Creation and Truly Good News of the Gospel

My friend Dave T. asks the following question: "Could you write me a brief, poignant and concise defense of a six day literal creation, and refutes other perspectives?"

The Argument from Science

As spelled out in the article “Evidence for a Young Earth”

http://www.earthage.org/youngearthev/evidence_for_a_young_earth.htm, (with references given at http://www.earthage.org/youngearthev/young%20earth%20refs.htm) there are at least 22 clocks, or indicators, given to us by nature that the Earth and Universe are young. The vast majority give an age estimate of less than 10,000 years. They include clocks based on:  

• Receding Moon
• Oil Pressure
• The Sun
• The Oldest Living Thing
• Helium in the Atmosphere
• Short Period Comets
• The Earth's Magnetic Field
• C-14 Dating of Dino Bones
• Dinosaur Blood and Ancient DNA
• Unfossilized Dinosaur Bones
• 165 Million Year Old Ligaments
• Axel Heiberg Island
• Carbon-14 in Atmosphere
• The Dead Sea
• Niagara Falls
• Historical Records
• The San Andreas Fault
• Mitochondrial Eve
• Population Growth
• Minerals in the Oceans
• Rapid Mountain Uplift
• Carbon 14 from "Old" Sources
• Dark Matter and Spiral Galaxies
• Helium and lead in Zircons

The Argument from Philosophy

So-called “science” that leads to Old Earth  conclusions is based on completely unbiblical presuppositions. In the words of Francis A. Schaeffer How Should We then Live? (1976 ed p.146) “scientists … [have] pushed God more and more to the edges of their systems.… [They] moved to the idea of a completely closed system. That left no place for God. But equally it left no place for man. Man disappears, to be viewed as some form of determined or behavioristic machine. Everything is part of the cosmic machine, including people.” This is falsehood!

The Argument from the Bible

The truth is the Gospel of Jesus Christ. This gospel has at its foundation the truth of a Creator God, who created all things in a literal period of six days, with the corollary of a global flood in Noah’s day.

Here are some great Good News verses that should only be ignored or hermeneuticized (by our theological professors) at our peril:

• Romans 5:12: "Just as sin came into the world through one man, and death through sin, and so death spread to all men because all sinned."
• Exodus 20:11: "For in six days the Lord made heaven and earth, the sea, and all that is in them, and rested on the seventh day. Therefore the Lord blessed the Sabbath day and made it holy." (in the Fourth Commandment, written by the finger of God on a tablet of stone)
• Matthew 24:39: "And they were unaware until the flood came and swept them all away, so will be the coming of the Son of Man." (direct words of Jesus)
• Genesis 1:31: "And God saw everything that he had made, and behold, it was very good. And there was evening and there was morning, the sixth day."

The Christian who wants to grow ever closer to Christ should aspire to these words of Paul:

“I want to know Christ, and the POWER of His Resurrection, that I may share in His sufferings, and be like Him in His death” (Philippians 3:10)

The power of the Resurrection to make all things new is the same power of our Creator, who originally made all things in six days, and who sent a cataclysmic judgment over all of the Earth in the flood of Noah.

To sum it up, if the Gospel is truly Good News, the Earth must be young!

(written by Marko Malyj)

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Five Things Evangelicals Need to Know About American Muslims

Sometimes we don’t love some people because of our erroneous beliefs. Let me tell you some things about most Muslims that most Christians don’t know.

1. You can’t be a good Muslim without believing in Jesus. Muslims believe in Jesus’s virgin birth—but not from the Father of God. They believe in his miracles. They believe in his perfection. They believe in his unique place. They do not believe as I do that he was God in flesh and part of the Trinity. The Muslims I know love to talk about Jesus, if you open up the conversation.

2. Most Muslims in the US are here because they want the freedoms we have. If they wanted Islamic law and culture, they would be in Islamic nations globally. If you ask them, they’ll tell you that. Most Muslims I know would fear the US becoming an Islamic nation. Money was not the only reason or even primary reason many came.

3. Most Muslims fear Islamic terrorists as much as Anglo Christians do. That’s why some are here. The majority of violence perpetrated in the name of God in the world is Muslim on Muslim. Yes, some Muslims commit terrorist acts against non-Muslims, but they by far kill their own people more than others.

4. Most Muslims want a relationship with Christians and others, but they are afraid to reach out. They are the minority. It’s up to the majority to reach out and build relationships. Our church practices many ways of reaching out to others of different faiths. Many who come to America value relationship and friendship far more than Americans do. Those friendships have the potential of going very deeply for those who are not afraid.

5. God has a special plan for Muslims. How can I say that? There are 1.5 billion of them in the world. He loves them. They matter to God. God always moves in the masses. You cannot ignore that many people. God created all people. He has a plan for them just as he has for other nations and peoples. I pray daily that God be glorified and Jesus exalted among all peoples and nations, Muslims included.

