Except the sum total of our possible and “probe-able” reality appears to have begun 13.7 billion years ago. All the space-time, matter, energy and dimensions of our universe with physical constants that also appear hardwired for life is not the eternal infinite nature. No proof but I’m a simple man. If it quacks like a duck…
Vinnie
How many fallacies do you see there?
Zero but I see language and human ability to comprehend and describe things at this high of a level breaking down. It’s like we’ve finally reached the end point of what science, real science, can tell us. In other words, we found God:
“For the scientist who has lived by his faith in the power of reason, the story ends like a bad dream. He has scaled the mountains of ignorance, he is about to conquer the highest peak; as he pulls himself over the final rock, he is greeted by a band of theologians who have been sitting there for centuries.” Jastrow
That’s the problem.
Our mediocre universe is obviously an infinitesimal. That is an absolute strongly uniformitarian given. As you know.
I know of no theologian who is up to date with cosmology. And Jastrow belongs to a sad group of physicists including Hoyle, Davies, Dyson, Polkinghorne whose rationality runs out and the fallacy of incredulity takes over and takes their science down the toilet with it. A great tragedy in the case of Hoyle.
Please point to a physicist, like Guth, or may be even Einstein, who was met by any theologian. There is no convergence in Kierkegaard or Barth, which is why they are proper theologians. Not inevitably failed apologetes.
I think Stephen Hawking* said something about the beginning of time, at which point the regress of cats stops. XD And the idea that QM may be hinting that the fundamental reality of the universe may be information still has its appeal, God’s mind having a couple of bytes to spare. Imagining that there is necessarily anything material ‘before’ that beginning is just that, imagination.
The energies of God doctrine provide an understanding of how God sustains His creation; it is absurd to say they at not nothing or whatever. The beginning is when God (the Word) creates all there is. Since this encapsulates time and space, we would argue that the beginning is just that, a beginning of time and the rest.
The notion of nothing is required by how we use language - since there is a beginning, there cannot be something prior to that. Also the creation is a gift (it is not necessary) from God, and our capacity to comprehend it, study, provide scientific insights, also speak to our place within the Creation.
I cannot make sense of some of your statements concenring rationality, eternity and what have you. 
Josh
Just saw this discussion in response to your post. Some of the replies are way “above my pay level”, but I just want to say, on a more basic level - isn’t “ex nihilo” – the doctrine of “out of nothing” just that - a doctrine formulated by early theologians? Where do the writings in the Bible actually say that this universe and form of existence we know was created “out of nothing” or that "nothing (material) existed before it? (whatever “before” means here 
)
That theologians came up with the term was understandable - they were actually stating that God was the “first cause”. Today we have some physicists theorising the existence of other universes – early theologians can hardly be blamed for having a more limited awareness!
Should Christians take the actual wording of such doctrinal terms as divinely inspired and infallible even given the limitations of human knowledge and language? And then spend so much time and effort on them?
Where should we draw the line?
In the same way and for the same reason, can we be sure exactly what “in the beginning” means in each place it occurs in the Biblical texts? In Genesis, can’t it be seen as referring specifically to the origins of our own world/universe? Whereas in John 1 it might have a more fundamental meaning?
Early theologians didn’t just make it up however.
By faith we understand that the universe was created by the word of God, so that what is seen was not made out of things that are visible.
Hebrews 11:3
…and he upholds the universe by the word of his power.
Hebrews 1:3
Those echoing this nicely:
By the word of the LORD the heavens were made, and by the breath of his mouth all their host.
Psalm 33:6
I like your catching that. 
The key point is - power of being.
Likewise. You are missing the void: there is no beginning of beginnings. No end of beginnings.
God - the Eternal, like any infinity - can not change.
A Christian says: In the beginning was the Word … and continues from this.
Thus, I would describe your comment as peculiar sophistry.
That’s a non sequitur. My comment is a brute fact. Yours is in the hermeneutic of wooden literalism. And mine does not in any way preclude yours: if God grounds being then the Word is always the beginning from eternity, God is the continuous if null then !null principle.
What does not follow? The discussion is the creation as we understand it (the observed age of the Universe), and the beginning of this creation which is stated as creation from nothing. The Biblical teaching is that God created the heavens and the earth, and we cannot consider as anything before this, as the creation is everything.
You can’t, but the brute fact of the infinite eternity of unchangeable nature, with its if null then !null principle in unchangeable God or no, remains.
Bill, quite honestly, i had never thought of this before. I always go back to thinking that our Earth and Human beings, despite our flaws, are just too perfect to have come about instantly, and instead, were created for a certain environment for some kind of purpose. Doesn’t feel like Natural processes could be solely responsible.
Can you tell im not a scientist!
