The Known World

THE SPEED OF LIFE

2010-08-23T04:16:11Z

PERCEIVING TIME

So the evening and the morning were the first day. – Genesis 1:5b

It may be easily overlooked that God created not only matter and energy, but also nonmaterial realities such as human will, and time itself. The first day was in fact the first day—we can try to think of God existing for eons “before” the creation, yet technically this is not so. It is not that He existed for a long, fixed amount of time, or even for an infinite time: He (Father, Son, and Spirit) just was, outside of time altogether. Indeed, Daniel, in his future vision, called Christ the “Ancient of Days,” and John reminds us, echoing the Genesis 1:1 declaration, that God was “in the beginning,” as was Christ, by whom “all things were made” (John 1:2-3). Even today, time is something that God “sees” all at once, such that He is notconstrained by it: “Known to God from eternity are all His works” (Acts 15:18).

By contrast, we are so inexorably held within time that we cannot really comprehend this. So we perceive life as a series of events or opportunities (Greek kairos) that must play out, in which we take part consciously, overlaid on the ongoing ticking of measurable time (Greek chronos). We attempt to mark this passage with the help of Earth’s rotation and the Sun, conveniently divided into hours, minutes and seconds. Although our experience and memories of life come more in the kairos sense, we nonetheless feel compelled, curiously enough, to clock out our lives beyond sunup and sundown, through the creative use of mechanical or electronic devices. Ultimately, time is now standardized by the vibration frequency of the cesium-133 isotope (the official standard for the second is 9,192,631,770 vibrations of this trusty metallic element).

Though sunrises are an intuitive-enough way to mark out our time, there is actually quite of bit of astronomy and mathematics in defining the actual length of a solar day (knowing this precise duration was required before the cesium-133 standard could be established). If days were based literally on Earth’s rotation (sidereal time, with respect to distant stars rather than the Sun), they would actually be 23 hours, 56 minutes, and 4.091 seconds each. But because Earth travelsaround the sun in a curved path, in the same direction in which Earth rotates, it has to rotate a bit more than 360 degrees to “catch up” to the same sunrise position, which takes closer to 24 hours. Still, because the orbit is elliptical (not exactly circular), the actual solar day varies throughout the year. There are in fact only four days per year exactly 24 hours in length. Thus, the 24-hour day (7,942,433,844,928,000 vibrations of cesium-133, if you must know) is actually the mean (average) solar day. Then there are also issues of leap-time adjustments and the precession of the equinoxes when it comes to defining calendars and seasons, but I will leave it at that.

In the living out of time through both event-oriented kairos perception and meticulously metered chronos, we note that our perception of time changes. We think of an “endless” wait in line, or of the Christmas that “flew by.” I think of my own children, or my students, who will graduate high school in just a few years, and I think of how quickly the previous few years went by. They, of course, perceive it differently, with each year experienced so uniquely and with so much that is new. I have thought that it is very much true that time flies more when we are older, and here is why: For me, the past year was a mere 2.3% of my entire life, whereas for my teenage children, the past year comprised over 7% of their lives. So literally, they lived three times more of their chronos time this past year than I did! We can’t reflect on the past year in light of the years to come, only on what has transpired, so this is how it is.

David, in humility, recognized the disconnect between God’s limitless perception and our limited one, speaking aloud his prayer: “Lord, make me to know my end, and what is the measure of my days, that I may know how frail I am. Indeed, you have made my days as handbreaths, and my age is as nothing before you. Certainly every man at his best state is but vapor” (Psalm 39:4-5). James echoed the thought: “…you do not know what will happen tomorrow. For what is your life? It is even a vapor that appears for a little time and then vanishes away” (James 4:14).

Before I consider any further this important matter of properly perceiving our lives in time, I would like to ponder how this enigma of time might be experienced by other creatures. I do not suppose that most creatures reflect on their lives much, or pine for days gone by or days to come. But I do think that with any degree of consciousness comes some perception of time, and this must be a unique property of each kind. For example, the National Geographic video Seasons in the Sea includes a time-lapse segment of sea star (starfish) interaction. It keenly notes that in “real time,” these creatures appear to be resting, with any motions appearing miniscule or purposeless. Yet in the time lapse, a truly social interaction emerges, with the creatures moving and interacting intentionally. If sea stars perceived chronos as we do, they would have to be immensely patient and focused, sticking to the plan of where to go and what to do next. I cannot help but think that for these creatures, life is perceived for them as in the time lapse for us. Perhaps it is a type of slow-speed consciousness (“slow” as compared to us at least, but normal for them). By contrast, think of the house fly that zig-zags frantically,occasionally pausing, but even then rapidly twitching its legs. To us, its two-to-four week lifespan is pure frenzy, but perhaps it “thinks” faster than we do, perceiving life at a pace less-frenzied for itself. Of course, there is no way to know what it is like to perceive life as a fly without becoming one, and even then, there would be no way to compare without a dual fly-human consciousness, and my mind is boggled even considering that one.

A clever scene in the animated movie Over the Hedge played around with this idea of perception. Hammy the hyperactive squirrel (as all squirrels appear to be) is given an energy drink, and proceeds on a backyard mission of mischief toward humans, all while retrieving a cookie. But after his drink, and before he heads out, an image is shown of Earth’s rotation slowing, as Hammy’s friends begin moving in slow motion. Hammy’s mission is no frenzy to him, as he saunters around, turns on a security system, avoids the lasers, retrieves the cookie, moves a garden gnome, and exits at his “normal” speed.

Do we believe that starfish and squirrels really perceive life with sluggishly disciplined patience and hyper chaotic frenzy, respectively? Or does biological perception of time—even chronos—vary by kind? Does the dragonfly, living the way it does for several years, live more or less of a perceived life span than a sea star at 35 years? And to what extent are our own years filled? Whether it be our changing perception of chronos, or the myriad of significant kairos events within that, we might do well to be less concerned about the years we will get, and more mindful of how much opportunity and richness of experience God provides in our earthly lives.

The key, I believe, is somewhat of a paradox: We must live in the present, with eternal mindset, what Paul Tillich called the “eternal now.” It is not about living in the past or the future, but in Christ. When God established the first day, and fashioned the Sun on the fourth to mark out this period for us and his creatures, the point was not to send us on an adventure of defining the solar day and dividing it up. Rather, it was to give us a wider perception of the present than the actual thin, elusive line that it is in the chronos sense. While each literal instant vanishes into the past before we can think about our being in it, by extension, the day can be our attainable “moment.” Paul admonished, “See then that you walk circumspectly, not as fools, but as wise, redeeming the time [kairos], because the days are evil” (Ephesians 5:15-16). Sure, the era in which we live is enshrouded in evil, as are the years, months, weeks, hours, and minutes. But it is the day with which we must be concerned. When Jesus told his disciples not to worry, He put tomorrow off limits, as something that we can never truly experience! Somewhat humorously, he told them “…tomorrow will worry about itself.” And then, on the mark, He declared “Each day has enough trouble of its own” (Matthew 6:34).

Perhaps we worry too much about time, and are thus concerned too little with opportunity. Our natural life is short, but our regenerated life is eternal, couched in the timeless, everlasting God. By recognizing that all we now have is today, for Christ and in Christ, we have all the time we need.

