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I Believe In God

Does God exist?

Here are six straightforward reasons to believe that God is really there.

By Marilyn Adamson

I know this a long and detailed explanation, but I feel she provides very concise answers to God's existence.....

1. The complexity of our planet points to a deliberate Designer who not only created our universe, but sustains it today.
Many examples showing God's design could be given, possibly with no end. But here are a few:
The Earth...its size is perfect. The Earth's size and corresponding gravity holds a thin layer of mostly nitrogen and oxygen gases, only extending about 50 miles above the Earth's surface. If Earth were smaller, an atmosphere would be impossible, like the planet Mercury. If Earth were larger, its atmosphere would contain free hydrogen, like Jupiter.3 Earth is the only known planet equipped with an atmosphere of the right mixture of gases to sustain plant, animal and human life.
The Earth is located the right distance from the sun. Consider the temperature swings we encounter, roughly -30 degrees to +120 degrees. If the Earth were any further away from the sun, we would all freeze. Any closer and we would burn up. Even a fractional variance in the Earth's position to the sun would make life on Earth impossible. The Earth remains this perfect distance from the sun while it rotates around the sun at a speed of nearly 67,000 mph. It is also rotating on its axis, allowing the entire surface of the Earth to be properly warmed and cooled every day.
And our moon is the perfect size and distance from the Earth for its gravitational pull. The moon creates important ocean tides and movement so ocean waters do not stagnate, and yet our massive oceans are restrained from spilling over across the continents.4
Water...colorless, odorless and without taste, and yet no living thing can survive without it. Plants, animals and human beings consist mostly of water (about two-thirds of the human body is water). You'll see why the characteristics of water are uniquely suited to life:
It has wide margin between its boiling point and freezing point. Water allows us to live in an environment of fluctuating temperature changes, while keeping our bodies a steady 98.6 degrees.
Water is a universal solvent. This property of water means that various chemicals, minerals and nutrients can be carried throughout our bodies and into the smallest blood vessels.5
Water is also chemically neutral. Without affecting the makeup of the substances it carries, water enables food, medicines and minerals to be absorbed and used by the body.
Water has a unique surface tension. Water in plants can therefore flow upward against gravity, bringing life-giving water and nutrients to the top of even the tallest trees.
Water freezes from the top down and floats, so fish can live in the winter.
Ninety-seven percent of the Earth's water is in the oceans. But on our Earth, there is a system designed which removes salt from the water and then distributes that water throughout the globe. Evaporation takes the ocean waters, leaving the salt, and forms clouds which are easily moved by the wind to disperse water over the land, for vegetation, animals and people. It is a system of purification and supply that sustains life on this planet, a system of recycled and reused water.6
The human brain...simultaneously processes an amazing amount of information. Your brain takes in all the colors and objects you see, the temperature around you, the pressure of your feet against the floor, the sounds around you, the dryness of your mouth, even the texture of your keyboard. Your brain holds and processes all your emotions, thoughts and memories. At the same time your brain keeps track of the ongoing functions of your body like your breathing pattern, eyelid movement, hunger and movement of the muscles in your hands.
The human brain processes more than a million messages a second.7 Your brain weighs the importance of all this data, filtering out the relatively unimportant. This screening function is what allows you to focus and operate effectively in your world. The brain functions differently than other organs. There is an intelligence to it, the ability to reason, to produce feelings, to dream and plan, to take action, and relate to other people.
The eye...can distinguish among seven million colors. It has automatic focusing and handles an astounding 1.5 million messages -- simultaneously.8 Evolution focuses on mutations and changes from and within existing organisms. Yet evolution alone does not fully explain the initial source of the eye or the brain -- the start of living organisms from nonliving matter.



