and the One who walks with me on it.

Monday, December 02, 2013

The Smallest Bits

       Would it surprise you to know that atomic theory was postulated around 400 BC by a Greek teacher name Leucippus who believed everything is composed of imperishable, indivisible elements called atoms, and further elaborated by his student Democritus?  Humans didn't see these particles until Thomson saw the electron in 1897, Rutherford saw the nucleus in 1910, and Chadwick saw the neutron in 1932.  Imagine millenniums going by with no proof of atomic proof.
 
       Now we know of kaons, pions, leptons and quarks.  Quarks are indivisible and the smalled matter in the nucleus.  If the atom is one million times smaller than a human hair, and the proton is 100,000 time smaller than the atom. Our current understanding is that the quark is a point-like particle with no spatial extent!  Interesting?  Crazy?
 
       See, right now we think the quark might be the smallest, but at one time we thought the same of the atom and we were wrong.  We get things wrong all the time: remember, we did think the world was flat at one time!  But as the quark is a thing, it must be made up of smaller things, at least that seems logical to me.  At some point, it may become impossible for man to see 'smaller' on the scale, but just because it is so small we can't see it doesn't mean that it doesn't exist.
 
       Long before man knew any of this, God knew it; after all, He made the universe and everything in it from the largest of the large to the smallest of the small.  He knows what the smallest thing in the universe really is.  Imagine that!  He set the physical laws in motion that keep the earth and universe 'alive'.  It all works because of Him. 
 
In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth. Gn. 1:1
(about Jesus) All things came into being through Him, and without Him not even one thing came into being that has come into being. Jh. 1:3
(about Jesus) For all things were created in Him, the things in the heavens, and the things on the earth, the visible and the invisible... And He is before all things, and by Him all things consist (bring or band together). Cl 1:16,17
(about Jesus) ...upholding all things by the word of His power... Hb. 1:3
...the ages were framed by a word of God, so that the things being seen not to have come into being out of the things that appear. Hb. 11:3
 
       Lord we thank You for all that You've given us, including our thirst for knowledge and  creativity to make tools to discover new things.  Forgive us for our arrogance in thinking we know better or more than You, and help us to be humbly in awe of Your greatness.  Thank You for the quarks that form parts of the atoms that make our cells and other parts, which live and breath and move and hold together- all because of You.  Thank You!!!