Opus 2026-402: Fine Tuned Humanity

If the entire universe exists as it does with the sole purpose of creating the bubble that we know as earth, why not also assume that the innumerable pagans in the world are there to provide an infrastructure for the righteous.

The first statement is about the Fine Tuning of the Universe.  There are about 200 different measurements involving physics, astronomy, chemistry and such across the universe that all need to be exactly where they are for the conditions of life to exist here on earth.  So far, in spite of the headlines you read in the MSM, there have been no planets discovered with life.  Telescopes get more powerful.  Our knowledge increases by leaps and bounds.  Still no life anywhere but earth.

I have been trying to read the book of Revelation.  It is a constant litany of death and destruction.  When I read the prophets in the Old Testament I see the same pattern.  If you know anything about history it is a record of war and genocide.  Look at the parable of the seeds.  Only 25% thrived.  When God told Elijah that there were still 7,000 men who had not bowed to Baal you need to realize that is out of a population of at least 3 million.  I try to fit the hope for peace and security into that.  It makes me wonder if there is a need for fine tuning the human race.

When I think of all of the hands that are necessary around the world for me to sit and enjoy a cup of coffee in the morning, ask yourself how many are necessary to provide and maintain a comfortable life that we know today.

Granted, in many years passed, the lifestyle of the righteous was not all that glorious.  We need to be careful though that we don’t try and see the world through our modern eyes and assume that those people were aware of their poverty.  If you lived in Medieval Europe, and you had enough food to feed your family, enough wood to keep them warm in the winter time, enough wool to give them clothes to wear, and a priest who actually understood the Bible and the gospel, would that not be enough to make you glory in the Providence of God?.

Will people in the future look back and wonder how we survived in the crude 21st century?  Enjoy the day.

homo unius libri

Opus 2026-377: The Gleaning

We may be approaching a time in history when the results of being civilized run into the accumulated weakness of the gene pool.

I have always assume kids are dumber because of cultural influences.  As a teacher I could often see the potential that was buried under a gilding of absentee parents and woke educators.  It could have been my imagination.  Maybe the dumbing down we see is the natural result of a society that keeps people alive who would normally have died in the course of growing up.  It would not necessarily be from neglect or euthanasia.  The world is a dangerous place and a child that cannot learn to look both ways or insists on getting out of a moving car would not have lived to grow up in the past.  

You would think we would see that in nature.  You would expect deer would be getting smarter as the dumb ones are turned into road kill.  I don’t see it happening.  At the same time I have heard hunters share that the deer seem to know when hunting season begins and disappear.  There must be many variable for survival in different species, even humans.  

Lions culled the herd.  They did not go after the alpha males.  They dragged down the infirm and weak.  During rutting season the strongest stag drives away weaker rivals and thus keeps the blood line strong.  The world of animals has a way of trying to build strength even without knowing the philosophy behind it.

Microbes do the same.  I have not done the research but I have been told that if you chart the deaths from different diseases the rate gradually declines over time.  This is seemingly true even in modern times with things like polio and measles.  The strong have bodies that fight off the disease, the weak succumb.  Some people sailed through the influenza season like it does not apply to them.  Maybe it doesn’t.
    
It is possible the same thing happens in cultures.  Rome did not fall in a day because the barbarians showed up and stomped them.  They did not forget how to make swords.  What they lost was the desire to use them.  Rome had repeated waves of lunatic, sword swinging illiterates that kept pushing at the gates.  Rome eventually died in a whimper.  Are we facing such a time in our world?  Are the barbarians of the Middle East going to bring down the West?  In the short run I am not an optimist.  In the long run the Christians might wake up and begin to assert themselves again.  If that happens it will be no contest.

We live in exciting times.  That is reported to be part of a Chinese curse.  Whether it came from the Chinese or not it is still a thing of concern.

homo unius libri

Opus 2026-308: Universal Power Outage

One of the arguments for the universe having a designer is what is called Fine Tuning.  Last I heard there are about 200 very precise measurements that must be in place simultaneously in order for the conditions for life to exist.  Most of them regard physics that I have no clue on but one has to do with graivity.  Gravity I don’t claim to understand but I can wrap my head around it.  I have dropped things on my toe a few times.

