God: All-Knowing, All-Powerful Creator of the World Who Still Rules the Universe Today
- Terry Sweeney
- May 24, 2009
The Rev. W. Terry Sweeney
May 24, 2009
God: All-Knowing, All-Powerful Creator of the World Who Still Rules the Universe Today.
I remember standing on the front porch of the house I was raised in waving goodbye to my Uncle who was going to Korea to fight in the Korean War. My father, a WWII vet, was standing next to me; His father a WWI vet who fought in the trenches of France was there as were several Uncles, all of whom served in WWII. My memory is that most were teary eyed if not opening crying.
I went into my room and looked at the globe on my desk and found Korea and two thoughts hit me: It’s far away and how complex our planet is.
That actually got me to thinking: and eventually I began to wonder how all of this came to be. For a while I used to think the earth was like a molecule in a bigger organism – yes, odd I know - but for a seven year old maybe that’s not to far a stretch to make.
Where did all this come from? Something must be keeping the day to day stuff that we need to live going - Look what needs to happen for life to exist on earth:
Surface Gravity;
- If stronger: the atmosphere would retain too much ammonia and methane
- If weaker: our planet's atmosphere would lose too much water
Distance From Parent Star;
- if farther: planet would be too cool for a stable water cycle
- if closer: planet would be too warm for a stable water cycle
Thickness of crust;
- if thicker: too much oxygen would be transferred from the atmosphere to the crust
- if thinner: volcanic and tectonic activity would be too great
Rotation period;
-If longer: daily temperature differences would be too great
-If shorter: atmospheric wind velocities would be too great
Gravitational interaction with moon;
- If greater: tidal effects on the oceans, atmosphere, and rotational period would be too severe
- If less: orbital tilt changes would cause climatic instabilities
Magnetic Field;
- If stronger: electromagnetic storms would be too severe
- If weaker: inadequate protection from hard stellar radiation
Oxygen to nitrogen ratio in the atmosphere;
- if larger: advanced life functions would proceed too quickly
- if smaller: advanced life functions would proceed too slowly
Carbon dioxide and water vapor levels in atmosphere;
- if greater: runaway greenhouse effect would develop
- if less: greenhouse effect would be insufficient
The conditions to sustain life on Earth are just perfect – variations along many variables would have meant life was unsustainable . . . . As I’ve thought about this I can think of three possibilities:
The first one assumes that everything THAT IS is because it just happened that way: dumb luck. We are the product of a 1 in a kazillion-kazillion. And since it IS it keeps going and what we see in climate change and so forth is just a further evolving of what will be at some date in the future.
The other two possibilities require an Intelligent Designer. . . we call that designer: God.
In these possibilities we rightly assert that God is behind all of this, but behind it in what way?
Well, God could have put all of this in motion and has left the scene and isn’t involved in what happens next. God’s objective was to get it started and from there who knows?
OR God could have got it all started and is still involved in the day to day stuff of what’s going on.
You see, either it’s all dumb luck or God was involved to get it going and then stepped away, or God got it going and is still at the helm of the day to day stuff.
The first possibility deals with no god: atheism, therefore everything evolved and species mutated, some disappearing and others forming new species – we are who we are through thousands of years of adaptation and evolution. This world view might say our ancestors were fish like creatures that thousands of years ago came upon the land and eventually walked erect. This world view debunks Christianity.
The second possibility deals with creationism: An Intelligent Designer – a creator God created the universe and designed life to be on this planet but that once His plan was set into motion he stepped away from it and is no longer interested per se or involved because He is distant and unknowable. DEISM
The third possibility also deals with creationism but with a God who is sovereign over the earth – very much involved, One that is All Knowing (Omniscient), All Powerful (Omnipotent), Ever Present everywhere (Omnipresent).
Depending on which one of these three possibilities you embrace you will also have dramatically different world view.
Certainly if we embrace the first option of evolution then everything in life is chance or a matter of choices and at the end there is nothing but darkness and the grave – to be recycled into the earth.
A Christian Worldview decidedly accepts the third possibility as truth.
God is as the Bible describes He who created all that is seen and unseen and as He created it we see it was good and it pleased Him. God is the creator who is revealed through both His creation (nature), His Word, and through the Holy Spirit. God is the God who spoke to Abraham and pronounced the Covenant that is in effect to this day.
He is LOVE whose purpose is to bring us into a full relationship with Himself; that means being known to some degree.
We can then point to Jesus. God’s Son, Jesus, is the fullest, complete expression of God’s revelation.
God is sovereign in revelation. No one can compel God to reveal Himself. Nor can we insist we can do something to make Him speak to us or act in any given situation. (God has spoken to many of us!)
A Biblical Worldview can say however that God has spoken in the past and we have a record of His speaking and therefore we can trust that He is and will speak again.
For example, out of God’s graciousness He came to Mary and Joseph through the Angel Gabriel. He revealed Himself in front of Elijah and the prophets of baal in flames of fire that consumed the very wet sacrifice. He is mighty and lofty, the Most High God, yet he wills to reveal Himself in both creation and through His mighty acts via the Holy Spirit.
