PROGRESS ACCORDING TO WHO?

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The Air We Breathe: How we all came to believe in freedom, kindness, progress, and equality Glen Scrivener Good Book Company, 2022

I gave a brief review of this book by the Australian pastor Glen Scrivener (now living in the UK) in a recent post. However, I would like to share more and encourage you further to purchase his book. It will equip you to engage in good conversations with the lost and with the Holy Spirit’s guidance help you to bring them to a knowledge of the truth. As a reminder Scrivener’s main thesis for his book:

“Today in the west, many consider the church to be dead or dying. Christianity is seen as outdated, bigoted, and responsible for many of society’s problems. This leaves many believers embarrassed about their faith and many outsiders wary of religion. But what if the Christian message is not the enemy of our modern Western values, but the very thing that makes sense of them?”

SCRIVENER ON PROGRESS

Progress does have a dark side. Darwin proclaimed biological progress (evolution by random chance versus creation by an intelligent designer), Hegel, historical progress (Hegel’s providence is not the providence of the Judeo-Christian God. Rather, Hegel argues that universal history is itself the divine Spirit or Geist manifesting or working), Freud, psychological progress, and Marx, economic and political progress. The ugly fruit of such philosophies notwithstanding, Christian ideals run through them like veins in blue cheese. But without a vertical reference (God unacknowledged), the desire for progress all too easily spawns violence. The 20th century was the most blood-stained in history, the ‘murder century’. Think of Stalin’s Holodomor (Ukrainian: murder by famine) and purge of tens of millions in the 1930s, or of Chairman Mao’s ‘Great Leap Forwards’ (1958–1962), where over 45 million died of overwork, starvation, or murder—not to mention the horrors of death camps like Auschwitz. Post-WWII, a moral standard was needed to establish the ‘self-evident’ moral truths so bespattered by the Nazis. As with slavery, those atrocities were deemed “crimes against humanity” but few admitted they were crimes against God. If they were mere “crimes against humanity”, we have a dilemma, for humanity was on both sides (evil oppressors and their victims). Scrivener states pithily, “If
we’re all squabbling apes, then there’s no transcendent justice in condemning Nazism” (p. 181). So what price progress?

Secularism today, having fled past evils, now pursues values like rights, freedom, and progress, but divorces them from their source. This concurs with Tom Holland’s thesis in Dominion—without Christianity’s humanity-enhancing teaching about the image of God, the ruthless suppression of weaker minorities fits evolutionary logic: “To believe that God had become man and suffered the death of a slave was to believe that there might be strength in weakness, and victory in defeat. Darwin’s theory, more radically than anything that previously had emerged from Christian civilization, challenged that assumption. Weakness was nothing to be valued. Jesus, by commending the meek and the poor over those better suited to the great struggle for existence, had set Homo sapiens on the downward path toward degeneration. For eighteen long centuries, the Christian conviction that all human life was sacred had been underpinned by one doctrine more than any other: that man and woman were created in God’s image.”

Transgender advocates want equality, compassion, and consent, but they divorce these from Christianity and recombine them
differently. Equality becomes a radical individualism as people emphasize rights over institutions and community. Compassion risks becoming what sociologists have termed ‘competitive victimhood’, and perceived victim status is used to gain an advantage. This leads to clashes between different minority groups—e.g. feminists versus trans-rights activists—so whose suffering takes precedence? Divorcing sexual consent from Christian values is a wrecking ball as far as marriage, family, and the wider community are concerned. As Scrivener points out, “Consent is vital, but it is not a sufficient foundation for sexual ethics” (p. 194). Progressive secularization is not a sustainable strategy! The WEIRD (Western, Educated, Industrialized, Rich, and Democratic) values upon which Scrivener’s book focuses are strongly believed by all, but people in Western society are
making a hash of applying them in everyday life. Compared to the ancient world, equality, compassion, consent, enlightenment, science, freedom, and progress were given a makeover by Christianity, and these are dear to the hearts of modern people. As
Scrivener says, “These are our creedal convictions, and, by and large, we are a society of believers” (p. 197). But even as people are straining to discard Christianity, they continue with their moralizing: “If anyone blasphemes our WEIRD values … we ‘cancel’ them—that is, we ostracise them socially and professionally. This is really a modern form of ‘ex-communication’ for modern kinds of ‘heretics’” (p.198). And anyone can find themselves a target, especially, as the author wryly observes, with the turbo-charging of outrage made possible by social media. In today’s ‘cancel culture, there is plenty of guilt, but without grace, forgiveness is nowhere in sight! Scrivener is right on the money in noting that the denial of King Jesus while trying to retain Christian ideals,
brings judgment, not liberation: “In order to pursue the kingdom without the King, we have had to dethrone the person of Christ and install abstract values instead. … [But] Values can only judge you” (p. 200). People need the Gospel of hope, so the author invites readers to consider how history will judge them— more especially how will God judge them? Wonderfully, Christ came not to police people’s morals so much as to heal them, cleanse them, and forgive needy, despondent human beings.