We’ve known this for 60 odd years and Ross (another one to add to the sad list above, although not in their league) had nothing to do with it. And it’s two generations. Sol is a grandchild population I star. The result of two waves of supernovae. What this entirely natural process ‘proves’ about God I cannot imagine, let alone what the entirely natural process of dark energy negentropy, sorry, negentropic dark energy, accelerating the expansion of spacetime says about Him.
So, Josh, This post by GJDS gets back to your original issue:" 
Klax
The energies of God doctrine provide an understanding of how God sustains His creation; it is absurd to say they at not nothing or whatever. The beginning is when God (the Word) creates all there is. Since this encapsulates time and space, we would argue that the beginning is just that, a beginning of time and the rest.
The notion of nothing is required by how we use language - since there is a beginning, there cannot be something prior to that. Also, the creation is a gift (it is not necessary) from God, and our capacity to comprehend it, study, provide scientific insights, also speak to our place within the Creation."
John 1: 1-3 says that In the beginning was the Word, the Word was with God, and the Word was God. It then proceeds to say that He created everything, and nothing was created that He did not create. Creation is a product of the mind of God. Scientifically there is “nothing” to examine physically or evaluate in a lab, but, like gravity, we can know intuitively and perhaps spiritually that it is there.
Then you asked, “Can you tell im not a scientist!” as if it may be a problem. The issue is actually a question of “Who will you believe?” The scientific stuff I point to are not my ideas. However, most of it originated with Max Planck. James Clerk Maxwell, Niels Bohr, Hendrik Lorentz, Albert Einstein, and subsequent Nobel laureates. Einstein’s math teacher came up with the Minkowski Spacetime four-dimensional manifold to understand the setting for relativity. Britannica or Wikipedia can define the Initial Singularity. I trust these scientific resources, and I recommend them to you.
Theologically, the Bible is not a science book, but when explained in context with the Quantum Field Theory, it does ‘ring true.’ Ex nihilo creation, by the Word of God, works as the universal Initial Singularity delivery mechanism as a quantum field. De novo creation by the Word of the Creator, instructing the new beginnings of Genesis, works by exciting the Standard Model of Elemental Particles to initialize material things at His direction. The Creator used the scientific principles He created the make His creation.
Einstein pointed out, “Science without religion is lame; religion without science is blind.” I agree.
I think you are quite right to understand that “Human beings, despite our flaws, are just too perfect to have come about instantly, and instead, were created for a certain environment for some kind of purpose. Doesn’t feel like Natural processes could be solely responsible.” That statement probably speaks volumes about the 13.8 billion years from the Initial Singularity and 3.8 to 4 billion years of our galaxy and planetary system. Our infinite God (Alpha and Omega) rules the time and eternity realms for His purposes. The Biblical books of John and Revelation go into some of the fundamentals of God’s ways and purposes, even when they go deep and wide. The technicalities are not as important as His offer of a spiritual relationship and even adoption into His family.
His Word is true, and our response is vital to us as well as desirable by Him.
Blessings,
Bill
That is a very confusing post. Who wrote what in response to what? What does ‘1d’ mean? You are quoting @GJDS without attribution, as if you wrote it.
I’m glad you agree with Einstein, that
the theoretical physicist was no supporter of religious beliefs, which he regarded as "childish superstitions
“The word god is for me nothing more than the expression and product of human weaknesses, the Bible a collection of honourable, but still primitive legends which are nevertheless pretty childish. No interpretation no matter how subtle can (for me) change this.”
“For me the Jewish religion like all others is an incarnation of the most childish superstitions…”
Dale,
I can’t help but notice the paradox in the verses you have chosen to refute my point:
Such anthropomorphic language must of course be metaphorical - but what it describes is surely not easily defined. Since such verses have had such influence, let’s think about the metaphors more closely: Is breath immaterial? What is a word without a means of transmission and a receiver?
Paul did not dispute the poet who expressed that “In Him we live and move and have our being” (Acts 17:28)
I am NOT saying that some form of matter or energy existed apart from God, just that losing one’s faith based on a perceived contradiction between a scientific understanding of the big bang and scripture is totally unnecessary and would be a pretty sad thing.
In fact materiality itself seems to me intrinsically linked with the Person of Christ, who is Himself the Word, “through whom all things were made”, while uncreated, he became incarnate, and after death, resurrected with a glorified body.
There are many puzzling things difficult to grasp or define in Christianity - a fact the Eastern Orthodox churches have long recognised. We should instead focus on the much more readily accessible life and teachings of Jesus.
The Spirit being God’s Pneúma or ‘Breath’ certainly does not denote anything material, nor does our having a spirit or soul necessarily either. So this fits:
The Spirit himself testifies with our spirit that we are God’s children.
Romans 8:16
Indeed. Recall my affinity for the suggestion about QM:
ETA:
(I don’t think I was trying to refute your point, but was pretty much agreeing with it.)
“Let your conversation be always full of grace, seasoned with salt, so that you may know how to answer everyone.” -Colossians 4:6
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