You married your relative

So, was the title catchy enough? Time to get back to my more... philosophical (?) posts now. Aren't all my posts though? Nevermind that.

Now, not everyone who will read this has been married. But something we all must realize is that no matter who you marry... you marry your relative. Whether it's your cousin or a stranger from across the globe. There are multiple ways to look at this and explain this, multiple ways to ponder this concept, so I will choose to look at it through the Bible. What else can you expect?

So, Day 6. There were two people. One male, and one female. 6,000 years later, you have over 7 billion people. That's quite the family there! But looking back, I noticed something interesting. In those early days, not only was it acceptable to marry close relatives, but common. As a matter of fact, there were at least two major times in history (creation and the flood) where it was not only common and acceptable to marry close relatives, but necessary as well.

This is a very interesting thought, considering Moses was told by God that close relatives couldn't marry, yet God made two major instances where that was absolutely vital. Now this seems very strange, a contradiction even. Well, what better reason to ponder the subject?

Everything looks different when you consider genetics. If Adam and Eve are our ultimate ancestors, that means all of the genetic material and variability for all of mankind was built into them. Also, since creation was originally "very good", there would be no faults in their DNA. We also now know that information is lost from generation to generation, and errors build up in the DNA.

A simple example I heard is two dogs, each with a gene for long hair and short hair, mate. They produce some puppies with both genes, but some with only long hair genes and others with only short hair genes. The puppies with only one type of gene have lost information and variability.

This is the same thing that happens when humans reproduce. And when you add in the mistakes and genetic diseases, then when two people with similar (imperfect) DNA reproduce, those mistakes compound on each other. However, early in history, with improved health and perfect DNA, these mistakes at first would be nonexistent, and later come about much more slowly.

It would take so long for these mistakes to manifest themself in a dangerous form, that for thousands of years we could intermarry with no problems. And when you look at the timing of things, it makes sense as well. Moses was told that close relatives couldn't marry about 2,000 years (I believe) after the flood. That's a long time for mistakes to build upon each other. When you consider the fact that intermarriage was allowed, and even made necessary, by God early on, and the effects of the fall on genetics, it actually seems to indicate that marrying a cousin or sibling isn't actually wrong morally. At least that's what I get out of it.

But, of course, times have changed. Now it is dangerous for close relatives to reproduce, because of what could happen to the kids. But before these mistakes existed, what reason would there be to keep close relatives from marrying? When we read the Bible, it seems God simply wants marriage to be between one man and one woman (although He also allowed multiple wives for a time... need to ponder that as well), what difference does it make how closely they are related? Assuming no genetics mistakes, of course.

My conclusion after pondering this issue? Well, we all marry our relatives anyway, what difference does it make how closely they're related to us? So I guess that means... incest isn't actually wrong (on a moral level). At least that's what I get out of it. That was really weird to say...

Nothing is Evil

I recently implemented something new. On Facebook I started a group called "

De' Tinker's Thoughts: Facebook Discussion Group", and asked the few members I had which post title they wanted me to write on. Well, the vote is in! So here I go...

Nothing is evil. How could that be? Don't we live in an evil world? Isn't evil all around us? What about the wars, the starvation, the lies, etc?

There is more to the saying then that. Maybe this makes more sense: Nothing was evil in it's original created form; or, nothing was created evil.

Whatever it is, it us us humans who make it evil or commit evil actions. Guns aren't evil, they are just a tool. Yet we use them for evil purposes. Eating meat isn't evil, yet we torture animals unnecessarily to get that meat or we intentionally provide low quality meat for people to eat. Even technology! Technology isn't evil, but as with the gun example, it can be used for evil purposes.

For instance, weather control technology. Some of you may not even believe we have the technology to effect the weather on any noteworthy scale. That's fine if you don't believe, it's up to you. Technology like that doesn't sound evil, does it? Well, it's not, whatever you were thinking. However, evidence suggests that this type of technology is responsible for multiple natural disasters and will also be used for a mass deception in the (near) future, with the intent of setting up a One World Government.

That brings me to another point, a Wold Government. Is that evil? Well, the idea itself isn't. However, the methods used to achieve such a government and the reason for that government are. The Almighty confused the languages of man at the tower of Babel when they created a One World Government, with the intention of being their own god. Mankind has always had that goal in mind, and is trying once again to create a modern "Tower of Babel" situation.

Getting away from the "conspiracy theories", here's another example: sex. These days I hear jokes about how Christianity means "if it's fun, stop doing it". In part this joke is talking about this very issue. The original purpose of sex was for pleasure between one man and one woman and to populate the earth. However, we have perverted it from it's original purpose, making most instances evil. Once again, it's not the idea that's evil, but what we do with it. That is why there is rape, adultery, homosexuality, etc. They have perverted the original purpose, in a similar way as was done with technology.

Since everything was originally "very good", any evil must have come afterwards. And of course, any object itself can't be evil anyway, just as an animal or idea can't. We are the ones that cursed creation through our actions, and we pervert and corrupt all of these things.

Of course other issues, such as killing and murder, are a little harder to explain. According to what I hear (to lazy to look it up myself), in the original Hebrew the same word is used for "murder" as is used for "kill". That means the commandment "thou shall not murder" could just as accurately be translated to "thou shall not kill". So does that mean killing isn't evil? Well... as I said, it's a little harder to explain, and I may be wrong on this one.

