This week I hosted some pastors from my denomination as a planning session for starting new churches. Guess what issue came up at the lunch table. Of course, it was the big national debate about immigration. I was seated next to a couple of young pastors one of which told us how he is essentially non-political but serves in a very conservative church. In his church some of his elders have voiced very strong concerns about illegal immigration but this pastor has cautioned them and asked them to consider how Jesus would handle the situation. He went on to say that we don’t know from Scripture exactly how Jesus would deal with the situation but we know that he would be very compassionate. That’s when I jumped in and offered, “We know exactly what we should do from Scripture.” At that point everyone around the table got a shocked look on their faces and asked me to explain. As you can imagine, I offered my input. Here is basically what I said.

Read Philemon.

If you don’t know the subject of the short epistle to Philemon, you should be aware that it is relevant to the illegal immigration issue. Philemon was the Christian man to whom Paul addressed the epistle. Apparently, Philemon’s slave Onesimus had run away and ended up in Rome and somehow been converted to Christianity, perhaps by Paul. Onesimus then became a beloved assistant to Paul during his imprisonment in Rome. Somewhere along the line, Paul became aware that Onesimus was a runaway slave; so, despite his great love for him, he penned the epistle as a letter to Philemon admonishing him to take Onesimus back as a fellow brother in Christ and not punish him. There is a sense in the letter that Paul wanted Philemon not only to avoid punishing Onesimus but to willingly allow him to return to Paul. This, however, is reading between the lines. The big point is Paul sent Onesimus home because it was lawful. Paul insisted that Christians obey the laws of the Roman Empire and of all countries in which they live. On a Christian level, Paul was not advocating slavery, but he was teaching Onesimus, Philemon and others how to live in a godly way in a less-than-perfect world. Philemon was at liberty to set Onesimus free, but that was his call. The law dictated that Paul send Onesimus back to his master.

Lessons from Philemon

What we learn from the epistle to Philemon is that Christians should never break the law to enter a country illegally—particularly just to get a better paying job. We also learn that Christians should willingly return to their country of origin if they have entered another country illegally. Finally, we learn that the church should admonish those who have entered a country illegally to return home as well as advocate for the home country to give humane treatment to those returning.

What America does to solve the border and illegal immigration problem is ultimately a political decision. This may include reducing illegality by putting illegal immigrants on a path to citizenship, etc. I personally am a big advocate of unlimited legal immigration for those who bring good skills and a positive desire to assimilate into America. I detest the fact that my niece’s husband from Australia, who loves America, has been struggling with the INS for years to get his American citizenship. However, from a Christian perspective, the biblical teaching on this issue is clearer than most people think.

Warning Label: this post contains thoughts and quotes from a medieval theologian. If reading this might cause hypertension, chest pain, headaches, heartburn or excessive gas, please do not proceed any further.

Everything that lives strives after its own complete fulfillment. By nature plants seek sunshine, animals seek food and water by instinct, and humans willfully seek to maximize their existence. Therefore, the ultimate end of human action (meaning the complete fulfillment of human nature) must be that thing which satisfies every desire. However, as we all know, there is a funny thing that happens to us every time we think we have finally found the “ultimate” thing that satisfies—it doesn’t. From this we learn that we are always yearning for something that must be infinitely satisfying and we know from experience that there is no created thing that infinitely satisfies. Or as Aquinas wrote: “man is not perfectly happy, so long as something remains for him to desire and seek” (Summa II1, Q. 3, Art. 8). Consequently, as we discussed in the last post, ultimate happiness is only found in God Himself. He is the infinite fulfillment of all our desires. This is why the greatest commandment in the Bible is to love God with all our heart, mind and strength.

Okay, great you say, I’ll be happy in heaven but what about now? Can we ever find happiness here? The answer is a big provisional “yes.” When I say provisionally what I mean is that you can find imperfect happiness in this life. Well, you ask, how do you do that? As you might guess, I believe the master-of-the-happy is my good buddy Thomas Aquinas. This is what he says about imperfect happiness.

