Last summer, for these Wednesday services, we did a series on some of the parables of Jesus. This year, I thought what we'd do is talk about some Old Testament stories. And we're going to start in the very beginning of the Old Testament, which of course is the beginning of the Bible, with the story of creation.
Now, a lot of times one of the first things that happens when we talk about the story of creation is that people want to know if we're supposed to take that story literally. Do we have to believe, as Christians, that God created the world in exactly six days, no more and no less? Or can we believe what current scientific theories tell us? In other words, can we be Christians and still believe in things like evolution and the big bang theory?
When we look at that, I think the first thing we need to do is recognize that faith and science do not need to be in conflict. They're sometimes portrayed that way in the media, but they really should not be. After all, both true faith and good science are really engaged in the same thing: a search for the truth. They may search for truth in different ways, but that should be the goal of both. And God certainly has nothing to fear from a search for the truth, because God is truth.
What true faith and good science also recognize is that nothing can ever be proven with one hundred percent certainty. Christians can never conclusively prove that God exists, that Jesus is the Savior, that the Holy Spirit acts in our lives or anything else. We can provide evidence, but we can never give one hundred percent certainty because God does not do that. God asks for faith, and if we had certainty there would be no need for faith.
The same could be said of science. Science can never prove things with one hundred percent certainty, either. It can provide evidence, sometimes a lot of evidence. There are things that science has proven with enough certainty that we rely on them every day of our lives, whether we realize it or not. Still, good scientists know that nothing is ever one hundred percent certain. Everything we learn raises more questions. Sometimes we think we know the truth only to find out that we don't. That why, in both science and faith, we refer to a search for the truth. Searching for the truth is a never-ending job.
I think, though, that when we in the church get bogged down in questions about creationism and evolution and intelligent design and all that, we miss the point of why the story of creation is in the Bible. The Bible was not written to be a science textbook. The book of Genesis was written thousands of years ago. It was originally written for people who had no concept of planets of galaxies or universes or anything else.
Could God have created the world in six days? Of course. God is God. God can do anything God chooses to do. God could've created the world in six seconds if that what God chose to do.
But the thing is that whether God created the world in six seconds or six days or six million years is not the point. The creation story is not in the Bible to specifically tell us that God created the world in six days. The creation story is in the Bible to tell us that God created the world.
From a faith standpoint, that's really all we need to know. After all, just that is pretty awesome, right? Creating the sun and the moon and the stars and the planets and everything else out of nothing? Creating plants and animals and fish and insects and humans out of nothing? That's a pretty big deal. That's pretty cool. How God did that or how long it took or anything else is not the point. The point is that God did it. The point is that nothing would exist without God.
If God created the world and everything in it exactly as it exists now in six days, that'd be pretty awesome. If God created the world and everything in it over thousands or millions of years using a big bang and evolution and stuff, well, that'd be pretty awesome too, right? In fact, in some ways that'd be even more awesome. Think of all the things God would've had to work out in advance to create the world that way. Just creating it as it is would be easier, really. To work out a system where everything happened at just the right time and in just the right place and things evolved and changed and grew over millions of years and eventually developed intelligence, well, that's beyond comprehension. That's so incredible that we cannot even really grasp it.
Think of how long scientists have been trying to create intelligent life, and we're not even close yet. Here's the other thing, if humans ever do create intelligent life, it still won't be anywhere near as awesome as what God did. If we ever do it, we'll be starting with the materials God gave us. God started from scratch. God started with nothing.
It's like the old joke. A scientist is talking to God and bets God he can create life without God's help. God says, “Okay, how are you going to do it?” The scientist says, well, “I just start with this dirt here...” And God says, “Hey, wait a minute, that's cheating. Go create your own dirt.”
God created the dirt. God created the chemicals. God created the intelligence that we have that allows us to even try to comprehend the world. God created it all. It all comes from God.
There's one more thing the creation story teaches us. And it's another reason why getting bogged down in debates about evolution and a big bang and stuff misses the point of the story. When we look at the creation story that way, we forget about one of the most important verses. It says, “God saw all that he had made, and it was very good.”
We forget about that verse sometimes. Sometimes we look at the world and it does not seem very good to us. We see wars, we see hunger, we see abuse, we see immorality, we see all sorts of things that don't seem to us to be very good at all.
God sees all that too, of course. God sees everything. Yet, God still says the world is very good.
I think the reason God says that is that God sees the potential for good in everyone and everything. God knows that each one of us sins. God sees all the times each of us falls short of what God created us to be. But God also sees all the times we get it right. God sees all the times we actually do show love to each other. God sees all the times we actually put others ahead of ourselves. God sees all the times we do something for someone with no thought whatsoever for what we'll get out of it. God sees what we are, but God also sees what we can be.
God sees something else, too. God sees how it's all going to end. We don't. Sometimes someone comes along who thinks they do, but Jesus told us that only God knows when the end will come. It could come a million years from now. Or, it could come tomorrow. We just don't know.
When we think of the end of the world, we tend to think of it as a really sad, tragic thing. And there are some ways in which it probably will be. If you've ever read the book of Revelation, you there's a lot of stuff that's supposed to happen before the world ends, and some of it's stuff that does not seem very pleasant.
Here's the thing, though. When the end of the world comes, God will create it. The same God who created the beginning of the world will create the end of the world. And just as God's creation was very good in the beginning, God's creation will be very good at the end. Whenever God is involved in something, it has to be very good.
No matter how much we humans might get in the way, no matter how much we mess up, we cannot take away from God's goodness. God's creation was very good in the beginning. God's creation is very good now. God's creation will be very good at the end. God's creation is very good because God is very good. Anything created by the very good God has to be very good. That includes each one of you. That includes me, too.
People have been arguing about when and how the world was created since I was a little boy. They'll probably still be arguing about it long after I'm gone. As Christians, though, what we need to know about creation is that whenever and however it happened, God did it. Because God did it, it's good. No matter what you and I may do, it will always be good. And whenever and however it ends, that will be good, too. Everything God does is good.
There's nothing wrong with trying to find out more, but those are the things we really need to know. If we know those things, our faith can handle anything that science may reveal to us.
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