A Christian Looks At The Space Age

by Doodson, A. T. | Category: Editorial | Feb 1964

Many Christians may be perplexed to know what to think about the Space Age which is engaging so much attention at present and using large sums of money. It is a sad feature of these activities that they are largely sponsored by military authorities in militant nations It will be well to enquire whether the Scriptures give any guidance on these matters.

When the Creation took place and at its close man was formed out of the dust of the ground, he was given authority over the fish of the sea and the fowl of the air and over every living thing that moveth on the earth (Genesis 1.28), and he was also to replenish the earth and subdue it. Neither then nor at any later time did God mention any of the heavenly bodies except as they gave light or indicated seasons, so that man had no authority given him with regard to any heavenly body.

It is part of man's province to know all that he can about this world that he may subdue it. Job knew something of the explorations of men when he referred to the face of the deep being frozen (Job 38.80), and it was because of explorations of men that Solomon could send for the gold of Ophir and also of Tarshish, a remote place requiring a voyage of three years (1 Kings 10.22).

Explorations of this kind cannot be criticized, except in the sense that men may mis-use what they find. It is important to note that not only man has authority over the things of the world, but there is one who is called "the prince of this world" (John 12.81), and "the prince of the power of the air" (Ephesians 2.2). He can, when allowed by God, control material things (Matthew 4.9), but his great work is in influencing the minds and spirits of men. The great evil he has done in the world we are very conscious of; he is still the enemy, and is well aware of the next great event when Christ will meet His saints in the air. All that the enemy can do to disturb that great event he will do personally and by influencing the actions of men. To be able to get explosives just to any particular point is what he would think most destructive of our meeting the Lord in the air. We who are Christians know that the power of the Lord is greater than anything Satan and his dupes can bring to bear upon the gathering of saints to their Lord in the air, and the God who rained great stones from heaven upon the enemies of Israel can be depended upon to destroy the missiles that Satan can organize. Men can truly say that a great triumph of mind has been achieved by what they have done, but the Christian can look at it all in a very different spirit.

The motives that men have in seeking to go further out in space need to be examined. They firstly seek to land upon the moon, and even to colonize it. They already know a great deal about the conditions of the lunar surface and its unsuitability for human life to exist there. Scientists have a desire to know more about the physical features and the character of the rocks, so that greater

information about the past history of the earth will become available, but their efforts will mainly lead to military usages as a place for spying, so that a race to be first at the moon will give advantages to the ones who achieve it, or, if two nations are about equally successful, it may lead to war on the moon and man's sad history on the earth will be repeated on the moon.

But there are also the attempts to reach a planet. Scientifically the reasons for desiring to do so are to increase understanding of the structure and temperature, and the composition of the atmosphere of the planet. It is doubtful as to whether a visit by men will add to the knowledge already obtained or to that which may be attained as scientific methods improve. The disturbing feature is this, that some men, scientists and others, hope to find life on the planet. For years there has been speculation as to the possibility of men on planets other than the earth, and imagination has run riot as to the kind of beings they could be. Why is it that men are so anxious to find life which is not of the earth? It is all a part of the Satanic impulses to endeavour to show that life does not require a Creator as Genesis teaches. Ultimately men will be deluded by the image of the beast (Revelation 13.14) which breathes and speaks (see also 2 Thessalonians 2. 11). This is one of the many signs that imitate the wondrous acts of the Creator. The pity of it all is that intelligent and learned men are bemused by the thought that life can exist apart from the Creator.

Leaving for a moment the question of whether men or beings like men do exist, we find men excited by a report of a skeleton of some creeping thing found in a meteor which has come from the heaven, and a Russian scientist has a fantastic story of experiments of his in which it is alleged that life in a low state has been created by him from matter which is inert, and other men of several nations are going to test his assertions by repeating his experiments. It is all part of the tremendous lie which Satan has placed in the minds of men such that all men evolved from creatures which came from the sea.

Let us suppose that men did live on a planet and, a very great assumption, that they were free from sin. It is certain that contact with men of this world would immediately introduce sin among them and the woes of earth would be repeated in that planet. But another supposition can be considered, that the men of the planet, if they existed at all, would not have been left alone by Satan, who would have sought to extend the bounds of his appointed place and cause sin to exist wherever men might be. I now ask, seeing that in the case of both assumptions sin needs to be dealt with, is it at all likely that Christ would die a death on each planet as well as the one on which we live? It is unthinkable that such would be the case, and this to my mind is a sufficient reason for asserting that there is no such possibility as men are imagining, and it is high time that they put on one side the delusions of Satan, and cleave to the plain indications of the Bible.

Doodson, A. T. | Feb 1964
Editorial