Scrivener skilfully defends the Gospels and their accounts of Christ, and he does so in a highly original and compelling manner,
demonstrating their sheer genius. The strong evangelistic approach is fresh, not hackneyed. Jesus, the History Maker, is the One behind the values so cherished by the West—He embodies them. In fact, Christ loved this world to death, pioneering life for all violators of those values through His Resurrection. This is not a book that fizzles out toward the end. In its closing pages,
Scrivener appeals in turn to the three categories of readers mentioned in the second paragraph of this review. It is refreshingly honest and very well executed. To Christians, he writes, “In all this, great wisdom is needed to discern the Christian-ish values of a
WEIRD culture from true Christianity” (p. 230). Absolutely, and this book deserves to be very widely read to equip us to convey the truth to those the Holy Spirit brings across our path.

VALUABLE NEW CHRISTIAN BOOKS

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The Air We Breathe: How we all came to believe in freedom, kindness, progress, and equality by Glen Scrivener. Good Book Company, 2022

This gripping book is apologetics gold: historically informed, cogently argued, relevant and contemporary, and sparkles with interest from start to finish. It is certainly deserving of the many inside-cover commendations from various Christian movers and shakers. And not just believers, for British historian (and non-Christian) Tom Holland writes: “It is not necessary
to be a Christian to appreciate the force of Glen Scrivener’s argument in this punchy, engaging, and entertaining book.

Scrivener’s main thesis:

The publisher’s own succinct statement is excellent:
“Today in the west, many consider the church to be dead or dying. Christianity is seen as outdated, bigoted, and responsible for many of society’s problems. This leaves many believers embarrassed about their faith and many outsiders wary of religion. But what if the Christian
message is not the enemy of our modern Western values, but the very thing that makes sense of them?”

The Three Pillars of Evolution Demolished: Why Darwin was wrong by Jerry Bergman. Westbow Press, IN, 2022

Jerry Bergman is a well-known creationist author who has extensively published over many decades and who has taught at several universities. He has taught biology, biochemistry,
anatomy and physiology, genetics, and other courses for over 40 years. He has over 1,700 publications in both scholarly and popular science journals and monographs.
The three pillars of evolution identified by Bergman are abiogenesis (aka chemical evolution), natural and sexual selection, and mutations. The author of this book finds all three of these pillars defective as evidence for evolution.

Bergman has examined claims of abiogenesis, the nature of mutations, and the explanatory power of natural selection. As in the title of this book, he has thoroughly demolished them. The
monopoly of the theory of evolution, in academia, is all the more irresponsible. In fact, it is puzzling apart from the possibility that God gave them over to a reprobate mind.

“So I gave them over to their stubborn hearts, to follow their own counsels.” Psalms 81:12

“The fool says in his heart, “There is no God.” They are corrupt, they do abominable deeds;
there is none who does good.” Psalms 14:1

“And even as they did not like to retain God in their knowledge, God gave them over to a reprobate mind… ” Romans 1:28

The Misted World of Genesis 1 by Michael Drake, Wycliffe Scholastic, Auckland, 2020

The Misted World of Genesis 1 is a forceful and deep defense and exposition of the traditional ‘historical week’ reading of Genesis 1 (figure 1). Author Michael Drake is the Founding Principal (Retired) of Carey College, a Year 1–13 Christian School in Auckland. He focuses on more recent interpretive strategies to harmonize Genesis 1 and long-age geology/evolution that draws on recent theories of linguistics, biblical scholarship, and Ancient Near Eastern (ANE) studies. The book is divided into two main sections: part 1 is a critique of contemporary long-age-friendly approaches to Genesis 1, and part 2 is a positive exposition of Genesis 1.

When Drake is dealing with the Genesis 1 text, he is almost always very careful and cogent. Sadly, this is not as much the case when dealing with those he critiques, which makes part 1 much weaker than part 2. Nonetheless, there is a lot of useful material in Drake’s analysis, and it repays close examination even where one disagrees. Drake has done his homework, and even if I don’t agree with all his solutions, his commitment to a clear and uncompromising exposition of Genesis 1 as the foundation of our faith is clear. May we all read Genesis 1 with the clarity Drake does.

Unearthing the Bible: 101 archaeological discoveries that bring the Bible to life by Titus Kennedy. Harvest House Publishers, Eugene, OR, 2020

In Unearthing the Bible, Dr Titus Kennedy isolates and illuminates 101 archaeological discoveries that buttress the thesis that the Bible is a reliable historical record by the traditionally recognized authors at the traditionally accepted times they lived. Kennedy’s book should be in the hands of everyone serious about a historical study of the Bible. Sketching
101 intersections between God’s Word and archeological evidence, Kennedy crafts a sturdy structure of information and argument that makes clear that belief in the truth, accuracy, and
reliability of the biblical narrative is not merely possible, but it is sensible and rational. Indeed, it takes a full dose of willful blindness and/or intellectual dishonesty to refuse to acknowledge
the legitimacy and implications of some of these artifacts. Complete with photographs and translations of ancient inscriptions, a helpful principle of organization, and explanations that
are clear and coherent, the book is a genuinely useful tool.

