I am back to the “Key Eight Beliefs” again. I am sorry about the side tracks, but I can’t resist it. Anyway, we are on to Belief Number Four, in case you had lost track.
Belief Number Three put forward the “controversial” (see note 1) view that God created the Universe and Man, because…well…that is the sort of thing that He does. What is special about Man is another subject and seems to have its own purpose.
We think of ourselves as special, both as a species and individually. We regard ourselves as superior to the animals. We are each the centre of our own universe. If not exactly in control of our environment, we certainly regard ourselves as having some kind of influence here. People have shown that they have no need to have a God to explain what they see in the physical world around us.
All of which makes you think that God must have missed a trick here somewhere. He goes to all the trouble of creating the most incredible universe (Psalm 19 v1 to 6 – “The heavens declare the glory of God”) and we ignore him. We even say that He does not exist. I know that many might say that God has already shown his presence by the extent and beauty of the universe. However, the point is that there are no posters in the sky saying “God – this way”. There are (mostly) no voices saying “Hello, this is God speaking”. No obvious and conclusive proof.
Of course, if you believe in God, then it seems so obvious. The magnificence of everything that we see around us in nature and what we learn from others about the universe “proves He exists”. But if you do not believe in God, then all this proves nothing.
God’s presence, even his existence, is cloaked in mystery. God seems to conceal himself in the universe, hiding himself from us. It is like one of those “Where’s Wally” jigsaw puzzles. Even his existence is a subject of debate. He teases us.
So why is He so difficult to find? Is it deliberate?
I remember, in my mid-20s, being at a playground. A friend was supervising some children who were playing. A little boy was chasing a girl and my friend said; “The boy chases the girl, until the girl catches him”. “I don’t understand. That should be the other around”, came the reply. “You’ll understand one day”. She was understandably very puzzled.
The answer, of course, is that God’s hiding is deliberate. We are intended to look for him and if we look for him, we will find him. If we don’t want to look for him or find him, then we will not be disappointed.
Why would be we look for him? Perhaps we have a need, we are scared, worried, wondering (“God - are you really there?), because we are made that way, or as the source of an answer or perhaps as a last resort, because we do not understand the world.
Going back to my title, and fourth key belief, Man was made for this purpose, which is to find God. Just as God wants to share himself with us, so we must find Him. He does not force himself on us, which is something of a mystery, but wants us to discover him.
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Note 1: As everything in the news these days is “Controversial”, I thought that I would throw this in, although I don’t know what it means.
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