A few weeks ago I spoke with someone who considered himself an atheist. In passionate tones, he told me his reason for denying the existence of God. The Bible has a specific message to people like him: "The fool says in his heart, 'There is no God.'"
If you are part of the rising militant army of atheists or the "closet" unbeliever, this is a gentle invitation to explore "the other side" of unbelief. I mean, why do you clutch so tightly to a few intellectually dishonest arguments in the face of overwhelming evidence? Have you saddled a chariot and traversed the breath of this limitless universe to find Him? Have you galloped through our solar system, have you touched the edges of our Milky Way? Have you hitched your wagon for the 1,000,000,000,000,000,000 km journey it takes to explore your neighborhood galaxy? Umm, no. It takes about 100,000 light years to explore your cosmic backstreets, which, in our average eighty-year life span, pretty much spells immortality. If you could achieve the speed of NASA's Voyager of 17.3 km/s, it would take you over 1,700,000,000 years to explore it from one end to the other [1]. Still feeling grand much?
How about getting out of our comfortable little galaxy to explore other cosmic lands? If you could spare a few billion light years (more like 212 billion) in your pilgrimage, you could park for a while on the edge of NGC 6872, a galaxy five times the size of our Milky Way. Have a hearty breakfast and saddle your light-year horse, because it will take you 522,000 light years to explore the backwoods of this spiral And you haven't found Him yet!
Astronomers tell us that no one really knows how big the universe is, or even if there are other universes like ours "out there". We are talking about God-size measurements now, a God who grabs the universe between two fingers and scans it faster than your market's barcode reader. Isaiah 40:12 describes the kind of measuring stick God uses:
Who has scooped up the ocean
in His two hands,
or measured the sky between His thumb and little finger,
Who has put all the earth’s dirt in one of his baskets,
weighed each mountain and hill?
We are talking about a big, big God! He is so big that this universe cannot contain Him, yet so "small" that He can fit inside the heart of a child.
There is much more evidence for the existence of an infinite, all-powerful God who exhaled this universe into our existence, yet stooped down to stamp His image into you and me. I know that, for some, even the raising of the dead wouldn't be "proof" enough for the existence of God. Because, you know, He actually did arise from the grave! Thirty seconds before you die, you will know. The veil between the visible and the spirit realm will become transparent, and you will see the eternal abyss which you fought so hard to deny. Ask Voltaire, or Robert Ingersoll, or Thomas Hobbs. Thirty seconds before you die, your heart will be so hard from the unbelief you caressed over a lifetime, that all desire for repentance will be extinguished out of you.
If you are still alive, if there is a flicker of "what if" breathing inside of you, I invite you to bow your knee and acknowledge Him. Give Him your all-your sins, your failures, your disappointments. Turn from your rebellion and acknowledge Him as your Lord and Savior. He is waiting for you, ready to forgive, ready to embrace, ready to give you the best life on the other side of time. If you need help meeting Jesus, write me. It will be my great honor to introduce you to my Friend and Savior, Jesus Christ.
"For God so loved the world that he gave his one and only Son, that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life."
[1] Numerical figures taken from NASA's website.
Threads
I have been absent from the world of words in the internet world for a long time. I am becoming increasingly aware that my silence is no less than sin against my Father God. No, there is no "thou shalt write" commandment hidden in the beautiful pages of my Bible. What it is, instead,is an inner urging to use my voice, the voice He has given me, to lay down reflections of His heart lived out in me. More than anything, I want this "pen" to bring glory to God, the One who has relentlessly loved me and kept me throughout my life.
Some of my reflections will seem incredibly "trifling", like my love for chocolate. Yes, you read it right. Yesterday I made a batch of raw chocolate fudge that looks deceptively healthy (no dairy, gluten-free, grain-free; I mean, it is practically a vegetable). "Oh, taste and see that the Lord is good...", cried the psalmist, and every time I serve my favorites in the food department, my tastebuds throw a party. The cocoa bean is His idea, and this small seed was designed for our pleasure!
At time, my reflections will read more like a journal. Today, Michal and I took a walk under the warm September sun, and my heart was filled with gratitude for autumn's day two that resembled summer's day one. The air was warm, the sun was incredibly bright, and a gentle breeze was swaying the auburn leaves in a dance of light and shadows. As evening drew near, He painted the skies with hues of orange, pink and gold-and He invited me to watch the dusk of today and the birth of tomorrow.
What do chocolate, and sunsets, and warm autumn walks have to do with anything, you ask? They are gifts that speak of a God who defines beauty, and joy, and pleasure. He is everywhere... if we only stop long enough to see Him. He fills our plates with the fat of the Earth, He colors our horizons with rainbow hues, He smiles in the glow of tepid September strolls. "The heavens declare the glory of God; the skies proclaim the work of His hands..."Sometimes we will explore the breath of rocks, and other times we will ponder the big questions of life. Through it all, God will be our center, the Bible our teacher, and His goodness our anchor.
Oh, that we would stop and explore the beauty of God in the small and great gifts of life... "Give thanks to the LORD, for He is good" - I pray that this truth will be etched on the tablets of our hearts in colors of crimson.
Some of my reflections will seem incredibly "trifling", like my love for chocolate. Yes, you read it right. Yesterday I made a batch of raw chocolate fudge that looks deceptively healthy (no dairy, gluten-free, grain-free; I mean, it is practically a vegetable). "Oh, taste and see that the Lord is good...", cried the psalmist, and every time I serve my favorites in the food department, my tastebuds throw a party. The cocoa bean is His idea, and this small seed was designed for our pleasure!
At time, my reflections will read more like a journal. Today, Michal and I took a walk under the warm September sun, and my heart was filled with gratitude for autumn's day two that resembled summer's day one. The air was warm, the sun was incredibly bright, and a gentle breeze was swaying the auburn leaves in a dance of light and shadows. As evening drew near, He painted the skies with hues of orange, pink and gold-and He invited me to watch the dusk of today and the birth of tomorrow.
What do chocolate, and sunsets, and warm autumn walks have to do with anything, you ask? They are gifts that speak of a God who defines beauty, and joy, and pleasure. He is everywhere... if we only stop long enough to see Him. He fills our plates with the fat of the Earth, He colors our horizons with rainbow hues, He smiles in the glow of tepid September strolls. "The heavens declare the glory of God; the skies proclaim the work of His hands..."Sometimes we will explore the breath of rocks, and other times we will ponder the big questions of life. Through it all, God will be our center, the Bible our teacher, and His goodness our anchor.
Oh, that we would stop and explore the beauty of God in the small and great gifts of life... "Give thanks to the LORD, for He is good" - I pray that this truth will be etched on the tablets of our hearts in colors of crimson.
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