Eclipse

Creation vs. Creator

ILLUSTRATION AT THE BEGINNING:

Show a picture of Mt. Rushmore.

Ask: How was this created?

Was this created by intelligent design or natural causes?

Show a picture of the Grand Canyon

Ask: How was this created?

Intelligent design or natural causes?

Why would you say both of them were created differently?

Why don’t you think man created and dug out the grand canyon?

Now, the specific natural causes that resulted in the grand canyon, I believe was the flood. And there’s good reason for that, but that isn’t the point of tonight.

The point of tonight is this…

All of creation is infinitely more complex than Mt. Rushmore.

And yet, we wouldn’t think twice about knowing that someone formed Mt. Rushmore.

Amazingly, It was carved in only 14 years by a guy named Gutzon Borglum.

Romans 1:20 “20 For since the creation of the world God’s invisible qualities—his eternal power and divine nature—have been clearly seen, being understood from what has been made, so that people are without excuse.”

I had a friend share a facebook status this week that Allison then shared with me.

Sean wrote:

“Christians have really missed an opportunity to share the truth of God with the upcoming solar eclipse. Instead of sharing end times memes which aren’t biblical, we could be sharing that the eclipse points us to Gods glory. He created the universe in such a way that we get these amazing shows every so often - on a predictable basis. God is not a god of chaos but a god of order. In addition, have you thought about the fact that the moon, with a mean diameter of 2,159.2 miles, and the sun, with a mean diameter of 864,938 miles, appear almost the same size in our sky. The reason they appear nearly the same size (and result in total eclipses) is their distance from the earth, which is almost perfect for that result. But the amazing thing is that those distances are important for life here on earth. The sun, any closer or further away would result in temperatures too hot or too cold for human life. The moon, any closer or further away would not stay in position. In addition, the moon is partially responsible for our tides which help support ocean life. None of this occurred by happenstance. It all points to the Creator. And that, my friends, is the real significance of the eclipse. For Gods invisible attributes, namely, His eternal power and divine nature, have been clearly perceived, ever since the creation of the world, in the things that have been made. - Romans 1:20a (ESV)”

1. What thoughts do you have when you read these paragraphs?

2. What are some other examples in creation that point to a creator?

3. Discuss in groups some of the ideas presented here.

For example: Is it significant that we understand the distance between the sun and moon from earth? Is that important to how we view life on earth?

4. “It all points to the creator” Why is that quote significant? How do we often ignore the creator in worship of what is created?

What were some things your groups discussed from these 4 questions tonight?

I think sometimes I am so consumed on what’s in front of me, that I don’t take time to look up and look around me and just be amazed at God’s creation.

To worship Him..

WORSHIP:

Worship is God's gift of grace to us before it's our offering to God. We simply benefit from the perfect offering of the Son to the Father through the power of the Spirit (Ephesians 2:18). Worship is our humble, constant, appropriate, glad response to God's self-revelation and his enabling invitation.

Bob Kauflin

Recognizing God through his creation is part of worship.

humbling ourselves… knowing we don’t have all the answers about this world and this universe, but we know the one who made it.

Are we constantly thanking God for displaying His glory through creation?

This is certainly part of worship.

Psalm 19:1–2 “1 The heavens declare the glory of God; the skies proclaim the work of his hands. 2 Day after day they pour forth speech; night after night they reveal knowledge.”

Acts 17:24–25 “24 “The God who made the world and everything in it is the Lord of heaven and earth and does not live in temples built by human hands. 25 And he is not served by human hands, as if he needed anything. Rather, he himself gives everyone life and breath and everything else.”

This is the God we worship.

Are you worshipping Him today?

Something Sean concluded his status with is that “it all points to a creator”

2. The Anthropic Principle:

- The universe is fine-tuned for our existence, for life.

- Have you ever tried to grow anything?

It’s not as easy as it sounds…

Let me just take a seed and throw it in a pot and I’m good to go.

For Christmas Roman really wanted a venus fly trap…

So I got him a glass bowl and some seeds.

But you know what you had to do.

We had to put the soil in the bowl.

Scatter the seeds.

And then water the soil with a very specific amount of distilled water…

- This is also a specific kind of water you have to buy in a store.

So I did that…

Then you had to wrap the entire bowl in plastic wrap so that the humidity would stay in the bowl and then set the bowl by a window.

We loosely followed directions, but you know wha

We planted it in January and according to the directions we should start to see a plant by April.

Well guys… It’s April…

no plant.

