Aliens and a Global Flood

When you think about how small our place is in the universe, does that drive you to despair or to praise? We know that there are not only billions of stars in this galaxy, but there are billions of galaxies out there. But instead of being led to despair, David says, oh Lord, our Lord, how majestic is your name on all the earth. When I think of the vastness of the universe and how small I am, it leads me to do the most meaningful thing a human being could ever do, and that is give praise back to God. It's true that the universe is massive and our place in it seems small. As Stephen just pointed out, that should drive us to praise the Creator. But what it drives some people to do is look for other explanations. For example, people look for alien life in other parts of the universe.

Is that possible? Is there alien life? What does the Bible say? That's what Stephen explores today in this lesson he's calling Aliens and a Global Flood. Stephen Davy continues his series called In Living Color with this very interesting message. God's Spirit through David the psalmist told us to look up into the night sky, to take a good look at the stars and the planets and marvel at the glory of God. I hope you've been looking around lately.

I hope you've been looking up. The stars are intended to tutor us into understanding a little bit more of the greatness of God. Now some would argue, in fact, millions of people now believe that since the universe is so large, surely there must be aliens, extraterrestrial species out there.

I mean, there have got to be Vulcans out there somewhere. When I began this series, I didn't expect to really address this, but I thought I needed to. I've certainly wondered, and I've wondered what the Bible referred to in reference to this. Mankind is contagiously curious.

That's one of the things God created in us. In fact, he's created in us a desire not just to explore here, but to explore everything out there, and I think we're going to have eternity to do just that. The Kepler telescope was launched about a decade ago into outer space, and in fact, it was launched for that very reason. The monitor about 150,000 stars to try to find orbiting planets that mirrored Earth and would show or prove the existence of other races, other creatures. By the way, I found it interesting when I stumbled across this that Kepler was just put out of commission. It finally ran out of fuel, received its last orders from NASA, and after a decade of exploration, taking it some 93 million miles into space, it's now out of fuel and will just now spin out there for who knows how long. None of the planets they observed have the uniqueness of Earth for life support, but then again, Kepler barely scratched the surface. They didn't even get one light year out of here, and our universe or our galaxy is 100,000 light years across.

Are there ETs? Are there extraterrestrials out there somewhere? Happens to be one of the growing convictions of our generation who would answer yes. What does the Bible say of anything? What are the implications of the gospel, if anything, to this? And so I found myself just whittling some thoughts into print here, and let me share some of them with you. In fact, I never really ended up getting to the point where I wanted to get this morning, so this is all just sort of introduction.

But there are major programs like SETI. It's an acronym for the Search for Extraterrestrial Intelligence, which is at this very moment scanning the heavens with radio telescopes, massive radio telescopes, listening to receive some kind of signal from some kind of intelligent race. Let me say for starters that even though we as Christians can ask the question, and that's fine, the conviction is really coming out of a worldview of evolution. In other words, if you disregard the Genesis account of origins and that planet Earth is just an accident created by a big bang, and it just happened along with trillions of other planets to be created along with the rest of the universe by accident, that planet Earth just accidentally happened to have viability for Earth, that it just so happened accidentally to have a little puddle of goop that we talked about in a past session, and that puddle somehow was able to accidentally initiate the development of atoms in the complex single cells into complex sentient creatures. And then if that was an accident, then that accident could occur out there somewhere else and there could be some other planet who has that same puddle of goop. In fact, maybe that puddle of goop started a lot longer in time before ours, earlier in time before ours, and they've really developed.

In fact, by now they're probably running around in these cool spaceships and we're still driving around in pickup trucks. All of that is possible if you disregard the record of scripture. We're told in the Genesis account that God created the heavens. He just speaks, even though we're talking about trillions of stars and planets, he just calls it the universe. In the beginning, God created the heavens, the universe, and the earth. Well, the earth is part of the universe. He didn't need to say that.

That's redundancy. No, he's distinguishing earth from the universe. In fact, Isaiah makes it clear in chapter 45 and verse 18, for thus says the Lord who created the universe.

