“I discovered what Darren Aronofsky’s first feature film was: Pi. Want to know its subject matter?  ... Kabbalah ... The world of Aronofsky’s Noah is a thoroughly Gnostic one: a graded universe of ‘higher’ and ‘lower.’ The ‘spiritual’ is good, and way, way, way ‘up there’ where the ineffable, unspeaking god dwells, and the ‘material’ is bad, and way, way down here where our spirits are encased in material flesh. ... Kabbalah has a pantheon of angelic beings of its own all up and down the ladder of ‘divine being.’ And fallen angels are never totally fallen in this brand of mysticism. ... They redeem themselves, shed their outer material skin, and fly back to the heavens. ... What!? Demons are redeemed? Adolphe Franck explains the cosmology of Kabbalah: ‘Nothing is absolutely bad; nothing is accursed forever--not even the archangel of evil or the venomous beast, as he is sometimes called. There will come a time when he will recover his name and his angelic nature.’ .... when Gnostics speak about ‘The Creator’ they are not talking about God. ... The Creator of the material world is an ignorant, arrogant, jealous, exclusive, violent, low-level, bastard son of a low-level deity. He’s responsible for creating the ‘unspiritual’ world of flesh and matter, and he himself is so ignorant of the spiritual world he fancies himself the ‘only God’ and demands absolute obedience. They generally call him ‘Yahweh.’... This Creator tries to keep Adam and Eve from the true knowledge of the divine and, when they disobey, flies into a rage and boots them from the garden. In other words, in case you’re losing the plot here: The serpent was right all along. This ‘god,’ ‘The Creator,’ whom they are worshiping, is withholding something from them that the serpent will provide: divinity itself. ... Let’s go back to the movie. The action opens when Lamech is about to bless his son, Noah. Lamech, rather strangely for a patriarch of a family that follows God, takes out a sacred relic, the skin of the serpent from the Garden of Eden. He wraps it around his arm, stretches out his hand to touch his son--except, just then, a band of marauders interrupts them and the ceremony isn't completed. Lamech gets killed, and the ‘villain’ of the film, Tubal-Cain, steals the snakeskin. Noah, in other words, doesn't get whatever benefit the serpent’s skin was to bestow. ... The rainbows don’t come at the end because God makes a covenant with Noah. The rainbows appear when Noah sobers up and embraces the serpent. He wraps the skin around his arm, and blesses his family. It is not God that commissions them to now multiply and fill the earth, but Noah, in the first person, ‘I,’ wearing the serpent talisman. ... The scandal is this: of all the Christian leaders who went to great lengths to endorse this movie (for whatever reasons: ‘it’s a conversation starter,’ ‘at least Hollywood is doing something on the Bible,’ etc.), and all of the Christian leaders who panned it for ‘not following the Bible.’ ...Not one of them could identify a blatantly Gnostic subversion of the biblical story when it was right in front of their faces. I believe Aronofsky did it as an experiment to make fools of us ... He’s having quite the laugh. And shame on everyone who bought it.”

(“Sympathy for the Devil,” Brian Mattson’s review of the movie Noah starring Russell Crowe, April 2, 2014, drbrianmattson.com)

Psalm 119:160
“Thy word is true from the beginning: and every one of thy righteous judgments endureth for ever.”

Some time ago, a news article described how scientists had studied the genetic material of a magnolia leaf that supposedly died 20 million years ago.

It might seem amazing that scientists would be able to duplicate the genetic material of a fossil, but the technique does seem to work. However, we reject the 20 million year date in favor of a biblical history of life on Earth. In fact, what scientists found out about this leaf supports the biblical history.

The genetic information in living things contains the instructions for making that living thing. The color of your hair, eyes, skin, your height and all of your other features are contained in your genetic information. Scientists are not able to read that information in all its detail, but they can tell the difference between one kind of creature and another. They can also compare similarities and differences in great detail. But when they compared this supposedly 20 million year old magnolia leaf to modern magnolia leaves, they discovered that even in its genetic detail it was virtually identical to the modern magnolia. Scientists freely admit their surprise. No evolution had taken place!

As science increases its ability to study the genetics of ancient creatures, it will continue to fail to find evidence of evolution. That’s because all creatures were originally created in finished form, according to their kinds, just as the Bible says.