I’m working hard right now on my garden too which I know will be viciously attacked by bugs come mid-June.

It’s difficult to grow food.

It’s not easy for me to do.

I wish it was…

You know what’s way more difficult…

Creating EARTH!

The Anthropic Principle - the universe is fine-tuned for our existence.

Something created it and where earth is located is specifically conducive for life.

Isn’t that amazing?

When you do the math comparing the diameter of the moon to the diameter of the sun, you will find that the sun is about 400 times bigger than the moon!

However, it’s because of their distance from the earth that make them both appear the same size in our sky.

Here are a few examples of how the earth is unique in the universe relative to the sun and moon.

1. The earth’s atmosphere is made up of many different types of gases.

- If those gases were too much or too little did you know our planet could heat up or cool down to unlivable temperatures?

- Additionally, the sun puts off radiation. If the gases in our atmosphere were not uniquely designed to absorb most of that radiation, we would die.

- The relationship of the earth’s atmosphere to the moon is incredible.

2. The earth’s albedo.

- This is the total amount of light reflected versus amount of light absorbed.

- In other words, the earth is absorbing and reflecting the perfect amount of light to allow life.

- If too much light were absorbed, earth would be too hot and we would die.

- If too much light were reflected, earth would be too cold and we would die.

3. Earth’s placement in the solar system.

- Similarly, if earth were positioned closer to the sun or further away, temperatures could shift to a point human life could not exist.

4. The color of our sun is also important.

If our sun were much redder on one hand or too blue on the other hand, Photosynthesis would not occur in plants, thus they would not live absorbing carbon dioxide and releasing oxygen for us to live.

Isn’t that amazing, the very color of our sun is conducive to plant life which is conducive to human life.

5. The position of the planets in our solar system are also incredible.

the larger planets like Jupiter have a huge gravitational pull and they absorb man meteors and other items in space that were it not for those other planets, those objects could reach and possibly destroy earth.

The planets orbiting around the sun that are farther from the sun than earth are protecting the uniqueness that is life on earth.

This is literally 5 examples of thousands you could find on this topic.

It takes far more faith to believe that we just exploded and ended up here than it does to believe we were created and placed here.

Each time we have unique phenomenons in creation, we should always worship and glorify God and be so thankful for the life he has given us.

Too often we are quick to celebrate ourselves and forget God who has given us all the good things we have.

We should Worship Him and be amazed at how He has fine-turned this world for life… for us.

In his book “the Screwtape Letters.” CS Lewis wrote from the perspective of a Demon General in Hell Screwtape writing to his junior Demon Wormwood.

One of the things that Screwtape tells wormwood is to “keep pressing home on him the ordinariness of things...”

In his book “I don’t have enough faith to be an Atheist”, Norman Geisler says,

“Lewis has hit on a tendency many of us have. In our fast-paced lives, we rarely stop and observe the world around us and, therefore, tend to consider every amazing facet of this beautiful universe as ordinary. But as we have seen, it is anything but ordinary. Now science is showing us like at no other time in history that this is a universe of incredible design and complexity. It’s giving us a new perspective on a world that we too often take for granted.”

Geisler…

We are not ordinary guys.

We live in an incredible place…

APPLICATION:

But we also live in a world where people want to make up their own rules.

Consider this.

We will spend billions upon billions of dollars to try to go to mars. And if we found a single living cell on Mars, we would claim forever that we have discovered life.

And yet here on our planet, a collection of cells growing inside a mother’s womb is the most dangerous place to live in the united states.

We argue forever that that is not a life, when that same life on mars would be the most valued discovery in history.

Years ago, I started writing a science fiction book about this very concept.

Has a baby in a womb ever been anything but a child?

In other words, if there is a “fetus” (hate that word, but we will go with it for now) growing, has there ever been a time where that has the potential to be anything but a human being?

NO!

20 billion out of 20 billion times, a human baby has been born.

So forget for a moment whether or not you believe that is a life inside of a woman…

100% of the time, forever, the potential of growing cells inside of a woman has only been one thing… A human life.

From the complexity of a human being...

To the distance of the sun and moon from the earth.

We serve an incredible God who has designed everything in this cosmos to point back to Him being the designer of it all.

John 1:1–4 “1 In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. 2 He was with God in the beginning. 3 Through him all things were made; without him nothing was made that has been made. 4 In him was life, and that life was the light of all mankind.”

Only through Him do we have life.

For those of us that believe, it’s up to us to take that life to those around us.

How are we doing that today?

Let’s pray.