Today's Science In Ancient Times

Job 26: 7-8

He stretches out the Heavens over empty space, and hangs the Earth on nothing whatsoever. He holds the waters in His thick clouds, and the clouds don't split under its weight.

Some science here: 

People used to believe that great pillars held up the Earth, or that Atlas held it on his shoulders, or some other support. But we know now that it really is suspended in "empty space." 

And all the moisture in the clouds that hasn't rained down yet is very heavy, yet the clouds don't split or fall down with the weight, because, "A way to illustrate the relative lightness of clouds is to compare the total mass of a cloud to the mass of the air in which it resides. Consider a hypothetical but typical small cloud at an altitude of 10,000 feet, comprising one cubic kilometer and having a liquid water content of 1.0 gram per cubic meter. The total mass of the cloud particles is about 1 million kilograms, which is roughly equivalent to the weight of 500 automobiles. But the total mass of the air in that same cubic kilometer is about 1 billion kilograms--1,000 times heavier than the liquid!" [Scientific American].   

Job most likely lived in the second millennium B.C. or earlier, before Moses or the Law. Even if the book was written later, Job still had knowledge of the Natural World that was accurate according to modern Science. 

How can that be?

It's because the God Who made it so was still known in Job's day, and He caused His Truth to be recorded in this ancient manuscript. 

Job lived not many years after Adam and Noah lived, so the people who wanted to know God did. It was later that all the other theories were recorded. 

So God's Truth does not change, even though man's theories constantly change. True Science always is the search for God's Truth in the Natural World. 

Even so, come, Lord Jesus!

Prosperous But Not Secure

Job 24: 22-24

... These people may prosper, but they will never feel secure about life. God may let them feel confident and self-reliant, but His eyes are on their ways. 
Such people may be prosperous for a while, but then they're gone. ...

This life is only a moment in the great Scheme of things. In view of eternity past and eternity future, the whole history of this Earth is only a passing moment of time. 

Each human life is only a breath, a disappearing vapor (James 4:14). We're born, and we die, and that little dash on our gravestone is our whole life. 

Some people who are super-rich deny that God has anything to do with their lives. They think that they've earned and deserve all the material wealth they have gathered. But they can enjoy it only as long as they live, only this brief moment in time, then they're gone.

And even when they're here, with all their prosperity, they "never feel secure about life." The richest man in the World was asked, "How much is enough money?" His answer was, "Just a little bit more." Even with all his riches, he still didn't have enough. 

Jesus said, "For what shall it profit a man, if he shall gain the whole World, and lose his own soul? Or what shall a man give in exchange for his soul?" (Mark 8:36-37).

The soul is the spiritual part of each of us that gives life to our bodies. Life is spirit, and when that spiritual part leaves, the body is dead. 

So even if someone can amass great riches, he can only enjoy them while he lives, he can't take it with him when he dies. And even if he lives a long life, what is that in the whole time-line of this Earth? And he will have lost out on the most important part, his eternity. 

Even Job knew that, way back in time probably before Abraham (Job is the oldest book of the Bible). 

God had given Job great riches, then tested him by allowing Satan to take them all away, including his good health and his grown children. After Job passed the test, God allowed him to amass twice as much wealth,  regain his good health, and even double the number of his children. 

People to whom God gives the ability to gain wealth (Deuteronomy 8:18) can lose it all and regain it, sometimes repeatedly. Money is fluid, it flows in and out of a life. God gives the ability to gain wealth to those who live according to His ways, the ways He put into this Earth for the World upon it to operate, by design. And even when a person follows these ways, even if he doesn't know or acknowledge God, he will still experience the consequences of his choices, to either gain or lose wealth. 

When the Israelites followed God's ways, they gained prosperity. But when they were comfortable, they got into the deception that they'd gotten it all by themselves, and began to make poor decisions, which resulted in the loss of their material possessions, and even under the tyranny of outside peoples. Then they turned back to the Lord, crying out to Him, and He sent a military leader to win back their freedom, and they went through the cycle again, over and over (see the Book of Judges). 