2. The universe had a start - what caused it?
Scientists are convinced that our universe began with one enormous explosion of energy and light, which we now call the Big Bang. This was the singular start to everything that exists: the beginning of the universe, the start of space, and even the initial start of time itself.
Astrophysicist Robert Jastrow, a self-described agnostic, stated, "The seed of everything that has happened in the Universe was planted in that first instant; every star, every planet and every living creature in the Universe came into being as a result of events that were set in motion in the moment of the cosmic explosion...The Universe flashed into being, and we cannot find out what caused that to happen."9
Steven Weinberg, a Nobel laureate in Physics, said at the moment of this explosion, "the universe was about a hundred thousands million degrees Centigrade...and the universe was filled with light."10
The universe has not always existed. It had a start...what caused that? Scientists have no explanation for the sudden explosion of light and matter.



3. The universe operates by uniform laws of nature. Why does it?
Much of life may seem uncertain, but look at what we can count on day after day: gravity remains consistent, a hot cup of coffee left on a counter will get cold, the earth rotates in the same 24 hours, and the speed of light doesn't change -- on earth or in galaxies far from us.
How is it that we can identify laws of nature that never change? Why is the universe so orderly, so reliable?
"The greatest scientists have been struck by how strange this is. There is no logical necessity for a universe that obeys rules, let alone one that abides by the rules of mathematics. This astonishment springs from the recognition that the universe doesn't have to behave this way. It is easy to imagine a universe in which conditions change unpredictably from instant to instant, or even a universe in which things pop in and out of existence."11
Richard Feynman, a Nobel Prize winner for quantum electrodynamics, said, "Why nature is mathematical is a mystery...The fact that there are rules at all is a kind of miracle."12



4. The DNA code informs, programs a cell's behavior.
All instruction, all teaching, all training comes with intent. Someone who writes an instruction manual does so with purpose. Did you know that in every cell of our bodies there exists a very detailed instruction code, much like a miniature computer program? As you may know, a computer program is made up of ones and zeros, like this: 110010101011000. The way they are arranged tell the computer program what to do. The DNA code in each of our cells is very similar. It's made up of four chemicals that scientists abbreviate as A, T, G, and C. These are arranged in the human cell like this: CGTGTGACTCGCTCCTGAT and so on. There are three billion of these letters in every human cell!!
Well, just like you can program your phone to beep for specific reasons, DNA instructs the cell. DNA is a three-billion-lettered program telling the cell to act in a certain way. It is a full instruction manual.13
Why is this so amazing? One has to ask....how did this information program wind up in each human cell? These are not just chemicals. These are chemicals that instruct, that code in a very detailed way exactly how the person's body should develop.
Natural, biological causes are completely lacking as an explanation when programmed information is involved. You cannot find instruction, precise information like this, without someone intentionally constructing it.



5. We know God exists because he pursues us. He is constantly initiating and seeking for us to come to him.
I was an atheist at one time. And like many atheists, the issue of people believing in God bothered me greatly. What is it about atheists that we would spend so much time, attention, and energy refuting something that we don't believe even exists?! What causes us to do that? When I was an atheist, I attributed my intentions as caring for those poor, delusional people...to help them realize their hope was completely ill-founded. To be honest, I also had another motive. As I challenged those who believed in God, I was deeply curious to see if they could convince me otherwise. Part of my quest was to become free from the question of God. If I could conclusively prove to believers that they were wrong, then the issue is off the table, and I would be free to go about my life.
I didn't realize that the reason the topic of God weighed so heavily on my mind, was because God was pressing the issue. I have come to find out that God wants to be known. He created us with the intention that we would know him. He has surrounded us with evidence of himself and he keeps the question of his existence squarely before us. It was as if I couldn't escape thinking about the possibility of God. In fact, the day I chose to acknowledge God's existence, my prayer began with, "Ok, you win..." It might be that the underlying reason atheists are bothered by people believing in God is because God is actively pursuing them.
I am not the only one who has experienced this. Malcolm Muggeridge, socialist and philosophical author, wrote, "I had a notion that somehow, besides questing, I was being pursued." C.S. Lewis said he remembered, "...night after night, feeling whenever my mind lifted even for a second from my work, the steady, unrelenting approach of Him whom I so earnestly desired not to meet. I gave in, and admitted that God was God, and knelt and prayed: perhaps, that night, the most dejected and reluctant convert in all of England."
Lewis went on to write a book titled, "Surprised by Joy" as a result of knowing God. I too had no expectations other than rightfully admitting God's existence. Yet over the following several months, I became amazed by his love for me.



