Fusion: Randomness and Creation

In this sometimes series, we are exploring the "fusion" of science and theology. Many Christian sites are responding to apparent contradictions between science and faith. My purpose in this series is to step beyond these problems to ask the question, "If science and the Bible are both revealing truth, what happens when we combine them? What new insights result from the fusion of growing natural revelation and special revelation?”

Einstein once declared that God does not play dice. His statement was less about theology and more about his initial distaste for quantum physics, but it serves as a backdrop to today’s post. Does God roll the dice? Did he create a universe regulated by chance, randomness? We Christians have difficulty with this idea of chance happenings. We prefer to think of God as the “Blessed Controller of all things” (J.B. Phillips translation of 1 Timothy 5:16). But physicists and biologists alike insist that all reality, from subatomic mechanics to genetic mutations, can only be understood as a flow of random events. Are they correct? Consider with me two contrasting theological frameworks:

1) God governs all creation with a “hands-on” approach, creating and then managing and superintending every detail, carefully orchestrating events to accomplish his purposes. If he did not special create each species, he at least intervened from time to time to guide the development of “irreducibly complex” biological systems. His directive influence extends not only over cosmic and biological evolution, but also over all human activity. He sovereignly guides every detail of the believer’s life, holds sway over the course of human history, even setting governments in place. In this way, the flow of creation moves unalterably toward the culmination of his over-all plan and purpose.

2) God initiates the cosmos, but then essentially leaves his hands off. He allows evolution to take its wandering course, and rarely intervenes in the affairs of human beings. But he is not the disengaged god of the deist; he is deeply interested and invested in the flow of human history (even entering into it in the person of Jesus) and interacts personally with people of faith. However he seldom exerts his directive influence; instead he chooses to let his creation take its natural course. His purposes are accomplish not by the force of his will and manipulations, but by the natural outplay of physical and spiritual laws.

In my previous Fusion post, I turned to the concept of evolutionary convergence to suggest that God might have created humankind “in his own image” using an entirely random evolutionary process. If this hypothesis were correct, it would mean that the second framework is no mere role of the dice. Rather, it would lead to this possible scenario: God created a vast cosmos, one of sufficient size to ensure the eventual emergence of planet capable of hosting life; he infused the cosmos with just the right chemistry to ensure that life could and would emerge and evolve upon that planet; and he waited patiently for nearly 14 billion years for these eventualities to transpire. After creating a universe capable of hosting and evolving humankind, despite its entropic nature, little or no direct divine intervention would have been required.

Such a scenario gives answer to the riddles posed by Richard Dawkins and others about the oddity of Christians assigning cosmic significance to human beings when we occupy an infinitesimal corner of an immense cosmos, and have been on the scene for a mere eyeblink of cosmic time. If, in fact, it best served the purposes of the Creator to allow his creation to develop according to natural laws, the scope of time and space may have been necessary.

But more importantly, such a scenario completely changes the playing field for theodicy, or the problem of evil. Under the first theological framework above, God must, in some answer for malaria, animal pain, millions of species extinctions, tsunamis, earthquakes, hurricanes, and indirectly responsible for Hitler, Stalin, Pol Pot, 9/11, and every other imaginable human ill. However, if God’s purposes are best served by leaving his hands off of creation, all such ills are seen in a different light, assuming that God’s choice of modus operandi was one of necessity, not of whim.

While this scenario may help to solve some problems for belief, for many it raises other problems and questions. Among them,

1) What considerations might prompt God to create and govern his universe in this way? What might compel him to leave his hands off of creation even when it is assailed by catastrophic horrors and unthinkable atrocities?

2) Does randomness presuppose Open Theology, or the idea that God does not possess perfect knowledge of the future? This question was raised by a reader in response to the earlier post on randomness.

3) Can such a view of randomness be integrated into the teachings of the Bible, which might seem to favor the hands-on God?

In upcoming posts, I will offer my perspective on these and other questions.

Reasons for My Belief

An atheist friend has asked me to lay out my evidence for theism. I am happy herewith to comply. Many “theistic proofs” have been forwarded over the centuries. Typically, they are oversold, stated in language too bold. In the following post, I humbly submit five of the most convincing lines of evidence for me, some related to long-standing arguments for God’s existence, some unique to my own thinking. They are modest claims, and may convince no one else. My purpose here is not to persuade a skeptic, but rather to show why my mind (which also tends toward skepticism!) is convinced of an unseen, supernatural Creator/God. I have chosen to disallow comments on this full essay. Soon, I will post a series of bite-sized sections of the essay and invite comments. In this way, the ensuing discussions can be more focused.

prologue

Four disclaimers at the outset:

1) I am merely offering evidence, and I propose to do no more than that. “Evidence” is a word with a spectrum of meanings ranging from “proof” to “hints”. Somewhere between those two extremes would be “indications”. My presentation of evidence here could be described as an offering of indications. The first three arguments are based upon standard teleological arguments, (argument from design). But they explore three variations upon that theme, and each is a stand alone argument, not dependent upon the others. In my opinion, these arguments are often abused by theists, their significance exaggerated. I do not view them, nor do I present them as “theistic proofs”. They are modest indicators, bits of inconclusive evidence which, when viewed together, form a strong basis to suspect a Creator.

2) I am not a defender of “Intelligent Design”, à la Dembski, Behe, Johnson, et. al. I hope it will be clear that the arguments presented here do not presume an interventionist God. The cosmos is subject, and quite obedient, to natural laws. It seems to work amazingly well without the constant supervision or intervention of Divine influence. But this in no way precludes a teleological view of the cosmos, with “design” set in place at the outset of Creation, and perhaps at the outset of life itself (abiogenesis). This view of a noninterventionist God in no way diminishes his ultimate influence; rather, it greatly enhances his wisdom and his creative genius.

3) I am not herewith offering evidence for the Christian God versus other god beliefs. Atheists often throw into these discussions the “many gods” argument. Richard Dawkins famously points out that “atheists disbelieve in just one more god than the countless gods that theists disbelieve in.” True enough. But the discussion of comparative religions is best left for another day, after the question of whether a God exists at all is settled. I am happy then to explain why I reject Zeus, Wotan, and Buddha in favor of the God Jesus came to reveal.

4) Some readers may be disappointed at missing citations or end-notes. It is not my purpose here to produce an academic paper. I am simply offering some of my personal reasons for belief. If a reader asks, I will attempt to source any of the quotes.

1) the finely-tuned cosmos

There exists in our universe approximately 30 distinct physical and chemical conditions each of which must be finely tuned within very narrow parameters in order for life to develop and prosper. These conditions have been noted by many authors. Those unfamiliar with this line of evidence may wish to reveiw the Wikipedia article on fine tuning here, and further descriptions of the argument here or here.