A recent power outage in our neighborhood got me to thinking about Fine Tuning.  I began to reflect on all the possible reasons why we lost power.  I could think of many from a drunk driving into a power pole to a key employee not showing up to work to press a vital button.  What became clear was how intricate and complicated our power grid really is.  It would not take much to bring it to a halt.  When that happens the fans stop, ovens stop baking, A/C takes a break and the list goes on.  Unless you are half way through a delicate recipe or on life support the damage caused by a power outage are in the minor range.

There are Four Fundamental Forces
        Gravity
        The Electromagnetic Force
        The Weak Nuclear Force
        The Strong Nuclear Force

The only one I have any concept of is gravity.

What happens if gravity goes off.  If you are a believer in evolution, not God and the concept of random chance, then this should be a real possibility to consider.  You should be afraid, very afraid.  What if the great roulette wheel in the sky decided to take a nap for a few hours on gravity?  

The first thing you would notice, and possibly the last, would be that anything not tied down would go flying up into the air, including you.  Imagine a rock tied to a string 3,000 miles long spinning at 1,000 MPH.  It is possible this would be the last awareness you would have because you would go flying up against the ceiling hard enough to crush every bone in your body.  

What would be the next observation?  Let’s assume that you were secured in an electric chair so you would go nowhere.  You would not notice anything for long because the atmosphere you are breathing would begin to expand.  There would be nothing left to breathe.  The planet earth would make an immediate detour heading away from its circular orbit and heading straight out into space.  So would every other planet in the solar system.  It would be possible there might be a race between the earth freezing and being burned up as the Sun, without gravity, began to spread out into the universe.

Then what if the Great Jokester in the Sky decided it was enough and turned gravity back on?  I am afraid it would be too late for us and earth.

Basically it would be the end of all things as we know them.  That is okay.  We would not live long enough to mourn the loss.  So you had better hope that there is a God and that Jesus is paying attention as He monitors the universe.  Chance is a tricky thing.  If you have ever had one of those moments when someone runs a red light and almost takes you out, you will have an idea of how fragile things can be.

homo unius libri

Opus 2026-306: Sometimes Simple

I am enjoying an approaching dawn which is being announced by driving rain, lightening and thunder.  As the rolling and rumbling thunder passed over my house I found myself thinking about the cause.  Does Thor cause the thunder with his hammer?  Ancient religions seemed to need to divide up the chambers of nature among many gods.  We Christians have one God who is understood to be big enough to handle it all.  

God causes the thunder, but how?  I dipped into my memory and came up with explanations tying it to lightening and air pressure.  I have no idea if my theory is accurate.  It was passed on to me as scientific but so has global warming and evolution.  Just because someone says it is scientific doesn’t mean it is.

For many things in life a simple explanation is all we need even if it isn’t accurate.  Recently I worked with the statement, “Water freezes at 32̊.”  I pointed out that a more accurate statement would be “Pure water freezes at 32̊ F at sea level.”  You do not need to know the second statement to know how to make ice cubes or let you water drip on a cold winter night.  You could go into the miracle of ice floating because of the expansion during phase change.  You could examine the difference in energy needed to move the needle one degree and make that phase change happen and how that energy transfer makes refrigeration possible.  If you don’t have a clue to what that means then rest assured that your freezer will still make ice.

In our theology we have the same kind of practical vagueness.  I refer here to the statement found in Ephesians 2:8 that we are saved by grace through faith.  That is enough of a summary to get a seeker into heaven.  A more accurate statement would be that God extends His saving grace to those who have faith in the shed blood of Jesus as adequate to cancel their sin.  From there you can move on to explaining what grace is, or trying to agree on a definition.  Good luck.  You can look into the meaning of faith and what it is you are believing.  You can write books about it.

Or you can simply say “Water freezes at 32̊.”

Sometimes the simple statements are more than enough to achieve the goal.

homo unius libri

Opus 2026-271: Click Bait: Tick Bait

Logic can be a dangerous thing.  At first I just scrolled by this bit of click bait:

“Farmers notice spike in ticks while Lyme disease vaccine is entering market by Pfizer.”

I think the idea that was being planted was that Pfizer has been sending teams into the fields of America releasing millions of ticks to create a need for their vaccine.  I guess it is possible.  It is certainly one explanation for the correlation.  I would suggest a bit more investigation is in order.  I will not do it because life is too short but if you are inclined, go ahead.