This World is still running as it was designed, but Mankind has broken the cycle of blessing, so that most of those living in the World are poor materially. Many don't even have the necessities of life. This is because people have rejected God and His ways, and the people are suffering because of it. 

Leaders of Nations lead unrighteously, having no concern for the people they rule, but sometimes telling them they do; putting scarcity in the place of plenty, and selfishly amassing wealth for themselves. 

But it will do them no good if they have not recognized God for Who He is, having sent His Son Jesus to be our Savior and Messiah to rescue us from the deceit and unrighteousness of the World, and cleansing us of all that besmirches God's creation of us. 

How much better for all of us to seek God and His righteousness in our lives, to share with those in our lives who may not know God yet, and to enjoy Him, along with His blessings. He is our prize; He is our reward; He is our dwelling place; wherever He is, is our home (Philippians 3:14; Psalm 91:9; Lamentations 3:24). 

So whether the Lord gives you the power to get wealth (Deuteronomy 8:18), or He sustains you in your everyday life, He will never allow you to be destitute while you're following Him in His ways (Psalm 37:25). 

The whole chapter 8 of Deuteronomy explains how vulnerable the people will be when they enter this good land and enjoy the prosperity it provides. 

We are all vulnerable, as human beings, to the seductions to deception from the World, our own flesh, and our enemy the Devil. Especially if we come into wealth after being poor. 

The most important, that should have First Priority with each of us, should be to get to know God, seek Him with our full focus, determined to follow His ways.

Jesus is coming soon, and whether I have great wealth with many possessions, or I'm living hand-to-mouth, I want to be ready to meet my Lord either in death or by Rapture, unhindered by things of this World. 

Even so, come, Lord Jesus!

Mars Hill

Acts 17: 22-31

Paul's sermon on Mars Hill, the Areopagus.

V. 22 So Paul stood in the midst of the Areopagus and said, "Men of Athens, I observe that you are very religious in all respects.

This was a high compliment to the people.

V. 23 "For while I was passing through and examining the objects of your worship, I also found an altar with this inscription: TO AN UNKNOWN GOD. Therefore what you worship in ignorance, this I proclaim to you.

He was going to tell them about the God they don't know yet. 

Vs. 24-25 "The God Who made the World and all things in it, since He is Lord of Heaven and Earth, does not dwell in temples made with hands; nor is He served by human hands, as though He needed anything, since He Himself gives to all people life and breath and all things;

God is too big to be able to live in a building. And He is the Source of everything.

V. 26 "And He made from one man every Nation of Mankind 

From Adam, the father of the whole Human Race. 

to live on all the face of the Earth, having determined their appointed times and the boundaries of their habitation,

God is sovereign in having each people live in the portion of the Earth He determined they would live: Orientals in the East, Negroid people in Africa, Caucasian people in the West, and Middle-Easterners in the middle of them all. 

V. 27 "That they would seek God, if perhaps they might grope for Him and find Him, though He is not far from each one of us;

(Jesus lived in the center of the inhabitable Earth, in Jerusalem. He is Savior of us all, everyone all around the center is called to come to Him.)  

V. 28 "For in Him we live and move and exist,

We are God's imagination, so we have our being inside His thoughts; if He were not thinking about us, we wouldn't exist!

"As even some of your own poets have said, 'For we also are His children.'

Some of the Greek philosophers came to the conclusion that we are from God, as though He had a family of human children. He did make us in His image, after His likeness (Genesis 1:26-27). 

V.29 "Being then the children of God, we ought not to think that the Divine Nature is like gold or silver or stone, an image formed by the art and thought of man.

Paul is indulging these Greeks in saying that all human-kind are God's children, to make the point that God is not less than Mankind, as if made of Earth's elements by the craft of Human intelligence; He is way above all that.

