We Can Believe in God

Jim once asked an atheist if he had ever wrestled, even for a few moments, with the thought that maybe God does exist.

"Absolutely!" the atheist said, to Jim's surprise. "Years ago when our first child was born I almost became a believer in God."

"As I looked down at that miniature-but-perfect little human being in the crib, as I watched the flexing of those tiny fingers and saw the dawning of recognition in those little eyes, I went through a period of several months during which I almost ceased to be an atheist. Looking at that child almost convinced me there had to be a God."

1. Everything Designed has a Designer

The design of the human body demands the existence of a designer.

Have you ever pondered all that's involved in the simple act of seeing? Scientists tell us that the delicate engineering of the eye's cornea and lens make the most advanced camera seem like a child's toy by comparison. The tiny rods and cones in the eye change light into electro-chemical impulses through processes the most sophisticated laboratory can't reproduce. And brain cells transform these electrical impulses into the miracle of perception--something no high-tech computer can come close to doing.

Engineering, chemistry, information processing--all are involved every time we open our eyes. Charles Darwin once stated that the thought of the eye, and how it could possibly be produced by natural selection, made him ill. Here's why.

The human eye could not have evolved over long periods of time, because it is absolutely useless unless complete. The lens, which focuses light, would be useless without the retina, which senses light. And all the light received would serve no purpose without the nerve fibers which carry signals to the brain.

Vision involves a complete system of organs--all interrelated, all thoroughly designed. That's the way it is with the whole human body. Lungs and heart, nerves and muscles, all perform incredibly complicated tasks that depend on other incredibly complicated tasks.

No wonder the Psalmist concluded that the human body speaks loud and clear of a wonderful Creator:

• "I praise you because I am fearfully and wonderfully made; your works are wonderful, I know that full well."-- Psalm 139:14 .  the New International Version of the Bible [NIV].)

We don't have to go far to find the "works" of God. The evidence right in our own bodies points to an infinitely skillful designer.

If you were to mark ten coins from one to ten, place them in your pocket, shake them around, and then pull each coin out and put it back in your pocket, what is the likelihood you could do so in exact numerical sequence? By mathematical law you have only one chance in ten billion of taking them out in order from one to ten.

Now consider the chances of a stomach, brain, heart, lungs, arteries, veins, kidneys, ears, eyes, and teeth all developing together and beginning to function at the same moment in time.

What is the most reasonable explanation for the design of the human body?

• "Then God said, 'Let us make man in our image, in our likeness,' . . . SO GOD CREATED MAN IN HIS OWN IMAGE, in the image of God he created him; male and female he created them."--Genesis 1:26, 27.

The first man and woman could not just have happened. The Bible affirms that God designed us in His image. He is the great Engineering Intelligence who thought us up and brought us into being.