Origins and Insanity (Is. 40:21-22)

Recently I was driving back from North Alabama and found myself listening to a public radio station in an area with few other radio stations available. The first sentence caught my attention and I listened in disbelief as the two men discussed searching for the stuff of life out there in the universe, for the place/thing that began it all. Their final takeaway was that one of Saturn’s moons held the best chance for discovering the origins of life. And as I sat and listened, I became sad that these men and so many others have chosen to reject the obvious (our Creator God of the Universe) only to believe and hope in something nebulous out there that might reveal where life came from. In delusion, they reject the only hope they have.

In reading Isaiah, I found reference after reference to God as Creator and Sustainer. There is none like Him, as Isaiah relates in chapter 40:21-22:

Do you not know? Have you not heard? Has it not been declared to you from the beginning? Have you not understood from the foundations of the earth? It is He who sits above the vault of the earth, and its inhabitants are like grasshoppers, who stretches out the heavens like a curtain and spreads them out like a tent to dwell in. (NASB revised)

Isaiah speaks without the benefit of a telescope or modern-day knowledge of the universe, but he does speak with an understanding of a viewpoint only God could have given him at that time. A few verses later, Isaiah speaks again of God, emphasizing His power and strength in these familiar verses (28-29):

Do you not know? Have you not heard? The Everlasting God, the LORD, the Creator of the ends of the earth does not become weary or tired. His understanding is inscrutable. He gives strength to the weary, and to him who lacks might He increases power. 

Man has not yet discovered the origins of the earth or the universe (nor will they because God is inscrutable), and they reject the explanation provided to them through God’s word over and over again. The obvious is before them, the order of God displayed in His universe that is never random yet always glorious because He made it. Yet there is no faith to believe the obvious.

This same God who created the universe found no obstacle in creating a nation for Himself from Abraham, pulling him out of a pagan nation (Gen. 11:27-12:4). This same God who laid out the heavens and the earth found no hinderance in grafting in Gentiles through Christ when He came to save. This same God will have none who will be able to stand before Him at judgment. This life is too brief to doubt, to spend on the vagaries of absurd theories and insane propositions of the earth’s origins. 

In my reading this week, I came across an idea that I found attributed both to Voltiare and to George Bernard Shaw (among others) that makes me think of these two men’s conversation on the radio. The gist of it is this: If the other planets are inhabited, they must be using the earth as their insane asylum. Listening to their ideas that only got more absurd as the show progressed makes me think earth is indeed an insane asylum . . .