This week there has been much talk by scientists operating the Large Hadron Collider about finding a “god particle”. Great excitement was generated about this particle which they think exists but up till now has managed to remain invisible. One of the investigating groups of physicists thought their experiment gave a grain of credence to their idea resulting in euphoria. So what’s it all about? Apparently we know quite a lot about stuff, matter or mass, like what it’s made up of, but what makes it stick together has remained a mystery. Peter Higgs working in Edinburgh back in the 1960ies reckoned there is a special particle which, like super glue, holds it all together. You might call it the Creator particle but the scientists, who mainly claim to be atheists, have called it the ‘Higgs boson’ after one of their own. Believing as they do in the Big Bang they have built this 17 mile tube which they send particles around in opposite directions so as to replicate the Big Bang. When they collide and bits fly off in all directions they hope to catch a glimpse of the “god particle” that held them all together. A kind of reversal of Creation to find out how the God, whom they don’t believe in, did it. What does the Bible have to say about all this? The Teacher in Ecclesiastes says, “there is nothing new under the sun” and back in the beginning of Genesis we read of men building a tower at Babel (which literally means God’s gate) to reach the heavens. Their quest to reach God by their own efforts failed, God creating confusion, and scientists have been trying to rationalise that confusion ever since. Job had a hard life and wanted to know why one misfortune after another happened to him. He never did get an answer but he gained an insight into the vast difference between the Almighty’s ways and his thoughts and ours; “Where were you when I laid the earth’s foundation?” Job Chapters 38 to 41 spell it out for us. The point is that God has made a way whereby mere mortals can know Him. That way is through His Son who came into the world to save sinners. The ‘Joy to the World’ that we sing isn’t about a ‘god particle’ but a Person who we can know. Jesus said, “Now this is eternal life: that they know you, the only true God, and Jesus Christ, whom you have sent. (St John 17:3). This eternal life comes to those who bow the knee to Him and acknowledge the great God He is – the Creator and sustainer of all that is – and not simply a sort of super glue! Don’t be blinded by science, look to Jesus who will reveal Himself to you and one day in the not too distant future, in the second Advent, will make all things plain.