Jesus said, "I am The Way, the Truth, and the Life" (John 14:6).
Welcome to our media campaign, Explore the WAY. For those who are wondering, doubting, thinking, or wanting to go deeper in faith, we invite you to explore with us as we consider the many reasons to believe.

• If you are a Christian, we hope to strengthen your discipleship.
• If you have not given God much thought, we hope to inspire you.
• If you have doubts, we hope to engage you.
• If you have been hurt by the church or Christians, we hope to encourage you.

Post a comment, ask a question, or join in a discussion about the great issues of life!

Welcome, Christmas morning!
You happily open a gift from a friend, and although it is nice, it’s just not you. The thoughtfulness of the gift is well-appreciated, but it isn’t quite right because this friend doesn’t actually know you that well. The next gift you open is so perfect, so you, so exactly right! Your emotions overwhelm you because this gift-giver knows you very well; in fact, this gift-giver knows you far better than you even know yourself. This gift is the Church, and this Gift-Giver is Christ himself. He knows us and has given us exactly what we need:
“The Holy Spirit has made you overseers, to shepherd the church of God that He purchased with His own blood.” (Acts 20:28)
 
What is the church? We may understand it in two ways:
Universal church: composed of all the followers of Christ worldwide and not bound by an organization or building.
Individual church: local assemblies of followers of Christ who gather for sacred purposes, typically within a building.
Much of the New Testament consists of letters to fledgling churches. The Bible calls the church the Body of Christ, Bride of Christ, Temple of God, Communion of Believers, and Divine Family. What a tremendous gift, indeed!
 
Why is the church so important? Christ’s church remains an institution in which his followers can thrive and make known the gospel - an organization for all time meant to teach and live out the example of Jesus Christ. The church offers worship, a place of group and individual prayer, it teaches and preaches the great truths of the Bible, and it offers the comfort of traditions and ritual that connect to thousands of years of an unbroken line of inspired believers. The church was never meant to simply reflect the temperature of the culture around it, like a thermometer. Instead, the church should represent a thermostat, helping to set the temperature of culture and society through love, kindness, wisdom, and knowledge as expressed by Christ in the Bible.
 
Some prefer to say, “I’m spiritual, but not religious.” Sadly, people with an honest desire for spiritual nourishment too often reject the very gift of the church given by Christ. The Bible, tradition, and experience makes it clear that there are no Christian islands. Believers are meant to be together in the church, we need to be together, supporting each other, encouraging each other, serving the needs of others, and holding each other to high standards in Christianity.
“Let us consider how to stir up one another to love and good works, not neglecting to meet together, as is the habit of some, but encouraging one another.” (Hebrews 10:24-25).
In this age of individualism and relativism (all is relative to personal preference), a strictly personal spiritualism inevitably leads to “the Church of Me” – my preference, my wants, my standards. Christ’s gift to us offers a better way.
 
Nevertheless, some churches and some church people have acted hurtfully. According to the Word of God (and our own practical experience), all human beings are sinful, imperfect, and struggle with right and wrong. As such, individual churches, members, and even pastors can sometimes cause hurt, wrongly condemn, and constrain honest questions or doubts. Such hurts must always be acknowledged and corrected. Jesus even recognized this reality:
“I appeal to you, brothers and sisters, to watch out for those who cause divisions and create obstacles contrary to the teachings you have learned; avoid them.” (Romans 16:17).
Still, when we encounter a bad doctor, we don’t reject the medical establishment altogether. We find a better doctor. If we encounter a hurt from within a church, we need not reject all churches; we find a better one.
 
G.K. Chesterton once noted, “When people stop believing in God, they don’t believe in nothing; they will believe in anything.” Non-believer David Foster Wallace added, “There is no such thing as not worshiping. Everybody worships.” The question then remains, what will we worship and how? Do we worship sports, money, power, social media, lust, politics? How do we order our time, money, and priorities? Do we choose to worship what we want, how we want, and when we want? The history, tradition, rituals, and truth of faith calls us to something higher than our particular preferences, desires, and preferred standards of behavior. The church, in all its glory and admitted imperfection, calls us to gather together for support, encouragement, knowledge, accountability, and wisdom so that we can receive, proclaim, and demonstrate the good news of life in Christ.
 
The mission of Jesus as God/Man/Savior established an unstoppable movement reflected by the church - a living example of the love and expectations of God. Jesus Christ knows us – he knows us far better than we know ourselves. He knows what gift we need - more than we even realize – and the great benefits of embracing this gift.
“On this rock I will build my church, and the gates of Hades will not overcome it. I will give you the keys of the kingdom of heaven.” (Matthew 16:18-19)

He wrote close to 30% of the entire New Testament, and he was beaten, jailed, and likely killed because of his message. Paul the apostle wrote to the new Christian church in Corinth: “If Christ has not been raised, our preaching is useless and so is your faith” (1 Corinthians 15:14).
 
