Of Pharisees and Physicists Part Two

At the beginning of last month I wrote about the Pharisees (teachers of the Law of Moses) who rejected Jesus; the Messiah that was predicted, foreshadowed, and prefigured in the writings of Moses, under the direction of the Holy Spirit. And I wrote about the teachers of the laws of nature who, in these modern times, reject Jesus through whom all things were created. He is the Author of the laws of nature. 

So I showed the similarity between the two sets of law-teachers. Both groups have missed the point of the laws which they have studies. And therefore both groups have rejected God who made the laws which they have taught. Now I want to continue with that observation. 

Jesus once indicted the Pharisees of those days by comparing them to "children sitting in the market place and calling to one another, saying:

'We played the flute for you,

And you did not dance;

We mourned to you,

And you did not weep.'

For John the Baptist came neither eating bread nor drinking wine, and you say, 'He has a demon'. The Son of Man has come eating and drinking, and you say, 'Look, a glutton and a winebibber, a friend of tax collectors and sinners!'" (Luke 7:32-34).

This same illustration is applicable and relevant to the discussion of today's "teachers of the law". I say this because when we tell of the amazing miracles that where performed by Jesus Christ, and all the other miracles described in the Bible, as well as God's ability to perform miracles at any time and place He chooses; the naturalistic teachers of the law will scoff and ridicule these claims. They will say that the universe operates according to orderly sets of laws. 

When we tell the truth that God Himself instituted the laws of nature which He created and owns, and that He carries out most of His work through the laws which He has instituted over nature; they will scoff and ridicule this. They will call it "an argument from silence" for a "God of the gaps". But as Dr. Georgia Purdom of Answers in Genesis has recently pointed out in her blog, "we do not use God to fill in the gaps because there are no gaps". And there is no silence (Psalm 19:1-4). There is only God and His creation, which He made and owns.

It is simple. God instituted the laws of nature, they are His laws. And He also reserves the right to command the natural universe, which He created and owns, to behave differently at specific points in time and space. When He does, we call the result a miracle. 

But now, whether God works by way of miracles, or if He works by way of the ordinary laws of nature which He instituted; the wicked, corrupt self-deceivers will reject Him either way. If they ever did see a miracle happen before their very eyes, they would say "There must be some scientific explanation for this".

They ignore the truth that if all the universe is entirely the result of random, unguided processes, then our their brains are also the product of random, unguided process. In that case all their thoughts are the accidental products of random, unguided processes. 

And in that case they have no reason to believe that any of their thoughts are valid observations of the universe in which they accidentally exist. And that undermines their supposed observation that the universe is a result of random, unguided processes. In short, their naturalistic worldview undermines itself.

Science - the orderly, systematic study of the natural universe is possible because the orderly, sovereign Creator of the universe made nature to operate according to orderly sets of laws. And He also created our minds to be able to function in an orderly way that allows us to think and make valid observations.

Jesus said to the Pharisees who denied Him, "You search the Scriptures, for in them you think that you have eternal life; and these are they which testify of Me" (John 5:39). His modern enemies claim to believe in the laws of nature. But the laws of nature point to the orderly, sovereign God who created nature to operate according to orderly laws. 

So the problem is not a lack of evidence. It is only the hardness of a fallen, corrupt, sinful heart that blinds anyone to the truth. These teachers of the law, in their heart of hearts, do not love God who is love (1 John 4:8), and who created humanity in His own image (Genesis 1:26-27) for the purpose of love (Matthew 22:37-40). They demonstrate their fallen nature in that they do not love God who is love.

The Bird's Song - A Tale of Trees and Birds

Once, there was a great forest of oaks and ash trees, rosewoods, maple trees and perhaps even a sycamore or two. This forest was situated at the base, and all up one side of a great Mountain called Temporal  And in this forest, there was an old, respectable looking tree named Rykard. And oh, he was a smart one, he was. As he stood with his root going down deep into the earth, he examined everything around him. He was a teacher of the laws of nature, as he could observe them.

