On October 21, I posted a prayer request in my blog about whether or not to continue with my Watchmakers Pulse website and blog. Since that time some wonderful friends have “sponsored” the expense of hosting the site and web domain so that it can continue. I am very grateful to them for doing that. Since our original plan for the site has changed a bit, I’m going to try to adapt it to the changes in our life that have happened since its inception. For those of you who might be new to it, here’s what I originally wrote about the name “Watchmakers Pulse” and what I had intended with it (found in the “About” page on the website.

Watchmaker’s Pulse is built around two concepts. The watchmaker analogy stems originally from William Paley (1743-1805). Paley was a Christian who was a champion for the tenets of natural theology. Based on scriptures such as Psalm 19 (The heavens declare the glory of God…) and Romans 1 (God’s invisible attributes are evident in creation), natural theology involves the principle that God’s activity and handiwork permeate all things, readily visible to those who wish to look and discover them. Paley’s argument was that if a watch were to be found in an open field, one would not presume that it just happened to have been formed. It naturally leads one to the conclusion that it was made by a watchmaker. This train of thought continues across the natural world. Why would someone see a __ (rock, tree, insect, animal, you fill in the blank) and presume that it just happened to have formed without the creative and deliberate work of a maker. It becomes difficult to draw the line between made and not made, using this line of reasoning. It is through this analogy that the term watchmaker is invoked for Watchmaker’s Pulse.

The pulse aspect of the name, of course, refers to the way life can be detected or assessed in a medical sense. More broadly, the word pulse has come to mean any kind of indication of the health or progression of an idea, organization, community, etc. Therefore, the Watchmaker’s Pulse is an organization dedicated to watching for, detecting, pointing out, studying, celebrating, or any other describing of the activity of the Creator.

Natural theology is not an end unto itself. In other words, one must be careful about simply relying on “nature” to reveal the handiwork of the Creator. Romans 1:20 does say that the attributes of God, as exhibited through nature, are visible to everyone so that they are without excuse. However it stands to reason that the same text (the Bible) which makes this assertion also asserts that all scripture is inspired by God (2 Timothy 3), that all humans are sinners and deserving of God’s judgment (Romans 3), and that all who trust God’s mercy as given through the necessary and only purchasing death of Jesus (John 14) will be saved and given eternal life with Him (John 1).

Natural theology is just that – a study of God as exhibited in nature, or God’s general revelation. God’s special revelation is through the Holy Bible, and doctrinal theology is the study of that. Watchmaker’s Pulse is designed to integrate these two principles through a regular examination of the interaction of life, nature, and the scriptures. Welcome to our adventure!