The Great Enigma
The marvellous universe with its countless stars and
distant nebulae, the earth upon which man dwells, animate and inanimate
creation, life itself, and above all, human existence and destiny - these are
all a great enigma. For thousands of years members of the race, endowed with
the faculty of reasoning, the capacity to search and to explore, have raised
certain questions. Some answers have been found, yet the most vital questions
have not been answered in the past and, in spite of the boasts of certain
scientists, they remain unanswered today. What is the origin of this almost
infinite space we call universe? How did it all come into existence? How did
the laws which govern and uphold the different solar systems with an
astonishing precision, perfect and inerrant, originate? Is our earth the only
planet on which life is flourishing? How did life originate on our globe? What
is man? What is the future of the earth? What is going on in these heavens so
deep and so mysterious? What is in existence beyond the farthest point reached
by the most powerful telescope? These are a very few of the many questions
which have baffled scientific efforts and which constitute the great
enigma.
There are plenty of theories which attempt and propose a
solution. Many times certain cocksure scientists have announced triumphantly
their discoveries, assuming that at least a part of the riddle had at last been
solved. But soon after their findings, other scientists, by their research,
have proved the supposed solution incorrect and another exploded hypothesis has
been buried in the ever-growing graveyard of forgotten scientific
theories.
Human science - what is it? We let another answer with
well-chosen words. "It is, as we know only too well, an edifice composed of
light and darkness, of truth and error, of humble research and arrogant
dogmatism, of daring hypothesis and clearly demonstrated theories, of millions
of facts and billions of thoughts, of the inborn and the acquired, of yes and
no, of dreams of the past and the future, of unbending prose and high-flown
poesy; an edifice continually being built up, now slowly, now quickly, and in
constant need of repair, ever growing, yet never completed." What ludicrous
things have been taught and are being taught by these scientists who ridicule
the faith of Christians, who push aside Gods revelation found in His
Word, and who arrogantly assume that direct Creatorship according to Holy
Scriptures is incredible! Their theories make the greatest demand upon
mans credulity.
We mention but one still advocated by a number of
scientists. They say that the simplest forms of life were carried and are
carried through space by tiny particles and picked up in some unexplainable
way. These particles containing life-germs were carried by meteorites to our
globe. This explains the existence of all life found on our earth, in a drop of
water, or in the unsearchable depths of the sea, animal life in thousands upon
thousands of varieties, and also human life. But a meteorite rushing through
space becomes a fiery, a red hot, mass. How then could a little speck of life
have survived such an intense heat? Only a miracle can account for such a
survival. And tell us, 0 ye scientists, where did these dust particles,
carrying the life germs, come from? The denial of an omnipotent creator
postulates the self-generation of these dust particles. Another unbelievable
miracle. As this is not a. work dealing with the different theories of science
and pseudo-science, endorsed by modernism of the religious stamp-theories which
are the stock in trade of the different brands of atheism - we do not cite
other equally ludicrous assumptions which do not come anywhere near the
solution of the great enigma.
Yet one thing needs to be said - all
these theories have one common trend. They uphold a spontaneous generation.
Dead matter, they say, was always existing, hence it must be eternal. They do
not believe in the existence of an eternal Being, God, but they believe in the
eternity of matter, call it protoplasm or by any other name. This dead matter
was quickened into life by natural law. Life called thus into existence by
spontaneous generation gradually shaped itself into manifold and marvelous
expressions, culminating in the race of human beings. Therefore not only matter
is self-made, but natural law, also, is self-existent; it developed itself,
endowed itself without any outside influences, with super-intelligence,
producing all the marvelous things in nature - things so great that man is
unable to comprehend them. To offer as a solution of the enigma of life, such
theories as these - dead matter producing life, and life shaping itself into
hundreds of thousands of different forms, through self-made laws, devoid of
free will - is a gross insult to the intelligence of any human being. Nature
reveals everywhere astonishing designs. Over a hundred years ago Dr. Paley
wrote his "Natural Theology" in which this great scholar uncovers the marvels
of the human body and some of its delicate organs like the eye and the ear, at
the same time tracing other equally amazing designs in other spheres of life.