It is said that death will be the last enemy to be defeated. Also, in original creation there was no death. However, upon further investigation of science, you realized that destruction was both possible and necessary before the Fall. You see, there is a fine balance in creation. Destruction and creation. We can't even see without this balance! As light comes into our eyes, it destroys certain chemicals. When these chemicals break down, it sends an electrical signal to the brain, telling us what we see.

Before the Fall, things were probably balanced differently. Balanced in such a way that there was no net decay, meaning that things could not die of age; or die at all. However, as I said, things changed. So the act of killing also upsets the balance, but adding lots of net decay. This is against God's original plan, for He wanted no death. But we now live in a fallen world, where death not only is possible but happens every minute.

I have not fully answered the problem though, is killing evil? Digging a little deeper, we find Jesus said that even if you are angry with someone in your heart, you committed murder against them (in your own heart). So based off all this, it seems it is really a matter of the heart. Even God commanded the killing of thousands (men, woman, children, even babies). The people that were killed were of a corrupt heart, and this was a punishment. But when we kill someone ourselves, we have no power, right or authority to give them that punishment; except in the case of government (which I will get to in a moment).

An individual on his own does not have this authority by default, but circumstances can present them self, such as getting attacked and taking a life defending yourself. Although you may not have been given the authority to "punish" this person, per se, you were fulfilling a God given instinct of self defense. Things are different when someone is causing you trouble and you hire someone to "silence" them. That is a heart problem right there. Also since man is created in God's image, he also is set apart and special from the rest of creation. Doing something evil towards another human is far different than it is from an animal or plant.

However, governments have been given certain authority from above to make and enforce laws, including the death penalty. This amount of authority has been given to them, to take a life, so it is up to the governments to respect these privileges. No matter how powerful a government becomes, they still answer to a greater power. It is the same for all of us, we each answer to something greater than ourself. In the case of killing and murder, it is a hard concept to clearly understand. You've just seen some of how I think it through.

Ultimately, death and killing isn't part of the plan, but is happening now. We must live with that. But as long as our heart is following God, our actions will lead us away from these evil acts (although we are still fallible humans). This means that it is possible to kill someone and not sin. It is the heart, the intent, that God looks at. This isn't to justify those who fought in the Crusades for "the glory of God", or any other similar circumstances. I merely mean that He will reveal His will if we listen, and there is example after example in the Old Testament where killing was part of that.

The simple answer? No. Killing is not evil (oh boy, is that weird to say!). It is our heart that is evil, and often times we kill because of our evil heart. The origin of evil also has an evil beginning, the Fall and Satan. But death also began there as well, but death is not evil. It is just a balance of nature that is not part of God's ultimate plan. There will come a time where he gives creation it's proper balance, then death and killing will be impossible.

There are many other examples, but this will suffice for now. This post is plenty long. However, I will soon be writing another post talking more about this issue.

School Assignment, still read it though

I had needed to do an assignment for a class, and I liked what I did since it related to subjects I enjoy discussing, so I decided to share it here. Tell me what you think (the assignment was to make a list comparing some contradictions between creation and evolution and then discuss some of them in greater detail):

Contradiction	Creation	Evolution
Sun and Earth	Earth created first	Sun came first
Origin of Death	Death came after sin as punishment	Death is permanent
Origin of Man	Created in God's image on day 6	Evolved from ape-like ancestor
Original form of Earth	Earth started as water	Earth started as molten rock
Noah's Flood	Is a historical event which explains fossils and much more	Is an impossible myth that contradicts with "evidence" for an old earth
Origin of Life	Life came from the living God (life came from life, does NOT contradict science)	Life evolved from a non-living primordial soup millions of years ago (This contradicts an observable law of science)
Origin of Matter	An all powerful ever existing God created all matter and energy	All matter and energy arose spontaneously (different theories have different answers)
DNA	An all knowing intelligent God created the complex coding seen in DNA	Information came about without an intelligent creator (contradicts science, information must come from intelligence)
Evolving	Everything reproduces after it's kind within it's genetic information, or even lose information which is more of devolution	One kind of animal can change into another, which requires addition of information which is impossible without intelligence
Miracles	The very core of Creation relies on an all powerful God who created everything supernaturally	Evolution relies on there being no god and uses only natural processes, there can be no miracles or anything supernatural
Man's Specialness	Being in the image of the Creator, man has dominion over the earth and is above all the rest of Creation, and has an eternal soul	Man is just an animal and is no more special than anything else. When man dies they die just like an animal.
Logic and Reasoning	Logic was made to follow universal laws of order by an All Knowing God of Order	Our minds evolved randomly and are controlled by chemical processes that arose from random chance, therefore we cannot trust our own mind's wisdom

Key contradiction 1: The order of creation (and original form of earth)

I chose to only mention the sun and earth for this, so that is what I put in the table. In reality there are many more aspects of this I could have discussed.

The evolutionary theory requires that dense gases and matter gathered around to form the sun billions of years before a ball of molten rock would form to eventually become the earth. Stars came first to evolutionists, and that included the sun. All other celestial bodies, such as planets and the earth, formed billions of years after. Another conflict that is underneath this is the fact that evolution says the earth started as fire (for simplicity’s sake), the Bible says it started as water.