V. 30 "Therefore having overlooked the times of ignorance, God is now declaring to man that all people everywhere should repent,

He's saying that they have no more excuse; now is the time for everybody to listen up and be turning their attitudes and thinking processes around to turn away from all the ideas and things and actions and lifestyles that draw us away from God and His ways and the great Salvation He has provided for us all. 

V. 31 "Because He has fixed a Day in which He will judge the World in righteousness through a Man Whom He has appointed, having furnished proof to all men by raising Him from the Dead." 

Here is where Paul is introducing these Greeks to Jesus. They invite him to stay and teach them some more, and some of them joined him and became believers. 

Paul has given us a good overview of how to witness to people who have never known God: Start from where they are coming from and draw them into the story of Redemption. Paul said that he wanted to be all things to all people so that by all means he would be able to bring some to salvation (I Corinthians 9:22). 

As Christians we all should be able to give our personal testimony of how God drew us to Himself (Revelation 12:11), to be ready to share with anyone who asks us why we have hope in this hopeless world, or can be cheerful in the middle of the problem we're facing, or maintain joy in our sorrow (I Peter 3:15). 

Paul told Timothy, who was a young pastor, to also do the work of an evangelist (II Timothy 4:5), even though he wasn't gifted to be an evangelist, but a pastor. So whatever our spiritual gift may be, each of us needs to also present the Gospel to everyone who is willing to listen. 

I hope that you have been reading this continuing blog, and that it has been able to help you know why you believe the way you do, and to back it up with God's Word. To be able to explain these deep truths in a simple way that can be understood by the hearer. 

I want everyone to know my wonderful God. He loves everything and everyone He made as Creator. And He is not willing that any should perish, but that all would come to know Him and His great Salvation through repentance and faith. 

Even so, come, Lord Jesus!

When God Relents

Jonah 3: 8-10

... "Cry loudly to God for help. Turn from your wicked ways and your acts of violence. Who knows? God may reconsider His plans and turn from His burning anger so that we won't die." 

God saw what they did. He saw that they turned from their wicked ways. So God reconsidered His threat to destroy them, and He didn't do it.

God never enjoys destroying the wicked. He would rather they turn from their wicked ways. Always.

God had called Jonah to go preach in Nineveh that God would destroy them in 40 days because of their great wickedness. They deserved it; Jonah had heard all the stories, and may have even witnessed, how cruel and violent these people were, in perpetrating unspeakable cruelty on those they conquered. 

Jonah wanted God to destroy them, and he knew that if they repented that He wouldn't, so he ran in the opposite direction (4:1-2). While he was in the big fish's belly he cried out to the Lord, and He performed a miracle in having that fish vomit him up on dry land, instead of at the bottom of the sea (2:1-10). 

I've seen a picture of a fish cut open with a man inside it. People who have spent any time inside a big fish have all their flesh and hair bleached white from the fish's digestive juices.

Can you imagine how stark Jonah must have looked there in the Middle East? That had to have had an effect on the Ninevites. Johah got only a third of the way through the city when they all decided to repent, from the king down to the lowest servant, and recognized the power of Jonah's God (3:5-9). 

God does destroy the unrepentant evil people, and He destroyed Neneveh a generation later. But He will also always relent and forgive those who repent and turn away from evil.

God has told us His ways; His good, moral, kind, generous ways. Evil is always bad for us, it always hurts and harms us. Ourselves and those around us. 

And God calls all people everywhere (Acts 17:30) to turn from their idolotries and thefts and murders and immoralities (Revelation 9:21), and turn to Him, to recognize that His Son Jesus is our Savior by taking our place in death as our personal Sacrifice (as He fulfilled that first chapter in Leviticus, the individual person's sacrifice). His Blood shed for our forgiveness actually takes away all of our sinfulness, from the grossest sin down to the "innocent" fib, and that Original sin that we inherit from Adam as our "flesh," our "sin-nature."  This cleansing makes us fit to enter Heaven, because God will not tolerate any kind of sin to dwell in His Presence (see Habakkuk 1:13). 

