Although attributed to the Russian Cosmonaut, Yuri Gagarin, the quote, "I looked and looked and looked but I didn't see God," apparently originated in a speech by Nikita Khrushchev at the plenum of the Central Committee of the CPSU in which he said in support of the state's anti-religion campaign, "Gagarin flew into space, but didn't see any god there." Actually, Gagarin himself was a member of the Russian Orthodox Church.
Can you believe a politician would lie and the media would support the ideology instead of investigating thoroughly and accurately reporting what happened? That could never happen in America, could it? Ah, well, I digress.
Whether it was Nikita or Yuri who made the statement, whatever the precise words might have been, the truth is that if Yuri's eyes were truly open, he would have seen God in every mile of the journey around the moon: "The heavens declare the glory of God; the skies proclaim the work of his hands" (Ps 19:1).
How so? In the same way love is seen in a woman preparing a special meal for her husband or a man taking his wife's down to fill it with gas for her or a child picking wild flowers for his mom. Love is one of those things we are certain of without ever actually seeing it, much like faith: "Now faith is confidence in what we hope for and assurance about what we do not see" (Heb 11:1).
We see the evidence of love in what others say and especially what they do, and we feel Love's presence, but we never actually see love. We can know God is by what he says and does, and we can feel his presence. The awesome expanse of wonderfully synchronized universe down to the incredible design of the human eye proclaim the power and presence of a Great Designer and Conductor of the cosmos. His written Word, handed down from the apostles is a letter written to His children proclaiming his great love for us.
And, for those of us who have accepted Jesus Christ as Lord, thereby filled with His Spirit, we have felt His presence and have witnessed the personal change in our lives. No, we cannot see God with the eyes of the flesh but the spirit within has a faith sight that most assuredly can see God in this world yesterday, today and tomorrow. Jus' Say'n.
Thanks Doc. You are able to give clarity to faith in these words. Reminds of today's reading at our house. "The wind blow where it pleases, you hear it's sound, but you do not know where it comes..." The evidence is all around us--but we can't physically see the wind.
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