Now on the other hand, Biblical creation clearly states that the earth came before the sun and stars, as well as the moon (which evolution claims formed closer to the time of earth than the sun). When the earth was formed, it began as water and land came afterward (Genesis 1:2, 6-10). It wasn’t until two days after the earth was formed that we see the creation of the sun, moon and stars (Genesis 1:14-18).

This isn’t even getting into other aspects of the order of creation that evolution gets wrong; there is birds and fish created on the same day (Gen. 1:20) vs fish evolving into land and then sea creatures, plants being created before the sun (Gen 1: 11-12, 14-18) vs evolving billions of years afterwards, man and dinosaurs created on the same day (Gen 1: 24-30) vs man evolving millions of years afterwards, etc. But I chose to mention just the sun and earth in the above table.

Key contradiction 2: The Supernatural vs the natural (and several other points)

One of the sharpest contrasts between creation and evolution is the fact that creation requires there be miracles and supernatural beings, while evolution strictly forbids it. This, I believe, is where the science for evolution falls apart, right at step one. Since evolution requires only natural processes (that follow the natural laws of physics), there is no reasonable explanation for the origin of all matter and energy, now why to explain how life came about, no way to explain logic, and no way to explain pretty much anything. Their problem is there is no way for something to come from nothing, and that is what they need to explain their world view. Where did everything we see today come from?

Creation, on the other hand, has a reasonable answer for this. Since creation relies on the supernatural, which by definition supersedes the natural (and it’s laws of physics), it is very easy to explain the origin of everything. It goes something like this, “In the beginning God created…” (Gen 1:1). Right there we have our answer; an all powerful, all knowing supernatural being, which is above nature and it’s laws (and which actually created those laws), is the one responsible for everything we see today. A more detailed answer to this problem may be found in John 1:1-5

 “In the beginning the Word already existed. The Words was with God, and the Word was God. He existed in the beginning with God. God created everything through him, and nothing was created except through him. The Word gave life to everything that was created, and his life brought light to everyone. The light shines in the darkness, and the darkness can never extinguish it”

“God created everything. . . and nothing was created except through him”, that makes our answer pretty easy. Provided God had the power to do so (which of course He did)  and was telling the truth when He wrote this down (and of course, He was), then creation has no problem answering this.

Key contradiction 3: Man

The final point I will discuss is the conflict between Man’s place in creation. When we compare the worldviews, we see two drastically different opinions. On one side we have creation which says Man was created in the image of the Creator Himself (Genesis 1: 27), and was also created perfect to live forever with the Almighty, and later turned away from the Creator and had to live with death and suffering (Genesis 3); while on the other side we have evolution, which says man evolved from an animal and his life has no meaning, when he dies he dies and there is nothing left, that he is no more important than an ant or a leaf. There is a drastic contradiction between these two beliefs, isn’t there?

Rewriting Genesis

In these days, many Christians are compromising their beliefs to fit into the world. One way they are doing this is by trying to fit evolution into the Bible. One of the ways they are doing this is "You're stupid for limiting God, He could have used evolution if He wanted to!" However, what they fail to see, is that the Creator TOLD us that He did not use evolution. The creation account is clearly written. If you wanted to write Genesis in such a way that it is obvious the Almighty created everything about 6,000 years ago, in 6 literal 24 hour days, you would leave it just the way it is. On the other hand, if you wanted to write Genesis in such a way that it is obvious the Almighty used evolution and millions of years, it would need to be entirely rewritten. So, I will show you a post I made on another forum recently, where I did just that:

In the video we watched for this week it was mentioned that to clearly state that creation took place in 6 literal, 24 hour days you would write it just the way it is. However, to clearly state that God used long periods of time to create everything you would need to rewrite not only Genesis, but the entire Bible. I decided what it would be like to rewrite just the first chapter (roughly). Tell me what you all think.

"In the beginning, God created nothing. There was no earth yet, and everything was rather boring and empty, so God said 'Let there be light' and nothing exploded and started expanding over billions of years to form the universe. And God saw that this huge, powerful and random explosion that created all light and matter in the universe was good. Since there was no earth and sun yet, He couldn't name the difference between day and night, so He sat around for a few billion years."

"God was bored again and decided to shake things up, so He took some of the random matter expanding through space and directed it to form into the earth over billions of years before creating the sun. Suddenly bored of a giant ball of rocks and lava, He decided to make turn it all into water over billions of years, and He then separated some of the water from the rest with an expanse in the sky. Seeing this work He had done over billions of years, and the earth floating there for no apparent reason, He called it good."

"Bored with just a big ball of water and a bunch of random fire and junk floating through space, He decided to make plants. So over millions of years, he made some of the minerals floating in the mud across the face of the earth and had it evolve into plants. After about the first day, He realized that the plants early ancestors wouldn't even be able to survive without the sun... and that caused a dilema. However, He saw this as very good."

"After having created the plants, God decided it would be a good time to create the sun. [from this point onwards I am adding to what I wrote in the post] After waiting millions of years for the plants to form, while supernaturally holding them together, He finally had some of the swirling gas in space create the giant reactor hanging in the sky now. While doing this, He also caused some floating rocks to start crashing together and form the moon. He would later use these two floating objects, the sun and moon, to signify the difference between night and day. After supernaturally causing the plants to survive for millions of years without the light of the sun, they finally got a break. Looking upon the millions of years of rotting plant matter, horrible weather conditions, and cosmic explosions, He saw it as good."