Kennedy’s book is a collection of convincing illustrations that scientific evidence does not contradict God’s Word. Just as biology, geology, chemistry, and physics are consistent with the Bible, the evidence found in archaeology is consistent with the Bible. Dr Kennedy has just released his next book, Excavating the Evidence for Jesus: The archaeology and history of Christ and the Gospels. I am eager to discover the biblical truths confirmed in his new book.

All of these books are reviewed comprehensively in the latest edition of Journal of Creation 2022 Vol 36 Issue 3. http://www.creation.com

BIG BANG IMPOSSIBLE

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Galaxies that weren’t supposed to exist

It’s hard to overstate the discrepancy between secular expectations and the James Webb Space Telescope’s (JWST) observations. Remember, just a few years ago, astronomers believed that galaxies would need at least three billion years (and possibly up to six billion years) to form.

Secular astronomers were already shocked when massive, mature galaxies were found to exist when the Universe was supposedly five billion years old. Now they have to grapple with JWST’s observations of galaxies that (according to their worldview) already existed just 230 million years after the Big Bang.

The left image (from NASA, ESA, CSA, and STScI) is from Hubble. The right image (from NASA, ESA, CSA, STScI) is from JWST. Note that the JWST doesn’t just produce more detail—it also reveals objects that weren’t previously visible at all. It’s turning out that many of these regions contain a lot more galaxies than were previously known. They were too dim to be seen with other telescopes, but they are visible to the JWST. In the images above, there are many examples of this. Look at all the galaxies in the JW photo that aren’t apparent in the Hubble photo. And a surprising number of these newly-discovered galaxies aren’t irregulars or peculiars. They’re disk galaxies.

That’s less than one-quarter of one billion. (And it’s only eight percent of three billion.)

Put another way, the JWST is showing galaxies that (from a secular perspective) already existed more than 2.75 billion years before they were supposed to be possible.

And even though this is shockingly early from the secular perspective, the problem is actually even worse than that. These galaxies weren’t forming at this time; they had already formed.

This means that the actual formation process must have occurred even earlier. Possibly much earlier.

We see this in a variety of ways:

  • As we’ve already mentioned, the JWST is observing massive galaxies at these distances. If small irregulars formed first and then merged into more massive galaxies later (as secular astronomers believe), then this had already happened in the regions that JWST is observing.
  • There is also evidence of larger-scale structure. Some of the galaxies have the same approximate redshift, indicating that they are in a “group or proto-cluster”. The models say that this structure wouldn’t exist immediately, so it would take time to form. But in these images, it seems to already exist.
  • Many of the faraway galaxies are quite bright. A few are comparable to, or even brighter than, our Milky Way galaxy.
  • Many of the galaxies are quite dense. As this study notes, in some regions stellar mass density is “three orders of magnitude higher than anticipated.” In other words, some of these galaxies have a density of stars that’s more than 1,000 times the expected value.
  • They are chemically mature. For example, there is a “surprising richness” of elements such as oxygen. But if the Big Bang model were true, at least two generations of stars must have already formed in order for this to be possible.2

However, these mature and already-formed objects being observed by JWST are supposedly very close in time to the Big Bang. And there’s little time available for all this to happen.

We see then, that in multiple ways…

The JWST images are showing galaxies that are not at all what secular astronomers had expected.

And remember, the JWST has only been operational for a few months. We’re only seeing results from the first few studies. So we’re only seeing a small sample of what will be discovered and published in the coming months and years.

This means it’s quite possible that mature galaxies at even farther distances will be found. In fact, it’s reasonable to expect this.

As we discussed earlier, if the Big Bang model were true, then there was an epoch of galaxy formation long ago—a time when immature and peculiars were just beginning to form, and more mature galaxies did not yet exist.

But even as the JWST has observed deeper and deeper into the cosmos, no hints of this epoch have been found.

As this study notes, “we have not reached the limit of where the first ellipticals and spheroids have formed. We will need to probe even higher redshifts to find when and if there are no spheroids or disk galaxies.”

But scientists are running out of time within which they can look for this alleged period of galaxy formation. As the JWST looks deeper into space, and thus (from a secular perspective) farther and farther back into time, there’s less and less “time after the Big Bang” available for the first galaxies to have formed within.

This “mature galaxy” crisis has been building since the mid-2000s, but now the JWST is pouring gasoline on the fire. In the creation movement, many of us were expecting discoveries like these, but the JWST has produced results that are even better than we could have anticipated.

It’s a great time to be a creationist!

So… is this the final nail in the coffin for the Big Bang model? Does this mean that secular astronomers are panicking, as some articles have claimed?

