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*** SHOW NOTES (not a transcript) ***
Lead:
They probably don’t say “God of the gaps,” but here’s what to watch for and what they mean.
Intro:
Yesterday we kicked off the book of Matthew and saw right away that his objective to his predominantly Jewish audience is to lay out an argument that Jesus is the promised King, Messiah, son of David.
Today we read about the beginnings of Jesus’ preparation for His earthly ministry. And since today includes the scene where Satan tempts Jesus, let me call out two things. Remember that the writer of the book of Hebrews points out that we don’t have a high priest — Jesus — who can’t relate to us. In fact, he says that Jesus was tempted in every way that we are but didn’t sin. And the three temptations Satan uses happens to cover the three foundational categories of all sin — lust, greed, and pride. All this is great news for us!
Today’s word of the day is “God of the gaps,” which isn’t a definition, per se — it’s a type of false argument. We’ll catch that in our thinking segment and then wrap up by praying through a psalm or two.
Sponsor:
Today’s sponsor and provider of background music is Pip Craighead’s The Dandelion Project, and the new track is Night School.
Bible segment (read along with The Bible Project):
Passage: Matthew 3-4
Translation: NIV (New International Version)
Verses: 42
Words: ~888
Thinking/reflection segment:
A “God of the gaps” complaint or argument:
Comes from someone whose worldview is most often materialism — that the physical cosmos is all there is. There is no God or supernatural realm. In other words, science is the source of all knowledge.
Argues that God is just superstition to explain stuff for which we do not yet have a scientific argument. Example: We can’t explain lightning, so it must be Zeus.
Science has explained many things that were once not understood, and therefore it’s only a matter of time before it explains anything else we do not yet understand.
When you hear this, remember that
It’s basically an admission that knowledge gaps still do exist in science.
It’s easy to think humanity knows more than it does and that our knowledge gaps are small. They are not.
Whether they admit it or not, this means that they are taking on faith that science will one day explain the gap because it has (sometimes) in the past. They do not have proof.
It is the natural bent of every human heart to reject God and replace Him with some form of idol. This goes back to the fall in Genesis 3 — Adam and Eve thought they’d be better at deciding what was good than God.
There is no silver-bullet response, and your response may vary depending on the topic at hand. That said, here are a few thoughts you can be confident in.
God is the creator of all — He brought being (the cosmos) into existence from non-being. In other words, He’s bigger than any gap.
Science isn’t at odds with Christianity. All the earliest big brains in science were Christians and pursued science because they saw creation as God’s handiwork. In a sense, science helps us more clearly see God.
Not having an answer doesn’t mean you’re stupid.
Just because science will, in the future, fill in some areas of knowledge that are current gaps does not disprove God.
Finally, if God, by definition, is bigger than and “wholly other” than the universe, then there are supernatural laws that natural investigation will never uncover. That’s why we call miracles miracles, for instance. If God created it all, His ability to act in time and space as we know it is not limited to time and space as we know it.
The bottom line: If God is real and who He says He is, there likely will always be things we cannot fully explain (such as a virgin birth or raising Jesus from the dead). If He is who He says he is, by definition our finite minds will never fully grasp an infinite mind. The question is, “Who gets to be God?'“ And as Paul says in Romans 1, “…what may be known about God is plain to them” and they “are without excuse.”
Wisdom segment:
Passage: Psalm 72-73
Translation: NIV (New International Version)
Verses: 48
Words: ~788
Love you!
-R
Roger Courville, CSP is a globally-recognized expert in digitally-extended communication and connection, an award-winning speaker, award-winning author, and a passionately bad guitarist. Follow him on Twitter -- @RogerCourville and @JoinForTheHope – or his blog: www.forthehope.org.
Sources and resources:
(1) C. Stephen Evans, Pocket Dictionary of Apologetics & Philosophy of Religion (Downers Grove, IL: InterVarsity Press, 2002), 12–13.