You might investigate if this is similar to winter coats being introduced in fall.  Or maybe if you are into bugs, mosquito repellent is ordered as winter is coming to a close.  What better time to market something that when people are concerned about an issue.

You might investigate to see if there is a spike in ticks every year at the same time.

You might investigate to see if this vaccine has been marketed this time of year for the past 50 years.

You might even look into whether the claim is true.

Keep in mind one of the principles of the scientific method:  Correlation does not mean causation.

homo unius libri

Opus 2026-241: Facing the Inevitable

Let me give you one of the most divisive statements ever made:

Genesis 1:1 (KJV) In the beginning God created the heaven and the earth.

The first three words begin the division. “In the beginning…”.  You would think this would be obvious but the pagan version of scientists have been denying even this bit of the obvious.  Science has been claiming there was no beginning ever since the Enlightenment became the dominant force in the West.  Their mantra has been that the universe is infinite at both ends.  In the early years when they were basing their theories on philosophy and personal necessity, that is understandable.  But we know more today and the truth is still ignored.

So Christians have always had a bone to pick with the pagans.  When you add the next word it gets even testier.  “In the beginning God…”.  Here is where punctuation might help.  As the secular scientists began to look at the evidence they themselves were collecting it became clear that the universe was not eternal.  So they would translate this, “In the beginning ?”  They didn’t know and had nothing but cool science fiction themes to work with.  Much of the science fiction writing I have read is trying to fill in the blank where the question mark goes.  Imagination is a wonderful thing to base a novel on but is not a foundation for reality and real science.

Christians of course would use different punctuation.  We would switch the question mark for an exclamation point. “In the beginning !”  This is a basic assumption that the early scientists had which allowed them to develop the scientific method and move deeper into discovering how things work from a single cell to a galaxy.  If you can’t make that assumption then you can’t depend on your answers.  Just picture how your day would go if the law of gravity decided to act on a part time basis,

Intellectuals like to cover it up but every field of study begins with assumptions that cannot be proven or are conditional.  Does 1 + 1 equal 2?  Not in computer binary language. Some things are taken on faith.  It would help if they would stop denying that basic reality.

We know where it began and who began it.  The rest we are still working on.  Enjoy the adventure.

homo unius libri

Opus 2026-187: Alternate Reality

In science fiction one of the themes is alternate reality.  The concept is that at key moments of decision or action there are at least two possible paths.  Take one such moment that I read about recently.  If Charles Martel had lost at Tours then the Muslim armies would have continued north and I would be writing in Arabic today.  Of course that assumes I would even know how to write.  The story writers will say that such a future did take place and exists in a parallel universe.  In their stories people cross over from one to the other and if they are worth reading, a good time is had by all.

We have seen science adopt the idea in what they call the multiverse.  There is no proof for such a thing.  It defies all the known laws of science but it is the child of necessity. The reason they go that way is because if they don’t they might have to admit the existence of God.  Heaven forbid, if you will excuse the expression.

As I was pondering a conflict in my life this concept came to mind, but in reverse.  The real life situation, which I am sure many husbands have experienced, is when you ask your wife where cheese grater is.  Her answer?  Where it has always been.  Ignore the fact that I did not ask where it has always been even though that might be a better question.  My problem is I can remember at least three different places that it has been kept.  I have checked all three, therefore it must be in a fourth.  Sounds logical but in her universe it has always been in the same place.

I occurred to me that what is happening is that several different realities have come together in my consciousness at this moment.  Right now the grater has always been in the same place.  In the other three realities it was kept in various different locations.

Of course it could be that as my mind ages I just don’t remember.  I think I am going to go with my new theory.

homo unius libri

Opus 2026-108: The Eighth Day?

As I was reading through Psalms 104, I came across this passage,

Psalm 104:29-30 (KJV) 29 Thou hidest thy face, they are troubled: thou takest away their breath, they die, and return to their dust. 30 Thou sendest forth thy spirit, they are created: and thou renewest the face of the earth.

In the first verse I was just thinking about animals dying but the second verse had a different feel.

Notice the word “created”.  This is the same word used in Genesis 1:1 in regard to God creating the world out of nothing.  In studying that passage I remember that this specific word usually has that idea.

So is this an indication that God is still in the creating business?  I know that on the seventh day He rested.  Creation as a red letter day was over.  As believers we have no problem with any of this but our friends who are into evolution have something they don’t want to acknowledge.  They document times when massive extinction of species takes place.  Every once in a while you hear about how many species disappear each year.  In the face of that we still keep finding new bugs and plants.