And then he does the same thing that Moses did in Genesis 1. He is the God who formed the earth and made it. He established it and did not create it, a waste place. The antecedent to that is the universe. The universe is a waste place, but earth is not, notice, but formed it to be inhabited. In other words, the God who created the universe, billions of stars and planets and galaxies, they were created in distinction to this unique planet.

They were created as waste places for reasons we have yet to fully understand. They are uninhabitable, but Isaiah specifies earth is not. Earth was designed to be inhabited, Isaiah 45, 18. Now, if you go beyond a clear text of scripture or two and you begin to think theologically and you take the theological ramifications of some race of people or some alien creature on some planet somewhere, well, the Bible tells us that the fall of Adam cursed not just Adam, not just Eve, not just the human race, not just planet earth, but what? All of creation. In fact, Paul writes to the Roman believers that all of creation is longing, as it were, for redemption.

They're all longing for it. And how does redemption take place? God took on human flesh and came in order to die to bring up a redeemed race of human beings who have repented of their sin and believed the Gospel. Of all of the planets in the universe, he didn't have to go, I wonder which one I'll send God the Son to, you know, and where he'll die. We know the Bible tells us he died once for all, so he's not going to die on that planet and that planet and that planet and this planet and that one.

He died once for all. And it happens to be coming to planet earth to visit here, take on the nature of the human race and redeem forever those who will trust in him. Now there's a growing fascination in the reality of other worlds. Not only are there Gospel issues and redemption issues and theological issues and the clear meaning of scripture as it relates to the origin of life and the unique creation of planet earth for habitation. Let me make a couple of practical observations relative to ETs. Let me just kind of spell it out.

You might not like it, but I want to just tell you. First, the possibility of life on other planets is a thinly veiled hope that mankind can avoid a creator God. If the Bible doesn't know anything about other races or alien creatures living on other planets and it doesn't, the Bible says that earth was created to be inhabited. But if Klingons are out there after all, then the Bible can be immediately and summarily rejected as prejudice to the human race and it really doesn't know what's going on anyway, so you can put it in the attic where it can collect dust with all the other old stuff you don't need anymore.

If Spock really has a home planet out there and that isn't science fiction, then the biblical statements about God's creation of planet earth for inhabited life are proven false, which means, and here's the hope, here's the thinly veiled hope of an unbelieving world. Whatever the Bible says about the future is probably wrong because they got the beginning wrong. Whatever the Bible says about judgment before a creator God is probably wrong because all of these other things are wrong. If God isn't the only thing out there, so to speak, but there are a lot of other things out there too, then you know what, we don't have to worry about him anymore.

And you certainly don't have to worry about a verse like Hebrews 9.27, it is appointed unto man to die, wants to die, and after that the judgment. The possibility of life on other planets is a thinly veiled hope that mankind can avoid that kind of reckoning with a creator God. Secondly, mankind's pursuit for alien life has become a replacement for pursuing God. You ever thought about the fact that the search for aliens as you read about it in scientific journals, as you talk to your friends and co-workers, is really replacing a number of hopeful things that you know belong to God?

Let me give you some illustrations. First of all, the average person feels a sense of cosmic loneliness, right? Without God there would be. You look at how little we are and you look at the galaxy and then you look at the universe and you're lonely. One scientist famously asked, where is everybody?

I love the way he put it, you know, where is everybody? Why can't we find somebody else out there in such a big universe? Well, the Bible informs us that we're not alone, that God is in fact creators for fellowship, is one day, because we've been redeemed by faith in his son, going to robe us and allow us to co-reign with him and that universe is going to become your playground. Secondly, aliens are pursued for what they might teach us about the mysteries of the universe. Why are we here? Where did we come from?

I'm not asking those questions by the way, because we've been told, we've been told that God is our creator, the originator of life as it is, God is the one who revealed our questions of purpose and identity as we passionately pursue him through his word. Third, then again, aliens might have advanced medical knowledge and know the secrets to life and death. In other words, maybe they've figured out how not to get sick. Maybe they've come up with cures for sickness. Maybe they've figured out how to live longer. Here's a good one, maybe they've figured out how to live forever.

