Psalm 104:27

​It was once thought that only man used tools. However, scientists have learned that some monkeys and even some birds use "tools." Now we can add dolphins to the growing list of tool-users.

Researchers studying dolphins in Australia's Shark Bay noticed that some dolphins were swimming around with sponges on their beaks. After some observation, both on the surface and beneath the water, scientists discovered what the dolphins were doing. Holding the sponges in their mouths, they would sweep the sea bottom sand, flushing out fish. Then they dropped the sponge and ate what they had flushed out. When they were finished eating, they retrieved their sponge and repeated the process.

Researchers found that about 10 percent of the females obtained their food using sponges as tools. For some unknown reason, very few of the males used this method. Furthermore, most of the females using this method were related to two maternal tool-using dolphins. Researchers debate whether these two taught their descendants this method of obtaining fish or whether the behavior is based in genetics.

Since this is not a widespread behavior among dolphins, it seems likely that it is a learned behavior probably taught to younger relatives by the maternal dolphins. After all, dolphins are known to be very intelligent, and intelligence is a gift from their Creator.

Notes: Science News Online, 12/10/08, www.sciencenews.org/view/generic/id/39219, Bruce Bower, "Dolphins Wield Tools of the Sea." Creation Moments, Inc., P.O. Box 839, Foley, MN 56329 www.creationmoments.com

“Four Bible translators have been murdered by militants in the Middle East, Bible translating ministry Wycliffe Associates, reports. According to Wycliffe, a raid took place on the translators’ office. Two of the translators were shot and killed, while another two died of wounds from being beaten. The last two managed to protect and save the lead translator by lying on top of him while the militants beat them with their now-empty weapons. The militants also destroyed translating equipment, including Print on Demand equipment, books, and translation materials. However, Wycliffe says the militants did not destroy the ‘computer hard drives containing translation work for eight language projects.’”

​“Four Wycliffe Bible Translators Murdered,” Christian Headlines, Mar. 18, 2016

1 Kings 19:9

​Cavemen. The very word conjures images of bearskin clothing, wooden clubs and perhaps some simple stone tools. We think of the cavemen themselves as part ape and certainly less than modern humans. All of these images help make human evolution look more plausible.

However, in China there are some 20 million people living in caves. The caves there are easily carved in the silty soil of the Western regions of the Yellow River. The caves are generally 10 to 13 feet wide and can extend as far as 25 feet back into the hillside. Sometimes the caves are connected to one another, creating a larger place to live. Many of the people who live in these caves would not think of moving out of them.

Caves are warm in the winter, cool in the summer, and they are fireproof. These caves include flues for venting the exhaust from cooking fires. But these caves are not primitive dwellings by any stretch of the imagination. They feature plumbing, electrical wiring and even cable television! Except for windows, some of these cave homes are as modern as anything you'll see in the rest of the developing world.

Throughout the ages, people have taken shelter in caves and even set up housekeeping in them. The fact that they lived in caves does not make them primitive at all.

Notes: Minneapolis Star Tribune, 12/21/08, p. AA5, Tim Johnson, "Cave, sweet cave: Many Chinese find home is in a hillside."
​Photo: Courtesy of Meier & Poehlmann. (CC BY 3.0).
Creation Moments, Inc., P.O. Box 839, Foley, MN 56329 www.creationmoments.com

Russian Dmitry Itskov is one of the world’s billionaires who is seeking immortality through technology. His 2045 Initiative aims to create an android capable of downloading someone’s personality within 30 years (“Media mogul Dmitry Itskov,”The Telegraph, Mar. 13, 2016). Itskov, who is “100 percent sure it will happen,” says, “The ultimate goal of my plan is to transfer someone’s personality into the new artificial carrier. Different scientists call it uploading or they call it mind transfer. I prefer to call it personality transfer.” Other billionaires who are seeking immortality through technology are Google founder Larry Page, Oracle CEO Larry Ellison, and venture capitalist Paul Glenn. Page, who funds a company called Calico (California Life Company) with the objective of curing old age, believes that there is no need for humans to start dying once they hit their 80s (“Larry Page Lists 5 Things That Google Will Conquer,” Business Insider, May 15, 2014). Ellison says, “Death makes me very angry,” so he created the Ellison Foundation to find a way to cheat death. Glenn funds the Methuselah Foundation, which claims that “the first person to live to be 1,000 years old is certainly alive today.” The Bible gives both the bad news and the good news about death: “For the wages of sin is death; but the gift of God is eternal life through Jesus Christ our Lord” (Romans 6:23).