The literal resurrection of Jesus Christ is Christianity. But did it really happen? Could it really happen? The fact is, if the resurrection was an actual moment in history, it literally changes everything! What then are the most common objections to the resurrection?
 
First, Jesus wasn’t really dead (swoon theory); he may have been arrested and crucified, but he somehow survived perhaps through a drug-induced drink (Mark 15:36). Although this objection remains a common one, it actually receives little scholarly attention because:
   (a) the Romans were experts at crucifixion;
   (b) soldiers themselves risked death if they failed to complete an execution;
   (c) even if Jesus survived, his bloody and agonized body would not have caused followers to believe in a resurrection any more than it would have today.
 
Second, the dead body was stolen. Jesus was certainly no common criminal as he generated great interest and a significant following. The Jewish ruling council had a vested interest in making sure he was dead and buried in a guarded tomb. Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John all note that Jesus was buried in a tomb by Joseph of Arimathea. The first eyewitnesses of the empty tomb did assume a stolen body. Soon after, as Jesus’ resurrection was being proclaimed, if the Romans or Jews possessed the stolen body, all they had to do was present it to stop any further talk of resurrection. They didn’t because it wasn’t.
 
Third, claims of resurrection were a mass hallucination of people who wanted to believe a resurrection had occurred. Actually, the Bible describes Jesus’ followers as having given him up for dead (Luke 24:1-11; John 20:24-26), and they were shocked by his resurrection, not expecting it. Hallucinations are not a group phenomenon, and the Bible records Jesus appearing at different times, to different people, and in different circumstances, thus making mass hallucination impossible.
 
Fourth, although the Bible accounts appear to differ in their details of the resurrection, a disciplined approach to Bible study yields their harmony. For example, Matthew describes one angel at the empty tomb while John describes two. However, only one angel speaks. Matthew could simply be highlighting the one who spoke, and of course, whenever you have two of something, you also have one. Likely both writers are describing the same scene with different emphases. Furthermore, critics would additionally object if all the accounts of the resurrection were exactly alike. Slightly differing accounts are actually evidence of non-collusion.
 
Even if there were (and we assert there are not) significant discrepancies within the New Testament, the unity of minimal facts demonstrates total agreement that:
   (a) Jesus was crucified, dead, and buried;
   (b) his followers cowered in fear assuming they were next to be arrested and killed;
   (c) he was resurrected in bodily form;
   (d) he appeared to his closest disciples, and to many others, who then charged fearlessly into the crowds only days later to declare his resurrection!
In fact, from the earliest moments of Christian worship, believers were proclaiming the deity of Christ and his sacrificial crucifixion and resurrection. No evidence exists showing an early form of Christianity that did not proclaim the resurrection as the central belief.
 
Historians note that it takes 30-60 years before legend can be confused with facts. As long as eyewitnesses are alive, legend gets muted. Paul’s first letter to the church in Corinth, written barely 20 years after the resurrection, was far too early to have incorporated legend. Paul was an eyewitness himself, and initially a reluctant one, given that before his Christian transformation he was a zealous Jew who arrested and persecuted Christians. What motive would he have, or would all of the first witnesses have, to lie about their belief in the resurrection? History records that the most influential of these first witnesses all died for their beliefs, further underscoring the truth of their encounters with the Resurrected Christ.
 
The central tenets of Christianity initially seem so illogical:
(1) its central figure arrested and crucified as the lowest form of criminal;
(2) its first followers confused about his message, objected to him at times, denied knowing him, and hid in fear after his death;
(3) its first eyewitnesses to the resurrection were women (whom ancient near eastern culture considered unreliable in court testimony).
No one would invent such details in order to “start” a new religion.
 
The accounts in the New Testament reliably describe real human beings reacting as real human beings would. They wept at Jesus’ torture and mourned his humiliating death. His closest associates feared for their own imminent arrest and condemnation, and when confronted with an empty tomb, they assumed a stolen body. And yet, within days, these questioning, mournful, terrified people marched into the Jerusalem crowds, in full view of the Jewish and Roman leaders, boldly declaring Jesus’ resurrection! What happened to them to cause such a rapid transformation? The answer is the same experience that caused Peter to reverse his denial of knowing Jesus in order to proclaim him the Divine Savior, for Jesus’ own brother, James, to proclaim him the Lord’s Messiah, and for Paul to cease persecuting Christians in order to proclaim him God in flesh – Jesus truly did rise from the dead!
 
