Our 35 year old VW camper van is due its MoT next week, it’s always an interesting time, will it pass or not? Most years it goes straight through, but just last week it developed a weird fault that took all my skills as an RN trained engineer to diagnose. Some electric bits worked others didn’t. No blown fuses, no melted wires, and seemingly no common point between them. No wipers, no blower motor and no headlights (side lights and main beam yes, but no headlights). After much head scratching, giving it a darn good looking at and consulting the (not very useful) wiring diagrams in the Haynes manual, I turned the key and it all just sprang into life … I turned it off .. back on .. worked … back off .. back on … didn’t work … ah …. memories of my old Chief’s voice came into my head ‘look at the evidence in front of you’ … what’s the common point? Of course! The ignition switch .. a little wiggle of the key and all is well … or not .. or is .. or isn’t .. sorted! (Now all I need to do is dismantle the steering column to fit a new switch, but that’s another blog). The evidence was in front of me …
I was working on a defective radar display, which one of the watchkeepers thought he had smelt burning coming from. So we were tracing the fault. Couldn’t see any obviously burnt components. So only one thing to do, with the covers off switch it on and look for evidence. As I had my head in the display looking around … I saw smoke start to appear from a capacitor .. my Leading hand smelt it too, and had his hand on the off switch (always health and safety conscious). ‘Lets just make sure, leave it a bit longer …. Yeah its definitely that .. switch it off’. I had looked for the evidence in front of me and found the snag. (As I turned round from the display the Weapons Engineering Officer was stood behind the Leading hand … he just shook his head and said ‘I’ve heard the phrase ‘tune for maximum smoke’ but never witnessed …. it till now …’
When I talk to people who are not Christians, one of the most common comments as to why they don’t get it is ‘Show me the evidence and I might give it a go’. Now I am not going to pretend that I can give any concrete evidence for stuff like the virgin birth, or walking on water or the resurrection from the dead … those require faith (that’s kinda the point really) .. but in the Bible there is some stuff about ‘look around you at the world, at creation .. is that not evidence of a creator God … of some power or force behind all this amazing world?
In the letter that Paul wrote to the Romans, which is part of the Bible it says this in Chapter 1 verses 19-20:
But the basic reality of God is plain enough. Open your eyes and there it is! By taking a long and thoughtful look at what God has created, people have always been able to see what their eyes as such can’t see: eternal power, for instance, and the mystery of his divine being. So nobody has a good excuse. What happened was this: People knew God perfectly well, but when they didn’t treat him like God, refusing to worship him, they trivialised themselves into silliness and confusion so that there was neither sense nor direction left in their lives. They pretended to know it all, but were illiterate regarding life.
So if you are struggling to sort out snags in your life, be they big or small, and are sceptical about God because you can’t see any evidence, how about looking for the evidence around you … in creation, in nature … or in a new born baby. Chance? Really? I for one don’t think so …
Photo by Livin4wheel on Unsplash