(reposted from Bob Roberts, Five Things Evangelicals Need to Know About American Muslims, Mission Frontiers, Issue 34:6, Nov/Dec 2012)

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Christianity to be taught in Turkish elementary schools

The Turkish government has decided to include an elective course on Christianity in the nation's elementary schools.

Local educators will be required to provide the course if at least ten students request it. Christian leaders of various backgrounds have been asked to help prepare a text, and the work is now underway.

Thank the Almighty for this, and please pray that all lessons will be accurate and uplifting in their approach and style.

(from a Christian newsletter, January 2013)

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How Long Is a Cubit?

The cubit is one of the earliest known standards of length, used in ancient Israel and throughout the Near East. It was originally the length of one’s forearm between the tip of the middle finger and the elbow. The word cubit comes from the Latin word for elbow and the Hebrew term refers to the forearm. The term occurs more than one hundred times in the Old and New Testaments to describe structures and distances.

Nations varied somewhat in defining the cubit's exact length, and both short cubits and long or royal cubits were common. Dual cubit values in Egypt were 17.72 and 20.67 inches, as determined from measuring sticks found in tombs. In Babylon, 20.806 inches was a common cubit length (Achtemeier, 1985).

Cubit measuring rods such as these from the Eighteenth Dynasty tomb of Aperia would have been common tools in the quarries and at the pyramid construction site (Photo by Jon Bodsworth)

There is a fascinating clue to the length of the cubit from the Old Testament and archaeology. Hezekiah’s famous Siloam water tunnel is referenced in 2 Kings 20:20 and 2 Chronicles 32:3–4. It was built around 700 B.C. to provide water for Jerusalem during a siege by the Assyrians under Sennacherib. This tunnel is hewn from solid rock and is a memorable hike for visitors to the old city of Jerusalem. When I walked the tunnel in 1995 by flashlight, there was a foot depth of moving water along the entire length of one-third mile, or 1,749 feet.

Originally there was a carved inscription near the tunnel outlet into the Pool of Siloam within the city wall. This Siloam Inscription, now in the Archaeology Museum of Istanbul, Turkey, records the tunnel length as 1,200 cubits. Comparison with the actual length yields a cubit measure of about 17.5 inches.

With a 17.5-inch value for the cubit, Noah’s Ark measures an impressive 437.5 feet long, 72.92 feet wide, and 43.75 feet high (300x50x30 cubits; Genesis 6:15). The Ark may well have been the largest building project in history up to that time. Also, the biblical giant Goliath was over six cubits tall (l Samuel 17:4), or nine feet.

(re-posted from Don DeYoung, How Long Is a Cubit?, published in Creation Matters, a publication of Creation Research Society, Volume 17, Number 5, September/October 2012, to appear at http://www.creationresearch.org/creation_matters/pdf/2012/CM17%2005%20low%20res.pdf)

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Reference
Achtemeier, P.J. (ed.) 1985. Harper’s Bible Dictionary. Harper & Row, San Francisco.

Aren't you afraid of me? After all, I'm a murderer!

The chairs sat empty and the church quiet when a dark, disheveled figure wandered through the open door. Rich Vallette, the pastor of the church in the Dominican Republic, and a Crossworld worker, looked up to study the stranger. Despondent and bewildered, he had walked in the church's open door seeking help.

"I am going to commit suicide today," he said. "I need someone to pray for me." After praying for him, Rich invited the man into his office and asked him to share his story.



The church in the Dominican Republic
where this story took place.

Lucieno had made murder his living. As a hit-man, he just finished a 14-year prison term. His guilt for the bloodshed of victims and the trauma of their families pushed him into crushing despair. "Death is the only way out of my miserable state," he said. "I'm here as a last resort before taking my own life."

Rich continued listening to the killer's story until Lucieno blurted out, "Aren't you afraid of me? After all, I'm a murderer!"

"No, I'm not afraid," Rich answered. "You're the one that needs to be afraid. I have Jesus and you don't." To Rich's amazement, Lucieno didn't threaten him or run away, but shouted, "That's what I need! It's Jesus!" But then Lucieno's joy at discovering the source of redemption turned to fear. "How could Jesus possibly forgive a sinful man like me who has taken people's lives and caused so much pain?"

"Jesus has already paid for your sin on the cross," Rich said. "Have you heard of the apostle Paul? He was like you in many ways. He tortured and murdered Christians, but Jesus forgave him! God transformed Paul's life and gave him a new mission: bring others to experience Jesus' forgiveness as well."

That was all Lucieno needed to hear. "Jesus, forgive my sins," he prayed aloud. "I don't deserve it, but would you give me a new life like Paul?" Lucieno raised his head and gave a huge smile - a brilliant expression of his new life in Christ.

(from Light, the Crossworld newsletter, November 2012)

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