Dealing with Jesus

Spirituality Column #79
May 13, 2008
Current! in Carmel (IN) newspaper
Current! in Westfield (IN) newspaper

Dealing with Jesus
By Bob Walters

Ben Stein’s recent movie Expelled presents Intelligent Design/Creation as a salient life science subverted by 150 years of incomplete yet burgeoning and now pervasive Darwinian/Evolution worldview and education.

The 1996 PBS NOVA episode titled “The Ultimate Journey,” a video on evolution commonly shown in high school biology classes with fascinating microphotography of embryos, confidently asserts itself as “The Odyssey of Life,” a veritable highlight reel of how life works. The video contains this direct quote, “We don’t know how life began.”

How odd. I know how life began; God created life, and us. The Bible lays it out in plain terms in Genesis chapters 1 and 2.

The fact that there is life because God wanted there to be life – and our trying to figure out the how and why of life based on that – is entirely different and I daresay more satisfying than evolutionists stuffily saying “we don’t know how life began” and foregoing any explanation of why life exists.

To an evolutionist, there is no “why.”

Creationism is different. That’s because the Bible is different, and Jesus is different.

Our God-given human creativity and freedom to invent secular views like evolution, humanism, and broad and competing swaths of philosophy – or conversely, to discover God, life, love, purpose, salvation, relationships and truth in the Bible – too often create conflict, not understanding. For the record, I don’t think science is specifically secular or necessarily divisive.

Discussing this with a friend from church, wondering why so many people insist on separating science and scripture, she said, “The problem is that if you deal with Creation, you have to deal with the Bible. And if you deal with the Bible, then you have to deal with Jesus … and a lot of people don’t want to go there.”

So true. The thing is, we should recognize that our individuality, uniqueness and significance all come from Jesus, not Darwin. Evolution defeats all those ideas, and Darwin doesn’t demand that we act right and love each other.

We’d all be better off dealing with Jesus, even in science class. And by all means … go to science class.

Walters (rlwcom@aol.com) finds dinosaur bones and carbon dating quite fascinating, but not as fascinating as his relationship with God, Christ and the Holy Spirit.

Natural Conflict

Spirituality Column #43
September 4, 2007
Current! In Carmel (IN) newspaper

Natural Conflict
By Bob Walters

Charles Darwin may have failed to accurately explain how we all got here, but his theories succeeded in creating a secular religion – Naturalism.

Naturalism is the accurate “ism” to describe the opposite of “Creationism,” where the Bible tells us God created the world, man, morality and relationships. Naturalism tells us that the creation is all there is, and that, essentially, creation created creation. God isn’t there, morality is a figment of our imagination, and love is a collection of brain waves.

Not a Creator? Darwin’s “Origin of Species” left even the author unsure as to whether his theories were accurate (read Lee Stroebel’s Case for a Creator). Though Darwin’s science, true to his own suspicions, was dreadfully flawed, it was the best alternative yet to God’s story of Creation told in Genesis 1 and 2.

Darwin obviated a need for “God” in the grand scheme of things. Hence we become, if not Creators ourselves, masters of our own morality. We decide what is good and evil; and it doesn’t matter, because we are all just accidents of nature anyway.

I think there is way more mystery, drama, magnificence and truth in the Biblical story, but our secular world has arrived at a place in history where the Bible is largely dismissed, God is easily ignored, Christ is routinely ridiculed, and the Holy Spirit has been morphed into a spirit of man rather than God.

What is the difference? And what does it matter?

This:

Naturalism rejects a personal God, rejects absolutes, rejects morality and ridicules faith. It gives us nothing and explains nothing of our spirit. Instead of faith, hope and charity, the natural order is survival of the fittest.

We have a great gift in God’s love and the transforming grace of Jesus.

Why, in God’s name, would anyone give that up?

PS – You don’t really think we crawled out of the slime and started thinking, by ourselves, do you? God created science, too.

Walters (rlwcom@aol.com) has made plenty of mistakes, but knows God doesn’t look at him as a mistake. That’s true of everyone. God wants us all.

Science, The Bible and Dinosaur Bones

Spirituality Column - #16 - Feb . 27, 2007
Current! In Carmel newspaper

Science, The Bible and Dinosaur Bones

By Bob Walters

What is science if not the search for God?

Science is the study of how things work and why things are. How long can you study the cosmos before you realize that, a) it can’t possibly be an accident, and b) Darwin can’t explain how the dirt got here?

That’s the punch line to an old joke about the world’s smartest scientist who challenges God’s uniqueness as Creator. “I can create life,” says the scientist. “Oh? How?” says God. The scientist says “It’s easy. You just take some dirt and ….”

God interrupts, “Where are you going to get your dirt?”

Science and religion should be separate, a USA Today article by Tom Krattenmaker Feb. 4 said, because Creationism is so, well, stupid. I thought the article read like a long-winded excuse for sleeping in Sunday mornings.

Science and religion are different, sure; but they aren’t mutually exclusive. I can have God, the Bible, and a pile of dinosaur bones and see no conflict whatsoever. God and God’s word are perfect, and the dinosaur bones are sitting right there.

Just because we can’t figure everything out doesn’t mean dinosaurs obviate God and the Bible (or vice versa). That’s our problem, not God’s.

Religion is how I find God in my heart; science is how I find God in creation. What’s wrong with that? He wants us to discover him; he just doesn’t make it easy.

What I think is hilarious is how scientists are perceived to be busily working against the idea of God, when what many scientists come up with is a healthy appreciation for God.

The Grand Canyon probably did take millions of years to be cut (I wasn’t there so I can’t be sure), but when I see the Grand Canyon, I think of God, not Darwin.

Walters, a Carmel resident at rlwcom@aol.com, sees God as a fact of all life.