Panspermia

When the theory of evolution was first popularized by Charles Darwin in 1859, his original thesis was that God created and then life evolved from there. (1) However, to quote one of his adherents “…we cannot allow a divine foot in the door.” (2) Men such as Julian Huxley could have nothing of the sort; life could not have been created by God. If it had been, then he, like a parent, would demand obedience, and that is not what they want. God, in their mind, could not have even created life, it had to create itself.

However, the problem remains that life cannot be created from nothing. Men such as Stanley Miller (1950s) have tried and failed to create life from non-living chemicals. For them, this does present a sizable problem, in fact, a gigantic one, if life could originate from non-living chemicals, and this has been proven many times over to be impossible, than life would have to be created by something. But a Divine Foot cannot be allowed in the door, so they need to come up with something. They came up with Panspermia, basically, little green men.

The idea is that, since life is so complex, it would have to have some sort of designer, something intelligent behind it. DNA, the blueprint for life, is unimaginably complex, so much so that for DNA to exist, DNA must first exist. In other words the mechanisms that keep it alive cannot come to be unless it is alive, and it cannot come to life without these mechanisms.(3) Men such as Richard Dawkins (author of The God Delusion) have admitted that it is impossible for spontaneous generation to occur, thus, a higher life form from another planet would have had to engineer us. Dawkins thought the higher engineer must have come from another planet, basically, Aliens.(4)

The scientific method is for things that are observable and repeatable, since the above is neither; it is a hypothesis, not science. The problem of the little green men theory is glaringly obvious at first glance; someone had to create the little green men, but no one has any idea who did. Thus, the only things this solves is nothing. Life did not originate here, so all they did was to transplant the problem to somewhere else, somewhere we have not yet discovered.

When Darwin wrote his book On the Origin of Species in 1859 he said that, in his day, the evidence had not been found, but that it eventually would be. The supporters of his theory have had over a hundred and fifty years, and they still have not found evidence. Could it be that there is none?

Through His Strength We Will Conquer,

Andrew C. Abbott

References:

1:p.243.

2: Acts & Facts, (vol.42 no. 3) Willingly Ignorant, By Henry M. Morris. Quoting from Millions and Millions of Demons. By Lewontin.

3:Impact, (#403) A Few Reasons an Evolutionary Origin of Life is Impossible. By Duane T. Gish. Ph.D.

4: For this interview see the documentary Expelled: No Intelligence Allowed.

Words

Old revolutions were waged with guns. In fact, when we read history, we read a great deal about wars and battles and killings and slaughters. However, sometimes the real point of all that is going on can be missed.

In both World Wars millions and millions of people were killed by starvation, by soldiers, by sickness, and many by their own governments. Entire countries ceased to exist, cities were decimated, over 100,000 were made casualties by one bomb; the atomic one.

Some may have looked around after VJ Day and wondered “What happened?” How did a little man with the rank of general by the name of Tojo in the country of Japan suddenly convince so many people to act like so many animals? How did the Japanese convince their seemingly normal citizens to do such atrocious things to others? To beat them, to inject them as guinea pigs, and to kill them for no reason.

This did not happen overnight. One million men did not wake up one morning and suddenly decide to put on Brown Shirts and begin to bring Hitler to power. Millions of Russians did not suddenly decide that after all, totalitarianism was a good idea, and Communism something they should try.

This happened because of the power of words.

Through a long and tedious process, the people of a nation can be brought to believe differently than their parents and forefathers did. When we were young we were told black is black and white is white, but if we told our children white is black and black is white, they would have nothing to oppose us with, no data, and thus they would teach their children that snow is black.

If they found old books stating that snow is white, they would almost certainly say that that was an old, unsophisticated, unprogressive idea created by people not yet modern.

Their ideas have total ascendency in almost every major outlet of news, entertainment, and fashion on the planet. They have taken over the books, the newspapers, the schools. Everywhere you go you are bombarded with their words. On signs, on screens, on radios, you cannot shut your ears to their message, they pelt you with their agenda until you listen.

