Today, people all over the world went outside to look at the moon. The reason was because the moon fell into the shadow of the earth for an extended period of time and changed colors from a light orange to a blood red. The 2011 lunar eclipse was one of the longest eclipses in more than a decade.
So a lot of people went outside tonight to marvel at the moon and have their thoughts captured by a “natural” phenomenon, something that breaks the monotony of their typical crazed and routine lives. Is this a starting point for a discussion about God’s existence? People’s attention was turned for an extended period of time away from themselves and toward something they don’t quite understand. Sure, our scientists tells us all about the specifics of what took place and they can even answer the question “why?” by explaining something about orbital paths in our solar system and the effect of one planet casting a shadow on a natural satellite. But where the answers cease is in the follow-up question: where did this structure, this finely-tuned structure of the universe come from?
The question looms. And it is never answered because science has no way of telling us.
It the wake of the deafening silence, distraction thankfully returns and people get to ignore the question marks that cause an uneasiness about their existence. Its an uneasiness that stems from the “lack of purpose” that is so clearly staring them in the face when they don’t have an answer for one question: “why?”
I should just say, I’m a firm believer in God’s existence. And not just God in the sense of an unknown creator that acted some time millenniums ago. I, um, believe in a God that scientists and philosophers argue about in terms of probabilities. In case you’re wondering where our greatest minds are at on the question “why?” – let me tell you: they discuss God’s existence (for and against) in terms of probabilities.
The God proponents work and study and craft logically mountainous arguments for the purpose of coming to a podium and telling their audience that because of the Universes’ fine-tuning, they see a “really, really, really high probability” of a God existing. The God opponents do a similar presentation, but they use their data in different ways to create different stories and to paint a different picture about the seemingly “smaller” probability of His existence.
This should make you feel a little uneasy about our situation. Our best scientists and philosophers cannot tell you with a 100% degree of certainty whether or not God exists. None of us can prove God’s existence. But this makes sense as, by definition, God is TOO great for any of us to logically deduce or prove by the way of futile reason and our observable evidences. He’s God for crying out loud!!!
Is the fine-tuning of the Universe there for us to point to our friends and say “see, God exists!” or is it there for us to stare in amazement and be brought to humility as we acknowledge that the question “WHY?” doesn’t have an answer that is provable in a laboratory? Perhaps we as people should trod a little more respectfully on this earth just in case the God who exists DID choose to speak through Israelite prophets and DID choose to come in the form of a man named Jesus of Nazareth and DID rise from the dead after being crucified in AD 33 and will return to judge all of mankind. Just saying, it’s worth thinking about…
After all the evidence is looked at, the probabilities for God may or may be not enough to convince you. Despite that, I think the greater question is whether or not it is smart to take a chance on the idea that all of what we see happened by accident. Consider those probabilities for a minute and tell me if that is where you’d like to place your bet.
Personally, I just don’t have that kind of faith 