Why should I fear in the days of evil, When the iniquity at my heels surrounds me? Those who trust in their wealth And boast in the multitude of their riches, none of them can by any means redeem his brother, nor give to God a ransom for him—for the redemption of their souls is costly, And it shall cease forever—that he should continue to live eternally, and not see the Pit.

For he sees wise men die; Likewise the fool and the senseless person perish, And leave their wealth to others. Their inner thought is that their houses will last forever, Their dwelling places to all generations; They call their lands after their own names. Nevertheless man, though in honor, does not remain; He is like the beasts that perish. This is the way of those who are foolish, and of their posterity who approve their sayings. Like sheep they are laid in the grave; Death shall feed on them; The upright shall have dominion over them in the morning; And their beauty shall be consumed in the grave, far from their dwelling.

But God will redeem my soul from the power of the grave, For He shall receive me. – Psalms 49:5-15

RESPONDING TO STRESS

2010-07-13T07:04:33Z

RESILIENCY AND COMPLIANCE

My brethren, count it all joy when you fall into various trials, knowing that the testing of your faith produces patience. But let patience have its perfect work, that you may be perfect and complete, lacking nothing. – James 1:2-4

From time to time, we experience circumstances that require us to “bounce back.” Life’s collisions come in many forms, whether failure, a personal attack, or an unpleasant circumstance. While James encourages us to recruit such trials as opportunities, Peter also adds that we should actually expect these, rather than regarding “fiery trials” as strange (1 Peter 4:12-13). This is a component of Christian maturity: recognizing that we are to cultivate character rather than to crave comfort. But how can we be so resilient in a world that defeats and demoralizes so many? And is resilience always beneficial?

In the physics of materials, resiliency is the capacity for a substance to recover its shape when deformed by stress. The stress may be compressive (such as a basketball striking the floor), or tensile (such as a bungee cord being pulled to secure a load), and causes a strain, meaning that it is shortened or elongated relative to its resting position. If, on a graph, one plots the stress against the strain, there is, up to a point, a direct (straight line) correlation. One can regard this either as the stress causing the strain, or as the strain storing up a reactive stress in order to restore the material when the stress is removed. This straight line slope, the ratio of change in stress to change in strain, is known as “Young’s Modulus” for a material. It is described as a force per cross-sectional area, much like a pressure (in pounds per square inch, or psi). A steep slope indicates a high Young’s Modulus value, meaning that a large stress is required to cause a small strain, or again one might think conversely that a very small strain generates a very large reactive stress for restoration. A very rigid material thus has a high Y value: Copper has a value of 17 million psi, whereas steel produces 29 million psi, tungsten 59 million psi, and diamond, the hardest known material, over 150 million psi. More “elastic” materials such as nylon only provide a Y value of 0.29 to 0.58 million psi (290,000 to 580,000), and rubber’s value is in the low thousands: extremely elastic.

Interestingly, though, the Y value for a material is a measure of ridigity, which is not the only path to resilience. Both rubber and steel recover to their original shapes after the deforming force is removed. So we find that resilience can be accomplished in two diverse ways: by giving a lot, or by giving a little, as long as the material is not permanently deformed. It is possible for some hard materials (such as lead) or soft materials (like clay or wet chewing gum) to be moved quickly beyond their straight-line stress-to-strain behavior, such that they begin to deform more easily and, soon after, permanently. This property is compliance, the opposite of resiliency. Compliance basically means that the straight-line portion of the graph does not persist for very long, yet the material remains intact, without fracture, even as it is deformed further. If something is very compliant, it undergoes “plastic deformation” through a very long rightmost portion of the graph.

Now it would seem that resiliency is an admirable characteristic for an individual to have, and that different individuals can recover from hardships in different ways. The stoic person, like steel, is strong and seemingly immovable: life’s adverse ammunition seems to just bounce off. I think of the toughness of Paul, who rolled up his sleeves in serving up the gospel message: “We are hard pressed on every side, yet not crushed; we are perplexed, but not in despair; persecuted, but not forsaken; struck down, but not destroyed…” (2 Corinthians 4:8-9). But the emotional, artistic person, like rubber, can be equally as resilient, deeply affected by circumstances, yet bouncing back nonetheless. I think of David, whose prayers were often a combination of calling out to God while talking himself through the circumstance: “Why are you cast down, O my soul? And why are you disquieted within me? Hope in God; For I shall yet praise Him, The help of my countenance and my God” (Psalm 42:5,11, 43:5).

But is such resiliency, which we might call strength of character, always good? For both Paul and David, their different manners of response nonetheless had in common that their strength and hope was in the Lord. In this manner, resiliency is admirable. Yet if one is strong without the Lord, this instead is self-sufficiency, which is deceitfully empty. The person strong without the Lord is preserving himself or herself, surely enough, but it is the flesh—worldliness—that is being sustained. So what is the mechanism by which a person is beneficially deformed—that is, transformed, or shaped—so that he or she will not bounce back into a lifestyle, character, or mindset that is deficient of what he or she should be?

That mechanism is compliance, and there are three ways that compliance can be accomplished. The first two are the difficult ways: If something is rigid, it can be made compliant with enough pressure. Rigid metals are indeed “malleable,” but take their new shapes only through immense forces, being stamped out with a yet harder die, or rolled out, or hammered, or inscribed. If something is elastic, it can be made compliant through heat, allowing its molecules to be “reset” in a new position. Sometimes it takes great pressure or heat, figuratively, to bring about a necessary change in us. It is not always preferable to bounce back, but instead to be altered. When we recognize this, we can, through a small yielding of the spirit, become a new material—something entirely compliant. This is the third and least difficult mechanism of change: becoming as wet clay before God. After all, this is what we were in our initial formation: A person does not resist being fashioned from a single cell in his mother’s womb. Our early lives were all about compliance, until the sinful condition began emerging in our wills.

So are we to be steel, rubber, or clay? The answer lies not only in our temperament, but in the context of what we are responding to. With regard to the stresses and influences of the world, we are to be resilient, “steadfast, immovable, always abounding in the work of the Lord” (1 Corinthians 15:58). “You are of God, little children, and have overcome them, because He who is in you is greater than he who is in the world” (1 John 4:4). We are to put on the armor of God (Ephesians 6:11-18). And in this resilience toward worldliness, we must maintain compliance toward God: “Therefore submit to God. Resist the devil and he will flee from you” (James 4:7). We are to be resilient toward lies, whether as steel or as rubber, but compliant toward truth, like clay. It is too easy to get these backwards, becoming naturally resilient toward God himself, resisting change on one hand, while behaving with compliance toward worldliness and allowing destructive molding on the other. Hard-heartedness toward God requires a painful working of pressure or etching just to become affected. Jeremiah 17:1 notes that due to this condition, “the sin of Judah is written with a pen of iron; With the point of a diamond it is engraved on the tablet of their heart….”

