The Law of Gravity Validates Christianity

 

One day he prayed: "Mr. Creator, show me the secrets of Your universe."

God replied, "Little man, you're not big enough to know the secrets of My universe. But I'll show you the secret of the peanut."

From the universe to the peanut. "Oh, well," Carver thought, "better the peanut than nothing."

"Take the peanut apart," God said. Carver did, and discovered several hundred components in the peanut.

God continued, "Now, start putting it back together again—this time in different forms."

I’ve heard different renditions of this conversation between George Washington Carver and God. But they all have the same point. God’s universe is just too complicated for our little brains to understand. So with that in mind, I like to focus on just a few aspects of the universe. Lately, I’ve been thinking mostly of the sun, the moon, and the earth. I wanted to know what God could be trying to show us about life and His ways concerning us. What I discovered was all amazing!

 

A few days ago I wrote a post on how the sun can be compared to God and Jesus and how we can be compared to the earth. In this post, I’m writing about how the moon can fit into this and even more aspects of our relationship to the sun.

 

I am amazed at how the sun can cause us to revolve/circle around it ever since the beginning of time. It’s just like an electron that is made to circle around its nucleus of proton and neutron forever. It must be some type of force that pulls us around and keeps us at just the right distance to keep us from freezing or burning to death. Amazingly all the planets are sentenced (for lack of a better term) in their own private ring around the sun so that we don’t crash into each other like bumper cars! I believe they say that it’s the sun’s gravity or magnetic core that pulls us to circle around it. But how come we don’t get any closer than 93 million miles? How come all the planets in our solar system aren’t the same distance from the sun?

 

I don’t know the answer to that. But hopefully one day I’ll find out. But a similarly cool thing is that the moon kind of does to us what we do to the sun. It’s attracted to something in the earth’s core (gravity or magnetic field) so that it can’t get away from us. And I love how the pull of our earth is not so strong that it pulls the moon right onto our crust! I believe they say that on Jupiter, the gravitational pull is so strong that humans could not walk on it. Our bones would likely be crushed because of how strong the pull is on that planet. They say that we’d have to evolve into having some super strong bones to keep them from collapsing into the ground. Perhaps only people with elephant legs could survive with a pull that strong!

 

So our gravitational pull on earth is just perfect for us to walk comfortable. We don’t have to pull our legs up with all our strength to take a step. We can also swim, run, jump, and skip with ease (depending on your weight or health) because of the perfect gravity level God put in our earth’s core.

 

One thing that I found particularly amazing was how we can find spiritual insight in gravity. I was thinking that if Oprah and I went to outer space in a space shuttle, we would have the same weight. Our mass would be different because she has more fat and skin than I do, but we would both weigh the same. So what on earth (pardon the pun) would cause things to be different when we are not in outer space?

 

I found that the law of gravity can be compared to the laws of God. The only thing that gives Oprah and me different weights on a scale is GRAVITY. Her mass is different than mine, but without gravity, she and I would be weightless. Only gravity makes us different.

 

Now for the sake of making a point, let’s just say that it would be a sin to weigh over 200 lbs. Let’s just say that anything less than that is considered holy or righteous. Now without the LAW of gravity, we’d never know what was right and what was wrong. Things could APPEAR wrong and sinful or holy and right, but we’d never know for sure without the standard. And we could not have a standard without being able to measure something against it. I’m not sure what the healthy weight is for a woman, but let's just suppose that it is 130 lbs. Let’s just say that starting at 131 lbs. you would be at an extremely increased risk of heart disease, diabetes, and stroke because at a convention every physician agreed unanimously that this was the case.

 

Now without that standard which could only first come from (the law of) gravity, everyone would technically be healthy because no one would weigh over zero pounds! So we need this law and we need a standard to let us know this hypothetically speaking right from the hypothetically speaking wrong. That’s how I look at God’s Word. The Bible gives us a standard. If there were no Bible with all its laws, precepts, statutes, commandments, judgments, etc., everyone would be on their way to destruction because there would be no example to aim for. So back to our example. If no one had a scale or the doctor’s report saying that 130 lbs. and below was the right weight, many people would eat themselves to “hell”. The weird thing would be that no one would even see it coming. No one would know that they were at a much higher risk of heart disease, stroke, and diabetes because they couldn’t be weighed. So when the law (of gravity) did come into effect, these people should not be mad at the law or rebellious against it because it was labeling them as bad or unhealthy. They should be glad because the law (of gravity) gave them a standard to abide by for health reasons.

