The Little Red Hen

This is a great parable:
Once upon a time there was a little red hen who scratched about the barnyard until she uncovered some grains of wheat. She called her neighbors and said 'If we plant this wheat, we shall have bread to eat. Who will help me plant it?'
"Not I, " said the cow.
"Not I," said the duck.
"Not I," said the pig.
"Not I," said the goose.
"Then I will," said the little red hen. And she did.

The wheat grew tall and ripened into golden grain. "Who will help me reap my wheat?" asked the little red hen.
"Not I," said the duck.
"Out of my classification," said the pig.
"I'd lose my seniority," said the cow.
"I'd lose my unemployment compensation," said the goose.
"Then I will," said the little red hen, and she did.

At last the time came to bake the bread. "Who will help me bake bread?" asked the little red hen.
"That would be overtime for me," said the cow.
"I'd lose my welfare benefits," said the duck.
"I'm a dropout and never learned how," said the pig.
"If I'm to be the only helper, that's discrimination," said the goose.
"Then I will," said the little red hen.

She baked five loaves and held them up for the neighbors to see.
They all wanted some and, in fact, demanded a share. But the little red hen said, "No, I can eat the five loaves myself."
"Excess profits," cried the cow.
"Capitalist leech," screamed the duck.
"I demand equal rights," yelled the goose.
And the pig just grunted.
And they painted "unfair" picket signs and marched round and around the little red hen shouting obscenities.

When the government agent came, he said to the little red hen, "You must not be greedy."
"But I earned the bread," said the little red hen.
"Exactly," said the agent. "That's the wonderful free enterprise system. Anyone in the barnyard can earn as much as he wants. But under our modern government regulations productive workers must divide their products with the idle."

They all lived happily ever after. But the little red hen's neighbors wondered why she never again baked bread.

-a classic parable, adapted by Ronald Reagan

Note: For the very last paragraph I used a version I had read that was slightly abridged from Reagan's version, but in my opinion ends with more emphasis.

Finishing Monopoly Faster

My oldest son knows how to play Monopoly now and wants us to play it all the time. Monopoly is a classic but we all dread playing it because it can drag out to four or five hours.

So, when we play, I set the alarm on my iphone to go off in one hour. After the alarm sounds, all payments to other players are doubled. (Payments to and from the bank stay the same.) This allows us to bankrupt each other more quickly. Then we set the alarm again to give us another hour (or so) of play. When it sounds, whoever has the most cash is the winner.

There you have it. No deep message; just a tip on playing monopoly.

When God Seems Like a Bad GPS

Sometimes a badly programmed GPS can seem to make more sense than following God. We expect God to take us on the most efficient route to our destination, but He doesn’t. Sometimes, we get driven right into a lake.

This shouldn’t surprise us, since God did the same thing to the Israelites as He was bringing them out of Egypt. These people were being directly led by God. He led them as a pillar of cloud during the day and as a pillar of fire at night. (I don’t think many of these people were writing books at this time debating the existence of God or the difficult mystery of finding God’s will.) Wherever the pillar went, the people followed as God set the route. And from the way God led them, we can learn at least two things about the way that God sometimes leads. God leads us for what we need and for His glory.

God leads us for what we need. In Exodus 13:17-18 we read:

 “When Pharaoh let the people go, God did not lead them by way of the land of the Philistines, although that was near. For God said, ‘Lest the people change their minds when they see war and return to Egypt.’ But God led the people around by the way of the wilderness toward the Red Sea.  And the people of Israel went up out of the land of Egypt equipped for battle.”

God knew that the direct route would not have been good for the Israelites. They thought they were ready for a fight, but they weren’t. Out of His wisdom and love for His people, He would not give them what they wanted right away. It would not have been good for them. 

God leads us for His glory. Then we read that God specifically led them to the sea so that He would get glory over Pharaoh and His army. Exodus 14:1-4 reads:

 “Then the Lord said to Moses, ‘Tell the people of Israel to turn back and encamp in front of Pi-hahiroth, between Migdol and the sea, in front of Baal-zephon; you shall encamp facing it, by the sea. For Pharaoh will say of the people of Israel, ‘They are wandering in the land; the wilderness has shut them in.’ And I will harden Pharaoh's heart, and he will pursue them, and I will get glory over Pharaoh and all his host, and the Egyptians shall know that I am the Lord.’ And they did so.”

First God leads them away from the direct route. Then He leads them to the sea and pins their back against the wall. The point is that you can be following God, exactly like you should be, and He may lead you on a detour or He might lead you into a tight place. 

In those situations, you might be tempted to think—as the Egyptians would have thought—that God no longer has your best interests in mind. You might think that God has abandoned you, or that He no longer cares, or that God is not in control, or that He is mad at you, or that He no longer loves you.

I don’t know what kind of curve ball God might have thrown into your plans, but remember that the God of the Bible is not like the capricious gods of the Egyptians; He faithful and keeps his promises. When God leads you on a detour or into a tight place, remember: God leads us for what we need and God leads us for His glory.

City in Vietnam or Jedi Master

 

This may be the stupidest thing I've ever created... or the most awesome.

(You may not be able to view the slide show on mobile devices. If so, click here or check back later from a computer.)

The Universe: Caused, Self-Caused, or Uncaused?

The First-Cause Argument 

Why is there something rather than nothing? This is a big question. Everything that we see around us was caused by something else. The chair you are sitting on was built by someone. The screen you’re using to read this was built by someone. You yourself were caused by your parents, and they were caused by their parents. Like a chain of dominoes, everything we see was caused by something else.