(Friday Church News Notes, March 25, 2016, www.wayoflife.org, [email protected], 866-295-4143)

Ecclesiastes 4:9

​We all know that there is strength in numbers. Many animals have even discovered this and, for example, migrate in large herds. However, one would never expect bacteria to have discovered this or know enough to organize themselves collectively.

Bacteria consist of a single cell that doesn't even have a nucleus. They have no nervous system, and they reproduce by simply dividing in half. Of course, there is no brain; yet, they seem to display a sense of consciousness that totally baffles the neurosciences. Some marine species of bacteria are able to sense when there are other bacteria around them. Then, when a sufficient number have gathered together, their metabolism changes, and they begin to produce a slime that then holds them together.

While all this is now known, new research shows that the slime, called biofilm, includes chemicals that are poisonous to the very predators that would ordinarily feed on the bacteria. In fact, the biofilm seems to protect the bacteria. The more bacteria there are, the more biofilm they make and the more protection they have from predators.

There are no simple forms of life. Even bacteria, which are an important part of the ecosystem, have been designed with the ability to protect themselves – something  they could never have invented for themselves.

Notes: Minneapolis Star Tribune, 7/29/08, p. A5, David Brown, "Cellmates: Research shows that bacteria, when under attack, stick together to survive." Creation Moments, Inc., P.O. Box 839, Foley, MN 56329 www.creationmoments.com

“A ‘manifesto,’ written by former Marine Kyle Odom, the 30-year-old man who shot Idaho pastor Tim Remmington, reveals that his life started to change drastically when he began doing meditation to relieve stress while in university. The meditation experiences led him into contact with familiar spirits (which he thought were aliens) and eventually led to two suicide attempts and then the shooting of Pastor Remmington. While Lighthouse Trails is not saying that every person who practices meditation is going to go crazy and start shooting people, we stand by our warning of 14 years that meditation does introduce meditators to demonic realms. For most, this realm seduces people into a complacent deception, and they may even appear more peaceful. For other meditators, like the student at Le Tourneau Christian University who graduated and told his parents he was now an atheist, they turn away from their Christian faith. Satan has many different methods of stealing a soul. And for some, these demons torture and torment a person, until they can eventually become like Kyle Odom. The occult (Satan’s domain) is not to be tampered with. When you consider that over 90% of the Christian colleges and seminaries are introducing contemplative spirituality (a belief system that incorporates meditation) to the lives of their students, it should make every Christian shudder and every Christian leader repent for allowing this into the church. ... [Contemplative guru] Richard Foster told his contemplative followers that they needed to say a prayer of protection before practicing contemplative prayer. Why would one need to do that, unless he is entering demonic realms? Meditation leads one to believe that God is in everything and all is connected together. This belief is an anti-christ religion, and that is why when people practice meditation, they are going to be influenced by familiar spirits. ... As we read the news story about Kyle Odom today, we were reminded about contemplative mystic Thomas Merton, who likened a contemplative meditation experience to an LSD trip. Odom’s manifesto expressed many experiences that sound like a bad LSD trip; but it wasn’t LSD--it was meditation, the very thing that most Christian leaders are either promoting or remaining silent about.”

​“The Man Who Shot Idaho Pastor,” Lighthouse Trails, Mar. 10, 2016

Psalm 94:9

​It turns out that not all creatures need eyes to see light. It all depends on what the creatures were designed to do.

The roundworm, C. elegans, lives below the soil surface where it needs no eyes. At the same time, this roundworm needs to sense light because too much exposure will kill it. Researchers noted that the roundworm has only 302 nerve cells. Study of these cells showed that some of them sense light in the same way that similar cells in vertebrates sense light. Evolutionists suggested that this is an example of an early step in the evolution of eyes. However, there is no evolutionary pressure for this roundworm to evolve eyes because light will kill it. Besides, animals that supposedly evolved long before C. elegans already had eyes.

A better explanation is that, like the cave fishes, this roundworm lives in the dark and needs no eyes that would, in any case, be constantly filling with dirt. No, this is not an example of evolution, but of good design by God.

God has designed all things to fit well into their respective environments. The fish that lives in the dark depths of the ocean has lighted lures, the fishes that live in the darkest caves have no eyes and neither does the roundworm, C. elegans. All these show God's fingerprints.