One such condition involves the synthesis of carbon, a process which takes place inside stars. The renown English astronomer, Fred Hoyle, spent much of his career analyzing the nuclear reactions which have taken place inside stars over the course of the history of our cosmos. It is well understood that these nuclear reactions are responsible for the bountiful supply of carbon in our universe, an element that one might not expect to find in abundance, but which is absolutely essential for carbon-based life. Hoyle discovered that unique characteristics in the nucleus of the carbon atom make it possible for these atoms to be produced in such abundance; he then calculated the likelihood that these characteristics should be present, and learned that they are statistically unlikely in the extreme. He went on to make this oft-cited observation:

“Would you not say to yourself, ‘Some super-calculating intellect must have designed the properties of the carbon atom, otherwise the chance of my finding such an atom through the blind forces of nature would be utterly minuscule.’ Of course you would ... A common sense interpretation of the facts suggests that a superintellect has monkeyed with physics, as well as with chemistry and biology, and that there are no blind forces worth speaking about in nature. The numbers one calculates from the facts seem to me so overwhelming as to put this conclusion almost beyond question.” ("The Universe: Past and Present Reflections." Engineering and Science, November, 1981. p 8-12)

Australian biochemist Michael Denton has studied many such elements of fine tuning, and has declared, "All the evidence available in the biological sciences supports the core proposition of traditional natural theology – that the cosmos is a specially designed whole with life and mankind as its fundamental goal and purpose, a whole in which all facets of reality, from the size of galaxies to the thermal capacity of water, have their meaning and explanation in this central fact." (Nature’s Destiny, p. 389).

While many of these evidences of fine tuning will be studied for many years to come, and we may find natural explanations for some, I am convinced that most will continue to point back to Holye’s “superintellect”, and Denton’s “special designer”. But not conclusively; it should be noted that other explanations have been suggested which might account for fine tuning. The most common of these are various multiverse scenarios. We are told that perhaps ours is just one in a chain of billions or trillions of universes; if so, the chances that one such universe would result in conditions favorable to life ultimately rise to one in one; and voilà, here we are!

Thus, the arguments from fine-tuning, no matter how intuitively they point to a Creator, can never prove the existence of God. For me and many others, however,
Occam’s razor (the logical construct which says, “All other things being equal, the simplest solution is the best”) leads us to a strong likelihood of a “superintellect” First Cause. The alternate explanations, while plausible, are complex and lack evidence. It is my view that the simplest solution is to credit fine tuning to the hand of the Designer, Planner, and Creator of the universe.

It is interesting to note that fine tuning, which may be the best of all theistic arguments, is rarely invoked by Creationists, even by Intelligent Design proponents like Philip Johnson and Michael Behe. The reason is that the fine tuning argument presumes naturalistic evolution. Fine tuning thus works bests for those theists who fully embrace Darwinism, as I do. And for me, an intelligent Creator is the simplest, most intuitive, and thus most likely explanation of the life-friendly cosmos in which we find ourselves.

2) the ordered universe

“God does not play dice.” Whatever Albert Einstein meant when he referred to “God”, there can be no mistaking the import of this well-known quote. The universe which Einstein studied, the universe which amazed him with its endless mysteries, the universe which he, more than any other human, helped to explain, this universe could simply not be ruled by chance alone. Someone, or something, must be providing certainty, order, predictability. Without that someone or something, our universe could only be subject to the whim of chance, a chaotic and unpredictable reality which could never submit to the inquiries of physicist or mathematician.

What set men like Copernicus, Galileo, and Kepler apart from the great majority of their contemporaries? Why did they suspect the true nature of the universe while others persisted in their primitive superstitions? What led them to explore the solar system as they did, and discover its governing principles? They were led by their undying conviction that their investigations would prove fruitful because of their strong belief in the Creator. They were armed with an expectation that they would find an orderly universe, one governed by mathematical principles and physical laws written by a Creator. Einstein tips his hat to these pioneers of science: “[T]hose individuals to whom we owe the great creative achievements of science were all of them imbued with the truly religious conviction that this universe of ours is something perfect and susceptible to the rational striving for knowledge” (Ideas and Opinions). To the 21st century mind, this expectation seems self-evident. Of course, we know the universe obeys the laws of physics. Of course mathematics is consistent. Of course the universe is orderly.

Ah, but not so fast! When Einstein confirmed these phenomena, he found them utterly remarkable! Einstein refers to this order as an “unexpected event”, and also declared that it should be regarded as a miracle: 

“Well, a priori [reasoning from cause to effect] one should expect that the world would be rendered lawful [obedient to law and order] only to the extent that we [human beings] intervene with our ordering intelligence... [But instead we find] in the objective world a high degree of order that we were a priori in no way authorized to expect. This is the ‘miracle’ that is strengthened more and more with the development of our knowledge.”

We take this ordered, law-abiding universe quite for granted. We regard it as expected, unremarkable. Does this confidence reveal how much we’ve learned, or how little we actually perceive? Is Einstein passé? Was he naive? Or did he see more deeply into the mystery of the universe than we are able, or willing, to look? Is the 21st century skeptic afraid to acknowledge that the order of the universe demands the existence of an “Orderer”?

I find a fascinating juxtaposition in the nature of our cosmos. The same universe governed by law and order is also subject to wild and unpredictable randomness. Clearly, this randomness plays a central role in the progress and development of the universe, and in the evolution of life on our planet. Such randomness is all we should expect in a universe of the materialist’s imaginings. But randomness is not all we have. And randomness, Dawkin’s “blind watchmaker” if you will, can only be productive and meaningful in a context provided by an orderly universe governed by unbending laws. When I consider these remarkable realities, I am compelled to acknowledge the wise and wonderful hand of the Creator.

3) markers of intelligence (in the origin of life)

Hume was right! When the eighteenth century philosopher David Hume argued so effectively against the arguments of design, he did so by suggesting that nature designs itself! And ever since Hume, science has been confirming that to be the case on many fronts. Matter is marvelously capable of self-organization. We understand the principles by which the universe structured itself, how matter coalesced following the big bang into stable star systems and galaxies, etc. Built into the chemistry and physics of the universe is an uncanny capacity to bring organization out of chaos, despite the laws of entropy which might predict otherwise. Built into life itself is a principle of self-design. Darwin helped us to see how random processes have resulted in variations subject to natural selection giving rise to the marvelous diversity of life forms on our planet today. Dawkin’s “blind watchmaker” is truly stunning in his ability to generate both diversity and functional complexity. But all these natural explanations for the amazing design and beauty we observe fail to answer the ultimate question: Why would a universe possess these remarkable characteristics in the first place? Why is the universe so full of the capacity to self-design, to self-organize? Why is it that everywhere we look, we find a cosmos busy crafting itself?