For this rewrite, I tried to keep the order that we see written in the Bible and explain those through natural processes. As you see, it doesn't work. The Bible says the earth came before the sun, evolution REQUIRES that the sun came first. Evolution also requires only natural processes and no guidance from God. As you can see, in that couldn't happen. Now you either have a choice in this matter, believe what the Bible says as it was written, or believe one of man's constantly changing opinions on the matter. The two don't fit together.

Questions to ponder

So the name of this blog is "De' Tinker's Thoughts" which is slang (or whatever the term is) for "The Thinker's Thoughts". And since I'm De' Tinker, it naturally implies I do some thinking. I have many posts already on here about my thoughts on matters. But this post will be different. I will simply ask you some of the questions I've been asking myself, and see what kind of answer you have; or just let you continue to think about them. I will also have a couple of statements in here, please tell me your response to those as well.

The borrower is slave to the lender. And America is called the "Land of the Free". So why is America over 14 trillion dollars in debt?

Why is it that someone who kills a pregnant woman can be convicted of double murder, but if that same woman has an abortion she was just exercising her rights over her body and did not commit murder?

Evolutionists say that they don't allow religion to effect science. Science, real science, the type of science that allowed us to walk on the moon, go to the bottom of the sea (parts of it), fly around the world in a single day, and so much more, is all observable and repeatable. Evolution involves something in the past that can't be repeated or observed, but instead have faith in their beliefs of the past. Does that sound like a religion to you?

Many Christians put so much effort into the latest health fads or whatever the worlds says is the right way to become healthy. Why do they try to use man's methods to achieve a God given potential for health? Why not use the Creator's methods to achieve the potential for health He gave us?

People who don't believe in a higher authority often talk about morals. Without a higher authority, there is no absolute for morals. So why do they punish people for what they believe to be wrong?

Why can kids no longer play games like tag or hide and seek (amongst many others)? These were staple games amongst kids when I was younger. Are they really "unsafe", or have the kids and their parents just become to soft?

In Evolution, it is said there's a chance for anything to happen given enough time and chance. I have come to realize that Time and Chance are the chief gods of Evolution. The third being, Imagination.

There is a multi-million (probably billion) dollar industry in health and fitness. They try to sell you all these fancy equipments, meals, and routines. However, it doesn't matter how fancy, simple, cheap, expensive, complicated, well thought out, easy, hard, etc your routine/diet/or whatever is. If you don't do you or use it, it just plain sucks. It's even worse when you use it/do it and it sets you back.

Why is it that decades before steroids people were setting verifiable strength records that have gone unbroken today with all of our "knew knowledge" in techniques and technology today? Some of these even being from the late 1800's.

If the Old Testament takes up over three quarters of the Bible, why do so many people talk about it less then one fourth of the time?

If mankind truly started out dumb and has gotten smarter, as atheists and evolutionists like to believe, then why have we found batteries several thousand years old? Or temples designed to have their own natural air conditioning requiring no power or maintenance for several millennium? Or pyramids that are thousands of years old yet built in such an advanced way that we couldn't repeat it today?

Why in America is it okay to question the government but not Darwin, when in many other countries you can question Darwin but not the government?

Why does America believe that teaching people to rely on the government will make them more productive and boost the economy?

Why is it people used to care for each other, help the sick, and feed the poor because they wanted to help, and now that the government is in charge of all that, no one helps (for the most part)?

The majority of people's food comes from some kind of grain (I won't even talk about all the processing). However, our digestion system isn't designed to digest grains and such, nor I body to process it. Our digestive tract is of more a medium length, suited more towards meat or ideally fruit (and vegetables). Our teeth range from blunt molars to sharp canines. We are omnivores, and are best suited for a majority fruit diet. I wonder why people are fat these days...

When America was founded, it was believed that the more kids you had the better off financially you would be. Why has that belief been reversed? Why do people assume that the more kids you have means the less money you will get?

In a letter penned by Thomas Jefferson was the famous quote "separation of church and state". What people don't realize is that it is often misquoted. In context, Jefferson was saying that the Constitution had built that wall of separation by saying that the government could not declare an official religion, therefore protecting people's right to freedom of religion. People now use the quote to get prayer out of schools.

The only type of person who is completely safe to pick on (the list is building) is a Christian adult white heterosexual male with no deformities or mental problems. If you choose to pick on anyone else, you are either a racist, sexist, bully, heartless, homophobic, non tolerant, or are discriminating in some other way. Why is this?

Praying in schools has been banned in schools and the workplace because it is considered unconstitutional and offensive, yet it is still just fine to curse in those same places? Cursing is offensive, but still part of our right to free speech all the same as praying.

It is taught these days that fat is bad. However, it is also taught that without fat we would die. How is this?

It is considered conventional wisdom or whatever that eating raw meat is bad (and will kill you). Show me a lion, bear, ape, shark, eagle, maggot, or any number of other animals that get sick from eating raw meat.

That's all for now, I may write another post like this sometime or write posts about one of these questions/statements. Please tell me your thoughts on these, even if you pick one and say a quick one sentence reply (I would like a lot more though).