Notes: http://www.sciencenews.org/view/generic/id/33889/title/Seeing_without_eyes. Photo: Uploaded to the Wikimedia Commons by Kbradnam. (CC BY-SA 2.5). Creation Moments, Inc., P.O. Box 839, Foley, MN 56329 www.creationmoments.com

In late 2015, archaeologists working at ancient Ur found an ebony stylus for inscribing cuneiform on clay tablets. This is the first ebony object found there and is further evidence of the city’s trade with the Indus civilization in South Asia (also known as Harappan and Meluhha). Elizabeth Stone of the State University of New York at Stony Brook, who is co-leading the Ur excavations, says, “There are texts that speak about the ‘black wood of Meluhha,’ but this is our first physical evidence” (“City of Biblical Abraham Brimmed with Trade and Riches,” National Geographic, March 11, 2016). The Indus civilization was a major commercial empire with trading ventures as far as Mesopotamia and Sheba in southern Arabia. The Indus people are mentioned in the writings of Mesopotamian kings such as Naram-Sin of Akkad, grandson of the famous kingdom builder Sargon. Indus ships had a capacity as large as 20 tons, equivalent to a modern 40-foot shipping container (“Digging in the Land of Magan,” Archaeology, Archaeological Institute of America, May/June 1997). They traveled across the Indian Ocean to ports on the Persian Gulf near modern Bahrain and up the Euphrates River to Ur, Akkad, Babylon, and other cities. Indus ships also traveled to the port of Al Mukulla on the southern tip of the Arabian peninsula in the modern Gulf of Aden. (For more about the ancient Indus Civilization and its international trade, including a PowerPoint presentation, see the “Queen of Sheba” section of Bible Times and Ancient Kingdoms, available from Way of Life Literature.)

​(Friday Church News Notes, March 25, 2016, www.wayoflife.org, [email protected], 866-295-4143)

In a mere two year period between 2012-2014, as many as 127 women were branded as witches and hung in Jharkhand, a state in eastern India (“127 women were branded witches,” The Hindu, Mar. 16, 2016). The same thing happens often in Nepal. Earlier this month, a mob burned alive a 40-year-old woman in Chitwan district, Nepal, after a shaman fingered her as a witch who caused the drowning of a boy. “Hundreds of lower-caste women are thought to suffer abuse at the hands of ‘witch hunters’ every year in Nepal” (“Nepal mob burns ‘witch’ alive,” The Telegraph, Mar. 18, 2016). When a woman is suspected of causing an event such as an accident, sickness, or death, charges are trumped up against her and a gullible population take matters into their own hands. The murders are motivated by idolatrous superstition as well as revenge and greed. Anuja Agrawal, a professor at Delhi University, says, “Often there are long-term animosities between the perpetrators and victims which translate into witch-hunt. Witch-hunt is a convenient mechanism to get rid of not only women but also entire families” (“Greed for property and power behind Jhakhand witch hunts,”Hindustan Times, Sep. 19, 2015).

(Friday Church News Notes, March 25, 2016, www.wayoflife.org, [email protected], 866-295-4143)

In spite of the fact that it is entirely unscriptural, The Young Messiah has been endorsed by some 50 Christian leaders, from Catholic to “evangelical,” including prominent Southern Baptists. Johnny Hunt, senior pastor of First Baptist Church of Woodstock, Georgia, and former president of the SBC, says, “The Young Messiah is incredibly entertaining but just as much, it is spiritually inspiring and stimulating as we contemplate what the early years of Jesus’ life entailed. You MUST see it.” Jay Dennis, pastor of Church at the Mall, a Southern Baptist congregation in Lakeland, Florida, says, “I want every pastor, priest, Christian leader, follower of Jesus and even those who are not believers to see The Young Messiah. You will be taken into an atmosphere where you are captivated at how Jesus must have dealt with being fully human and fully God.” The movie is loosely based on the novel Christ The Lord: Out of Egypt by Anne Rice, who writes erotic/occultic fiction. In 1998 she turned from atheism to Roman Catholicism, but in 2010, she quit “being Christian” because she refuses to be “anti-gay, anti-feminist, anti-secular humanism, and anti-science.” The Young Messiah follows the mythical journey from Alexandria, Egypt, to Jerusalem of a seven-year-old, long-haired “Jesus” and his parents. The child Jesus performs miracles, including raising the dead, but he doesn’t know that he is the Son of God. This is clearly a false christ, which the Bible so forcefully warns about (e.g., Mat. 24:4-5; 2 Cor. 11:4). The true Christ knew who He was, did not have to be helped by His parents, and He did no miracles until the wedding at Cana at the beginning of His ministry at age 30. “But thou art he that took me out of the womb: thou didst make me hope when I was upon my mother’s breasts” (Psalm 22:9).

