Creation

It is strange how we are sometimes reluctant to accept what is staring us in the face but which we know to be true. When I stand on the bathroom scales I am sure they cannot be right! Unfortunately they invariably are.

We live in a beautiful world on a wonderful planet, with finely balanced eco-systems, flowers and plants of amazing beauty. The complexity and intricacies of the natural world are unfolding before our eyes through microbiology and science. The variety of species, even of one type suggest more than the chance development and mutation through the survival of the fittest. The oceans would be a barren place if only the strongest was ruler.

The existence of all forms of nature, with the ability to reproduce or seed themselves in an environment providing the warmth, water, light and food necessary must be the result of more than chance or accident.

Consider a simple example of the common dolphin. It is a mammal: living under water like a fish, but breathing air as a land animal. How did the dolphin survive? How did it manage for long periods of time underwater without suffocating? Dolphins breathe through a hole in the top of their head. Complex nerve endings around this blowhole sense pressure changes in the water, so the dolphin knows exactly when it is safe to open the blowhole and breathe. Powerful muscles around the blowhole close it immediately upon descent into the water. Surely this could not have happened by chance mutations – a non-functional hole in the head would cause rapid decline in populations, and would have taken many thousands of years to improve, probably resulting in extinction. Had the dolphin evolved from mammals, how did it become so much in appearance like a fish without the intervention of a designer?

The human body itself, known so well to each one of us, has myriads of its own intricacies. How does the eye work? How is it that we can think, reason, feel emotion? Do we ever consider what would happen if we cut a finger and it didn’t stop bleeding? Even the most trivial of injuries would result in death as blood pressure drops and our heart stops beating. But, very much to our relief, we can simply put a plaster on a cut, and leave our body to go through the healing process. The blood begins to dry up, and then a scab is formed whilst healing takes place, and all that is left is a scar. The body’s healing mechanisms are remarkable – a similarly advanced process is the formation of a blister, a saline filled bubble that protects the new skin forming beneath. Surely, had these healing processes been formulated by evolution millions of people would have died from minute injuries, and survival of the fittest would merely be reduced to survival of the luckiest!

Spider’s webs are another marvel of nature that we encounter every day. The silk used by the creatures can be of different types – the strongest of these has a tensile strength greater than steel. It is also edible – once the spider has finished with a web, it eats the silk and it can be re-processed and used again. The web is always constructed following the same pattern – every species of spider uses an identical method, building the basic octagonal scaffold structure from thin silk first, then replacing this with very strong silk, and a sticky layer to catch flies. Spiders have been producing webs in this manner for millions of years. Fossils have been found in Spain that show that spiders have been spinning webs to catch prey at least 138 million years ago. Surely if evolution was credible, spiders would have altered their methods by now.

We could look at many other illustrations form nature which point to the need for a creator. You may find it interesting to find out about the Bombadier Beetle. It’s defence mechanism employs two chemicals which when mixed become highly explosive. When you investigate it in your own time, ask the question; Could this have evolved or happened by chance?

The Psalmist says: I praise you because I am fearfully and wonderfully made; your works are wonderful, I know that full well. (Psalm 139:14) In his contemplation of God’s creation he recognised the handiwork of his Lord in his own body and in the natural world: “When I consider your heavens, the work of your fingers, the moon and the stars, which you have set in place, what is man that you are mindful of him, the son of man that you care for him?” (Psalm 8: 3-4).

Our children are taught that the world evolved from the basic elements of life in an atmosphere that contained water vapour along with other gases of the right mix. Oxygen is assumed to have begun to be present when plants began to photosynthesise. A text book explains that these are theories about how the planet and atmosphere have evolved – they are scientists’ best efforts to explain what they see as evidence,

The record in Genesis 1 is simple, logical, fail-safe in it’s order and gives us the confidence that as God created the heavens and the earth (Gen 1:1), so he will “create new heavens and a new earth” (Isaiah 65:17) when he sends Jesus back to the earth again.