The achievements of modern science, such as the recent placing of a guided rocket on the moon, would not appear to have any basis for spiritual faith-confirming facts. But the outlook can alter as we try to probe into the background of the situation.
We see the event as the triumph of scientific knowledge and skill in the expression of the human desire to conquer and dominate even in the immensity of space and the earth’s satellite; using the gradually acquired results of research extending over many years to attain the objective.
In this we have the situation of human efforts attempting to extend their dominion over what in past ages was deified and worshipped by men as a “god”, as shown by the discoveries the archaeologists made when they excavated the sites of the earliest form of civilization in the history of man. “The Sumerians”, wrote Langdon, “were probably the first people to emerge from barbarism some time before 4,000 B.C. they were a talented race . . . so far advanced in culture as to live in organized society, to create good architecture, excellent pottery and invent a written script. Their cities and lands were in the valley of the Euphrates, and from there have come the ancient records of the most primitive religions. In them is read the details of the beliefs and cults which, we are told, indicate at their earliest date the existence of a monotheism—belief in one god—based on the principle that the whole universe and all things in it were derived from the “logos” or word of the water god as the first deity.”1 As centuries passed a multiplicity of “gods” appear, derived out of the original unity, so that as Sumerian cities were built they became the dedicated centre of a cult and worship. Of four such cities, Ur, in the south of their country, was the seat of the “Moon-god” worship; the temple first built in mud brick by Bur-Sin, king of Ur, about 2,220 B.C. Later conquerors destroyed and rebuilt the temple in more solid and costly construction. Finally, at a noticed in passing much later date, it came under the control of the powerful Babylonian ruler, Nebuchadnezzar, who restored the temple worship dedicated to “Nannar” the Moon-god and also established it in his own city of Babylon.
Into this condition of early civilization and at the height of its power there appeared, about the 20th century B.C., a new way of religious thought and belief in human society that changed the course of all human history. Out of the Moon worship age arose a new nation whose laws for control of their destiny were based on a Revelation from a Creator and established by visible experience of His power as indelibly written in the history of the nation. Originating with the Divine visitation and call of one man, Abraham, to leave the centre of the Moon worship and be guided to lands and a future of Divine Selection, the subsequent story of his descendants is the record of Israel’s place among the nations of the world. Through them came the inspired records and revelation of the Divine purpose in the earth, and the moral laws for guidance of personal conduct. In the writings of Moses their leader, which are without parallel in the annals of nations, it is stated, “The Lord our God made a covenant with us. . . . The Lord spoke with you out of the midst of the fire, while I stood between the Lord and you at the time to declare to you the Word of the Lord”.2
Complete rejection of all forms of humanly designed cults and worship was enjoined, “Thou shalt have no other gods beside me”. And special caution was given to exclude the influence and practices associated with the then world-wide worship of -nature-gods”.
The subsequent history of the “called out” people—although they had declared, “All that the Lord has said we will do”—was one of conflict with and often subjection to that form of materialism which found expression at their time in the condemned practices of their neighbours. And for a time the Babylonian ascendancy was complete, with Israel a subject nation.
Many centuries have passed but with that issue always remaining: the Word of God through Israel or the dominance of man in an extension of the Babylon of ancient times to a later civilization.
Israel’s history is always with us, written in imperishable documents by inspired men, and engraved on the stones uncovered from the sites of their past cities. The nation remained alive, though in dispersion and bitter persecution, but subject to a rising again in this later age and a restoration in their ancient land; a living witness to the truth of their Scriptures. In them is the Divine Word given for all ages and the fuller manifestation of His Power recorded by those men who were “eyewitnesses of His Power”. They speak of the One who came to the people of Israel as Him in whom the “Light shined . . . and the Word became flesh and dwelt among us . . . and we beheld His glory as of the only Son from the Father, full of grace and truth” ;3 and, again, that “God has spoken unto us by a Son. . . . He reflects the Glory of God and bears the very stamp of His nature”4 (Compare the foregoing with the previously mentioned Mosaic declaration of theWord spoken). The Power of the Eternal God has now been shown in Christ, the Son, by raising Him up from the dead, “and has highly exalted Him, and bestowed on Him a name which is above every name, that at the name of Jesus every knee should bow in heaven and on earth”.5
The times have changed, but not the issue. There is still in our day the conflict between the Power and Word of the Living God in the Son, and the modern false god of Materialism, combined with a God-denying Communism and cult of the Evolution theory of man’s origin. The moon is still the objective on which their minds are set. But the objective of those who hear and obey the Word of the Son, rejecting the god of this age, is well expressed by the words of the apostle Paul: “to set your minds on things that are above, not on things that are on the earth”,6 and to “press on towards the upward call of God in Christ Jesus”,7 who can change our lowly body to be like His glorious body . . . by the power which enables Him even to subject all things to Himself, an attainment that is beyond the ability of all human scientific power and makes the objective of human purpose as barren and sterile in comparison as the moon they seek to conquer.
We can and should face the issue in our day with confidence, if we obey the call, like Abraham, to come out, be separate as children of God in a “crooked and perverse generation”, among whom you shine as lights (luminaries—Eph. Diag.) in the world, holding fast the word of life.
The point about being a “luminary” is to illuminate others in the same way as the Son reflects the Light of God, and as the moon, we might note, is ordained to reflect the light of the sun.
References:
1—”The Bible comes alive”.
2—Deut. 5. 2-5. R.S.V.
3—John 1. 14. R.S.V.
4-Heb. 1. 2-4. R.S.V.
5—Phil. 2. 9. R.S.V.
6—Col. 3. 2. R.S.V.
7—Phil. 3. 17. R.S.V.
Reflections on the Potter and the Clay