“For imperfect happiness, such as can be had in this life, external goods are necessary, not as belonging to the essence of happiness, but by serving as instruments to happiness, which consists in an operation of virtue, as stated in Ethic. i, 13. For man needs in this life, the necessaries of the body, both for the operation of contemplative virtue, and for the operation of active virtue, for which latter he needs also many other things by means of which to perform its operations.” (Summa, Part II.1, Q. 4, Art. 7)

Allow me to translate what Thomas is saying. He notes that “things” like jobs, money, homes, food and friends are all necessary for attaining happiness. They are good, that is, unless they become the source of our happiness—that isn’t good. They should be “instruments” for assisting us to happiness. We need these external things to help us with the most important ways that we get imperfect happiness. Those two important ways to happiness are the two kinds of virtue. Virtue, by the way, has to do with moral excellence. And the two types of moral excellence are contemplative virtue and active virtue. Basically what this means is that 1) we sharpen our intellectual focus on the things of God which makes us much wiser for this life; and 2) we apply our godly wisdom to live a life of moral excellence in the everyday affairs of life. We want to avoid a life of strict heavenly-mindedness and also a life focused just on religious or moral activism. We need to put the two together. We become heavenly-minded with an eye to applying what we learn to the practical things of life. This is the way to imperfect happiness.

Nowadays we have a consumerist view of happiness. Everywhere we go from church to movie multiplex to mega-mall it seems we are admonished that you can “choose to be happy.” We are taught to think that we can choose what makes us happy from the various options that might be interesting to “me” (e.g. gourmet cooking or collecting baseball cards). However, this kind of choosing is as far as one can get from attaining true happiness. Think of happiness as choosing what makes you healthy. To begin with, if you are going to be healthy, you should find out what makes for human health. What you absolutely cannot do is choose any old thing that you think will make you healthy. What makes you healthy is an objective reality that is related to the nature of your body. If you say, no, I will choose to ignore my doctor and eat junk food; all you will do is destroy your health. Well, countless numbers of people are choosing all kinds of spiritual “junk food” thinking that these things will bring happiness but in reality these things are objectively destroying any possibility of them attaining real happiness. The bottom line is that you can be dead wrong about what makes you truly happy and, unfortunately, many people are.

In short, happiness is found in that which is loved for its own sake. Finding happiness can be conceived of as a long trip home from a journey—home is where happiness is. However, in order to get home you will need to stop along the way at a few inns. The inns may be comfortable and nice places to stay; however, you will wisely only stay in the inns long enough to rest and move on because you want very much to get home. Home is where you stay. In this little illustration the inns represent things that cannot bring happiness because they are not “home”—they are only means to the end of getting home. It would be crazy to stay at an inn that is only along the way toward home. Likewise, it is insane to find happiness in things that are intended to be a means to the end of attaining true happiness—things like money, pleasure, careers, hobbies, and recognition.

The question is, where is “home.” Well, like health, “home” or true happiness is an objective reality. Therefore, our whole life-purpose or goal should be to reach this objective reality that is loved for its own sake. In this sense, we do not set our own life goals, we discover the true “end” or purpose that is right for human nature. We choose this real “end” or we will miss the purpose of life. The end is “home” and it is also true happiness. In a very deep and objective way, finding happiness is finding true success in life. Okay, but what and where is “home.”

This may shock you, but just like there are “road rules” for the highway that leads home, there are rules that lead us to happiness. They are God’s “road rules.” You see, God’s rules are what are good for us and lead to true happiness. God, by the way, only makes good rules. God’s rules are not things we do and if we follow them then we get to go to heaven—kind of like getting a Brownie Button. Or like: “be a good little boy or girl and follow all my rules and I'll give you a great big cookie when you die, called heaven.” No, the #1 rule was given to us by Jesus and it is to love God with your whole heart, mind and soul. By learning to love God instead of all those other things (the inns along the way) which are good but can’t make us truly happy, the reward is that you get real eternal happiness—God Himself. It is not that God has some kind of thing for making up rules just because He likes rules. His rules are good for us and lead to true happiness.

The bottom line is that there is only one objective thing that can be loved for its own sake and therefore bring happiness and that is God. The way to happiness is to love God and the reward is God Himself, which is happiness. Choose happiness.

John 17:3 Now this is eternal life: that they may know you, the only true God, and Jesus Christ, whom you have sent.

Have you ever heard this, “God can’t love you any more or any less than he loves you right now?” Sounds good, huh? Only problem is, it is noodle-headed nonsense. Not only that, but it borders on the heresy of antinomianism (moral license). It is the doctrine of eternal security (which I believe in) gone amuck.

The truth in the “God can’t love you any more” statement is that God’s love is infinite and undivided. In fact, as Augustine pointed out, all things in God spring from His love—including His wrath. However, the error in the statement is the implied idea that there is nothing that we can do—good or bad—that can increase or decrease our experience of God’s love for us. I am going to show you from Scripture how wrong this is, but first let me give you an illustration that will help you understand how God’s love works in relationship to us.