Every year, he watched as he and his fellow trees flourished in the spring. Oh how beautiful the forest was in the spring; as the radiant sunlight seeped through the leaves and tumbled in between them to shine on all the flowers and shrubbery. Rabbits, squirrels, and other wildlife also went to and fro about the forest floor. And many a robin, and many a lark, and cardinal, and sparrow made sweet songs in the air, which was filled also with the sweet smell of living trees, and plants, and flowers blown in the breeze

But Rykard became indignant toward the song that some of the birds were singing. As late summer waned into early autumn, they were singing about another side of the Mountain. And as the story in the song told, that other side was inhabited by trees called Evergreens. And the Evergreens on the other side of the Mountain called their home Eternal  instead of Temporal.

"Quiet now!" Rykard said to the birds, as the tweeted around his branches. And he shook his leaves at them as they sang. "There is no other side of the Mountain! And even if there were, I know that there can be no such things as these 'Evergreens' as you call them. Even now you can see that our leaves are turning yellow and red. Soon they will be brown, and fallen off. This is how things work. No tree stays green all the time."

And he seemed to himself to be right. After all; every winter, the stern, rocky side of Mount Temporal showed itself hard and cold through the barren branches of the trees, their once-vibrant lives held in gloomy suspension. And Rykard insisted that if the forest began to believe in Evergreens, they would stop producing acorns and soon the whole forest would fade into oblivion.

As time passed, however, a rottenness ate away at Rykard, and soon he no longer thrived any time of the year. And the planter of the forest came to cut him down.

But Rykard's speech against the birds germinated in the minds of younger trees. And they remembered his call to silence them for the sake of the forest. The new generation of trees became even more inflamed against the birds and their song. They made a law that they would not allow the birds to nest in their branches anymore. And if any flew near them and in among their boughs, they would shake them out.

As time went on, the birds found themselves welcome with fewer and fewer trees in the forest. And eventually, some of the trees began to whack at the birds with their branches, and kill them. And so they did just as some ancient generations of trees, long since fallen and rotted away, had done; long before Rykard was ever a seedling germinating in the earth. 

Some owls and eagle called out to the forest planter concerning this matter. And he knew already about it, as he walked in the forest and knew its history from the time he planted it. And when it was high time, and summer was passed, he sent woodsmen in to up-root, haul away, and burn every tree that had bird's blood on it's branches. Then he brought small Evergreens from the other side of the Mountain and planted them to replace those that had been destroyed. And from that time, all the Mountain and surrounding land was called by the name Eternal.

The End.

Some Helpful Notes

1. The forest planter represents Jesus. Yes, I did make up the title "forest planter". I don't know if anyone has ever had such a title.

2. The birds represent those who present the gospel message.

3. The trees represent those who hear the gospel message, whether they receive it or reject it.

4. The reference to some of the trees falling and rotting away, or rotting and then falling, implies Divine judgement. 

Of Pharisees and Physicists

In today's scientific community, there are many who hold to the view that everything can be explained solely through natural processes. Accordingly, these individuals reject belief in miracles, which they see as contrary to the laws of the physical universe (or possibly multiverse) which is, in their view, all there is. This worldview is called naturalism. 

Naturalism denies that there is a God who is transcendent (that is, above or apart from the physical universe). Thus it denies that the Genesis account of a six-day Creation by a supernatural Creator only about six thousand years ago; and the Flood which covered all the earth and formed many of the geological features we observe today, can be true.

So modern science does not disprove the biblical account of world history. Rather, individuals and groups within the scientific community start with the assumption that there is no God and/or that the Bible is not His word. And they interpret all their findings in accordance with that presupposition. Often times they make up explanations for data that doesn't fit their interpretation. 