 

At the college I graduated from, UT Knox, my friend told me that the cheerleaders HAD to weight 105 lbs. Any amount over -- and I guess under as well -- would immediately disqualify them from having a chance on the squad. If there were no gravity, they couldn't weigh the girls. They would have to guess how much they weighed. (Of course, there would be no need for cheerleaders without gravity because the balls in basketball and football would just float everywhere, but let's just say there was a need for cheerleaders.) If you couldn't disqualify anyone based on that standard of 105 lbs., then any female could be a cheerleader if they were good enough. And if they were to "compromise" on this weight requirement, it would first go from 105 lbs. to 104 lbs. and/or 106 lbs. And if you allow a one pound compromise, what's to stop you from compromising by 2 lbs.? Then 5 lbs.? Then 20? You have to stop somewhere. Sure it would be nice to have a range like 105 lbs. - 115 lbs., but that is not the case. The rules say 105 lbs., so every girl who is serious about joining the squad will either gain or lose weight to be a member of that squad.

 

Without gravity, no one could really function on the earth. We’d be floating into the clouds where the air would be too thin to breathe. All the seeds we plant would float away (along with the soil). No tree roots would dig down into the soil to get nutrients. All the animals would float away. No one could have as meaningful as a relationship as they could have with gravity.  We couldn’t drive, run, walk, swim (because all the water would float away), and many other things. The world would be one crazy planet without our law of gravity!

 

Likewise, the world would be one crazy planet without God’s law. Everyone could kill without knowing it was wrong. Everyone could have sex with whomever without regret. Everyone could steal, lie, cheat, and do other sins without the law to keep them aware of the standard of right and wrong. Jesus is our standard for what's right and wrong, for what true or false. If you ask most people what is the definition of truth, they would say, “Truth is the opposite of a lie.” But that’s not the correct definition.

 

Truth means that the particular thing you are referring to is in compliance with an established standard. For example, if I give you some counterfeit money and tell you that it’s real, you could tell me, “Girl, that’s not real money! That’s not the truth! It does not conform, comply with, or agree with the standard that has been set by the U.S. Treasury or the Mint or the Federal Reserve (or wherever they print off our money). In many ways, it may look like a real dollar bill, but in all actuality, it is missing some of the requirements to being real or to being the truth.

 

Jesus says in the Bible, "I am the way, the truth, and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me,” in John 14:6. When He says "the truth", I take it to mean that He alone is the standard for right and wrong. If we base our opinions of right and wrong on a schoolteacher or a politician or a parent or even a pastor, that is foolish unless that person is in direct compliance with Jesus.

 

The other funny thing is that while many people try to fight against the law, they still ALL have to abide by it whether they want to or not. I don’t care how bad you hate the law of gravity; you will abide by it whether you walk down the street or decide to jump off a cliff. The law will be still there, and it must be obeyed -- or else you will get some bad and serious consequences. If a man wants to defy gravity’s law by jumping off a cliff and expecting to float, he will sadly find out that the law is no respecter of persons. We will ALL be judged according to Jesus’ standard.

 

But people who are saved (people who have given their lives to Jesus) don’t have to be under the law; only people who do not know Jesus will be under the law. People who are saved are under grace -- meaning that - in keeping with this extended metaphor about outer space - they are floating in grace! They are not under the law and judged by the law like others are being judged by the law. We are floating like astronauts in outer space. Because we love Jesus so much, we are being helped to live by the only two laws that Jesus says we must obey in the New Testament.

Matthew 22:36-40 - Master, which is the great commandment in the law?  Jesus said unto him, Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy mind. This is the first and great commandment. And the second is like unto it, Thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself.  On these two commandments hang all the law and the prophets.

This means that Jesus has already told us that by obeying just these two commandments (loving God with all that is within us and loving our neighbors as we should love ourselves), we have fulfilled all the commandments of the Old Testament (and there are a lot of them!) Every word the prophets prophesied in the Old Testament regarding obeying God is fulfilled with just these two laws.

Romans 6:14-16 - For sin shall not have dominion over you: for ye are not under the law, but under grace. What then? shall we sin, because we are not under the law, but under grace? God forbid. Know ye not, that to whom ye yield yourselves servants to obey, his servants ye are to whom ye obey; whether of sin unto death, or of obedience unto righteousness?

This means that when you get saved, you are no longer going to be judged by all those laws. You will be under grace. And more importantly in that scripture, I see that we are to become SLAVES to righteousness as opposed to SLAVES to sin. You have no choice in this life. You will be a slave or servant. You will either be a slave to sin or a slave to righteousness. If you don't pick to be a servant to righteousness, then by default you are a slave to sin.

Revelation 3:16-17 - I know your deeds, that you are neither cold nor hot. I wish you were either one or the other! So, because you are lukewarm—neither hot nor cold—I am about to spit you out of my mouth.  

No true Christian will try to take advantage of this state of floating in grace. We appreciate so much what Jesus did for us on the cross that we respect and love Him for it, and we make sure to tell others about it. God's grace is no excuse for reckless living!

Romans 6: 1-4 - What shall we say then? Shall we continue in sin, that grace may abound? God forbid. How shall we, that are dead to sin, live any longer therein? Know ye not, that so many of us as were baptized into Jesus Christ were baptized into his death? Therefore we are buried with him by baptism into death: that like as Christ was raised up from the dead by the glory of the Father, even so we also should walk in newness of life.