Written by J. P. Moreland |
Tuesday, May 14, 2024
The universe is precisely fine-tuned so that life could appear. More than a hundred independent, hard facts about the universe have been discovered in the form of basic constants of nature or arbitrary physical magnitudes which are, scientifically speaking, brute facts and for which there is no further scientific explanation (e.g., the force of gravity in the universe, the charge of an electron, the rest mass of a proton, the rate of expansion resulting from the Big Bang). What blows the minds of so many is that, if any single one of these—much less all one hundred!—had been slightly larger or smaller on the order of a billionth of a percentage point or more, then no life could have appeared in the universe. The universe is a razor’s edge of precisely balanced life-permitting conditions.

The Limits of Science and Danger of Scientism
The heart of scientism is the conviction that science can explain virtually everything. If there is not a valid scientific explanation for an event or state, then that is not properly an object of our knowledge. In reality, though, there are many things that science cannot explain. And the problem is not that we lack sufficient data—the problem is that these are the sorts of things that science cannot explain, even in principle. Moreover, these things are items that we know to be true. What makes all of this especially interesting is that theism can explain them.
Let’s look at five things that theism can explain but science cannot.
1. Science Cannot Explain the Origin of the Universe
For at least three reasons, science cannot—even in principle—explain the origin of the universe.
First, science explains one aspect of the universe by appealing to another aspect of the universe, often by connecting the two by subsuming them under a law of nature. For example, we explain the formation of water by appealing to the chemical properties of hydrogen and oxygen, along with some energy-releasing event that caused the two to come together according to these chemical properties. We explain the death of the dinosaurs by appealing to different catastrophic events. In all cases of scientific explanation, one already has to have a universe in existence before scientific explanation, initial conditions, laws of nature, and so forth have something to which they can apply. Scientific explanations presuppose the universe in order for those explanations to be employed in the first place. Thus, a scientific explanation cannot be used to explain the very thing (the universe) that must exist before scientific explanation can get off the ground.
Second, scientific explanations apply to ongoing temporal states or changes of states (both are events) of various things according to relevant laws. The moving of the continents, the formation of the solar system, the development of life, the decay of uranium into lead are all events or changes of state that are explained by other events and laws that connect the events. The ongoing event of a gas retaining its pressure at constant volume is explained by the gas’s retaining its temperature according to the ideal gas law.
And so scientific explanation presupposes time (events are temporal episodes, and no sense can be given to the idea of a timeless event) and the reality of events. Two things follow from this. For one thing, science will never be able to explain the first event (the beginning of the universe) because to do so, it would have to appeal to a prior event and a law connecting them. But in this case, the origin of the universe would no longer be the first event; the prior explanatory event would be. But then, to explain this first event, one would need to postulate another prior event, and a vicious regress ensues.
For another thing, since scientific explanations tie one event to another via a law, such explanations presuppose time for those laws to be applicable. Thus, again, science cannot explain the origin of the very thing (time) that must exist before scientific explanations can be proffered in the first place.
Third, coming-into-existence is not a process but an instantaneous occurrence. Consider the process of walking into a room. One starts completely outside the room, then one is 20% into the room, then 30%, and so on, as one passes through the entrance. Finally, one is 100% in the room. But coming into existence from nothing is not a process. It is not as though the entity in question starts off being 100% nonexistent, then is 90% nonexistent and so on until it is 100% existent. Remember, by “90% nonexistent” I don’t mean that 10% of the entity fully exists and 90% is completely nonexistent. Rather, I mean that the entire entity is 10% real. It’s hard to avoid the conclusion that notions like 90% nonexistent are incoherent.
Something either does or does not exist. Period. It follows that, apart from the creative activity of God, there can be in principle no reason, no explanation for why one thing—say, the universe—popped into existence as opposed to another thing— a Honda Civic, a bass’s backbone, one half of Mount Everest, or a pair of chicken wings. Science can only be applied to transitions of one thing into another, but coming into existence is not a transition; it is, as it were, a point action or instantaneous event. So science cannot in principle explain the coming-into-existence of the universe from nothing.
