Our difficulty in imagining god as creator

In a bit of a change of pace I want to write a brief piece about the difficulty many people have in imagining god as creator

- I think most people have trouble imagining God as the (personal) creator of the earth. It's not that they doubt He has the power to create a world or a universe. (i.e. to start some kind of a process going, etc.) But most people seem to have great trouble imagining god as the creator of all the myriad of creatures we see around us. (Or even of a much more limited number of kinds.) I have this problem as well; not intellectually so much, but emotionally. A god who created a cat kind let's say, seems much too.... too what? too personal? too much like a human artist? too small? too concerned for detail? too much like an engineer? too much like your brother in law the architect? too much like a scientist?

- I think this 'problem' (or what other word shall we use?) stems from our much too deistic view of God. (And clearly many people want a deistic god.) I think people find a god who designed the ears of a cat a little too... too what? obsessive? too interested in things... too concerned with details? I think so. Obviously a god who decides if a cat gets a tail or not is going to be concerned with how a man lives his life. (etc.)

- I don't know if part of the problem is that we imagine it would have taken God a lot (really a lot) of time. I think the problem is more one of 'why would He do it?' e.g. why would he design some marvellous (incredible) underwater creature almost no one ever sees? Why bother? It seems maybe as if this is a 'too small' thing for god to be doing. But maybe we think this because we don't appreciate the greatness of the ten thousand creatures we see around us. As far as any one of us goes, there are far too many creatures to number in a lifetime; even a Patriarchal lifetime. (I suppose Adam was the last man to be able to number all the creatures.)

- is it because we aren't creative ourselves (speaking of most of us) that we can't understand God as Creator? I don't think children have any trouble imagining god creating a squirrel or a bird... or anything at all. (Ask a child, ''if you had been god which animal would you have made?'' or ''what animal would you like to have made?") I think they feel 'instinctively' that it would have been great fun... a deep source of joy. I think it was, and Genesis seems to indicate this when god is portrayed as saying of the creation, that it was very good. (see notes)

- No doubt part of our 'hesitancy' to accept the idea of a creator has to do with anxiety over what this means to man as a whole, and to ourselves as individuals. i.e. if god designed the glass lattice work of the Euplectella aspergillum one has to assume he designed man with as much care for detail, function and aesthetics. ("We are fearfully and wonderfully made,'' declared David.) I think we worry about the implications of this focused attention, and the manifold implications of it. Even in what claims to be the Christian church there is a running away from the importance of the doctrine of Creation. (And it might be okay as some musty, old doctrine... of the kind penned by Puritans... but not okay as a living reality.) If man was created by God then it makes sense to believe it is this Creator who knows man best; knows his purpose, his capacities and abilities, knows how best he should live. Maybe this idea (and its implications) is at the heart of our reluctance to take Creation seriously. (Not to mention the outright hostility of some people.)

- For the Deist God is the ultimate cause of the creation, but had little to do with it. (In some forms of deism God had no idea even of what the creation would end up looking like. I'm not sure what I can do to give an idea of this kind of abstract view; but let's compare it to dropping a cup of paint onto a canvas from a hundred feet in the air.... we'd have no idea what 'design' would occur.) In this view the myriad creation just sort of happened by accident. God created some basic laws, and maybe matter, and then 'mixed' the two (sorry for that inadequacy of that :=) and then stepped back to see what would happen. In this view god in no way designed a cat's whiskers or an elephant's trunk... these just 'evolved' in response to environmental pressures. Many people find this comforting in that it provides a god whose not concerned with details... and thus, presumably, not concerned with the details of man either. (He may not even have created man; and may have been very surprised to meet this strange fellow called Adam.) In this view man is not made in the image of god, and thus has no responsibility toward God. (The implications of deism are profound. e.g. if god did not create man then man really has no reason to praise or worship god.)

- At one point in the psalms David asks of God, ''what is man that thou art mindful of him?" I think the expresses some of the bafflement we have about God. When we look at all the bizarre (to us at least) creature of the world we wonder why God made them. (i.e. if he did, why did he?) We get a strong feeling that we just can't know; that if God is the Originator of all things we are living inside a mystery. (or; inside mystery) If this is our 'fate' then there are things we can never know. (Or at least not in this life time; but maybe that's what heaven is for... maybe heaven will give us a chance to learn things we can never know otherwise.) Many people (especially those of a more curious bent) find it intolerable that there may be things one can't know simply by human endeavor. Clearly this is an 'existential' reality; but it seems to be the principle of the thing that bothers folk. (As I write this I'm listening to 'And Sometimes God Hides' by Robert Fripp.)

- And so here we are. We claim (because we're Christians) to believe in creation... but truth be known, we find the whole idea rather disturbing. Rather than a source of comfort and joy we find it a source of anxiety. We see it as a source of conflict with non-Christians and secular folk. We fear that if we embrace a full orbed doctrine of creation, it will make demands of us. Yes we want to affirm a doctrine of creation; but we want to look at it from a good distance... like a beautiful painting or a photo of the earth as seen from the moon. Creation as aesthetics; yes... but creation as theology... well, no.

Notes;
1. Hebrew for towb (good)
a) pleasant, agreeable (to the senses)
b) pleasant (to the higher nature)
c) good, excellent (of its kind)
d) good, rich, valuable in estimation
- in some contexts it means beautiful, fair,
- the word can mean good in the sense of kindness. (I'm not sure if that is involved here; but the bible says many times that god cares for, and takes care of, his creatures. see Job)
2. As pure speculation (a rarity in blog world) I would note that the root of 'towb' can mean 'a pleasant smell.' Now that's about as 'earthy' as one can get. (Can we assume this was because there was no death yet? that all things were still fresh and new, that the process of decay had yet begun?
3. 'Pie Jesu' - by Robert Fripp
4. Mathew Henry on Genesis 1:31 ("And God saw everything that He had made, and indeed it was very good.")
"The work of creation was a very good work. All that God made was well-made, and there was no flaw nor defect in it. 1. It was good. Good, for it is all agreeable to the mind of the Creator, just as he would have it to be; when the transcript came to be compared with the great original, it was found to be exact, no errata in it, not one misplaced stroke. Good, for it answers the end of its creation, and is fit for the purpose for which it was designed. Good, for it is serviceable to man, whom God had appointed lord of the visible creation. Good, for it is all for God’s glory; there is that in the whole visible creation which is a demonstration of God’s being and perfections, and which tends to beget, in the soul of man, a religious regard to him and veneration of him.'' - Mathew Henry on Genesis 1:31