The skeptics, in their zealousness to write God out of the script, may have inadvertently stumbled upon the very genius of the Creator. The stronger the argument for a self-organizing universe, the more cogently is the case made: this universe has the fingerprints of intelligence all over it. In the self-designing attributes of the cosmos, I see not an argument against God, but the most compelling argument for a greater Creator than we imagined, one whose intelligence and wisdom are seen in these very built-in processes. The intuitive sensibility of Paley’s argument has never been fully dispelled; it has only been pushed back in time, relegated to the deep mysteries of the Mastermind who first set it all into motion.

Nowhere is this proclivity toward self-organization more spectacular and compelling than inside the living cell. Michael Denton speaks to the design implicit in the living cell in his book, Nature’s Destiny:

“From the knowledge we now have of the molecular machinery that underlies some of their extraordinary abilities, it is clear that cells are immensely complex entities. On any count the average cell must utilize close to a million unique adaptive structures and processes—more than the number in a jumbo jet. In this the cell seems to represent the ultimate expression in material form of compacted adaptive complexity—the complexity of a jumbo jet packed into a speck of dust invisible to the human eye. It is hardly conceivable that anything more complex could be compacted into such a small volume. Moreover, it is a speck-sized jumbo jet which can duplicate itself quite effortlessly.

“The fitness of the cell for its biological role in the assembly and functioning of the multicellular life gives every indication, as with so many of life’s constituents, of being unique. In the case of many of their key properties and abilities, it is difficult to imagine how these properties and abilities could be actualized except in a material form with the precise characteristics of the living cell. In other words, if we were to design from the first principles a tiny nanoerector about 30 microns in diameter with the capabilities of the cell—with the ability to measure the chemical concentration of substances in its surrounding medium; with the ability to measure time, to move, to feel its way around in a complex molecular environment, to change its form; with the ability to communicate with fellow nanoerectors using electrical and chemical messages and to act together in vast companies to create macroscopic structures—we would end up redesigning the cell.”

Denton uses the term “directed evolution” to help answer the inevitable questions about how complexity of such staggering proportions could ever come to self-organize. Mike Gene suggests another term, which I prefer: front loaded evolution. Both of these theorists have proposed that the incredibly elaborate machinery inside the cell, machinery composed of variously shaped protein molecules specified by RNA blueprints, demand a designer. Not the designer of the Intelligent Design theorists who propose a designer for complex organisms. Rather, the designer of the DNA process which is capable of building such organisms over time through the processes Darwin described. Denton writes, "the evolutionary process of tracing out the tree of life becomes a perfectly natural phenomenon; the inevitable unfolding of a preordained pattern, written into the laws of nature from the beginning." (Nature’s Destiny, 282)

Some will reject this argument on the grounds that it lacks the full array of material evidence. Denton sees the evidence coming in small bits, like the pieces of a jigsaw puzzle:

"Because the validity of the argument [biocentric design of the universe] depends on so many independent lines of evidence, the conclusion is not materially threatened because the whole picture is not yet complete or because this or that phenomenon such as the origin of life or the mechanism of evolution is not understood. Just as the meaning of a jigsaw puzzle may be obvious long before all the pieces are perfectly placed, so too my argument does not necessitate that everything be explained." (Nature’s Destiny, p xvi.)

Others will object that this argument merely proposes another god-of-the-gaps. I reject god-of-the-gaps approaches because I am convinced that gaps in natural evolution are diminishing as our understanding grows. It may be helpful to distinguish between the “gaps” which are temporary empty spots in our current knowledge, and “gaps” which extend beyond the reasonable limits of science. Abiogenesis may be just such a gap. Far from slowly closing, the gap of abiogenesis becomes more and more daunting as our understanding grows. The more we know about evolution, the more we know about DNA, the greater becomes the mystery of the first cell, and of the DNA alphabet itself. It is this widening gap which I believe is unlikely ever to be filled. In this regard, I am in alignment with Denish D’Souza who has said, “I'm not making a god-of-the-gaps argument arguing that because evolution can't account for it, therefore God did it. But neither should we submit to the atheism-of-the-gaps, that holds since science explains some things, it can surely explain everything.”
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These first three arguments rely heavily upon the testimony of three scientists. Some skeptics will disregard such “appeals to authority” as not constituting hard evidence. True enough. And yet, 90% or more of what I know, I know because someone told me, and I accept their testimony. And I have little trouble accepting the testimony of Fred Hoyle regarding the chemistry of the universe, nor Albert Einstein’s descriptions of its physics, nor Michael Denton’s evaluation of the biochemistry inside the cell. It should be noted that I have not built this case upon the testimony of theists. Rather, I have appealed to the testimony of an atheist (Hoyle), and agnostic/atheist (Denton), and a deistic pantheist (Einstein). None of them profess belief in the personal God I proclaim. And yet, when considered as a whole, these mysteries of origins leave me with more than a suspicion of a rational designer in back of it all.
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4) the transcendent nature of human love

My dictionary defines transcendence as “that which is beyond or above the range of normal or merely physical human experience.” The Latin root suggests the twin ideas of climbing and crossing. As I use the word here, it speaks of a level of reality that is above us and beyond us crossing our physical, empirical reality. Our experiences intersect this “transcendent” reality when no material causation can be found for them. In my experience of human love, I find just such a transcendent quality.

Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn called mutual affection, which, among all living things, he found unique in humans, “the highest achievement they can aspire to.” Human love has inspired poets and artists through the ages. Plato told us why: “At the touch of love, everyone becomes a poet.” Even Einstein chimed in on the transcendence of human love when he said, “Any man who can drive safely while kissing a pretty girl is simply not giving the kiss the attention it deserves.” (Okay, that one was just for fun. But he did say that!)

Perhaps one of the best know quotes on love came from the physicist/philosopher, Blaise Pascal: “The heart has its reasons that reason knows nothing of.” This scientist who spent a lifetime in the realm of reason found in human love something that reason could never explain.

I agree. Some biologists will insist that they can find evolutionary paths that lead to the ineffable wonder of human love. But I doubt their accounting. Something so indescribably sublime cries out for an explanation beyond a few molecules bouncing around in the brain. Emotions and sensations on a much lower plane would have sufficed to ensure the propagation of the species. So whence the high joys of human love, especially marital love? These highest of human joys cross over into the realm of eternity, and give the human soul a sense of connectedness to something, or Someone who transcends the physical. That is my experience.

