Pondering Unanswerable Questions
Which Came First, the Chicken or the Egg?
Text: Genesis 1:24-31
Rev. Dr. John E. Manzo
March 21, 2010
There is a philosophical concept of circular cause and consequence. It speaks of arguments that go around in circles making resolution difficult.
A graduate cannot find a job because every job requires experience; and if no one gives a person experience, how can they ever find a job?
An actor cannot join the actor's union unless he has played a role in a union film, but a non-union actor cannot get a role in a union film because he isn't in the union.
Remember when CD players first came out? People would not purchase them because they didn’t have CD’s to play on the players; and they wouldn’t purchase CD’s because they didn’t have a player.
Life moves around in circles. And then there is the most famous one of all. Which came first, the chicken or the egg?
You may have looked at this sermon title this morning and decided that the title was a joke or I was being frivolous or trying to be humorous. The reality is that the subject of the chicken and the egg is a topic that has been discussed over and over again through many centuries. The philosopher Aristotle weighed in three centuries before Jesus was born and the scientist Stephen Hawking has weighed in during the modern era.
People have weighed in and it still remains an unanswerable question that is actually a small question in terms of the largest question it represents. How did the universe and each of us get here in the first place? Some will say that there is an easy and definitive answer to the question.
Some will say Genesis tells us everything we need to know.
Others will say Evolution tells us everything we need to know.
We’d all be delighted if the questions could be answered so simply; for many people they are-----but the reality is that the world we live in is still debating from whence we came and has been doing so for a very long time. While so many people like to try to make this unanswerable question have an easy answer, there really is no way to do so.
For one, while many people who call themselves creationists and evolutionists like to say that you must believe in one or the other, the reality is that there really is no way to not embrace both.
We believe that God is the Creator of the universe; science teaches us that the universe and everything in it has evolved and is evolving. These are not mutually exclusive things----in fact, they dance with each other.
Pierre Teilhard de Chardin, a French philosopher, theologian, and scientist, wrote in the early portion of the 20th century and concluded that believe both in God as a Creator and in evolution was the right answer. He did not see a conflict. He said that God created life and God’s creation was living and breathing, and never stagnant. It was always in the state of flux and change and constant movement. He wrote of people in relationship to each other:
We are one, after all, you and I. Together we suffer, together exist, and forever will recreate each other.
For Teilhard, to deny God as a Creator was to deny God’s greatest attribute; but to deny the evolutionary process of the universe and each of us was to deny God’s creative power and genius.
Much of the debate over creation and evolution is not a theological debate. A great deal of it is a political debate; but it is a political debate based on something holy and good. It is a debate based on the premise that someone is right and someone is wrong. The problem with the debate is that it is debated by people who are not so much interested in learning truth or embracing the truth as much as making political points.
Today, as a people we have celebrated the dedication of a beautiful little child unto God. Merideth’s favorite story in the Bible is the story of the walk to Emmaus. Her favorite part of that narrative is when Luke speaks to us about their hearts burning inside of them. Their hearts burned from their love of Jesus Christ and their encounter with the risen Christ. In Emma’s name that story will always be shared.
In this beautiful child we have a story of Jesus remembered and loved, as she is loved by her parents and family. If I would now say that we should have a debate about Emma being a beautiful baby, or debate about her parents’ love for her, or even Merideth’s favorite Bible text you’d look at me like I had two heads and say that this was NOT a subject of debate. Which, of course, would be true.
But we do this with God’s creation all the time. Creation is a gift of magnificent beauty and mystery and we ought not tarnish it by having debates on how the universe came to be.
My second point is that this also defeats the purpose of Genesis.
Many centuries ago the Jews were in captivity and listened to pagan creation narratives. What they heard over and over again was that the universe and the world around us was an accident without design, and the waste of something much larger. To the Jews of that era, this was not something they believed in.
Genesis was written, not as a scientific response to the world around them, but as a theological and faith based response. Genesis had two major points.
The first was that the universe and each of us did not come about by accident or by random chance, but came as the result of the design of a Creator.
The second was that the universe, and each of us, were good. The words are repeated over and over again. “God saw it; and it was good.”
Sometimes things don’t go as we expect and get turned around.
A man and a woman were riding along in a car and they were pulled over by a police officer who told the man, who was driving, “Sir, your brake light is out.”
“The man said, “I’m sorry officer but it must have just gone out. I’ll have it fixed right away.”
To which his wife said, “It’s been out a month. I told you to get it fixed!”
And the husband responded loudly, “Would you please be quiet, you foolish woman!”
The policeman said, “Sir, you were also going about 10 miles an hour over the speed limit.”
The man responded, “I’m sorry officer, I just have just gotten a heavy foot. I never speed.”
To which his wife responded, “You’re always speeding. I told you to slow down!”
And the husband responded loudly, “Would you please be quiet, you foolish woman!”
The police officer said, “And, sir, I noticed you are not wearing your seatbelt. I have to cite you on that as well.”
And the man responded, “Officer, please, I just took it off to get my wallet out of my back pocket.”
And his wife responded, “You never wear a seatbelt. I told you you’d get in trouble some day!”
And the husband responded loudly, “Would you please be quiet, you foolish woman!”
The police officer said, “Ma’am, is he always this nasty to you?”
She smiled and so, “No officer. He’s usually very, very nice. He only gets nasty when he’s had too much to drink.”
That story ends abruptly and most of us can figure out what happens next. But the story is not what we’re really expecting it to be.
Much the same can be said about Genesis. Genesis is often debated as a science book; in fact people often like to view it as a science book, overlooking one tiny detail. Genesis is in the Bible and should be treated as a document of faith. It is not a book written to tell us HOW creation came to be, but WHY creation came to be. Like so many of the unanswerable questions, HOW creation came to be is often the wrong question. Psalm 8, where our Call to Worship derives asks a much better question: “Why do you, O God, love us so much?”
The story of creation is not a story about politics of even science. It is ultimately a narrative of faith; a creator God who creates a universe in motion, and creates a universe that is good, and creates people in His own image and likeness.
The creation story is ultimately a story about love. Teilhard de Chardin said it well when he said:
Someday, after mastering the winds, the waves, the tides and gravity, we shall harness for God the energies of love, and then, for a second time in the history of the world, humanity will have discovered fire.
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