TITAN
The Beginning

“…In thebeginning, there was nothing but God.”

He was alone.As the story goes, God was lonely. He was all things, but He could not besomeone else. He desired someone to love and to love Him. With the spark of adivine whim, God ignited an explosion from which all things were created.

The Universeout of a point smaller than the head of a pin. Such is the power of God thatwhen He triggers an explosion, there is birth and life, not destruction anddeath. Stars, planets, asteroids, comets, and all things developed from God’sdesire to end His loneliness. Some think that God just said, “Zap!” and overthe course of six days everything was made. While He could’ve done that, Hedidn’t.

For God,there is no time. It took billions of years for life to develop and God restedwhile it did. He set life in motion and creation took its course. Life neededto grow and adapt to survive. God knew that if life was static and unchangingthere would be no purpose and nothing for His creations to achieve.

When Godreturned, He saw that life had flourished throughout the whole of His creationand on one small blue spec, the third spec from a young star, low creatures hadbecome something more. God saw a life form that could think. But not justthink—learn and decide. This life-form was still young and about as hairy asthe life it grew from, but God recognized the gift of intelligence He hadgranted the “man” (as He would later settle upon calling it). Man could ponder,man could question, man could reason, and, most importantly to God, man couldlove.

God spoke tothe man and named him Adam. You know all of this. It’s in your Bible and everySunday school teacher can recite it from memory. What’s important to know isthat for a time, God was sated by the man’s love. But before long, God realizedthat Adam was lonely as He had been. Adam had God’s love, but God was not likehim and could not be an Earthly companion.

Whether Godtook one of Adam’s ribs or found another being like him, only female, isunimportant. A woman, Eve, joined Adam. God brought them together so they couldlove one another and He bound their love in His name. Through their love of oneanother, they gave thanks to God and loved Him more.

Life went onlike that until God realized that something was missing. There was love, sure,but it was somehow wrong. He had company who loved Him for creating them, butthat love had never really been tested. They loved Him “just because.” He lovedHis children, but He wanted to know the depth of their love. They had been madeto love Him, but that isn’t real love. Love without choice isn’t love. Godbestowed free will on his human creations, so they could choose to loveHim.

But here iswhere some think that God made a bad decision. Free will is great, but with itcomes to opportunity to choose wrong. At this early moment in creation, choiceswere pretty limited and it boiled down to God or… what? In giving humans freewill, God created something terrible that was everything He was not. Godcreated the potential for Evil when he granted us “choice.”

This Evilwasn’t just a red devil with a plastic pitchfork, but the true darkness thatlives in the shadow of every human being’s heart. A black blacker than black, ahate so strong that it could take shape and breathe life amid the darkestshadows of the night, and a void of nothingness so complete that no human couldcomprehend its paradoxical existence let alone survive it.

God wasperfectly aware of what He was doing. The possibility of Hell and all of itsmisery swallowing the universe was worth it to know freely-given love if onlyfrom just one person. Love made God whole in a way that man can neverunderstand. He may be all-powerful and all-loving, but even God cannot loveHimself as someone else can. And to return His love to the humans and all ofcreation was marvelous. The glory of giving and receiving love is worth thesacrifice of His existence.

Adam and Evewere free to choose each other or not, though options were limited. God toldthem they were open to all of the gifts of paradise except for one tree, whichbore a ripe, succulent fruit. There were many other such trees, just not thatone. That was the price of their free will: don’t eat the forbidden fruit.

The nextpart of the story has been told many times in many ways. Some say a nefariouscreature, maybe a snake, tricked them into making the wrong choice. Or Adam andEve were so drawn to the one tree they couldn’t have that they were incapableof resisting. But all that’s important to know is this: Adam and Eve chose togo against God. They did something He asked them not to do. In doing so, Godnever stopped loving them, but their free ride was over. God told them thatlife would be hard from then on. God would no longer provide them with food andshelter. Eve would suffer the pain of childbirth and Adam would have to tillsoil and hunt to eat and fight to survive. Adam and Eve then felt shame attheir nakedness and mortified by what they’d done wanted desperately to make itup to God. They were driven from paradise to live their lives in service toGod.

Unfortunately,and God knew this was the price of free will, the potential for Evil became areal presence the moment Adam and Eve chose against him. Their choice unleashedpure malevolence. Evil, which had been only a possibility, a concept, was nowalive and scratching at the edges of creation trying to come inside. Evil setitself up in direct opposition to God—a dark balance to His divine light. Itcould command the shadows beneath rocks and trees where the light could nottouch and whisper temptation in the hearts of all men.

In thebeginning, the shadows were few. But as humans multiplied, so did the shadows.Every man and woman casts a shadow in the light. But for all the evil in theworld, God will not intervene. To do so would be to rob Himself of the love Heseeks. If God acts in man’s world, then man is not free. Mankind must choose tolove Him and choose to reject the dark. God risks His own destruction to giveand receive love. That is the extent of God’s love for man.

No, He wouldnot intervene personally, but God roots for good. He wants humankind to makethe right choices. Over time, as Evil grew stronger, it tempted man, frightenedman, and destroyed man with ever magnifying powers and frighteningmonstrosities so God sewed tools for resisting and fighting the darkness intothe fabric of creation. Some of these tools are but simple things likereligion, reason, and logic. But to face the darkest of the dark, to face eviland win, God helped man discover, create, and master special tools and powers.

Butas with all things, man must choose to use them.