5) the existence of evil

On a recent visit to Phnom Penh, my wife and I toured Tuong Sleng Prison, where Pol Pot held his recent arrestees before they were sent off to the killing fields. At Tuong Sleng, these prisoners were systematically tortured by the Khmer Rouge in an effort to extract more names of resisters. The prison, and its artifacts, were grim reminders of how utterly evil human beings can become.

Many consider the Problem of Evil to be the strongest argument opposing faith, particularly Christian faith. I have discussed this at length in earlier posts (see the sidebar Main Post Series for links to the Theodicy posts #7 through #11). However, as I reflect upon the meaning of evil, I have found it to be one of the strongest validations of my faith. This is indeed a 180° inversion of “the Problem of Evil”.

Evil, in its various inhuman permutations, takes on a life of its own at times. Without doubt, much man-on-man evil can (sadly) find its logical source in adaptive evolution. Evolutionary psychology seeks to define all evil in terms of biology. Dawkins appeals to the “selfish gene” for which our minds and bodies are mere survival machines. But not all evil readily fits the pattern we would expect from evolution. It is these horrifying and monstrous examples of evil which lead me to conclude that evil indeed does have a life outside of our natural, material world; evil goes beyond biological impulse. And if this is so, if evil is at times the manifestation of a supernatural force or personality, the mere existence of such an evil is an indication to me of a countering supernatural, personal source of good.

I do not subscribe to philosophical or religious dualism. The existence of a good God is not dependent upon a balancing force of evil. However, supernatural malevolence, if it exists at all, powerfully indicates supernatural goodness. And for this reason, every instance of inexplicable evil we encounter (one need not look long in the annals of history) is one more piece of tangible evidence for a good Creator/God who is, I believe, locked in a cosmic war with evil. In my view, this cosmic battle dates back at least to the creation moment, and is the major theme playing out in our universe. This conflict forms the basis for much of my own theology.

Some might fail to follow this logic. Some will deny any logic exists in this argument at all! However, my skeptic friend asked for my reasons for believing; and though this one may seem strange to some, and is certainly subjective, it has for decades been a lynchpin for my own faith.

epilogue

In these five lines of evidence, you may note a trend from objective toward subjective. I could add many additional evidences, but they would continue to be more and more subjective, more personal, more experiential. In truth, these experiences of a personal God who is involved in my life serve to verify my belief more than the objective evidences offered here. But I recognize that they will have less value as evidence for my readers, and hence I omit them. I sometimes appeal to the following analogy: I could never prove to a doubter that my wife loves me. I can offer no objective evidence. There is nothing in our relationship that could qualify as empirical proof of her love. And yet, I am as certain of her love as I am of almost anything else. Likewise, for myself and many other believers, God has made himself so real that our certainty approaches absolute knowledge, though we could never bring this certainty to bear upon another.

Nevertheless, these subjective, personal evidences are fortified in my mind when I consider the more objective evidences such as the finely tuned cosmos, the ordered universe, and the markers of intelligence. Indeed, the Bible appeals often to the testimony of creation (e.g. Romans 1:20, Psalm 19:1-4). I do not pretend that the evidence offered here should persuade a skeptic to alter his worldview. But I do believe that the nature of our cosmos provides ample ground to justify a serious exploration for an open-minded seeker of truth. For such a seeker, the ultimate proof will not be found in the words of a blog-post, but in the inscriptions of the heart.

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Comments have been disabled on this post. I look forward to your comments as each of the five evidences are posted individually. If you have a general comment, my email (which can be accessed at my profile–just click on the picture below "About the Host") is always open to readers.

POST #12: Randomness, what does it say about purpose?

ran’dom•ness, noun, a lack of order, purpose, cause, or predictability; proceeding, made, or occurring without definite aim, reason, or pattern.

de•sign’, noun, the purposeful or inventive arrangement of parts or details.

I am currently reading Random Designer by Richard G. Colling. (I will be offering a review here soon.) Colling owns up to the seemingly oxymoronic nature of his own title in the first chapter. According to the definitions above, randomness implies a lack of purpose, while design implies purposefulness. Can randomness ever be “by design” without ceasing to be random? Can randomness be purposeful? In this post, I will explore these questions and invite your comments. In future posts, I will further develop the prospect of randomness in evolution/creation, and the theological possibilities suggested by randomness.

Randomness is the linchpin of naturalistic evolution. A continual stream of apparently unguided genetic mutations form the potential raw material of gradual change demanded by the Darwinian model. Only an extremely small percentage of these mutations actually result in useful adaptations that offer improvement to the species. The great majority are neutral in effect, and some are damaging. This vast pool of mostly inconsequential mutations yielding only rare adaptive changes gives rise to the notion of randomness as the driver of evolutionary processes.

But does such a view of randomness (which I accept) necessarily translate into purposelessness? Can randomness be intentional? Can randomness be teleological (that is, can it serve a long-range purpose)? Can randomness be a tool to generate desired effects which would be unattainable otherwise? The answer to all these questions is yes!

This has been, and promises to continue to be, a politically charged election year in the United States. And in the ever changing fortunes of the candidates, we have been reminded again and again of the power of the unofficial poll. Just this morning I read that both John Edwards and Rudy Giuliani are likely to drop of their respective party’s nomination races. In each case, their decisions seem to be guided by the poll numbers in states which will vote next week. Polls may be useful, but their accuracy and usefulness hinge on one very essential polling principle: random sampling. Because a relatively small number of potential voters are actually polled, and the results are extrapolated to predict how the full electorate is likely to vote, polling organizations recognize that their sample of voters must be random. Randomness is a necessary tool to accomplish a desired purpose. Poll takers thus go to great efforts to ensure randomness.

Or consider the example of random number generators (RNG). An RNG is a physical device, and/or computer based program, which is designed to do just what the name implies: spit out sequences of numbers that are genuinely random. In cases where absolute randomness is required, an RNG is sometimes more difficult to design than one might think. Random number generators are used in applications where unpredictability is desired such as in cryptography, statistical sampling and, of course, in gambling. So again we can see that the principle of randomness can be planned, intentional, and purposeful.

Back to the title of the book I’m reading: Random Designer may not be as self-contradicting as it at first appears. Perhaps an Almighty Creator, able to accomplish his purposes in any manner he chooses might use randomness as His tool of choice. But, we may well ask, is it even possible for a sovereign God to leave things to chance? In Ecclesiates, Koheleth puzzles over such questions. In 3:1 through 17 he sees all that happens as falling in line with the timings and eternal purposes of God. Yet in 9:11 he observes that the race is not to the swift, nor the battle to the strong, and he laments that all is governed by chance. Koheleth seems content to live with the paradox; he offers no sure sounding logical solution.

