One of the most powerful arguments for the existence of God is simply known as "the design argument." The Hebrew writer penned these words: "Every house is built by some man; he that built all things is God." (Heb. 3:4.) "The heavens declare the glory of God and the firmament shows his handiwork." (Psa. 19:1.)

The argument was made popular by William Paley (1743-1805) who employed his now-famous "watch argument." He simply used the watch to illustrate that a watch demands a watchmaker. Paley argued that if one were to find a watch lying upon the ground, and one were to examine it, the design inherent in the watch would be enough to force the conclusion that there must have been a watchmaker. Thus, the design inherent in the Universe should be enough to force the conclusion that there must have been a Great Designer.

No rational person could believe that a watch just happened. It would be just as rational to believe that a tornado ripping through a junk yard of old cars and trucks could assemble a Boeing 747, as to believe that our world just came into being without intelligent design. One does not get a poem without a poet, or a law without a lawgiver. One does not get a painting without a painter, or a musical score without a composer. Neither does one get a creation without a Creator!

Emerson, the famous poet, wrote, "Nature is too thin a screen; the glory of the omnipresent God bursts through everywhere." Dr. E. A. Maness once remarked that the evidence for God could not be greater even if the word "God" were written upon every blowing leaf, embossed on every passing cloud, and engraved on every granite rock." Design---interesting, intricate, intelligent design---can be found everywhere. "For the invisible things of him from the creation of the world are clearly seen. . . ." (Rom. 1:20.)

Believers have catalogued example after example of obvious, intelligent design. Our universe is impressive, whether we look at it as a whole and at its smallest parts. If we drew a map of our galaxy, letting two dots one inch apart represent the sun and earth, we would need a map at least four miles wide to locate our nearest star and one 25,000 miles wide to reach the center of our galaxy! (Reason & Revelation, January 1989, 1.) Yet while the size is impressive, the inherent design is even more so. The sun’s interior temperature is estimated at over 20 million degrees Celsius. The earth, however, is located at exactly the correct distance from the sun to receive the proper amount of heat and radiation to sustain life as we know it. If the earth moved just 10% closer or 10% farther away, life could not be sustained on earth. The earth is positioned just at the right distance from the moon. The moon is 240,000 miles from us. If the moon moved closer to the earth by just a fifth, the tides of the ocean would be so enormous that twice a day they would reach 35-50 feet high over most of the earth’s surface. (The Case for the Existence of God, Bert Thompson and Wayne Jackson, 19-20.)

The lowly spider has remarkable engineering abilities. We have learned that the spider spins silk and makes a symmetrical web. In order to obtain food, some spiders spin a web in which insects will be caught. After spinning the trap, the tiny spider will spin a nest nearby to await an insect. To give notice of an insect’s being caught, she strings a "telegraph" line from the center of the web to the nest. Then she goes home and waits. Twang! The "telegraph" signals that something has landed on the web.

The home of the honeybee is an ingeniously designed masterpiece. The beehive is adorned with hundreds of tiny six-sided rooms. The cells are shaped precisely in all countries. The bee in constructing the cells chooses the exact angles of 120 degrees for the inclination of the sides and 210 and 70 for the parallelograms of the roof. This design is best for saving space, work and materials.

The seahorse is a master of camouflage. Deena Clark wrote that "Mother Nature (atheists words to replace God) outdid herself when she assembled the seahorse." While most are dark gray or bronzeblack, those in the Indian Ocean and Mediterranean Sea often wear waistcoasts splattered with pink, yellow, blue or white. At the approach of danger, a resplendent tropical seahorse, fins rimmed with topaz lights, can turn to dusky brown and impersonate the surrounding rocks.

The ancient Job well said, "But ask now the beasts and they shall teach thee; and the birds of the heavens and they shall teach thee; and the fishes of the sea shall declare unto thee. Who knoweth not in all these that the hand of Jehovah hath wrought this? In whose hand is the life of every living thing and the breath of mankind." (Job 12:7-10.)

Man himself is a marvel in divine design. Augustine once said, "Men go abroad to wonder at the height of mountains, at the huge waves of the sea, at the long courses of the rivers, at the vast compass of the ocean, at the circular motion of the stars; and they pass by themselves without wondering." The systems of the human body considered alone or functioning together tell of divine intelligence in design. The cells of the human body are so tiny. Some of them (the male sperm cells) are so small that it would require 20,000 to fill a capital, 0. Yet if all the cells of the human body (60-100 trillion) were placed end to end, they would encircle the earth over 200 times! Even the largest cell of the human body, the female ovum, is unbelievably small, being only 1/100 of an inch in diameter.

The recent work on the DNA reveals the extraordinary design of the human body. The DNA provides in coded form every physical characteristic of every living person. One of the remarkable discoveries is that the genetic code is universal for all living things. We all use the same alphabet. We all speak the same language, genetically. "Wherever you go in the world, whatever animal, plant, bug, or blob you look at, if it is alive, it will use the same dictionary and know the same code. All life is one." (Matt Ridley, Genome, 1999, quoted by Bert Thompson in R & R, August 2000, 62.) The unity of life is an empirical fact. It is also a biblical fact. ". . . seeing he gives to all life, breath and all things. And hath made of one blood all nations of men for to dwell on all the face of the earth." (Acts 17:25-26.) This was a single beginning for all. Scientists have now made the first rough draft copy of the DNA of the human cell.