"He is blameless"

I've been doing some reading in Job recently. There are two main thoughts and perspectives I have on it, this is one. This one is about Job himself. The Almighty Himself said of Job "He is the finest man in all the earth. He is blameless - a man of compete integrity." When The All Knowing Himself says that of you, it really means something.

Why did The Almighty say this of him? Because Job sought the Lord with all his heart. He had complete and utter faith, to an extent I can't even understand; though I would like to emulate it. I would just hope that I can avoid the great trials Job went though... but without those I would never know if I was that faithful. Scary thought...

At first, Job shows what seems to be the faith that anyone can show. He is very rich and famous, so the Devil says (paraphrased) "of course he has such great faith! Look at all of his blessings". That is why I have faith right now too, because I have blessings. This easy time is drawing me closer to the Creator, in preperation for the trials I know are ahead. However, Christianity today seems to promise only these blessings. It does not prepare anyone with the faith required when the blessings are taken away, and curses rain down upon us.

I hear estimates that Job was around 60-70 years old in the beginning of the story. He was known worldwide (literally, all around the globe) as a very rich, wise, and Godly man. No one could find fault with him. Then the trials came.

I don't want to repeat the entire story here because I'm talking about my views on the story, if you don't know the story go read it. It's in the book called "Job". Almost directly in the middle of the Bible.

Long story short, The Almighty tells The Enemy that the only thing he cannot do is kill Job. That was the one thing requirement in the final phase of Job's testing. Job had already lost his riches, his family, his friends, everything. Even a few "friends" of his who had traveled from locations possibly all over the world to meet with him, weren't all that encouraging. They insisted that he had done something wrong and this was punishment. Yet, The All Knowing called him blameless. They did not know this, but we do.

Job's former friends and even wife had told him to curse the Lord and die. Job refused. It got to the point that Job was stratching the boils covering his entire body with broken pottery. He had a terrible sickness and was lying in ashes with no one to help him. He was even being told that this was because of his sin. Yet he knew otherwise.

Think about it. The Almighty told The Devil that the one and only thing he could not do to Job was kill him. Satan took full advantage of that as well. I can hardly wrap my mind around that. Most of us, including me, complain when we are low on money, or food, or have someone cursing God, or something else like that. With Job, The Enemy could do anything he wanted, except kill him. I can't just stop reiterating this! As I said, it just blows my mind! Not that this happened to Job, but what Job did inspite of this. Or, I should say, what he didn't do. The Enemy was simply trying to make Job curse The Lord one single time. Even when he was allowed to do whatever he wanted to torture Job, he couldn't break him.

Oh, one other interesting twist. Most Christians today know that whatever hardship they go through will be rewarded with the gift of Heaven once they die. Job didn't know that. He thought that when you died, you died and that's it. Or at least that seems to be how he understood it. Yet, when he was suffering the worst that the Enemy could throw at him, he simply trusted the Almighty. A simple, child like faith. I can't comprehend it! He did not know why this was happening, when it would end, or what would happen next. He thought that the Lord had turned away from him, he believed that it was The Lord Himself tormenting him! Yet he did not break.

Job would have considered it worth to simply die from all this torture in faithful service to the Creator, even though he didn't know that he would live in perfect Paradise with Him. Job would rather go through all of this torment, trial and pain while staying faithful to the Lord and then simply cease existing when he died, then he would to reject his Creator.

I am having a hard time finding a way to put enough emphasis on this. Job did not know why his children were dead, riches stolen or destroyed, why his wife left him, or why the Creator had seemed to reject him. He did not know that the Almighty was allowing the Enemy to test him. He did not know that if he died he would get to live with the Creator. He did not know that when the trials were done, he would be given twice of everything he had before. He just simply wanted to die and cease to exist to get away from all this pain without reward, and cursing the Lord was not an option.

I have run out of words for now. I can't even remember if I explained my original point. This is just something that has been boggling my mind.

My Warning

This post will be a little less about my thoughts on things, and more about my experiences. It will also serve as a warning. I will tell you a bit more about me here. And about some troubles I went through.

If you have read my blog at all it should hopefully be very obvious that I am a Christian. However, it is only recently that I have felt so strongly about being a Christian (I'm talking about in the last few months before writing this). The reason is because most of the message I had heard all my life, about Jesus Christ dying for my sins, had been watered down so much. I would hear it repeated again and again that He died for my sins, but without the background behind any of this being explained, it all seemed very unimportant (for lack of a better word) to me. Yes, I knew what everyone said was true, but it carried very little meaning.

Whenever I went to church or heard someone read from or quote the Bible, it was almost always out of the New Testament and from many of the same passages. The meaning behind these passages and even the entire New Testament was never properly explained to me. What do I mean by properly? I will get to that shortly.

I did study the Old Testament, and I also knew most of the Bible stories as well (or better than) other kids. However, it was treated as something to talk about and "learn" from on Sunday's or neat little stories to tell kids before bed. Oh boy, have my perspectives on those stories changed!

This is where my warning comes into play. Many, if not most of all Christians, are doing this. They are making these stories, these very valuable and historically true and scientifically accurate stories, seem only as children's tales. They are also making the Old Testament unpropotionately weak. And worse yet, the biggest problem I had to overcome, was the fact that othe Christians were unknowingly downplaying the Almighty's power. That is part of the reason I myself rarely use the terms "God" or "Jesus", is because they were the only terms I heard most of my life, and they have lost meaning to me. As hard as that is to admit, it is true. So instead, I choose to use other names for our Creator.