When I consider the possibility of randomness in the purposes of God, my thoughts range far beyond arbitrary genetic mutations and adaptive changes in species. I’ve considered how randomness may function beyond evolution in the purposes of God. It may be His tool of choice to accomplish desired ends attainable through no other process. God may even now be using randomness.

As we move forward in this series of posts, we will discuss some possibilities about why God may be doing just that. We may discover how randomness provides meaning and texture to existence. We may find that randomness offers relevant answers to some very troubling questions about life, and about God. But first, in the next post, we will consider a common assumption: that randomness implies atheism.

Have you considered the possibility of randomness in the purposes of the Creator? Or does it seem impossible to you that a sovereign God could or would allow randomness to function in his Creation? Please comment ...

Book Review: God's Universe

In the last few months, a number of wonderful books have crossed my desk, and I wish to recommend some of them to you. The first of these is Owen Gingerich’s God’s Universe.

Owen Gingerich is a Harvard Professor of Astronomy and the History of Science, Emeritus, and a life-long Mennonite, a combination I found interesting. As a Bible-believing Christian, his books often deal with the interface of faith and science. God’s Universe (The Belknap Press of Harvard University Press, 2006), is his most recent offering.

The first chapter is a response to the prevalent scientific understanding known as the Copernican Principle, and its corollary, Mediocrity Principle. Gingerich takes exception to “Mediocrity”, arguing for the unique place humankind may occupy in the Universe, and citing evidence of purposeful design, though the design for which Gingerich advocates is not the same as Intelligent Design. This becomes more clear in the second chapter, entitled “Dare a Scientist Believe in Design?” He is careful to distinguish his view of design from that being asserted by the Intelligent Design movement. On pages 68 - 69, we writes,

Whether we look at the nature and abundance of the atoms themselves or the remarkable ratio of electrostatic to gravitational attraction or the many other details of our physical universe, we know that without these design features we would not be here. In a word, I believe in intelligent design, lower case i and lower case d.

But I have a problem with Intelligent Design, capital I and capital D. It is being sold increasingly as a political movement, as if somehow it is an alternative to Darwinian evolution. Evolution today is an unfinished theory. There are many question about details it does not answer, but these are not grounds for dismissing it.

Indeed, in the ensuing pages, Gingerich expresses substantial agreement with Steven Jay Gould’s assessment of evolution as being fact. So, how might design express itself in the seemingly random processes of Darwinian evolution? Gingerich answers with his own questions on page 70:

Are mutations blind chance, or is God’s miraculous hand continually at work, disguised in the ambiguity of the uncertainty principle? Or we could be more subtle, and ask whether God designed the universe in the first place to make possible the catalysts and unknown pathways that enable the formation of life.

As for design in cosmology, Gingerich devotes several pages to the fascinating studies of Fred Holye, the late British astronomer who, despite his own development of the overwhelming likelihood of design in the cosmos, remained an atheist his entire life. For me, these pages were worth the price of the book.

In the third chapter, “Questions without Answers”, Gingerich suggests that when it comes to the “why” questions, religious belief offers up better answers than unbelief. While Gingerich presents a strong case that contemplation of the universe can be more meaningful and coherent if it is viewed as the work of a transcendent designer, he readily admits that metaphysical assumptions may lead one to such a conclusion. In the end, these assumptions are more matters of the heart than the reason, as the closing Pascal quote suggests: “The heart has its reasons that reason does not know.”

This little book (just over 100 pages) is easy to read, and it is a wonderful primer to science and faith, randomness and reason, design and purpose. I recommend this book to my readers.

I'm back ...

Though I only gave it a somewhat veiled remark, one of the chief reasons for my hiatus from blogging was a disturbance in my own church fellowship. I help to lead a small fellowship of 50 or so believers here in Toledo, Oregon. When my friends here learned (from my own mouth!) that I consider common biological descent to be undeniable, and that I am open to Darwinian evolution, which seems to be the most likely theory to explain common descent, many were deeply troubled. It resulted in a crisis in our church life, and in a number of important relationships.

It has become clear to me that many of my friends either do not understand what I am doing here on this blog, or they suspect that science is somehow leading me away from Biblical faith. Nothing could be farther from the truth!

Evolution is a very small piece of the larger picture I am trying to develop here at “OutsideTheBox” But it is the piece that results in the strongest reactions among my friends. As I reenter this arena of writing, and interacting with you, I wish at the outset to submit to you once again what I am trying to accomplish here, and how evolution fits into the bigger picture.

Some of my friends are offended or deeply disappointed with me. Others are undisturbed, but unconvinced. A handful (mostly those who have read Francis Collins or Gordon Glover) find themselves in agreement with me. But there are others who have indicated that they just "don't care about this issue." That is, it matters little to them whether we got here by special creation or by natural processes. I must say that, as an isolated question, I am right there: it doesn't matter to me either. I frankly hated biology in school. Evolution is not some little hobby horse of mine. (I am far more interested in physics.) But here is the deal. I find that all of the scientific findings of the last 100 years play in big to our understanding of Scripture and theology. And I find that very few evangelical theologians and church leaders of our day have taken notice of this salient fact.

Not many people realize that after he came to his remarkable and earth shaking understandings about gravitational fields and the laws of motion, Newton spent the last years of his life thinking and writing about his favorite subject: theology. But this has not been true for the 20th century leaders of science such as Einstein, Bohr, Hubble, or Dirac. What changed? For many centuries, believers drove the engine of scientific discovery, and the engine was fueled by their love of the Creator. And with each new revelation of natural truth, they would go back and adjust the theology of the church as needed. The exploration of our cosmos and natural phenomena was seen as a doorway to deeper and more accurate understandings of God. Of course, these adjustments were always in line with the written revelation, although often a change in the way we read and understand scripture was necessary. Science was helping us to “rightly divide the word of truth.”

But with the near wholesale rejection of Darwin at the turn of the 20th century, a new course was set. We deeded over nearly all of science to the secularists. The church, as a whole, paid little attention. And certainly, faith no longer drove science.

My main interest is today, as it has always been, theology ... knowing and understanding God and his ways. And ultimately, not theoretical theology, but theology that filters down into the every day life of the believer. I study as I do because I want to make sense of my life and my world. I study science because it profoundly informs my theology ... it helps me to see what God might be up to in this world as he forms his Kingdom though people of faith. 

Evolution is a very small part of this picture. But evolution does imply some things about the possible place of randomness in the workings of God. Evolution does suggest some strong possibilities about how God may have chosen, and may still choose, to operate through natural processes. Evolution may have some extremely profound things to say about an ages-long battle between the powers of death and the Power of Life! 