Notes: Robinson, Jack. 1990. “Ancient leaf DNA copied at UCR lab.” The Press Enterprise (Riverside County, CA), Apr. 12. p. 1.
Photo: Courtesy of Forest & Kim Starr. Licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 Unported license.
Creation Moments, Inc., P.O. Box 839, Foley, MN 56329 www.creationmoments.com

“Jesus, the only begotten Son of God, who is the image of the invisible God and the One in whom dwells all the fullness of the Godhead, is not someone who should be portrayed (counterfeited would be more accurate) by a fallen, finite being--Christian or otherwise. Any such attempt will result in another Jesus, a false Christ. ... Since a host of very influential evangelical leaders ... have been singing the praises of The Son of God and the History Channel’s Bible series that spawned it, it raises a very serious question regarding their view of the Bible. ... Evidently these leaders had no problem with the distortion of the Word in scene after scene. Did the wise men show up at the stable right after the birth of Jesus? Did Jesus entice Peter to follow him by filling his nets with fish? Did Jesus draw the fish into Peter’s net by swishing the water with his fingers? Was Mary Magdalene the lone woman among the small band of disciples (if not one of the apostles)? Did Nicodemus play the good Pharisee/bad Pharisee, even challenging Jesus about paying taxes? Was Pilate a brutal military leader who threatened to shut down the temple? Did Jesus have confrontational exchanges with Barabbas? Did Jesus tickle a little girl and playfully tell her that the temple would be utterly destroyed? At the Last Supper, did Jesus drink the wine that he had just called his own blood? Did the mother of Jesus wash his bloody body in preparation for his burial? Did Jesus unsymbolically appear to John on Patmos? The list of unbiblical and extra-biblical scenes goes on and on. ... One of the amazing characteristics of visual media is the power of imagery. Scenes that appear on the screen can remain with a viewer, popping into the mind occasionally over his or her lifetime. That can be spiritually devastating. I've heard that some believers who watched Mel Gibson’s ‘biblical’ movie, The Passion of the Christ, had great trouble dismissing the face of James Caviezel when their thoughts turned to Jesus, even while in prayer. ... As Dave Hunt and I left the theater after reviewing Mel’s movie, I remember Dave crying out to the Lord to remove the imagery of the counterfeit Christ that had just invaded his mind! The Bible doesn't describe Jesus for us in any detail. ... The incredible power of the medium of film resides in its capacity to impact emotions through imagery, acting, dialogue, and music. Tears can flow even in animated movies. People can have artificial ‘life-changing’ experiences based upon what they see on the screen, but the Word of God declares: ‘the flesh profiteth nothing’ (John 6:63). ... Tragically, we are seeing in all of this the words of Peter fulfilled: ‘And through covetousness shall they with feigned words make merchandise of you’ (2 Peter 2:3).”

(T.A. McMahon, “The Bible According to Hollywood 2,” The Berean Call, April 1, 2014)

Benny Hinn recently announced that he is partnering with Liberty University to “form a powerful, worldwide ministry connection that will touch the world” (bennyhinn.org). The phony-baloney, Pentecostal Word-Faith heretic says, “Through this powerful alliance between Liberty University Institute of Biblical Studies and our ministry you can enroll in a Bible survey study course, earn a diploma from Liberty University, and receive your ministerial credentials, licensing, and ordination through World Healing Fellowship.” Appearing with Hinn to announce the program were Dan Reber, Director of Liberty University Institute of Biblical Studies, and Ronald Godwin, Liberty University Provost. Hinn has taught that Adam could fly like a bird and swim underwater like a fish. He claims that his “anointing” comes from visits to the graves of Kathryn Kuhlman and Aimee Semple McPherson. He alleges to have had multiple visions of Jesus, beginning at age 11, plus an eight-hour private conversation with the Holy Spirit. In a 1990 television appearance, Hinn said of his detractors, “Sometimes I wish God would give me a Holy Ghost machine gun; I’ll blow your head off!” Hinn tosses the “anointing of the Holy Spirit” like a baseball and “slays people in the spirit” by blowing on them. Hinn claims that physical healing is guaranteed and we must never say, “If it be thy will, Lord.” Though Hinn claims that thousands of people have been healed in his “miracle services,” repeated attempts by reputable researchers have failed to turn up genuine cases. (For documentation of these things see The Pentecostal-Charismatic Movements, available from www.wayoflife.org.) The yoke with Benny Hinn is the latest example of the slippery slide that Liberty University has been on since the late 1980s when Jerry Falwell renounced biblical separatism and began flirting with contemporary music, ecumenism, and charismaticism. We see the great change in thinking that can occur in just one generation.