Since even the Darwinian folks will admit there has not been enough time for evolution to take place, how do you explain new species after all this time?  This verse seems to give an indication.  God is still creating.  He is still renewing the earth.

We are in the eighth day of creation.  That is not a doctrinal point that requires belief.  It is just an observation.  As they say, results may vary.

homo unius libri

Opus 2026-029: Says Who?

When you come to a statement in the Bible which is obviously false you move to an interpretation which makes allowance for figures of speech, such as metaphor, simile, hyperbole.  You do this pretty much naturally on some of these statements.  For instance, does God have feathers?  That seems like a silly question.

Psalm 91:4 (KJV) He shall cover thee with his feathers, and under his wings shalt thou trust: his truth shall be thy shield and buckler.

So if you believe in literal interpretation of scripture, and read this verse, then you have to believe that God has feathers.  Maybe He does.  I’m not sure I found any verses that says, “God does not have feathers.”  At the same time most of us agree it’s a pretty silly individual who accepts this or demands that it be interpreted literally.

So when we have statements that do not make sense or are totally illogical, even the definitive dispensationalist would say that it is figurative.  We have established the principal.  Now the problem comes in applying that principle.

You see, one person’s logic is often another person’s nonsense.  Columbus was convinced that the Earth was round and that if he sailed west, he would reach China.  To him this is a matter of logic, information and reason.  There were people who disagreed with him.  Which one gets to determine what science teaches?

In areas of Bible interpretation and theology one of the unfortunate truths is that most people start with the traditions of their elders, their system, their theology and twist the scripture to fit into the gaps.  I think we all do this.  The difference is that some of us are aware of it and struggle with it whereas others just get that smile of superior wisdom, and administer a pat on the head.  Or as it was sometimes in the history, they burn us at the stake.

I just watched a short video where James Tour presented an argument that I’ve heard from John Lennox before about how if we lived 500 years ago, we would’ve all been Immovable Earthers.  Why?  Because the Bible says so.

Psalm 93:1 (KJV) The LORD reigneth, he is clothed with majesty; the LORD is clothed with strength, [wherewith] he hath girded himself: the world also is stablished, that it cannot be moved.

His point was that with more knowledge we eventually changed our understanding and switched from literal to figurative.  It does not change the actuallly point of the verse.  Understanding the poetical nature of a passage does not rob it of meaning.  In some cases it deepens it.

We need to work on our discernment as well as our credulity. 

homo unius libri

Opus 2026-026: God Is in the Gaps

One of the criticisms that the anti God crowd likes to throw at scientist who believe in God is what is called the God of the gaps.  They accuse these believers of saying that God must’ve done something when they are confronted by areas of knowledge that cannot be discovered.  It’s a not so subtle way put down of believers by claiming that they are unwilling to look in the gaps.

If their criticism is accurate, then it is justified, but in reality, their criticism is not that of skepticism, but it is the criticism of the cynic.  It’s a denial of what the believer actually believes.  First of all, the believer would say that God created the universe.  That’s pretty simple.  When he says that He’s not saying that we can’t investigate, that there are not areas that we have not figured out yet, or putting specific questions in the area that we will never figure out.  He is simply starting from the premise that God created the universe.

Is God in the gaps?  Of course.  He’s also in that established area between the gaps.  One of the problems we are finding today is that much of what scientist claim to know is fraudulent.  Does that mean that all science is fake?  Does that mean that science is bogus?  No, of course not.  It just means that some scientists are fakers.  God is in the parts that have been figured out.  What scientist don’t like to admit is that even in the parts they have figured out, there are questions that still need to be answered.

Real scientist are skeptics.  They question everything.  They even question the existence of God.  As a believer, I occasionally have questions like that myself, but since there’s some things you have to take on faith, such as gravity, I will continue forward, allowing God to fill the gaps until I get enough information to explain those gaps.  God doesn’t abandon the gap when I explain it.

I embrace the God of the gaps not because there is no explanation for the gaps, but because God is infinite, and I am still just beginning my journey towards eternity.

homo unius libri

Opus 2025-666: A Winter Question

Why did God make snow white?

