"DEAR GOD, YOU SURE DON'T ACT LIKE YOU'RE ALIVE" - Day 16

Day 16 – review of Days 9-15

The more I study nature, the more I am amazed at the Creator.  –LOUIS PASTEUR

Of all the people I worked with over the years, Art was one of my favorites. A pleasant gentleman with an accent definitely not Southern, he served as the hospital’s night shift security guard. Over the course of our time together, I discovered that he dabbled in woodworking. He even brought a couple of his crafts to the emergency department for me to see. I was so impressed by his talents that I asked him one Christmas season to construct a dollhouse for my daughters.

 Art took to this task with characteristic enthusiasm. Before he started the project, he drew blueprints of the dollhouse and asked me to approve them. He even included drawings of dollhouse furniture that he planned to make and of two dolls that he wanted to place there. After such preliminary work, I gave him permission to proceed with construction. A few weeks later he brought the finished product with him to work and proudly gave me a tour of the home. It was a two-story Southern colonial structure, white with green shutters, four large columns across its front porch. Inside were the traditional rectangular rooms adorned with the furniture he had fashioned. Sitting in one of the living room chairs and standing in the adjacent kitchen were the two dolls, a male and a female.

Overall, I remember being pleased with the dollhouse, but I also recall seeing a few imperfections in the work that confirmed Art’s amateur status. Still, it was a well-constructed gift that more than served its purpose, becoming for my daughters a source of playtime enjoyment. It now resides in an upstairs attic at home, awaiting the arrival of grandchildren years in the future. When I venture there during the year and happen to look its way, I can almost hear again Art’s New England brogue and see his warm smile. Although years have passed since his unfortunate death from a massive heart attack, Art’s dollhouse creation today reminds me of his existence and his nature.

Suppose a trio of robbers were to enter my home and see this dollhouse resting in the attic. Just by observing Art’s handiwork, they would be able to form several conclusions about him. First, they would assume that he had sufficient knowledge and power to build the dollhouse. They would also know that he had chosen to use his power and knowledge in creative activity. Thirdly, they would know that of all the different architectural styles available to him, he had chosen to build the specific structure before them. These men, having never seen or heard of Art Gallagher, could thus speak of his creativity, power, knowledge, volition, activity, and sovereignty in regard to the dollhouse and could do so merely by observing what he had made.

Not everything about him, however, could be discerned by them during their visit to my attic. Other aspects of Art’s nature would remain hidden, impossible to determine from examining the dollhouse. Important questions would linger. Was the builder one person or a group of people? For what purpose, if any, did the builder(s) so act? Did my children know who built the dollhouse, or did they have no such personal knowledge or relationship? These and other questions would remain unanswered when these three uninvited guests leave my house.

In like manner, I have asked you to look with me at the universe we all inhabit and to acknowledge certain attributes its Creator must possess. We have deduced that the God of the universe must be powerful enough to energize it, active enough to construct it, knowledgeable enough to understand it, volitional enough to will it, and sovereign enough to determine how to manage it. This much the Argument from Design has told us about the nature of God. Several questions, however, remain unanswered by this argument. It has not told us, for instance, whether one God or a group of gods was responsible for the universe, nor has it told us if this God (or gods) is good or bad, loving or unloving, fair or unfair. Furthermore, we cannot glean from the Argument from Design the purpose for which the universe was constructed or, for that matter, if it was constructed for any purpose at all. Lastly, we have yet to ascertain if this Creator God relates to His creatures, particularly to us as human beings.

So, having exhausted what the design of the universe tells us about God’s nature, we must now consider those four other arguments and determine what else we can learn about Him.

Daily Quotation

Quoted in Mark Water, The New Encyclopedia of Christian Quotations, 685.