(Friday Church News Notes, April 11, 2014, www.wayoflife.org fbns@wayoflife.org, 866-295-4143)

In an ominous move against First Amendment rights, the U.S. Supreme Court has refused to hear the appeal by a Christian photographer who was charged with human rights violation for refusing to photograph a private “commitment ceremony” for two lesbians. In 2006, Elaine Photography was fined nearly $7000 by the New Mexico Human Rights Commission for refusing to photograph the ceremony. Owners Elaine and Jonathan Huguenin are Christians who believe that marriage is the union of one man and one woman. The Huguenins took the matter to court, but they have lost at every level. In August 2013, the New Mexico Supreme Court “ruled that Christian photographers cannot decline to participate in gay-marriage commitment ceremonies” (“New Mexico Court,” Breitbart, Aug, 22, 2013). The state’s highest judges went so far to say that forcing Christians to act contrary to their religious faith is the price of citizenship. Justice Richard Bosson said, “The Huguenins are free to ... pray to the God of their choice ... But there is a price, one that we all have to pay somewhere in our civic life.” Even though eight state attorneys general filed briefs before the U.S. Supreme Court in support of the Huguenins, the judges refused to hear the appeal, thus letting the lower court’s anti-First Amendment decision stand. Legal pundits say that it is probable that the Supreme Court will wait until a federal appeals court rules on this issue before taking it into consideration, but it is ominous that the judges had no interest in giving immediate relief to Christians who are being oppressed by homosexual activists and by a government bent on advancing a “new morality.” This will create a climate in which it will be nearly impossible for a Bible-believing Christian to own a business or hold a job, particularly in government and education, if he or she is not willing to accept the government’s view of morality.

(Friday Church News Notes, April 11, 2014, www.wayoflife.org fbns@wayoflife.org, 866-295-4143)

Hebrews 3:10
“Wherefore I was grieved with that generation, and said, They do alway err in their heart; and they have not known my ways.”

People sometimes wonder why, with all the marvels science can design and build, it cannot build a good replacement for the heart. As medical science learns more about the heart, it becomes clear that replacing this complex mass of muscles is more difficult than might be imagined.

Your heart is about the size of your fist, really surprisingly small for the job it does. The heart is a pump with valves, tubing and an electrical system. Its four chambers are carefully designed to make sure that used blood goes to your lungs for oxygen and that blood from your lungs takes that oxygen to the rest of your body. In order to do this, your heart must pump 2,000 gallons of blood through more than 60,000 miles of soft tubing every day.

But the heart is much more than a pump. Researchers describe it as “an incredibly intelligent organ.” The heart is smarter than we are. When you need more circulation, it senses this and speeds its pumping action. It doesn't matter whether the need for more pumping action comes from increased exercise, or something you thought about that might require more heart action, the heart responds. Even when transplanted, the heart is able to respond to its new environment.

Like everything else God has created, the heart is not a simple organ, limited to only one job. The heart is custom designed to do many jobs well. And to this day doctors cannot tell you why one apparently healthy heart stops beating and another does not. Life itself is more than an organ; it is a gift from our Creator to each of us.

Notes: Huyghe, Patrick. 1985. “Your heart: a survival guide.” Science Digest, Apr. p. 31.
Illustration: Made by Ties van Brussel. Licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 3.0 Unported license.
Creation Moments, Inc., P.O. Box 839, Foley, MN 56329 www.creationmoments.com

Psalm 148:7
“Praise the LORD from the earth, ye dragons, and all deeps:”

Most of us have heard recordings of whales singing. Scientists have not yet learned to understand the whale’s language, but they have identified individual verses in whale song. Now they are more convinced than ever that whale song is a sophisticated language.

Whale song is made up of complex and stylized compositions, many of them longer than the longest of human symphonies. A single whale song can last up to 22 hours! Scientists have learned that humpback whale songs change a lot from year to year. Yet each humpback in an entire ocean will always sing the same song as the others. Scientists wondered how whales could keep the verses straight since the song changes so often.

Researchers have concluded that whales, like human beings, use rhyme to help remember their songs. Biologists studying whale song report that they have identified the same sub-phrases turning up in the same positions in verses that are next to each other. Whales apparently compose their long songs with rhymes, making them possibly the greatest poets on earth!

Evolutionists tell us that language is such an advanced development that even the first human beings could do no more than grunt and growl. And yet the whale not only has a sophisticated language but also creates poetry. Christians can comfortably put evolution aside to realize that the Bible is right when it says that the whole creation praises God. And whales make it very clear that the Creator Himself is the author of language – not some caveman.