Today, we, the coming generation are being told snow is black. Everything our great grandfathers believed is being taken away from us. And we have nothing with which to oppose this new idea. When we read old books, by men such as George Washington, we argue with ourselves about how unprogressive he and his counterparts, men such as Thomas Jefferson were, and how foolish to think small government is good. We have been trained that such things come from the Bronze Age, and that we are now in the Gold.

They are winning the war of the words. They have the media, they have the news sites, they have the churches in some cases, and they have the families. What is left to us you may ask? The truth is left to us. We may have suffered a beating but we have not yet been slain.

I believe it was the Iron Chancellor, Otto Von Bismarck who said that each generation that takes a blow is followed by one that gives one. The truth has taken a tremendous beating in this debate, the proceeding generation lost a lot of ground. But if we are going to win the war of the words, then let us fight now.

We do not have multi-million dollar budgets, but neither did the Fabian Socialists when they started. Because of the venue of mass-media, and the speed with which words can be transported across it, we can fight back by using the means that are at our disposal, such as blogs, websites, or online magazines.

This is a war that must not be fought with eloquence for the sake of eloquence, but rather truth for the sake of truth, justice for the sake of justice, right for the sake of right, and all because God commands it. We must use concise words, towards a directed plan. The Communists wrote out their plans and then enacted them, and we lost Western Civilization. We must plan before we act.

We are losing the war of the words, would you like to join us in fighting?

 

Through His Strength We Will Conquer,

Andrew C. Abbott

Money

Money, what is it? In America the word is thought of as dollar bills, or of credit cards. However, money is really an idea, a part of the supply and demand rule. Anything can be used as money, from lead, (once used in the country of Burma) to shells. It only has value if you attach it to it, and value it more or less than other things. If there is demand for your money because it is scarce or valuable, then it will have more purchasing power. If there are a lot of couches around and they are not selling, then we will begin to lower their price. Couches are a market unit, and have a relative value, and money, whatever you use for it, is also a market unit, and also has relative value. For instance, five dollars being five units are worth one unit of a bucket, thus they have a relative value. However, money has advantages that other market units do not have.

·        Divisibility,

·         Portability,

·        Durability,

·        Recognizability,

·        Scarcity (after Sproul, 2012.)

If we were on a barter system and I have sheep and want to buy a cow and my friend wanted to sell his cows, but he did not want sheep, we could not trade. However, if I have four hundred dollars, I could buy a cow, and he could use that money, which stores its relative market value, to go and buy wheat, which is what he really wants.

However, the money must be relatively scarce, or it will lose purchasing power. Again, if I have a lot of couches, and I want to sell them, but I have thousands of them, and there is only a limited supply of money, then I will have to lower prices if I want to catch some of that limited supply.

However, this also works the other way as well, if I print the units of money, and I print thousands and thousands of them, (or trillions and trillions) but the other economic units, the couches, the cars, and the houses remain relatively stable, then I will have to give more of these money units to catch some of those other units.

Our understanding and use of money, as individuals and whole societies, have a profound effect on the quality of our stewardship. A faulty money system can cause people to misjudge the value of their money and, hence, their ability to afford and services…. In short, a faulty monetary system can cause us to waste resources—resources over which God has made us stewards and for the use of which He will hold us accountable.

—E. Calvin Beisner, Prosperity and Poverty

Through His Strength We Will Conquer,

Andrew C. Abbott

George Washington’s Miraculous Escape

History first noted George Washington when, in 1755, at the age of 23, in the backwoods engagement of the battle of the Monongahela, his superior officer, General Braddock was killed. The British, in the seven years’ war, had been on their way to capture Fort Duquesne. Marching through the woods in their bright red coats, they were excellent targets.

