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Giving glory to the Creator1

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Stan Shebs, Wikipedia.orgLilium-candidum
Jesus counselled, “Consider the lilies, how they grow: they neither toil nor spin, yet I tell you, even Solomon in all his glory was not arrayed like one of these” (Luke 12:27).

When Solomon became king of Israel he asked God for wisdom that he might govern rightly. In response God gave him “wisdom and understanding beyond measure, and breadth of mind like the sand on the seashore”(1 Kings 4:29). In addition God said, “I will also give you riches, possessions, and honour, such as none of the kings had who were before you, and none after you shall have the like” (2 Chronicles 1:12). Those privileged enough to behold Solomon’s glory could be overwhelmed:

“And when the queen of Sheba had seen the wisdom of Solomon, the house that he had built, the food of his table, the seating of his officials, and the attendance of his servants, and their clothing, his cupbearers, and their clothing, and his burnt offerings that he offered at the house of the Lord, there was no more breath in her” (2 Chronicles 9:3–4).

Despite all this, the beauty seen in Solomon’s court was as nothing compared with the wonder of the natural world. Jesus counselled, “Consider the lilies, how they grow: they neither toil nor spin, yet I tell you, even Solomon in all his glory was not arrayed like one of these” (Luke 12:27).

Even in its fallen state, greatly marred by sin, the world around us still bears the hallmarks of an original creation characterised by the most exquisite beauty and perfection of design. Nature, generally, is breath-taking. Whether we consider the awesomeness of the stars, the grace of the gazelle, the manoeuvrability of the dragonfly or the plumage of birds, we behold stunning elegance and wonder.

Marvels of nature

Engineers who attempt to copy nature know this only too well. Such is the gap between our technology and that found in the living world, very often we lack the ability even to replicate it. Usually, the most we can do is to learn principles from nature and use these to make improvements to our own designs—a branch of engineering known as ‘biomimetics’. Scientists have discovered a motor found in micro-organisms which is used to pack DNA. For its size it produces a force 10 million times greater than man-made motors.2 It has been estimated that two human eyes can do more image processing than all the world’s supercomputers together.3 In these examples, nature’s technology seems light-years ahead of ours.

Design is evident all around us

When an archaeologist, digging in a field, discovers numerous pieces of jewellery, pots and tools, he rightly concludes that this provides evidence of human activity. No one denies this because we all know that such artefacts have to be designed. Similarly, if we were to see inscribed on a sandy beach, “Pete was here”, we would have no hesitation in attributing this to an intelligent agent. Again, there can be no doubt about this because it is ridiculous to argue that natural processes could provide the explanation.

Atheists, however, assert that science has shown that apparent design in nature and the information encoded in the DNA of all living organisms arose without any designer. Darwin’s theory of evolution, they claim, has explained how all the plants and animals found on Earth today arose from a single-celled microbe that somehow assembled itself in some chemical soup. Not only this, human emotions (good and evil), creativity, musicianship and literature, they say, can all be explained by natural selection in the jungle and the savannas of Africa.

Travis Isaacs, Wikipedia.orgScarlet-Macaw
The Scarlet Macaw

Despite the absurdity and scientific bankruptcy of such claims, the case for evolution is often made in a superficially convincing way, and Christians can very easily be unsettled by one TV programme after another asserting its truth. Particularly misleading is the selective presentation of facts, where only evidence which appears to support evolutionary theory is discussed. Here it wise to remember: “The one who states his case first seems right, until the other comes and examines him” (Proverbs 18:17).

In Creation magazine, we do just that. We examine the case for evolution and invariably find it wanting. At the same time, we show how design in the natural world, again and again, points to creation. In all of this, we seek to give glory to God rather than evolution, and to help people see the need to worship the Creator rather than that which He has created (Romans 1:21, 24).

inspiration-from-creation

UNIQUE NEW BOOK—INSPIRATION FROM CREATION

Allow me to share with you a new book by Professor Stuart Burgess and myself, Inspiration from Creation: How Engineers are Copying God’s Designs. This features some of the work Stuart has been doing improving man-made products by copying the natural world. Examples include new developments in micro air vehicle technology inspired by dragonflies, enhancements in robotics inspired by the human knee joint and aids for stroke victims inspired by a fish jaw mechanism. These demonstrate the transcendence of nature’s designs and how the Darwinian process cannot reasonably be understood to have produced them.

Published: 5 July 2018

References and notes

  1. First appeared in CMI Extra, December 2016. Return to text.
  2. This is a linear motor found in the T4 bacteriophage, a type of virus that infects bacteria. Return to text.
  3. Gilder, G.F., The Silicon Eye, Atlas Books, W.W. Norton & Company, New York, USA, p. 29, 2005. Return to text.

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