THIS TALK WAS FOR A FAMILY SERVICE IN WHICH THE CHILDREN STAY IN
PART 1, EARLIER IN THE SERVICE: PHYSICAL FORCES
There are different kinds of forces. For example, I can put my hands on Priscilla’s [my wife’s] shoulders and … hey presto! … she goes down. The force is coming from my hands on her shoulders. I’m physically touching her. But there are a lot of forces which we can’t see. They’re invisible. Can you think of any forces like that?
Demonstration 1. Throw an apple up in the air and catch it.
Was something pushing the apple down? Did I have a bit of string attached to the apple? No. So, what was the force which pulled the apple down? Gravity, of course.
Can anyone guess why I used an apple for this demonstration? [Isaac Newton, late summer, 1666; Isaac Newton 23 years old, at his family farm in Lincolnshire; an apple fell from a tree. Newton pondered it … and it led to him proposing the law of gravity. The apple tree is still there.]
In this case of the apple, it was the earth’s gravity which pulled the apple down. We can see the earth! We’re standing on it. But a large part of the gravity in the universe comes from something called dark matter. We can’t see dark matter and we can hardly detect it. So, something invisible is exerting an invisible force!
Demonstration 2. This time I have a globe instead of an apple. But it behaves just the same way as an apple. I can throw it up and it comes back down.
Do you think I can get the globe to stay up, with nothing at all holding it? [Do an internet search for floating globe and you'll see what I used. I have a 'C' shape floating globe.] Gravity is certainly pulling the globe down so something must be holding it up. What do you think it is? There’s a magnet inside the globe and an electromagnet inside the arm pulling it upwards. It’s another example of an invisible force.
Demonstration 3. I have a battery. Do you think that if I place the battery on this table and don’t touch it, it can roll forward all by itself? [Demonstrate: AA battery with neodymium magnets at each end placed on aluminium foil. Make sure you have the same poles facing outwards! The battery rolls forward by itself.]
Something made the battery roll along but it wasn’t me! What do you think it was? It was magnetism or, to be more precise, electromagnetism, like the previous example. The point of this is not to give a science lesson. The main thing is to see that a force was at work – but it was invisible.
Demonstration 4. I have a glass globe with a vane inside. [It’s technically a Crookes radiometer.] I can’t touch the vanes. Do you think that even though I can’t touch the vanes, I can make them turn round? [Demonstrate: shine light on the radiometer and the vanes rotate. If you’re inside you’ll need quite a powerful light.] I didn’t touch the vanes, but they span round! How did that happen? What kind of force was it? Again, we don’t need a science lesson. The point is, some force moved them, and we couldn’t see it. It was an invisible force.
So, we’ve seen some examples of invisible forces: gravity, electromagnetism and whatever force it was that caused the vanes in the radiometer to go round. [Air pressure produced by heat from the light.]
Scientists talk about ‘fundamental forces’. Gravity and electromagnetism are two of them. They’re invisible. Scientists know of two more fundamental forces which act on atoms. They’re also invisible. Scientists are wondering about a fifth fundamental force but they’re not sure yet if it exists or not, so if it does, it’s definitely invisible! ALL the fundamental forces which scientists know about are invisible.
Do you think there are any other invisible forces in the universe?
PART 2, LATER IN THE SERVICE: GOD’S INVISIBLE POWER
Earlier on we thought about forces. I’m going to switch to talking about power. Force and power are related but the Bible uses the word power much more than force.
Is there any invisible power that we know about, but scientists don’t know about – not unless they’re Christians, anyway?
The Bible says, there is. There’s a power which is invisible and can’t be detected by any scientific instruments and yet it is greater than any other power. It is God’s power.
I’d like to give you four big ideas about God’s power.
1. GOD’S POWER IS THE GREATEST
The God who we read about in the Bible has enormous power and strength. It’s far greater than any other power. How do we know that?
God created the whole universe! No other power we’ve thought about comes anywhere close. The prophet Jeremiah figured that if God could create the universe, he has power to do anything! [Jeremiah 32:17].
Where else do we see God’s power at work?
God brought his people out of Egypt. Pharaoh didn’t want to let his slaves go, but God made him. That was a great demonstration of God’s power!
When Jesus came, he healed people. That was a demonstration of God’s power [Luke 5:17; 6:19].
Jesus was crucified but God raised Jesus from the dead. Wow! When Paul wants to talk about how powerful God is, that’s the example he uses [Ephesians 1:19-20].
