THE EVERLASTING GOD
Our universe is not permanent. It has been known for some time that the universe had a definite beginning. This understanding is not even the result of a deep scientific pursuit but rather can be deduced by considering that if, while travelling along a trail, you find a heap of ashes with heat still emanating from the mound, it is reasonable to deduce that a source of that heat, likely a fire, was recently burning at that spot. Likewise, our universe is still emitting heat which indicates that the original emergence of the universe is not infinitely distant in history but rather a definite point within the measurable past.
To rationally conceptualize the requirements of the existence of the temporal universe in which we live, we must erect two distinct frameworks. One scaffold is the temporal one we recognize as our universe and another, is an eternal superstructure that must permanently endure from which the temporal one springs.
In the understanding of the naturalists or atheists, there is no eternal superstructure. To them, the basis for the existence of our universe is an infinite regression ( and progression ) of temporal evolutions that end up, by happenstance, expressing the current iteration in which we currently reside.
Of course, any sophomore who has done mental experiments related to infinite regressions knows that such a postulation yields the impossibility of actually arriving at our particular version of the universal flowering.
This untidy fact is cautiously ignored by most current non-theistic thinkers and have no real basis for commenting on the characteristics and condition of the universe that truly should not exist when logically constructed on their world view. At some point, however far back one would care to suppose, an infinite and conscious being must exist in order for a universe like ours to exist especially when it is smudged (however so slightly) with living and conscious beings.
Christianity, when examined at its foundational tenets, easily asserts the infinite and conscious being at the center of its world view as God. Christianity closes a peculiar loop in the metaphysical explanation for existence by firstly (and correctly) identifying that an eternal conscious being must exists in order for our universe to exist. Secondly, Christianity elevates the self-aware nature of human beings as being superlatively significant. Thirdly, Christianity declares that the self-aware properties of human beings are the direct result of being deliberately designed in the image and likeness of the creator of the cosmos. Axiomatically, this means that humans are made not only to look like God but also made to operate like God.
Using this as an initiating circumstance, one can understand why human beings are alive, why they are conscious and more tellingly, why they are able to study the universe and its accoutrements and understand its construction and functions. An atheistic worldview would have an extremely hard time explaining how a natural evolution of a species would result in a form of consciousness that can turn around and successfully study and understand the universal backdrop from which it emerged.
It is here where the Christian can layout a comprehensible rationale for the nature of mankind and then go on to explain our current status and the remedy offered by God for our plight which is plainly a fallen one.
An atheist cannot explain existence in general and certainly cannot explain consciousness and curiosity in particular without resorting to feeble trains of sequential mindless events whose contingencies beggar credulity.
A Christian rests in the knowledge that an elemental buttress of reality is baked into the fabric of the faith from the dawn of human civilization. Irrefutably, Christian canon has presented God with all the attributes that are a required for our existence while modern scientific endeavors have been stubbornly unyielding to the naturalist's dream of discovering the universe's fonz et origo apart from the Christian expression of God.
Further, Christianity presents Christ, a being of staggering qualities, as the exact representation of God the creator and goes onto explain that the apparent enmity between God and man can only be remedied by His suffering , death and resurrection.
For a world view to accurately posit the requirements of our universe, it should be allotted more credibility than a world view that is still claiming to be searching for the "scientific" explanation for the creation of the universe and of the living and conscious beings within it.
Christianity is indeed credible and implores those who do not know, to accept by faith that Christ is the only salvation offered by God.
Salvation from what? Well, salvation from the realm of darkness into which we were born. We easily recognize the darkness of our world when confronted by the brutish darkness of our distant and recent history and more directly, when we examine our own natures and find that we readily conform to the corrupting influences we are surrounded with.
Christianity is, in effect, a rescue mission for the humans who are repelled by the workings and demands of the realm of darkness and are searching for a redemption into the realm of righteousness.