The new observations are certainly creating some confusion in the secular scientific community. And perhaps we could argue that secular theorists should be panicking. But despite the articles you might have seen on social media, they aren’t. And this isn’t really surprising. Here’s why.

No panic (not even at the disco)

First of all, there was indeed a recent paper with a title that began with, “Panic! at the Disks.” But this was not meant to describe the authors’ emotions; it was actually meant to be a joke.

(The title was supposed to be a play on words, and was referring to an American rock band named “Panic! at the Disco.” Yes, even scientific papers include bad puns sometimes.)

And it’s also true that astronomers are surprised by the new observations. Media stories have contained quotes like these:

“The models just don’t predict this… How do you do this in the universe at such an early time? How do you form so many stars so quickly?”Garth Illingworth, University of California at Santa Cruz

“The reality is just kind of blowing our mind.”Jeyhan Kartaltepe, Rochester Institute of Technology in New York

“No one was expecting anything like this.”Michael Boylan-Kolchin, University of Texas, Austin

“This is way outside the box of what models were predicting.”Garth Illingworth, University of California (UC), Santa Cruz

“Right now I find myself lying awake at three in the morning, wondering if everything I’ve ever done is wrong.”Allison Kirkpatrick, University of Kansas in Lawrence

But these quotes only mean that these astronomers don’t understand how their models about galaxy formation could accommodate the new observations.

The quotes don’t mean that they are questioning the overall context of the Big Bang model.

Some scientists are even emphasizing this. For example, Eric Lerner, in his article The Big Bang Never Happened, reproduced the quote from Ms. Kirkpatrick (“I find myself lying awake…”), and implied that she is doubting the Big Bang model. She responded by changing her Twitter username to “Allison the Big Bang happened Kirkpatrick.”

It might seem strange that secular astronomers aren’t reacting more strongly than this. The JWST observations are so inconsistent with secular expectations that it seems logical to question the broader model that produced those expectations.

But this would be to ignore the bigger context. With very few exceptions, the secular astronomical community accepts the Big Bang model as fact. Secular scientists aren’t questioning this model, because it doesn’t even occur to them to do so.

Will the JWST observations force the secular community to re-evaluate their models of galaxy formation, early star formation, and so on? Yes, certainly. In fact, this process has already begun.

But the overall idea of the Big Bang is being exempted from this process.

Mature galaxies: not even the worst problem

History tells us that the new JWST observations probably won’t be enough to topple Big Bang cosmology.

Previous discoveries had already falsified the model, but they didn’t matter. Secular astronomers still hold to it anyway. So there’s no reason that the JWST’s discoveries will fare any better.

Let’s discuss a few examples.

The Big Bang model violates the laws of physics. It suffers from a problem I call the secular dilemma. Either something came from nothing (which violates the laws of physics in one way), or there has always been something (which violates the laws of physics in a different way). Either way, the Big Bang is inconsistent with the laws of science. The only cosmological model that explains our Universe and is also consistent with physics, is that a supernatural Creator (outside of the Cosmos) is responsible for it.

The Big Bang requires cosmic inflation: a contrived, just-so story about an “inflaton.” This is a made-up particle, completely outside of physics, that was invented purely to save the model from evidence that would be fatal to it otherwise.

It also requires a multiverse (an infinite number of Universes). This idea is not only unscientific, it’s anti-scientific3—but the secular community embraces it anyway, because the Big Bang model needs it (in order to explain away the overwhelming amount of fine-tuning and apparent Design of the cosmos).

The model requires dark energy—a mysterious anti-gravity force (and again, completely outside of known physics), that was invented to protect a fundamental secular assumption4 from being disproved by the data. And so on.

Although the JWST’s discoveries are radically inconsistent with secular predictions about galaxy formation, these predictions will just be changed soon to accommodate them. Compared to all the other fatal problems that the Big Bang model has—and all the contortions that the secular community has gone through to protect it—creating new predictions for accelerated galaxy formation will be child’s play.

The continued survival of the Big Bang model—despite a long list of should-have-been-fatal-to-it discoveries—shows us that it isn’t a scientific model after all. Scientific models are discarded when evidence accumulates against them, but the Big Bang has been immune from this.

That’s because it’s not actually a scientific model. It’s an ideology. It’s an unquestioned and unquestionable belief held by the secular community.

Conclusion

The James Webb Space Telescope was designed to show us more of the Universe. And even in only its first few months, it’s already doing just that.

Along the way, it’s also revealing something else.

The new telescope is also illustrating the hollowness of modern secular cosmology. We’re seeing the failure of more of its predictions. We’re seeing more inconsistency between the observed data and the model’s implications.

And most of all, we’re seeing the emptiness of the Big Bang’s claims to being a legitimate scientific model.