(Friday Church News Notes, March 25, 2016, www.wayoflife.org, [email protected], 866-295-4143)

Revelation 21:4

Bacteria and fungi form biofilms on just about every wet surface, like that bowl of water you left out last night! In this biofilm state, bacteria cause 70 percent of all human bacterial infections. On underwater pipelines, biofilms cause corrosion. Such biofilms even form on seaweed. That is, except for the seaweed called Delicate Beauty.

Delicate Beauty grows off the coast of Australia, and researchers long wondered why biofilms never form on this seaweed. Researchers have now discovered that Delicate Beauty secretes chemicals called furanones. Furanones don't kill the bacteria, but prevent it from colonizing by repelling them. This observation is important because it is believed that since the furanones don't kill the bacteria, the bacteria will not develop a resistance to the furanones.

Commercial production of these chemicals is now beginning to be used in water-cooling towers to prevent biofilm buildup and in clinical trials on contact lenses to prevent bacterial growth. So far these trials have been successful, and further applications are under study.

It was not God's desire that disease and death should come into His creation because of our sin. But He knew that it would. So He stocked the creation with things for us to discover to alleviate and avoid some of our suffering in this world. Christians know that there is no disease or death in heaven.

Notes: Science Illustrated, 7-8/08, pp. 62-69, "Inspired by Nature." Photo: Courtesy of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. (PD). Creation Moments, Inc., P.O. Box 839, Foley, MN 56329 www.creationmoments.com

John 3:14

​The Tiger Keelback snake has a bite that delivers slow-acting venom and prevents the victim's blood from clotting. An adult human could bleed to death from a bite, but it takes a while for the snake to deliver a lethal dose.

When threatened, the average Keelback will raise its head and display its colorful swollen neck. Should the attacker bite the snake near its head, it will get a mouth full of a much stronger poison from glands in its neck. Where does that poison come from? For years scientists have debated whether the Keelback produces its own poison, or does it get the poison from some other creature that it ate?

Now research has revealed that the Keelback actually does store the poison of a poisonous toad that it eats. Moreover, it seems to know that it has this poison stored. For example, on an island where there are some Keelbacks but no toads, these Keelbacks when threatened do not display their neck to an attacker. Rather, they flee from their attacker.

God has used many ingenious designs in His creation, knowing that some would recognize this and, by doing so, acknowledge His existence, power and glory. His desire is always that we might be driven to His Word to learn of the salvation He has prepared for us in Jesus Christ.

Notes: Science News, 2/3/07, p. 69, S. Milius, "Bite This." Photo: Courtesy of Yasunori Koide. (CC BY-SA 3.0).
Creation Moments, Inc., P.O. Box 839, Foley, MN 56329 www.creationmoments.com

“Atheism is a ferocious system that leaves nothing above us to excite awe, nor around us, to awaken tenderness”





​
(Robert Hall, Modern Infidelity Considered with Respect to Its Influence on Society, 1800).

Psalm 147:4

​Homer, the blind Greek poet, spoke of Odysseus's return to Ithaca and describes some astronomical events that seldom happen in the order he describes. Yet, the setting of the events he writes about took place 400 years before it is thought Homer lived.

As Odysseus sails home five days before a banquet, he notes that both the constellations Boötes and Pleiades are visible. Because of their placement in the sky, they are very rarely visible in the same sky in Greece. Homer also mentions Odysseus's sighting of Venus just before dawn. Then, on the day of the banquet there is a solar eclipse.

Some have dismissed these details as just colorful descriptions in a fictional poem. However, a solar eclipse did take place in that part of the world on April 16, 1178 B.C., just the time period Homer is writing about. Researchers then figured out the positions of the other astronomical features Odysseus is reported to have seen, and they were indeed happening on and within days of that date as described. The problem is, Greek astronomy at Homer's time was not believed to be sophisticated enough to figure out where these astronomical bodies were 400 years earlier.

Perhaps man, who has made astronomical observatories since before most historic cultures were established, was originally given such knowledge by his Creator.

