The God Who is There
“In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth…”
Genesis 1:1
Let’s not beat around the bush about it – In the beginning God created two things; the heavens and the earth. Put them together and you have a whole lot of everything and that’s a great deal!
I love the way the Bible opens with this basic and yet profoundly loaded statement that slaps anyone in the face who would say otherwise. It does not begin with an opinion: “in the beginning it is the view of the writer that God created the heavens and the earth.” Or “Herein lies the theory of creation.” Nor does it start with an apology – “In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth which can be seen by this bone that carries the DNA of a dinosaur and this photograph of Adam planting the first acorn.” Not that I have a problem with Christian Apologetics, on the contrary, I think creation researchers are among a special breed of genius with a very important ministry, but that’s not what I’m talking about here…
The Bible never actually makes an argument for the existence of God or the fact that he created everything and this is crucial because of two mind blowing and uncomfortable truths – the first being that his existence is obvious and the second truth that every one knows on some level that he does exist.
I know people claim to be atheists or agnostics or whatever but if they were honest I’m sure on the odd occasion they have asked God for a parking space or cried out “God!” in a moment of panic.
The Apostle Paul wrote:
“For since the creation of the world God’s invisible qualities - his eternal power and divine nature - have been clearly seen, being understood from what has been made, so that men are without excuse.” Romans 1:20
If you’re still not convinced I wonder if there has ever been a culture on this planet that didn’t have some kind of god or gods attached to it. We all know the story of Noah and the Ark but did you also know that there are something like 500 recorded flood myths found all around the world, most with striking similarities to the account found in the Bible? Upon such a discovery it would be easy to jump to the conclusion that there must have been an event in the past that led to most ancient cultures sharing the same "legend" – in other words, there really was a flood! Is it possible then that if every culture has a “god concept” then that “concept” could be rooted in the fact that there really is a God?
But back to the present day I can honestly say that there has never been a time that I was not aware of the presence of The God who is there. Even when I walked away from Christianity 10 years ago (I’m well and truly back now) I always knew that God was there. He is like the other person in the room who I don’t have to look at to know he is present. It is my firm conviction that everyone on some level has this “God sense” – we were created with it.
Now the Heavens and the Earth aren’t just two things. They are a symphony of stars and planets dancing together in an intricate play of gravity at an astounding velocity as the galaxies spin in a myriad of other tumbling galaxies in a space so vast that I haven’t got time to type out the number. Just look at these incredible Hubble scope pictures to see how mind boggling this finite infinity we call the “Heavens” really is.
Then we have the earth, this tiny blue and green speck in the middle of it all. The only planet in exactly the right spot, the porridge that isn’t too cold and isn’t too hot, sling-shotting around just the right sun at just the right distance with just the right moon providing us with tides and seasons and a biodiversity intricately woven together by the loving hand of a truly great Creator who didn’t do it all for no reason…
A God so grand and characteristically ingenious that all the brains in the world wired together couldn’t conceptualise the wonder of such a God. A God so great to create the Heavens and the Earth is not the white bearded man in the clouds, he isn’t the great red Santa in the sky – we are talking about someone capable of creating trillions of stars and who states in his Word that he knows each one by name while still being able to pin point exactly where you are at any given moment while knowing your thoughts and emotions simultaneously with 6 billion other individuals on a planet wide scale! A God who knows the words of every book ever written and ever will be written, the words and tunes to every song along with the number of every atom on every finger nail and every piece of dead skin that flaked to the ground and every grain of dust you flicked up as you walked down the foot path and every blob of bacteria that lived in every crack in the pavement and every particle you breathed in and out and every spider floating on the breeze with every dead leaf and where it landed and where the wind that blew it went and every possible combination of everything that could have happened while knowing the difference between every possible outcome and every actual event. A God who says that even the very hairs of your head are all numbered (Matthew 10:30)…
A God who loved you so much that he gave his only Son (John 3:16)
Such a God did not create such a wonder as the Heavens and the Earth just to leave it for his next favourite toy as Professor Hawkings once suggested (though the toy was my idea). In fact “by him (Christ) all things hold together – Colossians 1: 17
Its all for a reason and designed for a purpose. In all things God works for the good of those who love him. Romans 8:28
You can choose to live in denial and believe its all just random happenstance but I’m going with the Book that grabs the origins bull by the horns in its very first verse:
In the Beginning God created the heavens and the earth!