In the Old Testament, the prophet Isaiah proclaimed the coming of the Messiah (Isaiah 7, 9, 52-53). Paul saw and experienced the fullness of this Resurrected Christ that he wrote about and that we confidently proclaim today:
“For what I received I passed on to you as of first importance: that Christ died for our sins according to the Scriptures, that he was buried, that he was raised on the third day according to the Scriptures, and that he appeared to Peter and then to the Twelve. After that, he appeared to more than 500 of the brothers and sisters at the same time, most of whom are still living, though some have fallen asleep. Then he appeared to James, then to all the apostles, and last of all he appeared to me also…Christ has indeed been raised from the dead” (1 Corinthians 15:3-8).
 
And by the way, the truth of Paul’s words does indeed change everything.
 
Post Script:
If the resurrection is truly central to Christianity, why is it being addressed in article #8 in our 12-part series? Why not first?
 
Our series began by demonstrating the existence of God via
- science: cosmology (something cannot come from nothing), our exquisitely fine-tuned universe, the extreme complexity of biology;
- philosophy: objective morality and objective beauty indicate a standard outside of ourselves;
- personal experience: human consciousness exists beyond physical existence;
- reliability of the Bible: its trustworthiness and truthfulness.
 
With this foundation of evidence and information, we may now better assess the reasons to believe that the resurrection actually occurred.
​(To explore articles 1-7, please see this page.)

They abandoned worship at the Jerusalem temple because of widespread corruption, gathered up their scrolls of Scripture (the Hebrew Bible) and retreated in the 300s B.C. to Qumran near the Dead Sea. When the Romans threatened the region, these believers hid their scrolls in the dry caves high above Qumran. The scrolls remained hidden until 1947, over 2,000 years later, when a Bedouin boy found them while searching for his goat.
 
The Dead Sea Scrolls represented one of the greatest archaeological discoveries in history, and they authenticated the reliability of our contemporary Old Testament texts. Among the many discoveries was a complete scroll of the entire book of Isaiah. Although our oldest copy of Isaiah at that time was from the 1000s A.D., the Dead Sea scroll written 1,000 years earlier was a near exact match! For example, in comparing the texts, of the 166 words in the book of Isaiah chapter 53, there are only 17 letters in question. Ten of the letters are simply a matter of spelling, which does not affect the meaning at all. Four more letters are minor style changes, such as an added “and.” The remaining three letters spell the word "light," which is added in verse 11 and does not affect the meaning. In short, what the Dead Sea scrolls demonstrate is highly careful and exact transmission of Biblical texts down through the ages!
 
For the New Testament, our confidence in its reliability is even greater. True, we do not, for instance, possess the parchment on which Mark wrote his Gospel. However, this should not be surprising because we essentially have NO originals for any of the writings from the Ancient World. Still, is it reasonable to believe that we possess what the authors originally wrote? Or, has the text passed through too many hands over too much time to be trusted?
 
The New Testament remains the best preserved ancient text in history with 27,000 complete books or sections of the text in our possession. The oldest section dates from mere decades from the original, and the oldest complete New Testament dates to a little more than 200 years after the original. Compared to Homer’s The Iliad, the second best preserved ancient work, which is routinely taught in schools, there remain just 643 complete works or fragments of the text, but the oldest copy dates to 500 years from the time of the original.
 
Critics claim that the New Testament includes 400,000 variations among the many copies of the ancient texts, which sounds like a lot. However, of those variations, the vast majority are due to simple (easily identifiable) scribal errors of spelling or grammar. Less than 1% of those variations impact the meaning of the text, and while most variations have been resolved, NO Christian belief or teaching is impacted by the few variations among the ancient New Testament texts.
 
Along with preservation of the New Testament text, its internal evidence demonstrates its truth. First, no credible scholar disputes that Jesus of Nazareth lived and died in the early first century A.D in southern Israel. Historical sources outside of the New Testament mention him, albeit briefly because at the time they could not have imagined his impact. In the first century, women were not eligible to testify in a Jewish court of law. They were considered too emotional and unreliable. Yet…in the Gospels, women are the first witnesses of the resurrected Jesus Christ! Jesus calls Peter, “Satan,” and the disciples are all cowering in fear following Jesus’ crucifixion thinking they will be arrested and killed next. Just a few days later they charge into the street to proclaim his resurrection. Such “embarrassing” details would certainly have been edited out of the story unless it was what actually happened.
 
In addition, most of the books of the New Testament were written prior to 70 A.D., within roughly 35 years of the crucifixion, by eyewitnesses, personal associates of eyewitnesses, and within the lifetime of eyewitnesses. History also records that most of those who first proclaimed the reality of Christ’s resurrection died excruciating deaths. At any point they could have renounced their faith and lived. They didn’t because they knew the truth.
 