Taking four days to travel twelve miles, they had no idea whatever of woodland warfare. Washington complained that they had to stop to flatten every mole hill and build a bridge across every stream. Their general had been trained in the wars in Europe, where it was believed ungentlemanly to duck, even if you saw a cannonball coming straight for you. These were the men that toasted each other before battle, and would offer the other the chance to fire first, which would be politely declined. They would march in neat rows right at cannons and lines of men with guns, get mowed down in masses, while their officers ordered them not to flinch but march as the men in front of them were knocked down like dominoes.

When a detachment of scouting Indians and Frenchmen fired on them, they formed up into nice neat rows in the middle of a clearing and began to fire back. The Indians and their French allies lay down behind logs and picked them off. Men on horses were the first ones killed and wounded, Braddock among them. In all the Americans and British lost 900 men, the French and Indians about 16.

With the commanding general down, Washington began to order men about. He had two horses shot out from under, his hat shot off, and four bullets passed through his coat. He was later told by an Indian chief that the man had ordered his men to shoot the man on the horse, but that they could not kill Washington. Finally the chief fired on him, but was mortified that he could not die.

God, Washington said, had Providentially protected him, while “death was leveling my companions on every side.”

I need not state what history would look like, if we had had a revolution, minus Washington.

Through His Strength We Will Conquer,

Andrew C. Abbott

The Tower of Babel: Circumstancal Evidence

Genesis 11:1-9 says: And the whole earth was of one language, and of one speech. And it came to pass, as they journeyed from the east, that they found a plain in the land of Shinar; and they dwelt there. And they said one to another, Go to, let us make brick, and burn them throughly. And they had brick for stone, and slime had they for morter. And they said, Go to, let us build us a city and a tower, whose top may reach unto heaven; and let us make us a name, lest we be scattered abroad upon the face of the whole earth. And the LORD came down to see the city and the tower, which the children of men builded. And the LORD said, Behold, the people is one, and they have all one language; and this they begin to do: and now nothing will be restrained from them, which they have imagined to do. Go to, let us go down, and there confound their language, that they may not understand one another's speech. So the LORD scattered them abroad from thence upon the face of all the earth: and they left off to build the city. Therefore is the name of it called Babel; because the LORD did there confound the language of all the earth: and from thence did the LORD scatter them abroad upon the face of all the earth.

As the people spread out from Babel, they would have most likely gone off to settle, hunt, and build new communities in small family groups that understood each other’s language.

This would have caused different people groups that “were probably relatively isolated, very small and, as a consequence, fairly inbred," (LiveScience, 03/18/2013).

Although the Scriptures stand-alone without external proof, there is circumstancal evidence “The evidence comes from fragments of an approximately 100,000-year-old human skull unearthed at a site called Xujiayao, located in the Nihewan Basin of northern China. The skull's owner appears to have had a now-rare congenital deformity that probably arose through inbreeding, researchers report today (March 18) in the journal PLOS ONE. The fossil, now dubbed Xujiayao 11, is just one of many examples of ancient human remains that display rare or unknown congenital abnormalities, according to the researchers.” (ibid.)

Although the 100,000 year date is a part of the normal usual unscientific guesswork that is based on evolutionary assumptions, the evidence that humans were inbred, living small isolated populations, does lend itself to the Biblical record.

As the people spread further apart, dominant genes would have become more pronounced, thus causing different colors and racial features, and the language would have remained isolated for long enough that they would have begun to change, thus becoming modern the languages we know today in the many places around the world.

We can still see that all of mankind’s history came from one place. “If we look, first of all, for that part of the world which was the hothouse of the races, we can make only on choice. All the visible footsteps lead away from Asia.”-Anthropologist William Howell.

Then they would have begun to find iron ore and other such resources, begin to build homes, and then as they began to grow (remember they were highly advanced), they would have built cities, and tell the stories of the flood, which is where we derive the hundreds of documented flood legends. As more cities built we would soon have civilizations.

Andrew C. Abbott

A Bottom up Solution

Matthew 7:3-5 And why beholdest thou the mote that is in thy brother's eye, but considerest not the beam that is in thine own eye? Or how wilt thou say to thy brother, Let me pull out the mote out of thine eye; and, behold, a beam is in thine own eye? Thou hypocrite, first cast out the beam out of thine own eye; and then shalt thou see clearly to cast out the mote out of thy brother's eye.