Notes: Science Frontiers, July Aug. 1989. p. 2. Newsweek, Mar. 20. 1989. p. 63.
Creation Moments, Inc., P.O. Box 839, Foley, MN 56329 www.creationmoments.com

“To employ soft words and honeyed phrases in discussing questions of everlasting importance; to deal with errors that strike at the foundations of all human hope as if they were harmless and venial mistakes; to bless where God disapproves, and to make apologies where He calls us to stand up like men and assert, though it may be the aptest method of securing popular applause in a sophistical age, is cruelty to man and treachery to Heaven. Those who on such subjects attach more importance to the rules of courtesy than they do to the measures of truth do not defend the citadel, but betray it into the hands of its enemies. Love for Christ, and for the souls for whom He died, will be the exact measure of our zeal in exposing the dangers by which men’s souls are ensnared” (George Sayles Bishop, author of The Doctrines of Grace and Kindred Themes; Bishop was an Old School Presbyterian preacher who fought against theological modernism in the 19th century; he was weary with the compromising evangelicals of his day).

(Friday Church News Notes, April 4, 2014, www.wayoflife.org, fbns@wayoflife.org, 866-295-4143)

Job 10:10-11
“Hast thou not poured me out as milk, and curdled me like cheese? Thou hast clothed me with skin and flesh, and hast fenced me with bones and sinews.”

The automatic transmission in a vehicle changes gears in response to changing power demands and driving conditions. Likewise, the muscles in your body change gears in a sense, in response to your changing needs for them.

When you use a muscle group, the muscles begin to need more fuel and more oxygen, both brought to them by your blood. When you use a set of muscles, lots of new blood vessels will actually grow into the tissue to meet the increasing demand. This is one way in which exercise lowers blood pressure – by increasing the “tubing” through which it passes. If you often overuse a group of muscles, additional connective tissue will grow through the muscles, strengthening them.

The “automatic transmission” in your muscles engages when you use the same group of muscles for a continuing task like rowing a boat. Before long, the normal fuel freely available in your blood is used up. At that point, your body mobilizes stored fat, which allows the muscles to continue without exhaustion. Muscles that are often used to this point actually become more efficient at burning fat reserves. In even more strenuous exercise, a third “gear” kicks in, changing the way muscles burn fuel, so there is less waste for the circulatory system to deal with.

As scientists learn more about our incredibly complex and intelligently designed bodies, we find even more reasons to bear witness to our wonderful and wise Creator.

Notes: Bodanis, David. 1985. “What to look for in home fitness machines.” Science Digest, Apr. p. 42.
Photo: US Marines exercising on the flight deck aboard USS Bataan.
Creation Moments, Inc., P.O. Box 839, Foley, MN 56329 www.creationmoments.com

Wycliffe Bible Translators is partnering with the International House of Prayer (IHOP) for an annual Onething Conference. The first was held in January in Kansas City, with 30,000 in attendance. Wycliffe is represented by its Seed Company subsidiary. IHOP was founded by Mike Bickle, who holds the most radical Pentecostal latter-rain doctrine, believing that an apostolic miracle revival will precede Christ’s return. IHOP promotes 24/7 prayer, which sounds great, but their weird prayer meetings are accompanied by rock music, hypnotic repetition, women preachers, and charismatic deception. Consider this description from 2002: “Onstage at the Spiritual Warfare and Prophetic Worship conference, Mike Bickle sways with his eyes closed as he cradles an open Bible. Beside him, guitarists play and a woman sings. Two thousand Christians again and again sing a simple lyric: ‘Pour your spirit out over this place. Pour your spirit out over this place. Pour your spirit out over this place.’ For fifteen minutes, they repeat the line until, finally, the music quickens and a woman in a red dress on a rear balcony whirls, waving a shredded white flag of surrender from a pole ... In the mosh pit, a middle-aged woman jerks her head forward then back between her raised arms as she dances. She opens her eyes and blows kisses toward the rafters from her open palm, drops her head to giggle, then sends Jesus another kiss or two” (Deb Hipp, “Return of the Prophets,” The Pitch, Oct. 10, 2002). Wycliffe Bible Translators has long been involved in this type of Pentecostal heresy. See my eyewitness report on the North American Congress on the Holy Spirit and World Evangelism. It is titled Charismatic Confusion and is one of the free eBooks we offer at www.wayoflife.org. See also our report “Wycliffe Bible Translators” at the Way of Life web site. For more about Mike Bickle, the latter rain, and the new prophets see the book The Pentecostal-Charismatic Movements, available from Way of Life in print and eBook editions. At the North American congress in 1990, John Wimber was promoting both Mike Bickle and Paul Cain. The latter turned out to be a homosexual.