By contrast, Isaiah 64:8 declares “But now, O LORD, You are our Father; We are the clay, and You our potter; And all we are the work of Your hand.” Jeremiah experienced this in a first-hand object lesson:

Then I went down to the potter’s house, and, behold, he wrought a work on the wheels. And the vessel that he made of clay was marred in the hand of the potter: so he made it again another vessel, as seemed good to the potter to make it. Then the word of the LORD came to me, saying, “O house of Israel, cannot I do with you as this potter?” saith the LORD. “Behold, as the clay is in the potter’s hand, so are ye in mine hand, O house of Israel.” – Jeremiah 18:3-6

To be reworked and reformed as clay is not glamorous, and flies in the face of the self-made-man ethic—the worldly view of greatness or strength. The “selfish ambition” that Paul decries (Philippians 1:16, 2:3) is admirable to many, and is so because it invites admiration. But when we are molded as God desires, the admiration is moved from the material to the One who fashioned it. In the very passage mentioned earlier, in which Paul declared his resilience in the Lord’s strength, he first spoke of the treasure of the glory of God: “…we have this treasure in jars of clay to show that this all-surpassing power is from God and not from us…” (2 Corinthians 4:7, NIV).

So we can, and must be, resilient—in the world but “not of the world” (John 15:19, 17:14,16). This is ensured by our walking in the Spirit of God’s truth, though it is a growth and conditioning process. An oak tree limb loaded by its own weight, and perhaps the additional mass of a tree house, will actually grow its cells to different lengths to create a sort of compressive arch within the wood, making it yet stronger for the future. Similarly, bones take shape over time based on the way we use the attached muscles, becoming specialized to resist compression. Concrete can be “pre-stressed” with cables so that it has greater tensile strength that it would otherwise have. And by pummeling the surface of an automobile spring with tiny wire pieces (shot peening, as shown above) or pounding a sword with a round hammer (ball peening), surface irregularities create lateral stresses that resist surface fracture more than if these surfaces were smooth. All the evil in life that we must deal with does indeed “have its perfect work,” when we are patient, even when it pummels, presses, or pock-marks us up.

Yet concurrently we must be compliant—being “transformed by the renewing of our mind” (Romans 12:2). Our toughness through God should melt like wax before God.

Is this test hard?

2010-07-13T07:04:10Z

I get the question from one student most of the times that I hand out an exam in class. I usually give the smart-alec response “No, it’s on paper, which is fairly soft.” Then after the student rolls his eyes and asks more properly if the test is difficult, I continue in my sassiness by stating “If it wasn’t, it wouldn’t be a test.”

This month’s essay deals with that all-important testing in our life that we call “stress.” We simply cannot live without it, but because we know how it can affect us adversely, we tend to give it a bad connotation. We sometimes wish all our tests could be easy, but what would that accomplish? The question from us should not be “Do I have to take this?” or “Is this test hard?”, but rather “What does this produce in me or reveal about me?”

Please have a read and enjoy July’s write. Comments are welcome!

June is water under the bridge

2010-07-01T05:05:08Z

Well my monthly essay streak has been broken. Essay #18 for June didn’t get written just yet. I’m working on a piece about resiliency and compliance…how we can choose to respond to life’s challenges much in the same way as materials do. So its a bit of a physics materials primer with some creative application. But it ain’t on the way just yet. June was a great month, so that’s okay…the writing will continue yet.

THE FUTILE QUEST FOR THE MEANINGLESS

2010-05-26T05:05:16Z

RANDOMNESS, DETERMINATION, AND WILL

The lot is cast into the lap, but its every decision is from the LORD. – Proverbs 16:33

Youth today often refer to each other’s bizarre, out -of-place behavior as “random,” usually as a compliment. Yet randomness is actually quite sophisticated and elusive. If asked for a random number from one to ten, your choice is not likely to be random, because you might consider what others are choosing, or perhaps rule out “1” or “10” because, as the limits, they seem less random. Or you might rule out “5” because it is right in the middle (even though “6” is just as much in the middle). Or maybe you are partial to even numbers, or the elegance of the number “3” or “7”, or maybe you have fond memories of your eighth birthday. And finally, you may consider what you chose the last time someone requested such a number.

As creatures designed to live with purpose, in a purposeful, orderly universe, randomness is surprisingly difficult to create or identify. One researcher has even devised a challenge: assign one hundred coin flips in a row (heads or tails, you choose each time), as randomly as possible. And interestingly, it is very difficult to generate a sequence that is statistically random. In other words, his computer program can tell the difference between your virtual coin flips and real coin flips. More technically, our lack of randomness is exposed by our ratio of heads to tails, number and length of runs, and “serial dependencies” or “autocorrelations” (apparently a stupid coin understands these better).

As another example of the elusiveness of randomness, consider the nighttime sky. Star distribution appears rather random but it is far from it. And yet the non-uniform clustering of the visible universe, as imaged by our best telescopes, is anything but a predictable pattern either. I thought about this on two occasions when I had to peel glow-in-the-dark stars off of the ceilings of bedrooms. The children that had lived in those rooms had tried to create a little nighttime sky scene, but it simply did not look realistic. The same goes for teepee mountain drawings and attempts at something as “simple” as a cloud outline. Our attempts at randomness are usurped by the inherent order of things, or our own imposition of order of a different or simpler kind.

According to random.org, true random numbers are at a premium for drawings, lotteries, games, and applications in science, art, and music, and these must be generated in sophisticated ways that even a home computer cannot provide. The website, run by the School of Computer Science and Statistics at Trinity College in Dublin, Ireland, utilizes real-time “atmospheric noise” to generate true random numbers. These researchers do a pretty good job of explaining the difference between true randomness and pseudo-random numbers, and provide further discussion and links into the higher physics and philosophy of the whole concept. An excellent article in Wired magazine in August of 2003 also elaborated on the science and philosophy of randomness, along the way concluding that “true randomness is a stern taskmaster.”

So why would left-brained physicists, statisticians, and computer scientists want to get all philosophical about the very definition and existence of randomness? Perhaps because the deeper one gets into the topic, the more vexing questions it raises about the nature of free-will versus determinism. The basic argument goes something like this: If all outcomes ultimately have a cause, and that cause had a prior cause, and so on, then are not all events predetermined, including so-called “free will”? Or, conversely, if one believes in free will—truly free will—then one’s choices are not predetermined by anything, and thus are ultimately random. At least that is how the thing is often framed. Either conclusion, however, tells us we live a meaningless existence.

Now, if you are student of Scripture, you know the immense importance of human will, alongside God’s will, sovereignty, omniscience, and omnipotence. Age-old lines between Christian denominations are still drawn from this mutually-exclusive supposition: predestination or free will. We seem to think that one must either demote God and exalt human will, or exalt God and demote humans to robotic participation. Since God’s Word is accurate, exacting, and illuminating, we must reject the idea that it presents a false dichotomy in which we must choose “which side of Scripture” we fall on. So we should explore this further to make sense of it. To do so, I would like to consider the nature of randomness by examining its opposite: predictability.