His arguments demolish the whole infidel theory of chance and blind laws. What
a blessing it would be if this master-work could be republished and put into
the hands of our youth, to save them from the high school and college parrots,
who still prattle and babble over long-exploded theories.
Louis
Agassiz, the great scientist, started out as an atheist. After progressing in
his scientific research, he became deeply convinced that his atheism was a
miserable, a lying invention. The study of nature led him to natures God
and he became a believer and an earnest worshipper. Nor is he the only eminent
scientist who has acknowledged the superiority of the supernatural knowledge
offered to man in the Bible. There are many others. One of the noblest words
spoken by the great scientist, Lord Kelvin, is the following: "We are
absolutely forced by science to believe with perfect confidence in a Directive
Power - in an influence other than physical or dynamical or electrical forces."
And now, after certain infidels have had their say for several decades as to
spontaneous generation and these mysterious laws of nature, the leading, the
foremost, scientists of our times are almost in unison that the rule of blind
law in nature can no longer be maintained.
Dr. Fitchett, in his lecture
on "The Unrealized Logic of Religion" says: "It were as easy to believe that,
say, Miltons Paradise Lost, had been set up in all its
stately march of balanced syllables by an anthropoid ape, or that the letters
composing it had been blown together by a whirlwind, as to believe that the
visible universe about us - built upon mathematical laws, knitted together by a
million correspondences, and crowded thick with marks of purpose - is the
creation of some mindless Force." And the late Professor Francis Bowen of
Boston, Massachusetts, a great thinker, has left us the following declaration:
"I have faithfully studied most of what the philosophy of these modern times,
and the science of our own day, assume to teach. And the result is, that I am
now more firmly convinced than ever, that what has been justly called the
dirt philosophy of materialism and fatalism is baseless and false.
I accept with unhesitating conviction and belief the doctrine of a being of one
personal God, the Creator and Governor of the world, and of one Lord Jesus
Christ, in whom dwelleth all the fulness of the Godhead bodily; and I have
found nothing whatever in the literature of modern infidelity, which, to my
mind, casts even the slightest doubt upon that belief."
One of the
greatest materialists of the nineteenth century was Ernest Haeckel. An ardent
defender of the spontaneous generation hypothesis, he uttered a sentence which
is of much significance. He said: "If we do not accept the hypothesis of
spontaneous generation we must have recourse to the miracle of a supernatural
creation." In other words, when the spontaneous generation theory is disproved,
the only other alternative is direct creation. Not so long ago much was being
said by certain boasting scientists that they were on the high road to
producing life artificially. Among the most loud-mouthed was a certain
Professor Loeb. He tried to manufacture living cells out of some slimy matter.
We do no longer hear of such foolish attempts, because true scientists know the
truth, "Omne vivum ex vivo" - "aIl life from life." Pasteur and Tyndall have
given the death-blow to the spontaneous generation invention. And all
materialists should ponder over one of the last utterances of the famous Lord
Kelvin: "It is impossible to conceive either the beginning or the continuance
of life without an overruling creative power. I feel profoundly convinced that
the argument of design has been greatly too much lost sight of in recent
zoological speculation. Overpoweringly strong proofs of intelligent and
benevolent design lie around us, showing to us through nature the influence of
a free will, and teaching us that all living things depend on one everlasting
Creator and Ruler."
Scientist after scientist has expressed his
opinion that spontaneous generation cannot be proved and is nothing but a myth.
Professor Conn, in his "Evolution of Today" (page 16) says: "There is not the
slightest evidence that living matter could arise from non-living matter.
