A Sunday School Lesson Comes to Life
I will praise You Lord, for I am fearfully and wonderfully made! –Psalm 139:14
In a previous post on Natural Revelation, we wrote that nature abounds with evidence for a creator. God’s fingerprints on our natural environment is at once miraculous, unfathomable, and undeniable. I had heard Christian apologist, author, and itinerant speaker Ravi Zacharias tell a story that perfectly illustrated that truth in regards to our IN-vironment, the human body. After finding a blog post by Geoff Pound that included the visual (gratefully reproduced here) that made the illustration so powerful, we have used Ravi’s story each year as a part of our Sunday school curriculum.
“In a strange way, he became both the subject and the object of his study, both the designer and the design of his research.”
As Dr. Zacharias relates in his book The Grand Weaver*:
“Some time ago I had the privilege to speak at a conference at Johns Hopkins University on the theme “What Does It Mean to Be Human?” Before my address, Francis Collins, the director of the Human Genome Project and the co-mapper of human DNA, presented his talk. He spoke of the intelligibility and marvel of the book of life, filled with more than three billion bits of information. In a strange way, he became both the subject and the object of his study, both the designer and the design of his research. Extraordinary thoughts swarmed within me as I listened, virtually tuning in and out of the talk in order to reflect on the wonder of it all.
“In his last slide, he showed two pictures side by side. On the left appeared a magnificent photo of the stained-glass rose window from Yorkminster Cathedral in Yorkshire, England, its symmetry radiating from the center, its colors and geometric patterns spectacular—clearly a work of art purposefully designed by a gifted artist. Its sheer beauty stirred the mind. 
On the right side of the screen appeared a slide showing a cross section of a strand of human DNA. The picture did more than take away one’s breath; it was awesome in the profoundest sense of the term—not just beautiful, but overwhelming. And it almost mirrored the pattern of the rose window in Yorkminster. The intricacy of the DNA’s design, which pointed to the Transcendent One, astonished those who are themselves the design and who have been created semitranscendent by design. … In looking at our own DNA, the subject and the object came together.”
In a subsequent talk, Ravi further related that on that day when Dr. Collins first showed the slides “there was a gasp in the audience. And it dawned on me that I was looking at that because of which I was able to look at it. I was awe-stricken by that because of which I was capable of being awe-stricken. I realized the magnificence and the grandeur of the way God has fashioned us and woven us together. And Francis Collins, when he finished showing those two slides, said nothing! He picked up his guitar and sang a gospel song. The only response could be that of worship.”
The conference that Ravi attended with Dr. Collins took place in May 2006. In 2013 my friend Geoben and I had the opportunity to hear Dr. Zacharias speak on the problem of evil and suffering at the very same auditorium – Shriver Hall on the campus of Johns Hopkins University. Having read many of his books, listened to his daily podcasts, supported and communicated with his ministry, and seen him in person I counted Ravi as a friend, if not exactly an intimate one. The brilliant Dr. Francis Collins was another matter entirely, his work in human genetics and genomics being all but incomprehensible to my active but average brain.
In May of 2016, my friend Tom came to town and we attended a baseball game together. It was government employee night, and Tom must have wondered why I became so agitated before the National Anthem had even been sung. “Ladies and Gentlemen,” the PA announcer intoned, “Representing our federal workforce, please welcome the director of the National Institutes of Health Dr. Francis Collins, who will now sing the Star-Spangled Banner.” It was a Sunday School lesson come to life! We had been speaking the name of this unreachable man to our students year after year, and here he now was, performing rather impressive versions of the National Anthem and, later, God Bless America during the 7th inning stretch.
I shared with Tom the reason for my excitement and summarized our Sunday School lesson later that night. After relating the story I became eager to tell Dr. Collins about his unwitting participation in our personal drama. The following evening I wrote him a short note to let him know what a joy it was to see him at the game, to tell him that our Sunday School class would pray for him, and to express my gratitude for his part in illustrating to our students how “fearfully and wonderfully made” they are, down to the microscopic level of their DNA. Dr. Collins was kind enough to send a hand-written reply, and as it does not reveal any private details, I expect he will not mind if I reproduce it here.
“Well Done, Good and Faithful Servant”
Ravi and Francis are brilliant men in their own unique ways, and through the use of their divinely-conferred intellect and their diligent human efforts, both have rightly gained the respect and admiration of many people, not to mention future rewards from their loving Creator for their part in building the Kingdom. In the words of Jesus from Matthew 25, “Well done, my good and faithful servant. Since you were faithful in small matters, I will give you great responsibilities. Come, share your master’s joy.’”
In gratitude and appreciation to these two good and godly men, both of whom I now consider friends, may I humbly echo: Amen. Well Done.
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