Footnotes

  1. Because objects that are more distant have a higher redshift. The JW was specifically designed to be able to observe objects with high redshifts.
  2. The Big Bang model says that the Bang was incapable of making anything other than hydrogen, helium, lithium, and perhaps trace amounts of beryllium. Thus, for heavier elements such as oxygen to exist today, the model says that first, stars had to form from the hydrogen and helium. They then burned for a while, and created heavier elements via nuclear fusion, until finally they reached the end of their lifespans and exploded. The new heavier elements were then distributed throughout the cosmos. Only after all this happened could another generation of stars form that might incorporate the new elements.
  3. I discussed this in more detail in the video Our Created Universe.
  4. The so-called cosmological principle.

MORE ON THE BIG BANG – Is the Big Bang really scientific?

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Creationist scientists argue that the atheists’ claim that our universe arose from a random ‘explosion’ is absurd. For example, the rate of expansion would have needed to be just right, as even a tiny deviation from the required rate would have been catastrophic. If just a little faster, particles would have simply flown away from each other, never coming together to form stars and planets. If just a little slower, gravity would have pulled everything back together resulting in a violent ‘great crunch’, with no planets and no life. According to Nobel prize-winner, Professor Steven Weinberg, the number determining the required expansion rate (known as the ‘cosmological constant’) would have had to be just to right to within 120 decimal places.10

How realistic is it to believe that an ‘explosion’ just happened to produce an expansion rate this critical?

The expansion rate, however, is just one of many factors that would have had to be ‘fined-tuned’ for the big bang to have produced a universe like ours in which life could exist. For example, unless the masses of the particles that make up atoms, the forces that hold atoms together, and the force of gravity all had the right values, the big bang would have produced a lifeless universe. Creation scientists argue that a process that is this critical could not have occurred by chance.

Conclusion

Christians need not be intimidated into accepting secular accounts of origins. Big bang theory only appears to be scientific because people are exposed only to the evidence that appears to support it. At the same time, nothing is said about its major scientific problems. Big bang theory contradicts the account of creation in Genesis, and Bible-believing creationists should reject it on the authority of God’s word.

Extract from an article by Dominic Statham entitled “Is the Big Bang really scientific?” http://www.creation.com

References and notes

  1. Technically, CMBR is said to date from the 379,000 years after the big bang when atoms were formed. Previously, the energetic nuclei and electrons, as charged particles, would scatter any radiation, but when they combined to form neutral atoms, the universe became transparent to the radiation. Return to text.
  2. Horgan, J., Physicist slams cosmic theory he helped conceive, Scientific American, 1 December 2014; blogs.scientificamerican.com. Return to text.
  3. Burbidge, G. and Hoyle, F., The origin of helium and other light elements, The Astrophysical Journal 509:L1–L3, 10 December 1998. Return to text.
  4. Burbidge, G., The case against primordial nucleosynthesis, in: Hill, V., François, P. and Primas, F., eds, From Lithium to Uranium: Elemental tracers of early cosmic evolution, IAU Symposium Proceedings of the International Astronomical Union 228, Paris, May 23–27, 2005; adsabs.harvard.edu. Return to text.
  5. That is, measurements of ordinary matter density. See wmap.gsfc.nasa.gov/universe/bb_tests_ele.html. Return to text.
  6. Hartnett, J., Dark Matter and the Standard Model of particle physics—a search in the ‘Dark’, 28 September 2014. Return to text.
  7. Hartnett, J., Is ‘dark matter’ the ‘unknown god’? Creation 37(2):22–24, April 2015. Return to text.
  8. More precisely, because the wavelength of the light is now longer, it has ‘shifted’ towards the red end of the spectrum. Note that this does not necessarily cause a particular star to ‘look red’. Return to text.
  9. Professor Halton Arp, however, noted that there are many exceptions to this rule, which are difficult for advocates of big bang theory to explain. See Hartnett, J., Big-bang-defying giant of astronomy passes away, 31 December 2013. Return to text.
  10. Weinberg, S., Facing Up: Science and its cultural adversaries, Harvard University Press, USA, pp. 80–81, 2001. Return to text.
  11. Lewis, F.G. and Barnes, L.A., A Fortunate Universe: Life in a finely tuned cosmos, Cambridge University Press, UK, 2016. Return to text.
  12. See also Statham, D., A naturalist’s nightmare [review of Ref. 11], J. Creation 32(1):48–52, April 2018. Return to text.

WHY RADIOMETRIC DATING GIVES AGES OF MILLIONS AND BILLIONS OF YEARS

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A young age for ‘ancient’ granites

When physicist Dr Russell Humphreys was still at Sandia National Laboratories (he now works full-time for the Institute for Creation Research), he and Dr John Baumgardner (still with Los Alamos National Laboratory) were both convinced that they knew the direction in which to look for a definitive answer to the puzzle of why radiometric dating consistently gives ages of millions and billions of years.

picture – Linear accelerator used in radiometric dating.

