Creaturely Comforts
November 6, 2003
By Rev.
Todd Crofford
Sr. Pastor
Laurel Wesleyan Church
Congratulations… you exist! You may not feel excited about that today. Perhaps
you read the morning news and saw the wildfires, or the abuse of the foster
children in New Jersey, or another bomb in the Middle East. Maybe the trouble is
a little closer to home: finances are tight, relationships are strained, or the
job is not going well. Sure, it all can get very discouraging, so I was just
wondering if you would be willing to stop long enough to just read six
paragraphs that may just help you realize the profound meaning to the fact that
you exist.
Some choose to live their life believing they are the product of random
evolutionary process. Deep in your soul do you really believe that? I don’t. You
see, if you embark upon even the briefest journey of inquisition, you will find
irrefutable evidence that you are not here by chance; that an intelligent
creator made you and therefore your life carries meaning. Recently at a
University in the Southwest, a biology professor’s job was put on the line
because he spoke of the plausibility of intelligent design. Was that really such
a radical statement?
Consider the world around you. When you look down at your hand and by willing it
do so it opens and closes, does that seem like chance? Have you see the
blossoming of a tree, the changing of the seasons, or the birth of a baby? Do
you really believe those happen as a result of cosmic accident?
In 1991, Biosphere II, a $200 million project was launched in the Sonoran Desert
in Arizona. Mimicking all the major ecological environments of the world, and
stocked with all major species, this three-acre glass enclosed and sealed
“creation” had as a goal to support all life inside for two years. The
experiment was a miserable failure as within a year many species died and the
eight humans inside would have perished as well without oxygen being pumped in
from outside sources. The message behind the results is that recreating
Biosphere I (the Earth) even with the intelligence and ingenuity of modern
science, is no easy task. So isn’t it a stretch to say that the incredibly
intricate world in which we live came about by chance- without any intelligent
design whatsoever?
Consider reasonable mathematics. The building blocks of life are proteins. We
might think they are easy to come by, but they are not and random chance doesn’t
really cut it here either. Walter Bradley Ph. D., former director of the Polymer
Technology Center at Texas A & M, in speaking to the likelihood of protein
“accidentally” coming to exist says, “If you took all the carbon in the universe
and put it on the face of the earth, allowed it to chemically react at the most
rapid rate possible, and left it for a billion years, the odds of creating just
one functional protein molecule would be one chance in 10 with 60 zeroes after
it.”
So here’s the point. You can feel free to pick your belief about whether you
were created or you accidentally came into existence, but remember that
whichever way you believe carries significant influence into every crevice of
your worldview. Prominent evolutionist William Provine of Cornell University
admits that if Darwinism is true then, “there is no evidence for God, there’s no
life after death, there’s no absolute foundation for right and wrong, there’s no
ultimate meaning for life, and people don’t really have free will.” Yet, when
you decide to carry a worldview that has God in the center, then life does have
meaning, there is right and wrong, there is an eternity after this life, and you
do have free will.
Not only do I know there is a God in the depths of my spirit; I don’t have to
disregard the nature of the world around me or ignore science to believe it. All
indicators tell me there is a God. I am a creature comforted by my Creator’s
existence. So, if there is a God, I wonder what wonderful intentions He has for
your life? Congratulations, you don’t just exist… you are alive in a world where
a creator gave that life to you. Go make the best of it today!
The views expressed do not necessarily represent those of Site One
Networks, Inc, the congregation of
the Laurel Wesleyan Church or the Wesleyan Church International. You may respond
to the author directly by E-mailing laurelwesleyan@siteone.net
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