6. Unlike any other revelation of God, Jesus Christ is the clearest, most specific picture of God revealing himself to us.
Why Jesus? Look throughout the major world religions and you'll find that Buddha, Muhammad, Confucius and Moses all identified themselves as teachers or prophets. None of them ever claimed to be equal to God. Surprisingly, Jesus did. That is what sets Jesus apart from all the others. He said God exists and you're looking at him. Though he talked about his Father in heaven, it was not from the position of separation, but of very close union, unique to all humankind. Jesus said that anyone who had seen Him had seen the Father, anyone who believed in him, believed in the Father.
He said, "I am the light of the world, he who follows me will not walk in darkness, but will have the light of life."14 He claimed attributes belonging only to God: to be able to forgive people of their sin, free them from habits of sin, give people a more abundant life and give them eternal life in heaven. Unlike other teachers who focused people on their words, Jesus pointed people to himself. He did not say, "follow my words and you will find truth." He said, "I am the way, the truth, and the life, no one comes to the Father but through me."15
What proof did Jesus give for claiming to be divine? He did what people can't do. Jesus performed miracles. He healed people...blind, crippled, deaf, even raised a couple of people from the dead. He had power over objects...created food out of thin air, enough to feed crowds of several thousand people. He performed miracles over nature...walked on top of a lake, commanding a raging storm to stop for some friends. People everywhere followed Jesus, because he constantly met their needs, doing the miraculous. He said if you do not want to believe what I'm telling you, you should at least believe in me based on the miracles you're seeing.16
Jesus Christ showed God to be gentle, loving, aware of our self-centeredness and shortcomings, yet deeply wanting a relationship with us. Jesus revealed that although he views us as sinners, worthy of his punishment, his love for us ruled and he came up with a different plan. God himself took on the form of man and accepted the punishment for our sin on our behalf. Sounds ludicrous? Perhaps, but many loving fathers would gladly trade places with their child in a cancer ward if they could. The Bible says that the reason we would love God is because he first loved us.
Jesus died in our place so we could be forgiven. Of all the religions known to humanity, only through Jesus will you see God reaching toward humanity, providing a way for us to have a relationship with him. Jesus proves a divine heart of love, meeting our needs, drawing us to himself. Because of Jesus' death and resurrection, he offers us a new life today. We can be forgiven, fully accepted by God and genuinely loved by God. He says, "I have loved you with an everlasting love, therefore I have continued my faithfulness to you."17 This is God, in action.
Does God exist? If you want to know, investigate Jesus Christ. We're told that "God so loved the world that he gave his only Son, that whoever believes in him should not perish but have eternal life."18
God does not force us to believe in him, though he could. Instead, he has provided sufficient proof of his existence for us to willingly respond to him. The earth's perfect distance from the sun, the unique chemical properties of water, the human brain, DNA, the number of people who attest to knowing God, the gnawing in our hearts and minds to determine if God is there, the willingness for God to be known through Jesus Christ. If you need to know more about Jesus and reasons to believe in him, please see: Beyond Blind Faith.
BlueVeins · 22-25
I'll take this as an invitation to debate.

1) The overwhelming body of scientific evidence suggests that the complex world we see today is caused by a phenomenon known as rising complexity. To state it simply, complexity rises over time, like entropy. We don't know exactly why this happens, or on what scale. Perhaps it's a simple law of nature, like gravity, that will eventually be explained by naturalistic observation and mathematics.

And this phenomenon of rising complexity is observable to this day in things like the evolution of language and the development of the economy, neither of which are centrally controlled. That does prove that mystery still exists, but mystery =/= God.

As for the stuff about Earth, Earth is an amazing planet, but it's kind of just that... one amazing rock in all of the cosmos. A rough estimate suggests that there's somewhere around 10^21 stars in the universe, so it's not really astounding that one should possess amazingly habitable conditions on random chance alone.

