The eternal struggle has always been belief in God.
Is there a God, or isn’t there? Are we all here by happenstance?
Believers call non-believers doomed and short-sighted, and non-believers call
believers simpletons unable to see that science rules.
During the existence of this blog, I have tried to show that
science complements faith and vice versa. I’ve tried to illuminate the beauty that
each represent and influence the other. The truth is that science and faith
should exist together in harmony.
And then I found COLOR.
Recently I watched a National Geographic show called Brain
Games with my kids. It was the very first episode and it described color as an
illusion. Here’s what the narrator, Jason Silva, had to say,
Uh…
In fact, further on Mr. Silva says that when you see a
particular color, that object is EVERY OTHER color besides that one.
What? Every other color? So what is color?
The website, Archimedes Laboratory
says the following:
“Color is energy…in fact it is an electromagnetic
phenomenon, which depends on the way that light is reflected on the objects.
Every object absorbs a part of the light which hits it and deflects the rest
towards our eyes: this reflected light is interpreted by our brain as a
particular color."
Makes you want to say, “If color isn’t real, then what is?”
But that sentence sounds much like, “If God
isn’t real, then what is?”
Back to the Brain Games show and host Jason Silva who goes
on to say that, “We will never know the world directly. All we can know is the
representation of rendering, a cosmic dance between our brain and those signals
coming in…and our brain is throwing in expectations, intentions, preconceptions
and stereotypes…”
That is a loaded couple of sentences. But the take away for
me is the following:
If your eyes betray you, why would you rely on your eyes to tell
you if there is a God?
I believe God is using science to tell us that we shouldn’t
just believe what we see. We need to use the whole package…our mind, body and
soul to understand what is beyond. It doesn’t have to be visceral to be real.
When you make decisions do you listen to your eyes only? No.
You base your decisions on your experience, your senses and something else.
Your conscience.
So it is with God. He wants you to use your whole being to
see Him. Only then will He be able to reveal to you His infinite love and
desire for you. He shines all the colors of His Light on us, but we need to use
more than our eyes to be a part of it.
So if you know me then you know I cannot leave well enough
alone. So let me share with you the beauty of science and faith.
One of God’s attributes is that He is light. In other words,
He is every color there is—or white light. It is why the brightness of his
being is blinding as Saul turned Paul found out. It is why God told Abraham he
could not look upon him without dying. He is all, and everything.
If pure light holds all colors and we can absorb light, then
we can absorb God. And the light that is deflected? Perhaps that is a metaphor
for what we can give back to the world. It’s God’s way of saying that we are
each important in our own way and that if we allow God to shine upon us as
David asks in Psalm 4:7, then not only will we absorb all the goodness He has
to give us, but we will be able to reflect that unique part of us that God created
in us individually, we can bring light to the world.
Jesus pretty much said all this already! John 8:12 says, “Jesus
spoke to them again, saying, I am the light of the world. Whoever follows me
will not walk in darkness, but will have the light of life.” The light of life…hmmm.
If we remember God’s trait as all color then perhaps Jesus is using the science
of color to talk about the Father as well. But Jesus takes science even further.
In Matt 5:14 he says, “You are the light of the world…” I encourage you to read
on as Jesus makes the point that we will shine for others and that our light
should not be hidden.
The moral of the story? We reflect God’s light. Each of us
absorbs light in the unique DNA way God created us and we reflect His love with
that same uniqueness.
That is…if we choose to believe with more than our eyes.