No, I don’t mean the fairytale princess or the caricature created by Disney.  My question has to do with the color of snow.

Was God making a racist statement?

In case you’re new to people who write with an IQ of higher than 40 that was a rhetorical question.  Since God created all races, it’s kind of hard to believe that He would be racist.  Since Jesus most likely was Semitic and had a certain look about him, it’s doubtful that Norwegians are any higher on the racial hierarchy than people of the Middle East.  While it’s true that we don’t know for sure what the coloring was of people in those days we can look at modern distribution of population and be pretty sure that Jesus did not have blonde hair and blue eyes.

But back to our question…  Why is snow white?

Well, let’s look at the physics of the matter.  White is a reflection of all the colors of the spectrum.  Black is an absorption of all the colors of the spectrum.  So when you look at the color white, you are actually looking at all races mixed together.  Or you could say all race is rejected depending on how you want to look at it.

Why did God design the universe so snow needed to be reflective?  I’m guessing it has to do with the absorption of energy and the generation of heat.  Winter is a time of cooling.  It’s a time of the Earth renewing itself.  In order to do that there are certain temperatures that seem to be better.  If snow were black, it would absorb all the heat of the sun and melt very quickly.  Black cars are hotter in the summer than white cars.  I don’t know what that would do to runoff or to the temperature of the Earth around us.  Instead of being reflected in light, the sun‘s energy would be absorbed and warm the Earth.  Talk about climate change!

I don’t know if there are emotional contents to the color of snow.  Do all people tend to be more optimistic and up in a light atmosphere?  I believe I’ve heard that some cultures wear white to funerals as an expression of morning.  It’s possible that different colors affect different people or peoples in ways that others might not understand.  The fact that snow is winter and winter is depressing to many people might say to me that the reflection of white light is encouraging rather than depressing.

If that’s racist, then deal with it.  Just as snow is omnipresent once you get away from the tropics, so racism is a part of every culture if you define it correctly, or incorrectly as the case may be.

So go ahead and dream of a white Christmas.  Like all dreams it has elements of reality, but people forget what it’s really like driving through the slush, shoveling the sidewalks, coming in covered with cold, wet, white stuff, and all the other mysterious non-joys of winter time.  In case you have never lived in snow country let me advise you not to go out to pick up the newspaper in your stocking feet.

Merry Christmas.

homo unius libri

Opus 2025-532: Still Searching for Perpetual Motion

This morning, as I was using my iPad, I found myself doing something stupid and the iPad separated from the stand it was on.  My son has me set up with this new product where you have a keyboard and a protective cover that folds.  The iPad itself is attached to the top of the cover by magnets.  He shared with me how the magnetic technology had advanced to the point where these magnets did not mess up everything going on in the computer.  I was duly impressed.

But when the iPad itself became separated, I got to thinking about magnets.  Do magnets lose their charge over time?  If you put two magnets together in the proper way, they will stick together.  If you leave them sitting there, they will continue to stick together.  Will they eventually stop sticking?  If the loss of attraction takes place over 1 million years then it’s pretty meaningless.  If it takes place over six months then all my theories are gone.  But I like to speculate.

If this magnetism does not fade fast enough to be explained by the energy used to attract the other object, then we have a violation of the laws of physics.  At least it would seem that way to me.  This might be another one of those areas where research is already being done and I just am not reading that page in the newspaper.  It might also be an area that’s so obvious that no one is looking into it.  Or the research may have already been finished and I am preaching to the choir.

So many mysteries if we see them.  We only see them if we look for them.  Look for things that don’t make sense but happen anyway.

homo unius libri

Opus 2025-510: A Pattern of Uniqueness

Somewhere far in my past, I read a statement that told me that in all the history of the universe there have never been two snowflakes that are identical.  I may be overstating that a little bit, but I think that gives you the idea of what they were trying to say.  My question would be, “How do you know?”  That might be followed up with, “What difference does it make?”

For the scientist it’s probably just a speculation that gets his name in print.  Assuming that I accept it to be true, for me it’s an indication of the creativity of God.  Now why God would spend time designing new snowflakes, I don’t know.  Somehow I think that He puts certain processes on automatic and gets on to dealing with the snowflakes that are walking around and calling themselves Christians.