Also, I should point out that most of the Earth is entirely uninhabitable. A few kilometers beneath the surface, no life can exist, and a few kilometers up, nothing naturally lives (for essentially opposite reasons). The reality is that we live on a tiny layer of a grain of sand in space, and there's no indication that our situation is anywhere near typical.

2) We don't know what 'caused' the Big Bang, or whether or not causality as we know it is even relavent in the context of such a mind-bending event. When I say 'we,' that includes you. It could be literally anything, including another natural event. It's not evidence that there is a god; it's just evidence that there's unknowns remaining.

3) Again, there's a difference between evidence of unknown and evidence of God. There's no logical necessity that the universe have uniform laws based on only the knowledge that there is a universe, but we don't know... what exactly causes the universe to be the way it is, so there could be a reasonable cause in that.

4) The functionality of nucleic acids is an amazing thing, and this cannot be overstated, however, I feel like you're missing some key points. Namely, DNA is rather clumbsy and random; it's highly probable that you have some dysfunctional genes inside of you that would really hurt you if any one of them manifested. The only reason why it's OK is because those genes are recessive, and aren't in command.

DNA replication is not a very good process, and that generates tons of cancer cells, many more than you ever know about. Most cancerous cells are killed off before they can even cause problems, and yet the very few that slip past our defenses still cause unreal death and destruction.

We know how DNA coding comes about; we've made it happen in labs. It's random mutations combined with non-random environmental conditions that can causes small changes in the short term, which build up into large changes in the long term.

5) The importance of religion in modern society can be chalked up to how hard Christians push for it. Religion is a relevant topic because people use it to justify all kinds of things from banning gay marriage to providing abstinence-only education to invading other countries. Atheists try to refute religion because people are constantly trying to cram it down our throats and villify us; it's essentially a form of self-defense.

6) There's some evidence that Jesus existed at a person, but no evidence of the miracles he allegedly commited. The first accounts of his miracles were decades later and anonymous; there's no way of knowing whether or not they were true at all.

Riddle me this: If your god is real, why is the Bible so full of false stories? Why does it claim that languages were divided all at once, as opposed to the contemporary scientific knowledge that they diverged gradually as a result of errors? Why does it claim that the Israelites descend from Egyptian slaves when archeological evidence demonstrates the contrary? Why hasn't this guy told good-willing people who were mislead about his will that what they were doing was wrong?

-Thanks for reading.
faith2hope4love · 56-60, F
Your theories are purely scientific with no room for the acceptance of any other beliefs especially Christian!! 🤔 @BlueVeins

If I was not a nice person, I would have deleted your comments but I decided not too.
BlueVeins · 22-25
@faith2hope4love Since when is it a bad thing to think scientifically? And what was stated above doesn't explicitly contradict the core tenants of Christianity; you could recognize the truths I pointed out and still accept Christianity as your religion. What I said was merely a refutation of supposed evidence of Christianity's claims, not refutation of Christianity itself.

I have different arguments specifically tailored for that task.
faith2hope4love · 56-60, F
It is obvious that we are at opposite ends of the spectrum. We don't agree enough to even meet in the middle and shake hands!! Lol