Others had tried to find an answer in geological processes—e.g. the pattern was caused by the way the magma was emplaced or how it crystallized. This is indeed the answer in some cases.2,3 But Drs Humphreys and Baumgardner realized that in other cases there were many independent lines of evidence that suggested that huge amounts of radioactive decay had indeed taken place. (These include the variety of elements used in ‘standard’ radioisotope dating, mature uranium radiohalos and fission track dating.) It would be hard to imagine that geologic processes alone could explain all these. Rather, there was likely to be an answer that concerned the nuclear decay processes themselves.

From the eyewitness testimony of God’s Word, the billions of years that such vast amounts of radioactive processes would normally suggest had not taken place. So it was clear that the assumption of a constant, slow decay process was wrong. There must have been speeded-up decay, perhaps in a huge burst associated with Creation Week and/or a separate burst at the time of the Flood.

There is now powerful confirmatory evidence that at least one episode of drastically accelerated decay has indeed been the case, building on the work of Dr Robert Gentry on helium retention in zircons. The landmark RATE paper,4 though technical, can be summarized as follows:

  • When uranium decays to lead, a by-product of this process is the formation of helium, a very light, inert gas, which readily escapes from rock.
  • Certain crystals called zircons, obtained from drilling into very deep granites, contain uranium which has partly decayed into lead.
  • By measuring the amount of uranium and ‘radiogenic lead’ in these crystals, one can calculate that, if the decay rate has been constant, about 1.5 billion years must have passed. (This is consistent with the geologic ‘age’ assigned to the granites in which these zircons are found.)
  • However, there is a significant proportion of helium from that ‘1.5 billion years of decay’ still inside the zircons. This is, at first glance, surprising for long-agers, because of the ease with which one would expect helium (with its tiny, light, unreactive atoms) to escape from the spaces within the crystal structure. There should surely be hardly any left, because with such a slow buildup, it should be seeping out continually and not accumulating.
  • Drawing any conclusions from the above depends, of course, on actually measuring the rate at which helium leaks out of zircons. This is what one of the RATE papers reports on. The samples were sent (without any hint that it was a creationist project) to a world-class expert on helium diffusion from minerals to measure these rates. The consistent answer: the helium does indeed seep out quickly over a wide range of temperatures. In fact, the results show that because of all the helium still in the zircons, these crystals (and since this is Precambrian basement granite, by implication the whole earth) could not be older than 14,000 years. In other words, in only a few thousand years, 1.5 billion years’ worth (at today’s rates) of radioactive decay has taken place. Interestingly, the data have since been refined and updated to give a date of 5,680 (± 2,000) years.
  • The paper looks at the various avenues a long-ager might take by which to wriggle out of these powerful implications, but there seems to be little hope for them unless they can show that the techniques used to obtain the results were seriously flawed.

The Bible clearly tells us that God created a mature universe: Adam was a man, not a baby, the trees and plants mature and on day six Adam could see all of the stars in heaven. God tells us that He stretched out the heavens at creation on day four. The Cosmos could only have been created by a being outside of His creation with miraculous powers.

Big Bang from nothing does not explain the complex ordered universe that is so evident, it is certainly not good science.

Taken from an article by Dr. Carl Weiland “Radiometric dating breakthroughs” http://www.creation.com

4. Humphreys, D. et al., Helium diffusion rates support accelerated nuclear decay, icr.org, 16 October 2003. Return to text.

DO YOU REALLY KNOW WHAT THE HOLY SPIRIT CAN ACCOMPLISH IN YOUR LIFE?

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Jesus made it possible for our Heavenly Father to send the third person of the Trinity to indwell every believer to be our counselor, comforter, and teacher. Jesus said:

“But the Helper, the Holy Spirit, whom the Father will send in my name, He will teach you all things and bring to your remembrance all that I have said to you.” John 14:26

“But when the Helper comes, whom I will send to you from the Father, the Spirit of truth, who proceeds from the Father, He will bear witness about me.” John 15:26

“For through Him (Jesus), we both have access in one Spirit to the Father.” Ephesians 2:18

“Do you not know that your body is a temple of the Holy Spirit within you, whom you have from God?” 1 Corinthians 6:19

“In Him, you also are being built together into a dwelling place for God by the Spirit.” Ephesians 2:22

Have you ever had trouble praying? Well, the following Scripture makes it clear that the Holy Spirit that indwells you will express what you cannot express with words as “the Spirit intercedes for the Saints according to the will of God.” Isn’t that good to know? The Spirit of God searches the hearts and knows what is in the mind of the Spirit and He can help us communicate to God what we can’t always put in words.

“And he who searches hearts knows what is the mind of the Spirit because the Spirit intercedes for the Saints according to the will of God.” Romans 8:27

Note: The Spirit intercedes for the Saints. All who believe God and place their trust in Him are called Saints. Being called a Saint is not new to the New Testament. The Old Testament speaks of Saints too, all who believe God and have placed their trust in Him are considered Saints, right now, even while they’re alive as the psalmist writes that God “will not forsake his Saints. They are preserved forever, but the children of the wicked shall be cut off” (Psalm 37:28).

