January 8

Genesis 8 As a kid taking a bath, I would put my feet on one end of the bath tub and pull up as close to the end of the tub as I could. Then with a mighty shove, I would push back to the other end. It was great to watch the water slosh back and forth from end to end. I would pretend that I was causing mighty ocean tidal waves. Sometimes I would count how many times the tidal wave would go from one end of the tub to the other until I could no longer perceive its movement. I don’t remember what my record was; that was around 50 years ago, but I remember that it was great fun. I probably drove my family crazy as I spent so much time in the tub, and of course sometimes the tidal wave might leave the bath tub making a terrible mess. Then I would get in a little trouble. Mount Everest is 5 miles above sea level. How is it physically possible that the flood waters of the earth could have covered Mt. Everest? Did you know that Mt. Everest is currently growing? According to this website: http://www.extremescience.com/everest.htm , it is growing at the current rate of 2.4 inches per year. Let’s presume that Noah’s flood occurred in 2500 B.C. That would be 4500 years ago. At 2.4 in. per year it would have grown 10,800 inches by now, or 900 feet or .17 of a mile—1/6th of a mile. Another website, http://wiki.answers.com/Q/How_many_inches_does_Mount_Everest_rise_each_year , says that while the mountain builds up that much per year it also loses much to erosion each year for a net increase of .5 inches per year. One might say that the math demonstrates that the flood of water could not have covered the highest mountain. But then there are still two problems with that claim. It assumes that the flood was not geologically violent and the mountains were as tall now as they were then. It also assumes that the amount of water in the oceans is the same now as it was then. It has been established that Mt. Everest is growing. But it has not been established that it has always grown at the same rate or that it always grows. Could it not be possible that there might be years where it shrank? After all we have only been observing its height for less than 150 years. Evolutionary geologists, who believe in uniformitarianism, might be crying foul at this point. After all they would say that the same processes that formed the mountains are still in effect today. If that is true, and the earth is more than a billion years old, then how tall would Mt. Everest be? Hmmm. . . Let’s see. .5 X 1,000,000,000 / 12 / 5,280 = 7,891.41 miles. Obviously it hasn’t been up lifting at that rate for 1,000,000,000 years or even 1,000,000 years. Okay, I hear it. The evolutionist is crying, “Foul! You have created a straw man!” Okay, I have created a straw man, but I have also established that the rate of growth or decline of Mt. Everest changes in time. So how might this relate to the flood of Noah? Some theories of plate tectonics suggest that the earth was once one large land mass that, for whatever reason, the plates have shifted and moved changing the shapes of the continents. The Scripture says: Genesis 7:11 In the six hundredth year of Noah’s life, in the second month, the seventeenth day of the month, on that day all the fountains of the great deep were broken up, and the windows of heaven were opened. Genesis 8:2 The fountains of the deep and the windows of heaven were also stopped, and the rain from heaven was restrained. What is a fountain of the deep? Proverbs 8:22-32 tells how wisdom accompanied God as He created the foundations of the earth, including the fountains of the great deep. Could it be that in the original creation, there were massive amounts of water in the earth’s crust? Could it be that the opening of the fountains of the deep were the plates of the earth being moved with such force and suddenness that it spewed the waters of the crust into the atmosphere in giant geysers? Could it also be that as those plates moved, their colliding together increased the up building of mountains where the plates collided? What would that cause to happen to the oceans? In recent years we have seen giant tsunamis wreak havoc in Indonesia and Japan. If there were a sudden movement of the earth’s plate causing massive uprising of the mountains where they met, it would have caused massive waves in the oceans that would literally have wiped across the face of the earth in horrible tidal waves. If the mountains were much shorter at the time, they all could conceivably been covered by the flood waters of those tsunami/tidal waves. Those waves would surely have lasted for months as the plates slipped and shifted driving up mountains in their conflict. Could it also be that there used to be a canopy of water surrounding the earth? Could it be that when those giant geysers, driven by the hot magma of the earth’s crust, reached the canopy that the sudden change in temperature and particles of earth caused the canopy to condense and fall as rain causing 40 days of continuous rain? Would not the combination of the two cause massive and total destruction of land life? Indeed the real miracle is that Noah and those in the ark survived it at all. Would you not then expect to find massive amounts of fossils to be found in sedimentary rock layers even on the tops of high mountains? I think that is exactly what we have found. Those 40 days of rain and catastrophic movement of the earth’s surface took the rest of the year to subside. Like the waves in the bath tub, it took time for the land masses and oceans to settle down. Noah was in the ark a full year. It was unsafe to be outside, even if he was on a mountain top. So where is the glory of God in this? The massive flood demonstrates His great hatred of sin, but His offering of safety to all who would come into the ark demonstrates his great love for us. The ark is a picture of great love! He performed a miracle to save all who would enter the ark. It is too bad that more people did not take Noah up on his sermons of safety if they would enter in. Even today God offers safety from His wrath against sin to all those who will enter into the safety of His Son Jesus. It is too bad that more people do not take Him up on His offer. Indeed we serve a glorious King. Speak His glory to someone today! --Pastor john * Ezra 8 When I moved from North Carolina to Oklahoma, I took my van to my mechanic and had it serviced. I told him