Genesis vs Science

Dearest Mark, you have raised a good question (which was only brought to my attention last night). I have been contending with this question for years. And I have come to no satisfactory conclusion; or at least the conclusion I deemed as intellectually persuasive and verifiable. Just like the discussion on heaven and our possible occupation in that celestial abode, no one knows for sure nor can anyone describe it with the persuasiveness of authentic, live photographs.

The genesis account of creation was the standard, accepted authority on how the earth and all earth life came about until the 17th century when religious scientists like Copernicus and later Galileo published works that contradicted the Catholic Church’s interpretation of the Bible. It used to be that the earth was at the center of the solar system (and the Ptolemy universe). Then, science reverently disproved it. And we know that science is correct. Before that, the Catholic Church applied Genesis literally and came up with the view that the earth was flat. But now, we will be laughed at if we teach our children that the earth is flat.

Then, an agnostic named Charles Darwin, once a devout believer, joined the fray and proposed in general that our common ancestor was an ape and the latter's common ancestor was a fish and the latter's common ancestor was a multi-celled organism and the latter's common ancestor was a single-celled organism and the latter's ancestor was a pool of goo and possibly, with a little stretch of the imagination, the formless slim (goo) came from another planet far, far away as alien's accidental droppings (or, possibly transported by a passing meteoroid). This was a direct attack on the Genesis account of the instantaneous creation of Adam and Eve.

Now, the debate is about how old the earth is. The young creationist says it is only 6000 years old (some say about 10,000 years old). However, the history books tell us that Sumerians were just learning how to make pottery about 6000 years ago! How do you reconcile that with Genesis?

Further, to be precise, science has established that the earth is 14.7 billion years old. This clearly and disturbingly clashes with the literal 6-day creation. At most, the earth, according to the literal interpretation of the Bible in Genesis, is 6000 years plus 6 day old. So, who is right and who is wrong - Science or the Bible?

Going back to evolution, some Christian scientists crowned it as “God's elegant plan for creating humankind". Others, especially Evangelical Christians who are equally intellectual, denounced evolution as devil's theory, a creation of evil and Charles Darwin was the devil! (so much for freedom of speech and competing ideas).

The truth is, our children in the future will be taught the theory of evolution in colleges or universities as an explanation for the origin of life without any reference to the 1st chapter of Genesis. Imagine respectable institutions of higher learning teaching a theory young creationists see as from the bowels of hell to your precious child and you can do nothing about it! Should we panic?

Alternatively, we can take the middle road, and generally agree with what a highly respected late scientist once said, "Either half my colleagues are enormously stupid, or else the science of Darwinism is fully compatible with conventional religious beliefs and equally compatible with atheism." (Stephen Jay Gould). Can the theory of evolution be religion-friendly?

After all said and done, what is my position?

I have written that evolution has significant gaps but it is nevertheless really elegant, scientifically verifiable to a large extent and intellectually persuasive (that is, if you take the time to study it and not just parroting what others had to say about it). In the end, like faith, it requires some faith to accept evolution. But it is not all irreconcilable with Genesis if we open our mind up to the fact that we serve a God who is far more creative than we can ever imagine and it is within God's abilities to do as he very well pleases: be it an instantaneous creation or a gradual still-equally miraculous evolutionary creation.

As far as I am concerned, the creation of humankind originated from a thought or an idea and not from some blind random mutation in response to some blind random environmental whims. The complexity of our DNA surely points to a designer just like a watch or a well-carved out sandcastle found on the beach points to a maker.

So, Mark, I admit I am digressing. Part of the reason is that I am trying to avoid answering your question and Zenn's because what is the right answer anyway? The sun and moon were clearly created on the fourth day (verse 16 to 19). So, the light on the first day which separated the Night from the Day, and where evening and morning were cosmically apportioned, befuddles or confuses the sincere reader seeking for a coherent and consistent explanation. Surely, this first light (before the created sun and moon) has to be God's light and the darkness should logically refer to the formless, void depth - possibly existing before space and time were created. Note that space can be bent by gravity and time can be warped by speed and gravity, thanks to Einstein. Thus, space and time are not absolutes.