O my Father, You are so kind, so wise, and so powerful to have designed this Earth for us, to put in it everything we need, and to give us Your written Word so we can know You. Thank You for Your Holy Spirit in us to teach us Your Truth, and to be able to understand how all parts of Your Word fit together to tell one Story, the Story of Man, from before the beginning to beyond the end; the Story of our need and Your provision; about Jesus from beginning to end of the Book. 

Thank You for Your great Love, wanting for everyone everywhere to repent and follow Your ways. That is how we can access Your bountiful provision here on this Earth, and be cleansed to spend our Eternity with You. 

Even so, come, Lord Jesus!

Our Generous God

Philippians 4: 17, 19

Not that I seek the gift itself, but I seek for the profit which increases to your account. 
And my God shall supply all your needs according to His riches in glory in Christ Jesus.

Paul wasn't wanting only to have his own needs met, but that those who provided for him would be blessed. "Help me want the Giver more than the giving" (song: "More Than Anything," by Natalie Grant). 

Then those who have been generous with their material goods will be blessed abundantly by God, according to His riches in glory. God is not stingy, He is very generous. He is the Source of riches beyond compare. 

He is the Source of everything that exists, and He is extremely generous with everything He put into this Earth for our use and prosperity. To access this abundance, we only need to follow His ways, according to His purposes for each of us. 

God wants us to prosper, but we don't because we violate His Love He has given us, rejecting it and Him, and do things our own way. Then we deny ourselves and others the good things He put here for us to enjoy by closing off the ways to access them. Governments do this, also businesses and individuals let greed overtake their attitudes. They believe the enemy who tells them that to have something it must be taken from someone else. 

But wealth grows, just as trees grow, crops grow, and children grow. God has designed this environment for our sustenance and benefit; and just as the number of people grows, the capacity to grow what we all need is inherently in the soil and oceans and mountains and streams and our imaginations. 

Whatever you need more of, give it away. God's ways are not our ways. When we hoard, we lose what we have, but when we're generous like God is, then He will multiply what we have to not only meet our needs but have more than we need to share with others. The more generous we are, the more we will receive. It's an upward spiral.

Most of us just don't trust God enough to try Him on this (Malachi 3:10). 

I know I have given away some time when I was "running late," and ended up at my destination on time or even early. Now I try never to hurry, but consider that I will get there in God's time.  

But Paul's talking about money here. Do I trust God enough to give away money for His work even if I think I won't have enough left? Do I tithe off of my top, or wait to see if I'll "have enough"? 

If I wait, I won't have enough. My tithe must come off the top, to receive God's blessing to multiply the 90% to cover more than the 100% covered before. I don't know how He does it, but He stretches what I've tithed on. I have never gone hungry, or lacked a roof over my head or a place to sleep. 

So Paul wanted those in the church at Philippi to benefit by sacrificially giving. Because He knew how generous God is. 

O my Father, You are God. You are God Almighty. You are our Source for all wealth, health, and well-being. You have given us to one another so that we can love one another as You have loved us. When we care enough to notice what their needs are, and take of what You have given us to help them, then the World will know a little of Your character. 

Father, I want others to get to know You, to get acquainted with how wonderful You are, and how You love us all. Help me, Father, to live out Your character in all my relationships with my family and friends and neighbors and clients and readers. And even the strangers I meet while I'm out. 

Even so, come, Lord Jesus!

Our Judge

John 5: 22, 27

For not even the Father judges anyone, but He has given all judgment to the Son.

And He gave Him (the Son) authority to execute judgment, because He is the Son of Man.

God the Father has given to Jesus to be the Judge of the Earth. And not just the Earth but the whole Universe. Why?

All three Persons participated in the Creation, so is (are) the Owner(s). 

