Ecclesiastes 3:21
“Who knoweth the spirit of man that goeth upward, and the spirit of the beast that goeth downward to the earth?”

When it is a slow news day, the news agencies usually find a new story about human evolution. Another such article appeared recently in the New York Times. It concerned research into chimpanzees living in the Fongoli savanna of Senegal.

The exemplary research involved an extensive survey of chimp urine. While this might sound unpleasant, the researchers were looking for three specific chemicals. The presence of c-peptide would indicate if the animals were getting enough energy from their food, the protein creatinine indicates if the chimps are regularly getting dehydrated, and the hormone cortisol is produced if the creatures are stressed.

Research showed that, while the chimps clearly had enough food, they were often dehydrated and under stress. The chimps presented behavior that was significantly different from chimps that lived in forests, where water and shade were more abundant.

This much is interesting and useful research. However, some of the researchers go further and suggest that these conditions must be similar to what our chimp-like ancestors experienced two million years ago in the savannas of East Africa. They claim that the stress these hominins experienced would have caused them to sweat more and to walk upright, thus developing into modern humans. The New York Times article suggested that these hominins may have started walking upright to get fruit from trees, thus alleviating some of their stress.

It is a shame that such careful research should be spoiled by fairy-tale evolutionary conclusions that do not do justice to the observations made.

creationmoments.com/sermons/did-stressed-chimps-walk-upright

“Pastor Craig Gross is a fan of weed. He’s not quite a heavyweight user like rapper Snoop Dogg or the legendary Willie Nelson, but he does confess to having developed a comfortable relationship with the psychoactive drug he testifies has taken him to higher levels of worship. ‘I went to Coachella and saw one of my favorite artists that I’ve ever seen and I used marijuana before seeing him. It was amazing,’ Gross tells The Christian Post. ‘I’ve never lifted my hands in a worship service ever, ‘cause I was raised Baptist. I’ve done that in my bathroom worshiping with marijuana by myself.’ Often recognized as the founder of XXXchurch in Pasadena, California, a ministry that empowers individuals to break free from their pornography addictions, Gross has embarked on a new controversial mission: to sell and promote marijuana for Christians through a new venture called Christian Cannabis. As public perception continues to shift on the demonized plant he celebrates as a gift from God that was ‘created on day 3,’ Gross wants to bring Christian weed users out of the shadows and challenge churches to have frank conversations about marijuana. A recent poll by the Pew Research Center found that 62 percent of Americans, including 74 percent of Millennials, support legalizing marijuana. Ten states and Washington, D.C., have legalized it for recreational use for adults older than 21, while 33 states have legalized medical marijuana. Michigan is the latest state to legalize it for recreational purposes, while Utah and Missouri voted to legalize medical marijuana in last year’s midterm elections. Gross describes himself as among the untold number of Christians who first turned to marijuana for medicinal relief. It’s in the wake of this shifting and complex cultural and political landscape that Gross believes churches should start having deeper conversations on marijuana and he hopes Christian Cannabis can help drive them.”

​“Pastor Craig Gross,” Christian Post, Apr. 29, 2019

Genesis 1:16
“And God made two great lights; the greater light to rule the day, and the lesser light to rule the night: he made the stars also.”

In 1953, Ray Bradbury published a science fiction story entitled “The Golden Apples of the Sun”, about an ill-fated mission to scoop material from the Sun’s outer atmosphere. The title came from the last line of a poem by W.B. Yeats.

Sometimes, sci-fi stories appear to come true. NASA is now planning an unmanned mission to the Sun’s outer atmosphere. The spacecraft, called the Parker Solar Probe, will orbit the Sun at a distance of about 10 million miles. This might sound a long way, but Earth’s orbit is 93 million miles from the Sun, and that of Mercury, the closest planet to the Sun, is at 43 million miles.

