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Listen > Sermon Summary
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| October 19, 2003 Pastor Cliffe Knechtle (29:14) |
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Ultimately, Einstein realized he made mathematical mistakes and with tremendous humility admitted he was wrong and that the universe did have a beginning and therefore the universe is not God. Moving from pantheism to theism, he realized there is a creator behind all of this and said "The mathematical precision of the universe reveals the mathematical mind of God." We don't know if Einstein made the step to realize that God is a personal, living god who wants to have a relationship with us. Leo Tolstoy turned his back on the Christianity he was taught and got into radical socialism and radical communism, however, he came to realize that social reform is not going to solve the world's problems. The human dilemma goes so deep that social reformation is not enough. He questioned "What is my life for, to die?" He asked his philosophical friends "Where do I come from? Why am I here? Why do I live my life ethically? Where am I going?" and they gave him superficial, hollow answers that he knew were wrong. Tolstoy finally realized that he found the answers to these questions in the lives of the Russian peasants who, though living under the heel of poverty, had found the answers to these profound, human questions in the person of Jesus Christ. Tolstoy began to follow Christ. Fyodor Dostoyevsky also understood the gospels yet turned his back on Jesus Christ. He also became deeply committed to social reformation and to socialism. He joined in a plot to overthrow the czar and, as a result, was sent to Siberia for ten years of labor. As he was getting on a train to Siberia, an elderly woman handed him a New Testament which was the only book he was allowed to read while in prison. He studied and meditated on the New Testament and emerged from prison with a very deep faith in Christ. In his later books, he wrote that faith is not easy, but instead very difficult. He realized that unbelief is so reasonable because of the problem of suffering. His character Ivan in The Brothers of Karamazov said "Look at the innocent children who suffer, how can there be a good god in light of the suffering of innocent children?" Einstein struggled with that also and could not come to the point where he believed that God's character is good. There is suffering because God gave us free will. It's impossible for God to create us free and then make us do only good. God is all powerful but will do only that which is good, in conformity with his character, and that which is rational and is reasonable. God is love and love demands freedom; you can not force someone to love you. To manipulate us is to strip us of our humanity, to turn us into robots. We can not prefer the precision of an engineer over the love called for by a father. God took a risk when He created us with free will because he knew we could rebel against Him. If we exercise our free will to rebel, that freedom leads to our destruction. When we put our faith in Christ and begin to live truly free lives as Christ defines freedom, we experience real life. We are to use our freedom by understanding the purpose for which God created us and then living out that purpose in our lives. Summary submitted by Karen Walsh |
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Bronx Bethany Church of the Nazarene Gosple Chior, "Chosen" provided part of our worship music when we met in the New Canaan High auditorium.