Now what I mean by downplaying the Almighty's power is the fact that it is not mentioned enough, and when it is, not emphasized enough. Yes, I know that in church miracles are spoken of all the time! Jesus rising up from the dead, turning water into wine, feeding thousands with almost nothing, and several others. The problem is, at least it was for me, is that no one put nearly enough empasis on any of these. The sermon would always lead into how He loves us and died for us, and all that. Since I already knew that and had heard it dozens of times (and had already accepted Him), it was difficult for these to have lots of meaning for me.

There were the periodic sermons that would spark an interest when someone really went into the power of the All Powerful, but it didn't happen enough. And I hardly remember at all anyone making the "children's tales" in the Bible seem as they truly were, miraculous examples of the power and might of the Lord of Heaven's Armies!

This doesn't make any sense at all! When you look at the Bible, first off you notice it starts in the Old Testament. Also, it starts by showing the Almighty's power! What happens first in the Bible? Creation. Everything from nothing, because of a supernatural act on the part of the Creator. In the Old Testament (which is far larger then the New Testament), you see example after example of the Almighty's power and justice. You also see some of His love for us and some glimpses at His mercy. His love and mercy are shown most in the New Testament, through the Messiah. However, that is after thousands of years of history and well over half of the Bible. Everything else, all these examples of His undeniable power, lead up to this.

So why all my life did people ignore everything leading up to the ultimate example of love and mercy in Christ? After all, the All Knowing didn't. Why then do we?

Well I can tell you this, it kept me a weak Christian. So please to not make the same mistake. Do not ignore the power of the Almighty! Speak of it first and foremost, and those who listen will always hear. Heed my warning, maybe others will be saved years of learning as I have.

Now, everything really hit me all at once just a few months ago. I was on vacation and was reading some books, one in particular was a commentary on the book of Job. Unlike other commentaries talking about the faith of Job and such, this commentary showed how the book of Job was "one of the most historically and scientifically accurate records of the ancient world". It focused more on the power, wisdom and knowledge of the God of Job. That was the biggest turn-a-round points for me. I devoured that book! Then I devoured the actual book of Job, rereading large portions several times. I had never read the Bible so passionately.

Within weeks of each other, event after event occured which made me more passionate about the Bible and my Christianity than ever before. I even began studying the Bible to help me better write my own books! In a period of several weeks, I felt more fear than I ever had before. And by fear, I mean fear of the Lord. I caught glimpse after glimpse of just how powerful He was. One example may be found in the first chapter of Genesis. During the creation account, it is said that "He [God] created the stars also". With that little sentence, the Almighty describes Himself creating most of the universe! Our little planet earth, which is so small it should hardly be given any thought in the Milkyway Galaxy, and that one galaxy out of so many hundreds of billions of others that it shouldn't be given any thought; this little planet was deemed so much more important than the rest of creation that the rest of the entire universe was pretty much described as "He created the stars also"!

I still have not fully grasped the signifigance of that one sentence, but the more I understand it the greater it is! The fact that He would create so much, yet choose this one little speck in the corner of the universe as the location where those who He made in His own image reside, is just astounding. This fear of Lord has put things into better perspective for me. There are times where anything beyond the moment doesn't matter. It doesn't matter what I have, how long I'll live, where I'll go when I die, or even if I'm a "good person". There are times where I am simply frozen in sheer awe at His power. Those are the best times of worship I have ever had. Where I am simply overwhelmed with the knowledge of how insignifigant I am, in terms of power. Compared to the universe and all that the Creator controls, I seem as nothing!

Now, I am still studying farther and have more and more revalations of His power since these events. I mainly study the Old Testament, to learn the history and signifigance of the New Testament. Reading of the miracles and power surrounding those such as Noah, or Abraham, Jacob, and others has been a great experience for me. And for once, I read these stories not as children's stories, but as HIStory. Some days I still struggle to actually pick up my Bible, but when I do pick it up, it is with great enthusiasm.

Overall my warning is to make sure that things to not repeat. Christianity once seemed almost boring for me. Everything in the New Testament was dull. Now that I am studying the Old Testament and the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, it is constantly giving new life to the New Testament.

Also, my hope and prayer for eveyone who ever reads this is that they will also one day be able to experience what I am experiencing. This closeness, understanding and fear of their Creator. Not fear of retaliation or harm, but a fear composed of awe and wonder at something so much greater than ourselves! That is what Christianity is about! The most powerful being to ever exist, who created the universe and defined the laws of physics, who caused time to begin and to one day end, who can wipe out everything that exists with a mere thought; Christianity is about this All Powerful Creator wanting to know us. To know me...

The Great Footnote

Let me take you back to the beginning really quickly:

"In the beginning, God created the heavens and the earth"
Yes, when I said "Let me take you back to the beginning" I meant it. Back to the very beginning.

I will just be going back over my thoughts I've had recently.

