A simple God

Why do we try to simplify the universe to understand it better, but complicate God with the same intention?

Photo by Ryo Tanaka on Unsplash

If you take a moment to contemplate a tree, a landscape, animals, your own body, or the sky on a starry night, you might marvel at the enormous complexity and radical differences that exist among all of God’s creation.

The Bible says:

“How many are your works, Lord! In wisdom you made them all; the earth is full of your creatures. There is the sea, vast and spacious, teeming with creatures beyond number— living things both large and small.” (Psalms 104:24-25 NIV)

Many artists have fundamental elements that are repeated in their works, like a kind of seal that makes them recognizable and allows us to identify their creator. For example, many of Pablo Picasso’s paintings can be recognized by the styles or colors that characterized the different stages of his artistic life. These recurring fundamental elements ultimately give the work its identity.

“El Guernica” by Picasso (1937).

So, I ask myself:

What is the seal of God?

What is it that we can find in common throughout all his immense creation?

What do a tree and a star have in common? A volcano and an ant? Or even a drop of water and a galaxy?

To try to answer this, we need to look at creation a little more closely.

All of creation is made up of matter. All matter is made up of chemical molecules. And all chemical molecules are composed of different combinations of the 92 chemical elements¹ that exist in nature.

It’s incredible! Even stars, nebulae, galaxies, supernovae, and other cosmic masses have been studied using spectroscopy², and it has been observed that they are made up of the same chemical elements that we know and have in our periodic table.

Now, to those 92 natural chemical elements, another 26 that have been synthesized in the laboratory must be added.

Interestingly, if we delve even deeper into the analysis of the composition of the 118 existing chemical elements, we can discover that each and every one of them is composed of different configurations of the same three fundamental components: protons, neutrons, and electrons.³

It’s fascinating!

All the complexity of God’s diverse creation boils down to just three fundamental components.

And if you think about it, it’s a bit like what I was hinting at earlier about the seals artists use in their works. These fundamental particles would function as God’s seal on his creation.

But why am I mentioning this?

In my previous essay, in which I explored the topic of God and the languages ​​of love, I wrote this sentence:

“I think we should stop trying to overcomplicate God. There are things we will never understand, but we should enjoy the ones He does choose to reveal to us.”

This phrase came to me while reading a book called A Fortunate Universe by Lewis & Barnes. In this book, the authors explore the surprising “coincidences” and extraordinarily precise conditions that allow for the existence of life in the universe.

While reading about these things, I couldn’t help but think about how humanity, in its attempt to understand the reason for our own existence and the universe, has pushed so far that it has managed to study matter to levels that would seem impossible to reach.

I was surprised how the deeper we go into the composition of matter, the more we seem to discover how all the complexity of the universe, when broken down to its most basic level, shows a fundamental homogeneity that ends up creating unity and identity, showing us that everything is made of the same thing. It is the seal of God in his creation, as I decided to call it.

Now, my intention with this essay is not to make an apologetic argument for the existence of God, or anything of that nature. Rather, what strikes me when I think about these topics is the following:

Why is it that when we want to better understand the universe, we tend to simplify it into concepts that are more manageable for us, but, contradictorily, when we want to better understand or explain the nature of God, we tend to complicate it more and more?

I understand why it’s done, but I feel that sometimes when we talk about God we use such complicated words to refer to him, terms like omniscience, omnipotence, sovereignty, predestination, eternity, Trinity, providence, etc. And yes, all of those are truths about God and they are infinitely important.

But how do you share the Gospel with someone who doesn’t understand those terms?

How do you explain to a child what it means for something to be eternal? How do you explain to a new believer what the Trinity is? How do you explain to an illiterate person what omniscience is? How do you encourage someone who is hurting by talking to them about the sovereignty of God?

It is difficult to share the beauty of God with others when we categorize it in words or attributes that, although real, are very complicated to explain.

However, millions of people have come to know God without understanding any of those words.

The Bible says:

“… God is love.” (1 John 4:8 NIV)

It also says:

“… God is a consuming fire.” (Hebrews 12:29 NIV)

I’m almost certain that every person on the planet, no matter how young or old, what language they speak, their level of education, or where in the world they live, understands what fire and love are. And I’m convinced that each of us, in one way or another, can also explain it without much effort.

I’m not suggesting that God is simple to understand. He isn’t. In fact, his nature is infinitely deeper than our capacity to comprehend it.

But often the essence of what God really wants to show us about himself is simpler than we imagine.

Jesus, the person who knew God best, the man who best understood the greatness and depth of the Father, never allowed those profound truths to overshadow what was most important. While the Pharisees and Sadducees argued over complex concepts and interpretations of the law, he simply stopped to love people.

And when they asked him complex questions, such as, “What are the most important commandments?”, he didn’t give a long theological explanation. Jesus simply replied:

“Love God and love your neighbor.”

I myself have been in conversations where we’ve gone so deep into theological topics that in the end I prefer to simply stop and say:

“Thank you, but I’m just trying to love God and follow Jesus.”

Although I love talking about these topics, the truth is that sometimes we can try to explain incredibly complex doctrines and, at the same time, forget simple things like loving and forgiving.

And Jesus summed up the whole law in that.

Jesus summarized all the law and the prophets in loving God and loving your neighbor.

If I may use my metaphor of the seal again, this time from a more spiritual perspective: love is God’s seal on our hearts. It is what gives identity to our relationship with him. It is what makes our creator recognizable through us.

And it is, like the fundamental particles of matter, where we should go when we try to better understand God.

This is what we find repeated time and again in his Word. And yes, everything else is important too, but behind all the depth of God, behind all the mysteries we will never fully understand, He constantly leads us back to what is essential.

He leads us towards love.

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If you enjoyed this reflection, you might also be interested in this other essay on God and the languages ​​of love:

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If this Pensamiento resonated with you or blessed you in any way, I’d love to hear about it in the comments. Also, if you’re going through something and need prayer, please feel free to send me a private message.

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1. Currently, 118 chemical elements have been confirmed in the periodic table. Of these, 92 occur naturally on Earth. The remaining 26 are synthetic elements produced artificially in laboratories.

2. Spectroscopy is a scientific technique that studies how matter interacts with light. By analyzing the light that an object emits, absorbs, or reflects, scientists can identify the chemical elements that compose it.

3. Science has advanced so far that, using particle accelerators, it has been able to study the internal structure of protons and neutrons. Those who wish to delve deeper into this topic can research the Standard Model of particle physics.