Spontaneous generation is universally given up." And years before, another
eminent searcher, M. de Quatrefages reached the following conclusions: "I make
bold to affirm that the deeper science penetrates into the secrets of
organization and phenomena, the more does she demonstrate how wide and how
profound is the abyss which separates brute matter from living things." In view
of such outspoken declarations of real scientists, the words of H. G. Wells, in
his "Science of Life," appear puerile: "As a matter of history, life on this
planet originated not from life." But how weighty and significant are the words
of the co-worker of Charles Darwin, Alfred Russell Wallace: "So marvellous and
so varied are the phenomena presented by living things, so completely do their
powers transcend those of all other forms of matter subjected to mechanical,
physical, or chemical laws, that biologists have vainly endeavoured to find out
what is at the bottom of their strange manifestation and to give precise
definitions, in terms of physical science, of what life really is." Thales, six
hundred years before Christ, expressed his belief that all life originated in
sea-water. Materialists have travelled the same road and now, over 5OO years
after, are not nearer the solution of the origin of life. The Darwinian
Evolution is dead, a thing of the past, and all the other materialistic
theories are on their death beds. Men of real scholarship acknowledge readily
that the enigma of the beginning of life remains unsolved. They admit very
frankly that spontaneous generation remains, and will always remain, an
unproved theory. Let us listen to just a few of them. Professor William Bateson
of Cambridge, one of the greatest biologists, says:
"It is impossible for
scientists longer to agree with Darwins theory of the origin of
species."
Dr. W. H. Thompson, former president of the New York Academy
of Medicine, declared "The Darwinian theory is now rejected by the majority of
biologists as absurdly inadequate."
Dr. Etheridge of the British
Museum, the leading authority on fossils, says: "Nine-tenths of the talk of
evolutionists is sheer nonsense, not founded on observation, and wholly
unsupported by facts. This museum is full of proofs of the utter falsity of
their views." Here are the words of Professor Beale of Kings College,
London: "In support of all naturalistic conjectures concerning mans
origin, there is not at this time a shadow of scientific evidence."
And
Herbert Spencer, an outstanding evolutionist, made the fatal admission that:
"No scientist of repute ever claimed that evolution is science. It is only an
unproved hypothesis." Professor Huxley said: "Evolution, if consistently
believed, makes it impossible to believe the Bible." And Professor Drummond -
who was a professed Christian and who had fallen for evolution - before he died
declared: "I am going back to the Book to believe it and to receive it, as I
did at first. I can no longer live on uncertainties."
Professor
Virchow, who was one of the foremost medical men and scientists, said: "It is
all nonsense. It cannot be proved by science that man descended from the ape or
any other animal. Since the announcement of the theory, all real scientific
knowledge has proceeded in the opposite direction." Another Englishman, Sir
Charles Bell of London, made the statement: "Everything declares the species to
have their origin in distinct creation."
An eminent German zoologist,
Professor Fleischmann of Erlangen, adds his testimony by saying: "The Darwinian
theory of descent has in the realm of nature not a single fact to confirm it.
It is not the result of scientific research, but purely the product of
imagination." We realize that few scientists today, though evolutionists many
of them, are no longer Darwinians. The point is that Darwins five causes
of evolution - survival of the fittest, heredity, variations, struggle for
existence and natural selection - are admitted by men like Bateson and others
to be impossible as causes of evolution. Yet, while Darwinism is as dead as it
can be, evolution persists. Many leading biologists confess their total
ignorance as to the cause of evolution, yet they still believe in it.
Therefore we have said: "Darwinism is dead and all other materialistic theories
are on their death beds." Yet, in spite of these facts and the increasing
demonstrations that Darwinism and spontaneous generation are unscientific -
totally unproved - high school teachers and college professors, male and
female, continue to teach the young the lies and deceptions of Darwin - paving
for our youth the way which leads into atheism, radicalism and immoral
lawlessness. And words fail us when we think of the so-called "clergymen" who
pose as "Christian leaders," who have violated their ordination vows and who
brazenly hiss forth these lies as scientific facts. If they had a drop of
honest blood in their veins they would drop their Christian profession, disown
their affiliation with evangelical denominations, and accept the invitation of
"Free-thinkers" and "Atheists" to join hands with them in the attempted
destruction of the Truth of God. Inasmuch, then, as spontaneous generation is
dead and gone - an exploded theory (as Ernst Haeckel said) - supernatural
creation remains as the only alternative. But who is going to give us light and
understanding as to supernatural creation? Who is going to answer
satisfactorily the age-long question as to the origin of all things? True it is
spontaneous generation being inadmissible and impossible furnishes indirectly
the proof of a direct creation. But this is not satisfactory. We need something
more positive. Can it be obtained by more research, by more powerful
microscopes and telescopes? Is man, by searching alone, going to solve the
great enigma? Or is there another channel through which the needed knowledge,
the knowledge which science is unable to bestow upon us, may be obtained?