In the end, it is indeed reasonable to assert that we possess accurate accounts of the events and the teachings of Christianity. According to classical literature scholar, Giorgio Pasquali, “No other Greek text is handed down so richly and credibly as the New Testament.”
 
Police detectives call it chain of custody: evidence collected at the scene and properly handed from one to another to another all the way to the court room. In recording the life, death, and resurrection of Jesus Christ, we know of John the apostle, an eyewitness. He had three students, Papias, Ignatius, and Polycarp, who wrote to their students what they learned from John. Their student, Irenaeus, wrote to his student Hippolytus. From there to the first council of Nicaea to today, we see that what is proclaimed about Jesus has not changed. God exists (see our previous six essays), and God in Christ preserved his Word for us and to us. As retired homicide detective, Warner Wallace, notes, “The Jesus we know today, God in flesh, born of a virgin, rose from the dead, that Jesus is present at every stage in the chain of custody to today.”

Post Script:
The Bible’s Deuteronomy 31 records God telling Moses to read out loud the law (their Bible) every seven years. Such a tradition preserved the accuracy of the text for generations to come.

During the surgery, Pam’s eyes were taped shut, plugs were placed in her ears, her body temperature was held at 50 degrees, and she was clinically dead while undergoing a hypothermic cardiac arrest procedure to remove a life-threatening aneurysm. The whole operation was life-threatening, yet she survived. Later, Pam described in great detail everything that happened in her operating room: the personnel she had never met before, the specific instruments she had never seen before, how they were being used, the sounds they made, things people said…all from a viewpoint floating above her body. She was dead.  But then she was revived.
 
A neurosurgeon was placed in a medically induced coma due to brain and spinal cord swelling. The coma made him essentially brain dead, supported only by machines, but he was revived. He later recounted leaving his body, entering a realm of bright light and great peace, and meeting a young woman he did not know. Adopted as a child, and long after his near-death experience, the neurosurgeon met his birth parents and was shown a photo of his previously unknown biological sister who died years earlier. He immediately recognized her as the young woman he met within the bright light of his death coma. His career in neuroscience previously told him that such a conscious experience while clinically brain dead was not possible. But it happened.
 
The immediate followers of Jesus of Nazareth claimed to have met and touched their crucified and risen Lord. So certain of their experiences, their previous fears disappeared as they risked death to proclaim this life-giving truth. Most, as history records, were tortured and executed for their message of Jesus’s resurrection. Paul of Tarsus, persecutor of early Christians, experienced the resurrected Christ and became a Christian, a spiritual encounter so profound that it completely changed the direction of his life. He, too, suffered afflictions for proclaiming the truth of his experiences. Why would all these followers of Christ abandon their previous fears and unbelief to risk death? They did so because they were certain of their spiritual experiences.
 
Millions of people across history and cultures have described similar near-death experiences of bright light, peace, and spiritual calm. Others have had such unique spiritual experiences that nothing can shake them from declaring what they know to be true. Still others prefer to whisper about their mysterious spiritual experiences that impacted their perspective, life direction, or view of God. And unlike with science and data, such personal spiritual experiences cannot be measured, duplicated in a lab, or placed under a microscope. Nevertheless, these encounters remain so real to so many people that they cannot be swept aside with a dismissive wave of the hand.

Consider also that we all accept certain things as true that cannot be absolutely proven. For example, we cannot prove that our existence was not created five minutes ago with a built-in appearance of age, nor that our brain is not just in a vat of chemicals being stimulated by a laboratory scientist. Yet, we all hold certain properly basic beliefs (our foundation of knowledge) based on our experiences such as sight, sound, and touch. We agree there is a physical world around us because of what we experience. We may not be able to prove we possess an actual history longer than five minutes, but we all rationally accept this to be true based on our experiences. Similarly, it can be entirely rational to believe that our personal spiritual experiences are true in the absence of any provably more rational explanation.
 
A young child hears the voice of Jesus telling her, “Paint what you see.” At age four, she begins to create. Having never been to a church and not raised in a religious home, she nevertheless paints Christian images with extraordinary skill, including the two paintings on this page completed when she was only eight years old. Should we discount Akiane’s spiritual experience? In the absence of a more provably rational explanation, it is, in fact, equally or more rational to believe her sincere and fervent accounts of her spiritual experiences that so impacted her life and the world.
 
Despite the fact that some people lie about their experiences, are simply mistaken, or can be explained scientifically, countless other personal spiritual experiences impact all kinds of people for reasons that are often difficult to comprehend and explain. Neurologists still cannot account for near-death experiences or for instances of consciousness apart from our physical body. Visions, healings, even prayerful guidance or insight astound and captivate us while insisting on deep spiritual discernment and consideration of God as Creator.
 