 

If you want to reform the world for Christ, I have an idea for you first-Burn down your own idols. When Gideon was told to reclaim all of Israel for the God of Heaven, his first mission was to burn down the grove in his own hometown.

We have tried all sorts of formulas for taking back America, in fact, all of Western Civilization. We have elected Reagan, and we elected Bush. The moral-majority has tried bringing down the Berlin Wall, and we have had rallies marching on the capital. But still the edifice stands. We passed bills and called our senators, we have tried fixes from both sides. We have done stimulus packages and bailouts; we have tried New Deals and bipartisan reform. But in the end, the war on poverty did not end poverty; the war on drugs did not end drugs. I have an idea for a new war-a personal war on sin.

Top down solutions do not work. We have tried every variation. Even the chairman of the Federal Reserve admitted everything has been tried. But still the edifice stands. In Gideon’s day a revival broke out. Not because one hundred million voted, but because three hundred stood. Burn down the idols in your own life, and the fire just might spread. If you go preaching why everyone should burn down their idols without taking down your own, and you still have the same old problem-the edifice still stands.

Christianity is a personal war on sin, which, with the help of God, spreads. In the end it may take hold of the entire country, but until you clean your own room, do not try to clean out the capital building.

Many reformers either reform professionally as a job or in their spare time when they have nothing else to do. I have a new idea. Reform at all times…yourself.

Through His Strength We Will Conquer,

Andrew C. Abbott

John Wycliffe, the Morning Star of the Reformation

In the year 1329, in a small village near the town of Richmond, England, Roger Wycliffe’s wife gave birth to their eldest son, John.

In March, 1345, when John was 16, he was sent to Oxford by his father to become a priest. While there, in 1353, the black plague broke out. It was now that Wycliffe first began to question the authority of the church of Rome.  When the plague came, while the poor and impoverished died by the score the priests fled, not even offering that small comfort man is most in need of in his dying hour. In 1358 the plague died out, and the priests returned, however the damage had been done, the people no longer saw them as their protectors, nor did they have as much fear of those who had left them in the time of their greatest fear.

In 1372, a 43 year-old Wycliffe received his doctorate of divinity after a debate with John of Kenningham. Because there were few doctors of divinity, and because of his eloquence and knowledge so ably displayed at the debate, on July 22, 1376, John Wycliffe was asked to be an ambassador from England, to the Catholic Church.  The rift he was to discuss had begun in 1211, during the reign of king John, and the rule of Pope Innocent the III, (1199-1216). King John had attempted to change the law giving church the power to retain a percentage of the estate after a person died. He had lost the dispute, as well as additional power, the power of confirming bishoprics reverting to the pope rather than the king.

Wycliffe went to the center of Catholic rule, to discuss terms with the pope. He waited two years without seeing the Pope, at last, all was none negotiable and he returned home.

However, while at the seat of the Papacy Wycliffe had seen the luxury of the papacy as compared to the poverty of the populace. Saddened by these and other things, his writings began to portray “heretical doctrines.” And he began to be questioned. By the year 1381 he was forced to leave Oxford. By this time he was doing something very “heretical;” he was translating the Bible, always in Latin, and only read by the priests, into English.

In 1384 John Wycliffe was summoned for trial, but before he could answer the summons, he was called by a higher court, he died at the age of 55.

However, roughly forty years later, because he had not been burned as a heretic before, his bones were dug up and burned. They were dumped into the river, which flowed into the sea. And as the ashes joined the ocean, so the reformation spread.

Through His Strength We Will Conquer,

Andrew C. Abbott

Mankind: Ascending or Descending?

The evolutionists will tell us that man started off primitive, in fact as a ball of goo. But, after all of our evolution was complete we reached a wonderful stage, humanity. In my college-level textbooks, the theory is presented as fact, with no alternative view, it is seen of as much a fact that Julius Caesar was  killed by Brutus as that man started off as primitive and moved to more complex.