But I am even more interested in things like Big Bang cosmology and what we have discovered about entropy in the last 40 years. Nothing in recent science touches upon theology more than this! It effects our doctrines of salvation, atonement, etc.; it profoundly effects eschatology; it effects the prayer of the church; it effects how and why we do what we do in the world. I am deeply interested in Einstein's relativity and how that impacts Newton's laws of motion, and how that, in turn, speaks to theological determinism (an expression of ultra-calvinism.) Newton left us with a world in which the very laws of physics strongly endorsed determinism. Einstein changes all of that. But even more, quantum physics changes all of that. Quantum physics may just be God's delayed message to us late-day people that the stage of this life, and the ultimate battle with evil, has not been rigged ... indeed, could not have been rigged.

So, left to itself, I couldn't care less about the competing sciences of origins. Or science in general! But I do care deeply about understanding pain and suffering. I do care deeply about why God watches Hitler and Pol Pot and Stalin from the sidelines, and chooses not to intervene. I do care deeply about the "why" of my wife’s life-threatening cancer. And I care deeply that the church learn to respond with better answers to the reasoned objections and questions currently being voiced by the skeptics. For many believers, the stock answers which the church has been offering for hundreds of years are adequate. For me, and many like me, they simply are not. 

This might be hard for my friends to believe, but I am actually not a science buff! I am, as I have always been, a disciple of Jesus and a student of the Bible first and foremost. But I am jazzed about the possibilities suggested strongly by what science is uncovering in God's universe, and how these possibilities impact the way we think about God, how he operates, and what the Scriptures are saying. 

I think about how science informs my understandings of the Scriptures when I consider and pray for my wife, Ginger. I think about how science informs my understandings of the Scriptures as I listen to and try to minister to hurting people (such as Kathy, a recent guest at our fellowship.) I think about how science informs my understandings of the Scriptures when I deal with hard questions about evil and suffering from young people today. I think about how science informs my understandings of the Scriptures when I encounter the arguments of my atheist friends (and many of those arguments would blow most believers I know right out of the water!). And I think about how science informs my understandings of the Scriptures when I consider the coming train wreck for the church when the powerful DNA evidence for common decent finally filters down to be understood by the masses. It will not be a pretty sight. I feel desperately the need to alert my friends. 

Apart from all of that ... I couldn't care less about evolution!

POST #11: Theodicy, Q & A

My last post on theodicy, in which I propose that this cosmos exists as God’s answer to evil, and as his means of exterminating evil, has caused some consternation (as I expected). Mine is hardly a traditional concept. It is admittedly “outside the box”. Maybe a bit too far outside for some! But as these posts continue, I hope to demonstrate how well it fits Biblical theology, even as it flies in the face of traditional theology. My friend Steve, host of An Evangelical Dialogue on Evolution has raised some excellent questions. As I typed out my response, the comment grew to the size of a full post. Here are excerpts from Steve’s comments and questions (italicized), followed by my answers. Steve begins by responding to some comments from Jac. If you want the full context of this discussion, it can be found in the comments section of Post #10.

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Hi Jac:

I admit that when Cliff first started discussing these ideas a few months back, I thought it smacked very much of dualism. I don’t think that anymore since I believe Cliff has carefully addressed that concern a number of times. There is a difference in not be able to do something, and choosing not to do it. God is not limited in any way UNLESS he limits himself.... I’m not sure I’d put it in the same language as Cliff, that evil is “difficult for God to eliminate”. I think a more appropriate way of phrasing it is that the ramifications of eliminating evil in one swift blow are worse than allowing it to continue. (i.e. what Jesus said about wheat and chaff) But Cliff & I might be saying the same thing.

So I don’t think dualism is a problem, but I see two other challenges.

1) Where did evil come in the first place? ... Doesn’t the existence of evil outside of the space-time of our universe just push the issue back in “time” (if we can speak of time prior to the big bang)? Don’t we just end up needing the same argument again - i.e. a free-will / free-process argument? What is the benefit to theodicy of having the origin of evil outside of our universe? My questions don’t in anyway address whether your argument is consistent/good (and I know even you say it is speculative), I’m just not sure what the point or benefit is to theodicy. Maybe I'm missing something.

2) I’m really uncomfortable with the implication that the purpose of the universe is the destruction of evil. Maybe you aren’t saying “only purpose”, but it seems to be “primary purpose”. Is this what you are saying? To me this seems very much like we are being “used” by God. And I know we ARE “used” by God (we are his “hands”, “feet”, “eyes”, “ears” on earth helping to bring in the kingdom of God) – but that is different. I think the overriding theme in the bible is the redemption of creation, not the destruction of evil.
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Steve,

• In your response to Jac, your framing of the choice God made comes close to my own thinking. We’re going way beyond anything we could know when we talk about the pre-cosmos mind of God. But I conceive of it as something like this: when evil rose up, God might have chosen to snuff it out, maybe only to have it recur again and again ... but that perhaps he devised a plan involving us and this universe which would purge it forever. Whatever he is doing here with us is going to set the whole of the angelic hosts into awe at his wisdom (Eph. 3:10). That verse has always set me on a search for something more dramatic than Jesus dying for my sins and admitting me to heaven (as wonderful as that is!). I mean that these angels have known God intimately for billions of years, and he is doing something through the church (I understand church in this verse to refer to believing mankind of all time) that will demonstrate facets of his wisdom they have never witnessed before! Something very big is happening in the cosmos. My details may be sketchy. They may be all wrong. But I have to believe that we are in the midst of a drama that is beyond anything we have ever imagined! Evil may be a thing difficult to purge forever, but God has devised a plan -- long and involved -- that will do just that. Clearly any theology that sees evil as being once-and-for-all annihilated could hardly be called dualism.

Should it surprise us that God opted not to use his “Iron Fist” to stomp out evil? Is the concept that he would utilize a more “passive” tactic to overcome evil really so startlingly new? Is this not the manner in which we are instructed to overcome evil? Does he tell us to overpower evil? or to turn the other cheek. Does he tell us to use force against evil? or to go the extra mile. He says, “Do not be overcome by evil, but overcome evil with good.” (Romans 12:21) Why should we think that a cosmic battle with evil changes the rules of divine engagement? Is it not at least possible that God tells us to war against evil through nonresistance because that is precisely how he does so? And might it be that this is actually the best way? to let evil run its course, and actually die under the influence of divine goodness, love, and nonresistance ... even a nonresistance that cost the blood of Jesus? Or are these just the wistful notions of a Sermon on the Mount idealism that could have no practical role on a cosmic scale?

• You say Where did evil come from in the first place? and doesn’t this problem just put us right back at square one, with no real theodicy solution other than free-will?

