Throughout all of history, starting with the first human life on earth, people have been asking questions. Questions such as why do humans exist, what is our purpose, what fulfills us, and what happens after we die? In all of society these questions, have been pondered and question repeatedly, however, logical certainty cannot be achieved; making it personalized opinions in most cases. I as an intellectual person on this planet have actually been asking questions like this for a while, and I am ready to share my knowledge that I have come by over the years, while including the knowledge that I have gained so far during this school year.
“Then the LORD God formed the man from the dust of the ground. He breathed the breath of life into the man's nostrils, and the man became a living person.” Genesis 2 tells of the story of Adam and Eve, the first two people supposedly on the earth. Adam, as from the quote was made from the dust, while his companion was formed from within his own flesh; a rib turned into women. The two were the image of god and were created by god to take care of his creation, to populate the earth, and to have a relationship with Him. Adam and Eve were the first gardeners, parents, and people to disobey god. However, this biblical story explains why we are on earth in terms of a religious side. There is a whole other side to things.
Science, a word thrown into religion that can have many people feeling sick, has a different reason, of why we are on earth. Evolution, a word that can make people throw up, has a lot of conflict in people’s minds when it comes to religion. Evolution, a theory formed by Darwin states that humans evolved from other animals by chance. Many scientists now accept evolution as fact, and many more people around the world are following suit. I for one actually accept evolution as fact and presume it to be true because of the facts presented to me. However, it is conflicting for a reason; many people do not like it and mistakenly presume that evolution disproves religion, which it does not. In fact, the two come together as nicely as to opposite magnets do. Francis Collins for example made a good point when he said, “I do not find the wording of Genesis 1 and 2 to suggest a scientific textbook but a powerful and poetic description of God’s intentions in creating the universe.” I for one agree with him in that I do not take genesis 1 and 2 literal, as I feel many people in today’s society also do not take it literal. Chris of Yes or No by Peter Kreeft, who plays the speaker of the Christian faith, had this to say, “I don’t know. [If I believe in evolution] However, suppose I did. How would that contradict my faith?” Therefore, it can be concluded that even Christians can accept that evolution does not contradict religion, and I accept that.
However, everyone is entitled to his or her own opinions, and some take advantage of that by claiming what they feel is true. What do I mean by that? I mean they concluded that religion and evolution cannot mix, something I do not believe. Some will say that religion is not real at all, but evolution is, such as Steven pinker of Harvard, who claims that the theory of natural selection works, but then questions why a god would allow bad things to happen, such as 9/11. However, you also have someone like Albert Mohler, president of Southern Baptist Theological Seminary, who claims that that evolution happened, but it was not as random as Darwin would claim, that there was a helping hand to glide it along. Then the final type of people are those who say Evolution is not real, a thought I could not say I agree at all. They state that fossils presented do not prove that evolution took place, in fact may even prove that it did not take place. I for one know that fossils prove that old life lived on earth, but research does show that it actually does not prove evolution.
Now before we conclude I would also like to say something about the earth’s age. Science will tell us the earth is billions of years old, yet the bible claims that it is only 6000 years old, something seems wrong it would seem. Will for starters this is a misconception; there is no explicit verse, that relates the time of creation of the earth. Therefore, to conclude on why we exist, we exist because we were formed by a helping hand of a higher power and shaped and molded throughout the years into which we are today. We were made to protect the World we live in, to populate the world we live in, and if one chooses to adore the creator. There will always be speculation of how human’s existence came to be, but I feel this is the best bet. Therefore, a final note before I continue onto the next subject, we started out as dust, and we finish as dust, could it be a cycle?
The purpose of life, and what fulfills us is a challenging question that is hard to answer like the last. Like the last, the Bible tells us that the purpose of life is to take care of his creation, to populate the earth, and to have a relationship with God. However, could there be more to it than that? The bible actually tells us a list of many purposes in life, if you understand it the way that others do. For example, the website, http://www.dougbrittonbooks.com/onlinebiblestudies-selfworthandrespect/godhasplansforyou-youhaveapurpose.php has gone and made a long list of all those, so for this part I will be using examples from that site.
The purpose of life it would seem revolves around god, in many cases he bible tells us, you are created to know God, you are created for God's glory, you are created to praise God, you are created to spread the Gospel. So as it can be seen that bible for obvious reasons is heavily based around god, however it is not all about god. The bible also tells us that our purpose is to grow the fruit of the Spirit. What this means is that god wants us to grow our character during our life, it is more important that if we fail or succeed. However most importantly he wants us to use the talents that he gave to us, which can be seen in Romans 12:4-8. Most importantly, he just wants us to live our lives, do not minimize your life, live life as an adventure, and be faithful.
I actually have no problems with what the Bible says about our purpose, except I do kind of wish it was not so heavily revolved around god. I for one feel that there is a higher power, I just do not know who it is yet, for that reason I find it hard to know who to praise or spread, but I do try to get to know a higher power, who very well could be god. I think also that the purpose of life is what someone wants to make of their life, which is what a higher power would want I feel; to learn who they are. Someone who does not believe in religion or the Bible I feel can live by that. Life is after all just an adventure for all those living in it. So to conclude on this point I would say that purpose of life in unknown, but if you take, what the Bible gives it can help to give a good guideline of what our life is for and for those who do not believe then just keep doing what you are doing because it is what a higher power would want. In addition, what fulfills us I believe is what we want to fulfill us. For example, many people find it in Facebook; others find it in a wife or other means. However, in truth, we will never find it without that higher power or until death whatever comes first and that brings me to my next and final point.
"Do not let your hearts be troubled. Trust in God; trust also in me. In my Father's house are many rooms; if it were not so, I would have told you. I am going there to prepare a place for you. And if I go and prepare a place for you, I will come back and take you to be with me that you also may be where I am." John 14:1-3 says it best, that god does have plans for us after life. However, is it that simple and end it at that? No I am afraid not, this question is one that has plagued me the most and have given long hours of trying to find the answer to this question. For I am going to be honest here I am deeply terrified of dying and the unknown that comes with it. Therefore, I actually look for the reassurance that there is something after death and I am convinced there is. In the book, Yes and No, it talks about both Heaven and Hell. Christopher states that Heaven is open to all and that no one is condemned to Hell, and yes, Hell is a real place, human kind made it however.
However, there are people out there that claim far scarier things that end up scaring me. For example, some claim there is no after life and that everything will just go dark, like falling asleep and never waking up. Some others claim that you just are reincarnated as some other type of living creature, which I could believe. Because if you think about it, matter is never actually destroyed, so why couldn’t the matter that makes us just be recycled into some new life? It makes you think, but I hold true to the afterlife story and I hope really badly that it is true. Now before I conclude on this subject there is some interesting, “proof” to the argument of after death and that is the supernatural. For example, how does one explain having a near death experience or seeing something such as a ghost, as of now no one can. The facts all point to there being something unusual going on, people just cannot prove it. So to conclude I would say that there is life after death and it comes in the form of Heaven or Hell, which most people I would imagine choose Heaven.
As of now all of the stuff that we have talked about and focused on is almost, if not, impossible to prove. This is why what I write is what I believe to be closes and my best bet after all of the research I have done and the amount of time thinking of the topic at hand. I would like to conclude by saying religion and theology is independent upon faith, and it will not and cannot survive without faith, which I see now is why the bible is pretty focused on that.