Aside from theologians, scientists, and philosophers, perhaps pop musician Justin Timberlake put it most clearly:
“I can honestly say I am a Christian, but my spirituality has been developed on the road and is based on my experiences with God.”
​
Want to know more about God? Consider reaching out to people who’ve had a personal experience with God and ask them. Chances are, they’d love to tell you.

What is tall? Is 5’10” tall? What about to someone who is 5’3”? Is 6’2” tall? What about to someone who is 6’8”? Unless there exists an objective standard for what is tall (a definition outside of our opinion), tall becomes just a matter of subjective feeling. 
 
In our previous article, we noted the difference between objective and subjective. For example, objective is the accurate measured temperature of a room. Subjective is how we feel about the temperature, too warm or too cold. Subjective is opinion, objective is truth, regardless of opinion. As with tall, how do we know what good and evil are? Is there an objective moral standard, and if so, from where did it originate? Our options are:

1. Society determines moral standards.
2. Morality evolves over time, and thus societies become more moral over time.
3. Certain moral standards are established by a Creator and are a part of the creation of human beings.

The problem with #1 is that it is ultimately based on opinion. For example, Society-A decides that murdering other humans is always morally bad. So, what? Society-B decides that murder is morally good as long as it benefits them. Without an objective moral standard outside of opinion, Society-A cannot tell B that murdering them is morally wrong. It is all opinion. (Please note: murder and killing are not the same. Murder is the immoral, unlawful killing of a human being. Certain killings under certain circumstances can be both moral and legal.)
 
Consider also the statement that abusing a child for fun is always wrong. The societal argument says that it is always wrong because it damages the child, likely for life, and is damaging to the abuser, thus making overall society worse. However, what if a pill could be developed to ensure that the child would have no memory or scars from the abuse, and that the abuser would also not be psychologically damaged. Is it still morally wrong to abuse a child for fun? Of course, it is. We all know it is always morally wrong and evil under any circumstances. Option #1 fails.
 
Option #2 posits that morality is always evolving, that evolution drives moral goodness. If that is true, then we can never actually know what is truly moral. What we think is moral now might be morally evil later as we “evolve.” Plus, this option (while rejecting objective morality) still ultimately supports an objective moral standard toward which we are supposedly evolving. Option #2 also fails.
 
Now, it is important to note that a person who does not believe in God CAN certainly be a morally good and kind person. Conversely, someone professing religious values can commit morally bad acts. (They either do not live by what they say they believe, or sin can still impact an honestly religious person.) But these two truths have nothing to do with the issue of whether objective morality exists. It just shows that human behavior involves an amount of human will. God’s existence does not ensure that all people will be perfectly good; it only ensures that a standard of good and evil exists outside of personal opinion or societal assertion.
 
It is also important to note that human beings, although knowing deep down that certain things are always morally wrong, sometimes act otherwise and can even convince themselves that their evil actions are somehow justified. Both scenarios indicate the brokenness (a.k.a. sinfulness) in human beings, but do not undermine the existence of objective moral standards. For example, people know intuitively that human sacrifice is wrong, and the holocaust was evil. Such events remain rare in overall human history and are clearly recognized by nearly all people through the ages as objectively evil.
 
Still, some moral values do indeed exist due to societal agreement. America agrees on certain moral standards of kindness toward animals. Other nations disagree. Yet, beyond all this there clearly exists certain objective moral values that transcend human society and opinion. Therefore, we can assert the following proposition:

1. If objective moral standards exist, then a Creator outside of us must exist who established such moral standards.
2. Objective moral standards do exist.
3. Therefore, a moral Creator exists.
 
God gifts each of us with a basic moral compass. We know this deep down. God also, in His infinite wisdom, allows us to deny it, ignore it, or convince ourselves otherwise; yet it remains our best guide toward a decent and moral culture. As Rev. Martin Luther King, Jr. noted:
​
“If we are to go forward, we must go back and rediscover those precious values - that all reality hinges on moral foundations, and that all reality has spiritual control.”

“In all ranks of life, the human heart yearns for the beautiful; and the beautiful things that God makes are His gift to all alike.”  
      - Harriet Beecher Stowe
 
“Wow, look at that beautiful sunset!”
“Are you kidding me?! Sunsets are disgusting and ugly! They make my stomach turn.”
      Said no one, ever.
 
People from different lands and cultures across human history recognized the beauty of a colorful sunset. Poets, painters, and musicians throughout time have written, sung, and depicted the beautiful wonder of sunsets, waterfalls, mountains, lakes, people, animals, and art of all kinds. Beauty surrounds us, but is beauty only in the eye of the beholder? Is beauty just an individual statement of preference?
 
