Dr. Michael G. Stauss is one of my favorite Sunday School guest teachers and a dynamic speaker at several of my Esther Women lunches.
Stauss, a David Ross Boyd Professor of Physics at the University of Oklahoma, brings a different perspective and deep credibility to his audience. He is an experimental particle physicist who conducts research using some of the most advanced and complex devices ever built by humans, studying the most basic particles and forces that make up the universe.
But he could have been a theologian. Here’s part of his story as he tells it:
“When I was born, my father was doing a PhD in theology at Dallas Theological Seminary (DTS). When John Walvoord, president of the seminary, heard the news of my birth, he sent my parents a letter assuring me that I would be admitted to the seminary when I was old enough to attend. During my senior year of college, I still didn’t know what I wanted to do in life or where God was calling me, but with this letter in hand and excellent grades, I applied to Dallas Theology Seminary.
Since I like physics, I also applied to five graduate schools in physics. I didn’t know if I would be accepted into the physics graduate school, but I knew I would be accepted into the Dallas Theology Seminary.
Except it wasn’t me.
In my cover letter to the seminary, I honestly said that I did not know if God was calling me to a professional Christian ministry, but I am considering that option. Unbeknownst to me, the seminary had made a policy the previous year that only applicants who knew God would call them to a professional Christian ministry would be accepted, and unsure, despite my letter, Dr. Walvoord refused.
But God’s instruction did not end with the door to the seminary closed. Of the five schools I applied for a physics degree in, two of them accepted me and decided to go to UCLA.
On the first day of my first class at UCLA, the professor began reviewing a topic that every freshman physics student should know, but that I had never seen before. That struck me as strange because I had attended the four basic physics subjects that you need to graduate from high school.
However, I began to interview some of my fellow students about their preparation for studying physics. What I learned was shocking!
Every second student had taken each of the four basic physics subjects twice, once in lower classes and once in upper classes. However, since my major was not a physics but a natural science major, I only took each of the basic subjects once at the lower level. I was poor in my physics preparation for about a year!
I quickly realized that as a doctoral student in physics, I would not be able to be successful without the right qualifications. I told my academic advisor that as a bachelor’s degree I had only attended physics classes. He was amazed and asked bluntly, “How did you get in here?”
These words still ring in my ears today. I said something like, “I must have had good grades,” embarrassed, but I actually thought, “Wow, God must have really wanted me to be here!”
You see, by human criteria, I should have been easily accepted into Dallas Theology Seminary and quickly rejected by UCLA. But God is not limited by human criteria. It is trivial for him to close doors that should be open and open doors that should be closed. It moves the hearts of kings (and also the application committees of graduates).
Do you doubt that God can open and close doors for you? Do you doubt that God can do something in your life today that seems impossible? I encourage you to turn that doubt into confidence. God is true to his word when he says, “Anything is possible (Matthew 19:26).”
My career as a particle physicist is proof of that!
“’For my thoughts are not your thoughts, nor are your ways my ways,” proclaims the Lord. ‘As heaven is higher than earth, so are my ways higher than your way and my thoughts higher than your thoughts (Isaiah 55: 8-9).’ “
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