I just finished the book “Holy Sex!” by Gregory K. Popcak, PH.D and in light of the “Contraception: Why Not?” series of posts, I thought i would share an excerpt from the book that I enjoyed. It caused me to think back to the post “Contraception: Why Not? (Part 19)” where Professor Janet E. Smith asks where we get our immortal soul from if there is no immortal soul in either the sperm or the egg? Of course the answer is from God, He creates the immortal soul in every being. I just really enjoyed how the following excerpt was expanding on that point:
“God loves loving. Love is what God does best, but a lover isn’t much good without a beloved. This is why God seems to be endlessly fascinated with creating new things. It gives him more to love.
G. K. Chesterton once observed that God delights in creation because he loves it so much and loves creating more to love. In his book Orthodoxy, Chesterton writes,
It is possible that God says every morning, “Do it again” to the sun; and every evening “Do it again” to the moon. It may not be automatic necessity that makes the daisies alike; it may be that God makes every daisy separately, but has never gotten tired of making them. It may be that He has the eternal appetite of infancy; for we have sinned and grown old, and our Father is younger than we. The repetition in Nature may not be mere recurrence; it may be a theatrical encore. Heaven may encore the bird who laid an egg. If the human being conceives and brings forth a human child instead of bringing forth a fish, or a bat, or a griffin, the reason may not be that we are fixed in an animal fate without life or purpose. It may be that our little tragedy has touched the gods, that they admire it from their starry galleries, and that at the end of every human drama man is called again and again before the curtain.
Perhaps this is one of the things Jesus meant when he told us that unless we became like little children we could not enter the kingdom of heaven (Luke 18:15-17). Children never get tired of creating and of repeating a good thing. Neither does God. It is only we sinful, jaded adults who see a field of flowers and think “parking garage” or see a baby and think “second mortgage.” By contrast, if a small child – or God – sees the same field of flowers or the same baby, they both think, “Yeah! Do it again!”
Who do you think is living more authentically?
Even though God is completely sufficient on his own, God loves creating, and God especially loves to create people. As the Church tells us, the human being is “the only creature on earth whom God willed for its own sake” (Gaudium et Spes). Why? Because we are the only creatures he gets to spend an eternity loving. We are the only earthly beings built to last, so to speak. One can only guess that for God it is a joy beyond words to create creatures whom he can love eternally. This same God, who generously longs to share all of his joy with us, gives husbands and wives a taste of the particular joy that is creating and loving the creation by inviting us to bring his children into the world.”
-Holy Sex! By Gregory K. Popcak, PH.D. pages 149 & 150
Although we cannot create a new and unique person on our own, I do find it truly amazing that God brings us along in the creation processes. What an opportunity to experience God’s creative power through the mystery of life. To live this experience has got to be a gift designed to reconnect us to our creator.
There are those that argue for evolution and those that argue for creation and maybe some claim they don’t know. Well I am here to tell you I now have the answer to end all speculation and confusion. You see, I recently bought a bottle of Old Spice body wash – not the young mans kind, the good kind – the Classic Original scent (Much to my wife’s dismay – says it reminds her of her Grandpa). Anyhow I discovered the secret to our existence – right there on the bottle of Old Spice! Here is what it says:
“IF YOUR GRANDFATHER HADN’T WORN IT, YOU WOULDN’T EXIST.”
There you have it, the debate between creationism and evolutionism can now be put to rest.
I am currently reading the book “Searching for the God of Grace” by Stuart Tyner (ISBN: 0-8163-2152-3). I think grace is one of those spiritual topics many of us struggle with. All too often we want to use the word “but” after the word “grace”, usually in word or in action. Sometimes we do not even realize that our actions or even our thoughts are still focused on works but upon careful review, there it is – salvation by works more than grace. Anyhow, Stuart Tyner has a great way of looking at the creation story as it relates to grace. So I thought I would simply share it with you, you can find this on page 63 of his book:
With profound significance, the biblical story of the human race begins without one human being anywhere in sight. Deliberately, the story informs us, God waits to create Adam and Eve until the entire physical world is ready to be given as a thoughtful, bountiful gift.
It didn’t have to be that way.
It could have started out with a lot of hard work on our part. God could have decided that what we needed most was to have nothing given to us, nothing free, nothing except what we worked and sweated for, what we earned and deserved. “Here are your supplies,” God might have said to Adam and Eve at the beginning of Creation week. “Here is a stockpile of raw materials: carbon, hydrogen, a puff of oxygen, a pile of dirt, a shovel, a hammer, and a bucket of nails. What you put together is what you get to live with. An urban jungle or an Edenic garden – it’s up to you. That’s the way your world is going to work. Might as well get used to it from day one.”
God might have said that to Adam and Eve. But He didn’t.
Instead, He did all the work. “God saw all that he had made, and it was very good” (Genesis 1:31). ” ‘The hand of the Lord has done this; the Holy One of Israel has created it’ ” (Isaiah 41:20). “Without him nothing was made that has been made” (John 1:3). “All things were created by him” (Colossians 1:16).
If you accept the Bible’s assertion that “all these things … were written for our admonition” (1 Corinthians 10:11, NKJV) and that the Bible’s stories are able to make us “wise for salvation” (2 Timothy 3:15), then seizing the salvific significance of the Creation story becomes crucial: God saves us the same way He creates us – without our help! “Creation is already redemption.”
Now if that is to “wordy” for you and you need something else more simple, then how about the 5 point plan of salvation? You can find this on page 64 of the same book:
1. God does all the work (Genesis 1:1, 31).
2. God gives His work as a gift (Genesis 1:27 – 30).
3. The recipients of the gift disobey and then run away and try to hide from God
(Genesis 3:1 – 8).
4. God pursues the ones who are running away (Genesis 3:9 – 13).
5. God promises to take care of the problem caused by separation (Genesis 3:15).
There you have it, the long and the short of it – personally I like the long version.