Notes: http://www.sciencenews.org/view/generic/id/33683/title/Too_much_information_in_the_Odyssey.
​Creation Moments, Inc., P.O. Box 839, Foley, MN 56329 www.creationmoments.com

The America that exists today simply could not do what it did 70 years ago to save the world from oppression. What’s missing today? God’s blessing. This is the answer that secular libertarians and unregenerate political conservatives don’t understand. Though America was not a godly nation in the 1940s when measured by the perfect standards of God’s Word, she was a nation that loved Israel, and she was a nation filled with churches that were much more faithful to God’s Word than they are today, and she was a nation of people that were much more God-fearing than they are today. The unchurched generally believed in God and feared Him and respected the Bible and respected churches and pastors, which was the salty influence of God’s people. Even Hollywood was bound by a moral code. The military chaplaincy program was robust and nearly universally respected. What was true during the war in my mom’s Baptist church in Kathleen, Florida, was true across the land. The church was open every day, and every day people knelt before God and confessed their sins and begged His help. American’s victory in WWII was not a foregone conclusion. Had Hitler developed the atomic bomb first, he would doubtless have used it first on Russia and then on America, and it could have been America surrendering rather than the Axis Powers.

America’s root problems are spiritual, and the only real solution is spiritual. The only thing that will help America out of her terrible plight is a true revival, and there could be revival. Though the time on God’s prophetic calendar is late, there is no reason to believe that genuine revivals can no longer occur. But revival in America or Canada or England or other lands with anything like a biblical heritage will happen only on the basis of 2 Chronicles 7:14. “If my people, which are called by my name, shall humble themselves, and pray, and seek my face, and turn from their wicked ways; then will I hear from heaven, and will forgive their sin, and will heal their land” (2 Chron. 7:14). In context, this is a promise for Israel, but it has application to the church age. See Romans 15:4 and 1 Corinthians 10:11.

Nothing like a revival and lasting change will happen through Moral Majority programs or Tea Parties or Chick fil-A Days or Duck Dynasty support campaigns or bombastic, foul-mouthed Trump candidacies. As these have been tried repeatedly and enthusiastically over the past few decades, the moral depravity has only increased and the power of the forces for right and liberty has only decreased because these are carnal weapons that deal merely with symptoms and cannot affect the fundamental spiritual issues. These are band-aids on cancer. They can win minor socio-political skirmishes but not spiritual wars. Keeping Duck Dynasty on the air two years ago was not a sign of moral victory at a fundamental level; it was a sign of the power of the almighty dollar. At the very time that A&E was being pressured into keeping Duck Dynasty’s Phil Robertson on the air by an outpouring of support via social networking and “new media” sites, federal judges were ruling against biblical marriage in Utah and Ohio, and the Supreme Court ruled against biblical marriage laws in New Mexico. Which of these events will have the most far-reaching and lasting consequences? The heart of the tree is being eaten away even as the watchers are rejoicing at supposedly keeping a few leaves alive.

Revival could happen if individual Christians and individual churches repent before God at a deep level, repent of their adulterous love for this God-hating world, repent of their spiritual carelessness and lukewarmness, and beseech His help.

If even 100 Bible-believing churches took 2 Chronicles 7:14 seriously, who knows what would happen? If they started a weekly prayer meeting specifically for revival, specifically to beseech God’s help for the nation, if they called for fasting and prayer, and if the members of those churches would spend time seeking God’s face in a persistent manner, who knows how far the forces of evil could be driven back? God has never needed a majority. Gideon’s brave and vigilant few are enough.

The very fact that it is unlikely that even 100 Bible-believing churches will call for such prayer meetings, and that the majority of the members would not attend such meetings even if the pastors exhorted them to do so, is evidence that what I have often said is true about the root problem being the churches themselves. Even the best, for the most part, are lukewarm, settled down and comfortable in the world, not pilgrims but dwellers, mighty for pot luck and parties but weak for spiritual warfare.

(Friday Church News Notes, March 25, 2016, www.wayoflife.org, [email protected], 866-295-4143)

Psalm 20:1

​The potter wasp is a solitary wasp that makes a mud nest with several rooms in it. At egg-laying time, the wasp lays one egg in each cavity and leaves some food in each cavity. She also leaves behind a security force!

You see, there is another species of parasitic wasp that seeks out a potter wasp nest to lay its eggs. When it is successful, the baby potter wasps would have no chance of survival if it wasn't for the security force. The mother potter wasp has very specialized pockets on its back. Tiny mites live within those pockets, causing no harm to the wasp. Then, while the potter wasp lays her eggs, some of the mites exit and remain in each room with the egg. These mites will remain in the nest after it is sealed, feeding on the food left for the hatchlings. They also mate at this time, which conveniently provides a population of mites as food for the young potter wasps. While these mites are peaceful creatures, they are the security force, and should a parasitic wasp get into the nest, they eagerly attack it.