Let me quickly mention scripture: The deeper meaning of scripture is only revealed to us when the Holy Spirit opens our minds to understand what God is revealing to us – if that does not occur then the words of scripture remain clouded in unknowns or misconceptions.
Only God can take sinful man, place His word before Him and through the Holy Spirit turn the mans heart and mind thereby rebirthing the man as a child of God and set the man on paths intended to give God the greater glory.
We begin to see this in the dialogue at the Burning Bush: God has given Moses a command to return to Egypt to demand the release of the Hebrew’s held under slavery. Moses asked “Who shall I say sent me?” God answered “say I AM sent me.”
Behind this stands an eternal Being who has condescended to make a covenant with Abraham, sustain His chosen people down through the generations and is about to set them free from Egypt and years later usher them into the promised land.
Through generations God has led, sustained, yes punished and restored His people. Why? Because He is the God who has brought us into a relationship with Him and will not turn away from us. The New Testament records Jesus time and time again equating Himself with an eternal Father whose will He carries out in obedience.
In the garden –racked with fear and agony – Jesus submits to His Fathers sovereignty out of trust and obedience when He said, “Abba, not my will but yours be done.” The parable of the Laborers in the Vineyard (Mat. 20:1-16) and the Pauline Metaphor of the Potter and the Clay (Rom. 9:19ff) give us a clear picture from BOTH Jesus and St Paul of the sovereign nature of the God Jesus called Father.
God is not subject to or answerable to anyone.
The master hired some workers early in the morning, some at the third hour, some at the sixth, some at the ninth and finally some at the eleventh hour. All were paid the same wage at the end of the day. Those hired earlier (and worked longer) complained because it seemed unjust to them – after all they had worked longer! The master came to them and said, “Friend, I’m not being unfair to you. Didn’t you agree to work for a denarius? Take your pay and go.” The master went on to say it was his choice to do what he wanted to with his money. Then he wondered if the others were jealous because he was generous?
In Romans 9.20-21, Paul says this about us when we claim God is unjust:
20But who are you, O man, to talk back to God? "Shall what is formed say to him who formed it, 'Why did you make me like this?' "21Does not the potter have the right to make out of the same lump of clay some pottery for noble purposes and some for common use?
The creature is always under the creator – no servant is above his master. Much of the Doctrine of divine election rests on God’s sovereign ability and will to save us since we are unable to save our selves. Ephesians 1:4-5 teaches, “4For he chose us in him before the creation of the world to be holy and blameless in his sight. In love 5he predestined us to be adopted as his sons through Jesus Christ, in accordance with his pleasure and will—“
Sovereignty seems to rest on the belief that God both reveals Himself but also has the power to reconcile us back to Himself through the mediation of Jesus His Son. God purposefully elects His people to salvation – that purposefulness means He’s involved and sovereign; he chooses us – we do not choose Him (John 15.16)
Simply said it means that God really is an active God with both authority and power to providentially be active in the daily affairs of the universe not just an absent and uninterested authority.
The bible tells us this is a God who has numbered our days, counts the hairs on our heads and cares for us. Jesus promises to be with us to the end of the age and that when we ask in His Name and according to His will we shall receive. God also tells us that He has sent His spirit to those who in faith believe Jesus is the Lord and the Spirit then pitches His tent in us – we become the home of the Spirit.
All things are brought together on the Last Day under the Lordship of Jesus.
We could go on and on but truthfully a Christian Worldview embraces the truth that God is sovereign (in total control) over His creation.
I think perhaps the simplest way of saying this is that we are not alone, we are not accidents of nature – we are under God’s watchful, loving providential care.
Life is a contact sport that isn’t always easy. There are periods we will all face where life seems very hard – where it’s uncertain – maybe even bleak. The Bible tells us that God sent His Son into the world to redeem it: Make it what is was before the Fall of Man and sin entered into our lives.
A Christian Worldview says we know that bad things happen – we know that good things happen. . . . but whether we experience the good or the bad in the end it is for the good because God will not commit evil against us and in the end will redeem the bad to good.
Today we remember the tens of thousands who have fought and died.
There has been untold heart ache suffered by millions – the cost of which is infinite and unbearable to calculate.
Our first options says it was all either an accident or just the warring nature of men and the winners and losers were determined by chance. The dead are casualties of mans folly and history will record them in various ways.
Our second option is a bit harder to describe inasmuch as God then seemingly can be accused of sitting back and letting bloodshed happen seemingly not too concerned.
The third option is where we have to really dig deep and conclude there is a greater mystery behind evil and suffering then we are capable to understand.
Sin is a real element of life on this planet and whether it’s a Hitler or Mussolini or Pol Pot the lives of innocent people have been snuffed out as well as our soldiers, sailors, air-force, marines, merchant marines who gave their lives for the sake of freedom.
To say God is sovereign leads us to conclude that He is working His plan in the world in the midst of our exercise of free will and our fallen nature.
In spite of our sins and hatred, one day He will once and for all bring this world back to Himself as a New Jerusalem.
Sovereignty of God does not mean the world is perfect NOW but it does mean that God in His way, in His time and through His Son and by the power of the Holy Spirit is in control of what seems to be an ever increasing out of control world.
To Him be the glory – forever, and forever.
In the Name of God: father, Son and Holy Spirit.
Amen.
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