“Many daughters have done virtuously, but thou excellest them all.
Favour is deceitful, and beauty is vain: but a woman that feareth the LORD, she shall be praised. Give her of the fruit of her hands; and let her own works praise her in the gates.” Proverbs 31:29-31 (KJB)
Science
The Wisdom Of The Righteous
“The righteous wisely considereth the house of the wicked: but God overthroweth the wicked for their wickedness.” Proverbs 21:12 (KJB)
“The Righteous One observes the house of the wicked; he throws the wicked down to ruin.” (ESV)
Wrath Or Favor
“The king’s wrath is as the roaring of a lion; but his favour is as dew upon the grass.” Proverbs 19:12
A Cheerful Heart In Evil Days
“All the days of the afflicted are evil: but he that is of a merry heart hath a continual feast.” Proverbs 15:15 (KJB)
Be Wise And Depart From Evil
“The simple believeth every word: but the prudent looketh well to his going.
A wise feareth, and departeth from evil: but the fool rageth, and is confident.” Proverbs 14:15-16 (KJB)
Departing From The Snares Of Death
“The law of the wise is a fountain of life, to depart from the snares of death.” Proverbs 13:14 (KJB)
The Righteous And Their Animals
“A righteous man regardeth the life of his beast: but the tender mercies of the wicked are cruel.” Proverbs 12:10 (KJB)
Counsel Of Wisdom For Those Who Rule
“Counsel is mine, and sound wisdom: I am understanding; I have strength.
By me kings reign, and princes decree justice. By me princes rule, and nobles, even all the judges of the earth.” Proverbs 8:14-16 (KJB)
The Words Of Wise Counsel
“My son, keep my words, and lay up my commandments with thee. Keep my commandments, and live; and my law as the apple of thine eye.
Bind them upon thy fingers, write them upon the table of thine heart. Say unto wisdom, ‘Thou art my sister;’ and call understanding thy kinswoman: that they may keep thee from the strange woman, from the stranger which flattereth with her words.” Proverbs 7:1-5 (KJB)
Establishing The House
“Through wisdom is an house builded; and by understanding it is established: and by knowledge shall the chambers be filled with all precious and pleasant riches.” Proverbs 24:3-4 (KJB)
Wisdom and Flattery
“Keep my commandments, and live; and my law as the apple of thine eye. Bind them upon thy fingers, write them upon the table of thine heart.
Say unto wisdom, ‘Thou art my sister;’ and call understanding thy kinswoman: that they may keep thee from the strange woman, from the stranger which flattereth with her words.” Proverbs 7:2-5 (KJB)
Consider The Ant
“Go to the ant, thou sluggard; consider her ways, and be wise: which having no guide, overseer, or ruler, provideth her meat in the summer, and gathereth her food in the harvest.
How long wilt thou sleep, O sluggard? When wilt thou arise out of thy sleep? Yet a little sleep, a little slumber, a little folding of the hands to sleep: so shall thy poverty come as one that travelleth, and thy want as an armed man.” Proverbs 6:6-11 (KJB)
Understanding Righteousness, Judgment, and Equity
“For the LORD giveth wisdom: out of His mouth cometh knowledge and understanding. He layeth up sound wisdom for the righteous: He is a buckler to them that walk uprightly.
He keepeth the paths of judgment, and preserveth the way of His saints. Then shalt thou understand righteousness, and judgment, and equity; yea, every good path.” Proverbs 2:6-9 (KJB)
The Beginning of Knowledge
“A wise man will hear, and will increase learning; and a man of understanding shall attain unto wise counsels: to understand a proverb, and the interpretation; the words of the wise, and their dark sayings.
The fear of the LORD is the beginning of knowledge: but fools despise wisdom and instruction.” Proverbs 1:5-7 (KJB)
Prophets Speak – Christmas Day One Hundred Thirty and Nine
“Thus says the LORD, which giveth the sun for a light by day, and the ordinances of the moon and of the stars for a light by night, which divideth the sea when the waves thereof roar; The LORD of hosts is His name: ‘If those ordinances depart from before Me, says the LORD, then the seed of Israel also shall cease from being a nation before Me for ever.’ Thus says the LORD; ‘If heaven above can be measured, and the foundations of the earth searched out beneath, I will also cast off all the seed of Israel for all that they have done,’ saith the LORD.” Jeremiah 31:35-37 (KJV)
Because the love and promises of God are so vast, so deep, so broad, to the people of Israel; I can rest assured that His promises to me through Jesus Christ will never, never, never fail.
