Hiro, DVR, and a different perspective on the creation narrative

Recently, during a question and answer session at a college gathering, the question of creation vs. evolution came up and I'm not really sure what triggered it, but the character Hiro Nakamura and my DVR remote came to mind when I begin to try to understand the creation narrative. I guess the reason they both came to mind is that one of the major conflicts between creation vs. evolution is the argument that all of the geographical patterns seem to indicate that the earth was formed over a much longer time than a simple 24 hour day that is referenced in the Genesis account (and even then, I'm not sure that the word for 'day' in Genesis is specifically giving a specific amount of hours but that is a different argument altogether).

First of all, let me say that I don't doubt for a minute that God could have spoken the world into existence and in the time that it takes to exhale, the world was. God is big enough to do that and that is the bottom line of all of this...He did it. But I also think that our understanding of the whole argument is laden with assumptions and this is where the randomness of Hiro and the DVR remote come into play.

If you don't watch the show, Heroes, I need to explain the character Hiro to you. Hiro is a character who has the power to teleport back and forth through time but he also has the ability to stop time and move freely while the rest of the world is frozen in suspended animation. Basically, it's like Hiro has a DVR remote for life and he can simply hit the pause button and everything that is live pauses.

When we think about time and creation, we assume that God is bound and exists within it. We assume that during the 24 hour day of creation, God was bound by that time period....but what if God was making the earth and simply said "time out"? He could have taken eternity to make the earth (because He is eternal) and when He was done, he could simply hit the 'play' button and time would resume and the earth would be formed and by all scientific specifications, created in a twenty four hour time period...or less. I can just see God walking around the earth as it is frozen and hovering in space; studying it, molding it, shaping it, becoming small enough to walk on it's mountains, and then becoming big enough to reshape the very same mountains with His fingers. I think it would be consistent with God's revealed nature to say that He savored every moment of creating everything. He pondered and poured over every bit of it. And it could have happened in a moment and in a millenium all at once because He is God.

I think it can be helpful to wrestle with the whole question of 'creation vs. evolution' but I also think it is very pointless from a human perspective. There is so much information that we don't have. We can barely grasp the things that God has revealed directly to us about who He is, how in the world could we ever comprehend the things that He doesn't deem necessary to explain(and for our own good I'm sure). He simply tells us that He created all of it in six days and my guess is that He tells us in this way with those words because it is in terms that we can understand but I also believe that those words are exactly and fully true.

The Navy Seal Trident and Phillipians 1:18-30

I like to think that if I had not gone into ministry that I might have ended up in the military. I even like to convince myself that I might have even been special forces material....yes, delusions of grandeur, I know. These delusions were quickly shattered when I recently read a book written by a former Navy Seal who was the only survivor left from his Seal Team after a battle in Afghanistan. In the book, the author talks about the training process that Navy Seals have to go through to become a Seal and I realized that....well, I'm a panzy and I wouldn't have made it. The sleep deprivation alone would have caused me to "ring the bell" and give up (not to mention, cry like a girl the entire time).
The author then went on to describe the honor and the privilege that it was for a Seal to be able to wear the Trident badge that is only awarded to those who have come through the fire of Seal Training. He explained that only those who wear the Trident could truly appreciate its meaning and worth.

After listening to a message at our church on Sunday, I realized that the truths in the Bible are very much like the Seal Trident....allow me to explain.

This past week, a church planter spoke at our church. Just after accepting the call to move from Florida to Syracuse, NY to plant a church, He and his wife received very bad news. His wife had been diagnosed with a very aggressive form of cancer and her chances of survival were not good. They decided to follow God's call on their lives anyway and moved to Syracuse. This past summer, she passed away and He was left with four young children and a church in its infancy stage.

As He spoke this past Sunday, I very quickly understood that he knew things about suffering for the cause of Christ that very few do. He spoke from Phillipians 1:18-30 where Paul talks about his hope that God will use his sufferings for the cause of Christ. I have to think that when this church planter reads this passage, he understands the true gravity and depth of what Paul is talking about. He not only knows what it means, but he has experienced, at least in part, what it takes to be able to pen such words. This passage would be his Trident badge. He has walked and is walking through this fire and he is and will come through it victoriously.

it kinda makes me wonder...up to this point in my life, what "badges" of scripture could I wear because I have truly experienced the weight and gravity of their truth?

A Beautiful Accent

"What shall we say, then? Shall we go on sinning so that grace may increase? By no means! We died to sin; how can we live in it any longer? Or don't you know that all of us who were baptized into Christ Jesus were baptized into his death? We were therefore buried with him through baptism into death in order that, just as Christ was raised from the dead through the glory of the Father, we too may live a new life." NIV Bible.

