Word is actually God’s Word would be entirely circuitous logic; apart from elsewise evidence, such confidence would rightly be unfounded. But Paul’s statement that “all Scripture is given by inspiration of God” only reaffirms what Scripture’s many manifold witnesses (prophecy, natural & archeological history, early church fathers, as well as the less tangible, but no less real Holy Spirit) cause us to reasonably embrace- that God has preserved His revelation of all man needs to understand of both the natural & supernatural in the 66 books of Scripture.
Nevertheless, there is the fact that most of what is called knowledge & reason is primordially founded upon faith. Logically deduced knowledge, if extensively traced to its origin, finds some postulate made as a fundamental starting point. Take the “Big Bang” model of natural creation; astrophysicists devote their lifetime to constructing reasonable causations that assimilate with one another in order to arrive at an integrated, rational timeline from the very nanosecond of the singularity’s “bang” all the way to the present day.
But what they don’t tell you as they boldly assign precise dates to all the events of their timeline (so often with such certitude that those dates & events seem to be as sure as yesterday’s news events) is that all their reverse-engineering of the universe is presumed upon three fundamental faith-filled suppositions:
1. The ubiquity of current classical & quantum mechanics; in other words, is the empirical physics of today acting in same way, with the same metrics, as the physics of 13.7 billion years ago? Especially questionable since science seems all too eager to toss established physics in the pursuit of a rational early ontology, i.e. the period of time prior to "Planck time". If it can be said the physical laws of the universe somehow “changed” at the onset of “1 Planck”, then how can we be so confident of anything transpiring prior to that? Or even after that? How are the physical laws “changed”, & if so, then have they morphed again & again, or just that once? Indeed, after thousands of years of observation, we still don’t comprehend all the physical laws acting upon us right now, so any theory based on unempirical physics has to viewed with extreme skepticism.
2. The isotropic (same in all directions) nature of the universe.
3. The homogeneous nature of the universe (e.g.- is the entire universe composed of the same basic elements, e.g.- hydrogen & helium?)
I'm not saying that their model is wrong, I'm simply saying that it takes a tremendous degree of faith to believe that it is right.
Science of the day rests its beliefs upon its chronologically & spatially narrow viewpoint of the physical universe. Should I confidently claim to know that all birds can fly simply because all the ones I’ve been able to observe from my residency in Florida have been able to do so? Or that no snake can kill simply I’ve never seen anyone die from one? This is the weakness of inductive logic, & much of the in vogue establishment (money-hungry) science is rife with it. They preach Copernicus (that we hold no special place or viewpoint in the universe), but, so ironically for them, this makes science’s dependency on induction so much the greater, due to this lesser vantage point. Yes, deductions are made, but the problem is they are boastfully touted, all the while the frailties of the founding inductions are ignored.
In other words, their knowledge is founded on faith. The only problem- it is not honestly spoken of as such.
Unfortunately, man is so myopic in his ability to perceive even his own tangible sphere while concomitantly being so arrogant in claiming understanding of things his limited vision prevents him from seeing. Witness the episode of “Seinfeld” where the character George goes around making outrageous claims about things he thought he saw after losing his glasses. With a modicum of humility, he could have said “I think I might have seen…”, but unfortunately, humility was not his forte. So people were led astray, & in the end, George had to endure embarrassment for his cocksureness in the midst of his clear myopic hindrance.
Science desires to do likewise. They have wasted billions on building & operating radio telescopes around the world for fifty years now hopelessly trying to detect a single sign of extraterrestrial intelligent life, only to incessantly hear the same interstellar static that any of us can hear for free in our car on an empty radio frequency. They spend untold billions on particle colliders in an effort to demonstrate the existence of a “God particle” (the Higgs-boson particle- a hypothetical particle that would allow for the construction of mass into massless particles), while leaving God Himself forlorn in their lifelong examinations of the physical causes of creation. They treat this potential particle as if it were capable of excluding God from the act of creation (therein its media name), all the while feigning ignorance that, as elementary as this particle would be to the theorized Big Bang model, something still would have had to create it. As science states, neither energy nor mass can be created or destroyed, they can only change forms (& even massless photon particles are considered as mass in this case, subject to the same laws of conservation). Thus there exists no rational theory, or even a founding postulate, of how the Higgs-boson “God-particle” came to exist, despite the fact that its supposed reality has flaunted by science for over 40 years now. No atheistic physicist (they’re not all atheists, but many are deists) has been so bold to propose a “first cause” for their “God”; its cause is essentially taken on faith. This type of challenge is known as the “ontological argument” & it is just as relevant today, despite the tremendous increase in scientific knowledge in the 1000 years since Anselm first used it to add reason to a faithful belief in God’s existence. It is the most fundamental bulwark against arrogant atheistic claims to have an ontology based purely on reason. They present the atheism vs. theism debate as solely about reason vs. faith, instead of truthfully stating it as two separate ontologisms, each with an abundance of reason, but each also founded on faith.
The fact is, for both, it is not a matter of reason vs. faith, but reason built upon faith.
The bigger question: which is more believable- that matter & energy are self-creative, that a singularity containing all the potential of the universe just appeared without a causal dynamic, or that God exists “from everlasting to everlasting” (Psalms 90:2)? Neither gives any rationale for the academic to rally around to explain how something can come from nothing. God never tells us in His Word how He can exist infinitely in the space-time continuum; He simply says that He does. Atheists may mock such blind faith in a self-existent God, but to me at least, it seems eminently more reasonable that the supernatural can have this quality than the natural.
Indeed, such is my fundamental schoolyard-style challenge to the atheistic bully - that my blind faith is better, more reasonable even, than your blind faith.
