As I sat at the lights one day lost in the musings of my mind, I looked at the visual reality around me, and proposed a thought to myself that had sometimes crossed this path before. What if this was all there is? After all - the concept of an invisible battle playing out around us, filled with angels and demons and a great and powerful, creator entity known as 'God', seems weird and fanciful when compared with the concreteness of our sensory world. I'm not surprised that friends and loved ones might shake their heads a little indulgently, thinking I am sweetly deluded. And so, once again, I traced the pathways of logic that lead to me steadily holding to my beliefs within those questions.
I believe in God and the world the Bible paints because ...
1. When I look at the intricacies and magnitude of creation, I cannot believe the alternative - that the known, interwoven worlds simply came together as they are. That people can believe they did is beyond comprehension to me. In my mind it requires more faith than belief in God does.
2. There is absolute proof that Jesus existed. While his historical existence cannot be denied, some say that he was simply a good teacher - someone who tried to teach us to live in peace and harmony with each other. But - He claimed to be the 'I Am' (another name for God who always has, and will, exist), and the Son of God. And so, historical philosophers have stated, he was either deluded (but the things that he taught were some of the highest ideals known!), a self-aware liar (in which case you can hardly call him a good teacher), or he was who he said he was.
3. The life Jesus lived and stood for was pure, and represented the most beautiful way of living. The qualities of his life are what we all recognize as the most desirable for our own! Knowing our knack for tearing people down, if any dirt could have been found on him, it would have been shared voraciously. Instead he is seen as one of the most beautiful characters who have ever lived.
4. Events and people recorded in the Bible, but previously unknown by historians, have been verified over and over by archaeological finds. Proof to me that the Bible is true and can be trusted.
5. There are unexplained, dramatic healings and rescues that can only be attributed to a greater power interacting with us. People restored from life-destroying illnesses that medicine has no hope for. Others miraculously protected from deadly events with no logical explanation. My Dad was inexplicably thrown out of the way of a tractor imminently crushing him to a wall. There is no other way he could have escaped it.
6. Man cannot create life. He can alter it, and mimic it - but he cannot create the spark that begins it.
7. The human heart yearns for God. We all seek to adore something or someone greater than us. It is innate. And when an ultimate crisis faces us in life, most of us will cry out to him. "There is a God-shaped hole in everyone" and only those who fill that hole with him are satisfied. Everything else is in the end, not enough.
8. Personally - I get a sense of peace and quiet strength when I make the effort to connect with him, especially when I'm surrounded with his artwork. He changes my natural responses to more positive ones when I focus on who he is. I have a history of memories with him that warm my heart - special little gifts - things that show me that he cares about me. I never feel alone - ever. Never feel like I have to face life without the support of a caring friend.
I can never prove the existence of God to anyone. But there is enough to prove it to myself. And if this is true - so is the need for us to find him - as he tells us our world is on a path to destruction, and he is the only way out. At this time of the year, the story of the greatest gift ever given is told and retold. Maybe its time to wonder if it might be reality.