So for anyone who truly believes what the Bible says, the Almighty created the universe and all that is in it. That obviously includes the stars and the galaxies. Now to just step back, and consider what that means. When you step out at night and look up at the sky (provided you are somewhere that allows you to see the sky) the moon plus every single speck of light was created with merely a few words. It was created with such ease, the Almighty didn't even lift a finger. Now, these little specks of light aren't really so little. Here's a video that should better illustrate this:


Now when it went from our moon to Mercury, I was already thinking "Why even bother?" I'm not entirely sure what that meant, but I think it meant "Why even try to do anything impressive", or something like that. But, the moon to Mercury was only the first comparison in that video. I can't even remember which part of the video I just stopped trying to comprehend the size of the planets and stars compared to earth. By the time it got to Canis Majoris, I had completely stopped even trying at all. My mind almost turned off. Canis Majoris is believed to be big enough to contain over seven quadrillion earths. That is over 7,000,000,000,000,000 earths that could be fit in there! Oh, and the most important part. VY Canis Majoris is just one star.

There are believed to be at least 100 billion stars in our galaxy. This post here even estimates up to over 400 billion: http://www.universetoday.com/30305/how-many-galaxies-in-the-universe/
That same post also states that some estimates say there are over 500 billion galaxies out in the universe. And we live in just one galaxy, which we will never, ever fully explore. So basically they believe that for every star in our galaxy, there is an entire galaxy filled with hundreds of billions of stars. Now, I personally take that a step farther. I believe it is possible that there are hundreds of billions of these humongous galaxy clusters/universes! As long as the entire universe is smaller than the Almighty, it's possible. Oh wait, the Creator has no end. I guess that means the universe doesn't need one either. We will just never know how big it is.

I can't really find the words to express the thoughts going through my head about how big the universe is and how insignifigant I am, so I'll just spam the videos I've been watching.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=b0lxbzgwW7I

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3Ya12I036lg

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aQELxMFBpY4

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2l4leBHRvI4

These are just a few of the videos I've seen that have made me feel so overwhelmed. These are the ones that deal with just the stars and galaxies alone. To paraphrase what was said in the second to last link "I could sit here all day trying to find ways to describe the Almighty, but his universe already does that for Him"

So now to close this up, the reason I named this post.

"God made two great lights--the larger one to govern the day, and the smaller one to govern the night. He also made the stars..." The Almighty creating virtually the rest of the universe was put in as almost nothing more than a foot note in this verse. All those hundreds of billions of galaxies out there, each filled with hundreds of billions of stars, many of which able to contain hundreds of billions of earths, was simply explained as "oh yeah, He made all that stuff too". If there is a God, and He is so powerful as to consider the rest of the universe so insigfigant as to only give it a simple mention during the creation, who are we?

Men and Angels

When you hear the word "Angel", especially when talking about heavenly beings, what image appears in your mind?

Chances are, it is something loosely based off pictures like this one:

Obviously, it may not be exactly like that. But let me tell you this, I can almost guarantee you imagined it having wings. Why is this? Because of pictures like the one above. You see, as far as I can tell, the Bible never mentions angels having wings. Other heavenly beings do, but not angels.

I decided to make this post after reading in Judges chapter 6. In that chapter, Gideon is met by an angel of the Lord. When Gideon first began talking to the angel, he thought he was talking to just a man. This is consistent with many encounters between men (or women) and angels. Many times, they seem indistinguishable from any other person. This is the case with Gideon and the angel. Gideon never even realizes he's talking to an angel until the angel makes Gideon's offering burn up in flames by simply touching it with the tip of his staff. The angel disappeared after this, leaving Gideon in shock. He thought he was going to die, having just seen an angel of the Lord.

Most of the times you hear of angels in the Bible, people do not realize they are angels at first. Of course there are other times, the instances in Matthew come to mind, where people realize immediately that they are talking to angels. In cases like this, the angels first must either convince those they are speaking to that 1) they are not going to kill them and/or 2) that the angels themselves should not be praised, but the Lord the messenger serves.

Now, for those few readers of mine who understand what any of these mean: JJ, ((W)) ((W)), WYWUAS, JE, OMBC, and several others, I know what came to your mind when I said "Angel". And guess what, that is a much more accurate description. For those of you who don't know, I am talking about Jackie Evancho.

(Official site:http://www.jackieevancho.com/us/home)

Many call her an angel. Others say she is a super powered being sent down from some advanced alien race, while others say she is possessed by the ghost of a 300 year old opera singer. I'll be talking about the first theory; the "angel" theory.

I mention her because, biblically, she is a better representation of an angel then pictures like the one I showed above. She looks like perfectly normal human being, sounds like one (just not one for her age), acts like one (better than most though), ect. I am not saying she is an angel, at least not a biblical angel sent by the Almighty such as Gabriel or Michael, what I am saying though, is that she is closer to the biblical description. Meaning, no wings and seems like an ordinary person. Of course, angels also have the power to destroy entire armies by themself. I would rather not find out if Jackie could do that, since she is seen as a messenger of peace, and frankly, there's a chance I might be in that destroyed army by then. So I will just say she has an amazing gift from the Creator (who can give whatever gift He wants, to whatever extent, to anyone He wants) but is still a human being.

Now, to continue on, since it feels like I was stagnating. Now, if most encounters with men and angels seem like an encounter between two human beings, such as we see often in the Bible, how many times does that still happen today? I have heard, and I am sure many of my readers have as well, of stories happening even in these modern times of encounters with people they later believe to be angels. Now, if angels seem just like perfectly normal people, how many angels do we see in our life? How many angels have I seen? How many times do we interact with angels on a daily basis? Have I seen any today? I will never know until I get to Heaven. But it does get you thinking. It leaves me thinking...