If something is truly random, then it is completely unpredictable. So, suppose a truly random (as claimed) list of numbers was generated through random.org’s atmospheric noise algorithm, and written down for later use. That list would now become a pseudo-random list, because even though it was at once random, it is now known and predictable to whatever agency makes use of it. If I randomize a classroom student list, and bring it to school the next day for the purpose of putting kids into workgroups, the list is no longer truly random (particularly to me), but predictable (and I am likely to modify it somewhat after I see it anyway). Or, I could assign students based on an arbitrary criterion such as the fourth letter in their names. The result would appear random to them, but I would know otherwise. Now consider further the atmospheric noise from which random.org generates its values. This phenomenon is not predictable to the average person, and even though an informed physicist could in theory—with enough information and computing power—predict its outcomes, it is clearly not predictable due to its amazingly complex array of causes. Yet atmospheric noise is predictable to God—and not just because He knows it, but because He does it—and so to Him it is not truly random! And thus we find strangely that randomness can be described by degrees of predictability. As such, randomness is not an inherent property of an event or series of events, but a function of how well the events are understood. It may thus be that nothing is ultimately random (from God’s perspective), and that anything could be sufficiently random (from human perspective).

Still, most attempts to define the universe as a deterministic machine, or conversely as a chaotic system, are looking exclusively at physical processes. When we consider the very real entity of “will,” and the fluidity of nonmaterial causes (e.g. prayer), then all that is not random is not necessarily determined. Consider the theological worldview of “deism” as discussed in a previous essay. This views God as the one who created and set all in motion, including laws and principles which govern in the present, while Himself remaining detached and uninvolved in the present. This misconception of God allows for two extremes in the perception of randomness. In one deistic perspective, God predetermined everything through the initial conditions and laws he originated, such that when He stepped away, nothing could be truly random, and neither would there exist true free will. At the other extreme of deism, God only makes the laws and is not so intentional or even knowledgeable about outcomes, such that randomness exists (even from God’s perspective), and human will is the only directive, possibly itself random. So it seems that these historical divisions in the church may have emerged from deism’s detrimental influence. On the contrary, if we regard God as actively involved in the present, in which natural laws are merely descriptions of His typical modes of operation, then we know a world in which God is sovereign and purposeful, even while interacting with the human will and complexity of outcomes:

Now He who searches the hearts knows what the mind of the Spirit is, because He makes intercession for the saints according to the will of God. And we know that all things work together for good to those who love God, to those who are the called according to His purpose. For whom He foreknew, He also predestined to be conformed to the image of His Son, that He might be the firstborn among many brethren. Moreover whom He predestined, these He also called; whom He called, these He also justified; and whom He justified, these He also glorified. – Romans 8:27-30

So, rather than an “either-or” or even a “both-and” proposition, the question of randomness and determination is a “neither -completely” issue. By this I mean that 1) nothing is truly random, only “sufficiently random” for various human applications and our limited human understanding, and 2) all is not determined, but instead God embeds and absorbs human will, and the seemingly arbitrary, into His purposes. Consider Proverbs 16:33 mentioned above, “The lot is cast into the lap, but its every decision is from the Lord.” Einstein, in a passionate response to a particular interpretation of quantam physics declared “God does not play dice with the universe!” If God used the roll of the dice to establish an outcome that He did not know, then Einstein, and Proverbs 16:33, would be in error. But the proverb is not saying that God uses randomness to make His decision, but rather to reveal it.

An excellent example comes in the exposing of Achan’s sin. The Israelites were specifically instructed to destroy everything in Jericho, with the exception of the bronze, iron, silver, and gold articles, which were to be kept for the Lord’s treasury. This they did, with the exception of Achan, the consequence of which was a defeat at Ai. Joshua and the elders inquired of God as to why they were defeated, as Achan’s disobedience was not yet revealed. So God called Achan out, but not through lightning or disease, or anything that direct. Rather, God had the entire people consecrate themselves, wait until morning, and then systematically “take out” (presumably by casting lots) Achan’s tribe, clan, family, and then Achan himself. The specifics of casting lots is not known; it may be similar to drawing straws or numbers. Nevertheless, despite its seemingly arbitrary nature, it was used to determine important matters such as this in both the Old and New Testament record. And in addition to these, it is even given as a practical method for conflict prevention: “Casting lots causes contentions to cease, and keeps the mighty apart” (Proverbs 18:18). My friend Robert Moore still refers to this scripture when initiating “rock-paper-scissors” to determine the day’s trash-bearer on our backpack trips.

We might look at this further in Scripture by examining the word “chance” as it emerges in translation. If we ignore the usage synonymous with “opportunity” (such as “they had no chance to escape” or “my father Saul is looking for a chance to kill you”), then we get only a few occurrences. In one (1 Samuel 6), the ark is turned loose to determine whether God brought their destruction (if the oxen traveled toward Beth Shemesh), or whether it happened “by chance” (if the ark was taken a different way). This was an interesting test to say the least: asking for a sign from God as to whether He was involved at all. The ark was indeed pulled toward Beth Shemesh, settling that matter.

Another reference to “chance” comes in Ecclesiastes 9:11, where Solomon muses,

I returned and saw under the sun that—The race is not to the swift, Nor the battle to the strong, Nor bread to the wise, Nor riches to men of understanding, Nor favor to men of skill; But time and chance happen to them all.

So, not surprisingly, we find our strongest possible proof-text for the meaningless (and randomness) of existence among Solomon’s disillusionment in the quest for meaning. But what is he really saying? Despite his downcast tone (he is still thinking aloud here, and has yet to reach the bigger conclusions), if we look at verse 9, we see that he acknowledges God as the giver. If we look at verse 10, we see that he acknowledges the importance of man’s will in the midst of what God does. And a reading of verse 12 suggests that the apparent futility is not so much arbitrary, but due to a limited knowledge of one’s own life in the midst of an evil time. Furthermore, for the slow, weak, foolish, ignorant, and unskilled, verse 11 may be spun in a positive way: that all still have a “chance,” and again the “opportunity” meaning emerges. So try as we might to thrust Scripture into full-on determinism or the notion of true randomness, it speaks of human will and deficiency, and God’s will and sovereignty throughout.

Chaos is not comforting. And if we are honest, neither is the idea that human will drives all outcomes. Only the God-fearing are okay with the reality that things are ordered, yet beyond our understanding or complete control. Our peace and purpose come from recognizing a determined God of excellent purpose, who can and does take care of everything we need, and allows our willful participation. God is completely in control, which makes His invitation to faithful obedience all the more appealing.

GREAT AND SMALL

2010-05-26T05:07:26Z

GRASPING THE SCALE OF THINGS

He has made everything beautiful in its time. He has also set eternity in the hearts of men; yet they cannot fathom what God has done from beginning to end.
– Ecclesiastes 3:11

In a recent trip to New York City I had opportunity to tour around Manhattan on a ferry, and also see it from within, craning my neck to look up at skyscrapers. I marveled at the city from beneath, beholding the sheer volume of humanity being shuffled by its subway trains, and again from above, from atop the Empire State Building and later peering out the window on the flight back home. I found that my efforts toward absorbing as much as possible of my six day stay were often directed toward simply comprehending the scale of things.