2. Science Cannot Explain the Origin of the Fundamental Laws of Nature
Not all laws of nature are equally fundamental. Some can be derived from others. For example, Newton’s first law of motion (an object at rest stays at rest, and an object in motion stays in motion with the same speed and in the same direction unless acted upon by an unbalanced force) builds on Galileo’s concept of inertia (the tendency of matter to resist change in velocity; objects do not spontaneously change their velocities, which will remain constant unless acted upon by friction).
However, such derivations cannot continue indefinitely. There must be—and it is widely agreed that there are—fundamental or foundational laws of nature. But the existence and precise nature of these laws cannot be explained by science, since all scientific explanation presupposes them. As far as scientific explanation is concerned, these foundational laws are simply brute givens to be used to explain other things scientifically but which themselves cannot be explained scientifically.
So, how do we explain the existence and nature of these laws? Where did they come from? There are two major options here: (1) take them as unexplainable, brute entities, or (2) provide a theistic explanation. For many thinkers, myself included, the “unexplainable-brute-entity” option is not a good one. Since the actual brute entity might not have existed, we naturally seek an explanation as to why the contingent entity exists instead of not existing. And the fundamental laws of nature are contingent realities—after all, it is easy to conceive of worlds that have different fundamental laws of nature. So why does our world contain certain fundamental laws instead of others?
This seems like a perfectly permissible question, but some atheists reject the question on the grounds that it assumes The Principle of Sufficient Reason, which either begs the question (the only reason to believe it is if one already believes in God) or is just a brute principle that atheists are free to reject. The principle has different formulations, but one is this: For every contingent existent, there is a sufficient explanation for why it exists as opposed to not existing.
Theists have responded that the Principle of Sufficient Reason does not, in fact, presuppose the existence of God, and they insist that it is a rational principle that stands behind and justifies the human quest for explanations of why certain things exist and are what they are.
The atheist seems to be committing the informal taxicab fallacy. This fallacy occurs when someone hops into a principle or system of reason and uses that principle until he no longer likes the implication of the principle (or system), whereupon he hops out of the principle (or system) and stops using it. Applied to our discussion, we use the principle of sufficient reason all the time (e.g., when your car breaks down, your mechanic assumes there is a reason for why the engine exists in a bad way as opposed to existing in the way it should, so he tries to find that reason), and it has proven itself over and over again. But when we apply the principle of sufficient reason to the existence of the fundamental laws of nature (or, indeed, to the contingency of the universe we live in), the atheist rather arbitrarily stops using the principle because it most naturally yields a theistic explanation. He or she then jumps out of the taxicab.
3. Science Cannot Explain the Fine-Tuning of the Universe
What do we mean by fine-tuning?1 Our universe contains various constants (like the gravitational constant G in Newton’s law of gravity: F=G(m1m2/r2) and certain arbitrary physical quantities (such as the specific low entropy R2 level in the universe—the amount of disorder or useful energy to do work in the universe) that are not determined by the laws of nature but, as far as science is concerned, are brute facts that are just there.2
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Stanley brushes aside what the Bible says about homosexuality as “clobber” verses, as if those texts somehow harm gay sinners. He even suggests that a change of theology is in order if churches can’t welcome gay people into their midst.

I just finished listening to Pastor Andy Stanley’s Sunday morning sermon to North Point Community Church. I have to say that it is one of the most subversively anti-Christian messages that I have ever heard. Stanley says at the outset that he is preaching the message as a response to Albert Mohler’s column in World magazine titled, “The Train Is Leaving the Station.” In that article, Mohler criticizes a North Point-hosted conference that features gay-affirming speakers.