So, God has enormous power! It’s extremely important for us to know this and to keep it in mind. People make mistakes when they forget about God’s power.
But does God give us power?
2. GOD GIVES HIS PEOPLE POWER
The prophet Isaiah wrote: ‘He gives power to the faint, and to him who has no might he increases strength’ [Isaiah 40:29].
So, the answer is yes, God gives his people power. There are MANY other verses in the Bible which say the same [Psalm 68:35, for example, or the account of Pentecost]. We all feel faint sometimes. We should go to God. God has power and he’s willing to give it.
3. God gives INTERNAL power
What do I mean by INTERNAL power? The world’s biggest icebreaker is a Russian ship called Arktika. It has a nuclear power plant, and it can crash through ice that’s up to nine feet thick! The ship’s nuclear power plant is INTERNAL power. God gives US power like that: INTERNAL power.
Let have an example from the Bible. After Jesus died and God raised him to life, he told his disciples to stay in Jerusalem until God gave them power [Luke 24:49]. About 40 days later, God did just that. God’s Holy Spirit came on his disciples. It gave them power they’d never had before. They worked miracles. They had courage to answer the Jewish high priests – the people who’d had Jesus put to death! Jesus’ disciples had bags of get-up-and-go! Andrew went to Greece. Matthew went to Ethiopia and Iran. Bartholomew went to India. Peter ended up in Rome. Thomas went to Syria, Iraq, and India.
Where did this power come from? God had poured out his Holy Spirit on Jesus’ disciples. His power was invisible, but it was very powerful!
Let’s imagine how that might work today. Let’s imagine Jane. She’s a Christian and she’s 17. She’s just about to sit her ‘A’ levels. She wants to go on to study medicine. She prays to God to help her to be disciplined about her study and to give her understanding. And God answers her prayers. He gives her an internal power which is far beyond what she naturally has.
4. God gives EXTERNAL power
What do I mean by EXTERNAL power? The world’s fastest sailing boat is a boat called Vestas Sailrocket. It doesn’t have any engine at all! If there’s no wind, it has to be towed. But powered by the wind, it has reached 75 MPH! Wind is EXTERNAL power. God gives US power like that too: EXTERNAL power.
Let’s have an example from the Bible. There was a king called Hezekiah. An army of Assyrians came against him. Then King Hezekiah and a prophet called Isaiah prayed to God and cried to heaven. Then we read that God sent an angel and ‘cut off all the mighty warriors and commanders and officers in the camp of the king of Assyria’ [2 Chronicles 32:21].
God didn’t make King Hezekiah strong to defeat the Assyrians. God defeated them himself! This is a great example of EXTERNAL power.
Hezekiah lived about 2,700 years ago but I believe that what was true for him is true for us. God gives EXTERNAL power today just as much as he did in Hezekiah’s life. But he gives this power to people who are following him and trusting him. He doesn’t give power to people who are forgetting about him and disobeying him.
Let’s go back to Jane. Can God help her with EXTERNAL power? Let’s suppose she has an interview at a university in a couple of weeks’ time. She can ask God to give her favour and open a door for her.
Remember, God helps those who are faint. He’s very powerful, and he’s a very good Father!
CONCLUSION
I’d like to end with a little true story. A little over a week ago President Trump welcomed President Zelenskyy to the White House. Trump told Zelenskyy: ‘You’re in a very bad position. You don’t have the cards right now … Your country is in big trouble … If you didn’t have our military equipment, this war would have been over in two weeks.’
What Trump said might be true. But it’s only true on one condition: that God is not helping Ukraine. If God IS helping Ukraine, then those things are NOT true. If God is helping Ukraine, the situation for Ukraine isn’t hopeless at all.
I doubt very much that we’ll ever be in the situation Zelenskyy was in a week or so ago. But perhaps one day we’ll think about some situation and say to ourselves, ‘It’s hopeless. It’s a lost cause. I may as well accept defeat.’ If such a time comes, let’s remember God. Yes, God’s power is invisible. But it’s just as real as any of the other powers and it’s more powerful than any other power.
God helps those who are faint. So, if we’re facing a crisis, let’s do what Hezekiah and Isaiah did and ask him for his help. And even when we aren’t in a crisis, let’s go to God to seek his power. We’re ALL weak. We all need it.
TALK GIVEN AT ROSEBERY PARK BAPTIST CHURCH, BOSCOMBE, BOURNEMOUTH, UK, SUNDAY 9TH MARCH 2025, 10.30 A.M. SERVICE