In our attempts to comprehend greatness and smallness, we naturally make comparisons. We understand the strength and rigidity of a rhinoceros beetle supporting 850 times its own weight by comparing it to a 150-lb man supporting 127,000 pounds. We grasp the leaping ability of a flea by comparing its acceleration to that of the space shuttle: the flea has 50 times greater acceleration, and if scaled to the size of person, it would leap about 900 feet! Another mind bender is the glorious Iguazu Falls in Argentina: To get a handle on this we describe its width as three times that of Niagara Falls, and that it boasts a flow of up to 2.1 Olympic-sized swimming pools per second. (This comparison, of course, assumes that one has seen and comprehended Niagara Falls, and spent significant time in an Olympic-sized swimming pool.)

In our first attempts at comprehending scale, we are usually drawn to big things. But what is unique about large things? Many patterns in nature are “fractal,” meaning that they are essentially the same at any scale. There is no way to know the size of a cloud without some visual clue of comparison, as a cloud’s outline at any scale is virtually the same. Similarly, a small rock can be employed as a towering cliff in a miniaturized film set, as it has essentially the same appearance. The massive hotels along the Las Vegas strip baffle the weary tourist who walks on and on and seems to get nowhere—they look big, but turn out to be much bigger, like a Times Square on steroids. Designers and artists use such visual cues to home us in on a sense of scale, or even to trick us otherwise, and scientists put a coin or person’s hand into a picture so that the specimen’s size is properly interpreted.

Our fascination with scale was illustrated remarkably in the classic film Powers of Ten, which is now available at www.powersof10.com. The film begins with a downward view of a single square meter of a picnic, and proceeds to zoom out a factor of ten (10 m², 100 m², etc.) every second until we marvel at the insignificance of the picnickers in the vastness of the universe. Then it proceeds to zoom us back in, and takes us into the mysteries of the inner space within atoms. The picnic becomes strangely insignificant, observed at just one level of a mind-boggling range of scale, both small and great. We get the feeling that we are only privy to a slice of the reality of space in which we are embedded. In like fashion, on my recent trip, I visited the American Museum of Natural History, which has a wide display showing the “location” of things (galaxies, planets, humans, microbes, atoms) along a series of placards representing scale changes in powers of ten.

Mathematicians have devised ways to compress scale such that powers of ten can be understood more easily. One way is through exponential notation, such that instead of describing the width of a thin hair as 0.000018 meters, we describe it as 18 microns. So then everything else measurable in a few to a hundred or so microns is now easily comparable to something we can picture. Earthquakes have been measured and compared using the well-known Richter scale, now replaced by a similar “moment magnitude” scale. Thus, although earthquake energies may vary by a factor of a million, we typically hear of earthquakes described simply in the range of 3 to 7 on the magnitude scale. Similarly our ears can safely perceive sound varying in energy by a factor of trillions, but to get a handle on the practical differences, the decibel scale is used: 0 dB is the threshold of hearing, 60 dB is the level of conversational speech, and 120 dB is produced by the deafening sound of a diesel engine room.

Yet while most things can be perceived in multiples and divisions, various levels of scale do have unique characteristics, as evidenced by the beetle and flea mentioned earlier. Many physicists recognize “quantam effects” that apply only to the extremely miniscule. And due to how God put matter together using discrete particles, helter-skelter motions and forces at the microscopic scale become smooth and more easily modeled at a larger scale. Furthermore, the properties of things change inherently with size: For example, a super-sized insect would be unable to fly because the surface-area-to-volume ratio of anything decreases as its size increases; thus a super-sized insect would effectively fall through air like you or I would, rather than “swimming” through it rapidly as insects normally do.

So we find that we may get lost in the vastness of the concept of scale, wondering perhaps whether our universe might be contained in a single atom of another. But at the same time we may become baffled by the uniqueness of the view within a given window of scale (such that a less-powerful microscope setting can be more impressive than getting “lost” by being zoomed in too far). What are we to make of all this?

Firstly, I think an important principle is that this is not so much about size and space as it is about systemization. What is remarkable is not that something can be a billion times larger while another thing can be a billion times smaller, but rather that there exists systemized order at all levels. Sure, our bodies are composed of trillions of cells working wonderfully together to provide communication, capture and use of energy, processing of nutrition and waste, and so on; yet each one of those cells also has its own systems for doing the very same. Biology textbooks love to hail the cell as the “building block” of life, and have in the past erroneously called it the “simple cell,” thinking that we, and other multicellular organisms, are merely complex through evolutionary aggregation of these cells. Yet a single bacteria, the simplest of living things, has all the systemization necessary to maintain its life: transfer of genetic information, capture and use of energy, processing of nutrition and waste, and so on. What are its building blocks? In the same way, what is remarkable about skyscrapers, miniscule in the scope of mountains and seas, is that in addition to steel, concrete, glass, and a myriad of wiring and plumbing, they contain offices with employees, all working on various tasks, toward well-determined purposes well beyond that building; meanwhile one single person in a cubicle on the 49^th floor finishes her sandwich and tosses her apple core into the wastebasket, and this too is significant.

Secondly, I believe that our efforts to wrap our minds around everything through comparison lead us to consider our own significance. And beautifully, our inability to compress all scale into a single understanding (and that we even try to do so) actually shows our significance. Take for example the reaction to Voyager 1’s 1990 distant photo of the “pale blue dot” that is planet Earth. Famed astronomer Carl Sagan reflected eloquently years later: “Our posturings, our imagined self-importance, the delusion that we have some privileged position in the universe, are challenged by this point of pale light.” Yet by contrast, the person who accepts Isaiah 45:18, that God “…did not create it in vain, Who formed it to be inhabited…” finds that that Earth’s unique position amplifies our significance, in that we are it among all, like a pearl or treasure. Earth is the universe’s sweet spot. When Isaiah wanted to encourage strength and hope, he implored “Lift up your eyes on high, and see who has created these things, Who brings out their host by number; He calls them all by name, by the greatness of His might and the strength of His power; Not one is missing” (40:26). Getting overwhelmed by the scale of things can either swallow one up in an impersonal, indiscriminate Nature, or get one lost—in a good way—in the magnificence of a personal, purposeful God.

Lastly, I find that my attempts at grasping through comparison lead me to the idea of the incomparable. Understand this: God is not “great” in the sense that he is a thousand million times bigger than the universe that he made, or that He can see inside all atoms at once. Rather, he is great in that He is transcends all this: the great, small, and time itself. Paul, elaborating on God’s glory, uses the peculiar statement “the foolishness of God is wiser than men, and the weakness of God is stronger than men” (1 Corinthians 1:25). This might be interpreted as saying that our wisdom and strength is on a scale with God’s, only that He is much superior. But that analysis doesn’t hold when God has no foolishness or weakness at all. I think what God is saying through Paul’s human analogy is that if God had foolishness or weakness (which He does not), it would yet be greater than our wisdom or strength. In other words, there is no comparison. As difficult it is to fully grasp the creation, how could we expect to grasp and elucidate in human language the One who contained it all as a thought before anything existed?

“To whom will you liken Me, and make equal and compare Me, that we should be alike?” (Isaiah 46:5) The implied answer, of course, is no one! In Psalm 139 David muses about God’s omniscience and omnipresence—specifically His intimate knowledge of David’s own life—and concludes “Such knowledge is too wonderful for me; It is high, I cannot attain it” (v. 6). Yet this does not lead him to self-centered loathing or pity about insignificance, but rather to the praise of God for what David does know: that God, shown in His works (including His special creation of humanity), is marvelous (v. 14).

