Signs and Wonder

I am reminded when I look up at the sky during the day and the moon and stars at night that God placed them there to be for marking times: days, nights, and months. He also placed them there to be for seasons and signs (Genesis 1:14)

One of the “signs” is that they are a sign of God’s creative genius that cannot be overturned by speculations about a non-created origin of the universe. The example that comes to mind is the fact that we can see comets as they approach the sun.

Why do I mention that as evidence of recent design?

I’m glad you asked.

Every time a comet passes near the sun and becomes visible from Earth it is because it is venting some of its water and frozen gasses into its tail (which is always pushed away from the sun by solar wind). This means that they lose some of their material every time they approach the sun. Scientists who have measured the loss have noted that up to 3% of their material that can evaporate may be lost on each pass.

For short-period comets (with an orbit of less than 200 years) that has to make one wonder about the age of the solar system. If the solar system is billions of years old it makes no sense for us to be able to still see these comets. All of the material that can evaporate to form the tail would have dissipated within less than 10,000 years.

A while back scientists who believe in an old universe came up with a clever theory to cover this inconvenient observation: the Oort Cloud theory.

This is the idea that comets and asteroids can come from a region of space beyond the orbit of Pluto. This region encompasses the entire solar system with debris left over from the process of stellar and planetary formation. Pieces of rock and ice are occasionally somehow knocked out of their regular orbit by other passing objects and are captured as comets or short-period asteroids by the sun when their inward trajectory is modified by a close pass by a planetary body.

Unfortunately the Oort Cloud is too far away and our telescopes (which can apparently see galaxies on the other side of the universe) do not have the resolution to see relatively small bodies at that long range.

Translation: We can’t see it or measure it or perform experiments on it, but we know it is out there.

Why do we know? Because there are short-period comets that still emit gasses and we already know the universe is too old, Therefore they must be relatively newly captured. Therefore they came from a region that we cannot see clearly yet, but is close enough to send new comets.

In other words, the only reason to believe in an Oort cloud is to maintain belief in a billions-of-years-old solar system.

And the only reason to believe in an old solar system is to give the theory of evolution some small shred of credibility, because a millennia-old universe would give it no chance at all.

My conclusion: The Oort Cloud story is an entertaining tale, but it still takes faith to believe in something for which there is no actual physical evidence.

Oh, wait! That’s supposed to be the case for those foolish enough to believe in the Creator God of the Bible. We are the ones who supposedly believe in something we cannot prove.

I see the signs and can’t help but wonder why anybody believes in a universe that is uncreated and exists by mere chance.