(Friday Church News Notes, April 4, 2014, www.wayoflife.org, fbns@wayoflife.org, 866-295-4143)

Job 15:8
“Hast thou heard the secret of God? and dost thou restrain wisdom to thyself?”

It looks something like a small hyena, has habits similar to both wolves and the domestic cat, and eats almost nothing but ants. This strange creature is called the aardwolf.

The aardwolf lives on the African continent. It eats a particular type of termite that is about one fourth of an inch long. Although there are other ant eating creatures in the same habitat, like the aardvark, they don’t prefer to eat those termites upon which the aardwolf depends. These termites build dome shaped mounds guarded by soldier termites that squirt long threads of nasty-smelling and bad-tasting chemicals at intruders. The aardwolf seems to tolerate their attacks better than any other ant eating creature, although, as one naturalist put it, the aardwolf clearly does not like the taste of the soldier termites. Both the ants and the aardwolf are active at night. In one night, the aardwolf may eat up to 300,000 termites.

The aardwolf is strongly territorial, tolerating no competitors in its territory. As solitary creatures, the mates will share the same territory, yet completely ignore each other. But when it is time for mating and raising the young, they work and live together perfectly, the male helping the female in every aspect of raising the young. And, like the domestic cat, the aardwolf buries its waste.

Evolutionists admit puzzlement about how the aardwolf is related to other creatures. This makes the aardwolf yet another of those creatures that witness to God’s inventive creativity.

Notes: Richardson, Philip R.K. 1990. “The lick of the aardwolf.” Natural History, Apr. p. 78.
Photo: Aardwolf at the Cincinnati Zoo and Botanical Garden. Courtesy of Greg Hume. Licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 3.0 Unported license.
Creation Moments, Inc., P.O. Box 839, Foley, MN 56329 www.creationmoments.com

“Over the years the American Atheists have been having some serious problems with social behavior at their national convention. So they have developed a code of conduct for the 2014 conference. It is interesting to observe the things they tolerate (e.g., many kinds of sexual immorality) and the things they will not tolerate (e.g., lack of social etiquette). But in an atheist worldview, these atheists have no basis for this code. In their view there is no God and therefore no moral absolutes. William Provine, a prominent American atheist evolutionist and professor at Cornell University, put it this way: ‘Let me summarize my views on what modern evolutionary biology tells us loud and clear. ... There are no gods, no purposes, no goal-directed forces of any kind. There is no life after death. When I die, I am absolutely certain that I am going to be dead. That’s the end for me. There is no ultimate foundation for ethics, no ultimate meaning to life, and no free will for humans, either’ (Origins Research 16, no. 1/2, 1994, 9; as quoted in Technical Journal 10, no. 1, 1996, p. 22). ... So we are all just animals and it is the law of the jungle, the survival of the fittest. Animals don’t show the social decencies required in the atheists’ code. So why should people? This code is completely arbitrary. ... So where do the moral standards come from? They come from the moral law of God, reflected in the Ten Commandments (Exodus 20:1–17), which are written on the heart of every person, including atheists (Romans 2:14–16), because we are all made in the image of God (Genesis 1:26–27). Sadly, they don’t understand that the law of God actually brings great liberty and wonderful blessing (John 8:31–32, Psalm 1:1–6, and Psalm 19:7–14). They also don’t understand that the precious blood of Christ can wash away all their sins (1 John 1:7) and restore them to a right relationship with God (Romans 5:1) and that the love and grace of God can transform our lives to truly be the wonderful kind of men and women He created us to be and which will satisfy the deepest longings of our hearts (John 10:10 and 2 Corinthians 5:17).”

(Dr. Terry Mortenson’s blog, Answers in Genesis, Feb. 18, 2014)

Psalm 119:73
“Thy hands have made me and fashioned me: give me understanding, that I may learn thy commandments.”

For many people, the fun of the boomerang lies in the fact that it seems to go against common sense. You throw the boomerang away from you, and it returns to you.

Boomerangs of various shapes and sizes – and made of different kinds of materials – are easily available in many places around the world. Boomerangs can be made into many shapes other than the classic “L” shape we usually think of. They have been made into the shape of a windmill with six blades. Boomerangs have also been made into the shapes of twenty letters of the English alphabet. Contrary to the popular myth, boomerangs never were used as weapons by Australian aborigines. They used them as toys just as we do today.