Maybe they've figured it out. Again, the Bible tells us that one day God will heal all our diseases. We shall live forever in a newly glorified, eternal, perfected body that will never give out or wear out. Now the average person in our generation, if given a choice and you ask them out on the street, would rather find their solutions and their promises of hope and meaning in aliens than God. Richard Dawkins, a leading evolutionist, was on a forum some time ago where the evidence of a designed universe, not a creator, but just the fact that there's design in the universe. All of it was presented and the debate ensued. At the end, he conceded that the obvious design of the universe demands a designer.

He conceded, I'll give you that, and then he famously, tragically, but famously suggested what is a growing conviction in our generation. He suggested it would be the work of aliens. That actually came from his mouth, which means alienologism, if I could coin a term, and I just did, you heard it here first. Alienologism is in essence one of the fastest growing religions on planet earth. Let me tell you, aliens, Darwinism, theistic evolutionism can coexist peacefully. Even the theistic evolutionism, which troubles me more than the other two because this is supposedly from Christians who want to somehow synergize scripture with evolution, they completely in the process obliterate the clear meaning of the words of the text of scripture.

I mean, you can't have it both ways. But still, there are really excellent questions that come out of a study like this. If the earth is as young as biblical genealogies given to us in scripture and texts of scripture point to, which would put creation at about 6,000 years ago, then why does the earth look millions upon millions of years old? I mean, just look at the Grand Canyon. It would take millions of years, according to the scientific geological community, for the Colorado River to carve that thing out, tens of millions of years.

In fact, now they're, I've read recent reports that they're thinking that it's going to take longer than they really expected the earth to be around, at least in that form. So they're really not sure. Well that kind of conclusion is based on what we call uniformitarianism, which is another religion. Evolution and uniformitarianism are distinct in some ways.

We're not going to take the time to talk about it. But they are cousins. They have the same worldview. They agree together that whatever you see happening in natural processes today, we're doing the same thing when time began. Uniformitarianism, here's what it means. It means whatever's happening has always happened that way.

And that's normally true unless something else that doesn't normally happen happened. Let me give you a simple illustration. Our buildings around here are designed, our children's center and student center most recently built were designed with building styles that attempt to replicate the Williamsburg, the Jeffersonian colonial style architecture, hence the name colonial, by the way, which is not a very good name for international ministry, but there you have it.

I've done a lot of apologizing in India and Africa when I've spoken there. I don't represent, you know, Great Britain. Our student center and children's centers were the last buildings we built. If you get close enough to the buildings to look at them and study them, well just from a distance they look old. They look older. They look that heritage feel that Williamsburg feel. They look older than they are.

And there's a reason for that. The brick is all uniquely different from each other. Corners are nicked and scarred, the face of them scarred, and the mortar in between the brick is zigzaggy, which again gives the impression of erosion, gives the impression of rain years, decades, 150 years at least of rain and freezing and hot sun and cold weather defacing it all.

Kind of gives it that Williamsburg appearance. However, you can get the same look by putting those bricks in a big tumbler and turning the crank. And those bricks bang against each other and jostle one another and so you get a 150 year old look in about 15 minutes.

They all look different. And then that brick mason wears a little ring and when he's finished putting the mortar on, he'll run his hand down that mortar and it makes that squiggly little line. We call that grapevine mortar.

You've got to pay a little extra for all this stuff just so you know. And that also mirrors or replicates the look of age. So you get that old brick look that looks like it's been around for a long time facing all of the effects of erosion, but that student center was built about nine years ago. The Bible describes something that happened that doesn't normally happen that changed the face of the earth, that changed the topography, that created mountain ranges, that created ocean basins, that created massive canyons. Moses records in Genesis 7 what that happened to be. The water of the flood, we call it, Noah's flood, came upon the earth. The fountains of the great deep burst open. The floodgates of the sky were opened. The rain fell upon the earth for 40 days and 40 nights. Imagine around here what happens if it rains without stopping for about four days.

Imagine 40. And the flood was upon the earth for 40 days, that is it rained for 40 days, and the water increased and lifted up the ark so that it rose above the earth. The water prevailed and creased greatly upon the earth and the ark floated on the surface of the water. The water prevailed more and more upon the earth so that all the high mountains everywhere under the heavens were covered.