Yesterday, after our church service, I had the opportunity to spend some time in conversation with a man who was baptized in our service. He had moved to the United States from Scotland and he spoke with a beautiful Scottish brogue that reaked of masculinity and history. His accent made me feel as if I were talking to someone from another time and place and I secretly wished that I had an accent like his. He told me the story of how God had changed his life.....so much so, that he was now out of a job.....allow me to explain.

Before coming to know Christ, my new friend was a salesman. Apparently, he was a very good salesman and based on his own telling, had no problem decieving or shortchanging a customer in order to get the sale. After recieving Christ, he found that he could no longer ignore his conscience (apparently, the Holy Spirit speaks much louder than the unredeemed conscience) and started telling customers the truth about the product that he was selling. The company that he was working for did not like the fact that he was actually looking out for the customer and they eventually fired him.

I have to be honest, it was so refreshing to hear his story because in our American christian culture, I don't hear stories like his enough. It wasn't like he was trying to make some grandiose "stand" for Jesus. He just simply could not be deceptive any longer, even at the risk of losing his job, because he was truly a new creature acting out of a new nature.

I am so glad that my friend has come to Christ in America but I hope that he does not assimilate too deeply into the American christian culture because if he does, he may learn the fine art of compartmentalization and learn to say things like "well, that's just the business and that's how it's done" or "this is just a necessary part of sales and everyone knows that exaggerating and telling half truths is what a salesman is supposed to do".

I pray that my new friend's beautiful accent will never diminish and that it will be symbollic of a life that people envy because it reminds them of the reality that there truly is another time and another place to be lived for.

A New Currency

Matthew 25:34-36 "Then the King will say to those on his right, 'Come, you who are blessed by my Father; take your inheritance, the kingdom prepared for you since the creation of the world. For I was hungry and you gave me something to eat, I was thirsty and you gave me something to drink, I was a stranger and you invited me in, I needed clothes and you clothed me, I was sick and you looked after me, I was in prison and you came to visit me.'" New International Version Bible



The value of the "almighty" dollar seems to be not so "almighty" these days. Because of the current state of the U.S. economy, the value of dollar fluctuates frequently and there is much conversation of moving to a new global currency. All of this serves as a sobering reminder that cash, in and of itself, is only a symbol of value. It was designed to be a representation of the assets that we actually have, not the asset itself.



Strangely enough, our current monetary system has greatly influenced the way I think about giving. Most of the time, when I think about giving, I am immediately frustrated because I can't give as much as I would like to give due to the amount of dollars that I have in the bank. Does the dollar amount in my bank account truly represent what I am able to give? I don't really have an oppinion about whether the global financial system should move away from the dollar but I may need to personally consider a new form of currency.



In Matthew 25, Jesus gives a picture of what exemplary giving looks like and it is definitely not limited to money. If you are going to feed someone or give them something to drink, it might cost you a little bit of money but it will also cost you something else. If you want to clothe someone or take them into your house, you may incur a small financial expense but it will cost you even more in another form of currency. To take care of someone who is sick and to visit someone in prison will probably not cost you a whole lot of money but will require a very costly investment of one of your most valuable resources...your time.



This thought has become very liberating for me. I don't have to limit my giving to the money that I have in my bank account (don't get me wrong, that does not get me off of the hook of constantly streamlining my finances so that I can give as much money as possible). This especially becomes applicable when I think about using the "handy man" skills that I have recently been learning. How much money could I save a family that is living below the poverty line if I am able to go in and make substantial improvements to the physical structure of their house? If I go over and take care of a bathroom plumbing problem for the widow in my neighborhood, how much money have I given her now that she will not have to pay the expense of having a plumber come to her house? When I think about giving in this light, the possibilities grow limitless. The financial equivalent of what I can potentially give becomes exponential regardless of the current state of the "sometimes mighty dollar".

Carousels and Comparisons

Recently, I was standing alongside my three year old son as he was riding the carousel in the food court of our local mall. As we were going round and round, Zach looked at the kids on the horses behind us and said with a sly little grin, "we're beating them". I love the way that boy thinks. Not only were we beating them, but there is no possibility of them ever threatening our position. He is already turning out to be an eternal optimist. He wasn't comparing his position to the kids ahead of him with whom he could never catch up, he was comparing his position to the kids behind him. That's a smart kid.