In our previous three essays (available online through the link below), we explored three rather technical assertions:
1. The Universe did not self-create from absolute nothingness, but in fact had a beginning (Big Bang) and therefore a Beginner (i.e. God).
2. The cosmos gives ample evidence of extreme fine tuning, and the odds of this occurring by random chance remain so long as to be impossible. The more that scientists learn of the Universe and its properties, the longer the odds become for it all occurring randomly.
3. Biology, and especially DNA, also demonstrate extreme fine tuning, which random chance fails to explain. Such fine tuning testifies to a Fine Tuner (God).
These represent powerful arguments for the existence of God, but they can also become complex and detailed subjects. What if we can perceive God through something as straightforward as beauty?
 
Why do we all recognize beauty? Well, first we need to clarify the concepts of objective and subjective. Think of it this way: Jacob and Rachel enter a room. The thermostat shows the temperature is 75 degrees Fahrenheit. Jacob says it feels hot. Rachel says it feels cold. The temperature is objectively 75 degrees. They both know it is 75 degrees, but what they feel is subjective. Likewise, with beauty. No one looks upon a red rose, the Grand Canyon, or a golden retriever puppy and sees repulsive ugliness. (Any such person would be rightly described as disconnected from reality.) They are objectively beautiful, we all agree, even though we may feel a subjective level of intensity for such beauty. We can objectively recognize classical music as beautiful while subjectively feeling that “it’s just not my kind of music.” Many examples of objective beauty exist across time and cultures. All human beings agree that some things are objectively beautiful. How can this be?

There remain essentially two candidates for addressing objective beauty. The first is naturalism (a.k.a. materialism): all things naturally occur from within nature – nothing exists outside of our physical world. Naturalistic explanations often deny the existence of objective beauty at all. As author, Steven E. Parrish notes:
“Given naturalism and an impersonal Universe…one would have to say that beauty is something totally subjective, and the fact that we see beauty and enjoy beautiful things is a product of mindless evolution. In this case, it is something of a quirk. If the mutations of our ancestors had been a little different, we might think that piles of garbage were beautiful.”
 
If naturalism accepts any form of beauty, it is only due to evolution (a theory of unguided, natural processes), which states that any beauty has worth only as it furthers the health and fertility of our species. Yet, one can imagine our ancestors gazing at the beauty of a sunset and not noticing the approaching lion, thereby making beauty a detriment to survival. And if beauty aids survival, why don’t apes, dogs, or termites demonstrate some kind of appreciation or expression of beauty? Presumably they want to survive, too. Yet, animals survive just fine without beauty. Shouldn’t humans also be able to survive and thrive without beauty? Plus, we all recognize many beautiful things that have nothing to do with reproduction and survival. In short, naturalism fails to explain why objective beauty exists at all.
 
The Christian affirms objective beauty not because of naturalism but because of “super” naturalism – a spiritual perspective added to a scientific and philosophical framework. This represents the second and best option for explaining beauty:
a. If objective beauty exists, then a standard of beauty exists outside of ourselves.
b. Objective beauty does exist; therefore, a Creator established a standard of beauty.
 
God created all things and thus created that which is objectively beautiful. Human beings, created in God’s image, are given the unique ability to recognize, appreciate, and create beauty. We reflect God’s creative character in us. In this sense, beauty is indeed in the eye of the beholder, the Divine Beholder: God. As Helen Keller, born blind and deaf, so beautifully stated:
“The best and most beautiful things in the world cannot be seen or even touched - they must be felt with the heart.”

​Macro or micro. Big or small. Biggest or smallest.
 
In our previous article, we explored the macro – the Universe – the biggest, most vast expanse in all of existence. Despite it being at least 13.8 billion years old   and 92 billion light years across, we can still observe the Universe and measure its exquisite, fine-tuned design. This week, we peer inward, deeply inward, into the micro – molecular biology – and yet again we find exquisite, impossibly complex, fine-tuned design.
 
As we examine the building blocks of life, what are our options?
(a) Life originated because of random happenstance.
(b) Life originated because of finely tuned design.
​
If (a) is correct, then life has no ultimate meaning; we are merely a product of chemical and electrical impulses. If (b)  is correct, then something that is designed must have a designer, and if a Designer (God) exists, then life by definition possesses deep spiritual and metaphysical meaning beyond our mortal comprehension.
 
The development of electron microscopes in the early 1930s opened up a tiny world that previous scientists could not have imagined. The further we examine the realm of microscopic life, the more we discover astonishing complexity. 
 
For example, if you are walking along the beach and you see “Jacob loves Rachel” written in the sand, you don’t assume the waves wrote it. Even a short message of basic information such as this requires a mind to produce it. Natural forces do not create messages of information. And yet with DNA, a message 3.2 billion letters long resides in every one of the 40 trillion cells in the human body. DNA is genetic material that contains all the information about how a living thing looks and functions. Every cell of every living thing carries DNA. Even a one-cell amoeba has within it a volume of information equal to 1,000 large text books. If you stretch out all of the DNA strands in a human body, they would reach the Moon and back 200,00 times. That’s a lot  of information!
 