THE LAWS OF NATURE

2010-03-12T21:07:08Z

MOVING BEYOND DEISM

For by Him all things were created that are in heaven and that are on earth, visible and invisible, whether thrones or dominions or principalities or powers. All things were created through Him and for Him. And He is before all things, and in Him all things consist. – Colossians 1:16-17

In light of the scientific method, few question today that the universe operates according to natural laws. In fact, the fundamental laws of physics are so well established that scientists yet hope to harmonize this handful of relationships and constants together into a single “Theory of Everything,” or TOE.

In and of itself, this explanatory power of science need not threaten belief in a Creator. In fact some might contend the opposite: Knowing the harmony of the natural order, we might ascribe this to a powerful Creator who set the whole universal machine into motion. Yet what type of God do we arrive at when we see his purpose mechanistically, more so as a watchmaker than as the inventor of time, or participant in it? By ascribing to God primarily the role of past lawmaker, one may erroneously view Him as distant, uninvolved, and dispassionate about the present universe and Earth. Like our Declaration of Independence, we might subtly regard as separate the laws “of Nature” and “of Nature’s God.” He can easily become the one who created and wound up the clock—but who now sits back and simply watches everything unfold. I would like to explain why this is an unbiblical and deficient understanding.

First, let us look at the atheistic perspective regarding the “natural” and the “supernatural.” The atheist leaves God out of the picture altogether. Thus “natural” is all that is, and technically, “supernatural” does not exist because nothing is super, or beyond natural. And many atheists are materialists as well, believing that all is material. Yet materialists may have a hard time explaining immaterial realities such as love, hope, or human consciousness. And even if they do not regard God or angels, or reduce the mind to mere brain chemistry, they must still deal with the mystery of immaterial forces such as electromagnetism or gravitation. Thus, the term “supernatural” might occasionally be employed to describe mysterious immaterial phenomenon, though not initiated by God or any deity.

Next, let us look at the deistic perspective. This, held by many of our founding fathers, by the great scientist Isaac Newton, and unknowingly by many today, essentially sees the “natural” as does an atheist. The difference is only in the source of the natural laws. The deist recognizes that nature cannot self-originate, and neither can it construct its own laws. They must come from something greater than nature itself. And yet the deist places great emphasis on knowing through human reason, rather than revelation. The deist claims that his is a “natural religion, not a revealed religion.” To the deist, God is respected and admired, but not necessarily known, cherished, or loved. They may worship the intelligence and magnificence of the creator God, yet not worship God himself, discarding His personal characteristics, including love, generosity, anger, correction, and His ability and desire to communicate with mankind.

In battling against atheism, or specifically, evolutionism, many Christians have aligned with or heralded the “Intelligent Design” movement, thinking that it presents scientists at last “proving” God. But God does not need to be proved, and most in the Intelligent Design movement do little more than reduce God to the one that makes the impossibilities of evolution possible. It becomes an excuse to embrace an impersonal evolution rather than a personal Creator. In fact, this movement is merely a minor homage to the Creator or some type of Creative Force, and an intellectualist reaction to the stuffy dogmatism of atheists. (It is not an “outgrowth of the Creationism Movement” as many have said, although creationists, by trying to ally with non-Christian Intelligent Design proponents in order to influence school curriculum, have indeed made it seem that way.)

So, simply put, the deist regards the “natural” as what occurs as the result of what God did, yet without God’s present involvement. And for the deist, “supernatural” is primarily the act of creation, or perhaps those rare times when God intervenes.

This leads us to the biblical theistic perspective. Christ Himself, and His Word in scripture reveal to us that God is intimately and continually involved in all things. Although His initial act of creation is complete, He has participated and intervened in the unfolding of history ever since. And his participation is more “natural” than “supernatural.” Consider how God’s action in the commonplace is described in the present tense in this sampling of biblical passages concerning astronomy, weather, and life itself:

Lift up your eyes on high, And see who has created these things, Who brings out their host by number; He calls them all by name, By the greatness of His might And the strength of His power; Not one is missing. – Isaiah 40:26

That they may know from the rising of the sun to its setting that there is none besides Me. I am the LORD, and there is no other; I form the light and create darkness, I make peace and create calamity; I, the LORD, do all these things. – Isaiah 45:6-7

…for He makes His sun rise on the evil and on the good, and sends rain on the just and on the unjust. – Matthew 5:45

Ask the LORD for rain In the time of the latter rain. The LORD will make flashing clouds; He will give them showers of rain, Grass in the field for everyone. – Zechariah 10:1

Who covers the heavens with clouds, Who prepares rain for the earth, Who makes grass to grow on the mountains. – Psalm 147:8

…but the land which you cross over to possess is a land of hills and valleys, which drinks water from the rain of heaven, a land for which the LORD your God cares; the eyes of the LORD your God are always on it, from the beginning of the year to the very end of the year. – Deuteronomy 11:11-12

The young lions roar after their prey, And seek their food from God. [What] You give them they gather in; You open Your hand, they are filled with good. You hide Your face, they are troubled; You take away their breath, they die and return to their dust. You send forth Your Spirit, they are created; And You renew the face of the earth. – Psalm 104:21,27-30

In fact, the Colossians passage at the front of this essay suggests that the very existence of matter is continually dependent on Christ’s sustaining power. This is further supported by the simple description of the annihilation of matter in 2 Peter 3:10-12 (and Isaiah 34:4)—descriptions consistent with what would happen if the strong nuclear force, known to bind together sub-atomic particles, were “let go.” So, unlike in the atheistic and deistic perspectives, the natural is not void of God. Properly, “natural” is merely a scientific description of how God typically operates.

Additionally, God also intervenes specially. This ranges from the materially supernatural (turning water into wine, multiplying fishes and bread, transporting Enoch and Elijah) to the supernatural in terms of the timing and unfolding of what may otherwise be natural (ravens bringing food to Elijah, a wind blowing quail into the camp, an eclipse darkening the sky at Christ’s death). So regardless of the degree to which matter is involved, “supernatural” simply describes God’s atypical action. God does not “show up” only to perform supernatural acts; He is always purposefully present. We must not hold it against God that most of the time He chooses to operate predictably, particularly in the material realm. He is a God of order; without this, there would be no science to practice! So, unlike in the deistic perspective, the supernatural is of importance throughout history (not merely at the Creation), and is not limited to the immaterial. It is little for God to be involved supernaturally even among the “laws of nature,” as He is already so engaged continuously.