Have you ever stood around a blazing campfire on a cold night? You probably remember that the closer you got to the fire the warmer you got. God’s love is like the blazing campfire, it doesn’t change, but our relationship to the fire does change relative to how close or far we are from that fire. The closer we are to God, the “warmer” we are and the greater our experience of His love. Conversely, the further we move from God, the less we experience His love. In this sense, the “cold” represents the experience of His displeasure and anger against our disobedience and waywardness.

Now let’s do a quick overview of Scripture. The “nothing you can do will change God’s love for you” idea distorts these scriptural concepts:

● All of the references in the Bible (Old and New Testaments) that refer to how believers can “please” God (e.g. praying for our leaders [1Tim 2:3], caring for our parents [1 Tim 5:4, etc.) and all those that tell us we can displease Him (Isa 59:15).

● All of the passages in the Bible that tell God’s people that obedience to His word brings blessing and disobedience to God’s word brings cursing. (Deut. 28-29, Ps. 1, Sermon on the Mount, and the “woe” statements by Jesus in Luke 6:24-26)

● All of the passages in the Bible that tell God’s people that there are certain sins that are an “abomination” to God (e.g. homosexuality, divination, etc.) and that if we engage in them we become an abomination to Him (Deut 18:12).

● Jesus’ very clear teaching to His disciples that they are to stay busy until He returns because He is going to reward or reprimand us when we stand before Him (Matt. 25:26—“you wicked and lazy servant”).

● The teaching from the Apostle Paul in 1 Corinthians 11:29 that if we abuse the communion table, God can judge us and cause us to fall sick and die. I don’t think the people who teach that nothing we can do will change God’s love for us realize that God’s love may come in the form of deadly discipline.

● The teaching from James 4:8 that we can choose to draw near to God which implies that we can move away from Him.

Believe me there are scores of verses that reinforce the idea that our experience of God’s love can change from blessing to cursing. Of course, the great danger in believing that there is nothing we can do to change God’s love for us is that it leads to a lax attitude toward our own disobedience. Logically, if there is nothing I can do to increase God’s blessing on my life, why do anything for the Lord? Conversely, if God is going to love me the same no matter what, why not go to Vegas and party until he sends Jesus back? In my opinion, this distorted view of God’s love is one of the worst subtle lies that, unfortunately, is prevalent in the church today.

The Current State of the “Art” of Cosmology

The Beginning

A general consensus amongst cosmologists is that the Big Bang (Singularity) is the actual way that the universe came into existence. No other model has been repeatedly verified and substantiated and is as coherent. Professor Edward Wright of UCLA puts it this way, “In the 1950's the Big Bang was not well-tested, and the Steady State model was a very useful alternative that encouraged many observations. Now the Big Bang picture is well established, but the inflationary scenario added on before events in the classic Big Bang is not well-tested. Many alternatives versions of inflation have been suggested, but do not think that these alternatives represent weaknesses of the Big Bang.”

The End

It is also the consensus of cosmologists that the universe will not oscillate or return to a point of origin as a “Big Crunch.” NASA’s cosmological webpage states, “However, recent observations of distant supernova have suggested that the expansion of the universe is actually accelerating or speeding up, like the red curve, which implies the existence of a form of matter with a strong negative pressure, such as the cosmological constant… If dark energy in fact plays a significant role in the evolution of the universe, then in all likelihood the universe will continue to expand forever.” Source: http://map.gsfc.nasa.gov/m_uni/uni_101fate.html

It appears that our universe came into being a finite time ago and will continue to expand indefinitely as all matter goes cold. In other words, our universe is a “one-off” entity.

What can be Said about the Beginning

Cosmologists generally recognize that empirically we do not know how the universe came into existence. The University of Chicago’s “Cosmology Primer” states, “We can't get any closer to the Big Bang at t=0 and say anything with confidence (or even with informed speculation).” http://pancake.uchicago.edu/~carroll/cfcp/primer/index.html

Some have indicated that sub-atomic particles appear out of nothing; however, as Paul Davies admits, “The processes described here do not represent the creation of matter out of nothing, but the conversion of pre- existing energy into material form." In other words quantum physics clearly does not produce something out of nothing. Source, Paul Davies, “God and the New Physics”, p. 214.

Is God the Likely Creator of the Universe?

It is probably good to have a little discussion about the likelihood of God’s existence. However, let’s keep in mind that if you begin with the idea that God’s existence is very unlikely, then it will probably take some pretty strong evidence to convince you that God exists. Or, one might not even be persuadable because one is invested into an atheistic view and therefore one expects any evidence one encounters to be flawed. At best, one might view evidence of God’s existence with much greater suspicion than one normally would in other areas of one’s life. If, however, one begins with a certain intellectual openness to God’s existence, one might find some arguments to provide at lease a rational framework for further inquiry. It is sensible, then, to take the probability of God’s existence into account.