Genesis 1:1
Let’s not beat around the bush about it – In the beginning God created two things; the heavens and the earth. Put them together and you have a whole lot of everything and that’s a great deal!
I love the way the Bible opens with this basic and yet profoundly loaded statement that slaps anyone in the face who would say otherwise. It does not begin with an opinion: “in the beginning it is the view of the writer that God created the heavens and the earth.” Or “Herein lies the theory of creation.” Nor does it start with an apology – “In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth which can be seen by this bone that carries the DNA of a dinosaur and this photograph of Adam planting the first acorn.” Not that I have a problem with Christian Apologetics, on the contrary, I think creation researchers are among a special breed of genius with a very important ministry, but that’s not what I’m talking about here…
The Bible never actually makes an argument for the existence of God or the fact that he created everything and this is crucial because of two mind blowing and uncomfortable truths – the first being that his existence is obvious and the second truth that every one knows on some level that he does exist.
I know people claim to be atheists or agnostics or whatever but if they were honest I’m sure on the odd occasion they have asked God for a parking space or cried out “God!” in a moment of panic.
The Apostle Paul wrote:
“For since the creation of the world God’s invisible qualities - his eternal power and divine nature - have been clearly seen, being understood from what has been made, so that men are without excuse.” Romans 1:20
If you’re still not convinced I wonder if there has ever been a culture on this planet that didn’t have some kind of god or gods attached to it. We all know the story of Noah and the Ark but did you also know that there are something like 500 recorded flood myths found all around the world, most with striking similarities to the account found in the Bible? Upon such a discovery it would be easy to jump to the conclusion that there must have been an event in the past that led to most ancient cultures sharing the same "legend" – in other words, there really was a flood! Is it possible then that if every culture has a “god concept” then that “concept” could be rooted in the fact that there really is a God?
But back to the present day I can honestly say that there has never been a time that I was not aware of the presence of The God who is there. Even when I walked away from Christianity 10 years ago (I’m well and truly back now) I always knew that God was there. He is like the other person in the room who I don’t have to look at to know he is present. It is my firm conviction that everyone on some level has this “God sense” – we were created with it.
Now the Heavens and the Earth aren’t just two things. They are a symphony of stars and planets dancing together in an intricate play of gravity at an astounding velocity as the galaxies spin in a myriad of other tumbling galaxies in a space so vast that I haven’t got time to type out the number. Just look at these incredible Hubble scope pictures to see how mind boggling this finite infinity we call the “Heavens” really is.
Then we have the earth, this tiny blue and green speck in the middle of it all. The only planet in exactly the right spot, the porridge that isn’t too cold and isn’t too hot, sling-shotting around just the right sun at just the right distance with just the right moon providing us with tides and seasons and a biodiversity intricately woven together by the loving hand of a truly great Creator who didn’t do it all for no reason…
A God so grand and characteristically ingenious that all the brains in the world wired together couldn’t conceptualise the wonder of such a God. A God so great to create the Heavens and the Earth is not the white bearded man in the clouds, he isn’t the great red Santa in the sky – we are talking about someone capable of creating trillions of stars and who states in his Word that he knows each one by name while still being able to pin point exactly where you are at any given moment while knowing your thoughts and emotions simultaneously with 6 billion other individuals on a planet wide scale! A God who knows the words of every book ever written and ever will be written, the words and tunes to every song along with the number of every atom on every finger nail and every piece of dead skin that flaked to the ground and every grain of dust you flicked up as you walked down the foot path and every blob of bacteria that lived in every crack in the pavement and every particle you breathed in and out and every spider floating on the breeze with every dead leaf and where it landed and where the wind that blew it went and every possible combination of everything that could have happened while knowing the difference between every possible outcome and every actual event. A God who says that even the very hairs of your head are all numbered (Matthew 10:30)…
A God who loved you so much that he gave his only Son (John 3:16)
Such a God did not create such a wonder as the Heavens and the Earth just to leave it for his next favourite toy as Professor Hawkings once suggested (though the toy was my idea). In fact “by him (Christ) all things hold together – Colossians 1: 17
Its all for a reason and designed for a purpose. In all things God works for the good of those who love him. Romans 8:28
You can choose to live in denial and believe its all just random happenstance but I’m going with the Book that grabs the origins bull by the horns in its very first verse:
In the Beginning God created the heavens and the earth!
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