What makes the boomerang return to the thrower? The arms of the boomerang are curved on top and flat on the bottom, like an airplane wing. So as the boomerang moves through the air, its wings create lift just like an airplane’s wings. But as it spins, the edge of the boomerang wing that is speeding forward in spin creates more lift than the relatively slower opposite arm. This causes the boomerang to tip. As a result of a principle known as gyroscopic precession, this uneven lift causes a constant turning pressure on the boomerang, eventually returning it to the thrower.

The boomerang uses sophisticated aerodynamic and physical principles. It clearly was not invented by people who were primitive. Rather, it is a testimony to the intelligence that the Creator gave to every human being – from the first to the last.

Notes: Robson, David. 1983. “Many happy returns.” Science 83, Mar. p. 100.
Photo: Courtesy of Guillaume Blanchard. Licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 1.0 Generic license.
Creation Moments, Inc., P.O. Box 839, Foley, MN 56329 www.creationmoments.com

“Arab leaders said Wednesday they will never recognize Israel as a Jewish state, blaming it for a lack of progress in the Mideast peace process. ‘We hold Israel entirely responsible for the lack of progress in the peace process and continuing tension in the Middle East,’ the League communique said. ‘We express our absolute and decisive rejection to recognizing Israel as a Jewish state.’... The statement, which came at the end of a two-day summit in Kuwait, also rejected what the Arab League described as the continuation of Jewish settlement building in the West Bank and the ‘Judaization’ of Jerusalem. ... The League's announcement rejects a key demand of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu in Mideast peace talks.”

(“Arab League,” Associated Press, Haaretz.com, Mar. 26, 2014)

“And Samson lay till midnight, and arose at midnight, and took the doors of the gate of the city, and the two posts, and went away with them, bar and all, and put them upon his shoulders, and carried them up to the top of an hill that is before Hebron” (Judges 16:3).

Samson’s God-given physical strength was amazing. He killed a lion as if it were a lamb (Jud. 14:6). He killed 1,000 Philistines with the jawbone of an ass (Jud. 15:15). And he removed an entire city gate. Gaza was the Philistine’s chief city and was fortified with high walls and a large gate at least 10 feet high and 10 feet wide that was strong enough to withstand an attacking army. The gate at Ashdod, a lesser Philistine city, was 10 feet wide (M. Dothan, “The Foundation of Tel More and of Ashdod,” Israel Exploration Journal, 23, 1973, I, pp. 10-11), and the walls of Ekron, also a lesser city, were nine feet thick (“Ekron - A Philistine City,” Israel Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Nov. 23, 1999). The Gaza gate would have consisted of two thick doors that could be barred, and the side posts probably turned in stone sockets. Many of the ancient gates were also covered with metal or at least reinforced with metal bands. Samson pulled up the barred gate with the side posts attached and carried the whole thing off. It was as if he pulled a flower out of the ground, yet Dr. William Barrick computed the weight of the gate and posts to have been between five and ten tons (“Samson’s Removal of Gaza’s Gates,” drbarrick.org, n.d.) And Samson carried the gate to Hebron, which was 36 miles away and 3,200 feet higher in altitude! Samson is a fascinating but ultimately sad case. He was a God-called judge who could subdue the Philistines, but he could not subdue his own sensual appetites.

(Friday Church News Notes, April 4, 2014, www.wayoflife.org fbns@wayoflife.org, 866-295-4143)

For a long time beginning in the 19th century, skeptics lightly dismissed the biblical account of Samson as a myth. For example, in 1966 John McKenzie wrote, “... the historical quality of heroic tales is always low. This is easy to see in Samson. A palace or temple which could support several thousand people on its roof supported by two central pillars separated by an arm’s length never existed” (The World of Judges). As has happened countless times, the Bible’s critics have been proven wrong. The temple at Gaza has not been located, but Philistine temples excavated at Tel Qasile (northern Tel Aviv, 1970s) and Gath (2010) had central pillars upholding the roof as described in Judges 16.  Archaeologist Bryant Wood, Ph.D., describes these findings: “Both temples share a unique design—the roof was supported by two central pillars. The pillars were made of wood and rested on stone support bases. With the pillars being about six feet apart, a strong man could dislodge them from their stone bases and bring the entire roof crashing down. ... The [biblical] report is that of an eye-witness, again demonstrating that indeed the Bible is the world’s most accurate textbook” (“Samson and the Temple of Dagon,” Bible and Spade, 1974, pp. 53-54). I have stood between the stone bases of the pillars at the Philistine temple at Tel Qasile, and I could touch them with my hands. This is not the temple where Samson died, but here is clear evidence that Philistine temples were constructed with two central pillars supporting the roof and that a large man operating in supernatural strength could push the pillars apart as the Bible says. Samson would doubtless have been larger than me, and the pillars in the Gaza temple could have been closer. The foundation stones of the pillars at Gath appear to be closer together than the ones at Tel Qasile, though I have not seen this first hand.