The science of men has searched, and is continually searched for, and endeavored to measure the vastness of the “heavens”, yet to no avail. They have not fully found the secrets of the whole earth; and never will.
What do I want for Christmas today?
I want you to know the vastness, the depth, and breadth of the love and promises of God for you; how much He loves you is shown in the cross of His Son; in His burial all our sins, shame, guilt, condemnation, and death was left there; in His bodily resurrection He gives us eternal victory over the power of death; I want you to know Him, His love, and His promises; that He never fails.
The Truth: Creation
The following is a quote from Dr. Al Mohler, President of the Southern Baptist Theological Seminary in Louisville, KY.
The denial of a historical Adam and Eve as the first parents of all humanity and the solitary first human pair severs the link between Adam and Christ which is so crucial to the Gospel.
If we do not know how the story of the Gospel begins, then we do not know what that story means. Make no mistake: a false start to the story produces a false grasp of the Gospel.
You may read the articles by clicking here and here.
The whole of the Bible is at stake, if the first nine chapters of Genesis are not historically true. Then, the message of sin, and the good news of the gospel of Christ and His cross would not be needed.
The Bible, including the first nine chapters of Genesis are literally true, the gospel is the good news needed for the world, and Jesus Christ is Lord of all.
-Tim A. Blankenship
Science Needs God
The most recent email update from Answers In Genesis was an interesting one; they all are to me. Dr. Greg Bahnsen has written some articles concerning the matter of science and their need for God. There would be no science [knowledge] apart from God’s creating it.
The following is from the AiG email update in its entirety:
Q: Why does science need God?
A:
It is one of those embarrassing historical ironies that modern science could not have arisen except in the atmosphere of a Christian world-and-life view. Nevertheless, the scientific community today persists in playing the prodigal by assuming an antagonistic stance against the Christianity of divine revelation. Hypnotized by Darwin’s evolutionary scheme and enchanted with the products of scientific technology, modern man has granted science a secularized godship and bows before it in fetish idolatry.
The pitting of science against revelation is certainly odd. For, a certain state of affairs is needed for the scientific endeavor to be meaningful or fruitful. The scientist must believe that the state of affairs is conducive to science, or he would not venture into the scientific enterprise. He must believe that there is a world of things and processes that can be known and that he himself sustains a relationship to this world that allows him to know these objects and events. But then, what reason can the scientist give for his belief that the state of affairs is actually conducive to science? Why is the world such as it is and not otherwise?
Here the scientist, who depends on the self-sufficiency of his logico-empirical procedures, is in a predicament. His response is usually to make various hypotheses about the world and then point to the beneficial results that flow from such hypotheses; he gives, can give, no reason for those hypotheses—they just are, because they work. If pressed, or if he is philosophically inclined, he may even go so far as to say that his “working hypotheses” have no reason unless it be “chance.”
In other words, the consistent naturalistic scientist seems to hold to an irrational set of beliefs about the state of affairs simply in order that his “rational” scientific endeavor may get off the ground. It is rather obvious that prior to any scientific endeavor we must begin either from speculation (about “chance” hypotheses) or from revelation. The Scriptures (of the one Person who knows) reveal how it is that this world, and man in it, are such as to make scientific endeavor meaningful. The state of affairs that exists is due to the creation and providence of the sovereign God. If science (so-called) could actually refute the truths of Scripture, then there would be no actual basis for science at all. The desire of the scientific community to pit its enterprise and conclusions against Christian revelation is ultimately suicidal.
Revelation, Speculation, and Science, the first of our articles by Dr. Greg Bahnsen.
If the link above does not work then maybe this one will. Thanks to Ken Ham and all at Answers In Genesis.
-T.A.
The Precious Life
It is my opinion that the value of human life is on a low scale among humans. It comes across at times that the lives of animals – dogs, cats, horses, etc. – are of more value than the human being who may not be able to “contribute much to society…” If they are going to be born with a medical problem many parents are now given the suggestion “Abort this baby. He/she is not going to be able to contribute much to society” or something similar to that.
