Truth is Falling Everywhere, Except

Part 3 of 3.  Footnotes may be accessed in this same essay at my website: www.christianityontheoffense.com

              

               When such a celebrated thinker as Stephen Hawking declares, to the contrary, that the cosmos can easily be accounted for apart from the existence of an all-powerful and intelligent creator, secular culture is very quick to suppose that the case for God’s existence is thereby further discredited.  Such pronouncements also tempt believers in God to suspect that the security of Christian belief requires insulating our convictions from the scrutiny of the facts of science.  Yet in actual fact, Dr. Hawking isn’t appealing to science, but instead to a philosophical commitment, and that of a kind that is deeply flawed.  While the brilliance of his mathematical mind cannot be contested, two things need to be understood:  Firstly, his competence in math does not automatically carry over into his philosophy.  And secondly, mathematical conjectures that are coupled with theoretical physics don’t necessarily equate with empirical reality.  Hawking’s attention is focused on conjecturing over abstract conceptions which cannot be proven by scientific observations, even in principle.

                Observational and measurable data from Big Bang cosmology indicate, to the contrary, that the entire cosmos (matter, energy, space, and time) had an absolute beginning out of nothing in a manner that is entirely consistent with the opening declaration of the Bible: “In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth” (Genesis 1:1).  Consequently this miraculous creation-event, fully documented as it is by scientific methodology, utterly overthrows atheism even as it powerfully affirms the existence of the God of the Bible.  On the other hand, Dr. Hawking’s fixation on theoretical as opposed to empirical physics is merely a further example of employing data selectively in service to a preferred materialistic paradigm which in the end cannot be sustained by the empirical data. 

               

            This ploy is furthermore an indicator of that logical outcome which follows from denying the existence of a standard-bearer of truth (God); namely that PMs effectively exempt themselves from obligation to follow facts where they lead.  In response to their illegitimate tactic Christians dare not join them by diving into the same miry abyss in which the concept of truth is digressing into irrelevance and dissolution.  For the fact is there remains a place where truth continues its marching onward with full conviction.  Building as we do on the foundation of God’s Word of truth (John 17:17) which embraces both His own revelation and His works (Psalm 111:7), we can expect these two to harmonize.  With respect to the proclamation of the Gospel, the biblical grounds for our knowing our message is true lies not merely in the fact that God says so, but because His very Word demonstrates this epistemological methodology all the way from Genesis through the Book of Revelation.  Consequently, in the name of the God of all truth, we may boldly emphasize the reality of this relationship between word and world under the actuality of the providence of God.  Take notice of three essays of mine which illustrate that the unvarnished facts of science and history indeed point to the truth of God’s revealed Word by indicating that He is both Maker and Redeemer.  Christians have nothing to fear from the unity of truth, while we have everything to gain by highlighting it in our proclamation of the Gospel of Jesus Christ!