Monday, August 8, 2011

Weighty Beauty, Haunting Clarity & Stephen Hawking

Andrew, one of the pastors at my church, started a series today about the beginning of the world. He said that the first verse in the Bible was basically the first line in a really good book, and set the tone. Immediately, I thought of all the really good books that have really, really good opening lines:

“It was the best of times; it was the worst of times…”

“It is a truth universally known that a man in possession of a fortune must be in want of a wife.”

“It was a dark and stormy night.”

And really, the Bible is the best book I’ve ever read.

It’s full of stories and histories and people I can relate to. All the great themes are there, too – sin and redemption (of course), but also wars and wanderings, poetry and praises, rants at a quiet God and chapters and chapters of birth records, infinite beauty, the end of the world with angels and demons and incest that brought down a nation, too, just for good measure.

Andrew continued, saying that he sees the first part of Genesis as a creed, a statement of faith, written in the form of a song. There’s a rhythm, repetitive and comforting, telling the story of a God creating a world where we happen to live.

What it isn’t is a logistical wonder. It doesn’t make logical sense; there’s not an exact timeline to follow. One doesn’t start at the edge of darkness, meander through the dinosaurs and end up with a tidy little flow into the third millennium. What the first chapter of Genesis does show is who God is, and consequently, who we are in relation. And that makes for a very worthy introduction.

Andrew continued, drawing a parallel between going to the first Creation story and looking for a timeline to seeking information about the shepherds from John’s telling of Christ’s birth. Almost everyone knows the Christmas story from Luke, resplendent with angels and shepherds on hills and Mary smiling beatifically.

And here’s what John has to say: “The Word became a human being and lived here with us. We saw His true glory, the glory of the only Son of the Father. From Him, all the kindness and all the truth of God have come down to us.” (John 1:14)

No shepherds. No angels. No candy canes. Weighty beauty, granted, but one wouldn’t look for an overstuffed inn in John. Conversely, there is a haunting clarity to John’s words that one cannot find in Luke’s more detailed telling.

There is beauty and answers to hard questions offered in each Scripture. But if the wrong questions are asked, all of the good remains hidden, like staring at poetry written in an unknown language.

That thought really started my mental train rolling out of the station, because it’s very rare for even a semi-liberal Christian to make the statement that any thought is just…. wrong.

But the statement was made, and like a mini A-bomb, the thoughts rippled after. If I read a single, given Scripture with an expectation of a particular answer, what other ideas or answers am I not allowing to come to me? What could I be denying in my single-mindedness?

What answer do I really want Scriptures to give me? Why am I even approaching a holy book with the idea that it serves me?

There was, curiously enough, a special on the Science Channel tonight, dealing with the argument of science explaining the creation of everything, versus religion’s. Stephen Hawking explained his stance, ending with the statement that God (if He exists – which Hawking doesn’t believe) wouldn’t have the time to create the Big Bang, which created the universe.

Andrew made the comment at the beginning of his lecture this morning that he doesn’t really believe that the debate between how science says we got here versus how Scripture describes it really matters at the end of the day. He believes that there are other issues far more worthy of debate, time and energy – like the condition of your soul and mine; like suffering – anywhere, everywhere; like how each and every one of us has a responsibility to make the world a better place for every single one of us, whether we like each other or not.

I have to agree; But I find it very, very interesting that Stephen Hawking thinks that God didn’t have the time to create us. And because, in Mr. Hawking’s mind, God lacked the time, this proves God couldn’t possibly exist.

And at this point, I have to confess (although I fully acknowledge it’s petty), I wonder this: when Christians are narrow-minded, it’s called judgmental. What is it called when scientists do it?

My pettiness and Hawking’s limited logic tend to make one very striking point: we’re both imperfect, and we are the problem. Flawed and imperfect humans skew everything, because we can’t see where we’re weak or lacking.

There are reasons why it took Galileo in the 1600s to figure out the Earth was not the center of the universe – and it wasn’t just because the Church wanted it to not be true. Humans, although we have brilliant moments, are not masters of the universe. We learn more completely in groups, in community.

It’s the arrogant and lonely who think otherwise, and their clay-footed, pedantic logic will show.

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