Dead in the Water

There are a lot of metaphors, sayings, and what-nots for how hard life is. Life is an uphill battle. It's not all just a bed of roses. Life is like wrestling a gorilla; you don't stop when you're tired; you stop when the gorilla is tired. (That one is actually on my parents' fridge for some reason) The same applies to a person's spiritual walk with God. I've heard that walking with God (for those not hip to "Christianese", that can be roughly translated as "being a Christian") is like walking against the direction of a moving sidewalk (like the ones at the airport). It's a challenge to go forward, but if you stand still, you don't stay in one place - you lose ground. The same with a relationship with God. If you don't continue to move forward and continue to seek, the natural tendency is not to plateau and stay the same, but to drift and move further away. That's why when the Bible talks about seeking and pursuing God, the verb tense in the original manuscripts usually imply a continued action, not a one time thing. It's not like trying to find your keys. You lose them once and when you've found them you're done (well, until you lose them again anyway). It's a continual process, and since God is an infinite God, there will always be more to find.

I like the idea of a river better. To me it's more like swimming upstream. Moving sidewalks don't change. A moving sidewalk will be level and move at a constant rate until you reach the end. Not so with a river. You might run into a cataract or rapids. The speed at which the current is pushing you back might even change - for better or worse. The direction of the current to the right or left may also change as the river winds it's way through the land. And really, you don't know what will happen until you get there. But the result is the same. If you stop moving, you lose a lot of ground. Give up and you're back where you started. Eventually every river flows out into an ocean or lake, so if you stop moving for long enough, you'll end up in a sea of everyone else who stopped moving forward.

I guess that's what is so impressive about salmon. If you didn't know, salmon swim upstream to get to their mating grounds. Very few make it to the end of the trip - they usually get eaten along the way. If most people were salmon I think we'd go extinct real fast. Like two generations tops. For most people - myself included - the moment we realize something is hard, we want to give up. Back to the ocean or lake for us. But these salmon (forgive me for being anthropomorphic) want something so bad, not even death can stop them. If only we had a few more salmon-like Christians in the world. Or, y'know, Christ-like ones. Because that's exactly what Jesus did.

Truth is, our whole lives are a fight against the current. You can't avoid it. It goes down to our very chemical makeup. In the world, chemically and molecularly speaking, things tend toward equilibrium. Whether it's a chemical reaction or a solution of two chemicals, they will naturally and spontaneously try to adopt a conformation and arrangement that is at the lowest energy. Sounds nice, right? Know what you call a living thing whose body is at equilibrium with the world around it? Dead. (Trick question, sorry) Down to our very chemical makeup we don't get the luxury of following the proverbial energy gradient to equilibrium. The most basic definition of life involves a fight, a struggle, an upward movement of energy.

I'm writing this not because I've somehow mastered this system and found the cruise ship up the river with no worries. I'm writing this because I've reached an impossible-looking set of white water rapids in my place in the river of life right now and I have two options: struggle past them or allow myself to float back downstream. Problem is, I already know what's downstream. Upstream, I've heard through the grapevine, there are more rapids, a strong current and surprises I could never imagine. But there is also something wonderful, many wonderful things, and I'm just crazy enough to want to get there. Salmon-crazy.

The good news is I'm not a salmon. I have a Savior who will be there every step of the way. A God who loves me and lifts me up on wings like eagles. Sometimes, I wish God was the magic cruise ship for getting up the river, but it's not the case. Jesus said, "In this world you will have tribulation [trials, trouble, sorrow], but take heart for I have overcome the world." (John 16:33) Jesus already swam up His river. Now, He sits at the right hand of the Father, interceding for me, so I can make it up my own river (Romans 8:34).

The Theo-Bio Perspective

I suck at naming things. Seriously, I do. I have a snake. It's name is Coon. Why? It's face markings kind of look like a Racoon. Case in point? I think so. When you're someone who just fails at naming things, you come up with blog titles like "The Theo-Bio Perspective." True story. Anyway, I thought I'd start this blog by explaining the title and explaining what I plan to do with this blog.

The Theo-Bio Perspective. Theo means God, or is the derivative for "God" or whatever the proper linguistic terminology is. Like theology, the study of God/religion, or theocracy, a government centered around God/a central religious dogma. Theo=God. Bio means life. Biology, the study of life, which just happens to be my current area of study in my academic endeavors. Bio=life. Throwing out all rules of prefixes, suffixes, root words, and proper English, you combine the two (with a little hyphen for aesthetic purposes) and you get Theo-Bio.

