God of the Gaps

A few years ago I went home to Meridian for the funeral of my friend, Brad Morse. He was my same age and, outside my family, I'd probably spent more time playing tennis with him than anyone (which is saying something). He'd been murdered in cold blood by a shot to the head from a stranger who stole his car.

I remember his father speaking at the funeral about the claims of many that it was "his time" and that God had "called him back," and basically crediting his son's demise to God. The father pushed back and said it wasn't "his time" and that the murder was wrong. My bias is that I agree with him.

I think a lot of people believe in a God of the Gaps (AGOG, I'll call him).

In ages past and in some cultures today, AGOG gets the credit for everything not yet explained. Bad harvest? Must've offended AGOG. You got pregnant? AGOG smiled on you. You won in war? AGOG must be on your side. There's a wondrous diversity of life, and all creatures are adapted to their habitat? Must be AGOG's work. Your mom died? Must be AGOG's doing. Especially on the life and death front, AGOG gets the credit. The less explainable the phenomenon, the more AGOG gets credited with its occurrence.

Then materialism happens (the idea that there's a natural explanation for everything). You push a ball and it rolls across the floor? Everyone can explain that- it's momentum. Let go of a pen and it falls to the floor? Gravity. Marvelous wonders in the sky? Phases of stars. Poor harvest? Insufficient soil nitrogen. Won a war? Your guns were bigger. Someone is sick? Germ theory. You got pregnant? Fertile womb and high sperm count. Who needs AGOG when science can explain all these phenomenon?

A miracle is nothing more than a phenomenon you don't understand- yet. Consider these lyrics:

"I was sitting on a southbound plane,
I was buried in a magazine
When the man in the next seat over
Wanted to talk to me
He talked about the universe,
He talked about Saturn's rings
He said, "I might be an atheist,
Except for just one thing:

"It passes all my understanding
How it all worked out just right
The distance that we live from the sun,
The stars that shine at night
We may prove that it was just an accident
But how did it begin?
It passes all my understanding"

This lovely song talks about the development of this man's faith. However, his faith is in AGOG- as soon as he figures out a reasonable explanation for how it began, he's back to his atheism. The question isn't whether the not-yet-explained is likely to be satisfactorily explained by scientific advancement in the near future or not- the question is the more close-to-home-hitting question of the nature of your faith and belief in God. Is God or your faith in Him diminished by the advancement of scientific understanding? It shouldn't be. Otherwise, that god and/or your faith will expand or contract as a consequence of the explainability of phenomena you observe. There are many mysteries still, such as how to resurrect, and what exactly life and death are, and how to create a spirit from intelligence, or how to breathe life into Adam- but there are answers to these questions- natural ones. "All difficulties are but easy when they are known." (Act 4, scene 2, Shakespeare's Measure for Measure) If you knew the secret and had the skill, there's little doubt but that you could restore life to someone or create Adam from the dust of the earth. (see Spencer W. Kimball, “Our Great Potential,” Ensign, May 1977, 49, paragraph 3- other examples include producing a spirit and organizing matter.) These answers' discovery does not and cannot diminish God. Were it not so, He would be a God of darkness, one whose necessary incentive would be to hide truth from you and to hold back the revelation of mysteries in order to preserve the information asymmetry requisite to his power advantage. Ours is a god who, on the other hand, seeks to edify and enlighten and perfect and exalt and teach us to become like him and share in his light. It is better to base one's belief in God on revelation and other more sure principles than substantively on the not-yet-explained.  I like Lincoln Cannon's description: "Arrogance is not in attempting the good old fashioned work that leads to desired results. Rather, arrogance is in the passive thought that your God will save you despite your efforts.
The God in which I put my faith would have us share in that glory (Romans 8: 17), speaks according to our language (D&C 1: 24-28), reasons among us according to our understanding (D&C 50: 10-12), withholds no knowledge (D&C 121: 26-33), and invites us to greater works (John 14: 12)."

As a sidenote, I'd say the true god works by natural means somewhere between 99 and 100% of the time- and more likely the latter. Sorry, AGOG- I don't endorse you.

Credit goes to Kenneth Miller in "Finding Darwin's God" for dawning this idea in my mind. 

Postlude on AGOG's brother, AGOTI (A God Of The Improbable)
Oftentimes I observe improbable events ascribed to God.  Three examples:
1) "The motorcycle slid right underneath the semi-truck: two feet more and I would have been crushed. God saved me." -Trevor
2)  "I was desperate that day and stopped at the Cougareat. I've sat there a hundred times and no one's ever sat by me. Jennifer sat by me and listened to me and told me to call the BYU Continuing Ed. department- and now I finally have a job- thank you, God." - Sarah

3)   "Genesis 30: 22 ¶ And God remembered Rachel, and God hearkened to her, and opened her womb.
  23 And she conceived, and bare a son; and said, God hath taken away my reproach."

In testimony meetings or otherwise, it is the improbability of the event that evidences God's work. I see a few problems with using the improbability as God's signature. 1) Low probability events happen normally, though at a low level- thus, each year, though small, there are a certain quantity of motorcyclists who are saved in a collision by sliding underneath the semi.  Is there a way to distinguish the normal from the intervention?  2) When low probability events fail to happen, do they indicate God's failure to intervene?  Say Trevor's motorcyclist buddy was killed in the same crash because he missed the narrow safe zone under the semi- is this higher probability event evidence of the absence of God's intervention?  3) Is God prohibited from blessing people on a large scale?  If an event because popularly accessible, is it no longer Him because it's no longer improbable?  Fertility doctors can fairly routinely "open wombs" now, making infertility reversal much more common than it was in Rachel's day.  Presuming the general mercy and goodness of infertility reversal, why not attribute the skill of fertility doctors/drugs to God despite how common the "miracle" now is?  4) Are improbable events always evidence of God?  Sarah's department was the only one on campus in 10 years to fire a new hire a week after intake.  Nathan comes across an obscure website with a rarely read anti-Mormon article, which leads him to lose his testimony.  Was that improbable event God's doing?

Thus, it seems most likely that God's hand is in all things, both probable and improbable, and He is responsible for all good things, whereas the devil or men are responsible for the bad things.  (D&C 59:21, Moroni 7: 15-19)  God's signature is better evidenced by the test described in Moroni 7 than the improbability of an occurrence.  Go join your bro, AGOTI.