How do atheists counter such strong arguments for design in our world? Indeed, they acknowledge these examples of wonder in our world. Recently, there have been books and articles written about design and order. But, we should not think that atheists are ready to concede for a moment that design means a Designer, or order means an Orderer. Richard Dawkins wrote The Blind Watchmaker in 1986. This work was intended to counter Paley’s argument concerning the implications of the existence of a watch. He wrote that things that look like intelligent design are simply the results of natural selection at work.

While Christians write about order and design in the world, unbelievers write about the lack of order and under-design. They write about "suboptimality" or "dysteleology." If all things were designed perfectly, everything would be optimal. While we note the wonder of the creation, they point out the aberrations and imperfections. How should we think about wisdom teeth that most often must be removed due to a lack of space for them? Evolutionists claim that it is the result of changes in man’s jaw structure as he evolved. Or an appendix that becomes dangerous if it ruptures? Or Siamese twins, two infants joined together? (Eng and Chang, 1811-1874, joined by a band of flesh at the chest.)

Why do we have moles and other dangerous growths on the skin? Recently, a dermatologists, told me that we have an average of 20 moles on our bodies. Most are harmless, but none serve a useful purpose. Some develop into melanoma. In the eyes, it is called melanoblastoma. Melanin, dark skin pigments, protects the skin from sun burn and improves vision in bright sunlight. But, melanism is an abnormal development of melanin in the skin, hair and eyes. Why do abnormal things develop if God is the Creator?

Earthquakes and other natural disasters? Droughts and floods? Extreme heat and cold that cause humans to die? We do not live in a paradise. We must protect ourselves against the elements.

Extinction. We have learned that over time some animals and plants become extinct; that is, they cease to exist. Dinosaurs are a good example. We have various interested groups trying to preserve various animals and creatures of the sea. Sometimes, man is at fault. We have destroyed their natural habitat. Others die because they did not have the ability to adapt to changes in their environment.

Henry Morris, the head of the Institute for Creation Research, wrote that "if evolution is true, then there have been three billion years of suffering and death in the world of living things leading up to man. . . If God used evolution, He used the most wasteful, most cruel process, that he could possibly conceive by which to produce man. But the God of the Bible is not that kind of God." (Creation: Acts/Facts/ Impacts, 45, quoted in Science on Trial, Douglas Futuyma, 121.)

Atheists ask, "If the world’s species had been created by the wise and living deity imagined by the creationists, why should more than 99% of them be extinct?" (Science on Trial, 121.) The environment is often harsh and detrimental to living things. As one writer put it, We live in a "zoologically destitute" world today. As a teenager I would load my gun and spend an entire day walking through forests and meadows. After hunting for hours, I would be happy if I saw a few rabbits, squirrels, and birds. On a hot summer day, only a few snakes could be seen. Our planet is not a thriving paradise of plants and animals. Man is multiplying and replenishing the earth, but the other creatures are not doing so well. Zoos house and protect a precious few species. Has something gone wrong with our world? Is it optimally designed?

Death in general. Consider, further, the question of why plants, animals, and man are mortal. Why aren’t organisms capable of living forever? A Creator could presumably make a perfect organism that could live forever. But genes cannot. An organism can acquire only so much energy; the more energy it devotes to reproduction, the less it has for its own maintenance and survival. Thus organisms that reproduce early in life "wear out" and are apt to die. Those who produce less seeds or offspring live longer, but then there are fewer of the species to survive. Evolutionists claim to be able to give reasons for senescence (growing old) and death, but creationists, they say, cannot.

Why would a beneficent Creator create the mayfly, in intricately constructed wings and legs only to die within half an hour, the time it needs to mate and lay eggs? Why does an elm tree produce millions of seeds each year, almost all of which die? Why is there such waste if God designed these systems? A man lives his few threescore and ten, then goes the way of all the earth. How difficult the effort to gain knowledge and wisdom; yet how quickly we die. Experience and knowledge dies with the individual. We try to preserve it in books and words left behind.

Evolution by natural selection does not demand optimal results. But creation by an all-knowing God does demand the best possible world. Natural selection cannot invent the best possible genetic variations; it can only replace inferior genes with the best genetic variations that happen to be available when the environment poses its challenge. We should expect to see many different genetic solutions to any adaptive problem.

There is obvious, purposeful design in our world and in our own bodies. This is indisputable. Atheists seek to discredit this design by a word game. Instead of design, they call it order. To illustrate the difference, they offer this analogy. Have you ever noticed the way waves wash pebbles ashore? The heavier ones are dropped first and thus land farther away. The lighter ones float back and drop from the wave last. This distribution of pebbles looks like design, but it is more properly order. Thus, they describe all the things that look like purposeful design in the world.

But this word game, substituting order for design, does not help their cause. Design demands a designer. However, order looks to an Orderer. "Orderer" is an English word just like designer. It means one that orders. If order is found, then there must be an Orderer. The truth is that order and design are words that are akin to one another in meaning. There is no great distinction to be made. (Reason & Revelation, October 1998, 40-41.)