First, it seems we had the Stone Age, and then we moved to the Bronze Age, after that we go to the Metalworking Age, and then, if we do not stay there, but continue to advance, we will finally become modern men with universities to remind us how close we are to apes.

However, as Christians, our starting point is not what a biased scientist says, in his fallible reason, but rather we look to the Scriptures. Geneses 4:20-22 says And Adah bare Jabal: he was the father of such as dwell in tents, and of such as have cattle. And his brother's name was Jubal: he was the father of all such as handle the harp and organ. And Zillah, she also bare Tubalcain, an instructer of every artificer in brass and iron: and the sister of Tubalcain was Naamah.

This is only the fifth generation of mankind. The first man, Adam, is still alive, and already we have artificers in brass and iron, musical instruments, (scholars tell us those also started off simple) and tents, rather than the ground. Also, we know man was talking at this time, thus discrediting the theory that that skill took a long time to develop. (The most insane theory on how this skill developed I have ever heard of is that ancient man started eating fungi, which caused him to begin to speak.)

Ancient civilizations, those primitive people who were supposed to barely be able to know how to speak, built the great pyramids. Structures so gigantic that even today we do not know how they did it.

The books they left us, such as the Gilgamesh Epoch, show that they knew how to write. And, if some scholars are correct, Adam may have written a part of Genesis, thus showing that the first man know how to transfer thought from his mind onto some sort of material.

In places like Peru, we find things such as the Nazca Lines. Gigantic lines running over miles of desert, you are barely aware they are there when you are on the ground. But once you take to the air, you see amazingly geometrically accurate pictures. Pictures you cannot see on the ground, pictures invisible to the only place primitive man was supposed to have been able to access. Although I am not proposing that the Peruvians had airplanes, scholarly work has been done that at least suggests that they may have had hot air balloons.

It seems that perhaps the scientists were wrong when they said that man was simple and became more complex. However, they will always fly from the word of God, because to except that He created is to except that He rules. Because science may, from one or two finds, seem to contradict the Bible, does mean we must throw out the Scriptures, rather we should have faith, recognizing we may never understand everything in the life. However, “Truth crushed to earth will rise again.”

Through His Strength We Will Conquer,

Andrew C. Abbott

A quote from the Puritans

"There are some circumstances that I am in with many wants. Well, how shall I come to be satisfied and content? A carnal heart thinks 'I must have all my wants made up or else it is impossible that I should be content.' But a gracious heart says 'What is the duty of the circumstances that God has put me into...Let me exert my strength to perform the duties of the present circumstances.

"Others spend their thoughts on things that disturb and disquiet them, and so they grow more and more discontented. Let me spend my thoughts on thinking what my duty is...You should rather labor to bring your heart to quiet and contentment by setting your soul to work in the duties of your present condition, and take heed of your thoughts about others conditions as a mere temptation." (Jeremiah Burroughs The Rare Jewel of Christian Contentment. p.13 Published and abridged by Chapel Library. 2010.)

Darwin and Hitler

The following quotes are not to say that every Darwinist is a Nazi, but it shows the relationship between the two beliefs. If you follow the theory of evolution to the end, that man is an animal and must evolve upward, then the only way is through natural selection, which in the wild results in the strong killing off the weak.

“With savages the weak, in body or mind are soon eliminated. We civilized men on the other hand, do our utmost to check to process of extermination. We build asylums for the imbecilic, the maimed, and the sick. Thus the weak members of civilized society propagate their kind. No one who has attended to the breeding of domestic animals will doubt that this must be highly injurious to the race of man. Hardly anyone is so ignorant as to allow his worst animals to breed.”

Charles Darwin, the Descent of Man.

“The stronger must dominate and not blend with the weaker, thus sacrificing his own greatness. Only the born weakling can view this as cruel, but after all he is only a weak and limited man; for if this law did not prevail, any conceivable higher development of organic living beings would be unthinkable.”