This arrangement that benefits both the potter wasp and the mites is too intricate to have come about by accident. It was designed by the same Creator Who protects His children.

Notes: http://www.sciencenews.org/view/generic/id/33774/title/Mighty_mites. Photo: Courtesy of Bruce Marlin. (CC BY-SA 3.0). Creation Moments, Inc., P.O. Box 839, Foley, MN 56329 www.creationmoments.com

“I have long been of opinion that the evidence of the truth of Christianity requires only to be carefully examined to produce conviction in candid minds”






​
(John Jay, first Chief Justice of the United States, 1796, Jay Papers).

Job 12:8

​It was a nice day on a tropical reef in what is now Western Australia when an armored fish began to give birth. Before she could finish, the violence of the Genesis Flood encased her in mud.

Of course, that's not how evolutionists interpret the evidence. Our mom-to-be is a member of a newly discovered species of placoderm, a family of now-extinct armored fish. Not only were these fish armored, their jaws could apparently crush bones. Evolutionists say that these fish lived between 354 and 417 million inflated evolutionary years ago. This discovery pushes back the first-known example of a fish giving live birth 200 million evolutionary years ago.

After the discovery, scientists went back and studied the fossils of another placoderm and discovered that it, too, had a uterus with three apparent unborn pups in it. Scientists say that the partially born youngster was already a quarter of its mother's ten-inch length. This helped its survival in a fish-eat-fish world. Scientists admit that the fish had an unexpectedly sophisticated reproductive system. Such systems, they say, are found only in supposedly much more evolved fish.

Of course, like all other living things, the placoderms did not evolve but were created. Their so-called advanced reproductive system does not show evidence for evolutionary progression, but it does show evidence of a caring Creator.

Notes: http:www.livescience.com/animals/080528-fossil-embryo.html.
​Creation Moments, Inc., P.O. Box 839, Foley, MN 56329 www.creationmoments.com

Noah Webster, author of the American Dictionary of the English Language of 1828, who knew many of America’s Founding Fathers personally and was one of the most influential voices calling for the Constitutional Convention and the creation of America’s federal government, believed that it is necessary to elect righteous men to positions of authority. “When you become entitled to exercise the right of voting for public officers, let it be impressed on your mind that God commands you to choose for rulers just men who will rule in the fear of God. The preservation of a republican government depends on the faithful discharge of this duty; if the citizens neglect their duty and place unprincipled men in office, the government will soon be corrupted; laws will be made not for the public good so much as for selfish or local purposes; corrupt or incompetent men will be appointed to execute the laws; the public revenues will be squandered on unworthy men; and the rights of the citizens will be violated or disregarded. If a republican government fails to secure public prosperity and happiness, it must be because the citizens neglect the Divine commands and elect bad men to make and administer the laws. ... When a citizen gives his suffrage [vote] to a man of known immorality he abuses his trust; he sacrifices not only his own interest, but that of his neighbor; he betrays the interest of his country” (Noah Webster, Letters to a Young Gentleman Commencing His Education: to which is subjoined A Brief History of the United States, 1823).

(Friday Church News Notes, March 25, 2016, www.wayoflife.org, [email protected], 866-295-4143)

​“Now, more than ever before, the people are responsible for the character of their Congress. If that body be ignorant, reckless, and corrupt, it is because the people tolerate ignorance, recklessness, and corruption. If it be intelligent, brave, and pure, it is because the people demand these high qualities to represent them in the national legislature. ... if the next centennial does not find us a great nation ... it will be because those who represent the enterprise, the culture, and the morality of the nation do not aid in controlling the political forces”

(James Garfield, “A Century of Congress,” Atlantic, July 1877; Garfield was the 20th U.S. President).

