Dozens of cosmic characteristics must be exquisitely fine-tuned to make physical life possible. The degree of fine-tuning observed exceeds by many orders of magnitude the fine-tuning of which humans are capable. Despite such evidence, rather than because of it, some people, including scientists, speculate about the existence of an infinite number of universes. Given an infinite number of universes, they rationalize, at least one could be expected to develop, randomly, the characteristics physical life requires. Thus, chance, or "random fluctuations" in some kind of primeval field, seems to them as plausible an explanation for apparent design as a divine Designer.

The question remains, however, Where do the infinite number of universes come from? If from some kind of primeval field, then where does the primeval field come from? If "nothingness" represents an instability, and "nothing" must, therefore, give rise to "something," why has no one ever observed something coming from nothing? Can any physical process deliver an infinity of products? Must infinite variety be the outcome? Asking enough questions ultimately leads to an all-powerful, uncaused Causer.

Growing evidence points to a universe that hyperexpanded (at many times light's velocity) during its first 10^-33 seconds of existence. The inflationary big bang multi-verse proposed by several astrophysicists to account for this hyperexpansion, however, can be much more easily structured as an inflationary big bang uni-verse.

Anyone who appeals to infinite (or even just a very large number of) universes commits a form of the gambler's fallacy, as described in the following example: Someone flips a single coin in an auditorium in the presence of witnesses ten thousand consecutive times and each time that coin lands with heads facing up. One committing the gambler's fallacy says that outside the auditorium 2^10,000 (2 x 2 x 2 . . . ten thousand such multiplications) coins might possibly exist and that all these coins may have been flipped 10,000 consecutive times each. He further speculates that every coin outside of the auditorium produced a different set of results in their 10,000 flips than the one observed inside the auditorium. On this basis he concludes that the coin flipped in the auditorium represents that one possible instance out of 2^10,000 coins that the laws of probability state would produce ten thousand consecutive heads. He, therefore, would conclude that the coin in the auditorium still has a 50/50 chance of landing on tails, and would be willing to bet on tails for the next flip.

A team of 41 astronomers from Australia, Japan, New Zealand, and the United States took advantage of a naturally occurring telescope to image a small planet orbiting a star somewhere between us and the Galactic Bulge (the dense concentration of stars that exists at the core of our Milky Way galaxy).¹ The natural telescope consisted of a large star functioning as a gravitational lens. According to general relativity, a sufficiently massive body can bend the path of a beam of light that passes close enough to it. Therefore, if such a body lies between us and another object located directly behind it, it can magnify for us the image of the more distant object (see diagram). The more massive the lense object is, the more it will magnify.

Gravitational lenses that astronomers are fortunate enough to find exhibit widely varying magnifying properties. In this particular case the magnification exceeded twenty times.

The team's results demonstrate that relative to the star, MACHO 98-BLG-35, that provided the gravitational lens phenomenon, the planet orbiting it is between 0.004 and 0.02 percent of the mass of the star. For star masses that could possibly give rise to such a spectacular magnification, the planet mass orbiting it would fall between 3 and 35 times the mass of the Earth (or, 0.17 and 2.0 Neptune masses).

Here is a well crafted rebuttal to Richard Dawkins. For those of you that are not aware of Richard Dawkins he has been a large speaking head for the atheist community and has appeared on many US and UK television shows. He also has headlined many large debates. Richard Dawkins' book The God Delusion has been a best seller on a handful of lists. Published just last year it is still in the top 20 rankings on Amazon.com. He has two other recent popular books The Blind Watchmaker: Why the Evidence of Evolution Reveals a Universe Without Design and A Devil's Chaplain: Reflections on Hope, Lies, Science, and Love. Though it may seem that Dawkins creates many straw men his popularity has given rise to Atheism and a voice against orthodox Christianity. As Christians on mission for Jesus he at least needs to be on the radar as you engage with those that do not know Jesus.

From the fall of 2004 until the fall of 2005 I preached through the entire book of Genesis verse by verse. It was one of the richest and most rewarding studies I have ever done. I got so enthralled with preparing for the series that I ended up writing a 200-page introduction and commentary for our church that we printed in-house. Here is a section from the book that attempts to answer the most common questions about the perennially hot doctrine of creation. At the end of this document are some suggested resources for those wanting to study further on this issue.

Today a debate rages about the question of origins and where creation and humanity came from. Much of the passion that surrounds this question is because the question of origins has implications for everything else. For example, Genesis says that there was a beginning to history which means there will be an end. Genesis says that creation comes from God which means it belongs to God. Genesis says that people come from God which means that people will stand before God in the end.