What I find striking is the similarity between these members of the scientific community and the Pharisee (a leading religious sect) of Jesus' time on earth. Those Pharisees rejected Jesus because they viewed His teachings and His claims about Himself to be in conflict with the laws of Moses, and the laws of their own making. They viewed Jesus as a rival who undermined their authority; just as the naturalistic/evolutionary members of the scientific community may see creationists.

But the law of Moses was meant to show us our sin, and thus our need for grace and mercy in Christ. As Jesus said to His antagonists, "For if you believed Moses you would believe Me, for he wrote about me" (John 5:46). In truth, then, there is no conflict between Moses and Jesus.

In the same way, modern science, which is the study of the physical universe, was born out of the conviction that an orderly Creator made and upholds the universe in an orderly manner. This means that the laws of the physical universe were declared by God who is above and apart from the physical universe, just as the law of Moses was given to Moses by God the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who came to fulfill the law and provide salvation from, and forgiveness of sin.

And so, God also has the power to command the physical universe to behave differently at specific points in time and space. When He does, we call the result a miracle. Proponents of naturalism don't like that any more than the legalistic Pharisees liked Jesus going around forgiving sins that they wanted to see punished in accordance with the law. 

And so, by their strict adherence to a naturalistic interpretation of the laws of nature (which are meant to point to God) the naturalists seek to nullify God; just as the Pharisees, by their strict adherence to the letter of the laws of Moses (which were meant to point to Christ) missed the spirit of the law and sought to nullify Christ. Both groups have missed the point of the laws that they have studied. 

But there are many who know that the Law of Moses highlights the fallen, sinful nature of humanity, and our need for salvation by grace through faith in Jesus Christ. And He has told us that the first and greatest commandment is to love God with all our being. And that the second most important commandment is to love each other as we love ourselves (Matthew 22:37-40). And whoever obeys the first commandment will also obey the second (1 John 5:1-5).

And not all Pharisees were against Jesus. Nicodemus was a Pharisee, and he met privately with Jesus to learn from Him early on in His ministry (John 3). Later, Nicodemus found the courage to defend Jesus in front of the whole Sanhedrin (John 7:50). And even later than that, it is believed that Nicodemus died a martyr for following Jesus.

Joseph of Arimathea, too, was a prominent member of the Sanhedrin (Mark 15:43). He let Jesus borrow his tomb for a few days. And Nicodemus helped him take Jesus down from the cross and prepare His body for interment (John 19:38-40).

A few years later, another Pharisee, named Saul of Tarsus, would become a follower of Jesus. Taking on his gentile name, Paul, he went on to write most of the New Testament; not to mention his extensive missionary journeys throughout the Mediterranean world. He also spent time in prison for preaching the gospel. He continued, however, in the ministry, preaching about Jesus until his head was removed by a Roman sword, circa 65 AD.    

Now just as there are those who truly understand the law of Moses, there are also those who know that the laws of nature in the physical universe point to its orderly and sovereign Creator. He is love (1 John 4:8). And He created humanity in His own image. We were made in the image of God who is love. 

This is the reason we even have a concept of love. We are fallen, and corrupted because of sin. But the law of God who is love is still inscribed in our inner being by God who created us in His own image (Romans 2:14-15).  

And just as not all Pharisees were against Jesus, so not all scientists are against the Creator who is one and the same with Jesus (John 1:1-5; John 10:30). As I already pointed out, modern science was born from the conviction that we live in an orderly universe, created and sustained by an orderly Creator according to His orderly reign. This conviction is what made the systematic, orderly study of the physical universe possible. 

Francis Bacon, Copernicus, Johann Kepler, and Isaac Newton all believed in the Genesis account of Creation, the Fall, and the Flood. Charles Darwin stole the idea of natural selection from zoologist Edward Blythe, who believed the Genesis account, and  considered natural selection to be a display of Divine providence in action. And natural selection does not add new information to the genome of any creature. It only works with already existing information. Therefore it is incapable of being the catalyst for molecules-to-man evolution.