The heat at the surface of the Sun is clearly the most important factor. Therefore, the design of the spacecraft is a wonderful example of human creativity and problem solving. One can imagine the tests carried out with different materials. The craft will have an 8-foot “umbrella” to deflect heat, made of an alloy of molybdenum, titanium and zirconium. Printed circuit boards are etched with acid onto tungsten – the metallic element with the highest melting point. Cables are obviously not covered with plastic, but with specially grown heat-proof crystals. The temperature of the shield will reach a few thousand degrees, yet its inside will be just 85°F!

God, who made the Sun on the fourth day of the Creation Week, has given human engineers such wonderful talents, reminding us again that we are made in the image of God.

creationmoments.com/sermons/the-golden-apples-of-the-sun

The Discipling Church: The Church That Will Stand Until Christ Comes , first published in 2017, is now available as a free eBook. This church manual aims to establish churches on a solid biblical foundation of a regenerate church membership, one mind in doctrine and practice, serious discipleship, thorough-going discipline, and a large vision for world evangelism. We examine the New Testament pattern of a discipling church, and we trace the history of Baptist churches over the past 200 years to document the apostasy from the biblical pattern to a mixed multitude philosophy. We also document the history of “sinner’s prayer” evangelism which has affected the reality of a regenerate church membership. The book deals with biblical salvation with evidence, care in receiving church members, the church’s first love for Christ, the right kind of church leaders, the right kind of preaching, training church members to be real Bible students, the many facets of church discipline, building strong families, youth ministry, training preachers, charity, reproof, educating the church for spiritual protection, maintaining standards for workers, the church’s prayer life, the church’s separation, spiritual revival, the church’s music, and many other things. There is a chapter on moving from a mixed multitude church to a discipling church. The last chapter documents some of the cultural factors that have weakened churches over the past 100 years, including theological liberalism, the public school system, materialism and working mothers, the rock & roll culture, pop psychology, the feminist movement, New Evangelicalism, television, and the Internet. There is also a list of recommended materials for a discipling church. Dr. Don Jasmin, editor of The Fundamentalist Digest, says, “The book The Discipling Church is well named. It is loaded with Scriptural exposition, Scriptural explanation, and Scriptural edification. This spiritually rich volume covers almost every phase of a genuine Biblically discipling church. Every pastor should procure this spiritually enriching treasury, one which a preacher will readily consult for valuable assistance and counsel in seeking to maintain a Scripturally balanced N.T. ministry.” 550 pages. The Discipling Church is available for reading and downloading as a free eBook and for purchase in a print edition, from www.wayoflife.org.

(Friday Church News Notes, May 3, 2019, www.wayoflife.org fbns@wayoflife.org, 866-295-4143)

Genesis 5:4
“And the days of Adam after he had begotten Seth were eight hundred years: and he begat sons and daughters:”

 Many people seem to have a problem with what must have happened during the world’s second generation. I have been asked, “Where did all the people of the world come from if Adam only had two  children, and one of them murdered the other?” The purpose of such questions is to imply that Adam was either figurative or that there must have been other people in the world as well.

In fact, Genesis names three sons of Adam and Eve, not two. There was Cain, Abel, and, later, Seth. But this still doesn’t help these questioners because Seth was another son.

Apart from Cain, Abel and Seth, there were other sons who were not named, and there were daughters. So the third generation would have come from marriages between sons and daughters of Adam and Eve.

Does this sound like the sin of incest? In fact, such close intermarriage was not forbidden until the giving of the Law to Moses. And the Law protects people by preventing the selection of deleterious mutations that can be concentrated in the offspring of such close partnerships. But this world had only just gone wrong. In the second and third generations, and down to the time of Moses, there were not sufficient mutations for close intermarriages to be dangerous. So we have also answered the age old question: “Who was Cain’s wife?”