So, before the beginning, space and time did not exist; only the light of God.

Mark, I invite you to imagine an eternity-universe before space and time came about and this eternity-universe may be different in scope and content from this present universe. This eternity-universe may very well be the home of disembodied beings like angels and demons. So, the darkness may be outside of the created heavens and earth. Or, it may be somewhere inside this created heavens and earth but in another dimension and in another form (note that scientists have recently discovered theoretically that there may be many dimensions not visible to the human senses - thanks to something call the string theory).

Mark, you may ask now: Michael, you are not helping. Well, I don't even know whether I am helping myself to understand what I am trying to help you to understand…?

So, how about the evening and morning before the fourth day when God created sun and moon? Maybe this refers to the division between the darkness of hell as a result of Lucifer’s rebellion and the light of God; both held in constant balance, tension and conflict.

Note that hell is enshroulded in perennial darkness because, even though God is light and his presence is everywhere, it is possible that His presence is felt in hell but not manifested or expressed. So, there is no light in hell. Understood? Prove-able? Go ahead, be my guest.

Or maybe, this "evening and morning" should not be taken literally. One author's view is that the evening and morning refers not to the demarcation of night and day but describes God creating in a cycle with a beginning and an ending. The morning refers to the start of creation activity and the evening, the end or resting of creation activity. So, one should not interpret it literally. Some even suggested that the Genesis account should be read poetically. Mark, whatever floats your boat, poetry or literalism.

Lastly, Zenn wrote about not taking the first few days of creation (before humans came into existence) as literal 24-hour day. This is partly the gap theory to accommodate and reconcile science with the Bible. If science says that the earth, through fossil records and half-life of radioactivity isotopes, is 14.7 billion years, then maybe each day of the first five days represents an era or an epoch of much longer time period than the chronological 24-hour day. Maybe one day is millions and millions of years.

You see, before we came into being, time is irrelevant or a-relevant.

For example, let me ask you this question: if a log dropped in the middle of a dense, deep forest, and no one was there to hear it, does it make a sound?

If no human being heard it, the sound it makes, if we can call it a “sound”, is irrelevant. It is as good as saying there is no sound. Mark, you must be all geared up to throw in your view on this. But what I am trying to say is that all that the dropped log had created was mere soundless vibration. Right? And this vibration has to reach our eardrum for processing. And if it does, then our eardrum will resonate accordingly and feed it into our nervous system. From there, it goes to our brain for interpretation, that is, our brain will tell us the loudness of the sound, our memory system will tell us where we had heard the sound before, and our frontal cortex will make sense of the sound, that is, is it a warning of foreboding danger or a friendly sound?

You see, this is a complex system of processing only us human beings and animals can perform. Without us, living beings, can we call this “unprocessed, un-interpreted sound” a sound? It is basically just vibration, molecules bouncing off other molecules.

So, by extension, if we did not exist at all, what is time then? No one can read or tell time. Even if it existed, and we can call it “time” for lack of a better word, is it relevant?

Mark, my main point is that the whole universe, that is, the rotation of the earth, moon and planets, the division of night and day, the changes in the climate, the physics of gravitational pull, and the chemistry of life, makes sense because of us. We are the missing link to making sense of everything that is around us. Without us, nothing makes sense. Before we came on board, time could be a 24-hour day cycle, or a two-hundred-million day cycle. Time held no relevance, whatsoever.

In any event, if no one was there to tell time, time has lost it’s function permanently. Some even say that it was as if the whole universe was waiting for us to finally come along to make sense of it all. Mark, you dig?

So, my conclusion is that life is a mystery. Even scientists have to admit that they are knowing more and more of less and less. One author, professor emeritus James P. Carse, wrote that there are three kinds of ignorance. Ordinary ignorance is what you do not know because you have not asked or read to find out about it. It is not knowing because you were just not informed of it. All of us are ignorant of something. None of us are know-it-all.

