In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth. Genesis 1:1
The scientific world was impressed with the findings of a satellite which explored the outer reaches of space. The Cosmic Background Explorer satellite, which was put into orbit as part of the U.S. space program, confirmed that immediately following what scientists referred to as the “big bang,” there were ripples of matter that seemed to form in patterns. What was observed was not a chaotic explosion such as follows when you put a firecracker under a tin can or in an ant hill, but a systematic pattern that reflected design.
The question immediately follows, though, “If there is design, then who is the designer?” An editorial asks, “Does this discovery prove God’s existence?” Says the editorial: “The proofs are not theological but philosophical. Though religion acts as a guide, the proofs must stand the test of strict rationality.” But the editor who wrote the column admitted that design raises a question which Thomas Aquinas posed: “If there is design, does not this bear witness to the fact there had to be a designer?” A watch does not appear without someone having designed and manufactured it. A building doesn’t appear apart from an architect’s concept. An explosion in a print shop does not produce a book. And, reasoned Thomas Aquinas, neither can there be design in creation apart from a Designer, who, believed Aquinas, is God, the Creator.
Aquinas drew from Aristotle, the Jewish Rabbi Maimonides, and Arab philosophers in putting together his five proofs for the existence of God, one of which is that design proves a Designer. Aquinas, who lived seven centuries before modern science came into its own, argued that something cannot be created from nothing, and when you acknowledge that creation followed a pattern of development, you have recognized the power of a Creator. That creator, believed Aquinas, was the God of the Bible, who described the creative process in the book of Genesis.
Have you ever wondered why some scientists are so very opposed to recognizing a Creator God as the force of creation—the one who formulated the laws of cause and effect which resulted in our beautiful planet? The very fact that some are so violently opposed to recognizing His existence is a powerful proof of His reality, so contends Gilbert Keith Chesterton, the British author and writer.
G.K. Chesterton wrote, “I was a pagan at the age of twelve and a complete agnostic by the age of sixteen.” He abandoned whatever faith he grew up with and then, as an adult, began to ask why some were so violently opposed to Christianity. He began asking himself, “What is it about the God of Christianity which they so want to deny?”
In his own words: “As I read and reread all the non-Christian or anti-Christian accounts of the faith … a slow and awful impression grew upon my mind—the impression that Christianity must be an extraordinary thing. It was attacked on all sides, for all contradictory reasons … . And it did for one wild moment cross my mind that perhaps [these] might not be the very best judges of the relationship of religion to happiness who, by their own account, had neither one nor the other.”
Seemingly, the deeper the probe of science, the closer we come to the reality of the God who spoke the Word and brought our world into being. As Chesterton wrote, science is “moving towards the supernatural with the rapidity of a [railroad] train.” Yes, old Aquinas was right: Design demonstrates the existence of a Designer.
Resource reading: Psalm 33:1-11