Those are very insightful questions. I have excluded events outside of time and space from my posts, because we have no way of discerning anything about them. But that is a too easy cop-out, and your questions are valid. One possibility, I suppose, is that prior to the drama of this cosmos, there was some kind of balance-of-power dualism, one that will after this cosmic battle come to its final end. But I doubt it. The Bible does tell us about a war in heaven, a rebellion against God’s authority led by Lucifer. But imagine with me that that is exactly what happened, and this cosmos and its process was God’s answer. (The following logic gets very complicated, but stay with me.) We do not need a new free-will theodicy to explain this eruption of evil. In fact, if we surmise that angels do have an inherent power of self-determination, and that Lucifer simply made a horrible choice, note that he did so without a backdrop of evil going on around him. This angelic “free-will” did not require a context filled with natural evil and moral evil, did it? In other words, if your argument is valid (that I have just pushed the “free-will” theodicy argument back 13 billions years) then our present day free-will theodicy arguments make no sense. Why should unthinkably horrible events be a necessary backdrop to ensure genuine free-will, as free-will theodicy implies? If Satan had genuine free will without tsunamis and earthquakes and unthinkable suffering of millions of innocents, why would such manifestations be deemed necessary to validate our free-will?

So no, I do not think I just pushed the problem back to an earlier free-will argument. Or if I did, then the nature of that earlier free-will argument is completely different from the one I have rejected. Still, I have not answered your question, and that is because I believe no answer exists. Our problem of evil is limited to events within our cosmos. We know evil exists. It’s ultimate cause is a mystery, for now. But theodicy attempts to answer the question, “why does it persist? why does God just look on, and take no action?” My thoughts are limited to these questions.

• You say, I’m really uncomfortable with the implication that the purpose of the universe is the destruction of evil. Maybe you aren’t saying “only purpose”, but it seems to be “primary purpose”. Is this what you are saying?

Yep, that is what I am saying. Shocking? But it may make more sense to you after I have posted more thoughts about how death, resurrection, evolution, nonresistance, the theology of suffering and glory all interconnect to this framework. In my mind, a goal to destroy evil does not exclude nor minimize the stories of the redemption of creation, and our personal redemption, etc. Rather, it adds a layer of purpose and meaning on top of these themes, enriching them and contextualizing them.

Are we just being “used” in this scheme? I certainly don’t conceive of it that way. I see that we are called into a significant and meaningful partnership with God, and with Jesus. It is our choice whether to accept this call. Its a volunteer army!* Part of this calling may be an invitation to suffer for his cause. But God, through our captain Jesus, has already led the way in suffering. We are called to join in with him. And if we do, we are granted to share in the glory of the Kingdom! This is the teaching of 1 Peter, and Romans 8. This certainly elevates our role in the cosmic scheme of things. Traditional theology has taught us to see ourselves as of little count. Pawns being acted upon. A false humility. What I am seeing is that God has given us significance beyond our imaginations. Can he get the job done without me? Yes. But I have (we all have) the amazing potential of actually speeding up the process! (2 Peter 3:3-14). A God who adopts me as his own child, calls me into high service, asks me to join in his suffering, makes me a co-heir with his Son, sharing in his glory ... such a God can scarcely be seen as “using” me.

* An exception might be those innocents who suffer at the hand of evil, and unwittingly play a role in this battle. When they experience the glory that goes hand in hand with their suffering (Romans 8:17-18), I have no doubt they will in retrospect happily accept the role they were given to play out, and not object that they were “used”.

POST #9: Theodicy, a New Approach (Part One)

The problem of evil presupposes that God is 1) good, and 2) all-powerful. When set against the backdrop of natural and moral evil in a cosmos he created and over which he rules, these two presuppositions set up an incongruence that deeply troubles thoughtful believers, and bars the pathway to belief for the skeptic. In earlier posts, I described this problem, and tested standard Christian answers to the problem and found them to be incomplete, or unsatisfying.

Perhaps our theodicies have failed to adequately answer the questions raised by evil because we have failed to ask the right questions:

The problem of evil assumes:
• God exercises unrestrained sovereignty ~ Does He?
• God is responsible for all events ~ Is He?
• God can end evil any moment he chooses ~ Can He?

The problem of evil exists, in part, because most Christians believe that the abolishing of evil would be a simple task for an Almighty God. Ask most Christians if God could crush evil, and they will respond “Sure, he could crush it under his little finger this very instant.” Christians profess that the power of God is much greater than the forces of evil; and most Christian theodicies presume therefore that God is “permitting” evil to persist for some higher purpose. Perhaps we need to take a step back and recast the drama of this cosmos, with some help from physics coupled with the teachings of the Bible. Take a journey with me to the end of time, and then follow (in part two) as we journey backwards to the very dawn of time, the first instant of the Creation Moment (aka the Big Bang).

But before we take these journeys, let me be clear about what I am not suggesting. Many have attempted to solve evil’s riddle by minimizing God’s power, or suggesting that the power of evil is equal to the power of God. There is a category of theodicies which deal with the problem of evil in this way, many embracing various forms of Dualism. I reject these views. The questions I am asking, and the answer I will be proposing, have nothing to do with lowering our view of God’s omnipotence, nor will they impact the free exercise of his sovereignty. Dualism, which sets Good and Evil into a kind of eternal balancing act, is not Scriptural. John assures us, “Greater is he that is in you than he that is in the world” (1 John 4:4), and all of biblical revelation points to a coming climactic victory over all God’s enemies.

I will suggest, however, that when evil arose in God’s presence, he was confronted with a formidable challenge. I will suggest that the annihilation of evil is the overriding purpose of the cosmos. I will suggest the destruction of evil was not a simple task, but one that required a 13.7 billion year process and a vast entropic universe to accomplish; and that it would involve untold suffering. I will suggest that in this suffering he himself would lead the way, but that he would also call upon creation, including man, to suffer with him. And I will suggest that, after the dust settles, angelic hosts who will have observed the entire process, will drop their jaws in utter amazement at the multi-faceted wisdom of God displayed through what he accomplished, in part, through people of faith (Ephesians 3:10).

It is necessary to return to the earlier posts on entropy, particularly third and final installment. In those posts, we established the timeline of entropy both from the sciences of cosmology and physics, and from the Scriptures. Let us now revisit those concepts.