The following is a quote from the mother of a child with Down syndrome:
“I’d much prefer society eradicate prejudice than eradicate all babies with Down syndrome. I could go into all the ways our son has made our lives better — and certainly our hearts bigger. Our lives would not be better if, as we were advised even before we declined the recommended test, we never had him. But society won’t listen.”
The quote if from an article in Baptist Press by Andrea Higgins, titled, “Don’t Use The ‘R’ Word”. If you would like to read the article you may by going to Baptist Press. I think you will enjoy the article.
Another thing, back off of Sarah Palin. She is a responsible mother, and the fact that her oldest daughter is having a child shows that our youth today have a problem. No one’s young people are exempt, not even a Presidential or Vice Predential candidate.
The daughter has determined to keep the child, and raise him/her, with a husband and the father, themselves. Applaud her, but don’t condemn her or her mother. You better look at your own life before you condemn.
-Tim A. Blankenship
Stem Cell Research – Changing???
Here is an interesting article from FAITH AND FAMILY VALUES:
LIFE DIGEST: Researchers moving to reprogrammed cells from embryonic ones
– Aug 19, 2008
Prominent scientists previously committed to stem cell research that destroys human embryos apparently are shifting their allegiance to reprogrammed stem cells that do no harm.
Harvard Stem Cell Institute’s George Daley, a former president of the International Society for Stem Cell Research, is talking up reprogrammed, or induced pluripotent stem cells (IPSCs), the online newsletter BioEdge reported Aug. 14. Only three years ago, Daley testified before a U.S. Senate committee that reprogramming was “extremely high-risk” and cloning for destructive embryonic stem cell research (ESCR) was preferred, according to BioEdge.
Daley and fellow researchers have used reprogrammed stem cells to produce cell lines for 10 diseases, including muscular dystrophy, juvenile diabetes, Parkinson’s disease and Down syndrome, according to a report in the journal Cell, Bio Edge reported.
“We wanted to produce a large number of disease models for ourselves, our collaborators and the stem cell research community to accelerate research,” Daley said. “The original embryonic stem cell lines are generic, and allow you to ask only basic questions. But these new lines are valuable tools for attacking the root causes of disease. Our work is just the beginning for studying thousands of diseases in a Petri dish.”
As a result, Daley and other scientists have progressed further using reprogrammed cells “in six months than he had in years toiling over embryonic stem cells,” BioEdge observed.
The California Institute for Regenerative Medicine (CIRM) appears to be moving toward IPS cell research as well, according to BioEdge. In an Aug. 13 news release, CIRM described itself as “the largest source of funding for embryonic and pluripotent stem cell research in the world” after long calling itself a funding source only for ESCR, according to the newsletter.
“It appears that the CIRM’s love affair with slow, inefficient, expensive, ethically fraught and legally complex human embryonic stem cells may be drawing to a close,” BioEdge commented.
Bioethics specialist Wesley Smith wrote of the developments on his weblog, “It may not yet be a full fledged exodus, but it would appear that the tide has changed dramatically.
“If this continues, and it becomes clear that the tide is irreversibly flowing toward IPSCs, the political ability to create an international ban on human cloning with the catcalls of CURES! CURES! CURES! to distract leaders from doing the right thing will increase. We may actually be able to throttle human cloning before it gets too far out of the test tube.”
Reprogrammed cells, or IPSCs, gained worldwide attention in November when research teams in Japan and Wisconsin reported they converted normal human skin cells into stem cells that were, in effect, embryonic in nature.
Embryonic stem cells are considered “pluripotent,” meaning they can develop into all of the different cell types in the body. Adult stem cells, also referred to as non-embryonic stem cells, typically have been regarded as “multipotent,” meaning they can form many, though not all, of the body’s cell types. The 2007 study results showed adult cells can become “pluripotent.”
The stunning reports were issued only days after cloning pioneer Ian Wilmut startled the scientific world by announcing he had abandoned research, or therapeutic, cloning in favor of the reprogramming method.
Stem cells are the body’s master cells that can develop into other cells and tissues, giving hope for the development of cures for a variety of diseases and other ailments.
BioEdge says its seeks to promote ethics and compassion in medicine.
You can find this article and more at this link.