Without a moments hesitation we answer this question affirmatively. The
human race has at its disposal a supernatural knowledge given in a supernatural
way. This knowledge which offers to man the Truth is positive, fixed,
unchangeable, unaffected by the changing things of time. It is a knowledge
which transcends human reason, a knowledge which is offered to man to believe.
Scientific knowledge is only deduction and as such nothing but sinking sand.
But this higher knowledge is not gained by reasoning deductions, but by
acceptance of faith. Well said Emanuel Geibel: "The end of philosophy is to
know that we must believe."
But who has this super-knowledge to offer?
Where does it come from? The knowledge which brings to man the Truth and the
solution of the great enigma comes from the Almighty Creator, God Himself. It
is divine revelation knowledge. According to David, the illustrious King of
Israel, it is only the fool who says in his heart "There is no God" (Psa.
xiv:1). This was written by David three thousand years ago. Even at that time
men were living who were mental perverts and attempted the denial of the
existence of a Being by whom all seen things were made. The King who lived a
life crowded with the evidences that God is - who had fellowship with Him, had
received messages by His Spirit, was led and preserved by Him - brands the
atheist a fool. Belief in God, as the author has shown in another volume,
(Christianity or Religion) is a universal fact in the human race.
Polytheism, fetishism, animism, and other forms of paganism, have for a basis
belief in the unseen and in supernatural beings. Nor is polytheism (the worship
of many idols) the original form of worship, which, according to evolution, man
adopted when he came forth from his animal ancestry. Far from that! The most
painstaking and scholarly anthropologists have brought to light that
monotheism, the belief in one God, was the belief of the human race at one
time. They knew God, the Creator of heaven and earth, in the beginning. The
atheist is contra-natural; he belies his own consciousness. Atheism is a mental
obsession, a mental perversion; it denies what demons cannot deny. "Thou
believest there is one God; thou doest well, the demons also believe and
tremble" (James ii : I9). It is no compliment to our civilization when men and
women, cultured and uncultured, learned and unlearned, turn to atheism. It is
not progress but one of the outstanding evidences of degeneration. A God, who
created all things, whose offspring man is, demands a revelation.
Man
cannot know God by himself. God must come down to man and reveal Himself to His
creature. "Canst thou by searching find out God? Canst thou find out the
Almighty to perfection" (Job. xi:7).
