Jesus,
Creator of Heaven and Earth
By Stephen
Terry
Commentary
for the January 5, 2013 Sabbath School Lesson
“…For
the foundations of the earth are the Lord’s; on them he has set the world.” 1
Samuel 2:8, NIV
For most Christians, the idea that God created the world
is a non-negotiable tenet of faith. This is what the Bible indisputably
proclaims. Not only is the concept of a Creator God found in Genesis, but it is
closely tied to the fourth commandment of the Decalogue in Exodus, chapter 20
and is also included in the message of the first angel in Revelation 14. The
first chapter of the Gospel of John also ties together the roles of Creator and
Redeemer. But what does this mean empirically?
Scientific method asserts that all can be observed, measured,
and understood. However, measurement assumes relativity and relativity assumes
linear time. One cannot measure something without referring to its relative
position in time and space. But this can become problematic once we step
outside of linear time. This can happen if we assume that time began with
Creation or in the case of some scientific theorists, with the universal
genesis of the “Big Bang.” Indeed, the Bible proposes the establishment of time
with the creation of days and weeks in the first chapter of Genesis. Linear time
is also vital to the “Big Bang” because it relies on the idea of an expanding
universe, and one cannot determine expansion without time as the simple formula
D = R x T demonstrates. So why would we step outside of linear time?
We are essentially doing this when we ask, “What existed
before Creation?” or “What existed before the ‘Big Bang?’” While science has
never satisfactorily answered the latter question, most Christians would answer
the first by simply stating “God.” But this simplistic answer is far more
complex than one might think. For example, a commonly understood attribute of
God is omnipresence. To be omnipresent means to be present at everywhere at every
time. To such a being, time would be meaningless. You or I might say, “See you
tomorrow.” However, for God, He would already be seeing you tomorrow at the
same moment He is seeing you today. Therefore, the interval that would be
meaningful to those of us bound by this dimensionality would be totally
irrelevant to God. The limitations of linear time would not apply to Him. In
much the same way, a three-dimensional object appearing in part on a two-dimensional
plane would not be bound by two-dimensions and if moving in the third,
unperceived dimension might appear to magically disappear and reappear in that
two dimensional world. This might even appear “god-like” to any two-dimensional
inhabitants of that world.
Only with the advent of modern physics have some of
these concepts begun to be understood. Applying this two-dimensional/three-dimensional
model to our world leads us to hypothesize the existence of other dimensions
that are as beyond our understanding as three dimensions were to the
two-dimensional world inhabitants. If we inculcate the concept that God is omnipresent
throughout time and space, then of course, by definition He would be
multi-dimensional, at least beyond the dimensions we could measure. If we then
apply another understood attribute of God to this possibility, that He is infinite,
then we perhaps should consider the possibility of an infinite number of
co-existent dimensions. While not apparent to us, they would be as real to an
omnipresent and infinite being as ours is to us.
Why does any of this matter? It matters because just as
those two-dimensional creatures could neither conceive of nor measure the third
dimension, we may not be capable of measuring Creation in any meaningful sense
with the tools at our disposal. For instance, we do not understand how light can
separate the day from the night on the first three days of Creation when the
Sun was not created for that purpose until the fourth day. While it seems
illogical in our dimension where we are constricted to linear time, perhaps it
makes perfect sense interdimensionally.
Of course this begs the question as to whether the
Creation account is an inadequate representation of what actually took place,
constrained by our limited perspective. Truth, whether it is true or not, is
still truth when viewed from a particular perspective. For instance, spontaneous
generation as proposed by Aristotle was held to be true for approximately two thousand
years, until experiments by Louis Pasteur revealed the true source of the
generation. Nonetheless, spontaneous generation remained a demonstrable truth
for all the years prior. This was not because it was inherently true but because
inadequate understanding was responsible for a false hypothesis that appeared
irrefutable.
When it comes to theology and the Bible, literalism can
create similar problems. It can cause us to define “truths” about Creation that
may be nothing more than articulations of perspective rather than actual Truth.
Some of the paradoxes that arise from these inadequate articulations can be
very troubling to the literalist. For example there is the problem of age. Did
God create the world with age built in? For those who adhere to a young earth
perception, it is troubling when geologists speak of geologic ages and carbon
dating. They feel that the world should literally provide only evidence
supporting a young earth. However, even the literalists might admit that Adam
was created as a mature being. As a matter of perspective then, the earth would
appear to be several decades old based on Adam’s appearance as opposed to mere
days.
If we extrapolate this to tree rings and geologic
strata, then what appeared to be several decades becomes centuries and eons. Some
are troubled by this and feel that if God created the world and universe with
age then He is being deceitful. However, if we hark back to the
two-dimensional/three-dimensional model, is it deceitful for the third
dimension to interact with the second or are the fruits of that interaction the
way they are because they can be nothing else? For instance, could Creation
have been imbued with age because it was made for creatures that must dwell in
linear time and that appearance of age allowed those creatures to make sense of
the world around them?
In a mechanistic sense, whether or not one wants to
accept the commonly accepted measurable ages of the world around us, we are
able to use them to classify, measure, and understand the inter-relationships
of the systems we were given when our world was created. To take what we were
given by God and use it in this way is not a denial of God; rather it is an
acceptance of the gift He gave us to help us understand our world, the gift of
linear time and by definition, the relativity that it brings with it. To accept
such a gift is a glorification of God and an enhancement of the potential He
placed within us to understand our world and the universe within the
constraints of our dimensional limitations.
If God is to be God, he can only communicate with his
creation base upon their created limitations. Quite possibly, He can no more
explain Creation to us than we can explain a steam locomotive to a toddler. What
we may consider deep and profound truths may be no more than God going “Choo!
Choo! And Chug! Chug!. While these simple profundities may be all that is
necessary to thrill the toddler, most adults know that there is no point in
discussing anything deeper with the child.
The Genesis creation account was written for a people
only recently released from centuries of slavery. As examples of human
achievement, they were severely wanting. Most may have understood little beyond
their daily round of tasks and their concern for their next meal. Even Moses understood
little of the significance of who he was. His rudimentary sense of justice
caused him to kill an Egyptian, but there is no indication that he even had a practical
knowledge of God. Some speculate that his mother taught him what he needed to
know about God while caring for him until he was weaned. Others speculate that his
father-in-law as a priest may have taught him. But the account of the incident with
the burning bush does not reveal any sort of ongoing relationship with God
prior to the event.
Considering all of this, what God revealed to Moses
about Creation may have been limited not just by the normal human perspective
but also perhaps by human understanding degraded to its lowest possible level.
Perhaps the more important lesson that God wanted to teach was not a literal
account of exactly how Creation took place, but rather that perfect faith
transcends the ability of perfect knowledge to save and uplift humanity. Maybe
more important than Creation viewed through the lens of linear time is the understanding
that faith in a God who transcends time and space is more efficacious. “For we live by faith, not by sight.” 2 Corinthians 5:7,
NIV
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Waters Ministry
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