You don’t need to go to snowflakes though.  As I sit looking towards the rising sun, I see it filtered through a wonderful oak tree.  If I look to the left, I see three more oak trees just beyond my porch and I defy you to find much of anything that is similar between them.  Yes, they all have bark, but the patterns on the bark, while recognizable as oak, are totally unique to that tree.  The branches bend and spread and the leaves sprout.  Yes all of that.  And in all of it, I would venture to guess that in the entire world, there are no two oak trees that are absolutely identical.

How do I know?  I don’t.  I would not put that down as an eternal truth.  I think I’m pretty safe in making that accusation though.  Is it because God doesn’t like identical oak trees?  It could be.  It’s possible that He gets offended by too much uniformity.  It’s possible that it’s just an expression of His attributes.

I for one will enjoy the variety.  I will also enjoy the similarities.  It makes for a great balance in life.

homo unius libri

Opus 2025-508: Monday Pulpit: To Change or Not to Change, That Is the Question

In our Sunday school discussion we came across two different passages of scripture, which in my mind set up a tension.  They were quoted far enough part that I don’t think anybody else noticed it, but the first one was,

(Rom 3:10 KJV)  As it is written, There is none righteous, no, not one:

And a big thing was made over how no one could be righteous.  OK.  Later on as the subject changed and the topic went on a different path, somebody quoted the passage from James,

(Jas 5:16 KJV)  Confess your faults one to another, and pray one for another, that ye may be healed. The effectual fervent prayer of a righteous man availeth much.

Now we have a problem.  If the prayer of a righteous man is effective and no one can be righteous then it’s impossible for prayer to be answered.

Seems logical to me.  It seems logical because there’s a fallacy in the application of the verses.

And this got me thinking about how people try to take God and put Him into a box and force Him to be what they want Him to be.  This morning as I was on the porch thinking about how God is dynamic and not static, it came to me through several jumps that there’s a reason why God is considered a spirit.

Now we get into physics.  There are four phases of matter that I’m aware of.  One of them, plasma, I know little about and does not exist on the planet Earth in its natural form.  We are familiar with the other three.  We have solids, liquids, and gases.  Each one has different attributes.

Most people want to make God in the image of the solid.  They like to quote verses which say that God does not change; that He is always the same.  They like to quote how He is a rock.  And there are some interesting parallels there.

Unfortunately, the Bible tells us that God is spirit, not a rock.  What are the differences?  A rock cannot change its mass nor its shape, nor its volume.  It is static.  While we’re on it, we might as well look at the attributes of liquids.  Liquids do not generally change their mass nor their volume, but they can change their shape.  God is not a liquid nor a solid.  He is a spirit, which literally means gas.

Gas does not change its mass.  That stays the same, but it can adjust its volume and its shape.  It can expand and contract without changing its mass.  It can bend and fill crevices without changing its mass, so in a very real sense spirit can change and stay the same.

Such is God.  I hate to tell you, but He is able to get out of the box that you put him in.  That’s something rejoice about.

homo unius libri

Opus 2025-504: Negative, Negative

I think somewhere in the past year I wrote about the possibilities of God making a round square or a square circle.  Since I’m not sure, let me repeat briefly.  One of the arguments that people like to throw out about the existence or nonexistence of God is to ask if God can do anything, can he make a square circle?  Now the conflict here is obvious because in the definition of the two terms they are mutually exclusive.  In our world, such a thing is impossible on the basis of logic.  Therefore theists will tend to say that “No, God could not logically do that.”  My point was that outside of our reality, outside of the universe that was created for us, it’s very possible that God could do something, but we could not understand it.

I was thinking of another question that comes up having to do with a mathematical term, the square root of a negative one.  Based on the laws of mathematics, such a thing cannot exist.  Yet, in spite of that you can write it out and use it in mathematical formula.  How can something which cannot exist be useful in a world where things do exist?  It’s one of those things that puzzles me.  I thought that this idea of the square root of a negative one is another one of those concepts that is impossible in our universe, but could very well exist outside of our reality.  God existed before our universe, therefore there must have been a reality outside of what we know.  Not only do we not know it, but it would be impossible for us to know it because of the structure of our minds and our ability to think.

That doesn’t mean that there is not such a thing.  It could be perhaps a whole new range of numbers or mathematical concepts.  We know positive numbers and negative numbers. We have categories of real numbers and unreal numbers.  Why not a whole new category of the square root of negative numbers?  I don’t know what you would call it.  Possibly negative negative.  Or we could call them zombie numbers.