I do wish you all the best!! 😊
Jumpycat · 26-30, M
Its always been a struggle for me to accept any sort of god because my life has always been followed by struggle no matter how nice or how much good it just got worse and worse but just because i dont believe in a god dose not mean ill act any different ill still treat everyone nice and ill still treat them with kindness that way i know i do it for me and im not doing it for a god as for everything else too much logic makes sense for me we have one planet with all different people believe in all different gods swearing their god is the true god but surely they cant all be true did we just create it out of fear something for people to hold onto so death would hold less despair and why would he only give us Jesus in a human age we have history far before him but only when people with very little knowledge where around was savior and why do they always tend to follow what people at the time would think was normal writing is always been bent to fit current ages to keep the illusion that its right.
faith2hope4love · 56-60, F
@Jumpycat It is a personal decision for each of us. I pray that you will find the answers you are seeking!! ☺
Jumpycat · 26-30, M
@faith2hope4love And ill hope that your faith helps you find your inner strength.
faith2hope4love · 56-60, F
@Jumpycat Thank you, I do appreciate that!! ☺
MrBrownstone · 46-50, M
Or we could be living in a computer simulation which answers those questions too.
faith2hope4love · 56-60, F
@MrBrownstone Definitely far beyond a kid's imagination!! 🙄
MrBrownstone · 46-50, M
@faith2hope4love Definitely not a magical person in the sky.
faith2hope4love · 56-60, F
@MrBrownstone That is your opinion but I disagree!!🙄
SW-User
There is always some level or abstract design for anything we know to exist. Such design needs a designer that understands HOW it will work, WHAT it should work with, and then finally how to construct it. This alone was enough to make me believe that it is quite literally impossible to witness design with an origin from seemingly chaos. All science points against order, design, consistency, and the unnatural manipulation of elements being the results of chaos and entropy. Just wanted to share why I believe
faith2hope4love · 56-60, F
@SW-User God is the creator and sustainer of life!!💖
Magenta · F
@SW-User @faith2hope4love
I so agree with you both. The universe and earth are so perfectly designed. It wasn't some random explosion that [i]figured[/i] out how to hang clouds in thin air, suspended above the earth to give much needed water. Or a sun that has a definite purpose and is suspended perfectly to give much needed life-giving light, heat, and energy...and a million other things. It is high intelligence. Look at our own amazing bodies. It sure wasn't some random explosion that created the miracle of life growing within a womb, etc. etc..

Science is ever searching and never able to come to the knowledge of the truth.
faith2hope4love · 56-60, F
@Magenta Thanks so much for sharing your thoughts...I really like your explanation!!😊
1000PaperCranes · 26-30, F
4 is a common misconception. The earth can and does wobble on it's orbit by several miles from the sun and stays in the safe zone. If moving slightly closer or further from the sun were dangerous, we'd all be wiped out by a medium sized earthquake.

Now, this doesn't disprove anything of course. One could even argue that it fits snugly into your point about intelligent design.
faith2hope4love · 56-60, F
Thank you, I appreciate your comments!! 😊@1000PaperCranes
Lovely writing....

I do believe in God and see his miracles everyday! Feel blessed....😇
faith2hope4love · 56-60, F
@Vivaci Thank you but I can't take credit for the article..glad you enjoyed reading it!!😊
That is wonderful...He is an amazing God!!🤗
Outstanding
.. yes.. I believe in God and know Jesus
faith2hope4love · 56-60, F
@KingLionHeart Thank you!!😊 We are truly blessed!!🤗
@faith2hope4love truly! 🤗
AnaKoroleva · 36-40, F
I appreciate the thought and consideration you have put into this, and it is perhaps the most convincing argument for God I have heard, I respect you for your belief.
faith2hope4love · 56-60, F
@AnaKoroleva I appreciate you taking the time to read the article. Thank you for your positive comments!!🙂
Harriet03 · 41-45, F
Your describing science! 🤔
faith2hope4love · 56-60, F
@Harriet03 God is the master mind behind the science....a system so detailed and integrated that our finite minds cannot fathom it all!!
Harriet03 · 41-45, F
@faith2hope4love Yours certainly can't!
Aren't you a bit old for pretend friends??
You stick to fairy tales, I'll stick to science.
Goodluck..✌
faith2hope4love · 56-60, F
@Harriet03 It is a wonderful life and I am loving it!!!💖💖
Harriet03 · 41-45, F
God is man made!
faith2hope4love · 56-60, F
God did make man!!😊@Harriet03
Karmalives · 51-55, M
Wanna go to a Slayer concert with me?
Karmalives · 51-55, M
@faith2hope4love is that a maybe 🤔
faith2hope4love · 56-60, F
@Karmalives You are persistent!! Lol
Karmalives · 51-55, M

 
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