DNA – Authentic Hope for Answers

Two days ago I had an eye test and a prescription for new spectacles. Then I read some words of Jesus from the Sermon on the Mount: “The eye is the lamp of the body. So if your eye is healthy, your whole body will be full of light. But if your eye is bad, your whole body will be full of darkness” (Matthew 6.22-23).

For a long time I didn’t really understand those rather enigmatic words. But then I saw that the eye is how you see the world. Do you see it correctly? If you do, your whole life will be well led; if you don’t, you will stay in the dark about important things.

Another way of saying this is: what is your worldview? How do you understand the big picture? Do you see meaning in our human existence? Can you put it all together? If you’re confused about the big issues of life, your personal experience will be dark, rather than light. You will experience dark emotions like meaninglessness, hopelessness, anxiety and despair, and emotional or psychological problems will not be far away.

So it’s important that your eye be healthy – that you see the world and your place in it with good sense and a true perspective. Then you will have a meaningful life and be able to conduct yourself in a worthy and fulfilling manner.

So how should we see the world? There are basically two major options: either we are here by pure chance, with no design, no wisdom, no overarching intelligence to guide us, but merely our fate to fulfil; or there is a Greater, wiser Mind behind the universe and more specifically able to lead us into a fulfilling life according to his intelligent design as our divine Creator.

After generations of scientific experts have contributed to the first of those options, using the theory of evolution to support their philosophy of naturalism and materialism, we are able to come to a serious conclusion. This worldview must be categorised under the rubric, “the eye is not healthy”: it not only fails to offer a positive vision of human fulfilment, it actually destroys various elements that we require in order to live a psychologically healthy and fulfilling life. There can be no purpose if all came about by chance; there is no reason even to believe that our brain and its rationality is valid if we are but the result of an impersonal movement of atoms; there is no serious basis either for any wise guidance in moral questions nor for the wondrous value of love which would be merely the emotions of our physical system. It is for following this worldview in the West over these last decades that society suffers from its various ills. This is not the best explanation. As Jesus also said, “if the light that is in you is darkness, how great is that darkness!”

A healthy eye, however, allows you to see how “the heavens declare the glory of God” and when the universe began, there must have been an almighty Creator. As you open your eyes to the amazing fine-tuning of the constants of physics, so indispensable for the universe and life to exist, you can conclude that there was a Divine Mathematician who calculated all those precise numbers. And as powerful magnification has brought to light the “language” of DNA, which language requires personality, we see that the Creator must be personal in whose image our personalities are a reflection.

Is your eye healthy? Do you see there is necessarily a Creator?

He reveals himself in the Bible.

Clive Every-Clayton

Atheism suffers from ignorance of the most important thing in the entire universe. There are numerous indications of God’s wisdom and power in creation, facts that science has uncovered that prove there must be a supreme Mind behind this amazing creation. Stephen Meyer in his book “Return of the God hypothesis” deals thoroughly with three scientific facts that require a divine Mind. Let me summarise his reasons in simple language.

First, the Big Bang requires Someone who began it: you cannot evoke matter to explain the origin of matter, he writes. The Creator must have been immaterial (spirit), powerful, eternal, and personal. Secondly, the mind-boggling numbers of the constants of physics are so extraordinarily precise that life would not be possible if they were altered even just a tiny bit. Explosions normally result in much disorder and confusion: how then did the Big Bang issue in a created world where order and scientific laws abound, to say nothing of the beauty and the immense number of life forms? Our minds may easily conclude that this must involve an infinite Mind at work. Thirdly, the DNA discovered in every cell of our bodies possesses information encoded in what resembles a language. Scientists realise that wherever we see a language we have to acknowledge the agency of persons. The Creator of DNA must possess personal characteristics.

These three relatively recent scientific discoveries form the basis of a case for the return of the God hypothesis. People are led to believe in God on the basis of scientific facts for which no better explanation can be found. Indeed, scientists who want to hold persistently to their atheism have a hard time refuting these claims that Stephen Meyer backs up with his profound scientific reasoning.

Atheists cannot simply close their eyes to these discoveries of science and what they imply. Rejecting as a matter of course the very notion of God is to ignore the most important factor in the universe: on the other hand, opening up to the probability of God would open the way to the meaningful and vital answers we need. God our Creator knows those answers. We do well to listen to him. And even if you’re not convinced, it’s worth taking a serious look at the Bible to check it out. There is wisdom to be found on every page!

It may surprise atheists to know that the Christian faith is evidence based. It is not in conflict with science: rather, modern science developed in the West in the 17th century because the generally accepted Christian faith had established a consensus that the Creator was wise and intelligent and therefore his creation would yield scientific knowledge to those who studied it carefully.

But scientific facts are not the only things that point to God. It is astonishing that so many intelligent people do not grasp the vital fact that the historic person of Jesus Christ was none other than an incarnation of God the Creator! All who take the time and trouble to read and to seriously consider what Jesus said about himself in chapters 5 to 8 of John’s Gospel must admit he made divine claims. And a reading of his life and deeds in the Gospels also reveals his miraculous divine power, his unique sinless holiness and his brilliant teaching on all sorts of things we need to know. God sent his Son into the world to tell us truth we need to understand. Just consider what Jesus said before Pontius Pilate: “For this reason I was born and for this reason I came into the world, to testify to the truth” (John 18.37).

Clive Every-Clayton

Tag: DNA

Healthy eyes

Science points to the Creator