-Tim A. Blankenship
Scientist Playing God
It seems to me that in the 1940’s there was a man who was trying to perfect a certain race. According to him there were some people who were not worthy of living and thus, he proceeded to have 11,000,000 people murdered. Some were burned alive, some were gassed, and it seems that some may have been buried alive. There are people of our race [the human race] who want to deny these events ever happened, but what planet were they born on.?
Just recently I read the story of a British woman who selected a “cancer free” embryo, and destroyed the ones remaining. Are doctors and scientist playing like they are God now? Is this not what Hitler was trying to do as well. The only difference being it is being done earlier in the stage of human life.
Let me give you an excerpt from the article I read:
“A London woman is carrying Great Britain’s first baby guaranteed not to inherit breast cancer, but she had to eliminate several of her other embryonic offspring to do so.
Doctors used preimplantation genetic diagnosis (PGD), a controversial screening method, to determine which of the 11 embryos created by means of in vitro fertilization (IVF) had the gene that would have resulted in a female child having a 50 to 85 percent chance of developing breast cancer, according to The Times of London.
Six of the embryos tested positive for the gene and were rejected. Two embryos without the gene were implanted, producing a pregnancy of 14 weeks as of June 29, and two others were frozen, The Times reported.
The 27-year-old mother, who desires to remain unnamed, and her 28-year-old husband are fertile, but they chose IVF and PGD because of the prevalence of breast cancer on one side of the family. The husband had tested positive for the gene, known as BRCA-1.
“For the past three generations, every single woman in my husband’s family has had breast cancer, as early as 27 and 29,” the mother said, according to The Times. “We felt that, if there was a possibility of eliminating this for our children, then that was a route we had to go down.’”
If you would like to read the rest of the article you may go to Cancer free Child .
I can understand people not wanting to have children with diseases, but those things are out of our hands. Life and death are in God’s hands, and until we realize that and we continue on the path of selection for our children or others, this is going to lead to a destruction of human life far beyond that of the Jewish Holocaust. It already has through the abortion of the unborn babies of America and the rest of the world. Now, in the name of science and health, there will be another. Again, let’s stop playing God, and let God give the life and take the life, when He chooses.
-Tim A. Blankenship
Women and Intelligence
It seems that there has been for many years a debate over the origins of the human race. I have never made any secret of my personal belief that we are created in the image of God, both male and female. I have also never made it a secret that I believe what the Bible says concerning the order, means, and days of creation.
When the Bible tells us God created the stars, planets, moons, the plants, the animals, then the man and woman in six days, then I believe that is what God meant. I know some view me as being of lesser intelligence because of that, but the non-theist who holds to the theory of evolution seems to be of lesser intelligence in my mind.
I have written on the matter of Creation in previous articles on this blog. If you desire to read them you may go to Fire and Hammer and click on the category Creation, or click on either of these links to find days 1-4 of Creation.
The reason I am writing this article is because I received the weekly email from Answers in Gensis (AiG), and they had read an article from “Answers” magazine dealing with the book by Darwin, “Origin of the Species”. In the book he gives reference to the “Inferiority of women”. Darwin, as many of you know supported the view of “Survival of the fittest” and women are not the fittest according to Darwin. They have apparently survived because the men have always protected them. From what I have read, that seems to be his implication.
According to the article:
“According to Charles Darwin, the central mechanism of evolution is survival of the fittest. In this concept, inferior animals are more likely to become extinct while the superior ones are more likely to thrive.1 The racism that this idea has produced has now been both well-documented and widely publicized.2 Less widely known is the fact that many evolutionists, including Darwin, taught that women were both biologically and intellectually inferior to men.”
And the reason “women are inferior to men”?
“women were less evolved than men, and because of their smaller brains, they were “eternally primitive,” childlike, less spiritual, more materialistic, and “a real danger to contemporary civilization.”3“
Why do many women support the idea of evolution when the “father of their faith” believed women to be inferior. The Bible begins by putting the woman [Eve] on equal par with the man [Adam]. Both made in the image of God. Adam was the head of the woman because he was created first, and that is what God ordained. It in no way makes man superior, and the woman inferior no more than, as a man, the General is superior to the private. Only in order of rank is the General superior.
