LANGUAGE

LANGUAGE

“And God said, ‘Let there be light’, and there was light” (Gen. 1:3).

The Bible tells us that God said something on all six days of creation. On day 3 and day 6 He spoke twice. On day 3, as you know, was the beginning of plant life and on day 6 was the beginning of animal life. God obviously had a special association with both of these special days.

Among all of the creatures God made, however, only man has the ability to speak. Both his brain and his wind pipe are uniquely designed to make this possible. Interestingly, the creature most capable of reproducing human words is not the chimpanzee, but the parrot.

The origin of language has been a source of controversy for centuries. One reason for the controversy is that many scholars assume the universe is a closed system. When you see words on a piece of paper, however, even the most brilliant reductionist cannot explain those words by a scientific examination of the paper and ink. The words are easily explained, however, by acknowledging that the words came from intelligence outside of the paper itself.

While the heavens declare the “glory” of God (Ps. 19:1), only man was created in His “image” (Gen. 1:27). Remember! There is no concept of creation that does not include the appearance of age. Adam did not come from a microscopic life form in his mother’s womb, he was created as an adult. Neither did he have to learn a language like a little child, but was created by God with the capacity to verbally communicate from day one. Indicative of Adam’s language skills is the fact that God permitted him to give names to all the livestock, birds, and beasts that God had created (Gen. 2:20). In our modern world this advanced science is known as “taxonomy”.

While many animals and insects can communicate on some lower level, language is still unique to humans. Dolphins and bees, for example, can communicate at some level but certainly cannot produce libraries where their siblings can do research. In this regard it is therefore easy for anthropologists to recognize writings made by man. I am told, for example, that scholars found two scratches on a cave wall in China. The first mark headed upward at a 45 % angle and the second intersected with it near the top and headed back down. To English readers it looked like an upside down “Y”. To those familiar with the Chinese language, however, it was obviously their pictographic symbol for “man”. Animals do not write words in any language!

We should not be surprised, therefore, that God chose to communicate his nature to mankind by condescending to become one of us (Phil. 2:5 - 11). It is therefore appropriate that Jesus is known as the “Word” of God. Since a “word” is a vehicle of communication, Jesus became the “Vehicle” by which God communicates His nature to man. Since God is infinite and man is not, we cannot fully comprehend everything about God. In Jesus, however, is the fulness of the Godhead in a body (Col. 2:9). By understanding Jesus, we can grasp the ultimate understanding that the finite mind is capable of understanding. Please remember! “In the beginning was the Word and the Word was with God, and the Word was God” (Jn. 1:1). Also remember: “The Word became flesh and made his dwelling among us” (Jn. 1:14).

When a prominent atheist accused Christians of inventing God because they were afraid of the dark, Professor John Lennox responded that unbelievers invented atheism because they were afraid of the light. While these cute sayings prove nothing, the Bible does teach that fallen man doesn’t like to retain God in his knowledge (Rom. 1:26). Thus, rational man will immediately recognize that three letters “S.O.S.” indicate intelligence. Irrational man, however, insists that the 3 billions letters in the human genome arranged themselves in their proper order by accident.

Please remember that our salvation involves language, for with the heart man believes unto righteousness and with the mouth confession is made unto salvation (Rom. 10:10).