Mark you may not know about divorce laws. And I may not know about the intricacies of the stock market. It is normal. We can dispel this ignorance by learning about them. By learning, our ignorance is converted to knowledge.

The second kind of ignorance is willful ignorance. This is the ignorance that comes with arrogance and dogmatism. It is a condition whereby “we are aware there is something we do not know, but choose not to know it.” These are the people you need to avoid or at least avoid engaging them in a debate because they are never wrong even when they are clearly wrong. These are the people who can turn black to white, argue until the cows are even afraid to come home, and make nonsense out of nonsense. They are the typical stick-in-the-mud (or cement) characters. When they have ossified or entrenched themselves in their own belief system, they will defend it with their life even when proven wrong by acceptable standard of measure. This kind of ignorance will harm you mentally and emotionally because you will never learn the truth even when it kicks you in the face a hundred times over.

Then, the last kind of ignorance is referred to as a higher ignorance. This ignorance is described as one that is “a result of long reflection, combining a deep reading of the thinkers who have gone before us with a continuing process of self-examination.” Mark, you fall under this category. You reflect about things. You query, you argue, you expose inconsistencies. The Bible is there for you to dissect, strip apart and debate. But at the same time, you admit your limitations. You know your search, like all scientific searches, however earnest and diligent, will bring you to a point where you can go no further. Unless you are God, you will have to admit your dependence on Him by trust and faith.

There is definitely a gap in our knowledge about Genesis. There even appears to be some inconsistencies that cannot be reconciled by human effort. So, what shall we do? Professor Carse suggests this, “To know God (or the mind of God), they typically said, is to be God; therefore, not being God, all things divine remain forever hidden from us.” The Bible in Deut 29:29 echoes the same sentiment, “The secret things belong unto the Lord our God, but the things which are revealed belong to us and to our children forever, that we may do all of the words of this law.”

So, God has secrets and it is locked up somewhere in this vast universe and He has kept it from us for reasons only our faith can console. This is where we will have to draw the line and accept that we have reached a knowledge traffic junction with red lights against us, telling us to stop and reflect. I sincerely believe that science and God work together hand in glove, and when science reveals some of the mysteries of God in the future, the red lights will turn green to beckon us to proceed forward. But then, we will reach another knowledge traffic junction and we will have to stop again for the next turn of the lights.

Mark, I therefore invite you to accept and embrace uncertainty in life and belief. And when in doubt, or plagued by doubts, let faith stand in the gap of your visceral need for certainty. We all should learn to find restful patience and calming peace in the face of uncertainty because the assurance is this: nothing stays uncertain for long. One day, all will be revealed - that is one certainty you can count on.

Have a victorious National Day!

5 barley loaves & 2 small fishes

Jesus did it again

Do you know who gave Jesus 5 barley loaves and 2 small fishes to feed 5 thousand? In John 6:9, we are told that a lad sacrificed his family lunch for a mass picnic. The lad should be no more than 9 years old. It appeared that he was the only one who attended Jesus' mass rally with food. Nobody knew for sure why he had brought food for that day. One clue was that the people were celebrating the Passover feast and the little boy might be preparing for the feast with the bread and fishes.

The bible tells us little about the little boy whose basket of bread and fishes kept thousands from going hungry that day. One thing's for sure...the boy had never expected that Jesus would ask him for all that he had that day so that he could perform a miracle of great dietary proportion. It is no easy task to sit everyone down on a deserted mountain top with nothing to show but a basket of 5 barley loaves and 2 fishes. I estimate that the tiny basket was only enough for a family of 5 - provided they were not too hungry. But Jesus promised them that it was more than enough to feed all - all 5 thousand of them! A promise no right thinking and rational person would give to 5 thousand hungry, and possibly rowdy, mob.

From a secular and practical point of view, Jesus could have taken the opportunity to ask the multitude of 5 thousand to fast for that afternoon. He could have told them what he would be telling them at John 6:27, "Do not labor for the food which perishes, but for the food which endures to everlasting life, which the Son of Man will give you..." Jesus could have further told them the core message of the gospel at John 6:35, "I am the bread of life. He who comes to Me shall never hunger, and he who believes in Me shall never thirst."

