17:23 Therefore, the
One whom you worship without knowing, Him I proclaim to you: 24 “God, who made
the world and everything in it, since He is Lord of heaven and earth, does not
dwell in temples made with hands. 25 Nor is He worshiped with men’s hands, as though
He needed anything, since He gives to all life, breath, and all things. 26 And
He has made from one blood every nation of men to dwell on all the face of the
earth, and has determined their pre-appointed times and the boundaries of their
dwellings, 27 so that they should seek the Lord, in the hope that they might
grope for Him and find Him, though He is not far from each one of us; 28 for in
Him we live and move and have our being, as also some of your own poets have
said, ‘For we are also His offspring.’
There are realities we don't often think about. Part of the
problem is too many of us live on concrete and are almost completely
disconnected from nature in a hands on sense. Some may call it a coincidence
that the growing acceptance of evolution and the shift from rural living to
city living happened at the same time. I don't believe it is a coincidence at
all. Those who live in and work with nature can see how complex and amazing it
is. To think a random series of accidents produced everything we see in nature
including our own bodies is preposterous. It defies logic, and science. However
if you repeat something to people for long enough it becomes "true"
even if it takes generations.
Paul is speaking to men who have inherited a worldview that
includes a multiplicity of gods, each one responsible for something different.
Today we find those beliefs archaic and even barbaric. The day will come when
the theory we came from nothing and developed by a series of unguided accidents
will be just as archaic.
Into this worldview comes Paul proclaiming one God
responsible for all life and all things.
Earlier this week I was digging potatoes. My dad had planted
them in rows by colour: three rows of red potatoes and five rows of white
potatoes. I had dug all the red rows last week and two of the white ones. So
this week I was digging a white row. I pulled up a plant and guess what was
underneath? A cluster of white potatoes and two red ones. Red potatoes from a
white plant? Yes. Because nature is not how we make it out to be. God created
from one blood all the nations of the earth. The notion that there are separate
races of human beings based on colour is a myth, a human fabrication.
Consider this family:
http://nypost.com/2010/07/21/blond-bombshell/
Or these identical twins:
(http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/newstopics/howaboutthat/12172157/Britains-first-black-and-white-twins-born-from-same-egg.html)
Race is a man-made phenomenon. We divided ourselves but our
ancestry is the same. One God created one people.
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