that I was making a trip to Oklahoma. “Please flush and fill the radiator. Check for any potential problems.” Twelve hours into our journey, I was approaching a rest area on I-40. Suddenly, my hot engine light turned on. Just in the nick of time, I merged over into the exit lane and pulled into the rest stop. My radiator was dry. Apparently the mechanic who serviced my van failed to retighten the radiator hose appropriately. I tightened it the best I could, refilled the radiator with water from the rest stop and continued on my journey. No harm done. But what would have happened had it boiled dry a few miles later or a few miles earlier? I would have been on the side of the road perhaps without access to water. The good hand of my God was upon me. The timing could not have been better. Ezra was making a journey of approximately the same distance. Only his vehicles were wagons. His powers were mules, oxen, camels. His dangers were not mechanical failure but pirates. Often caravans would have armed escorts to protect them. Apparently Ezra had been bragging about his God. He was ashamed to ask for an escort. He threw himself upon the mercy of God. And God provided all the protection he needed. That is the glory of our Lord. We can trust in His protection as long as we are doing His will. Even if we die, it is only to accomplish the best for His glory. Indeed we serve a glorious King! Speak His glory to someone today! --Pastor john * Psalm 8 What makes a name excellent? Is it not what a person does which positively exhibits what that person is? If I say, “Mickey Mantle,” and you are my age and a baseball fan, you immediately think of the man who held the homerun record for decades. I still remember watching him on television on October 10, 1964, Game 3 of the Worlds series. It was the bottom of the ninth. The Yankees were tied 1-1 with the St. Louis Cardinals. Mantle walked to the plate and slammed a home run on the first pitch. I was elated. I immediately took a victory lap around the house. When I hear the name Mickey Mantle, that is what I think of. However, if you are old enough to be my father, you might think of a man who could not hold his alcohol, was inclined to gambling and womanizing, and was therefore not worthy of being a role model for kids. A few years before his death, Bobby Richardson shared the gospel with Mickey. He prayed to ask Jesus to be his savior. His life seemed to then fall in line with a godly lifestyle. A few years ago, I used the name Mickey Mantle in a sermon as an illustration of heroes. After the sermon a man the age of my father told the negative things about Mickey Mantle that I had never learned from baseball cards or the newspapers. In his mind it was not an excellent name. What makes God’s name excellent? What He has created should alone make His name excellent. When I consider the stars and moon, it sends me reeling in awe of our fantastic creator. Just the sheer size alone, mass and volume, dwarfs me in overwhelming smallness. Then I consider the complexity of how it is set in place, then I am amazed at His capacities. Why should He ever think about me? I am less than a grain of sand in the whole world in comparison to the Universe! Yet, He is mindful of us. I never think of sand, unless it annoys me. He not only constantly thinks of us, but He has made us a little like Himself. He has given us some glory and honor. He has given us the right and ability to rule over the sentient beings of this earth. Even as He rules, so can and should we. As I reflect upon that, I realize just how wrong we are to reject His rule. How gracious He is to bring us back to Himself! Does that make His name excellent? We are born to rule under Him. Wow! Indeed we serve a glorious King. Speak His glory to someone today! --Pastor john * Matthew 6:22-34 My father-in-law loved to watch C-span and a few other news channels. Consequently his thinking was very much molded and shaped by what he observed on those channels. When he retired, he had a great amount of time to watch television. Care to guess about what most of his conversation concerns? Yes, you guessed it, politics. You couldn’t talk to him very long without him telling you what he thought of George Bush. You see, the lamp of the body is the eye. If the light in you is politics, your whole life will be politics. For some people their whole life is making money. It is all they think about. It consumes them. Money is the lamp of their eye. Their conversation will eventually turn around to something about money. Some people are obsessed with clothing. The lamp of their eye is having the right clothes. Other people obsess with having the right body. They spend hours working on fitness and diet. Jesus says that the lamp that ought to fill our eye is the kingdom of God. Jesus is the King of that kingdom. He says that if we seek it first, the rest falls into its proper order. Notice that Jesus as the King has already modeled for us how it is done. I've been reading through the Scripture every year since I was about 20. That means I've read the Bible from cover to cover over 30 times. You know I can't seem to remember a single instance where Jesus seemed concerned about money, a meal, a place to sleep, clothing, weather, or his safety. There was a time when Peter was concerned about paying the temple tax. Jesus sent him fishing and Peter found the needed money in the mouth of a fish. There were a couple of times when they were in the wilderness with a multitude. People were hungry. Jesus took a little and fed the multitude. When He died, the only thing of value that He had was an outer garment, which was probably given to Him. Once He was crossing the Sea of Galilee when a storm came up and threatened to capsize the boat. He was sound asleep in the middle of the storm. Fearful of perishing, His disciples wakened Him. He simply told the storm to calm down, and it did. Another time His disciples were caught in a storm on the sea. He saw them from land. So He went out to calm them--not in a boat but walking on the water. Yes, He models how a citizen of the Kingdom should live. His eyes were on the Father. Ours should be on Him. If the lamp of your body is Christ, your whole body will be full of light. If the lamp of your body is Christ, what do you think will be the bulk of your conversation? Indeed we serve a glorious King! Speak His glory to someone today! --Pastor John