Adolf Hitler. Mein Kampf.

Through His Strength We Will Conquer,

Andrew C. Abbott

Kindness: a poem

I am stuck on a conundrum, and its making me reflect,
About a troubling weakness, and a character defect.
It’s one that often plagues me, and it plagues some friends of mine,
I’m speaking of the painful message sent when we’re not kind.

The greatest act of kindness in all of history,
Was modeled by the Savior while hanging from a tree:
“Forgive them father, was his cry, ” they know not what they do.”
In those few words He demonstrated kindness pure and true.

He could have said forgive them, and then let the matter stand.
He could have just ignored them, as He hung there by his hands.
But instead He showed them kindness, by taking up the case
Of wretched hypocrites and fools who merited disgrace.

Its easy to show kindness when there’s nothing on the line.
Its easy to be generous to those who treat you kind.
Its easy to be kindly to the beautiful and handsome
Its easy to think kind thoughts when invited to a mansion.

But when you can show kindness to those who want your hide,
Or those have betrayed you to save themselves, and then lied.
Or if your act of kindness gets you nothing but a loss,
Then you’ve an inclination of Christ’s wording on the Cross.

Kindness is how and why you love your drooling little brother.
Kindness is the way you sit beside your aged mother.
Kindness is showing mercy on a loved one in despair.
Kindness is forgetting your own hurts, to show them you care.

There are some folks who act kindly, when they have something to gain.
There are others who feign kindness, when they hiding their own blame.
There are some who are selective in the kindness that they show.
And others who are only kind to certain folks that they know.

There’s something very ugly when a good man acts unkind;
But before you judge him harshly, keep this one thing in mind.
You too have been quite unloving, thoughtful, maybe cruel.
And if you hope for mercy, don’t forget the golden rule.

Yes, there’s been enough unkindness on everybody’s part,
That now would be the perfect time, to call for a fresh start,
Its time to think right kindly of the loved ones you call friend,
The way you hope they think of you when you’re feeling at the end.

‘Cause the precious few who treasure kindness deep within their heart.
And even when they are hurt by others, always play the part,
Of being so truly, deeply wholly, passionately kind,
Are the folks that touch your heartstrings and are always in your mind.

You will meet with many prophets, and with mercies not a few,
You will walk with those hospitable, and charitable too.
You will learn from the diligent, and from some humility,
But to meet a truly kind man, is to glimpse eternity.

Douglas Winston Phillips

The Emperor is Naked

Hans Christian Andersen, in the April of 1837 published a book entitled Fairy Tales for Children, in which one the stories was entitled “The Emperor’s New Clothes.” In the story, two weavers come to an Emperor’s palace and say they will make him the finest suit of clothing in all the world. The clothes will be visible to any save those who are "hopelessly stupid.” The entire court cannot see the clothes, but keep quiet to keep their ignorance from being found out.

Of course, the clothes never existed at all, though everyone pretended they did. In the grand parade held to exhibit the new clothing, which everyone is pretending to see because they do not want to be labeled “hopelessly stupid” a small child cries out suddenly "The emperor is naked!" The emperor continues the procession.

Today, in modern science, politics, culture, religion, we have a very naked emperor. The only ones who would go against the system of modern progress, however, are those who are hopelessly stupid. Thus, to say you see a problem is to prove your own ignorance.

Last night I watched a docu-drama in which a scientist confessed that they see the problems with evolution, and even talk to each other about it, but to speak openly is to be Expelled. There are those who have shouted out that the emperor “is naked!" yet those who do just see him continue on with the procession.