Like men, there are many women who are very intelligent; and there are some men and women who need much help when it comes to intelligence. When it comes to God and Creation, anyone who believes all we see, touch, hear, feel, smell and taste “just happened”, needs help. Anyone who believes that those things which cannot be seen, touched, heard, felt, smelled and tasted, such as the atom, “just happened” needs help in the area of intelligence as well.
I am not the most intelligent man, but I have enough to know that anything that has order, design, and purpose had a designer. I also know that Designer to be God when it comes to the Creation. I also know that there are many women, most of them as a matter of fact, who can survive quite well without a man. However, where would the world be without the two loving and caring for each other? Especially as God has designed it.
-Tim A. Blankenship
Noah The Farmer; The Vineyard and the Wine
Noah The Farmer; The Vineyard, and His Wine
Anyone who would approach the study of beverage alcohol from a Biblical perspective, and would say that alcoholic beverage is not even referred to would be naive at the least and deceptive at the most. I am not going to approach it from either perspective. There is alcoholic wine in the Bible, and it was abused by godly people. Was it ever used properly? That may be an answer we will get to sometime later in these studies, conclusions, or essays.
The title suggest something to us of Noah. Noah of the ark, who built the ark designed by God. Noah; who found grace in the eyes of the LORD. Noah; who “walked with God”. Noah; who was used by God to save humankind from destruction.
In this post and future ones I make it no secret, my agenda is to try and persuade Christians against the use of beverage alcohol. This first post gives us a Bible example of the folly of drinking alcohol.
Hear the example of Noah from God’s Word:
“And Noah began to be a farmer, and he planted a vineyard. Then he drank of the wine and was drunk, and became uncovered in his tent.” Genesis 9:20 (NKJV).
Let me say here that there is nothing, absolutely nothing wrong with grapes and grape juice. Vineyards produce grapes, and with some effort from men, they will produce grape juice; and then, with some aging the juice will ferment and become alcoholic naturally with its sugars.
Drunkenness is clearly rebuked, and condemned by Scripture. Noah sinned by his drunkenness. Did he know that this fruit of the vine had become alcoholic, and lead to becoming drunk? Quite possibly. We learn from Noah, that even the best of juices need to be drank in moderation. Even water should be drank in moderation. The reason I bring that up is; just a several months ago, in 2007, a woman in the State of California, entered a contest seeing who could drink the most water the quickest, she won, and she died. The autopsy said she died of “Water intoxication”. Even with this though there was no harm that came to others.
In Noah’s case harm did come to others. He brought shame on His family. He brought a curse upon his grandson, and his heirs. Noah brought shame to himself.
“And Ham, the father of Canaan, saw the nakedness of his father, and told his two brothers outside. But Shem and Japheth took a garment, laid it on both their shoulders, and went backward and covered the nakedness of their father. Their faces were turned away, and they did not see their father’s nakedness.” Genesis 9:21-23 (NKJV).
Surely you can see by Noah’s drunkenness, that if you never take up the habit of drinking the wine [any beverage alcohol] you will never get drunk. You will not bring this embarrassment into your family. You will not get in a car and harm other people on the highways, and roads of our land. You will not bring shame to your name, at least in this fashion.
There are many physicians which tell us that there are medicinal qualities in wine, and more in certain kinds of wine. One of my own doctors, after he had told me that my good cholesterol number was too low, and I asked him how to improve it told me, “Drinking a little wine would be one place to start”. For me that was completely out of the picture. I have heard the studies, which have told us that the pure fruit of the vine is just as good for those benefits, and I enjoy my daily glass of red grape juice. Grapejuice does have all the medicinal qualities that wine does. There is scientific evidence which proves it. And the juice does it without alcohol. There are no health qualities in beverage alcohol. That is no excuse for drinking, and taking the chance of getting drunk. The only medicinal use I could think of for alcohol is for cuts and bruises, and maybe for dulling of the senses when a minor surgery or something would be done without any other anesthetic available.
