Christ's Busiest Week: Part 2

Allen Webster

Topic(s): Evidences, God, Jesus, Science

Links to this entire series:

• Christ's Busiest Week: Part 1
• Christ's Busiest Week: Part 2
• Christ's Busiest Week: Part 3
• Christ's Busiest Week: Part 4

A great English artist was working on a beautiful landscape painting when a lady of rank looked on and remarked, “But, Mr. Turner, I do not see in nature all that you describe there.”

“Ah, Madam,” answered the painter, “do you not wish you could?”

So the agnostic does not see the Lord’s hand in nature, but he could if he would only open his eyes (mind) to what is there.

Light is a key word in the first chapter of the Bible—found seven times; 272 times in Scripture. Light is a form of energy that travels freely through space. All would agree with Solomon: “Truly the light is sweet” (Ecclesiastes 11:7).

God asked Job a series of tough questions. One was, “Where is the way where light dwelleth? And as for darkness, where is the place thereof?” (Job 38:19). Thus God indicated that light travels in a “way” (derek, a traveled path, cf. Genesis 16:7), and darkness stays in a “place” (maxim, a spot, cf. Genesis 1:9; 28:11).

Until the seventeenth century, it was believed that light was transmitted instantaneously. Then Sir Isaac Newton suggested that light is composed of small particles that travel in a straight line. Christian Huygens proposed the wave theory of light, and Olaus Roemer measured the velocity of light as evinced by its delay while traveling through space. Scientists now know that light is a form of energy called radiant energy, and that it travels in electromagnetic waves in a straight line at the speed of over 186,000 miles per second (660 million miles per hour). ¹

Some evolutionists use the fact that light spanning the distances from stars to us proves the universe is billions of years old. (Otherwise the light would not have had time to get here.) But they fail to see that God created “light” as well as the “lights.” He put the sun and stars in their places and created the light path from each to the earth (Genesis 1:14–16; Psalm 19:1). God made a “mature” universe with stars already lighting up that first night that Adam held Eve’s hand and looked up at the moon and sky.

Day 2: Jesus made the firmament (Genesis 1:6–8). The word firmament (rakeea) comes from a root (raka) that means “to stretch out.”² And oh how the universe stretches out! The sky, with its hues of blue and billowy clouds, the atmosphere and its protective bubble around the earth came to be on the same day. Why is the sky blue? Air is full of particles that scatter the light. Tiny dust particles floating in the air scatter blue light more than red and yellow so the sky looks blue.

This atmosphere provides many benefits for mankind, beyond the obvious that it allows us to breathe. For instance, it helps protect us from the ultraviolet rays of the sun and burns up most of the dangerous asteroids and meteorites before they can reach the earth’s surface.

In the expanse above us God flies His starry flag to show that the King is at home, and hangs out His placard that atheists may see how He despises their denunciations of Him. He who looks up to the firmament and then writes himself down an atheist brands himself at the same moment as either foolish or prejudiced.³

Day 3: Jesus made the dry land, grass, herbs, and fruit (Genesis 1:9–13). Unfathomable imagination and remarkable love was shown on day three. What Michaelago, DaVinci, Edison, and Carver put together never had a fraction of the creative genius of Jesus.

Think of the fruit He made that day: Apples, peaches, strawberries, plums, watermelons, cantaloupes, pears, and tomatoes.

Think of the trees He made that day: Redwoods, pine, oak, hickory, olive, sycamore, sequoia, and poplar.

Think what the world would be like without grass: oxygen-deplete, eroded, sparse, unattractive.

Think of the cooking spices He invented: Salt, black pepper, red pepper, basil, chives, dill, mints, oregano, parsley, rosemary, sage, tarragon, and thyme, to name a few.

Think of the medicinal herbs that many still use even in this modern age: Ginseng (for energy and building the immune system), garlic, eucalyptus (for allergies and colds), peppermint and catnip (for upset stomachs).

How much better our lives are because of Creation Day #3!

Day 4: Jesus made the lights—the sun, moon, and stars (Genesis 1:14–19). What a marvelous day this was! Reading Genesis 1 reminds us of Psalm 19.

The heavens declare the glory of God; and the firmament sheweth his handywork. Day unto day uttereth speech, and night unto night sheweth knowledge. There is no speech nor language, where their voice is not heard. Their line is gone out through all the earth, and their words to the end of the world (Psalm 19:1-4).

Sun. The sun is mentioned 160 times in the Bible. “Truly the light is sweet, and a pleasant thing it is for the eyes to behold the sun” (Ecclesiastes 11:7). David pictured it:

In them hath he set a tabernacle for the sun, which is as a bridegroom coming out of his chamber, and rejoiceth as a strong man to run a race. His going forth is from the end of the heaven, and his circuit unto the ends of it: and there is nothing hid from the heat thereof (Psalm 19:4-6).

The surface of the sun is at a temperature of about 11,000 degrees F. It has a diameter of 864,000 miles—one hundred times that of earth’s—and could hold 1.3 million earths inside it. Rather than being fixed in space, the sun actually is in an orbit of its own (cf. Psalm 19:5–6). In fact, it is estimated to be moving through space at the rate of 600,000 miles per hour, in an orbit so large it would take approximately 220,000,000 years to complete just one orbit.

Endnotes:

¹ In Defense of the Bible’s Inspiration, Apologetics Press, Montgomery, AL, p. 46.

² The expanse refers not only to the celestial bodies, but also the air, light, rain, dews, all of which display the infinite power and wisdom of their Almighty Creator (Psalm 150:1–2; Genesis 1:6–8, 14–15; Daniel 12:3).

³ Matthew Henry, Comments on Psalm 19.