I think for a three year old, comparing his position on a carousel to others is innocent and cute. The problem is that many of us, in our spiritual journey, continue that habit and it becomes something altogether different. We either go before God with a heart of complaint because of who is ahead of us on the carousel or we allow ourselves to get really puffed up because we look behind us to see how many people we are beating. I wonder if, while we whip our plastic horses so that they'll speed up, God is up in Heaven shouting, "It's not a race! It's a ride....would you just learn to enjoy the ride!"

90 degree angles

Genesis 1:14-18 "and God said, 'Let there be lights in the expanse of the sky to separate the day from the night, and let them serve as signs to mark seasons and days and years, and let them be lights in the expanse of the sky to give light on the earth.' And it was so. God made two great lights - the greater light to govern the day and the lesser light to govern the night. He also made the stars. God set them in the expanse of the sky to give light on the earth, to govern the day and the night, and to seperate light from darkness. And saw that it was good." The NIV Bible

I have recently been learning the construction trade from a friend of mine. I work for him on Fridays with jobs that he is being hired for and on Saturdays, he comes over and helps me with some re-modeling projects that I am doing at my house. Through this learning process, I have come to understand how crucially important the 90 degree angle is to quality construction. Every wall should be perfectly perpendicular to the floor and every board should be perdendicular to the one that it is nailed. Pretty much everything that is built hinges in some way on the use of this angle. Let me re-phrase that...everything that is built by man hinges on the 90 degree angle.

In my obsession with the ninety degree angle, I was struck by a profound realization. I could hardly find anything that God has created that uses ninety degree angles. I don't see them in trees, clouds, grass, humans, animals....I just don't see them. I guess somewhere in creation there may be a ninety degree angle but for the most part, you just don't see a lot of hard angles or even straight lines for that matter.

The things that God makes just seem to explode into place with free movement and life. Trees look as if bark, branch, and leaf just erupted out of the ground. Mountains have a rugged unsubmissiveness to any appearance of order and symetry....and humans, I can't really explain what we look like accept that we are a beautifully raw mix of order, chaos, and symmetry that is still entirely organic.

It's funny how man applies hard angles and lines to pretty much everything we put our hands to. When man makes something, it almost always devolves into industry with smoke and fire and regulatory specifications. (I say 'almost always' because there will always be the artists among us). When man puts his hand to religion, it becomes a system of rules and regulations with sub-rules and sub-regulations created by committees and sub-committees.

With God it's just different. Everything that God makes resembles......life. Each creation has its own pattern and it's own chaos that is submitted only to its Creator. Even the 'religion' (or the title that men with angles and lines would give to it) that God has given us to know Him is organic and relational and wild. Jesus clearly stated why He came when he said "I have come so that you may have life and have it more abundantly" and He lived a life for us to model that was undomesticated and beautiful and perfectly organic....and he was a carpenter by trade. I wonder what his take would be on the ninety degree angle?

Greatness

Recently, I have been wrestling with the issue of greatness. More specifically, wondering if God will use my life to accomplish some great thing and what that great thing is. Amazingly (I know I shouldn't be amazed...but I was) on the very day that I was journaling about that question...God answered it through a friend that I had just met. He was sharing his story and mentioned a very obscure passage of scripture that God had used in his life.

The passage is Genesis 5:24 "Enoch walked with God and he was no more, for God took him", New American Standard Version.

That's all it says but it spoke volumes to me as soon as I heard it. It doesn't speak of brave and heroic feats of faith or even benevolent acts of sacrifice....it just says that Enoch walked with God. What if for the rest of my life, all I do is walk with God? In Enoch's case, it was apparently enough to please God so much that he couldn't stand not having Enoch in His physical presence....so he just took Him. There are very few great men in the Bible who achieved that distinctive honor. In fact, the only other members of the "ascension club" are Elijah and ...Jesus. Everyone else got into God's presence the old fashioned way.

To be honest, it really takes the pressure off. But, I have also realized that I have just simply become aware of something that has been in front of me all along. When describing God's approval or dissaproval, Jesus uses phrases like "depart from me, I never knew you" or "well done, my good and FAITHFUL servant". These phrases are relational in nature. The "great things" that were done throughout the Bible were simply acts of obedience to the voice of God and that voice was recognized only because the hearer's had been walking with God.

The simplicity of this truth is so freeing for someone like me who is 35 years old and is on the verge of a mini-midlife crisis. Up to this point, I have walked with God as best as I know how, and as far as I know, I am where He has called me to be. I may or may not accomplish some "great thing" by the world's standards (and even by Sunday School standards) but I'm not responsible for that. I am simply called to walk with God and if that's all I do for the rest of my life, then that will be my "great thing" and I will get to hear words reserved for people who do great things...."well done, my good and faithful servant".