Either way it’s an interesting thought when I’m sitting on a dark porch on a cold windy morning.  My thought goes to science fiction where they have to come up with ways in which spaceships can travel faster than light.  I think someday there will be a scientific breakthrough in that area.  We may not know how it works, but we will know that it does work.

Welcome to the world of theology for the crazy.

homo unius libri

Opus 2025-459: Step Down

How is it that we can touch the living God and not be destroyed?  Remember how Moses asked God if he could see His face?

(Exo 33:18 KJV)  And he said, I beseech thee, shew me thy glory.

And remember God’s answer about how Moses could not see his face and survive,

(Exo 33:20 KJV)  And he said, Thou canst not see my face: for there shall no man see me, and live.

Now stop to think about that.  We are told that we can approach the throne of God boldly.  We sing about coming into His presence.  We believe that we are filled with His spirit.   We go to worship services where we talk about the presence of the Holy Spirit.

And we are not destroyed.

My mind goes to different methods of transferring energy.  Think of a huge engine driving a massive ocean liner.  Picture that drive shaft attached to your liver.  You would not have a pleasant experience.  Or think about the surging electricity that courses through those high-powered lines you drive under on the interstate.  To touch them would fry you beyond recognition and yet, when you do something stupid in your house and get a shock you were able to walk away just kind of shaking your hand and your head.

Somehow, the massive power that comes out of the generators at Hoover Dam is brought down to a manageable level that benefits each and every one of us.  I’m not sure what the devices are called.  I probably knew it but at my age it’s somewhere in the distant past.  However, I know they exist.  I don’t know what means God has used to step down his celestial Big Bang power to make it where we can come to the throne.  But in this case, I think I do know what it’s called, it’s called Jesus.

I don’t like messing with electricity.  I had a guy at the hardware store ask me if I knew anything about electricity because I was looking in that section.  When I got through laughing, I explained that it’s one thing I really didn’t know anything about it and didn’t like to mess with.  I still plug in my devices and turn them on knowing that they will work.  I don’t need to know everything in order to know enough. 

The Holy Spirit is called the Comforter not the fryer.  And Jesus is our savior not our consumer.  Since we can’t adjust to God, He adjusts to us.

homo unius libri

Opus 2025-451: Statement of Purpose

In questioning my purpose in life, my eyes fell upon the silhouette of the oak tree, spreading its branches between me and the potential of sunrise.  What’s good for the goose is good for the oak tree?  What is the purpose of the oak tree?

The first thought was to process carbon dioxide into oxygen so that other creatures could live.  In the process of doing that it absorb sunlight and cools the air.  It’s spreading branches shelter the ground underneath, allowing more tender greens to thrive even in the Texas sunlight.  It helps to hold the soil in place.

It provides a home for small creatures of various kinds and gives the birds a place to roost.  It spreads acorns all over the ground which provide food by some animals and objects for my grandson to collect.  It serves as a wind break.

And of course, there is the beauty and aesthetic balance it provides.  That’s something we often overlook even as we consider the glory of nature.

Not bad for a living organism that’s not even aware that it is alive.  How much more must I provide to the world in ways that I might not be aware of?

homo unius libri

Opus 2025-429: In the Image of Bug

This morning, my mind went to a meme that I saw attacking artificial sweeteners.  It showed a picture of something which I couldn’t identify with a group of bugs, walking around it and not touching it.  The written portion pointed out that ants and bees, and a long list of other creatures would not touch this particular artificial sweetener.  I think their point was because the ants didn’t eat it, we probably shouldn’t put it in our bodies.

I’m sure that if I could think for a while, I could come up with all kinds of things that I might eat that ant wouldn’t.  Conversely, I vaguely in the back of my mind, remember watching a video of a group of ants, hauling the carcass of another dead bug towards their tunnels.  Am I supposed to take that picture as suggesting I need to eat more dead bugs that I find laying on the ground?

How often do we see things that are represented as facts and connected to other facts and acting like they actually had something to do with each other?  I think it’s an overwhelming habit we have.  We see it in the climate change advocates.  Drought is a result of climate change.  Floods are result of climate change.  Heat waves are the result of climate change.  Blizzards are a result of climate change.  What’s key here is they change their terminology from global warming, and global cooling to climate change.  I remember a line that I believe Dick Cheney threw out one time after describing dramatically this climate change and saying it’s called “winter”.

