“ye have the testimony of all these thy brethren, and also all the holy prophets? The scriptures are laid before thee, yea, and all things denote there is a God; yea, even the earth, and all things that are upon the face of it, yea, and its motion, yea, and also all the planets which move in their regular form do witness that there is a Supreme Creator.”

But that order is also in addition to the testimonies of others, the scriptures, words of prophets, and, as Paul mentioned, personal experience testing the promises of God. It’s as we live according to His word and seek Him out that we can come to know He exists.

But when you do know that, it’s awfully hard to look at the order and beauty in nature and see it as anything else but pure evidence of God. I was reminded of this over the weekend as we drove to see the fall leaves in our local mountain ranges. It was nothing short of sacred to me.

Scott, I’m interested to hear more about your thoughts on how the Book of Mormon is “the most interesting and convincing of all intellectual cases for belief in God.”

~Michelle

I’ll checkout the Sherlock article.

Personally I find the Book of Mormon to be the most interesting and convincing of all intellectual cases for belief in God.

In re-skimming this article I noticed this:
“that behind this incredibly complex universe that all things eternal would also have a marvelous Creator, Designer, Artist, and Order-er.” I was going to argue that the infinite regress of eternally progressing individuals is a counter example, but the infinite series may be more an intellectual concept than a physical entity. Then I wanted to argue that intelligences (the on-shaky-doctrinal-footing pre-spirit versions) weren’t created, but D&C 93:29-30 “placed” sounds like ordered so perhaps this statement does hold if the “and” is changed to “or.”

However, you missed the whole point of my article if we are arguing philosophically about the existence of God. I even state in my conclusion: “Simple logic can give us [only] a shallow assurance of His reality.”

To know the true existence of God we must test His promises. In so doing, we can discover for ourselves whether these promises are fulfilled through our obedience (which I coin as enlightened obedience).

To me, this is the only way to discover both facts: 1) God indeed does exist, and 2) He loves us infinitely. I do think the Intelligent Design theory is a decent argument in building a simplistic foundation for the possibility of a God. However, for me, Enlightened Obedience provides a more full approach to discovering God and His eternal truths.

I believe in God and TCOJCOLDS but I side with Hume and Darwin on this one.

I see no reason that order or complexity or purposefulness logically necessitate a creator. Chaos theory, feedback systems, natural selection, economic markets, fractals, cellular automata all provide a different perspective.