That God has revealed Himself in
His creation is an unquestionable fact. "The heavens declare the glory of God
and the firmament showeth His handywork. Day unto day uttereth speech, and
night unto night showeth knowledge" (Psa. xix :1-s). "The visible things of Him
from the creation of the world are clearly seen, being understood by the things
that are made, even His eternal power and Godhead" (Rom. i :2O). All nature
bears witness to the existence of an Almighty God, who has manifested His
Omnipotence and His Wisdom everywhere. The greatest scientists are not the
materialists, the atheists, but men who believed in God, for they discovered
His footprints in creation. Copernicus, the founder of the great system which
made his name immortal, was a godly man. He requested to have put on his
tombstone the words: "That which Thou hast granted the dying thief is all I
ask." Kepler, an equally great astronomer, whose discoveries are as great as
Newtons, concluded his most important work with these words: "I thank
Thee Lord, Creator, that Thou hast given me this joy in Thy creation, this
delight in the works of Thy hands. I have proclaimed the glory of Thy works to
man as far as my finite mind was capable of grasping Thy infinity. If I have
said anything which is unworthy of Thee, or if I sought after mine own honour,
forgive me." Sir Isaac Newton, whose discoveries still are unsurpassed, in
spite of the claims of a certain infidel, was a diligent student of the Bible
and a firm believer in its infallible Truths. Linneaus, the greatest naturalist
of all times, when discovering inflorescence, cried out with delight: "I have
seen the footprints of God." William Herschel, another great astronomer,
said:
"The wider the field of science extends, the more numerous and
indisputable become the proofs of the eternal existence of a creative and
almighty wisdom." Leibnitz, one of the most powerful thinkers, was a believer,
the author of a beautiful hymn: "Jesus, whose death and suffering have brought
us life and joy." One of the greatest chemists was Liebig. He unreservedly and
joyfully confessed his faith in God and said: "The chief value and glory of
science is that it promotes true Christianity."
Among the more recent
astronomers, Maedler holds a high rank. He made the statement: "A true student
of nature cannot be an unbeliever; natural law and Gods law are one and
the same." Similar confessions have come from the lips of Faraday, Robert
Mayer, Agassiz, Pasteur, Lavoisier, Cuvier and many others.
We quote
but one more, who is, we believe the greatest living American scientist,
Professor R. A. Millikan, of California. He writes in his "Science and Life"
(page 56):
"It seems to me as obvious as breathing that every man who is
sufficiently in his senses to recognize his own inability to comprehend the
problem of existence, to understand whence he himself came and whither he is
going, must in the very admission of that ignorance and finiteness recognize
the existence of Something, a Power, a Being, in whom and because of whom he
himself lives and moves and has his being. That Power, that Something, that
Existence, we call God." Still more outspoken are the words of Professor
Shepardson, an electrical engineer of International reputation, who says: "The
evidence obtainable from study of material phenomena gives us confidence in
concluding that a Supreme Being exists, that He is profoundly intelligent, that
He designed and constructed and governs the universe, and that He encourages
those who seek to learn of His works and ways."
But there is a higher
source from which this knowledge springs. God has revealed Himself in and
through His Word. While Creation reveals Him in His Omnipotence, in His Wisdom,
and all Creation makes known His Glory, the great enigma is not solved by these
things. When Sir Walter Scott, the well-known novelist and poet, was
approaching the end of his life, he requested his son-in-law to bring to him
the book. The son-in-law asked the dying man, "What book?" Sir Walter answered:
"There is but one Book - the Bible."
Countless thousands have found out
that when it comes to dying that there is only one book. That Book is rightly
called "Ihe Book of books." We have no time or space to waste with the
refutation of the coarse and perverted attacks which present day atheist and
free-thinkers have launched against the Book. Nor do we pay attention to the
more subtle attacks which are so widespread in Christendom itself, which
masquerade under the name of Bible-Criticism. The atheist openly and boldly
stabs the Bible with his dagger; the baptized infidels in the different
evangelical denominations betray the Bible with the Judas kiss.
Frequently the writer has been asked for a substantial reason of his unswerving
faith in this Book as the infallible revelation of God, in which the things
unknowable by scientific research are made known. The answer he gives is - the
Bible itself. We have read and studied this Book for over sixty years. With
many millions of human beings, among them the most noble of the highest
intellect, we, too, have found that this Book contains in its blessed pages the
words of eternal life and brings to the mind and heart the knowledge which
satisfies and gives assurance. The more the great Book is read and searched the
more the conviction grows that it is not an empty, unmeaning, human phraseology
which the chosen instruments, who produced its pages, wrote several thousand
times: "Thus saith the Lord," and "The Word of the Lord came unto me," and
again "The Lord spoke unto me." The more one turns in the spirit of reverence
to this Book the stronger becomes the conviction that the Book is
"God-breathed." The holy men of God wrote as they were moved and controlled by
the omniscient Spirit of God. The sixty-six books which compose the Bible were
written by different men under different circumstances yet they present a
supernatural unity, which can only be explained by the one supernatural author.