Couched in a metaphorical way, I am sure the 5 thousand would NOT think lesser of Jesus if he had NOT performed the miracle of feeding the 5 thousand with only a basket of 5 barley loaves and 2 small fishes.

To any ordinary Christian folk, it would defy all natural laws of this world to turn that small basket into food for the masses. Even with the help of modern technology, mass rapid transportation and a well-equipped kitchen of hundreds and hundreds of helping hands, it would have taken more than one day to prepare for and deliver the food to 5 thousand. But Jesus defied natural laws and performed the miracle so unbelievably well that at the end of the meal, when all 5 thousand were fed to their belly hill, there were 12 baskets of bread remaining. I guess even McDonald would have been amazed by the mass rapid production of fish burgers in one hot afternoon!

The lad who gave it all

My focus on this gospel account is on the young lad and not so much on the miracle itself. The miracle, you see, is only a means to an end...and that end is how that little unknown boy sacrificed all that he had for all that he would ever need. I believe that this was the essence of Jesus' message that day.

Borrowing from the words of Jesus "I am the bread of life," and meshed that with a little allegorical creativity, I interpret the 5 barley bread of life as different aspects of our life: that is, our life in the past, our present life, our life in the future, our life within and our life eternal. As for the 2 fishes, I interpret that as the great commission of witnessing and follow-upship. In this letter, I will only focus on the 5 aspects of our life.

Surrending our past to God

Just like the boy who gave his bread to Jesus, we are called to surrender our past to God. Our past matters and it affects how we live in the present. Many events in the past color our present thinking and behavior. Mistakes and regrets abound in our past. For some of us, we cannot bring ourselves to forgive the people who had hurt us deeply and gratuitously. Victims of abuse and betrayal cannot let go of the hatred they have for their perpetrators. We are invariably tied to our past like a ball of chain around our ankle and we live our lives today burdened by past hurts, pain, anger, guilt, mistakes and regrets.

Because some of us are so affected by our past in a negative way, we allow it to overshadow all past achievements and joyous good times. We consciously practise selective recollection and erase from our memory all the good that had happened in the past and trade all that for all the bad, the ugly and the most painful.

It is time to do something about it. It is time to let go, cut off the chain that binds us, release ourselves from the hurts and the guilt, forgive the unforgivable and surrender it all to God. Give our "basket" to Jesus and allow him to turn our pain into healing, our mourning into joy and our regrets to rest. Here is Jesus' invitation to you in Matthew 11:28, "Come unto me, all ye that labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest."

Trusting God with our future

From life in our past to the future, we are called to trust God with our future. Remember the scripture, Christ in you, the hope of glory? What does the future hold for us? Have we taken the time to think about it? Needless to say, we do not experience our future now or directly. We only experience it mentally or when we think about it creatively. Common words associated with our future are hope, goals, aspiration, target, wishes and dreams. It may sound uncanny to say this but the truth is, our future affects our present. For those whose future is bleak, their present is generally bleak. For those whose future is bright, their present is correspondingly bright. Imagine telling a convict on death row to cheer up. Or try telling an Aids patient to laugh more often. It is much harder than words can evoke.

Since our future depends on our choices and actions today, we do have a stake in our future. For some of us, we create our future. Our future can be what we want it to be. I see my future as a mature tree bearing forth fruits and my present as the first seed. If I plant my seed well, I will get a good harvest in return.

But the challenge here is, can we trust God with our future? Can we rest on the blessed assurance that God has a plan for us? Can we be confident to face our future even when our past and our present are so messed up and troubled? Do we give up our future, stop making positive choices, scatter the seeds unto the wayside, just because we feel doom and gloom over our present? Can we have hope for our future?