(Friday Church News Notes, April 4, 2014, www.wayoflife.org fbns@wayoflife.org, 866-295-4143)

Job 21:22
“Shall any teach God knowledge? seeing he judgeth those that are on high.”

What breathes with its feet, has thousands of jaws but no mouth, has up to fifty arms and an eye on the end of each arm? No, it’s not a new creature for the next Star Wars movie. It’s the starfish.

When God designed the starfish, it almost seems as if He tried to see how differently He could make this creature from all the others. Depending upon the species, the starfish can have from three to fifty arms while there is an eye on the end of each one. The rough skin of the starfish is covered with tiny jaws to keep parasites from attaching themselves to the starfish. Even more amazing is the fact that each of these thousands of jaws works independently of the rest. To get its oxygen, the starfish takes water in through tubes in its feet, each containing a tiny pump and a pipe system linking it to the other feet.

The starfish presents us with the lesson that our Creator did not have to make the creation in any specific way. This is referred to by theologians as “voluntary creation.” If God had chosen to, you and I might be breathing through our feet – although I’m glad we don’t. But the biblical truth of the voluntary creation was one of the crucial ideas that provided the basis for the modern scientific method.

Notes: Bob Devine, Uncle Bob’s Animal Stories (Moody Press, Chicago, IL, 1986), pp. 65-70.
Photo: Arm tip of the Leptasterias polaris starfish, showing tube feet and eyespot. Courtesy of André-Philippe D. Picard. Licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 3.0 Unported license.
Creation Moments, Inc., P.O. Box 839, Foley, MN 56329 www.creationmoments.com

“I pray that I may be able to preach with such convicting power that my people will sweat! I do not want them to leave my services feeling good. The last thing I want to do is to give them some kind of religious tranquilizer--and let them go to hell in their relaxation. ... The messages preached in our churches should make backslidden Christians sweat. And if I achieve that objective when I preach, I thank God with all my heart, no matter what people think of me. Jesus is Victor! ... Lord, help me to preach with boldness--not concerned with ‘what people think of me.’ Amen”


(A.W. Tozer).

Job 37:8-10
“Then the beasts go into dens, and remain in their places. Out of the south cometh the whirlwind: and cold out of the north. By the breath of God frost is given: and the breadth of the waters is straitened.”

Researchers have discovered a species of mammal that can actually survive being frozen for several weeks.

Scientists were amazed to find that the little Arctic ground squirrel can allow its body to drop to 27 degrees F – that’s five degrees below the freezing point of water – for up to two weeks at a time during its unusual eight-to ten-month hibernation period. After the two weeks at this very low temperature, the squirrel rouses itself, returns to normal body temperature, takes care of a few bathroom duties, and then returns to a state of nearly frozen hibernation for another two weeks. The squirrel usually comes out of hibernation for its short summer in June. It has only two or three months before the ground freezes again and it returns to hibernation, so the squirrel is very busy eating and mating for two short months. You could say that the Arctic ground squirrel sleeps most of its life away.

Scientists say that the Arctic ground squirrel is the only mammal that is able to allow its body temperature to fall below freezing. If they can find out how the squirrel does it, they believe the same method might be used to preserve transplant organs for longer than a few hours. So once again, scientists expect to learn new medical methods by studying how the Creator does the same thing.

Notes: “Squirrel makes its body subfreezing to hibernate,” Minneapolis Star Tribune, Saturday/July1/1989/8A.
Photo: Courtesy of Ianaré Sévi. Licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 3.0 Unported license.
Creation Moments, Inc., P.O. Box 839, Foley, MN 56329 www.creationmoments.com