We compare it to a magnificent structure resting upon an unmovable rock. As we
enter the portal and explore the structure we discover marvellous things. As we
climb higher and higher the vision enlarges; through its windows we look over
the distant past and before us spreads the panorama of the future, till we
reach the great capstone, the final great revelation, from which we behold
human destiny in the endless ages of eternity.
The real scientist, not
the scienticulist with a smattering of picked-up knowledge, sees Gods
footprints in all Creation. In a far higher sense the true student of the Bible
can trace Gods footprints in all history, learn from it what Being He is,
find here His majestic and infinite attributes. He is seen in His Omnipotence,
as the Eternal One, in His Omniscience, in His Omnipresence; He is Light,
Holiness and Righteousness, He is Love, all-merciful, the God of Mercy and of
Grace. This is the unsurpassed glory of the Book - God - Revelation. Human
reason cannot comprehend Him; the finite can never reach up to the infinite.
Faith accepts Him and finds in the knowledge of Him the help, the comfort, the
joy and peace, which no science is able to give. But the Bible also reveals the
origin of man, solves the enigma of human existence and makes known human
destiny. Here we receive the knowledge that man is not like the beast that
dies, that he is not evolved from the beast, but is a created being in a class
by himself. In him is the breath of the Almighty, he possesses endless being.
Between the lowest man and the highest developed beast is therefore a gulf
which cannot be bridged. All attempts to find the missing link are hopeless.
How can one find a thing which does not exist?
And this Book with its
super-knowledge, with its solution of the great riddle, is hated and despised
today as never before. Yet in spite of all the hatred, all the pernicious
attacks to destroy the Book, or to undermine its authority, the old Book
stands. It will continue to stand for God and His Word are One. So let the
turbulent, the turbid and the angry waves of atheism, modernism and other forms
of infidelity dash with increasing force against the Rock of Ages. The waves
will cast up their own mire and dirt, only to be broken to pieces. The Rock
will stand. Unspeakably majestic is its beginning. "In the beginning God
created the heavens and the earth." This one sentence, composed in the Hebrew
of seven words silences forever the invented theories of man and annihilates
the false religious inventions with which man tries to satisfy his religious
instinct.
Here is the complete and final answer to materialism and
spontaneous generation. The different forms of agnosticism are refuted; atheism
is given the lie, and polytheism and pantheism are wiped out by these seven
words.
The charge is brought against the Bible that it fixes Creation
as having taken place some six thousand years ago. The Bible does not make any
such claim. The date put over against the first verse of the Bible in some
editions - 4004 B. C. - is put there by man. It is no part of the inspired
text. The age of the physical earth is not revealed in Gods Word and
science gives only the wildest guesses. Perhaps the reason why this is not
revealed in the Bible is that no human figures could express the age of our
globe.
But what is the meaning of the second verse of Genesis where we
read that the earth was without form and void, or as it should be translated,
waste and empty? Geology gives us an interesting information in connection with
this mysterious chaos. It reveals the fact that originally this earth existed
in a different form from what it is today. It once sustained a gigantic animal
creation and an equally gigantic vegetation. Something happened to this
prehistoric earth. It was plunged into death and destruction; a great
cataclysmic change took place. It remained in that condition for an
incalculable period of time during which the earth was submerged in water and
probably covered with ice. What happened to the original earth? Why did the
Creator let it go down into the night of death?
In our next chapter we
shall touch briefly on the possible solution of this mystery. From the Creation
account we learn that God in His own time, and that was but recently, dispelled
the darkness by light, commanded the light to shine out of darkness, and
commanded the earth to come out of the state of death on the third day. The
earth is garnished once more with vegetation and a new animal world is called
into existence. It is interesting to find that the word "create" is used thrice
in the first chapter of the Bible. It is found in the first verse in connection
with the beginning of all things, when God created out of nothing. It is found
in the twenty-first verse in connection with the new animal Creation and
finally it is used in connection with the creation of man. The other word used
is "made." This necessitates the existence of matter, which is shaped into
something. So God put the earth into the condition as the dwelling place of an
intelligent being. That being is man. What dignity Gods Word puts upon
man! God speaks in the plural, because while He is One, there is with Him in
all eternity His Word and His Spirit.
