from Israel My Glory, Volume 68, Number 6
No One To Talk To?
November/December 2010 Editorial
by Elwood McQuaid
British scientist Stephen Hawking
is one more atheist trying to
tell us there is no God. In his
new book, The Grand Design,
Hawking contends, “Because there
is a law such as gravity, the universe
can and will create itself
from nothing.
Spontaneous creation
is the reason there is something
rather than nothing, why the
universe exists, why we exist.” For
him, the “Big Bang” was an
inevitable result of the laws of
physics. Thus “spontaneous creation”
did the job without any
need for God.
For the professor, there is a
choice: to believe a God caused
creation “for reasons we can’t
understand” or that “a law of science,”
which he presumably does
understand, fused the creation.
Thus we have the basic formula
of the evolution theory: science
is God. Moreover, a personal
Creator God is the fantasy of
dimwitted crackpots.
Most interesting in Hawking’s
manifesto is a conclusion more
explosive than the spontaneous creation
nonsense: “If you like,
you can call the laws of science
‘God,’ but it wouldn’t be a personal
God that you could meet, and
ask questions.”
And there’s the rub. Here we
are, mired in confusion and surrounded
by enigmas, with no one
to talk to. In the current swamp of
political correctness, politicians
and big thinkers are taking a crack
at proffering their own, somewhat
subtler, variations of the Hawking
formula that are just as deadly.
Truth is, if a Higher Authority
were not available, there would be compelling evidence that the creation
inhabited by men of vastly
differing convictions and agendas
would self-destruct. If we were, in
fact, alone on an orbiting molten
mass covered by a thin carpet of
clay—a Godless void—we would
be doomed. If that scenario is the
best the scientific elite can deliver,
they can give us nothing at all—certainly
not a better, enlightened
world. The good news is there is an
alternative to despair and a dead end
view of our existence.
Several years ago, an Orthodox
Jew surveyed the seemingly endless
struggle for Middle East peace and
declared, “If God does not step in
and save us, there is no hope for the
future.” He was correct.
As I’m writing this, the main
players in the Mideast peace talks
are meeting in Washington, DC, in
the hope of starting negotiations
that could lead to a settlement. As
they began their low-expectations
deliberations, loud protests were
already coming from Arab and
Islamist elements declaring there
would never be peace with Israel;
and Hamas terrorists made their
point by murdering four innocent
Jewish residents of Judea.
Furthermore, Palestinian Authority
President Mahmoud Abbas
declared that, should Israelis resume
construction of living quarters in
what Arabs call the “occupied territories,”
including Jerusalem,
talks would immediately end. In
the whole fabric of conflict visible
everywhere on this planet, there is
no evidence a humanly devised,
spontaneous eruption could provide
the answers we desperately
need.
The good news is there is a Power
outside of ourselves—someone with
whom we can meet and talk and
from whom we can get answers to
our most perplexing questions. The
first answer comes from the affirming
Word:
“In the beginning God created
the heavens and the earth” (Gen.
1:1). And that’s merely the start.
Every created wonder, great and
small, confirms that indisputable
fact. So much so that, contrary to
all no-God theories (including the
delusion of a spontaneous bang),
the psalmist could say with accuracy
and confirmable authority,
“The fool has said in his heart,
‘There is no God’” (Ps. 14:1).
Moreover, God is (contrary to
Hawking’s thinking) someone we
can meet and, by prayer, legitimately
ask any questions we want to ask.
That intimate relationship became
available to all who believe because
of the deliverance brought to us
through the redeeming sacrifice of
Jesus Christ.
The issue is not the existence of
God but, rather, the exclusion of
Him. Here’s the picture:
“Behold, I stand at the door and
knock. If anyone hears My voice
and opens the door, I will come in
to him and dine with him, and he
with Me” (Rev. 3:20).
A
preacher friend frequently
used to say the message was not
“the theories, guesses, and speculations
of men but the sure Word
of God.”
In or out. That’s the choice.
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