“May you be strengthened with all power, according to his glorious might, for all endurance and patience with joy, giving thanks to the Father, who has qualified you to share in the inheritance of the Saints in light. He has delivered us from the domain of darkness and transferred us to the kingdom of his beloved Son.” Colossians 1:11-13

God’s grace delivered us out of the darkness and brought us into the light and transferred us from the kingdom or domain of darkness into the kingdom of His beloved Son, Jesus Christ. He does that only for His Saints who’ve repented and put their trust in Him and that’s only because we’re qualified by Jesus’ redemption.

“To the church of God that is in Corinth, to those sanctified in Christ Jesus, called to be Saints together with all those who in every place call upon the name of our Lord Jesus Christ, both their Lord and ours.” 1 Corinthians 1:2

The root word for “saints” comes from the word sanctified so those whom Jesus died for are the sanctified ones or saints. To be sanctified is to be “set apart for holy use” and that is what the Saints are. For now, we have been called out of the world to go back into the world to call others out of the world. However, prophecies being fulfilled in our time tell us that Jesus’ second coming is not too far in the future.

Do you know what our role will be when Jesus returns to earth with the Saints?

“And the kingdom and the dominion and the greatness of the kingdoms under the whole heaven shall be given to the people of the Saints of the Most High.” Daniel 7:27

“Or do you not know that the Saints will judge the world? And if the world is to be judged by you, are you incompetent to try trivial cases? Do you not know that we are to judge angels?” 1 Corinthians 6:2-3

FREEDOM

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If God exists, then we also need to consider a positive aspect, which is sometimes called “freedom for.” Just like a car that has been designed by its creator to operate in a certain fashion, humans have been made in God’s image for a greater purpose and only experience freedom when they discover and live that purpose (Genesis 1-2). It is only when we know the truth, and align our lives to it, that we can experience genuine freedom.

LIVING IN ACCORDANCE WITH GOD’S DESIGN:
The secular worldview says to live as you want. The Christian view says to live as God leads.

The secular view emphasizes the individual as supreme. The Christian view says that loving God and loving others is supreme.

The secular view says that we create existential truth. The Christian view says we discover the truth.

God has done His utmost to reveal the truth to us by sending His only Son not only to reveal the truth about Him and us but to atone for our sins and rebellion by dying on The Cross in our place that we might have the opportunity to get back into a right relationship with our Heavenly Father.

“And the Word became flesh and dwelt among us, and we have seen his glory, glory as of the only Son from the Father, full of grace and truth.“ John 1:14

“For the law was given through Moses; grace and truth came through Jesus Christ.” John 1:17

“God is spirit, and those who worship him must worship in spirit and truth.” John 4:24

God has also made it clear as to what is the outcome for those that reject the truth about God.

“Therefore God gave them up in the lusts of their hearts to impurity, to the dishonoring of their bodies among themselves, because they exchanged the truth about God for a lie and worshiped and served the creature rather than the Creator, who is blessed forever! Amen.” Romans 1:24-25

“He will render to each one according to his works: to those who by patience in well-doing seek for glory and honor and immortality, he will give eternal life; but for those who are self-seeking and do not obey the truth, but obey unrighteousness, there will be wrath and fury.” Romans 2:6-8

God has also revealed in great detail what will unfold in the last seven years prior to Jesus’ return and the wrath of God is poured out on an unrepentant people. For those that want to know the truth, God has given it to us in His Word. Literally, thousands of fulfilled Bible prophecies prove the Bible is God’s revealed inerrant Word. You reject it at your own peril as the following Scripture reveals.

“Then the kings of the earth and the great ones and the generals and the rich and the powerful, and everyone, slave and free, hid themselves in the caves and among the rocks of the mountains, calling to the mountains and rocks, “Fall on us and hide us from the face of him who is seated on the throne, and from the wrath of the Lamb, for the great day of their wrath has come, and who can stand?” Revelation 6:15-17

GOD THINGS HAPPENING IN ITALY

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Franklin Graham’s Noi Festival in Milan Breaks Attendance Record, Hundreds Respond to Gospel

Noi can mean we or us. It can also mean together or united,” “It also means joining forces, belonging to something bigger.”

More than 520 evangelical churches came together to plan and pray for the Noi Festival with Franklin Graham in Milan, Italy over the weekend, resulting in a historic turnout of people hungry to hear the Gospel of Jesus Christ.  According to the Billy Graham Evangelistic Association (BGEA), this marked the first time in Italy’s history that hundreds of Italian churches worked together to share the Gospel. The churches’ efforts resulted in a standing-room-only crowd of more than 13,200 people at the Mediolanum Forum Saturday night. 

God is certainly doing something in Italy as this wonderful response to the Gospel follows the recent election of Italy’s Christian prime minister, Giorgia Meloni – whose campaign was based on the belief that the government’s job is to support family, church and civil society rather than control it. 