DNA is like an enormous computer code, and where there is a code there must be a coder, where there is a message there must be a messenger. Additionally, DNA doesn’t mutate to create new body types, and it represents positive evidence for an intelligent designer.
 
Consider also the flagellum, a hairlike “tail” that helps some cells and microorganisms move and swim. A bacterial flagellum, like a motor on a boat, is a type of rotating propeller attached to a drive shaft and motor fueled by a flow of acid. It is a remarkably complicated system of numerous different parts with specific functions that relate only to flagellum movement. Remove one of the 40 different proteins necessary for the construction and activity of a flagellum, or any of its unique parts, and it ceases to work  as intended. The odds of a flagellum emerging on its own by random chance were calculated to be virtually impossible, falling outside of the accepted boundaries of random probability. Either the flagellum is the result of an immense series of coincidences after coincidences, or it is by design.
 
Many other biological systems are equally or even more complex: the human eye, biochemistry of vision, blood clotting, cell membranes, antibodies, photosynthesis, and many more. All are composed of different parts that must come together in extremely intricate ways for the system to function properly. The more we discover about micro-complexity, the clearer it becomes that random chance simply cannot stand up to sustained scrutiny.
 
Yet, some scientists steadfastly refuse any other possibility beyond a random, natural (material) explanation for the origin of life. As Dr. Richard Lewontin, biologist & geneticist, asserts:
“We take the side of science in spite of the patent absurdity of some of its constructs, in spite of its failure to fulfill many of its extravagant promises of health and life, in spite of the tolerance of the scientific community for unsubstantiated just-so stories, because we have a prior commitment, a commitment to materialism…Moreover, that materialism is an absolute, for we cannot allow a Divine Foot in the door.”
 
Adding it all up, where to place our faith becomes clear. Biochemist, Michael Denton, sums it up well: “The complexity of the simplest known type of cell is so great   that it is impossible to accept that such an object could have been thrown together by some kind of freakish, vastly improbable, event. Such an occurrence would be indistinguishable from a miracle.”

​Consider a man walking – hundreds of years in the future. He pushes through a set of trees and sees a tremendous mountain. On the peak he beholds four giant faces as if they are emerging from the mountain itself. What should he assume? What would you assume? Did these four intricately detailed faces we know as Mount Rushmore come about by the natural process of rain and erosion? Of course not. That man and you would wonder, “Who designed and created such an impressive display?”
 
In our previous essay, we demonstrated that the Universe is not eternal (Big Bang evidence shows the Universe had a beginning), and that something cannot spring into existence out of absolute nothingness. As such, the best answer to the origin of our Universe is a designed beginning. At this stage in our exploration, we can also identify data that point to this Creator of the cosmos via the remarkable design within space.
 
In 2007, Antony Flew, one of the 20th century’s most prominent philosopher and atheist (a person who does not believe in God) stunningly announced that he now believed in God. In his thundering book, There Is a God, Flew stated his belief in a “divine Source” because it was the best answer to the evidence that had “emerged from science.” Following the Big Bang, as we look across the cosmos, we are faced with two options:

1. The cosmos came about by unguided, random chance.
2. The cosmos is designed, that signs of design are evident, and that these signs point to a Designer.

(It is important to also note that while there remains more than enough evidence of design in the Universe to infer a Designer (God), there is also evidence of some imperfection, deformity, decay, and disease. Later in this series, we will explore the characteristics of God and whether God and His creation are imperfect, or whether, as the Bible describes, there was a Fall or a corruption of God’s creation.)
 
What then is our evidence for an extraordinarily fine-tuned Universe that we can measure and study? Although much of cosmology and astrophysics can get very technical, consider this: If you gather all the stars, planets, moons, galaxies, nebulae, gas, and dust in the Universe, it makes up just .27% of the ingredients in the Universe. The rest is made up mostly of dark energy and dark matter (but don’t worry about what that is). The point being, if we were to change the total quantity of the ingredients in the Universe by just 1 part in 10122 there would be no possibility for life. That number is a 1 with 122 zeroes after it. That’s a big number, and that’s big fine tuning!

In other words, think of a gigantic muffin recipe that calls for enough flour to fill the entire volume of planet Earth. We all know how tiny a single grain of flour is. Consider this: If you were to add ONE GRAIN of flour or take away ONE GRAIN, the recipe would be ruined. That is how extraordinarily fine-tuned our Universe is and how mathematically impossible it is that creation came about by random chance.
 