Yes, we can have hope for our future only if we surrender it to God just like the little boy who gave it all to Jesus. I guess on that day, the most reluctant person was the little boy. It was a hard choice for him to give everything he had to Jesus. I can imagine the big ugly sulk over his tiny rosy face when he surrendered his basket. It was more than just taking away a child's toy, it was taking away his livelihood. But however difficult, that one choice made all the difference. That one choice became the inspiration for all who read the bible even up to this day.

Remember, surrendering our future is an act of the mind, since our future has not yet happened. After mentally giving our concerns and anxiety of our future to God, we stop thinking about it. We carry on with our life by faith and hope. We release the burden to God and resist the temptation of taking it back. It is a daily choice; a daily discipline. And no matter what happens, good or bad, we trust that God has made a way for us. In the end, we walk diligently in the direction that faith takes us. For on the road of faith, trust is our signpost, hope is our map and Jesus...our travelling companion.

Living courageously in the Present

Then comes our present. This is the life we are living now. How should we live since we have surrendered our past and entrusted our future to God? Our present is the all-important bridge that links our past with our future. Our present therefore does not stand alone. Memories of the past and prospects of the future do affect our present thinking and behavior.

There are many ways we can live our current life. There is an epitaph that reads, "Live fast, die young, and leave a good-looking corpse." Nothing in that epitaph talks about how our life impacts others - for good or for bad - when we die. I personally know that a good life is not measured by how good the dead looks. In fact, nothing about the dead looks bad, unsightly or out-of-place. Think about the well-ornated coffin, the well-decorated funeral and the well-intended wreath. And even the well-embalmed corpse looks more alive than some of those who are living. So, having said that, how should we then live our present life?

With reference to our past, we should now live with love and courage. With reference to our future, we should now live in hope and faith. I assume that living with love and in hope and faith are patently obvious. But why courage?

Let me make it clear: Courage is not the absence of fear or doubt . It is the absence of duplicity or double-mindedness. Courage is single-mindedness. Courage is standing on what is right and refusing to compromise even when it seems most attractive, most popular and most convenient to do so. It takes courage, a lot of it, to stand firm on what is right against the rising tide of dissent, against temptations and against ridicule and mockery.

This world desperately needs more courageous men and women - people who will stand up against ungodly rulers, against repressive policies and against hypocritical designs. People like Ruby Bridges.

Ruby was an African-American during the days of segregation. All Ruby wanted to do was to go to school. But racial wars in America had kept many people like Ruby from getting a basic education. So when the opportunity came when a federal judge ordered New Orleans to open its public schools to African-American children, Ruby and her parents were overjoyed. However the joy did not last very long. The federal judgment caused a great commotion amongst the white parents. They protested against the ruling and threatened any black children of immediate physical harm should they attend school. In fact, they went to such extreme as to stop their children from attending school should the school admit one black child. Many African-American parents kept their children from school for fear of physical harm. But this did not stop one black girl from attending school.

Two US marshalls accompanied the brave little Ruby to school. At the empty school, the crowd made up of white parents shook their fists at Ruby. They shouted at her and threatened to do terrible things to her if she kept coming to school. Undaunted, Ruby walked into the classroom with her head held high, unashamed and unafraid. Then she spent the day alone with her teachers inside that big silent school building. The courageous Ruby came to school everyday after that despite threats on her life and her parents' lives.

When her mother was asked about her daughter, she said, "There's a lot of people who talked about doing good, and a lot of people who argued about what's good and what's not good, but there are other folks who just put their lives on the line for what's right." And little Ruby did just that. Indeed, our life shrinks or expands in proportion to our courage.

Life within and life eternal

Finally, let's deal with our life within and life eternal. Our life within is our spirit life and it is closely tied to life eternal. Our spirit is the only part of us that survives our physical death. It is also where the real you resides. Apostle Paul says in 1 Corinthians 2:11, "For who among men knows the thoughts of a man except the man's spirit within him." It is this "man's spirit" that will live forever in God's heavenly kingdom. It is therefore the place we are called to nurture and develop. This is where our first priority and responsibility as a Christian lie.

