More God Questions...

From our TREK friend:

Hi Kris,

This is hell week for us. My wife produces a musical every year at the school she teaches and the performance is tonight.

I will look for that book you recommend, Learn the Bible in 24 Hours. I'm curious to see how it all fits together. You did mention how it could only be divinely inspired, so I'm curious to see the author's reconciliation of all the wildly inconsistent threads spread throughout the good book.

As you say, God created time itself and is the one who can see the whole parade. Which is interesting, because he was obviously in no hurry whatsoever to put humans into the celestial mix, considering what a blip we are in the overall picture of the cosmos. He created the Earth, then waited billions of years before it was ready to be populated by man. Which is fine. What I'm curious to know is, was man always part of God's plan? Was the universe created and made virtually infinite for man's benefit, or just to confuse him and cause him to question why a being so powerful created a universe so large that we, as humans, could never fathom it? There are virtually billions of galaxies, each one spans a distant so vast, we cannot comprehend it. So, that makes me wonder why the universe seems to have a mind of its own.

Which brings me to another point, one where I would feel comfortable in "defining" God. I think, over the years what has made the most sense to me is the Einsteinian logic, where he basically defines God as the laws of the universe, the laws of physics. Although many Christians will try to paint Einstein as a believer, if you read his quotes it's pretty clear that he stands in awe of the complexity of the universe, and that is his definition of God. Not necessarily a being.

So I finished the Dawkins book, which is good if a bit off course at times. I don't think he is a bad or misguided person, but he is obviously frustrated by the thinking, or lack of, that is behind most religious groups.

Kris, to your credit, you define your beliefs well and are obviously not in the category of those who use their faith as a means to dismiss others, more as a spiritual quest that you follow and would like others to find for themselves. I see your message as being that one must find a harmonic convergence, of sorts, in order to get on the -- God's -- wavelength.

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My response:

Blessings and thanks to your wife, for what she does and all she goes through to give students and their parents and relatives an entertaining reason to go out at night! I used to be involved in plays, too, so I know what a madhouse it can be, but out of it all comes something sublime: a creation!

To answer your questions and comment on your comments...

Yes, man was always a part of God' plan (He knows the whole parade, remember? and exactly where we would louse up and what it would take to redeem the whole situation of which we are so much a part -- being capable, as we are with free will, of great love and great destruction). So far, we seem to be the only beings that can discern Him (although, in our arrogance, that might NOT be the true situation -- Jesus said if His people remained silent the very rocks would cry out, and the Bible says that all creation groans for our return to the Garden (communion with God) so things can be set right again.

I think the more out of whack man is (God's specified "image-bearer" -- and he gave us influence to match the title), the more out of whack everything we touch or influence is -- and if you are in the loop with physics you know that our very thoughts influence the movement of atoms and the growth of plants...

Yes, I believe God created it all and that he wants us to share in it -- maybe not to reach it everywhere He has touched, but just to realize that he has touched it everywhere. You can call God what Einstein calls God -- I'm okay with that -- but the entire message of the Bible is to call God what YOU call God after you have met him and have a relationship with Him, not what others have called Him as they are able to understand him.

I wonder if you're afraid to simply ASK Him to tell you about Himself? Even if it sounds corny, since you don't believe there's anyone out there, you might give it a try and then wait and watch for belief and proof to be revealed to you. It's all around you. I do know that -- because it's all around me, around all of us, just like ABC, NBC, CBS, CNN, FOX and etc. -- we just have to tune in the the wavelength He's on in order to receive Him.