The inventor of the MRI scanner, Raymond Damadian, is a creation scientist. And there are many other formally trained scientists who hold to the Genesis account of a six-day Creation, approximately six thousand years ago. Dr. Georgia Purdom has a Ph.D in biology and works for Answers in Genesis. Dr. Jason Lisle has a Ph.D in astrophysics and leads the research team at the Institute for Creation Research. And these are just a few examples.

As I believe in grace, so I believe in miracles. This flies in the face of the rigid teachers of the law. No law can nullify the love of God. And no law can nullify God who is love. By His great power, which we call miraculous; He created the universe in six days, six thousand years ago. And He made humanity in His own image.

I will close with this quote from Philip Yancy:

"Some see miracles as an implausible suspension of the laws of the physical universe. As signs, though, they serve just the opposite function. Death, decay, entropy, and destruction are the true suspensions of God's laws; miracles are the early glimpses of restoration."

C.S. Lewis, Evolutionism, And Christian Apologetics

In 1999, when I was sixteen, the writings of C.S. Lewis awoke my interest in Christian apologetics. I have found his works very helpful to growing in understanding of the Christian faith. To this day I appreciate Lewis for both his apologetical and fiction writings.

The interesting thing is that while I defend biblical creation, C.S. Lewis started out his Christian life as a theistic evolutionist. His early theological works reflect a belief in evolutionism. 

At least at one point in Mere Christianity, Lewis made use of the evolutionary myth to try to illustrate what spiritual growth in Christ is like. 

The Problem of Pain is a good read. The book was written to answer the question of why there is suffering in the world, and Lewis made a lot of very helpful points. But there is a weakness in the book. 

If theistic evolutionism were true, that would mean that  there was suffering, disease, and death in the world before humans existed and sinned. That is an irreconcilable contradiction to God's word, which says 

"So, in the same way that sin entered the world through one person, and death came though sin, so death spread to all human being with the result that all sinned" (Romans 5:12 Common English Bible). 

Lewis seems to have tried to get around this by mixing evolutionism and creation in an inconsistent kind of mash-up (see chapter five of The Problem of Pain). It seems he was already showing a growing disbelief in evolutionism. 

It does make me glad that as Lewis grew in knowledge and understanding, his writings did begin to reflect a departure from theistic evolutionism. He began to show a leaning toward biblical creation.

He came to reject what he called "universal evolutionism"; apparently referring to macro-evolution as opposed to micro-evolution. Though for clarity, it is better to refer to micro-evolution as speciation within the biblical, created "kinds" (Genesis 1:11, 21, 24-25).

Lewis wrote, "You remember the old puzzle as to whether the owl came from the egg or the egg from the owl...universal evolutionism is a kind of optical illusion, produced by attending exclusively to the owl's emergence from the egg" (see link).

So Lewis eventually came to recognize the fallacy of evolutionism. And that is good because holding to biblical creation makes for stronger apologetics. Conversely, the old-earth-evolutionary compromise is a weakness in the arguments made by many of the current leading Christian apologists. There is simply no reason for it. 

Evolutionism just does not mesh with the gospel. To defend the historicity of Matthew-Acts, but not that of Genesis is simply inconsistent. Believing in the events recorded in the Gospels and Act, there is simply no reason to disbelieve the events recorded in Genesis. In fact, the significance of the restorative works, atoning death, and redemptive resurrection of Jesus the Messiah is wholly predicated on Genesis.

In a debate with a Christian who accepts evolutionism, an atheist can mockingly say "You don't even believe the Bible, and you're trying to convince me!" The pastor at my church told of such an exchange that took place during a debate that he attended.

And evolutionism is not a scientific fact. Evolutionism is an interpretation of scientific data, just as creation is also an interpretation of scientific data. Not only is this so, but evolutionism, at its core, is a naturalistic, atheistic explanation of the universe, life, and origins.

Recommended sites:

www.answersingenesis.org
www.icr.org
http://creation.com/