“Either repent or continue to suppress the truth in unrighteousness while knowing that your false worldview cannot account for anything. This is exactly what Elijah did with the prophets of Baal. He exposed the foolishness of their worldview. In this, the Spirit provoked many Israelites to repentance as He opened their eyes, but He withheld regenerating grace to others as was the case with the false prophets themselves. Ultimately, that is up to Him. We, like Elijah are called to shut the mouths of those espousing a false worldview leaving them without excuse, but God Himself determines who will actually repent. This is the means that God has chosen from the beginning, yet He alone determines the result of those means, something we must humbly submit to.” –J. Anderson

 

 Through His Strength We Will Conquer,
Andrew C. Abbott

Part 3, Charles Darwin: the refutation

On November 24, 1859, Charles Darwin’s book On the Origin of Species: or the preservation of favored races by means of natural selection was released for the first time. All 1,250 original copies were sold on the first day.
The last paragraph of this book reads: “It is interesting to contemplate a tangled bank, clothed with many plants of many kinds, with birds singing in bushes, with various insects flitting about, and with worms crawling through the damp earth, and to reflect that these elaborately constructed forms, so different from each other, and dependent upon each other in so complex a manner, have all been produced by laws acting around us. These laws, taken in the largest sense, being Growth with Reproduction; Inheritance which is almost implied by reproduction; Variability, from the indirect and direct action of the conditions of life and from use and disuse: a ratio of increase so high as to lead to a Struggle for Life, and as a consequence for Natural Selection, entailing Divergence of Character and the Extinction of less-improved forms. Thus, from the war of nature, from famine and death, the most exalted object which we are capable of conceiving, directly follows. There is grandeur in this view of life, with its several powers, having been originally breathed by the Creator into a few forms or into one; and that, whilst this planet has gone cycling on according to the fixed law of gravity, from so simple a beginning endless forms most beautiful and most wonderful has been, and are being evolved.” This is, in a few sentences, the entire plan of Darwin’s book.

In other words God created one or a few forms, sometime in ages past, and those forms could, of course, not all survive. So they struggled to stay alive, the best won the struggle for life, and had the best children, and their children fought, and the best of them survived, and had the best children. Thus, man came from some lower creature.

Since Darwin mentioned a Creator, let us ask the Creator what he says about this. Genesis 1:26-27: And God said, Let us make man in our image, after our likeness: and let them have dominion over the fish of the sea, and over the fowl of the air, and over the cattle, and over all the earth, and over every creeping thing that creepeth upon the earth. So God created man in his own image, in the image of God created he him; male and female created he them.

If man evolved, then we must ask the question, when did he become made in the image of God? When he was a rat, a cat, or a horse? Or perhaps when he became a man. But then, how are we to know that we have arrived at the last stage of our evolution, are we still changing? Or is there danger that we might go back down, and I might have children that are rats?

A great deal of Darwin’s scientific problem lay in the fact that he did not understand DNA, the blueprint for life. This blueprint allows certain amounts of variations, such as a larger dog or smaller dog. A finch with a long beak or a finch with a short beak. However, when Darwin saw these he thought that the animals could become a different type of animal, and that was where he was wrong. Animals cannot get better, but they can mutate.

Harmful mutations are the only form of change DNA can go through, it is a loss of information. The most notable case I am aware of in human mutation is a tribe in Africa who has had to interbreed for so long that many have two toes, their teeth fall out suddenly, and they have many other difficulties.

Harmful mutations are why a camel might be born with only three legs, or one in the wrong place. However DNA cannot mutate to the extent that a camel becomes a blue whale. We do not know exactly where the limits are with every animal, but they are there.

In the end however, Charles Darwin’s problem was not scientific. Darwin had the problem of many, and the Scriptures speak of it in Romans 1:20-22: For the invisible things of him from the creation of the world are clearly seen, being understood by the things that are made, even his eternal power and Godhead; so that they are without excuse: Because that, when they knew God, they glorified him not as God, neither were thankful; but became vain in their imaginations, and their foolish heart was darkened. Professing themselves to be wise, they became fools,

 

Through His Strength We Will Conquer,

Andrew C. Abbott

Part 2, Charles Darwin: the book

After his return from the voyage of the beagle, Charles Darwin married his cousin, Emma Wedgwood. As he studied and thought, he read Thomas Malthus' work Population. Having seen the obvious variation of the Finches during his trip to the Galapagos, he began to think of the way that favorable variations must be preserved, and others gotten rid of. Malthus explained that a struggle for life was always going on, and thus the weaker were killed off, and the stronger survived. This, Darwin thought, must be how the finches varied. "Here I had at last got a theory by which to work."