Look what happened to Noah; sure he had every right to enjoy the fruits of his labor. He evidently had purposely made the wine; then he proceeded to drink the wine and very much over did himself, and became drunkened by the alcohol, then he did something he would not in his normal state of mind done. He uncovered himself openly in his tent. The thing about the drinking of anything alcoholic is that you never know how much it will take to cause you to lose your moral decision making process. How can a Christian in a society which is driven by alcohol stand in their church, or any Christian setting and argue and defend the drinking of beverage alcohol? I say “society which is driven by alcohol” because when a news channel for two years in a row on “Derby Day” gives a recipe on the making of a “mint Julip” or something like that – which is a purly strong alcoholic drink – and they live as though it is just a dream drinking the beverages; it is surely a society driven by alcohol. Many of the commercials on television and in Newspapers, and magazines are from the alcohol industry.
Noah did not have the pressure of society to cause him to drink to drunkenness; and preachers today scream legalism when other preachers, teachers or myself tell us it is a matter of calling to righteous and holy living and protecting the name of Christ. The more the preachers speak of silence from the Scriptures concerning beverage alcohol, the more the numbers of alcoholics and drunks will increase. Whether we want to accept it or not, our silence is our approval. Your people, old and the young especially, are waiting to hear from you. Give them the facts, give them the pictures, give them the warnings from God’s Word, and trust God to work. If you are God’s man in the pulpit you have that responsibility. If you don’t you may start finding your people’s moral compasses failing; or even your own.
I pray this will make you think before you drink. You may not be able to think afterwards.
-Tim A. Blankenship
Science, Christianity, and The Bible
Science, Christianity, and The Bible
There are some who are trying to tell us that science and the Bible cannot agree. That, Christianity and the Bible are in complete opposition to science. There really could be nothing further from that thought.
Just what is the meaning of “Science”? The word itself means knowledge. The Bible cannot be in opposition to “Knowledge” because that is what is within the pages of God’s Word – the Bible. There must be some thought put to having knowledge.
There is a so-called knowledge which endeavors to tell us that the earth, and the universe in which we reside; as well as the occupants of this world and universe are products of an accidental explosion, without any order, and all of this just happened to come forth out of the chaos. Is that real “Science”? Is that “Knowledge”? Real science would acknowledge that there is order in the universe. The order allows the true scientist to figure out the time of the morning “sunrise”, and the setting of the evening “sunset”.
Real science can give you the dimensions of an archaeological discovery of an ancient city wall, and tell you that it had a maker, and can sometimes even discover who that maker was. Real science can tell you that 1 + 1 = 2, and that if there was no order to this universe they would not be able to tell you anything of any real significance.
Could a tornado hit a scrap metal yard, and a car just happen to pop up out of the chaos? What would the chances of that be? I have heard the figures on that, but it is so astronomical, there wouldn’t be enough room for anything but zeros in this article. So there would be absolutely no chance of that happening. How about a house being built by that same tornado as it swept through a forest? Probably the same amount of zeros. Where is the science – the knowledge – in evolutionary thought. It seems to truly be without thought.
Let’s think about this thing called SCIENCE. True science recognizes that there is order to the universe. True science knows that 1 + 1 = 2, and 2+2=4. It also knows that it takes a builder to build a wall or a house; and true science will truly recognize that there was a builder, designer for something so much more grand, beautiful, and larger as this universe; and all that is in it. True science would recognize the grandeur of the human body; its design, its many vessels throughout, the muscles, the eyes, the ears. Not recognizing a designer is to deny sense, sensibililty and true science.
The true scientific mind will recognize the truth. Science will rely on the evidence, and all evidence for the universe and all that is in it is clearly to the clear thinking, and knowledgeable mind; there is a Creator. He designed it and everything within the universe. He designed the earth, and all life upon it; and He designed and made one special creation in His own image. That is man.
In my mind it is a bit unclear why some of those who are made in their Creator’s image want to say that their Creator does not exist. They try to throw out the Creator for the lie. They want to rule their own lives, and never have to answer to anyone, but themselves.
The Bible, Christianity and Science fit quite well together. As a Christian I recognize that there is order in the universe; and recognize that houses are designed by designers/architects, and built by builders. I know that, because I have helped build a few, and worked on remodeling others, and it does not happen by accident. To say anything else would just be clear foolishness.
The Bible tells us that “The fear of the LORD is the beginning of knowledge” (Proverbs 1:7). That tells me that science, ie., true science must begin with God. If you begin anywhere else it is faulty science. Science will not give you knowledge of the Bible, but the Bible will give you knowledge of science. In this previous sentence it could really be worded like this: “Knowledge will not give you knowledge of the Bible, but the Bible will give you knowledge of knowledge.” Strange right? But nevertheless correct. Do not fall into the trap of interpreting the Bible with science; interpret science with the Bible.