Stanley never explicitly names Mohler in his message, but he does say at the outset that he does not hold to the same version of Christianity that Mohler holds to. The rest of Stanley’s message certainly bears that out. Indeed, the entire message is an apologia of sorts for North Point’s decision to host gay-affirming speakers and for North Point’s teaching on sexuality. Stanley writes,
“[Mohler] is actually accusing me of departing from his version of biblical Christianity. So I want to go on record and say, I have never subscribed to his version of biblical Christianity to begin with, so I’m not leaving anything. And if he were here he would say, ‘Well, Andy, I’ve never subscribed to your version of biblical Christianity.’ And that’s okay. We can agree to disagree, but this is so extraordinarily misleading. In my opinion, just my opinion, his version of biblical Christianity is the problem. His version, this version of biblical Christianity is why people are leaving Christianity unnecessarily. It’s the version that causes people to resist the Christian faith because they can’t find Jesus in the midst of all the other stuff and all the other theology and all the other complexity that gets blobbed on to the message.
Bottom line, that version of Christianity draws lines. And Jesus drew circles. He drew circles so large and included so many people in his circle that it consistently made religious leaders nervous.”
Stanley frames the message as if this imbroglio is merely a misunderstanding and that critics like Mohler just don’t get it. Stanley says that North Point didn’t host a bible or theology conference. Rather, it was a “pastoral” conference designed to restore the relationships of parents to their gay children. He further contends that North Point has not changed its teaching on sexuality. He says that North Point continues to teach that biblical marriage is the union of one man and one woman, and that sex outside of marriage is not God’s best. Sounds pretty Christian, right?
Well, not really. Actually, not at all. Stanley immediately follows that affirmation by saying that some gay Christians find this teaching too hard to follow. He says gay people at North Point know what the Bible says about marriage, but they choose to enter gay marriages anyway because they don’t want to spend their lives alone. They don’t want to live without love and a family, so they marry a same-sex partner and then just add that to following Jesus. Stanley says that North Point doesn’t draw “lines” to keep those people out of the church. Rather, they draw “circles” of inclusion so that they can remain at North Point as gay “married” couples. In Stanley’s words,
“[Gay Christians] choose a same sex marriage, not because they’re convinced it’s biblical. They read the same Bible we do. They chose to marry for the same reason many of us do, love, companionship and family.
And in the end, as was the case for all of us, and this is the important thing I want you to hear me say, it’s their decision. Our decision is to decide how we respond to their decision. Our decision as a group of local churches is how are we going to respond to their decisions? And we decided 28 years ago. We draw circles, we don’t draw lines. We draw big circles. If someone desires to follow Jesus, regardless of their starting point, regardless of their past, regardless of their current circumstances, our message is come and see and come sit with me. And this is not new. This is who we are. It’s who we’ve always been. And this is why I love our church and this is why I’m so extraordinarily proud of you. We aren’t condoning sin, we are restoring relationships, and we are literally saving lives.”
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Never has there been any point in God’s eternal existence when the Son was not begotten by the Father. If there had been, then the relation of Father and Son would be merely temporal and there would be no way of maintaining a singularity in the divine essence while affirming a real plurality of persons. Without generation as an eternal operation of God, tritheism or modalism are the only alternatives. This truth of eternal generation helps in the interpretation of certain passages of Scripture. For example, no doctrine gives greater aid in understanding John 5:26 than this. “For as the Father hath life in himself; so he hath given to the Son to have life in himself” (KJV). 

This article is part 12 in a series by Tom Nettles on Remembering Jesus Christ. (Part 1, Part 2, Part 3, Part 4, Part 5, Part 6, Part 7, Part 8, Part 9, Part 10, Part 11).

The first of the ecumenical creeds was formulated in a council called by the emperor Constantine. According to historians Eusebius of Caesarea and Lanctantius, Constantine was converted to Christianity as he prepared for a battle with Maxentius in the year 312. His victory, which he attributed to Christ, made him the sole ruler of the western portion of the Empire. After a dozen years of gaining more knowledge of the church’s organization and doctrines, Constantine, aware of a theological controversy that stirred the church, made arrangements for church bishops to meet in Nicea (present day Iznik in Turkey) to settle the dispute. Around 300 bishops were able to come with only half a handful of representatives from the west.
