A Pastor’s Thoughts

By Pastor Leon Jicha, Park Terrace Community Church —

When life is not going well, have you had doubt about your faith? In any major decision, certainty is virtually impossible. An element of faith is always required. Everybody experiences doubt when it comes to faith at some point in their lives. Doubt is both natural and healthy when it leads us to honest, careful reflection about our faith.

Many people in the Bible wrestled with doubt at some point. Moses, David, Joseph, Peter and Thomas, just to name a few. Faith is a choice we make, a decision. We can’t be certain. Instead, we review what we can know, and make a choice to believe or not to believe.

Psalm 19:1-4 says, The heavens declare the glory of God; the skies proclaim the work of his hands. 2 Day after day they pour forth speech; night after night they reveal knowledge. 3 They have no speech, they use no words; no sound is heard from them.4 Yet their voice goes out into all the earth, their words to the ends of the world.

The psalm recognizes God’s hand in the natural world, which points to the creator. Consider the following points: The natural order of the world “pours forth speech” about God according to Psalm 19. Most people throughout the world, of any religion, regard the order, purpose, and beauty of the natural world as evidence of God.

This is true of the view expressed in Psalm 19. What do you see in creation that points to God? Some may observe the natural world and conclude that there is no God. (There’s an element of belief about this as well.) Beauty and order of nature do not prove conclusively that there is a God, but rather are important evidence that leads many to believe in God.

There is often a perceived conflict between science and faith. This is due to a mistaken reading of the biblical creation stories as scientific accounts rather than as symbolic, poetic, and narrative expressions of God’s role as creator.

There are two creation stories in the Book of Genesis: Genesis 1:1–2:4a and Genesis 2:4b–3:24. The biblical creation stories teach us that God is the creator and that God has a purpose in creating the world.

The first creation account is poetic, signaled by a clear structure, repetition, and an emphasis on order and alignment between creation and God’s spoken words. The second is narrative and emphasizes the close relationships between humans and the ground, animals, other humans, and God. Both creation stories reflect the understanding of their writers.

To read and evaluate the biblical creation stories based on modern science is to misunderstand their purpose. They are not meant to tell us about the “how” of creation (which science can), but rather about the “why” and the “who” of creation (which science cannot).

Many influential scientists throughout history, including Isaac Newton, Galileo, Georges Lemaitre (who formulated the Big Bang theory), Johannes Kepler, Francis Bacon, and many others, believed in God. And a large percentage of modern scientists today express faith in God. One can value both science and faith and see them as complementary. Modern science and its conclusions do not disprove God, and faith can enrich one’s appreciation for science even as science and its understanding of nature can deepen our faith. While the natural order and beauty of the world are compelling arguments for the existence of God, our personal experiences of God can be even more powerful and persuasive. How has God made a difference in your life?