creationmoments.com/sermons/the-worlds-second-generation

“The current Southern Baptist President, J.D. Greear, is proving himself to be unfit for the position he holds in America’s largest Protestant denomination. Over the last few years, the SBC has taken a sharp turn toward political as well as theological liberalism while pushing a social justice agenda. Reformation Charlotte reported earlier today that Greear, during an eisegesis of Romans 1, compared homosexuality to ‘greed’ and ‘boasting,’ even stating that most of these sins are ‘more egregious in the eyes of God’ than homosexuality. Of course, this is foolish, as homosexuality is the one sin that caused God to wipe cities off the face of the earth. It is, according to the text he clumsily referenced, the sin that God gives people over to because of their other sins. It is actually the wrath and judgment of God being poured out on a people to be given over to depraved minds and dishonorable passions. It has now come to light that not only has Greear misrepresented the Scriptures regarding the sin of homosexuality, he has also called on Christians to stand up for the rights of LGBT people. The ‘rights’ that LGBT people are fighting for are, for example, the right to use the public restroom of whatever gender they choose to identify as on any given day. The right to get married and practice sodomy in the apartment next door. The right to get married in your conservative church. The right to be fully embraced as an active, affirmed, and participating member of your church. And the right to propagandize you and your children with their vile affections that God has given them over to...”

“SBC Prez,” ReformationCharlotte.org, Jan. 31, 2019

Genesis 4:23-24
“And Lamech said unto his wives, Adah and Zillah, Hear my voice; ye wives of Lamech, hearken unto my speech: for I have slain a man to my wounding, and a young man to my hurt. If Cain shall be avenged sevenfold, truly Lamech seventy and sevenfold.”

Five generations after Cain came a man called Lamech. This was not the same Lamech who became Noah’s father.

The significance of Cain’s descendant, Lamech, is that he decided to take on the role of God for his own life and those around him. God had said He would avenge Cain sevenfold if anyone would murder him. But Lamech wanted to do his own avenging, and this was to be seventy-sevenfold. And he announced he killed people, not for attempted murder, but just for being wounded or struck.

This usurpation of God’s role was also seen in Lamech’s other actions. God had set the pattern that marriage was to be one man and one woman through how He dealt with Adam and Eve. But Lamech decided to have two wives. If a man takes two wives, then neither is his equal partner. Lamech’s motivations for being the world’s first polygamist are seen in his wives’ names – Adah, meaning “ornament”, and Zillah, meaning “shade”. There is nothing wrong with a man being physically attracted to his wife (singular), but these names suggest that it was only physical attraction that Lamech was interested in.

Lamech is a clear example of what happens over a few generations when a people turns away from God. In just five generations, we have a society that rejects God’s definition of marriage and seeks its own control on society. This pre-Flood society seems very similar to that of today.

creationmoments.com/sermons/cains-great-great-great-grandson

“Last week, Justice Francesca Marzari of the Supreme Court of British Columbia, Canada, declared a father guilty of ‘family violence’ against his 14-year-old daughter on the sole basis that he had engaged in ‘expressions of rejection of [her] gender identity.’ These ‘expressions’ revolved entirely around his polite refusal to refer to his daughter as a boy in private, and his steady choice to affirm that she is a girl in public. As previously reported, the BC Supreme Court ordered in February that 14-year-old Maxine* receive testosterone injections without parental consent. Accordingly, Maxine began regular injections at British Columbia (BC) Children’s Hospital over the course of the last two months. Her father, Clark*, strongly objects to this treatment and immediately sought to reverse the decision in the BC Court of Appeal. Hoping to raise awareness of his case, Clark gave a number of interviews to media outlets, including The Federalist. In these interviews, he repeatedly referred to his daughter as a girl, stating to The Federalist that ‘she is a girl. Her DNA will not change through all these experiments that they do.’ While many might take this to be an honest statement of biological fact, Marzari quoted it as a prime example of Clark’s ‘family violence of a public denial of [Maxine’s] gender identity.’ Marzari convicted Clark of this violence, and issued a ‘protection order’ preventing him from speaking to journalists or the public about his case. While the main thrust of Marzari’s ruling focused on Clark’s public statements, Marzari also ordered that Clark be enjoined from ‘exposing’ Maxine to any materials that might ‘question whether [her] gender identity is real or the treatments [she] seeks are in [her] best interests.’ What Marzari found particularly egregious, however, was not Clark’s private interactions with his daughter but his ‘continued willingness to provide interviews to the media in which he identifies [Maxine] as female, uses a female name for [Maxine] and expresses his opposition to the therapies [Maxine] has chosen.’ According to the court, this willingness placed Maxine at ‘a significant risk of harm.’ (*Clark and Maxine are not the real names of the father and daughter involved. Their identities have been concealed by court order. Court documents use the initials CD and AB, respectively.)”