Now the Son, the Second Person of the Godhead, has become Man, and bought us with His precious Blood, so we belong to Him by purchase, also. That's why Jesus has all authority to judge.

And those He has redeemed, He has taken upon Himself the wrath due each of us; so those who belong to Him by faith will face Him as Judge for rewards only (the Bema seat, I Corinthians 3:10-15). 

All the rest will face His Justice for all the evil that has deceived them, and drawn them away from what is Good. They will suffer the wrath that sin brings (the Great White Throne, Revelation 20:11-13). 

God takes no pleasure in the death of a wicked person (Ezekiel 18:32; 33:11), because that person has no more opportunity to turn away from wickedness to embrace God's Love, which is what He would much rather they do. 

We are all responsibie for all our choices, even when we think we have no choice but to do what we do. We just don't recognize the alternative, to do what's right. So we all will give an account for even every word that we say (Matthew 12:36-37). And especially our choice to accept or reject that we deserve the Death Jesus died for each of us to save us from the power of sin and death and deception. 

O Father, thank You so much for sending Your own Son, my Lord, Christ Jesus, to be my substitute in Death so that You could give me Your Spirit to live in my spirit, making it alive; now I can communicate with You. Teach me to listen closely for Your quiet voice in my spirit, leading me into the path You want me to take. 

Even so, come, Lord Jesus!

What Was Gain Is Now Loss

Philippians 3: 7-14

But whatever things were gain to me, those things I have counted as loss for the sake of Christ. 
More than that, I count all things to be loss in view of the surpassing value of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord, for whom I have suffered the loss of all things, and count them but rubbish so that I may gain Christ, 
and may be found in Him, not having a righteousness of my own derived from the Law, but that which is through faith in Christ, the righteousness which comes from God on the basis of faith, 
that I may know Him and the power of His Resurrection and the fellowship of His sufferings, being conformed to His death; 
in order that I may attain to the resurrection from the dead. 

Not that I have already obtained it or have already become perfect, but I press on so that I may lay hold of that for which also I was laid hold of by Christ Jesus. 
Brothers, I do not regard myself as having laid hold of it yet; but one thing I do: forgetting what lies behind and reaching forward to what lies ahead, 
I press on toward the goal for the prize of the upward call of God in Christ Jesus. 

Whatever things were gain to me are now loss for detracting from Christ in my life. 

I won't attain the goal of the Resurrection of the dead until Jesus returns, but I will continue to press on, putting in the past what is in the past, and stretching forward to reach what lies ahead, toward the upward call of God in Christ Jesus.

This is a new day, the "first day of the rest of my life." A new start on doing what I can toward the benefit of God's Kingdom that is here on Earth within us now, and will cover the World at His return. 

O my Father, help me, strengthen me to do these things. Teach me how to keep the past in the past, how to reach forward to lay hold of what You are offering me, and to allow the loss of whatever is keeping me from fully embracing You and Your ways in my life. 

Father, you allowed Saul of Tarsis, the Pharisee, to give up all his standing in the community, and the wealth it gave him, to become Paul the Apostle and Evangelist, travelling the whole known World, supporting himself as a tentmaker, and depending on the generosity of strangers to meet his needs. 

I feel like I am on my way to do what Paul did, and I am looking forward to see what that will look like for me. I am not Paul, I am not like Paul in many ways, but I trust that You gave me the dream of vagabonding the World spreading the seed of the Gospel, much like Paul did. 

And I have given up my mansion for a small house, which I don't consider a sacrifice at all, any more than Paul did, in counting all he had before as garbage. 

Father, now that I have turned this corner of ridding myself of that burden and becoming debt-free, please show me step by step what You would have me do to obey You in sowing the seed of the Gospel wherever You have determined is fertile soil. 

Lead me, Father, take my hand and guide me into the very path You have designed me to traverse in this World, until Jesus returns to claim His own. 

Even so, come, Lord Jesus!