We might summarize in this way:

	“Natural”	“Supernatural”
Incorrect Concepts	~All that is ~Material ~God uninvolved	~Imagined ~Immaterial ~God’s only involvement
Correct, Biblical Concept	How God typically operates, both materially and immaterially	God’s atypical action, both materially and immaterially

What is the practical application of this doctrine for the believer? First, that God is present, and this presence removes the uncertainty and fear of an existence with an absent or distant God:

God is our refuge and strength, A very present help in trouble. Therefore we will not fear, Even though the earth be removed, And though the mountains be carried into the midst of the sea;Though its waters roar and be troubled, Though the mountains shake with its swelling. – Psalm 46:1-3

Let your conduct be without covetousness; be content with such things as you have. For He Himself has said, “I will never leave you nor forsake you.” So we may boldly say: “The LORD is my helper; I will not fear. What can man do to me?””– Hebrews 13:5-6

Second, we are reminded that God’s involvement in our lives, as in history, is at times unpredictable, and uniquely personal. He has special purposes to carry out, and will act in ways that touch upon both the material and immaterial. These actions are no more powerful than what it takes to emerge a flower, or cycle Earth’s winds, but they are much more meaningful. Though we pray, we need not “pray God down” to find it in Himself to override some laws that govern His world. He’s already doing it all; we can fellowship with Him and enjoy utter dependence on Him for bread, as well as its multiplication—for life, and also its sanctification.

For I know the thoughts that I think toward you, says the LORD, thoughts of peace and not of evil, to give you a future and a hope. Then you will call upon Me and go and pray to Me, and I will listen to you. – Jeremiah 29:11-12

March Essay Coming

2010-03-12T08:47:05Z

Does God really send rain, or does he merely watch droplets form according to his predetermined physics? Or maybe He doesn’t care about the rainstorm at all. The coming essay “The Laws of Nature” looks at the matter of God’s involvement in His world. I’ll be picking apart “deism,” an unbiblical perspective that infects the thinking even of believers, and may cause us to underestimate or undervalue God’s involvement in our lives.

PRESERVING AND PROLIFERATING THE TRUTH

2010-02-18T22:16:40Z

DNA AND THE WORD OF GOD

The grass withers, the flower fades, but the word of our God stands forever. – Isaiah 40:8

We are bathed in the information age. Ideas are in storage and movement all around us, encoded in the language of ones and zeroes, eventually expressed as music, images, and words. Interestingly, despite all the pixels, paper, and iPods, information itself is nonmaterial, originating in the human mind—itself created by the mind of the One before all things. John 1:1 tells us “In the beginning was the Word (logos), and the Word was with God, and the Word was God,” and John goes on to quote Jesus’ claim “I am…the truth…” (John 14:6).

Information ranges from trivial data and patterns to meaningful principles and directives. Information that reflects reality is what we call “truth.” To deny truth is to deny reality, whereas to accept Christ fully is to realize truth, which is to say, to accept reality. How is this acceptance accomplished? Although a person must exercise his or her will, that person must have encountered reality first:

How then shall they call on Him in whom they have not believed? And how shall they believe in Him of whom they have not heard? And how shall they hear without a preacher? And how shall they preach unless they are sent? As it is written: “How beautiful are the feet of those who preach the gospel of peace, Who bring glad tidings of good things!” But they have not all obeyed the gospel. For Isaiah says, “Lord, who has believed our report?” So then faith comes by hearing, and hearing by the word of God. But I say, have they not heard? Yes indeed: “Their sound has gone out to all the earth, And their words to the ends of the world.” - Romans 10:14-18

We see here from the reference to Psalm 19 that the primary hearing of the Word is the creation itself. Theologians call this “general revelation.” And yet Paul’s admonition in this passage, as in other Pauline writings, is that while individuals are ultimately responsible to respond to the gospel, they deserve another hearing, one from a proclamation of the Word—what theologians call “special revelation.”

So, although truth is reality, embodied in Christ and revealed in the creation, God chose to further elucidate the Word into words for mankind: “The entirety of Your word is truth…” (Psalm 119:60). “…for prophecy never came by the will of man, but holy men of God spoke as they were moved by the Holy Spirit” (2 Peter 1:21). “All Scripture is given by inspiration of God, and is profitable for doctrine, for reproof, for correction, for instruction in righteousness…” (2 Timothy 3:16).

What this means, however, is that the incorruptible, unchanging Christ, and all that He embodies, must be narrated though the corruptibility of human languages. How does God ensure that we get the message right? What guarantees that our Bible is indeed God’s Word, effectively preserved and proliferated?

To look at this question of the transmission of the greatest information, representing the greatest reality, I will examine the most densely-packed, functional informational structure known to man: the DNA molecule.

In the last fifty years, scientists have made us aware that cells possess DNA, a collection of extremely long, tiny molecules, each structured as a twisted ladder, bearing an organism’s physical blueprint. And more so, in tandem with mRNA, tRNA, and other cellular workers, these not only provide instructions, but carry them out, building proteins necessary for growth and maintenance. The human genome, or DNA plan, involves 23 pairs of chromosomes (each a collection of information on one DNA molecule), holding a total of about 30,000 genes (distinct sets of instructions), comprised of three billion nucleotide bases (each like a letter in an alphabet of four possible letters). All this is duplicated in something near 100 trillion cells.

Regarding each nucleotide base as two bits of information (storing 2², or four possible states), this is like the storage of over three trillion terabytes of data. One terabyte hard drives have recently become available for media and backup purposes, and cost around $100—a real deal as they can hold hundreds of full-length movies! Yet the body’s memory is also dynamic, continually duplicating all this information in its replacement cells, at lightning speed, and usually without error.

Just as we might examine how the Scriptures can be reliable and effectual, we can examine why our own DNA is reliable and effectual. And though I don’t have the expertise to draw this analogy out completely, I can suggest some principles.

Redundancy

The entire collection of DNA information, we might think, needs not be present in every cell. After all, a cell is quite specialized, and requires only a small portion of this information to carry out its tasks. But it is all there. In the scholarship of historical texts, the practice of “textual criticism” relies on comparisons across multiple copies to ascertain the reliability of the original. The Bible towers above all other historical documents, with over 14,000 Old Testament manuscripts and fragments copied throughout various geographic regions, often by devoted scribes who went to unimaginable lengths to ensure accuracy. The New Testament boasts over 5,000 ancient manuscripts. By comparison, many of our Greek classics, seldom questioned as divergent from their original, are constructed from one dozen or fewer ancient copies. So, just as our bodies lack no reference for comparison, the Word of God has been divinely backed up.

The DNA code itself contains an inherent redundancy as well. I consider the German language as one example: The American Standard Version of the Bible states John 3:16 in 25 words and 110 characters, whereas a similar translation in German employs 27 words and 130 characters. The information is the same, but the coding different. A German scientific report, though perhaps even more tedious than a comparable English one, is less likely to be misunderstood, simply due to its structure. Similarly, when DNA has variations on a three-letter “word” that produce the same result, this is not necessarily an inefficiency, but a redundancy that allows for the “absorption” of error to some degree.

In addition to this, the DNA molecule is itself a duplicate, with “complementary pairs” that are essentially like a negative image. So the molecule contains identical information on each half, readable in both directions.

Likewise, the Bible is redundant when it articulates a single vital principle through historical accounts, proverbs (both negatively and positively), poems, prayers, laments, quoted teachings, law, and historical correspondence. This is not inefficiency, but resplendent redundancy. Indeed we have “Christ on every page” of Scripture. So why do some not get the message? If not for lack of exposure to these many facets, it is for lack of attributing authority to its unified message and its Messenger.