“Father Gagged, Found Guilty of ‘Family Violence,’” The Federalist, Apr. 24, 2019

Genesis 4:9
“And the LORD said unto Cain, Where is Abel thy brother? And he said, I know not: Am I my brother’s keeper?”

Why does God ask questions? It is clearly not because He will benefit from the answer. God is omniscient – all-knowing. He already knows the answer to the question. So if the answer to the question is not for God’s benefit, it can only be for the benefit of the person asking the question.

For example, when God asked Cain “Where is Abel thy brother?”, God already knew that Cain had just murdered Abel. The purpose of the question, therefore, was to give Cain the opportunity to admit his crime and to repent of it. This leads us to the remarkable conclusion that it is possible for a murderer to repent and, therefore, to be saved and forgiven. This is a hard truth for some to accept, but there will be murderers in heaven – men and women who have committed the most dreadful crimes but who have repented and been forgiven. (As a qualification, I would say that this does not affect the way that human authorities should deal with the murderers.)

Eventually, Cain says, “My punishment is greater than I can bear.” Is this repentance? I think not. Cain regrets what he will have to endure, but there is no evidence from this statement that he has turned away from his life of sin. From the time of the world’s first murder, and onwards, we must note that repentance is not simply being sorry. It is a complete change of direction, throwing oneself on the mercy of our Savior, Jesus Christ.

creationmoments.com/sermons/did-cain-repent

Note from Bro. Cloud: I received the following testimony from a young preacher recently. It describes what is happening widely in Independent Baptist churches. It describes what has become the majority thinking over the past 15 years. I pray that this young man will stand fast in the “strictness” of God’s Word and not follow a multitude to do wrong.

​“Dear Brother Cloud, I have been GREATLY encouraged by your writings because I had been struggling with the idea of holding to and preaching Christian standards when so many of the ‘good’ independent Baptist churches and pastors no longer do. I was getting to the place where I felt alone in desiring to preach and teach holiness from the pulpit, for I had asked many (at least 10) preachers if adapting CCM was ok and if we should preach hard on modesty and music and they ALL told me that if we love people and show them the love of the Lord they will eventually come around to creating their own standards. I was so discouraged because I had been convicted about the music/dress that I was listening to and allowing in my own life and family and was desiring to find a man who would say, ‘YES! TAKE A STAND!’ So thank you for doing right no matter the cost. I have been the youth pastor at an independent Baptist church, but I have been asked to leave by the pastor because he feels I am ‘too conservative/fundamental’ for his ministry (our church is adapting CCM praise music and giving up modesty for the sake of ‘keeping the unsaved in church’). I am in the process of seeking God's face and will for where He wants us to go and what He wants us to do. The main purpose of this email is to let you know that as I seek to serve the Lord, my goal is to be what you laid out in your ‘O Timothy’ magazine. My desire is to be one of the 1,000 preachers that will not give up the faith and hold to sound doctrine and Biblical standards. I do not expect a response, but I wanted you to know that your sound Biblical teaching has given me the Biblical foundation I had been praying for/ searching for so that I could respond (both to others and in my own heart) with the Bible as to why I DO believe that holding Bible standards on music, dress, television, technology, etc., is VITAL to Christianity today.”

​(Friday Church News Notes, April 26, 2019, www.wayoflife.org, fbns@wayoflife.org, 866-295-4143)

Isaiah 45:12
“I have made the earth, and created man upon it: I, even my hands, have stretched out the heavens, and all their host have I commanded”

 Of course, the twelve new moons of Jupiter recently discovered are not really new. They were there before, but we hadn’t seen them before. They were probably there when Galileo discovered the first four moons of Jupiter.

