What is the perfect? Let’s plunge into the Deeper Waters and find out.
“We believe God created this world to be perfect for us to live in.”
My evangelism partner said something similar to this as we went door-to-door. I told him I wouldn’t say that. I gave a brief answer why, but why not spell things out more in detail here?
What I am going to say also has really nothing to do with the age of the Earth. I think someone who holds to a young-Earth if they so choose could hold this. I am not interested in a deep debate about the science behind the matters. I am going by simple observational clues. Those who want to debate deeper science can do that, but I realize I am definitely not knowledgable enough in the area to do that.
I was asked after saying that that if this world wasn’t perfect, what was it? That was a simple question to answer. I said what the Bible says. Good. This world was made good.
Could this world even be perfect? What would that entail? After all, the world is going to be changing constantly. Will it be moving from perfect to imperfect? Certainly not. Imperfect to perfect? Then it wasn’t made perfect. Degrees of perfection? In a certain sense, that is understandable, but that still means we don’t have perfect as most of us understand it.
So let’s move on to other points. For one thing, many animals were created with attributes that make no sense in a perfect world. For instance, the digestive system of creatures that eat meat and their teeth are very different from those that eat grass products.
Also, consider other creatures. My favorite example is the porcupine. Did it ever not have quills? Could the chameleon always change its color to hide? Did poisonous creatures suddenly get the ability to pass on poison to targets? What about mayflies? They live an extremely short time. What would happen if they never died?
But what about Romans 5:12? Through sin, death came into the world!
I don’t see any reason to think that this means all physical death. I take it to mean spiritual death, the death due to sin. Consider two points in addition.
First off, why is there a tree of life in the garden if there is no need for man to sustain life? My theory is that man is created potentially immortal, but that would have been by continuing sustenance from the tree of life. God alone is said to be inherently immortal.
Second, God tells Adam and Eve that if they eat of the fruit of the tree of knowledge of good and evil, they will die. Imagine if He said, “You will florble if you eat the fruit.” My writing here has the word florble underlined red. It doesn’t recognize it. There’s a reason for that. I made it up.
For the threat to have any meaning, the word would have to be understood by Adam and Eve. They had to know what awaited them if they disobeyed. Somehow, they did.
Also, if you do believe God knows the future, then you would have to have it be that this world went from perfect to imperfect, and if it could do that, well, it wasn’t perfect to begin with. However, you also have to know when God made the world, He knew mankind would fall. He knew this world would have evil throughout it soon.
Okay. Well what about Heaven? Will that be perfect? No. It will not.
It will be good and it will have no evil, but imagine this. Could we not add one more person and it would be a better experience? One more angel? Anything like that?
In Heaven, there will be no suffering and no evil, but there will always be ways things could be better because we are all less than perfect by nature. God alone is perfect. Everything else is good and lacking nothing that is fitting for them, but they are not perfect.
The perfect world doesn’t exist.
The perfect God does.
In Christ,
Nick Peters
(And I affirm the virgin birth)
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