Replication

Before a cell can divide, whether as an informational “clone” such as in a body cell, or in order to share paternal and maternal information, as in a sex cell, DNA must replicate, or copy. In most textbook discussions regarding cell division, the mechanics of the copy reduction during mitosis (the re-splitting of duplicate DNA into two cells from one) are described in great detail, whereas the initial replication, just as remarkable, is often mentioned only in passing. As discussed previously, Scripture has thousands of ancient manuscripts to assist in the redundancy required for textual criticism. Yet today this multiplication continues, as the Bible has been reprinted in the billions, in thousands of languages. Gutenberg’s moveable-type printing press is still regarded by most experts as one of a handful of most-significant inventions of all time. Among those experts, many will admit that the reproduction of the Bible into common language is a powerful, effectual result of that invention. And today via the Internet, the number of electronic copies of the Word increases exponentially as the Bible is mirrored on servers and home computers worldwide.

Transcription

The word “transcription” (literally, to “copy across”) sounds a lot like replication, yet it is more specific. This is the transfer of one relatively small segment of DNA into a moveable copy, made available for a specific task without corrupting the original information. When we study a portion of Scripture, we are taking from it something of value—something that can be applied in our lives. We do not consume the entire Word at one sitting, as that would be too much for us to comprehend. And yet we should “transcribe” with sufficient context so as to take something with intended meaning, not merely something that we can make meaning of. It is not “what does it say to me?” but rather “what does it say?”

A beauty in God’s Word is that it speaks unchanging truth into diverse persons at different times. It is nourishment, “daily bread,” rather than a nauseating binge or dispassionate I-V to which we are hooked up. And, like the relatively short messenger RNA molecule (mRNA), it moves from the page in which is represents reality, to a place in which it is realized.

Translation

Though we use the word “translation” to refer to a language transfer, this is not the sense of the word in DNA science. Translation of language is part of the redundancy and replication of God’s Word, but I want to look at its other meaning here. Translation in DNA is the ultimate step, leading to “protein synthesis”: Messenger RNA, having accurately taken only the relevant portion of DNA for its task, goes on to work in concert with transfer RNA (tRNA) to adjoin particular amino acids in the correct sequence, so that a protein molecule can take shape and become part of the body at large.

What astounds me is that information molecules (DNA) store the blueprint, while similar, shortened information molecules (mRNA) contextualize and relocate only relevant portions of it, and further information molecules (tRNA) accomplish, and literally “flesh out” the purpose of that information, using the resources made available to the individual. The whole process is intelligent, purposeful, precise, and practical. And so with God’s word, what has been taken from Scripture is expressly for beneficial action. God’s Word is “living and active” (Hebrews 4:12, NIV), or as 2 Timothy 3:16 puts it, “profitable.”

Mutations

While neo-Darwinian evolutionists revere mutations as part of the very creative process, good science recognizes mutations for what they are: error. It cannot be emphasized enough that all lies and inaccurate representations of reality are built from (often mostly from) truth and reality. Satan began misrepresenting truth in the Garden, and his approach continues today. The mutations that occasionally plague DNA’s information flow are similar to the mutations that attempt to corrupt God’s Word. DNA is improperly replicated, transcribed, or translated when any of several types of errors make it through.

One type of error is “deletion.” The omission of a base causes a DNA segment to be read out of sync, like the phrase TODAY IS A GOOD DAY becoming TODAI SA G OODD AY, all because the Y dropped out, or perhaps becoming TODAY IS A DAY, which is true, but not the intended truth. Journalists know the power of “slanting” news by accurately reporting only selected details. This is why the whole gospel must be preached; if it is not complete, it is not the good news. An example of this is to speak of God’s grace and forgiveness, while ignoring his holiness and justice, or to embrace heaven while ignoring hell.

For the wrath of God is revealed from heaven against all ungodliness and unrighteousness of men, who suppress the truth in unrighteousness…. – Romans 1:18

A second type of error is “insertion.” As with deletion, insertion mutations in DNA shift the reading of information, such that each “word” becomes the nonsensical combination of two word portions. Extrabiblical information is a normal part of our lives, and it can be enriching to learn from sources outside of the Bible. But when those sources are regarded as a reference of truth on level with God’s Word (even when they contain God’s truth), this is corruption. This can be a subtle addition to a biblical principle, or in can be a more blatant addition of entire written works held up as “Scripture.” Works-based salvation is perhaps the most notable insertion error, having in some form or another made its way into all religions.

Every word of God is pure; He is a shield to those who put their trust in Him. Do not add to His words, Lest He rebuke you, and you be found a liar. – Proverbs 30:5-6

Insertions and deletions are known together as “frame-shift” mutations. Yet a third type of DNA error is a “point shift” mutation, in which one base is simply changed. What begins as a small change can lead to serious repercussions in how a protein molecule folds and takes shape. Similarly, it is remarkable how a single word change in certain biblical passages can have large ramifications for the passage’s meaning. So we should beware of relying solely on paraphrased Bible versions, and especially of so-called translations such as the New World Translation, containing a cult’s intentional, small changes to de-deify Christ.

Who changed the truth of God into a lie, and worshipped and served the creature more than the Creator…. – Romans 1:25

A fourth type of error is an “inversion” mutation, in which the DNA segment, small or large, is reversed. A sentence printed in reverse loses its informational value. Though we might be hard-pressed to find an example of someone corrupting truth by presenting it backwards, we certainly do find those that make a confusing mess of God’s word, using it liberally but making its message incoherent. There is a logical and historical flow to the canon of Scripture: The sequence of the Creation account itself, or the unfolding of God’s actions throughout history, or the fulfillment of biblical prophecy can become confused if seen as a helter-skelter, allegorical collection of unrelated ideas.

Woe to those who call evil good, and good evil; Who put darkness for light, and light for darkness; Who put bitter for sweet, and sweet for bitter! – Isaiah 5:20

Despite the myriad of ways in which DNA can be corrupted, its inherent redundancy and its method of operation ensure that mutations seldom endure. For the one who ascribes authority to God’s Word, there is confidence not only that God’s Word is truth, but that it endures, and is effectual. The Word of God can speak for itself, and as we frequently find, it interprets itself. We would do well to 1) hold the Bible up as the ultimate authority, 2) submerge ourselves in its entirety, 3) cross-reference its truths one to another, and 4) submit to its translational work, as it “fleshes out” Christ in our lives.

Are these getting longer?

2010-02-18T22:16:04Z

So I’m ready to post another essay, and if you have been reading these over the past 13 months, you may have noticed that my longest posts have come in recent months. But not to worry–this isn’t a one-directional trend. In fact, I have a few lighter ideas in the hopper for later.

Many have questioned the reliability of the Bible, and claim that it is brought to us with inherent errors. They insist that even if it could be transmitted and translated properly, it makes no claim to be a unified text of anything, let alone of God. There are a variety of ways to defend agains these attacks, but this month I wanted to primarily make comparisons to DNA, an informational wonder in the natural world. The God who created DNA to be what it is, and to do what it does, is certainly capable of effective communication. I hope you’ll enjoy “Preserving and Proliferating the Truth.”