Make sure you pray for Giorgia Meloni and Italy as she is sure to come under intense spiritual warfare. I recently returned from Florence, Italy where I attended my eldest granddaughter’s wedding. Despite the fact that Florence has no visitors from China or Japan due to Covid, still, tourist numbers are breaking records so the city is flourishing.

GOD AND THE BIBLE ARE NOW THE OPPRESSOR

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People hate being held accountable, especially when it comes to a standard that is impossible to meet in their own strength. When a holy God says your way of living is sinful, the natural flesh reaction is now to label God as an “oppressor” who needs to be removed from all aspects of civil discourse.

The natural extension of this thinking is to also attempt to silence, cancel or even prosecute those who follow God’s standard. This now includes parents who stand up for common sense and decency in our publicly funded government schools into which every form of unholy indoctrination has crept in. In fact, what used to be secretly brought in through the back doors of our public schools is now openly and proudly paraded through the front doors as policies that promote highly sexualized material as being necessary for the diverse, equitable, and inclusive materials, books and curriculum needed to “properly” educate the current generation of social justice warriors.

What happened to just teaching core academics? In America, why do pride flags now outnumber American flags in the classrooms? In one local Loudoun County, Va., elementary school, the large pride flag with an upraised black fist and phrase “Love Always Wins” is prominently displayed over the music room’s piano while the teacher proudly displayed pictures of him and his gay lover’s personal life to elementary age children.

These children are slowly becoming numb to tradition and godly, values taught by their parents at home and slowly are being indoctrinated over their 16,000 hours of government-sponsored education.

Parents standing up for traditional values and calling for a return to academics in our schools and removal of identity politics from classrooms are now seen as “dangerous” by school boards across the country and even by the Department of Justice. This is why in the Loudoun County school system, the current policy prevents a parent from knowing if their child is expressing gender confusion at school. The teacher can know. The school counselor and staff can know. The principal can know, but NOT the parent.

Parents are viewed as some sort of extremist, backwoods cult member who will harm their child if they are involved when a child crosses over into the dark world of transgenderism after being groomed by social media influencers and their peer group. Then the confused child is further abused by the missionaries of transgenderism inside the walls of our schools who do everything possible to prevent that child from being told “No” by their parent. Outside groups are even allowed to provide support and temporary housing for your gender-confused child so they don’t have to go home to you, the “oppressive” parent.

Where do parental constitutional rights end and criminal physical and mental abduction begin?

In the end, this is a fight for the ages.  A battle of worldviews. Will man be on the throne or God?

In today’s critical theory parlance, every idea, thought, person, institution, and policy must be divided into one of two classes: “oppressed” or “oppressor.” Christians are seen now as having benefitted from God’s oppressive system of rules which has to be stopped if society is to further evolve into a more “diverse, equitable, and inclusive” order. In reality, following God’s objective standard brings favor, blessing, and salvation.

In considering the “intersectionality” of our faith, is it really oppressive to be a Christian?

What if you’re a white Christian? Or Asian Christian? Are you let out of “oppressor jail” if you’re a black Christian or does your Christian faith always outweigh your melanin when it comes to your score on the oppression scale?

Those who desire nothing more than the cancellation and prosecution of free speech now have a new weapon. This weapon of language causes division found through critical theory which only tears down instead of building up, divides instead of unites, and accuses instead of forgives. This new lexicon of the religion of equity places man on the throne and views God, parents, and those with the wrong skin color as irreconcilably broken oppressors with no hope of redemption. 

Christianity is actually liberating. Of all the world’s religions, only in Christianity has the work to conquer true oppression (sin) already been done by the work of Jesus on our behalf. We were all born into oppression as part of the one-blood human race. We were truly victimized by the oppressor of our soul, Satan. Only in Christ, can oppression be truly conquered providing freedom for those oppressed and in bondage to sin. Satan is the true author of oppression. Jesus liberates and sets us free.

Post based on a report by Clint Thomas is a Loudoun County, VA father of 5 and local business owner.

JESUS MODEL FOR THE CHURCH

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Great teaching on Jesus model for the church by Jim McCotter. Jim has established hundreds directly and thousands indirectly of House Churches around the world. In this video, Jim is teaching a few believers and everything is backed up by Scripture. Many of you will have Ah-Ha moments as I did.

Most of you know I have been supporting the growth of the Kenya House Church Movement (KHC) for about four years now and have seen growth from six to twenty-one house churches over this time period. I now believe that God has brought Jim McCotter into contact with KHC to take it to next level. Two of the KHC leaders are now participating in training with Jim on Zoom. This video is the first in that training series – 5 Reasons for House Churches.

I have recently posted a report on a KHC Mission Trip to Olasi. If you have not seen it please do so. I would like to get the leader of KHC, Charles Otieno Owino mobile again. There is a picture of Charles and his broken vehicle at the bottom of the post.