Isaiah 44:24-25 Thus says the LORD, your Redeemer, who formed you from the womb: "I am the LORD, who made all things, who alone stretched out the heavens, who spread out the earth by myself, (25) who frustrates the signs of liars and makes fools of diviners, who turns wise men back and makes their knowledge foolish.
Nevertheless, there is the fact that most of what is called knowledge & reason is primordially founded upon faith. Logically deduced knowledge, if extensively traced to its origin, finds some postulate made as a fundamental starting point. Take the “Big Bang” model of natural creation; astrophysicists devote their lifetime to constructing reasonable causations that assimilate with one another in order to arrive at an integrated, rational timeline from the very nanosecond of the singularity’s “bang” all the way to the present day.
But what they don’t tell you as they boldly assign precise dates to all the events of their timeline (so often with such certitude that those dates & events seem to be as sure as yesterday’s news events) is that all their reverse-engineering of the universe is presumed upon three fundamental faith-filled suppositions:
1. The ubiquity of current classical & quantum mechanics; in other words, is the empirical physics of today acting in same way, with the same metrics, as the physics of 13.7 billion years ago? Especially questionable since science seems all too eager to toss established physics in the pursuit of a rational early ontology, i.e. the period of time prior to "Planck time". If it can be said the physical laws of the universe somehow “changed” at the onset of “1 Planck”, then how can we be so confident of anything transpiring prior to that? Or even after that? How are the physical laws “changed”, & if so, then have they morphed again & again, or just that once? Indeed, after thousands of years of observation, we still don’t comprehend all the physical laws acting upon us right now, so any theory based on unempirical physics has to viewed with extreme skepticism.
2. The isotropic (same in all directions) nature of the universe.
3. The homogeneous nature of the universe (e.g.- is the entire universe composed of the same basic elements, e.g.- hydrogen & helium?)
I'm not saying that their model is wrong, I'm simply saying that it takes a tremendous degree of faith to believe that it is right.
Science of the day rests its beliefs upon its chronologically & spatially narrow viewpoint of the physical universe. Should I confidently claim to know that all birds can fly simply because all the ones I’ve been able to observe from my residency in Florida have been able to do so? Or that no snake can kill simply I’ve never seen anyone die from one? This is the weakness of inductive logic, & much of the in vogue establishment (money-hungry) science is rife with it. They preach Copernicus (that we hold no special place or viewpoint in the universe), but, so ironically for them, this makes science’s dependency on induction so much the greater, due to this lesser vantage point. Yes, deductions are made, but the problem is they are boastfully touted, all the while the frailties of the founding inductions are ignored.
In other words, their knowledge is founded on faith. The only problem- it is not honestly spoken of as such.
Unfortunately, man is so myopic in his ability to perceive even his own tangible sphere while concomitantly being so arrogant in claiming understanding of things his limited vision prevents him from seeing. Witness the episode of “Seinfeld” where the character George goes around making outrageous claims about things he thought he saw after losing his glasses. With a modicum of humility, he could have said “I think I might have seen…”, but unfortunately, humility was not his forte. So people were led astray, & in the end, George had to endure embarrassment for his cocksureness in the midst of his clear myopic hindrance.
Science desires to do likewise. They have wasted billions on building & operating radio telescopes around the world for fifty years now hopelessly trying to detect a single sign of extraterrestrial intelligent life, only to incessantly hear the same interstellar static that any of us can hear for free in our car on an empty radio frequency. They spend untold billions on particle colliders in an effort to demonstrate the existence of a “God particle” (the Higgs-boson particle- a hypothetical particle that would allow for the construction of mass into massless particles), while leaving God Himself forlorn in their lifelong examinations of the physical causes of creation. They treat this potential particle as if it were capable of excluding God from the act of creation (therein its media name), all the while feigning ignorance that, as elementary as this particle would be to the theorized Big Bang model, something still would have had to create it. As science states, neither energy nor mass can be created or destroyed, they can only change forms (& even massless photon particles are considered as mass in this case, subject to the same laws of conservation). Thus there exists no rational theory, or even a founding postulate, of how the Higgs-boson “God-particle” came to exist, despite the fact that its supposed reality has flaunted by science for over 40 years now. No atheistic physicist (they’re not all atheists, but many are deists) has been so bold to propose a “first cause” for their “God”; its cause is essentially taken on faith. This type of challenge is known as the “ontological argument” & it is just as relevant today, despite the tremendous increase in scientific knowledge in the 1000 years since Anselm first used it to add reason to a faithful belief in God’s existence. It is the most fundamental bulwark against arrogant atheistic claims to have an ontology based purely on reason. They present the atheism vs. theism debate as solely about reason vs. faith, instead of truthfully stating it as two separate ontologisms, each with an abundance of reason, but each also founded on faith.
The fact is, for both, it is not a matter of reason vs. faith, but reason built upon faith.
The bigger question: which is more believable- that matter & energy are self-creative, that a singularity containing all the potential of the universe just appeared without a causal dynamic, or that God exists “from everlasting to everlasting” (Psalms 90:2)? Neither gives any rationale for the academic to rally around to explain how something can come from nothing. God never tells us in His Word how He can exist infinitely in the space-time continuum; He simply says that He does. Atheists may mock such blind faith in a self-existent God, but to me at least, it seems eminently more reasonable that the supernatural can have this quality than the natural.
Indeed, such is my fundamental schoolyard-style challenge to the atheistic bully - that my blind faith is better, more reasonable even, than your blind faith.
Isaiah 44:24-25 Thus says the LORD, your Redeemer, who formed you from the womb: "I am the LORD, who made all things, who alone stretched out the heavens, who spread out the earth by myself, (25) who frustrates the signs of liars and makes fools of diviners, who turns wise men back and makes their knowledge foolish.
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