If you are searching for truth in science, then you must begin with God. Remember, “In the beginning God…” (Genesis 1:1). Beginning anywhere else will lead to grave and dangerous error; and it could be at the expense of your God – given eternal soul.
I once met a man, an atheist, who was highly educated. I introduced myself, and told him what I was doing, making visits as the pastor of a small town church, and meeting some people; and I started to question him of what he believed about God. His answer somewhat surprised me. “Haven’t you realized that the geological evidence clearly proves that the earth has no creator”, not necessarily verbatim, but close. He proceeded to say he did not believe there was a god of anykind. My answer was, “You mean to tell me that you can believe that the house you live, the one you are standing in now, could’ve just popped up here by accident?” Do you know what his answer to that was? “That has nothing to do with it.” Then he proceeded to tell me of his education, his major in geology, and his degree in geology; as though that should be proof enough. It really did not do anything profound for me. He asked my degree of education, to which I responded, “NO college”. I do have enough sense to know that it takes a Designer to build something so vast and wide as this universe, and its living inhabitants. Christians do not despise education, nor science; true science. All science must begin with God. Anything else, science, religion, or education that begins with man, or earth, or anything worldly will fall short or truth. That is SCIENCE; that is BIBLE; and that is what I believe as a CHRISTIAN.
-by Tim A. Blankenship
Altar of Worship
An Altar of Worship
“And Noah builded an altar unto the LORD; and took of every clean beast, and of every clean fowl, and offered burnt offerings on the altar. And the LORD smelled a sweet savour; and the LORD said in his heart, I will not again curse the ground any more for man’s sake; for the imagination of man’s heart is evil from his youth; neither will I again smite any more every thing living, as I have done. While the earth remaineth, seedtime and harvest, and cold and heat, and summer and winter, and day and night shall not cease.” Genesis 8:20-22 (KJV)
This is the first mention of the building of an “Altar unto the LORD”. It is assumed, at least by me, that Adam and Eve would have built an altar, and that in the offerings of Cain and Abel; they would have built an altar, and that the men “call[ing] on the name of the LORD” (4:26) would have meant the building of altars; but this is the first mention of it in the Bible. Noah was a worshipper of God before he went into the ark: he had proven it by His obedience. He was a worshipper on the ark: he had proven it there by his patient faith. Now, he is off the ark, going back onto the solid soil and rock of the earth. He wanted to start off this new world in the right way, the God-way, and worship the Creator who had delivered them all. The altar is recognition of God’s presence, power, glory, and deliverance from the evil of the world.
This offering was made by the sacrifice of every clean animal – one of each. That would probably have included cattle, sheep, goats, and the clean fowl. It was a complete sacrifice and offering to the LORD God. God Himself received it. “And the LORD smelled a sweet savour…” means that it was pleasant in His sight, and that He received the humble act of His servant Noah. Moses, as the author of Genesis tells us, writing, “…And the LORD said in His heart, ‘I will not curse the ground any more for man’s sake; for the imagination of man’s heart is evil from his youth; neither will I again smite any more every thing living, as I have done. While the earth remaineth, seedtime and harvest, and cold and heat, and summer and winter, and day and night shall not cease”. This was God’s covenant with Himself; as far as Noah was concerned. It was also His covenant with man and the earth.
It is due to this covenant that we are dependent upon the sunshine for heat, and the seasons to guide us when to plant crops, and harvest our crops. It is my opinion that this was the beginning of the seasons; Spring, Summer, Autumn, and Winter. That due to the ecological upheaval that happened due to the flood, the caverns of the earth bursting forth, the canopy of the earth bursting and pouring forth the water; all had changed. We all know that the earth is enduring and endures much more than any of us.
It is amazing that God gives us this order of things. It is the only means by which science could be studied. If there is no order to things, there would be nothing sure. The scientist of our day can tell us what time the sun’s rising and setting will be. They can tell us how close a passing comet will pass to the earth or another planet. If there were no order there could be no science, at least, no reliable science. God gives us the means for true science. It is in Him and His Word that we trust.
Broken Pieces 