Sy Garte - The Works of His Hands. A Scientists Journey from Atheism to Faith

Combining a childlike enthusiasm for discovery with a polymaths understanding of the natural world, Sy offers unusually clear explanations and insight into why it is important for us, not just the specialists, to know such things as how cells get their energy. For decades he saw the pursuit of truth through science as the height of lifes purpose. What could top the joy of scientific exploration? Sy has an answer for this question toodiscovering the God who created these wonders. As the book unfolds, he does not just show us that science and faith are compatible. He offers the story of his life to illustrate how the two together offer a new and much heightened view of lifes purpose.

P AUL W ASON , vice president of life sciences and genetics at the John Templeton Foundation

An arresting, wholly transparent account of a scientists struggle with faith. There are many books of this sort, but almost none of this caliber or candor. Garte is a biochemist who competently explores physics, philosophy of science, quantum entanglement, mathematics, evolution, consciousness, and the fight for morality and justice, all in a fast-moving personal story thats quite funny at points and heart-wrenching in others.

P ERRY M ARSHALL , author of Evolution 2.0, and founder of the Evolution 2.0 Technology Prize

Sy Garte may be compared to C. S. Lewis in Surprised by Joy. As his pastor, I delighted in reading this personal narrative about Sys transformation from an atheist to a believer in the triune God. His conversion was stimulated by his thoughtful inquiries as a scientist but completed by an encounter with the risen Christ. Sy found God only to realize that our gracious God had been wooing him with love and glimpses of joy for decades. A book worth reading by anyone who struggles with the intersection of science and faith.

R EV . M ARTHA M EREDITH , pastor of Rockville United Methodist Church

There are two pernicious myths about the Christian faith that circulate through modern culture. The first asserts that to become a Christian, one must park ones mind at the doors of the church before entering. The second myth is that senior academics set their foundational beliefs in stone early in their careers, and they remain intact until retirement. The spiritual and intellectual voyage of Dr. Sy Garte crushes both of these myths. Raised by parents steeped in communism and anti-theistic materialism, then educated in biochemistry and biological evolution, Garte spent much of his academic career as a fervent atheist. Yet an intuitive inkling that something was missing in his lifeand in his scienceopened the way for him to discover the grace of God in his Son, Jesus Christ. This book deals with many intellectually challenging issues Garte faced in his journey, including a renewed understanding of evolution as Gods method of creation. Garte is a brilliant example of a Christian following Jesuss command to love God with our minds (Matt. 22:37).

D ENIS O. L AMOUREUX , DDS, PhD, PhD, professor of science and religion at St. Josephs College, University of Alberta

In The Works of His Hands, biochemist Sy Garte shares what he learned (and is still learning) during his career as a scientist in search of purpose and meaning. He discovered Christianity, to paraphrase C. S. Lewis, as the light by which everything else may be seen. His insights, offered in narrative and creative storytelling, provide a road map for reconciling science and faith, both for spiritual seekers peeking over the fence from the yard of agnosticism and for worried believers gazing out the chapel window at the so-called challenges of modern science. Thoughtful, provocative, playful, and intimate.

S TEPHEN O. M OSHIER , professor of geology at Wheaton College

The Works of His Hands: A Scientists Journey from Atheism to Faith

2019 by Sy Garte

Published by Kregel Publications, a division of Kregel Inc., 2450 Oak Industrial Dr. NE, Grand Rapids, MI 49505.

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any meanselectronic, mechanical, photocopy, recording, or otherwisewithout written permission of the publisher, except for brief quotations in reviews.

Distribution of digital editions of this book in any format via the internet or any other means without the publishers written permission or by license agreement is a violation of copyright law and is subject to substantial fines and penalties. Thank you for supporting the authors rights by purchasing only authorized editions.

Scripture quotations are from The Holy Bible, English Standard Version (ESV), copyright 2001 by Crossway, a publishing ministry of Good News Publishers. Used by permission. All rights reserved.

A portion of . Used by permission.

A portion of was originally published in Evolution and Imago Dei in God & Nature (Boston: American Scientific Affiliation, 2012). Used by permission.

ISBN 978-0-8254-4607-8, print

ISBN 978-0-8254-7584-9, epub

Printed in the United States of America

19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 / 5 4 3 2 1

This book is dedicated to the love of my life, my wife, Anik Albert

Great are the works of the L ORD ,[they are] studied by all who delight in them.

The works of his hands are faithful and just;all his precepts are trustworthy.

Psalm 111:2, 7

T HIS REMARKABLE BOOK documents a journey of personal discovery and intellectual exploration, ranging over some of the greatest questions we face as human beings. Science and religious faith are often declared (generally by those anxious to shut down any discussion of the matter as quickly as possible) to be incompatible. Its an influential view, though resting on an outdated understanding of how we make sense of our world. In this engaging work, Sy Garte takes us on a myth-busting intellectual journey as he tells his own story of discovery and reappraisal, raising questions about some of the most deeply entrenched cultural certainties of our time.

Garte is lyrical in his praise of the natural sciences and helps us capture the sheer sense of wonder and intellectual excitement that accompanies a respectful and loving engagement with the world of nature. The work is shot through with beautifully crafted vignettes of scientific descriptionsuch as the role of quantum entanglement in photosynthesis.

Yet Garte, while celebrating the explanatory successes of the sciences, is alert to their limits. For a start, there are deep questions about meaning and value that science cannot answer. Yet the problems go much deeper than this. Garte highlights some fundamental questions about the rationality of our universe that arise from an appreciation of its uncertainty and strangeness. Can human reason really hope to grasp the complexity of our world? For Garte, the philosophical implications of quantum physics and the role of chance call into question the pure materialism that is so oftenand so wronglydepicted as the natural default ontology of science.

How can such a materialist philosophysomething that is bolted on to the scientific method rather than being its essential foundationhelp us account for our emotional reaction to our world, expressed using rich words such as