Now, I originally pulled this from off the top of my head because it combines my two favorite things in this world. God and biology. Two things that seem so politically incorrect to have next to each all in one little word-like things. But, come on, it sounds really stupid, right? Theo-bio is very obviously not a word; your average third grader could tell you that. It doesn't even remotely sound like one. Then I thought of the real meaning behind those words. Theo=God. Bio=life. God-life. It was then that I realized I had to keep it (and it wasn't like a girl who names her pet snake Coon could come up with anything better, so it really didn't hurt to keep it anyway).

That brings me to the purpose of this blog. I love God. I like science. (I would say I love science, because in the realm of flippant English semantics I do, but to put it on the same level as God in juxtaposing sentences wouldn't seem quite right. Like how right now I'm seated on my bed not moving anything but my fingers, so it would be technically correct to say I'm not moving. But relative to the rest of the universe I'm actually moving quite fast by my own standards and it would be silly to say I'm "not moving.") I'm also extremely long winded, but that's beside the point. The point is that both God and science have a bad reputation. Walking around my secular school (as opposed to a private Christian university) with the science community, I'm a religious nut. Not that I've actually ever been called that, but you only need to be told by a professor once that your should throw away you Bible to get the gist of his/her feelings on the subject. And that sentiment goes pretty straight across the board if you want to be taken seriously as a secular scientist. So, in the scientific community I'm not a "real scientist."

On the other hand, there is a tendency in the religious community to look down on those who study the sciences. Ironically, both sides think the same about the other: they're nuts/crazy/ignorant/misguided/silly/pick-your-condescending-adjective-of-choice. Both have reasons for disliking the other. Yes, there are religious people who take things too far and throw to the wind all basic concepts of reason. Yes, there are scientists who are too consumed in what is material and too set in their ways to even consider the possibility of God and the supernatural. But I like to think there is a healthy balance.

God has given us great minds to explore this world and come to an understanding of it that can't be found in the Bible. At the same time, to study the creation and forget the Creator (or worse deny the fact that there is One) is limiting how much you can truly understand about the world, which is a lot like shooting oneself in the foot. So, I like the balance. Science is a great tool, a valuable tool. But there is only so much science can and should say about the world. I often assert that by studying biology, I'm really studying God (or at least an aspect of Him). God is often defined by His characteristics. Jehovah-Rapha "God is Healer," Jehovah-Shalom "God is Peace," El-Saddai "God Almighty," The Author of Salvation, The Lord of lords, etc etc etc. One name of God in particular, "Creator of all things" or "Author of Life" is the particular characteristic of God that I study.

I believe that by studying God as a Creator I can understand more about God overall. Romans 1:20 says

For since the creation of the world God’s invisible qualities—his eternal power and divine nature—have been clearly seen, being understood from what has been made, so that people are without excuse. (NIV; emphasis mine)

So really, I see science as a study of God, when used properly as a tool. Science can be misused, as can any tool. The Bible is also a tool (a more reliable one, for sure, since it relies on the wisdom of God not the wisdom of man), and it too is misused. The Scriptures that were designed to set people free have been used to hold them in captivity. Rulers have used the Bible (as have others with other religious texts) to frighten people into submission. Those who were meant to be holy men and women of God have deceived people with false doctrine and continue to do so even today. Still, you don't throw out the tool, because some people use it the wrong way - read the warning labels on things like hairdryers or microwaves some time to get the full effect of my point.

Anyway, this blog will not be used to prove Christianity is right. I plan to write under the assumption that it is. If you disagree with my assumption, I encourage you to keep reading but look into my claims. I'm not an expert in any sort of field; I don't claim to know all the answers. I don't even claim that everything in this blog will be truth. However, I do promise that I will never write anything in an attempt to deceive anyone or write anything I know is false. Honestly, the reason this blog exists is because sometimes I get ideas. Most people I know don't care, would rather debate me than listen, or wouldn't understand (not everyone in this world is a biology major, sadly). I really just want to write some of these things down sometimes and I find it bad form to post all my feelings on Facebook (I graduated middle school quite some time ago). So to the five people in this world that may come across this at some point in their life and find it interesting, this is for you. (Oh, and I don't proof-read my posts, sorry, I'm not majoring in English)