Additionally, our Universe is expanding (stretching) and it has been since the beginning. However, if the rate of expansion one second after the Big Bang had been smaller by 1 part in a hundred thousand million, million, the Universe would have collapsed on itself. If the charge of an electron had been only slightly different, stars would have exploded. If the strength of gravity were changed by 1 part in ten thousand billion, billion, billion there would be no life-supporting world. The exact tilt of Earth’s axis, the position and characteristics of our Moon, the specific role of Jupiter, and many other precise factors all contribute to a perfect Universe for life. In short, our Universe displays truly remarkable, almost unfathomable, fine tuning. Only a Designer best explains such elegant and complex design.
 
Critics will counter with a theory known as the multiverse, the idea being that if you have enough universes beyond ours (a near infinite number), one is sure to randomly, and by pure chance, support life. However, multiverse remains only a theory supported by speculation and not by independent evidence. Is it wise to bet everything on such speculation and theory?
 
If we would never believe that the faces of Mount Rushmore were the result of random rain and erosion, then why would we ever believe our Universe randomly took shape to such a profoundly perfect degree? The science and the numbers don’t lie. The finely tuned aspects of our Universe remain truly extraordinary, and they only become more so as time and science have advanced. This is what Antony Flew meant when he said his faith relied on what had “emerged from science.” 

p.s. "Do You Know the Muffin Man" is a traditional English nursery rhyme referenced in the movie, "Shrek."

​The band Blind Faith (with Eric Clapton and Steve Winwood) produced some great music, but blind faith is a lousy way to think about God. From the ancient Israelites to all of us today, God doesn’t expect blind faith. We possess eyes to see, ears to hear, and a mind to think. Moses heard from God in a burning bush and saw the Lord’s mighty works, the disciples listened to Jesus’ preaching and witnessed his resurrection, and we are given additional reasons to believe through science, logic, and personal experience.
 
Certainly, belief in God’s existence requires faith and trust. However, God continues to reveal Himself in remarkable ways that tip the scales heavily in favor of belief. That’s why we are offering this bi-weekly series: to explore some of those reasons to believe. If you are a Christian, we hope to strengthen your discipleship. If you have not given God much thought, we hope to inspire you. If you have doubts, we hope to engage you. If you have been hurt by the church or hurt by Christians, we hope to help you heal. In all, we hope you’ll “Explore The Way” with us and even connect with us online for further exploration.
 
First, we start with the fundamental question, the first among questions. Before we can explore who God is, whether the Bible is trustworthy, or did Jesus really rise from the dead, we must ask why is there something instead of nothing; how and why are we here at all instead of a vast, dark nothingness? The moment something begins to exist, an explanation is expected. How and why did something such as our universe come into existence in the first place? If I look at a violin, I don’t assume that it “popped” into existence out of pure nothingness. I presume it began to exist (it had a beginning, it was created), and it had a beginner (it was caused to exist in the first place, a creator.)
 
Thus, the proposition follows:

1. Whatever begins to exist has a cause (a beginner).
2. The universe began to exist (via the Big Bang).
3. Therefore, the universe has a cause (the beginner, a.k.a. the first cause).

Either our universe has eternally existed, or it was caused to exist (it had a beginning). “Nothing” cannot create something because it is nothing – no thing! The universe had a beginning at the Big Bang, and thus if space, matter, and time had a beginning, then the beginner (the cause) must be spaceless, non-physical, powerful, and timeless (with no beginning). Sounds a lot like God! Does this proposition prove God exists? Perhaps not on its own, but this foundational proposition is the first piece of a large and extended family of evidence that makes the case for God’s existence and thus compels our attention.
 
Despite a belief in God as The First Beginner (the Uncaused First Cause), there clearly remains some mysteries of faith. For example, the two paintings of Jesus shown here. Both pieces show extra-ordinary technique…literally.
 
Akiane Kramarik grew up in a non-religious, non-churchgoing home. Yet, at the age of four, she said God encouraged her to draw and paint the visions she saw. By age seven, entirely self-taught, she completed her first painting, and just a year later she completed her favorite work, Prince of Peace (above). Is she simply an artistic savant? Perhaps. And yet, she describes remarkable spiritual experiences she had as a young child that inspired and gifted her with a kind of miraculous ability.
 
Science, logic, and personal experiences: God is not hidden, just veiled. God offers us glimpses, experiences, and evidence of His existence, and God reveals Himself in ways that fortify faith without halting our desire to pursue more of Him. Our call is to pursue and ponder what God reveals in order to believe and grow in faith – deep faith, but never blind faith. There are reasons to believe. When Blind Faith’s Eric Clapton and Steve Winwood sang, “Can’t find my way home,” we can imagine Jesus responding, “Yes, you can. Follow me.”