First, we will move forward in time to the end of this present age. Here we will discover that entropy ends. The need for the sun as an energy source will cease (Isaiah 60:19, Revelation 7:16, 21:23; 22:5). Natural pain, suffering, and death, all products of entropy, will cease (Revelation 21:4). At the same time, Satan will be judged, and evil will be swallowed up forever. (Depending upon one’s eschatology, this may all happen at once, or be spread out by as much as 1000 years. But it all occurs within the context of the closing of this entropic world, and the creation of the new heavens and earth. In my own view, these events are all simultaneous.) Romans 8:18-23 describe this moment when all of creation is delivered from the bondage to decay, led into this liberty by the children of God, revealed in this late day to be sons (and daughters!) of God. The context suggests that suffering ceases in the same instant. From these specific Scriptures, and the general teaching of the Bible about the concurrent changes in both the spiritual realities and in the physics of the cosmos, I have concluded that the fate of entropy is in some way linked intrinsically to the fate of evil. We also understand from the Romans 8 passage that entropy was introduced into creation by the Creator himself, but included as a provisional element, one from which he fully intended to liberate creation in the fullness of time. If the fates of entropy and evil are thus linked, and if the plan of the Creator was that entropy would someday cease along with evil, we might conclude that the purpose of an entropic creation is related to evil, and to evil’s ultimate demise.

This conclusion, which is based upon physics, the Bible, and logic, is central to my entire thesis; if you tend to scan these posts, please read that last sentence of the previous paragraph slowly.

In my next post, we will travel back in time to the creation moment in an attempt to understand what might have been the ultimate purpose of the Creator. And I will then apply these understandings to theodicy.

POST #6: Entropy, the Implications

Years ago, I adhered to the Young Earth Creationism (YEC) position; that is, I believed creation occurred over six 24-hour days at some point in the last 10,000 years. I was persuaded that this sort of time frame was required by what seemed to be a Biblical teaching that all death was a consequence of Adam’s sin. But I came to see that this theological construct stems from a wooden, literalist reading of Genesis and the New Testament, and that it is not the only reasonable way to interpret these scriptures. I also came to see that the notion of death being non-existent in our universe until about 6,000 to 10,000 years ago is completely untenable in light of scientific evidence. Earth is strewn with a history of death and species extinctions dating back some 3.7 billion years.

I also came to see that death and entropy are intrinsically linked. So, I set out on a search to discover the moment in time when entropy (and, with it, death) entered into creation. It seemed to me that this would be a critical understanding in theology. I soon learned that physics and cosmology have identified that moment, with a high degree of precision. And it dates all the way back to the creation moment (See my last post).

I identify this key passage in Romans with entropy (Many, but not all expositors do. Judge for yourself.):

The creation waits in eager expectation for the sons of God to be revealed. For the creation was subjected to frustration, not by its own choice, but by the will of the one who subjected it, in hope that the creation itself will be liberated from its bondage to decay and brought into the glorious freedom of the children of God.
– Romans 8:19-21 (NIV)

Follow this progression of observations:

1) At some point in time, the Creator chose to subject his entire creation to a principle of decay. This “bondage to decay” I understand to be entropy, the law of physics described in Post #4.

2) This subjection of creation to the bondage to decay in Romans 8:19-21 has been almost universally understood as a part of God’s response sin, part of a sin-related curse. So, in traditional Christian theology, this subjection has been connected variously with the sin of Adam, the Tower of Babel, or the Fall of Satan, etc.

3) However, we now know that entropy dates back to very first moments of this universe’s existence.

4) This would suggest that if entropy is God’s response to sin or evil, this sin or evil predates the creation moment, or the creation moment is commensurate with the onset of evil.

5) There will come a time when entropy will have run its course. Creation will be set free from its relentless entropic march toward death. And this moment of liberation, when entropy is halted in its tracks, is precipitated by an event identified as the revealing (or “manifestation”) of the sons of God.

The implications of these observations on theology, the purpose of God in creation, and specifically, the purpose of man, are profound. If the above observations are accurate, they suggest the God may have created this cosmos with the purpose of dealing with and exterminating evil. They suggest that entropy might be one of the tools which God is employing to accomplish this purpose. They further suggest that humankind plays a critical role in this plan.

Being raised in the evangelical church, I had always been taught something like this: God’s purpose in creation, particularly the creation of man, was fellowship. He created us so that we might come to know him, and we might enjoy fellowship with him. Indeed, it had long been a settled matter: “The chief purpose of man is to glorify God and enjoy Him forever.”

I’ve always loved the elegance and simplicity of that phrase from the Westminister Catechism. But I now question whether it is completely accurate. Without doubt I am to glorify God, and I do believe that eternity will be required to explore and enjoy our infinite Father. But “the chief purpose of man”? I have come to believe that God has a purpose for mankind that transcends fellowship. “The chief purpose of man,” I might suggest, “is to co-venture with God in his overarching plan to exterminate evil.” And far from minimizing the importance of fellowship with God, this overarching partnership in the conquest of evil creates a far deeper potential for camaraderie between God and man.

Some might fairly argue that these conclusions are a bit overreaching, and largely speculative. While I believe that this scenario, the entire cosmos existing as God’s response to evil and as his plan to annihilate evil, does have a foundation in Scripture, science, and reason, I confess that, to a degree, it does venture into the realm of speculative theory.

However, in future posts I will explore how this overarching story, when used as a template for various scriptures and theological problems, is reasonable. We will explore how it relates to the Biblical themes of resurrection, nonresistance, suffering, and the most explicit scriptural statements on the purposes of Christ’s coming, and man’s existence. We will see how it gives a better answer to the age-old Problem of Evil (theodicy) than those typically proposed by Christians. We will see how it relates to evolution, and how evolution ceases to be a feared atheistic threat to faith and becomes instead the elegant and awe-inspiring plan of God. We will discover in it a rational answer to the skeptics’ argument that earth, and mankind, are extremely insignificant in view of the utter vastness of the universe.

In my personal faith journey, I have grappled with these issues. I read the arguments of skeptics. Frankly, they often make more sense than the standard answers Christians offer. I have struggled with the Problem of Evil, and have not found the solutions offered by Christians to be at all compelling. Most atheists site the Problem of Evil as the primary obstacle to belief in God. In this new way of viewing creation, I have found satisfying, rational answers to such faith issues that have taunted me for decades. I invite you to explore these answers with me as these posts unfold.

P.S. This line of thought is often objected to on the grounds that entropy is necessary and good. It is true that within the bounds of this cosmos, driven as it is by the energy flow of entropy, we could not live without entropy. Because of entropy we are warmed by the sun, our food is produced; in fact, everything necessary for physical life is provided by entropy. But entropy is also the source of all natural disasters, of diseases, and ultimately, of physcial death. Entropy is itself a dying process. So while I must be clear in stating that entropy is not evil, we must not forget that it is by its essence, death. Entropy is temporary; it is not part of God's plan for the coming utopian heaven and earth.