I recently read an article dealing with the deep space probes that NASA sent out to explore our corner of the universe beginning in the 1970's. According to the article's author, the probes carried in them several items explaining what earthlings are all about and inviting whoever found these probes to come to earth and "say hello." The first batch of these probes, launched during the Nixon presidency, have begun to exit our solar system and will go literally into "no man's land" in the near future. Although most of the probes have continued to send information back to earth (it takes several hours for their transmissions to reach NASA receivers), they will run out of fuel in the next few months and subsequently become deep space trash. Imagine a “V-ger” type scenario like the first Star Trek movie.
What caught my eye in this article, however, was not the
scientific issues dealing with the probes or their mission, but the fact that
the author was bemoaning the fact that NASA has, in his view, given an open
door invitation to aliens who may be hostile to come to earth and create
mayhem. The author quotes renown atheistic physicist Steven Hawking as saying
that, although most alien life forms are likely to be microbes (how he comes to
such a conclusion is beyond me), those who are more advanced are likely to be
hostile and looking to colonize other planets--a la European style middle ages colonization.
You basically have a Star Trek scenario where most of the aliens you will encounter
will be looking to harm you with few, if any, docile and friendly.
I don't know about you, but this all sounds rather strange to my
ears. To have individuals discussing extra-terrestrial life in matter of fact
terms seems like a case of jumping the gun to me. Although we have no reason to
believe that there is life in other planets, scientists continue to discuss it
as though it were a foregone conclusion. They don't speak of possibilities or
theories, but, just as with evolution, they speak of it as fact and then
disdain those who point out that, hey we haven't seen any of this yet!
Why do I even care about such things? Simply because the same
people who will tell us that space aliens exist, are those who will turn around
and tell us that evolution is a "fact" that cannot be denied. And why
do they say such things? For no other reason than that it is what they believe
and that settles it. It is akin to the old bumper sticker that declares “God
said, I believe it, that settles it” (the problem is, that if God said it,
whether I believe it or not, THAT SETTLES IT!) Those who are the most
vociferous about "evidence" are the same ones who pontificate about
matters that supposedly happened billions of years ago with little more than
their say so. They see something happening in our current world, micro
evolution or adaptations to our environment, and automatically extrapolate from
those events to billions of years back and what must have happened then. If we
have small variations and adaptations today, imagine what that means given
billions of years, they’ll say! As one theologian put it in ridiculing such
nonsense "just give time and chance a chance" and anything is
possible. Thus, you see the scientific community constantly increasing the age
they claim for the universe, which at last count was somewhere around 13
billion years!!
But not only so, we are told that extra-terrestrial life is pretty
much a fact with little more than wishful thinking. Yet, events such as the
life and death of Christ and His resurrection are labeled a myth that cannot
possibly be believed by those who are enlightened. An event of history for
which there is ample evidence is looked upon as some sort of hoax that only
those who are ignorant and simple can possibly believe. The New Testament tells
us that the events of Jesus' life were not done in a corner. They were done in
full view of the world and were attested to by thousands who were eye witnesses
to these facts. Paul told his audience in Corinth that he "delivered to
you as of first importance what I also received; that Christ died according to
the Scriptures, that He was buried and that He rose again according to the
Scriptures" (1 Corinthians 15:3-4). He then goes on to explain that if
Christ did not raise from the dead, if the events that he is describing did not
in fact happen, then Christianity is false. This is not some sort of legend
whose advocates couldn't care less whether they were historical or not. These
were real, fact-based events with real, living people.
How is it possible that people who, by all measures of
intelligence and smarts, are extremely bright can have such cognitive
dissonance? The Bible, again, provides us with the clear answer. "Look on
yourselves brethren how that not many among you are wise or rich" (1
Corinthians 1:26). Thus, God has determined that the things that are looked
upon by the world as low and unworthy are the very things that He considers
appropriate for his purposes. Those who are the least among us are the ones
that God raises up and glorifies. The world looks upon the things of Christ as
foolish and worthless. But God has made of such the crowning glory of His work.
For that, we can all be thankful!
Our Christian view of deliberate, created uniqueness would be seriously threatened (the alien loving, God hating crowd believes) if life in space was discovered. If man and this earth are not the centerpiece of God's establishment of life, and life is discovered among the stars somewhere (or everywhere), you have what appears to be a pretty good argument against special creation. Spontaneous, willy-nilly life spread throughout the universe as portrayed in Star Trek like shows do very little to reinforce the Biblical worldview. Thus, I think, like any "scientific" notion that challenges Biblical truth, this is bound to be embraced and advanced by the God-denying (or minimizing) masses.
ReplyDeleteAbsolutely! Man will go to unbelievable lengths to try and squeeze God out of the picture. But, he is unable to do so simply because someone, or something is going to be his god. Thus, it is either nature, the environment or aliens. That all is a perfect example of why the atheistic worldview is so bankrupt.
DeleteThanks, Mike--good article!
ReplyDelete