The God of Order
one
The existence of Order
Another way we see evidence of God’s existence all around us all the time is the fact of order in the physical universe. By “order” we just mean stable patterns, regularities. We mean the fact that we can be reliably sure that if we drop our cup of coffee, it will fall to the ground.
All of science is based on the fact that the universe exhibits these regularities. Science is about finding those regularities, the order, and then expressing it in formulas. Then we can use those formulas to make predictions and to develop new technologies. But the first step is always to find the order, to discover the regularity.
And that raises the question – where did that order, where did those regularities in the universe come from?
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We shouldn’t take the order in the universe for granted
We get so used to living in an orderly, regular, reliable universe, that we take it for granted. But think how impossible it would be to live in an utterly chaotic universe, one that was totally arbitrary or lawless.
You could never predict or depend on anything.
In this universe, when you drop a cup of coffee, it falls to the ground.
In a universe without order, if you dropped the coffee cup it could just as easily fly up to the sky like a balloon, or it could hover in place, or it could disappear altogether, or turn into something completely different, like a moose.
That’s not the universe we live in, thank goodness!
It’s not the universe we live in because there are so many regularities we can depend on because there’s so much order.
But then we ask the question again – where did those regularities, that order, come from?
three
Order doesn’t come from Chaos
It seems like an obvious move to go from the fact that the universe is organized to the conclusion that Someone must have organized it. Atheists know this, and so they are desperate to come up with some other explanation for the universe’s order. And you can tell how desperate they are by how bizarre their explanation is.
They usually say that the cause of the order in the world is chaos!
Yes! They are desperate to convince people that if you get enough chaos, it will eventually lead to order!
That’s like saying if you add up enough positive integers, you’ll eventually get a negative integer. It’s absurd. Nothing can come from its opposite! You don’t produce more light by increasing the darkness. You don’t tell your kids to become financially secure by just racking up higher and higher debts.
But the atheists are somehow convinced that if they can come up with enough chaos, that will explain the order
They’ll talk about multiverses full of chaotic universes for which they have no evidence, but that doesn’t explain why every universe isn’t chaotic. It doesn’t explain why our universe is orderly. Or they’ll talk about an infinite past, for which they also have no evidence, where the universe churned randomly, but that doesn’t explain why the universe is still churning randomly.
No, nothing never comes from its opposite. Chaos doesn’t lead to order, and monkeys jumping on typewriters will never produce the complete works of William Shakespeare.
Order doesn’t come from chaos. It comes from a Mind.
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Producing Order requires a Mind
Some parents will look into their kids’ bedrooms and say, “Okay, kids, time to do something about this: this room isn’t going to clean itself up!”
That’s absolutely right. Things don’t put themselves in order. Our kids’ bedrooms don’t put themselves in order. Our desks don’t put themselves in order. Our kitchens don’t put themselves in order. This universe didn’t put itself in order.
When something is organized, when something has order put into it, that order comes from a Mind acting deliberately.
This universe was not only brought into existence by a first cause, a Necessary Being, it has been organized by a Supreme Intelligence
five
The God with a Plan
Throughout the Bible, we are repeatedly reminded to take comfort from remembering that God has organized this natural world.
Psalm 104 talks about how God has structured the whole world in an orderly way, that He’s arranged things for the stars and the sun and moon and the plants and the beasts and birds and fish. All this allows humanity to delight in the good things of life, things like bread and wine and oil.
In the book of Job, God answers Job’s hurt and confusion by reminding him of all the natural wonders, all the natural order, that God has put into the world. It’s as though God is saying to Job: “I know you don’t understand what’s going on in your life, but look, you can see that I’m a good organizer, a good planner. I planned out the whole universe and I have a plan for you.”
And Jesus says that when we get anxious, we should remember the sparrows and the lilies. God has taken care of them, He’ll take care of us.
This is a world with order. It has a design. Every piece of this universe is following the plan designed by the Supreme Planner.
God takes delight in making lovely, intricate, complicated and surprising designs. He has done that with His universe. He has done that with His plan for salvation. He is doing it right now in your life.
So be glad and take heart, even if you don’t right now see how the plan is unfolding. You will see it one day. And you will rejoice in the God of Order and what He has done with you.