This idea of cause and effect is at the heart of the first-cause argument for God. This family of arguments is also known as the cosmological argument because cosmos is the Greek word for world. There are different forms of the cosmological argument, but one that I find very persuasive goes like this:

·         Whatever began to exist has a cause.

·         The universe began to exist.

·         Therefore, the universe has a cause.

This argument is based on the law of cause and effect: whatever began to exist has a cause. However it is very important to state this law correctly. This law does not state that everything has a cause. Misstating the law like that results in the inevitable question, “Well, if everything has a cause, then what made God? Got ya!” I’ve heard university professors dismiss the first-cause argument in this way, demonstrating that they did’t really understand it in the first place. Instead, it is important to state that everything that began to exist must have a cause. If something never had a beginning—if it is eternal—then it didn’t need a cause. (In philosophy, this type of being would be referred to as a necessary being rather than a contingent being.) Therefore God doesn’t need a cause since God is eternal and never started to exist.

Further, if the universe has a cause, this cause must be outside of the universe. This is true since everything that has a beginning is caused by something outside of itself. Also, the chain of cause and effect cannot go back forever. There has to be a first-cause—a first domino that was pushed. Therefore, there has to be an eternal first-cause that exists outside of the universe and is powerful enough to bring the universe into existence. If this is true, it is a strong argument for the existence of God.

Caused, Self-caused, or Uncaused?

Let’s think about this another way. Was the universe created, self-created, or uncreated? There are only three options. Either (a) the universe was uncaused, or (b) it was self-caused, or it was (c) caused. If you’re having a discussion with someone, write these three options on a napkin and the other person to pick which one he or she things is correct. If you’re thinking through this for yourself, which one do you think is correct?

Self-caused
We can eliminate one of these three options right away. It is impossible for the universe to be self-caused.  That would violate the law of non-contradiction. The law of non-contradiction states that something cannot be both “A” and “Not-A” at the same time and in the same way. For example, something cannot be both “completely blue” and “not completely blue” at the same time and in the same way. But if the universe was self-created, it would need to exist and not-exist at the same time and in the same way. Unless the universe existed, it would have no ability to create anything—because it doesn’t exist. But if it already exists, it doesn’t need to be created! Therefore the universe cannot be self-caused. Being self-caused or self-created simply doesn’t make sense. We should eliminate it as an option.

Uncaused
If the universe is not self-caused it must be either caused or uncaused. If it is uncaused, there are two theoretical options: the universe could have came into existence with no reason, or it could be eternal and therefore does not need a cause. The first of these options—that the universe came into existence without a cause and for no reason—asks us to sacrifice a lot. That idea would sacrifice the law of cause and effect as well as the principle of sufficient reason. I do not think we should consider this a serious option. From nothing nothing comes. 

A more common response is to proposed that the universe itself is eternal. After all, it is asked, if something must be eternal, why can’t this thing be the universe rather than God? That is a valid question, however I believe there are two solid replies to this, one scientific and one philosophical.

1. The scientific reply is that eternal existence of the universe doesn't fit the current scientific understanding of cosmology. The eternal existence of the universe seemed possible when the dominant model for the universe was the steady state theory. However, the steady state theory has been supplanted by the Big Bang model, and one of the significant implications of the Big Bang theory is that is includes a beginning to time and space. In fact, some scientists resisted converting to the Big Bang theory because of this implication. If the universe began with the Big Bang, we need to ask what caused the Big Bang. The Big Bang is not something eternal and it did not cause itself. (Please note: This argument does not require anyone to believe in the Big Bang or an old universe. The point is that even if that model is true, it does not eliminate the need for a cause for the universe.)

(If the universe begins with a singularity approximately 14-16 billion years ago this is the temporal limit for the universe. Based on Einsteinian physics, time and space could not exist before this point. And even if we could conceive of a temporal eternity for this singularity before this point, there would still need to be an outside force to cause this singularity to move out of its equilibrium—which it must have been in if it was eternal. Although some physicists have speculated that there have been a series of oscillating universes, it is calculated that because of entropy these oscillations could not be eternal and must end in the hot or cold heat death of the universe. If the universe were eternal, this would have already occurred.)

2. The other reason that the universe cannot be eternal is because it is impossible for there to have been an infinite amount of time that has passed before now. This is a fascinating and brain bending argument that I find absolutely convincing. Imagine that there is a series of dominoes extending from inside the room you are in, out the door and out of view. For all you know, perhaps there are an infinite number of dominoes. But, now imagine that you see the dominoes falling, one knocking over the next, as this series of falling dominoes comes into your room. If you saw the dominoes fall, you could know with certainty that there was not an infinite number of falling dominoes. Why? It would take an infinite amount of time for an actual infinite amount of dominoes to fall. And just like a person can never finish counting to infinity, an actual infinite number of dominoes could never finish falling. Therefore, if an actual infinite number of dominoes had to fall before getting to your door, then the falling dominoes would never reach your door. In the same way, if an actual infinite number of minutes had to take place before yesterday, time would have never reached yesterday, much less today. Therefore, just as there had to be a finite number of falling dominoes, there also had to be a finite—not infinite—amount of time before today. An infinite past simply doesn’t make sense. Therefore time must have a beginning. And if time had a beginning it must have a cause.

Caused
If the universe is neither self-caused or uncaused, the only remaining option is that it was caused. Whatever this cause was, it must be something that transcends the universe and something with the level of power needed to bring a universe into existence. Added to this, there must be some sort of necessary and eternal first-cause that—itself not requiting a cause—exists as the sufficient reason for contingent reality. With this in mind, it seems very reasonable to believe “In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth.” (Genesis 1:1)

Related:
Universe, Create Thyself
Why God But Not Thor?
Faith With Reasons