First!

That oh so common comment you see on just about everything these days. Everyone is so happy to be the first to comment on something that all they can think of to say is "first". But, since this is my first post, I decided to name it just that.

I decided to make this my more intellectual, or philosophical, blog. My other is more science fiction with a comedic edge. This will be about deeper, more serious stuff.

So, the thought that made me finally decide to start this blog:

Food.

Yes, very deep, serious, intellectual and philosophical, I know. I just came off a fast this morning, and my mind was going over our society's view of food and everything involved with it. You want to know what I came to realize? Almost everything involving food in these modern days (in America I know) is sinful and just wrong. We eat to much, to often, and we eat stuff that is so far removed from the way the Almighty created it that it isn't even funny. Yet, we say all this is healthy!

Let me explain further, laconic speech won't help to much with any controversial subject I bring up. We live in a society that says homosexuality, nudity, sex before marriage, bribery, disrespect, thievery, adultery, idolatry, and so much more is acceptable, and christians try their best to stay out of that and usually disagree with the world's view and that stuff (unfortunately, many christians are giving in). We live in a society that has taken the Creator out of as much of the created as possible, perverted everything they can, yet we still say their views on food and health are correct! But we say their views on morality are not... hmm, something seems wrong to me.

If the Creator wanted the Creation to stay healthy, why would he make health attainable by technology only available, at most, two times so far in history (one of those times is today, the other in ancient history. A subject for another post)? What about all those thousands of years where people were still living in little wood houses and using axes to chop wood for heat? They didn't have all the processing equipment to make our modern, "healthy" food. Why would anyone do something that stupid? Lead alone the All Powerful, All Knowing Creator of the Universe? No, he made it so we could be perfectly (at least as perfect as we can be in the fallen world) healthy without the aid of modern processing technology.

Let's start from the beginning. When He, the Creator, created the world, everything was a vegetarian. Also, everything was more efficient. We were protected from the harmful rays coming from outer space, had a thicker and more energizing atmosphere, had higher quality soil, ect.... making all the plants unbelievably healthy compared to anything today. Every living beast of the earth and foul of the air, as well as man, could get all the nutrients they needed from eating these plants in their natural form. There are some theories that they could have eaten fish too, something about the word for life describing fish as opposed to describing other animals being different in Greek and therefore fish weren't alive in a certain way, but I'll keep it simple and just say everything was a vegetarian in the beginning. No cooking or processing required, other than that which the body did naturally during digestion.

Move forward to after the fall. Death and degradation came into the world. Carnivores started appearing (the animals already existed before, they just ate plants; possibly a subject for another post), and in an estimated less than 1700 years, there was the flood. During that time, the world hadn't degraded, or "died" enough that we needed to eat animal products at all. We still had the protection from space, the thick atmosphere, really good soil, good plants, ect. It was still similar to the way things were when they were made "very good". Of course, sin was rampant, but biologically things were a lot closer to the beginning then they were today.

Then the flood happened. It fundamentally changed the entire world. Some of our protection from space was gone (and continues to deteriorate today), the atmosphere had changed, and several plants that might have fed us the right mix of nutrients possibly went extinct, amongst many other things that happened after the flood. Something interesting I noticed was, immediately after the flood receded and Noah and his family were back on dry land, was the fact that the All Knowing told them they could eat animals now. I realized, just hours before typing all this, that this was probably because He knew they could no longer get the all their required nutrients from plant matter alone. So mankind was allowed meat, by the Law of the Creator, for the first time.

Fast forward an estimated 4,300 years to today. The quality of the food has degraded so much it makes me want to laugh! Why do we think that processing it by man's methods will make it better than it grew under the Creator's Laws? If anything, the farther from the beginning we get, the less we should process the food, not more. You want to know why we do it? Because the Enemy, Satan, wants to remove the Almighty out of even the food we eat! Including, how we eat it! That, along with so much else stuff, all of which relating to sin, is why we eat both so much food and food of such low, processed quality. I'm not saying that eating a twinkie is a sin, per se, but the fact that we have so far removed food from the way it was created with purpose, and the fact that we eat much more than we need to, is the sin.

I realized another aspect of this when I was whittling down a secret stash of candy I had. I was eating a reese's egg, taking little bites and savoring the taste of each as long as I could. It took my probably three minutes to eat that one reese's, and it was very enjoyable. I was thinking of eating a second, when I realized if I did it would be gluttonous, selfish, and therefore sinful. I was shocked at that revalation, and decided not to have another. Then I thought over how everyone else eats. I realized it was very sinful as well. We eat far more than we need to, far more often, and we appreciate it very little.

The best part? If we ate our food the way the All Knowing, All Powerful, All Existing Creator meant us to, we would not eat to much, we would not eat to often, and what we ate would be the highest, undefiled quality we could get. Wait a minute... that sounds a lot like a few diets I've heard about; such as the Paleo diet, The Primal Blueprint, Spartan Health Regimen, ect... All of these encourage eating things in their natural state and not eating more than necessary. This philospy sounds very good to me. Eat as the Creator meant us to eat. But, why do so many people refuse to do this, or worse yet, even call this unhealthy!? Because, we have tried to remove the Creator out of everything He created. Including our diets.

If you have any questions, comments, anything, just leave a comment. I have more thoughts on several other things, so keep watching!