Evolution vs. Simplicity - Bill Rollins 12.7.2015
Holy Father, I hereby admit and claim that we, the “crown” of your creation, (also known as “the human race”) do not know how to run the administration of this planet you have placed us on. This is a confession of our foolishness and lack of wisdom. This is a confession of our pride and arrogance in thinking we were capable of building a society - let alone even getting along with each other.
Our forefather and foremother took upon themselves (contrary to Your advice) the determination to decide what was good and what was evil. We, as a race of people, have followed in their footsteps. We, as a people, have failed miserably again and again. We as a people continue to err, for we have no wisdom.
You, in Your wisdom, saw fit to bless this human race with a book, a manual, on how to run all things - even after we rejected Your tree of life. Alas, we have rejected the book and shunned Your advice. We are to blame.
As I look around this planet, I see violence and destruction everywhere. Evil is running rampant. I know that for about 6000 years this scenario has continued unabated. But today is the only day I have before me and so today I appeal to You, the great and awesome God, who “by Your great power and outstretched arm, have created the heavens and the earth” (Jer. 32:17). May You install the one true King upon this land; the One who will straighten out all things according to Your will; the only Son of God and Son of Man, Yeshuah the Messiah. He is the One, the only One, who is worthy to take the scroll from Your right hand and to open the seals.
May Your kingdom come!
So much of mankind is convinced of evolution, and yet the reality is that God created all things. If we look at the things around us in “nature,” we see the bird building a nest in the same way it did three thousand years ago (Psm. 84:3). She has not progressed or evolved in the way things are done. The lion still raises her cubs in a den.
But man has “progressed” in the things he does, from walking, to riding a camel, to building a cart ... to a jet airplane; from a simple hut to a palace; from word of mouth to the internet; and somehow this progression of man from simple to complex aids our erroneous concept of evolution.
Once we come to understand that nothing comes by evolution but that all things come from the Creator, maybe we can come to see that our “progress” from simple to complex, from bow and arrow to nuclear bomb, is not really all that good. Perhaps there is a joy in simplicity that we have overlooked as we run as fast as we can through this life.
In Micah, Chapter 4:1, we catch a glimpse of what life will be like under the rule of our true King, Messiah Yeshuah, for “the mountain of the Eternalʼs temple will be established as chief among the mountains - it will be raised above the hills and people will stream to it.”
So ... what will happen in that day? Verse two continues, “Many nations will say, ʻlet us go up to the mountain of the Eternal, to the house of the God of Jacob. For He will teach us His ways so we can walk in His paths.ʼ” People will be learning about the ways that God originally intended for mankind to walk. They will allow Him to settle disputes because He is all wise and all righteous; putting war behind them and realizing that good but simple agricultural practices are what He desires. And then in verse 4 of Micah 4 we read, “Every man will sit under his own vine and under his own fig tree.” We will then go from “agribusiness”, hog confinements and 10,000-head cattle feed lots, to the simplicity of every man having his own means to produce his own food and doing so without fear and in safety.
There is simplicity in the word of God, but man has tried to hide it with many devices. In Ecclesiastes 7:29 we are told what Solomon has found - “This only have I found, that God has given man a straight path to walk in but men have gone in search of many schemes.”
God put mankind on a straight path; He gave him a fully fruitful garden, “and God, the Eternal, planted a garden in the east, in Eden and there He put the man He had formed. . . And He made all kinds of trees . . . pleasing to the eye and good for food . . . a river watered the garden” (Gen. 2:8-10). And so He told man he was free to eat from any tree but one. The rest of the story is very well-known.
God placed His chosen people - His nation - on a “straight path.” He gave them a land flowing with milk and honey: “For the Eternal your God is bringing you into a good land, a land with streams and pools of water, with springs flowing in the valleys and hills; a land with wheat and barley, vines and fig trees, pomegranates, olive oil and honey. A land where bread will not be scarce and you will lack nothing; a land where rocks are iron and you can dig copper out of the hills (Deut. 8:7-9). Then God said, “Be careful that you do not forget the Eternal your God, failing to observe His commands, His laws and His decrees” (Deut. 8:11). The rest of this story is also well-known!
It is amazing how merciful and patient God is with us. He wants us to enjoy the simplicity He has ordained. He wants us to rejoice in that straight path He creates for us. He says in Isaiah 30:15, “In repentance and rest is your salvation, in quietness and trust is your strength.” What peace these words convey! The very next words are, “But you would have none of it.” He doesn’t ever force us to enjoy the rest we will find in being obedient to His ways or the rest we find in His Son, our Savior. He will, in His patience, allow us to grind ourselves into the muck and mire of total confusion and still He tells us He will pull us up out of our own ruin. (He does not say it will be easy!)
This, of course, will be Godʼs doing in the millennial reign of the Messiah. And it shall bring mankind full circle into the simplicity of life that gives contentment. In one sense, man will be forced to find this contentment in a simple life. Just as the Israelites were “forced” to take a day of rest every week.
Today, we rush onward to develop newer ways to find comfort, rest, peace, ease - all the things that God would freely give us if we would seek His face with our whole heart.
I believe it was the poet e. e. cummings that wrote, “progress is a comfortable disease.”
In a way, I guess I can be accused of preaching to the choir. Do we not all understand the reality of what God has for us? But sometimes we do not look as though we do. Maybe it is time to humbly bow before our Father in Heaven and renew our efforts to “sigh and cry over all the detestable things done in the land”.
The book of Jeremiah does not have very many uplifting passages, but this is one of a few I have found.
In that day, declares the Eternal of Hosts,
“I will break the yoke off their necks and will tear off their bonds;
no longer will foreigners enslave them.
Instead they will serve the Eternal their God
and David their king, whom I will raise up from them.
There is much to say about this chapter 30 in Jeremiah, but let it just suffice for now to say that I long for that day.
May Thy kingdom come.