If I Cannot See God, I Cannot Believe in God

You already believe in many things you cannot see.

Have you ever seen the wind? No, but you have seen its effects in hurricanes and tornadoes and such. You have heard it and even felt it. So, although you have not seen the wind, you know it exists.

Have you ever seen your brain? Probably not, but you still see the results of your thinking. You can reason, ask questions, and give answers. So, although you cannot see your brain, it still exists.

Although I have never seen God, I have seen some of what he has done (Rom. 1:20). God exists.

We could use an example of the complexity of the sun and the earth's relationship to it, or the moon's gravitational pull (Psa. 19:1-4), but as Augustine observed, "Men go abroad to wonder at the height of mountains, at the huge waves of the sea, at the long course of the rivers, at the vast compass of the ocean, at the circular motion of the stars, and they pass by themselves without wondering."

The Bible says we are uniquely made (Psa. 139:14-15). So, let us merely look at the eye:

The human eye is enormously complicated - a perfect and interrelated system of about 40 individual subsystems, including the retina, pupil, iris, cornea, lens and optic nerve. For instance, the retina has approximately 137 million special cells that respond to light and send messages to the brain. About 130 million of these cells look like rods and handle the black and white vision. The other seven million are cone shaped and allow us to see in color. The retina cells receive light impressions, which are translated to electric pulses and sent to the brain via the optic nerve. A special section of the brain called the visual cortex interprets the pulses to color, contrast, depth, etc., which allows us to see "pictures" of our world. Incredibly, the eye, optic nerve and visual cortex are totally separate and distinct subsystems. Yet, together, they capture, deliver and interpret up to 1.5 million pulse messages a millisecond! It would take dozens of Cray supercomputers programmed perfectly and operating together flawlessly to even get close to performing this task. (Richards)

The eye is absolutely amazing! All the separate subsystems must be present and performing perfectly at the same instant, or the eye will not work. Even today's digital cameras with all their complexity cannot be put together by mere chance; you cannot shake them together in a box until the are perfectly fit together and fully functioning. How much more wondrous is the human eye. Even Darwin in the Origin of the Species had to confess, "To suppose that the eye, with all its inimitable contrivances for adjusting the focus to different distances, for admitting different amounts of light, and for the correction of spherical and chromatic aberration, could have formed by natural selection, seems, I freely confess, absurd in the highest degree possible" (page 155).

So, we can see the design of the eye, that it is wondrous, and its existence is not by mere chance. It has a designer, and his name is God. So, every time you see a sunset, a sunrise, the moon, the stars, the oceans, and all the many other wonders of creation, it is God that gave you an eye to see it.

Although we have all the wonders of creation, the body, etc., we do not need to see the natural to believe (John 20:29; Heb. 11:1). Faith is a gift from God (Eph. 2:8-10). Although faith cannot be seen, it still exists. It sees with spiritual eyes (John 3:1-8). While it can use natural sight to see that God does exist (Rom. 1:20), it can also inquire into the supernatural reasoning of the Holy Spirit. As Paul writes, "The man without the Spirit does not accept the things that come from the Spirit of God, for they are foolishness to him, and he cannot understand them, because they are spiritually discerned" (1 Cor. 2:14; cf. Rom. 8:5-8). God can open our eyes to see more than what is merely visible in this natural world (Luke 24:31-32).

A supernatural born-again encounter with God causes a change to take place (1 Thess. 1:5), as in the case of Paul on the Damascus road (Acts 9). No, they are not always as dramatic as Paul's; some are like a tornadoes, while others are like gentle breezes - however both are supernatural. This new life gives us new sight (John 3:3). This new sight gives us new eyes to understand the existence and character of God more fully, as well as an understanding of his love, grace, and acceptance. As Paul says, "We have not received the spirit of the world but the Spirit who is from God, that we may understand what God has freely given us" (1 Cor. 2:2).

Ask God to open your eyes to see him today.

Reference

Lawrence O. Richards, It Couldn't Just Happen. Thomas Nelson, Inc.