Wisdom from the X-files
Can there be a more important question? Your entire path in life will be altered by your answer to this seemingly simple question. Everything that you do today will be affected. And yet, very few of us have given it the thought that it deserves. We avoid it because there is no clear unambiguous answer. We avoid it because the consequences of being wrong could be devastating. We avoid it because we don’t like being told what to do…….and what not to do.
This is a binary question…… there are only 2 possibilities and they are mutually exclusive.
The proof that God doesn’t exist:
This is really an unfair question. It is very hard to “prove” a negative……but I’ll try. What is real is limited to what can be measured by man using today’s technology. Or, if you can’t measure it……..it doesn’t exist. Since God cannot be found in a laboratory or in the fossil record, he cannot exist. The obvious problem with this is that every day we expand our reach. Science grows. Knowledge grows. And so, the definition of what is real expands. Things that were not real yesterday are real today…..things like magnetism, black holes, human DNA, the internet. Another problem is that very real, very important things that cannot be measured become not-real. Things like love, honor, hope, fear, and respect. This position begins with an assumption. The assumption is that our knowledge is complete and since we haven’t “found” God, he can’t be real. This, of course is a bad assumption.
The proof that God does exist.
There is a reality that is beyond what we can measure. There are things that science cannot find and explain. We can sense it. Some people sense it more than others. We are fairly comfortable with this…….until it begins to interfere with our desires and our plans. This is a very important point. Many people reject God because they don’t like him interfering with their plans. Let’s face it, God can be disruptive. His plans can interfere with our plans.
So, there are things that are real that cannot be measured. They touch our lives every day. Joy, love, our thoughts, our personalities. The question is, “Is God one of them?” If you want God to physically manifest himself to you, you are probably going to be disappointed. He just doesn’t seem to work that way. So I look for indirect evidence of God.
The first of these is the large empty place in our spirit. We sense that we are incomplete. We are lonely, unloved, facing death, unsatisfied. We try to fill the void with busyness: work, hobbies, sports, food, alcohol, drugs, sex. Yet, it is always there, just under the surface. I have heard this described as a “God shaped hole”. We know that something is missing. No matter what we take from the physical world, there is a void in our spirit that we cannot fill in the material realm. The thing that is missing must be non-material. It must be spiritual.
The second is hope. ….or the lack of it. We will all die. From an historical perspective we will die soon…..possibly very soon. No matter how good your life is, it will end in a few years……at the most in a few decades. Science leaves us with nothing but despair. You will die and the lights will just go out. We intuitively sense that there must be more…….an afterlife. But, in order for there to be an afterlife……….paradise, there must be a creator, God. You can argue about the fine points of his nature; but, ……No God….No afterlife. I sometimes hear people describe their vision of paradise. What they describe is a very nice place that conforms to their ideas of right and wrong. It is comfortable and is populated by people that they like. Anything and, for that matter, anyone that they don’t like is not allowed. If you notice, they never mention God in their paradise. Because, in point of fact, their paradise has no external God…… THEY made it up…….THEY are the creator……..THEY are the God of their own paradise. This is very common. But, how can somebody who can’t create a handful of dirt create a paradise and resurrect themself? Better yet, if they can create paradise, why don’t they just make themself immortal. Why? Because they aren’t God. If you ask them if they are God, they will look at you like you have 2 heads.
The third is our innate moral code. We all know what is right and wrong. If you ask 1000 people to list 20 things that are right and 20 things that are wrong, you will pretty much get 1000 copies of the same list. This is built into our DNA. We are born with this knowledge. Where did it come from? Darwinian evolution doesn’t handle this well. Darwin tells us to eat and feed our children. Giving food to a homeless person whom we don’t know and whom we will never see again is not “positively adaptive”. Cheating on your spouse spreads your DNA. Nothing could make Darwin happier. But, we all know, without exception, that it is wrong. Our innate moral code came from somewhere……….God. Don’t get me wrong. It is common to do things that are wrong for a good reason. We all do this. We have an enormous capacity for justification. We do things every day that we have found ways, often highly creative, to justify. But, if we dig deep into our hearts, if we go to that small quiet, uncomfortable and possibly scary place……our conscience……we still know what is right and wrong. We just don’t do it. In modern society we have decided that if something makes us happy, even in the short term, then it must be OK. We have essentially replaced the restrictive concept of “right” with the more flexible concept of “it works for me”. This means right enough to get by with…..for me…..for today……even if it’s not “OK” for my neighbor. It’s hard to fit God into the modern concept of “OK”.
The forth is the historical record. Jesus died and was resurrected. At least 40 people saw him. 12 apostles spent the rest of their lives testifying to the resurrection. All but one of them died horrible deaths rather than deny it. Today we would execute a man based on the testimony of one or two witnesses. How can we ignore 40 witnesses? Therefore, Jesus is devine. Jesus endorses the Bible. Therefore the Bible is reliable. The Bible describes God in detail. Therefore God is real.
So, Christianity hinges on the resurrection. This is the most important decision in human history. This is the most important decision in your life. Did Jesus rise from the dead? I believe that the evidence says he did.
So, we are pretty much left with two possibilities: either there is a powerful external God who has created a Paradise…..or there is nothing. Incidentally, I have heard hell described as “the Nothing “.
We like God when we are in trouble, when we are in pain, when we are in desperate need. We don’t like him when we want something, when we have a perfectly serviceable justification, and he says, through that little voice inside of us, “No……that is wrong”. Faced with this problem, we typically push God back into the box, hide the box in a closet, and do what we want. Even then, though, when he is safely stowed away, when he can no longer interfere…….in our hearts we know that he is real, that he is right, and that we are wrong.
How do we decide? As Mulder and Scully on the X-files say, “The truth is out there”. How do we conform ourselves to the truth? Because fighting against the truth is a losing proposition.
If God doesn’t exist, then do whatever you want. But you better hurry, because you will soon die and the lights will just go out.
If God does exist, then why does he allow the “mystery”? Why doesn’t he appear in a cloud surrounded by lightning and thunder……shout my name. …..and give me my marching orders?
The answer is repeated over and over in the bible. At every encounter with God it is the same. God approaches, often from a great distance, he comes almost to us. Then……he requires us to take a small step toward him. Invariably this step requires faith, risk, and trust. Think of Peter walking on the water.
God comes 1000 miles. …..but he then requires us to take that one step.
The small step that is required of us is a token. It is tiny and ultimately symbolic. It is not much….certainly not payment in full….certainly not enough to entitle us to anything. But, from God’s perspective, it is about all that we can offer…..in that light it is huge. It symbolizes our desire for relationship with God….and it underscores our smallness before God. We cannot “earn” our relationship with God. We cannot purchase it. We cannot deserve it. We cannot do something that will obligate God to admit us into relationship. Ultimately, we offer our little token and God opens his arms.
God doesn’t display himself in a scientifically irrefutable way because he requires us to take that token step. …..with an act of faith…….a public acknowledgement of our love and desire for relationship.