Jerry Falwell, Jr., Chancellor of Southern Baptist-aligned Liberty University, likens U.S. presidential candidate Donald Trump to King David. In an interview with the school newspaper, Liberty Champion, he said that he has been friends with Trump since his first visit to Liberty in 2012 and has joined Trump on the campaign trail. He speaks of Trump as a down-to-earth guy who served Falwell and his family Wendy’s cheeseburgers and personally set up a big screen Elton John concert for Jerry, Jr., after learning that he is a long-time Elton John fan. The latter tells us a lot about Jerry, Jr.’s spiritual life as well as Liberty University’s true soul, and it goes far to answer why Falwell would be so enthusiastic about Trump for president. To love Elton John’s music is to affiliate intimately with the evil things of the world and is gross disobedience to God’s Word. “And have no fellowship with the unfruitful works of darkness, but rather reprove them” (Eph. 5:11). “For all that is in the world, the lust of the flesh, and the lust of the eyes, and the pride of life, is not of the Father, but is of the world” (1 John 2:16). Falwell said, Trump “is the kind of guy that will walk into Washington, kick over the tables, kick over the chairs, throw the bums out, start over, and do things that a career politician would never do.” He said further, “God called King David a man after God's own heart even though he was an adulterer and a murderer. You have to choose the leader that would make the best king or president and not necessarily someone who would be a good pastor.” We would reply, first, that God called David a man after His own heart and called him to be king BEFORE his adultery and murder. Beyond that, while it is true that Trump will probably kick things around, and that is what his supporters want, since they are fed up with the status quo, this perspective does not take into account two fundamental issues: what will he kick? And how much power does a president have for kicking? Even the best president does not have the power to make substantive changes to the American government, let alone to America’s moral fiber. Such things would require overwhelming support from the American people, which does not exist on the good side, and an overwhelming majority in Congress, which is nowhere in sight. Substantial changes would require a massive dismantling of the incredibly bloated federal government and the welfare state. It would start with disbanding the Department of Education and putting education back into the hands of the families and communities. It would require impeaching hundreds of state and federal judges for ruling by fiat rather than according to the U.S. Constitution, for raising modern political correctness to the level of the Bill of Rights. It would require dramatic reduction of the power of vast bureaucracies such as the Environmental Protection Agency, Office of Homeland Security, and Occupational Health and Safety Administration. It would require the government to live within its means and not bankrupt future generations with a pile of debt so massive it can barely be conceived. Fundamentally, “winning American back” would require bringing the American people back to moral character and the fear of God. Can Donald Trump do any of that? Not a whit. I have never seen evidence that he aims to do any of that, even if he were dictator. A president is not a pastor, tis true, but a man lacking moral character will not make moral decisions nor promote national moral character. A man who vows “till death do us part” and breaks that holy covenant two times over has a serious moral problem. A man who signs his word on documents and then uses bankruptcy to back out of his financial obligations when things get sticky (which is legal but not moral), is a liar and a thief. Someone says, “But if not Trump, it will be Hillary.” That’s no choice at all, but though I might not have a choice at the ballet box, I am not left without a choice. I can pray to the One who has ultimate control over human affairs, and I can urge others to pray, and prayer is a powerful thing that has been known to change the course of nations. “The effectual fervent prayer of a righteous man availeth much” (James 5:16).

(Friday Church News Notes, March 25, 2016, www.wayoflife.org, [email protected], 866-295-4143)

Deuteronomy 31:6

​If you're a long-time listener, you know that Creation Moments does not discuss politics. That's why today's program focuses not on Ben Carson's political involvements but on Dr. Carson's courage as a scientist and world-renowned surgeon for sharing his politically incorrect views on Darwinian evolution.

In his book, Take the Risk, Dr. Carson makes it crystal clear that he rejects Darwinian evolution. Here is a portion of what he wrote:

"For me, the plausibility of evolution is … strained by Darwin's assertion that within fifty to one hundred years of his time, scientists would become geologically sophisticated enough to find the fossil remains of the entire evolutionary tree in an unequivocal step-by-step progression of life from amoeba to man – including all of the intermediate species."

Dr. Carson continues: "Of course, that was 150 years ago, and there is still no such evidence. It's just not there. But when you bring that up to the proponents of Darwinism, the best explanation they can come up with is 'Well … uh … it's lost!' Here again I find it requires too much faith for me to believe that explanation, given all the fossils we have found without any fossilized evidence of the direct, step-by-step evolutionary progression from simple to complex organisms or from one species to another species. Shrugging and saying, 'Well, it was mysteriously lost, and we'll probably never find it,' doesn't seem like a particularly satisfying, objective, or scientific response."

Doctor Carson, we couldn't agree more!