"And God said, Let us make man in
our image, after our likeness, and let them have dominion over the fish of the
sea, and over the fowl of the air, and over the cattle, and over all the earth,
and over every creeping thing, that creepeth upon the earth. So God created man
in His own image, in the image of God created He him; male and female created
He them." Mans constitution is more minutely given in the second chapter
of the Bible. "And the Lord God formed man from the dust of the ground, and
breathed into his nostrils the breath of life, and man became a living soul."
It is this which differentiates man from the beast. Man is the offspring of
God. If these opening chapters of this Book are not true, then throw your Bible
away; it begins all with a lie! But if there is a beginning, as there is, a
God, a heaven, and an earth, and man the offspring of God, then the Bible is
true to the last word concerning the new heaven and the new earth.
And
man is seen in fellowship with His Creator. He is not described as a half-ape
only uttering grunts without intelligent. language. The first man possessed a
higher intelligence than man possesses today. God showed to Adam His created
beings, every beast and every fowl, to see what Adam would call them. "And Adam
gave names to all cattle, and to the fowl of the air, and to every beast of the
field." Let us suppose that Mars is inhabited and possesses an animal creation
adapted to that planet. Let us suppose that in some way a Committee of
Scientists headed by H. G. Wells and Albert Einstein were suddenly transported
to Mars and confronted with the different animals found on that planet. Would
they be able to name them in as correct a way as Adam did? Certainly not. Adam
possessed the knowledge of Gods creation, the know!edge now lost to man,
which he tries to recover and which eludes his grasp. But something happened to
man. The fellowship, the great purpose of mans existence, was broken. The
mystery of lawlessness was born. The tragic history of the human race begins;
it is still being written as never before.
But even the Bible, the
written Word of God, is not the very highest revelation of God, in which
knowledge is offered and the great enigma is solved. There is a higher
revelation. It is the revelation of God in His Son, the eternal Word of God,
known in history as the Lord Jesus Christ. The Bible had announced His coming.
Prophet after prophet had by divine inspiration written of His person and of
His work. He appeared and entered human existence in the supernatural way of
the Virgin Birth, conceived by the Holy Spirit. He came to make the invisible
God visible in His Person. "No man hath seen God at any time; the only begotten
Son, who is in the bosom of the Father, He hath declared Him" (John i:18). "All
things were made by Him, and without Him was not anything made that was made.
In Him was life and the life was the light of men" (John i:3-4). "This is the
true God and the eternal Life" (1 John v:20). His own words of self-witness
confirm these and other statements. "I and the Father are One" (John x:S0). "He
that hath seen Me hath seen the Father" (John xiv :9). He spoke of His works as
a witness of His Deity. Omnipotence and Omniscience were constantly displayed
in His life among men. His moral character manifests holiness and
righteousness; Gods Love and Mercy are revealed in Him. In his words of
truths He confirms the revealed facts as to God, the origin of man and human
destiny. But the highest purpose of the manifestation of God in the person of
His Son, the eternal Word, was the solution of the mystery of lawlessness, to
redeem man, to bring man back to God, to reveal the Love of God and ultimately
defeat the forces of evil, to dethrone lawlessness and bring all things back to
God.
The solution of the great enigma is found in the Person and Work
of the Son of God and in the great revelalions of the Spirit of God, who has
come to show to man the marvelous truths of redemption, the ultimate goal of
human existence and all in Him "in whom are hid all the treasures of wisdom and
knowledge." Evolution and any other materialistic science has failed to explain
His superhatural Person. It can never explain Him. All it can do is to
negate.
End of Chapter One