Don’t get too excited about all of the people telling you that everything is going to kill you.  My understanding is we’re going to die eventually anyway.  The side effects of the medicine they want you to take might be more serious than the side effects of your artificial sweetener.  We can’t get the data.  We just have to use the common sense that was built into our bodies.

Which brings me to my point.  We are created in the image of God, not in the image of bug.  We are certainly not created in the image of contemporary science.  Bugs don’t care what we think, they just want to bite us.  Science doesn’t care much about us as long as they get paid for coming up with the opinions that they are told to express.  Our God gave us free will and we are free to make choices based on what our minds and the Holy Spirit tell us is right.

Make sure you are channeling the right image.

homo unius libri

Opus 2025-422: The Wall

I was sitting speculating on the place of additives and preservatives in our food and how the gurus of health are telling us that we need to avoid them or we will die.  OK, that may be a little too dramatic, but you know the things you’re hearing.  We’re used to science going back and forth on whether eggs are good for you, whether coffee will stunt your growth, whether vitamin D will cause Alzheimer’s and other exciting theories.  Most of them are pretty much groundless and are pushed for a commercial reward.

But I was wondering if when God created man and develop the immune system that we have if there isn’t a residual way of dealing with these additives that is hidden below the surface, waiting to come out.  Buried deep in the sections of DNA previously thought of as junk there might be an enzyme that will use an unpronounceable additive to cure cancer.

I think I’ve written about that before, but that took me to another thought.  When you look at the controversy between evolution and creation and consider the way in which scientist who are believers have been trying to hide behind the concept of design in the universe, I wonder if this is a wall that science is starting to run into that they will not be able to get beyond until they open their minds to reality.

When doing research on the Big Bang theory for a sermon on Genesis 1:1, it became clear that this theory was resisted by scientist mainly because it seemed to indicate a designer, a prime mover, the existence of God.  Several are on record as saying that’s why they resisted it.  There are other instances where the theoretically objective field of science has been held back because the scientist didn’t want to embrace ideas that might point toward a supreme being.

So I wonder if an areas in biology and physics the scholars are going to have to run into reality before they can move beyond the wall.  Are there concepts that they cannot approach unless they are open to all possibilities?

My memory goes back to a science fiction story I read years ago in which someone was in a jail cell demanding to be let out.  He kept throwing himself against the door.  It would not give.  He literally rattled his cage.  No matter how hard he pushed the door wouldn’t open.  The story went on, but the climax was when someone came and told him he could leave anytime he wanted to and they simply pushed the gate open and walked in because it wasn’t really locked.  The problem was it just opened one way and the story ends with the prisoner again, throwing himself against the door and refusing to pull.

What kind of doors that are standing ready to be opened is science ignoring because of the potential, not the proof, but the potential, that it might indicate there is design in the universe?

The science is settled.  So is the Titanic and its not going anywhere. 

homo unius libri

Opus 2025-415: Dimensions

The Bible talks about heaven and hell.  I find myself wondering how much of those concepts we can understand.  That sense of wonder expands to us understanding or grasping God in His expanse and Jesus as deity.  What will it be like in their presence.  Honestly, I don’t think we can comprehend it now.

We as human beings are locked into the four dimensions.  I have no trouble comprehending four dimensions that we can understand:  Length, width, height, and time.  I was thinking about how we as human beings are locked into our sense of spatial reality which involves those dimensions.  Scientist and mathematicians talk about additional dimensions.  I really can’t remember the last number I heard, but it was far beyond me.  Those dimensions can only be grasped in the human mind in terms of mathematical formulas or laws of physics.  They have no relationship to our senses or our awareness.

Will we be locked into this box in eternity?  Will God forever limit our abilities to comprehend, or at least know that we don’t comprehend?  I think of Genesis 1:1 where God created the heavens and the Earth.  We are having a hard time, understanding the Earth and all of the complexity involved in it, how can we understand heaven?

If God adapts us in the resurrection in such a way that we can comprehend some of these additional dimensions, will we still be human beings?  We still think of ourselves as individuals?  We don’t believe that we’re going to be absorbed into Nirvana or the Force.  We believe we will retain our individuality.  What does that look like when we are removed from the limitations of our corporal bodies?

So many questions. 

homo unius libri