God is Law

The universal acknowledgement and exaltation of God as the Creator of the universe, and the God of mercies, take our mind off the fact that the universe and humanity are governed by laws; that God is a God of Law, and Law is Order, and by-laws have the universe been managed all these innumerable years. The Bible is God’s Constitution for humanity, and we owe ourselves the duty of knowing it, and working with it. 

Knowledge of the laws of God is not religion; it is a practical, empiric necessity, the ignorance of which is fatal to nations and to our survival on earth.

Whether we accept or reject the Bible, the laws of God work with inexorable exactitude, and create results with mathematical certainty, such that the state of the earth and that of humanity must be explained in relation to the obedience or disobedience to the laws that regulate both nature and man. 

The laws are several, and encompass planetary laws, ecological laws, spiritual laws, moral laws, personal laws (psychological, social, relational, etc), and laws of governance (justice, economics, leadership, etc.,). What are some of these laws?

Our solar system, with its planets, is governed by laws of physics and mathematics too abstruse for my literary mind to understand. Suffice it to say that a German astronomer and mathematician, Johannes Kepler, using 20-year data collected by a Danish astronomer, Tyco Brahe, formulated the planetary laws known as the Law of

 Ellipses, the Law of Equal Areas, and the Law of Harmonies.  

The Law of Ellipses states that the path of the planets about the sun is elliptical in shape, with the centre of the sun being located at one focus. 

The Law of Equal Areas says that an imaginary line drawn from the centre of the sun to the centre of the planet will sweep out equal areas in equal intervals of time.

The Law of Harmonies states that the ratio of the squares of the periods of any two planets is equal to the ratio of the cubes of their average distances from the sun. 

To these laws we add Isaac Newton’s law of gravity. The confluences of these laws have enabled the planets to move unerringly round the sun in their orbits, and for the sun and other satellites to maintain their positions in space without falling from the skies! 

In contemplating the marvellous universe, the Psalmist declares: Praise Him, sun and moon; Praise Him, all you stars of light! Praise Him, you heavens of heavens, And you waters above the heavens! ― Psalm 148 NKJV.

This aspect of laws has drawn the greatest debates among interpreters of the Bible. There are those who say man is central on earth, and all things must serve his interests, based on the injunction:  

"Be fruitful and multiply; fill the earth and subdue it; have dominion over the fish of the sea, over the birds of the air, and over every living thing that moves on the earth." ­—  ­­Gen 1:28 NKJV)

One writer, Lynn White Jnr, in his essay: The Historical Roots of Our Ecologic Crisis, 155 Science 1205 (1967), states:  "God planned all [creation] explicitly for man's benefit and rule; no item in the physical creation had any purpose save to serve man's purposes." 

This view point might have influenced people to disregard ecological laws and fostered the rapine exploitation of the earth’s resources, with dire consequences, of which galamsey, in Ghana, which has destroyed forests and rivers, is a telling example. 

The consequences of ecological abuse have been horrendous, and that is what UN Secretary-General Antonio Gutteres lamented at the November 2022 Climate Change Conference (COP 27): “Greenhouse gas emissions keep growing.

Global temperatures keep rising. And our planet is fast approaching tipping points that will make climate chaos irreversible. We are on a highway to climate hell with our foot still on the accelerator.”  

(Conservation of Forests –Deut 20:19). Trees oxygenate the air and provide numerous benefits to us. Deforestation is thus injurious to the ecology.

The May 2022 report of the State of the World’s Forests states that the world has lost 420 million hectares (mha) of forests, approximately 10.34 per cent of its total forest area, in the last 30 years, and 15 per cent of 250 emerging infectious diseases have been linked to deforestation.

According to the Food and Agricultural Organisation, Ghana has around 7.9 million hectares of forested land, of which 7.6 are natural or primary forests, and the rest cultivated forests. 

In 2022, Ghana lost 18,000 hectares of primary forest, “one of the biggest increases in forest loss of any country in recent years,” says FAO. 

(The conservation of life – Deut 22:6-7). Here we have conservation and respect for the life of animals in the eco-system. The principle here is applicable to all life forms. Ghana practices conservation within our traditional eco-culture. 

Hunting and fishing are banned in certain periods of the year, no doubt to allow for increased production of new life. Since this is good, the Government must nationalise the practice legislatively, to enhance the vitality of our eco-system.

Deut 23: 13-14: “And thou shall have a paddle upon your weapon, and it shall be, when thou shall ease thyself abroad, thou shalt dig therewith, and shall turn back and cover that which cometh from thee” (NIV)

God abhors open defecation! And, symbolically, filth of any kind! In much of Africa, environmental filth, inclusive of marine pollution, has created diseases such as cholera, malaria and dysentery. 

Creating sanitary conditions for community living is a duty as sacred as life, for God cherishes a clean environment, and Ghanaians must do well to keep Ghana clean!

The writer is a lawyer.

E-mail: akwesihu@yahoo.com