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We Don't Create, We RE-Create

Wayne Hilsden

4th May 2015

Our reasoning goes like this: If God is the Creator who made us to be like Him, then we too have the ability, and Divine permission to create. I actually prefer to say, "RE-create." 

I say RE-create, because whatever we human beings create is with materials that already exist, raw materials that the Eternal Creator of the Universe alone brought into existence before we ever came to be. HE, unlike US created ex-nihilo (out of nothing). WE, on the other hand, can only recreate from materials which already exist. Nothing is new under the sun. The only thing that is new is that we are able to take existing elements and combine them or reconfigure them in unique ways and come up with novel shapes and forms. 

A plexiglass pulpit is created from man-made material. Yet the material was not made out of nothing. It is made from a compound of natural substances that have existed since the creation of the world.

Man has created complex and powerful computers. There was a time when computers didn't exist, believe it or not. But there's not a single component in these computers that didn't come from somewhere in the natural God-created universe. And by the way, as proud as man is over this invention, computers still crash. 

I remember when Ann and I were sitting down with our third son Jonathan for breakfast when he was about 4 years old. We asked Jonathan to thank God for our food. And here's how he prayed: "Well actually God, we buy our food."

While God has given us the ability and even the permission to create new things, we must never forget that the original materials have God's exclusive patent and copyright stamped upon them. 

And just to keep everything in perspective and to keep us humble, let's admit that whatever we "create" is merely a reflection or emulation of what God has already created. We think we have done something awesome by building vehicles that fly, but birds and bees have been already been flying the skies for quite a long time. We build multi-million dollar submarines to travel deep in the ocean, but the simplest of fish and other sea creatures have also been able to do this with ease since creation. 

And when it comes to fine arts, when we paint or draw a beautiful landscape - we're just offering personal impressions of what God has already made. 

And therefore all our ingenious "inventions" or our artistic offerings are of a lower rank and order - only God is a True Creator, because He fashions totally original creations "ex nihilo" (out of nothing. One could see out of thin air, but then even the air didn't exist until He created it).

The greeks could never imagine that their gods would be pleased by anything created from matter. For matter, in itself, is evil. 

But the God of the Bible seems to actually bless and sanctify objects fashioned by fallen man from earthly matter. 

CLICK HERE for Part 2: Five Ways to Develop As RE-Creator