One of the greatest astronomers of the twentieth century, Allan Sandage, once commented: “It was my science that drove me to the conclusion that the world is much more complicated than can be explained by science. It is only through the supernatural that I can understand the mystery of existence.”1
As I was reading this quote I was fascinated by the phrase, “the mystery of existence.” Have you ever pondered why do things exist? Why do we have a universe? And why do we exist? The more I thought about this great mystery the more I realized that a supernatural explanation is the only valid answer. Since scientists now all agree that our universe had a beginning there must have been nothing existing before our universe in a material sense. And if there was nothing material out there then how could our universe form from nothing?
The only logical answer must be that a supernatural, all-powerful Being, must have existed in eternity past that decided to create our universe from nothing. And since nothing can ever create something, there must have been something immaterial in existence that did the creating; that we call God. This is a great mystery, but God must always have existed, in order for the existence of everything we see today to have come into existence. And why should you and I exist? The only answer, I believe, is that it was God’s good pleasure to create us, first, in His image, and second, for a relationship with Him. Now God didn’t need to create us because He already had perfect fellowship in the Trinity, but He wanted to lavish His great love on special objects of affection and that’s where you and I come in.
We are here by a divine creative act of God. Before we became a fertilized egg cell we only existed in the mind of God. But at the moment of conception, the foreknowledge of God became the reality of life and we took on the quality of existence. The evolutionary mantra of nobody times nothing equals everything makes no sense when we contemplate our existence. However, when we replace nobody by somebody – a supernatural God – then our existence make so much sense. In closing, our astronomer friend, Allan Sandage, perhaps said it best when he concluded: “If there is no God, nothing makes sense.”2
1 Personal Observations on Allan Sandage’s Spiritual Journey – Reasons to Believe
2 Personal Observations on Allan Sandage’s Spiritual Journey – Reasons to Believe
“If there is no God, nothing makes sense,” said astronomer Sandage. Maybe he was reflecting on the song written by a King- To the Chief Musician. A Psalm of David. The fool has said in his heart, “There is no God.” Ps. 14:2 & Ps. 53:1.
This is why to “make sense” out of anything we must rely on the Triune God’s revelation of Himself in Scripture. No other foundational presupposition provides support for knowledge, logic, science, or ethics. We say that God’s existence is the precondition of intelligibility, meaning that without Him, we couldn’t prove anything.
This leads us to use an apologetic that recognizes the blindness and folly of the unbelieving heart. We must distinguish between proof and persuasion. All of us are fools until Jesus changes us. Our apologetic, or defense of the faith, can reduce the unbeliever’s worldview to absurdity but it’s only the Holy Spirit that can bring light and life by removing the veil from their eyes and replacing the heart of stone with a heart of flesh.
We must start our defense where Scripture starts at Proverbs 26:4,5-“Do not answer a fool according to his folly, Lest you also be like him.” “Answer a fool according to his folly, or he will be wise in his own eyes.”
There is no neutrality of facts. We do not reason with a fool on his own terms vs.4. But for the sake of argument, we then stand on the fools perspective momentarily to show him the outcome of his worldview, vs.5. He cannot justify or “make sense” of anything. In the words of Romans 1:20, they are “without an apologetic.”
Our job is to shut his mouth as the Holy Spirit opens his heart. They know God, but they do not honor him as God or give thanks to him, but they become futile in their thinking, and their foolish hearts are darkened. Claiming to be wise, they become fools. Romans 1
Praise God, we are “justified by his grace as a gift, through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus, whom God put forward as a propitiation by his blood, to be received by faith” Romans 3. Only then does our worldview “make sense.”