“The planet is not in danger of catastrophic man made global warming. Even if we burn the entire world's recoverable fossil fuels it will still only result in a temperature rise of less than 1.2 degrees C. So say The Right Climate Stuff Research Team, a group of retired NASA Apollo scientists and engineers--the men who put Neil Armstrong on the moon--in a new report. ‘It’s an embarrassment to those of us who put NASA’s name on the map to have people like James Hansen popping off about global warming,’ says the project’s leader Hal Doiron. Doiron was one of 40 ex NASA employees--including seven astronauts--who wrote in April 2012 to NASA administrator Charles Bolden protesting about the organization’s promotion of climate change alarmism, notably via its resident environmental activist James Hansen. During his stint as head of the NASA Goddard Institute for Space Studies, Hansen tirelessly promoted Anthropogenic Global Warming theory. He retired last year to spend more time on environmental campaigning ... Doiron is similarly skeptical of the computer models used by climate alarmists. He and his team argue that the 105 models currently used by the IPCC are seriously flawed because they don’t agree with each other and don’t agree with empirical data. There is no empirical data indicating Anthropogenic Global Warming will produce catastrophic climate changes. AGW can only produce modest global warming, likely to be beneficial when CO2 benefits to crop production are considered. Doiron says: ‘I believe in computer models. My whole career was about using computer models to make life or death decisions. In 1963 I had to use them to calculate whether, when the lunar module landed on a 12 degree slope it would fall over or not - and design the landing gear accordingly. But if you can't validate the models--and the IPCC can’t--then don't use them to make critical decisions about the economy and the planet's future.’”

(“Earth Is Safe,” BreitBart.com, Mar. 8, 2014)

Genesis 1:11
“And God said, Let the earth bring forth grass, the herb yielding seed, and the fruit tree yielding fruit after his kind, whose seed is in itself…”

The voodoo lily is native to Southeast Asia, although it is sometimes sold in the west as a curiosity. When it flowers, the voodoo lily sends up a fleshy, purple spike that can be three feet long. Besides being one of the worst-smelling flowers you’ll ever experience, the spike has another amazing ability.

The spike of the voodoo lily generates a number of hormones that, when heated, smell like rotting meat. It does this because the flies that pollinate the lily feed on decaying flesh. The smell draws them in to look for food, and in the process pollinate the lily. The flower stalk is able to generate plenty of heat that creates its awful smell. Temperatures inside the flowers can reach 110 degrees F. In order to generate this much heat, the voodoo lily actually operates at a metabolic rate similar to that of a hummingbird in flight! This frantic rate continues only until the flower is pollinated.

As a matter of interest, while the voodoo lily is the most dramatic of heat-producing plants, several common household plants that are related to the voodoo lily also produce heat when flowering. These include the dieffenbachia and the philodendron.

Scripture offers a very modest account of God’s creative activity. Incredibly imaginative and intricate designs are included in the simple statement, “Let the earth bring forth grass...”

Notes: Rick Weiss, “Blazing Blossoms,” Science News, Vol.135, June 24, 1989, pp. 392-394.
Photo: Courtesy of Jörg Hempel. Licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 3.0 Germany license.
Creation Moments, Inc., P.O. Box 839, Foley, MN 56329 www.creationmoments.com

Humans can distinguish several million different colors and almost half a million different sounds, and a new study has found that we can distinguish more than 1 trillion smells. This is according to a report in Science magazine, March 21, 2014. The abstract says, “It demonstrates that the human olfactory system, with its hundreds of different olfactory receptors, far outperforms the other senses in the number of physically different stimuli it can discriminate.” It is obvious to any but the willfully blind that there is an Almighty Creator!

(Friday Church News Notes, March 28, 2014, www.wayoflife.org fbns@wayoflife.org, 866-295-4143)

Romans 8:22-23
“For we know that the whole creation groaneth and travaileth in pain together until now. And not only they, but ourselves also, which have the firstfruits of the Spirit, even we ourselves groan within ourselves, waiting for the adoption, to wit, the redemption of our body.”

In 1836, well-known English astronomer Sir John Herschel wrote a series of articles for the New York Sun reporting his discovery of life on the moon. He reported seeing buffalo, goats, cranes and other animals. The Sun finally admitted that the whole thing had been a prank, and most of the public was amused.

There is as much evidence for life on the moon or other planets today as there was in 1836. Moreover, as we explore the other planets of the solar system, the evidence grows that there is little hope that other life will be found in space. At a conference on extra-terrestrial life, well-known astronomer Dr. Robert Jastrow remarked that the question was “essentially a religious controversy.”

That the question of life in space is religious is an important insight in two ways. Recent advances in biochemistry have abundantly demonstrated that life could not have begun spontaneously from non-life on planet Earth. Evolutionists are putting their faith in the discovery of evidence that life began on some other planet. There is the further hope that with such a discovery this will be the final nail in the coffin of Christianity and proof of their own religion of evolution. What space exploration has taught so far confirms what the Bible implies – that planet Earth is a very special place specifically designed for life.

Photo: Great Moon Hoax lithograph of “ruby amphitheater” for The Sun.
Creation Moments, Inc., P.O. Box 839, Foley, MN 56329 www.creationmoments.com