Notes: Dr. Ben Carson, Take the Risk: Learning to Identify, Choose, and Live with Acceptable Risk, pp. 160-161 (Zondervan, 2008). Photo: Courtesy of Michael Vadon. (CC-BY-SA 4.0).
​Creation Moments, Inc., P.O. Box 839, Foley, MN 56329 www.creationmoments.com

We have a lot of differences with the German Reformer Martin Luther, but one of the things that we respect and appreciate from his life is his boldness for the truth as he saw it. He didn’t mess around and mince words. He was not a religious politician. He imitated Bible prophets such as Enoch (Jude 14-15) in his earnest contention for the faith. We need a lot more of this today. Here is a man who lived in a day when protest against Rome could mean imprisonment, frightful torture, even burning alive, but he could not be quieted. He nailed his protest against the pope’s indulgences to the door of a major Catholic Church. He stood before the pope’s men at the Diet of Worms and refused to back down, saying, “I cannot submit my faith either to the pope or to the councils, because it is as clear as day that they have frequently erred and contradicted each other. Unless therefore I am convinced by the testimony of Scripture, or by the clearest reasoning, and unless they thus render my conscience bound by the word of God, I cannot and I will not retract, for it is unsafe for a Christian to speak against his conscience. Here I take my stand; I cannot do otherwise: may God be my help!” Speaking of the right of the individual Christian to interpret the Bible, Luther wrote, “The Romanists profess to be the only interpreter of Scripture, even though they never learn anything contained in it their lives long. They claim authority for themselves alone, juggle with words shamelessly before our eyes, saying that the pope cannot err as to the faith, whether he be bad or good; although they cannot quote a single letter of Scripture to support their claim. Thus it comes about that so many heretical, unchristian, and even unnatural laws are contained in the canon law. ... In such a case, what is the need or the value of Holy Scripture? Let it be burned, and let us be content with the ignorant gentlemen at Rome” (Luther, Appeal to the Ruling Class).

(Friday Church News Notes, March 11, 2016, www.wayoflife.org, [email protected], 866-295-4143)

Ephesians 6:11

​To hear evolutionists tell it, millions of years of chance mutations, combined with natural selection, produced all manner of living creatures. Now, let's look at just one creature – the porcupinefish – and see how the theory of evolution works out in real life. If the theory fails the test, it's a strong indicator that the theory lacks the power to explain the existence of any living creature.

The porcupinefish is blessed with not one, not two, but three lines of defense. The first comes into play when a predator is near. The porcupinefish quickly swallows a large amount of water, practically doubling its size. This makes the fish too large for some predators to swallow.

The second line of defense comes into play as the fish transforms itself into a football-sized balloon covered with menacing barbs. Its scales stand on end, turning it into an aquatic version of the land-dwelling porcupine. The very sight of these sharp scales protruding in every direction scares off many predators.

The third line of defense for some porcupinefish species is the neurotoxin in their internal organs – a toxin that's at least twelve-hundred times more potent than cyanide. As Wikipedia points out, "As a result of these three defenses, porcupinefish have few predators."

Now, can evolutionists explain how this unique fish came to have these three lines of defense? No, they can't. Not even Darwin tried to explain it when he wrote about the porcupinefish in his book The Voyage of the Beagle.

Notes: 1000 Wonders of Nature, p. 120 (Reader's Digest, London). Wikipedia: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Porcupinefish.
​Photo: Courtesy of Gihan Jayaweera. (CC BY-SA 3.0).
Creation Moments, Inc., P.O. Box 839, Foley, MN 56329 www.creationmoments.com

Few things are more important than for a Christian mother to be a keeper at home. Many fathers of godly grown children have told me that one of the wisest decisions they made was to keep their wives at home to be with the children. I can say that myself. My grown children can say that. The mothers of all eight of our grandkids are keepers at home, and it is paying good dividends to those families. Young families can easily use the extra income from the mother working outside the home, but God has promised to meet our needs when we put Him first (Mat. 6:33). Evangelist Billy Sunday and his wife, Nell, provide a sharp warning on this subject. In 1908, they left their three boys (age 15, 7, and 1) in the care of nannies and traveled together on the evangelism trail. Nell was Billy’s campaign and business manager. Their boys turned out to be drunkards with nine marriages between them. They all died before age 40: George of suicide after being arrested for drunkenness and auto theft, Billy Jr. in a drunken car crash, Paul in the crash of an airplane he was piloting. Yet during World War I, Nell Sunday pushed for women to work outside the home. She said, “... at last, the doors of the Doll House have been opened and women have been invited to come into the great world outside.” The only Sunday child that turned out “right” was their first child, a daughter that Nell raised herself before venturing out of the home. If there aren’t children at home, of course, that is a different story. “The aged women likewise, that they be in behaviour as becometh holiness, not false accusers, not given to much wine, teachers of good things; That they may teach the young women to be sober, to love their husbands, to love their children, To be discreet, chaste, keepers at home, good, obedient to their own husbands, that the word of God be not blasphemed” (Titus 2:3-5).

(Friday Church News Notes, March 11, 2016, www.wayoflife.org, [email protected], 866-295-4143)