The water prevailed 15 cubits higher, that is from the tops of mountains, a cubit's 18 inches times 15 gives you about 22 feet, 22 feet above the tallest mountain. All flesh that moved on the earth perished. Birds and cattle and beasts and every swarming thing that swarms upon the earth and all mankind of all that was on the dry land, thus God blotted out every living thing that was upon the face of the land. The global flood isn't necessarily my main objective here, but let me point out, because there are plenty of individuals in the church as well that struggle with this idea of a universal flood. It just dismissed the idea.

In fact, one evangelical pastor I was reading just this past week just dismissed the whole thing, said it's regional. In fact, if you look back at the text, he tells us that all mankind and all mankind of all that was on the dry land, thus God blotted out every living thing. All flesh that moved on the earth perished. All, all, all. Let me give you the literal meaning of the Hebrew word here translated all.

It literally means all. Secondly, if the flood was local, animals could have migrated. They could have migrated to another region. In fact, why have Noah spent 120 years building an ark if it's only going to be in Wake County?

People could have migrated too. Even third, four months after the rain stopped, the dove couldn't find dry land. This is after four months. It doesn't take 120 days for local flood waters to drain away into nearby rivers and lakes, but for this dove, he couldn't find any dry land after four months. Again, it was more than an entire year. If you read the account, Noah's not in the ark for 40 days or 40 nights.

He's in it for over a year, and it takes more than a year before there's enough land exposed to permit Noah's family to leave the ark. Now, all these features, again, indicate something far greater in scope than a flood in Lumberton, North Carolina. But here's where it gets serious. This is where it troubles me.

In such a cavalier manner, I say, yeah, it was regional. If the flood didn't affect the entire human race, then Jesus Christ got it wrong. Now, it's one thing for me to preach and make a mistake, and I've done that, I'm sure. In fact, I know I have. Some of you have told me, and I appreciate that because I have three services.

I have three chances to get it right. It's one thing for me to make an error. It's another thing for Jesus to be preaching and for him to get it wrong. Jesus is talking about the coming kingdom, and he says, the coming of the Son of Man will be just like the days of Noah.

The flood came and took them all away. When he comes again, is he just going to affect Lumberton? When he comes again, it affects all of humanity.

It affects the entire globe. And he says, you know, it is just like that flood that affected all of humanity. My coming will affect all of humanity as well. Well, if Jesus got it wrong, it's a little surprise that Peter got it wrong too. He warned of a coming universal judgment likened to the universal flood. He writes in 2 Peter, the world at that time was destroyed, being flooded with water, but by his word, the present heavens and earth are being reserved for fire.

You had an earlier judgment by water that affected everybody. You got another coming judgment. It hasn't happened yet, but it's going to be a judgment by means of fire. It's not going to be a regional firestorm. Peter goes on to tell us in this chapter, if you want to get around here sometime, that the universe will be burned up in a roar, he says.

This roar is gone. Earth will be burned up. The final judgment occurs and then God recreates the universe and a new earth.

It's going to affect everybody. Number six, if the flood wasn't global, not only did Jesus get it wrong, Peter get it wrong, God the Father lied. You comfortable with that thought? God the Father lied and he's still lying.

Why? Because God promised the flood would never happen again. He gave a sign. The sign was the covenant sign of the what? The rainbow. If the flood of Noah was a regional flood or a local flood and God said that will never happen again, then God ought to apologize to the people of North Carolina and Argentina and Iraq and Japan and Florida and Turkey and Indonesia where this year there were regional floods that ended up costing billions of dollars taking the lives of hundreds of people.

What meaning is there in a rainbow? There was a universal flood that tumbled the earth. Just as the flood came long ago and safety was found in only one place, the ark.

Only one place. And for 120 years mankind was invited to join Noah. So also in the coming judgment there will be safety in only one person, Jesus Christ who today through me is inviting you to believe the Gospel and be saved forever. My friend that really is the only wise response.

God will keep his word. Thanks for listening today. Stephen's lesson here on Wisdom for the Heart is called Aliens and the Global Flood. You can replay it or share it with a friend from our website which is wisdomonline.org. You can also listen again on the Wisdom International app which you'll find in the iTunes and the Google Play stores. We also have a book version of this series also called In Living Color. Learn more at wisdomonline.org. Do that today then join us next time for more wisdom for the heart.