The Likelihood of God’s Existence

From the perspective of Ockham’s razor, it seems unlikely that God exists. The “razor” tells us that if we have two equally good explanations we should choose the simpler one. In regard to God, if we have a way of explaining the universe with God and one without God, then the one that doesn’t add God into the mix is the more economical. For example, it is simpler to postulate many finite things than one infinite thing so it seems unlikely that God exists.

Richard Swinburne in “The Existence of God” makes the opposite case. He postulates that an unlimited force is actually simpler than a limited force. He notes that a limited force is defined by its own force and whatever things constrain it. My car has 220 horsepower but it can only go a certain speed because it is constrained by wind resistance, road conditions, etc. On the other hand an unlimited force is only one thing by definition and nothing constrains its infinite force. Swinburne also notes that scientists recognize that an infinite force is intrinsically more probable than any great but finite force. Consequently, Ockham’s razor, if Swinburne is right, implies that it is more likely that there is an infinite force; therefore, the likelihood of God’s existence is pretty high.

The Cosmological Arguments

The cosmological argument for God notes that the existence of the universe needs some explanation for why it “is” rather than isn’t. Furthermore the very existence of the universe is strong evidence that a Causer exists—perhaps the only adequate explanation of why it should be. However, a troubling question can be introduced that needs to be dealt with. The question is, “Does God have a cause for His existence?” If there is no God then there is one thing which we cannot explain and that is the universe. If, though, we add God in, we can say He created the universe but then there remains something which we cannot explain and that is God. We can postulate that God is uncaused, but this creates a difficulty for us, too. His existence seems to counter the idea that everything that exists must have a cause for its existence. The reason for this is that if God did not have a cause then it seems to contradict the basic premise of the cosmological argument (everything must have a cause) and someone can resist the argument by simply saying that maybe the universe “just doesn’t have a cause, too.”

The Kalam Argument

The Kalam cosmological argument avoids the objection that God (as uncaused) violates the cosmological argument. It does this by making the distinction between the type of thing that the universe is and the type of thing that God is. It postulates why the universe needs an explanation for its existence but God does not. The Kalam argument posits that everything that has a “beginning in time” must have a cause for its existence. Since the best evidence is that the universe had a beginning in time, then the universe must have a cause of its existence and that cause is God. On the other hand, the uncaused nature of God who does not have a beginning in time is consistent with the argument that, “Everything that has a beginning in time has a cause.”

The Argument from Contingency

The argument from contingency also makes a distinction between the universe and God. That distinction is that the universe is contingent (this means that it is possible for the universe to not exist). The argument maintains that everything that exists contingently must have a cause. Since the universe is contingent, then, it has a cause for its existence and that cause is God. God, however, has an uncaused existence that is not contingent but rather is necessary. This is consistent with the basic claim of the argument which is that, “Everything contingent has a cause.”

The Teleological Argument

The Greek word “telos” means end or purpose. Arguments for God that are teleological focus on order of the universe and that the order has some aim, end or purpose. Modern teleological arguments focus mostly on the “fine-tuning” of the universe particularly as it relates to the support of life on earth. Recent court battles between Intelligent Design theorists and naturalists are a modern incarnation of the teleological argument. Antony Flew, a British world-class philosopher of science and life-long atheist recently announced that because of design elements in DNA he has renounced atheism. He noted that if his belief upsets people, well "that's too bad,… My whole life has been guided by the principle of Plato's Socrates: Follow the evidence, wherever it leads."

Summary

My personal view is that it is reasonable to consider the very real possibility that God may have created the universe. The consensus view of cosmologists is that the singularity is the way things began (time, space, the cosmos) and that our universe is a “one-off” entity that will expand forever. This means it had a beginning a finite time ago. Additionally, at this point, we cannot empirically say anything with certainty before the singularity-event. Certainly, one might reasonably say nothing about the cause of the universe and simply wait until more scientific information might arise. On the other hand, rarely do humans leave such a huge question unanswered. This is where philosophy and theology come into play; however, I hasten to add that it is not just philosophers and religious people that recognize the troubling questions raised by a finite universe. Professor Edward L. Wright at UCLA, a leading astrophysicist, notes the implications and problems that the Big Bang poses for both creationists and atheists: “The big bang poses a problem for young-earth creationists because it makes the universe billions of years old rather than thousands. Such an assertion undercuts their system at its foundation. Big bang cosmology also presents a problem for atheistic scientists because it points directly to the existence of a transcendent Creator - a fact they dare not concede.”