We are called to cultivate a spirit of righteousness and humility. We are called to be like Christ, to demonstrate Christ's love and compassion and to be a servant to all and master to none except our fleshly desires. All this seems like a tall order; a task reserved for the great men and women of God. Surely, ordinary, average men and women like us would not meet the mark. But Jesus reminded us that the greatest in the kingdom of heaven is that of a little child. He said, "therefore whoever humbles himself as this little child is the greatest in the kingdom of heaven." The key here is humility.

Score with humility

It is easy to be a child when we are a child. But as we grow older, we become less child-like. With age and experience, we shed all remnants of childhood and become an adult. But the years of accumulated knowledge and experiences only serve to ossify some of our attitudes and beliefs. We become less receptive, less teachable and less flexible. Things we will normally say and do as a child no longer seem sensible or palatable to us as adult. As our ego expands to contain all our years of mis-shapened and wieldy knowledge and experiences, we become rebellious to change, even when they are for our own good. Good advices fell on deaf ears. Our heart becomes militantly defensive and jealously guarded. Instead of being an instrument for God's use, we become an instrument for our own use.

Ironically, it is when we think that we are the greatest in God's kingdom that we are the least of them all. It is when we think that we have arrived that our journey has just begun. For it is written, "He said to them, you are the ones who justify yourselves in the eyes of men, but God knows your heart. What is highly valued among men is detestable in God's sight."

Being humble is easier said than done; because humility requires us to surrender to God the one thing that we cannot let go, that is, our pride, our ego.

Through the years, our pride has become an inextricable part of us. It has become our identity; the part of us that others see, adore and admire. Pride defines us as who we are. It is the part of us that we show to the world to get the world's approval. It is also the part of us that we draw our stubborn self-will from. So pride will not let us go. Neither are we quick to let it go to God. But Jesus admonishes us about it and the price of "greatness" in the kingdom of God is to surrender our pride to Him. Let God deal with our ego.

So, there you have it, the 5 aspects of our life that we are called to surrender to God. The story of the feeding of 5 thousand has taught me an invaluable lesson about life and it cannot be better expressed in this scripture, "...for whoever wants to save his life will lose it, but whoever loses his life for me will find it. What good will it be for a man if he gains the whole world, yet forfeits his soul? Or what can a man give in exchange for his soul?" (Matthew 16:24-26)

Have a life-surrending day!

Left hand is better than right

Do you know that God used a left handed man to kill a right handed pagan king!
That pagan king is Eglon of Moab who had tyrannized the people of Israel for 18 years.
So, in came Ehud, the leftist. For some reasons, Ehud had lost the use of his right hand.
So his daily activities depends wholly on his left hand. God seized this opportunity and entrusted Ehud with a sacred job: Become his divine assassin!

And the opportunity arrived on tribute day. As all nations came to pay tribute to the king, Ehud stood in line for his turn. As with all days, the security guards protecting King Eglon was as tight as a corset and most were denied access to the king. This was not so for Ehud.

You see, Ehud was not seen as a threat as he was left handed and viewed by all as a
handicap. So, Ehud had a private one-to-one audience with the king. As Ehud drew closer to the fat pagan king, who was then seated on his royal ornate throne, he revealed his sword and quickly plunged it into the unsuspecting king's belly. The king was so fat that his belly swallowed the sword. The king's death liberated the people of God.

God uses our weakness and turns it into strength. Ehud's left hand, Moses' cowardice, Peter's denial and Saul's hatred were weaknesses in the eyes of Man. But God used them all to accomplish great work and to fulfill specific purposes.

Do you have a handicap? Do you think you are unworthy? Do you feel inferior, unwrought, undeserving? God doesn't care about your weaknesses. You may be left handed, small sized, unruly looking, God doesn't CARE. All He cares is this: your left hand does not work alone...God complements it with His Right Hand! Together, we work in partnership with God and impact lives for His glory!

(Inspired by a book by Pastor David W.F. Wong entitled "The Left Hand of God and other Surprises" - if you want to read it, let me know.)

Bible Quirks

Mike, for you to fill in this space.