A team of astronomers around the world were actually trying to find the elusive Ninth Planet that many believed to exist beyond the orbits of the Trans Neptunian objects, like Pluto and Eris. However, Jupiter was more or less in the path of their observations, and astronomers, using a telescope based in Chile, discovered the moons. But one of these new moons has been described as an oddball.

Most moons of Jupiter orbit in a prograde direction. That is, they orbit in the same direction as the planet’s axial rotation – counter-clockwise, as seen from north of the solar system’s plane. But some moons orbit retrograde, which is a concept very difficult for evolutionary astrophysicists to explain if all the moons coalesced from early planetary material. The oddball moon orbits prograde, but its orbit crosses the orbits of several retrograde moons. As one researcher commented: “This is an unstable situation. Head-on collisions would quickly break apart and grind the objects down to dust.”

If the Solar System had really been in existence for 4.5 billion years, then a collision, involving the oddball moon, would have been pretty much certain to happen. The fact that it has not done so is much more consistent with the biblical timescale of just over 6,000 years.

creationmoments.com/sermons/jupiters-new-moons

The following is from a reader: “About three years ago I was speaking with another fundamental Baptist pastor here in the area. I mentioned that I truly believed the Lord was coming soon. He said, ‘You know, everybody was preaching on this back in the 70’s, 80’s and 90’s and thought surely Christ would come before 2000. I really don’t preach that much any more.’ I about fell on the floor and responded to him, ‘If Christ did not come by then, how much closer now?’ I said, ‘I preach His coming regularly trying to wake people up to holiness and living for Christ so that they won’t be ashamed at His coming.’ Speaking to a missionary friend who spoke at our church recently, I mentioned this story. His words were, ‘I have heard more from you today about the second coming than I have for months in other fundamental Baptist churches. This is from a man from a large missions ministry who preaches regularly across the country. Our people live in denial of this truth and unfortunately our preachers are also.” Another reader sent the following comment: “Fundamental Baptist preachers seem very reluctant to delve into prophecy. ... I don’t think I have ever heard a really solid message from an IFB preacher from the mountain of Old Testament prophecies with momentous future fulfillment.” The imminent return of Jesus Christ is a major New Testament doctrine, and the preaching and teaching of it is essential for holy living. Preachers who neglect it are rebels against God’s Word and are not qualified for the ministry. The mindset of always looking for Christ’s return was modeled by the church at Thessalonica, which “turned to God from idols to serve the living and true God; and to wait for his Son from heaven...” (1 Th. 1:9-10).

(Friday Church News Notes, April 26, 2019, www.wayoflife.org, fbns@wayoflife.org, 866-295-4143)

Genesis 3:24
“So he drove out the man; and he placed at the east of the garden of Eden Cherubims, and a flaming sword which turned every way, to keep the way of the tree of life.”

 One of the favorite questions, on which lounge theologians like to ponder, is the location of the Garden of Eden. A number of candidate locations have been offered. Those reading Genesis 2 will notice that four rivers are mentioned. Two of these rivers have familiar names – the Tigris and the Euphrates. Today, the rivers rise in Eastern Turkey and flow through Syria before reaching Iraq. The sources of the two rivers are fairly close together, geographically speaking. So one of the suggested locations for Eden would be near their sources. Another would be near their confluence.

But neither of these locations show rivers spring out of a single river. And, in any case, rivers were probably re-formed during the Flood. So the current Tigris and Euphrates are not the rivers of Genesis 2, but have been named for them since the Flood.

Another suggestion is that Eden was located at modern-day Jerusalem, probably under the Temple Mount. Other suggestions have included Madagascar or Tanzania.

However, in Genesis 3, when God expelled Adam and Eve from Eden, He “placed at the east of the garden of Eden Cherubims, and a flaming sword which turned every way, to keep the way of the tree of life” (Genesis 3:24). That cherubim would still be around if Eden were still around. In fact, much of the Earth’s crust was replaced at the time of the Flood, and the continents re-arranged. We can therefore confidently suggest that Eden is nowhere. It used to exist, but, since the Flood, its location has been destroyed.

creationmoments.com/sermons/where-is-eden