The controversy that prompted the call to Nicea focused on the teaching of a presbyter of Alexandria Egypt named Arius (260-336). Arius strongly concluded that the monotheism necessary to Christianity eliminated the possibility of any other personal entity sharing the status of absolute deity. In a letter to his friend Eusebius of Nicomedia in 318 during the initial tensions of the controversy, he complained that Alexander “greatly injures and persecutes us . . . since we do not agree with him when he says publicly, ‘Always Father, always Son, ‘Father and Son together,’ . . . ‘Neither in thought nor by a single instant is God before the Son.’” Arius instead taught that “before he was begotten or created or ordained or founded, he was not.” He, that is, the one called the son, is not “a part of the unbegotten in any way” but was “constituted” by God’s “will and counsel, before times and before ages.”[1]
Arius’s affirmation, therefore, of the lordship of Christ could not mean that he was co-eternal with the Father and of the same nature. The phrases anathematized at the end of the Nicene Creed 325 represent some of the phrases that Arius used to define his understanding of Jesus, the Christ. Because only God is eternal, Jesus is not; and so, “There was when he was not.” Since he is begotten, he must have come into existence subsequent to the Father and, therefore, “begotten” is taken as a synonym for “created.” Since he is created, he cannot be of the same eternal immutable substance as the Father and is, on that account, of a different substance. Since he is a created moral being, even though the first of all created things, he is mutable and could have sinned. The Father, however, endowed him with the power of creation, set him forth to be the redeemer of the fallen race, a task that the Son effected without blemish and thus gained the status of savior. In order to be like us and succeed where we failed, he had to take our flesh. In his person, however, his humanity consisted only of the body while the created logos constituted the rational soul of the person Jesus.
This savior concocted by Arius, therefore, was neither God nor man. The views of Arius show that a single theological principle pressed with a relentless, but false, logic uninformed by other revelatory propositions leads to destructive conclusions.
Among the most important of the biblical theologians opposed to Arius was a young deacon at Alexandria named Athanasius (296-373). Athanasius had written a book entitled On the Incarnation of the Word.[2] In it he had discussed how the incarnation of the Son of God solved an apparent dilemma. God intended to bring his creature man to a state of glorious fellowship with God. He also threatened that if his creature disobeyed then death would be the certain outcome. How can God complete his purpose for man and at the same time keep true to his word? The incarnation is God’s answer to this apparent dilemma. The one who was both God and man could take the death man owed for “all men were due to die,” thus fulfilling the veracity of God’s word and the honor of God. At the same time, he brought to glory the human nature that he shared with the creature, thus fulfilling the divine purpose for man. Athanasius was well-armed in biblical knowledge and in theological reflection for the vital corrective that the Arian speculation demanded.
Though the Council had negative fall-out in church-state relations and the eventual authority of canon law, the most important result of the Council of Nicea was the adoption of the creed. To show the pivotal importance of the substance of this creed we will point to five short insertions. Eusebius of Caesarea (the first church historian) proposed the confession used at baptism by his church (or something very similar) as a possible statement to bring unity to the deeply divided council. When the Arian party agreed to sign the proposed statement, the party led by Alexander of Alexandria (d. 328) and his young deacon Athanasius (296-373) knew that no real unity could be gained by such a tactic. A creed that simply embraced the serious doctrinal disagreements would only perpetuate substantial disharmony and lead to constant dispute. Preeminently, ambiguity about the legitimate object of worship would in fact endorse a principle of idolatry and capitulate to the impression that Scripture itself was not clear in its christological focus. The wisdom of God would be impugned for leaving us without clarity on the status of the one he called “My beloved Son.” What could be more absurd in Christianity that to leave the christological issue a matter of opinion, ambiguity, and diverse formulation?
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