He was urged by Hooker, a botanist, and Charles Lyell, the man whose three volume work had gotten him started, to publish his ideas. Darwin moved slowly however, until 1858, when A. R. Wallace, (1823 – 1913) a naturalist, sent him his own essay on the same topic. Darwin quickly rammed his own work through, and, in 1859, at the age of fifty, Charles Darwin published his book the Origin of Species: of the preservation of favored races by means of natural selection.

Darwin begins the book surprisingly well. The doctrine of fixity of species is his first target. With examples, reason, and common sense, Darwin proves that, to a certain extent, animals do change. A dog may be larger or smaller, have a differently shaped nose, or a bigger head, yet it still came from a common ancestor, a dog.

Thus Darwin begins to tread the cold waters of evolution by putting one toe into the pool. Next he tells us that the best survive by means of natural selection. If there is a drought, and the only food to be had is high up in the trees, the giraffe with the longer necks will survive. The long necks will thus breed children with long necks, and the giraffe neck will continue to grow longer.

Up to this point, in his reasoning, Darwin was correct. Birds with stunted wings usually die off and the more fit to survive will breed  birds with proper wings. However, Darwin then carries his reasoning farther. The flying fish (a type of fish that leaps out of the water to escape its predators) that can jump the farthest will survive, and his children will jump a little farther, until, finally, his children can jump so high that they begin to grow wings, and become birds. Darwin said it did not seem too fantastic to him to believe a horse could become a giraffe, nor, a seal a bird.

He admits, on page eighty five of his book, that, the evolution of an eye seems too fantastic, but, he says, "Reason tells me, that if numerous graduations from a simple and imperfect eye to one complex and perfect can be shown to exist, each grade being useful to its possessor, as is certainly the case, if further, the eye ever varies and the variations be inherited, as is likewise certainly the case, and if such variations should be useful to any animal under changing conditions of life, then the difficulty of believing that a perfect and complex eye could be formed by natural selection, though insuperable (unsupportable) by our imagination, should not be considered as subversive (destructive) of the theory.”(Author’s parentheses.)

I will follow up with Part 3, Charles Darwin: the refutation. Because camels cannot evolve into dolphins.

Through His Strength We Will Conquer,

Andrew C. Abbott

Part 1: Charles Darwin: the man

In 1809, in England, Robert and Susanna Darwin had a son. They named him Charles. The young man loved to explore, and to tell stories. He wanted to know how things worked, he wanted to learn.

In 1818, after the death of his mother, nine year old Charles was sent to boarding school at Shrewsbury, a Unitarian school. As he grew older, the plan for him to become a medical doctor fell through, as Charles did poorly in his studies at school. Instead, he was sent to school to be a minister. Upon graduating in 1831, instead of becoming a comfortable country parson, he was given the chance of a lifetime. A trip around the world in the name of exploration. The name of the ship was the Beagle. Under captain Fitzroy, they would navigate the waters off South America, survey and explore. Darwin was to be the captain’s companion and ship’s naturalist. Although he had no formal education in this field, he self-appointed himself to the latter position. Upon arriving on the ship Darwin was given Sir Charles Lyell’s Principles of Geology by the captain. He brought another book with him, the Bible.

Sir Charles Lyell’s book said that the present was the key to the past. That all of what we see now, the rivers, the rainfall, and the erosion, have always been this way. The erosion of the Colorado River, through Grand Canyon, (not used by him, so far as I know, as an example, but I use it to illustrate) has always been this way. The river carved the canyon, the rain caused the badlands. The world was very old, there had been no great flood.

Darwin read this book on board the ship, and, eventually, began to wonder. As he continued to wonder, he came to Galapagos Islands. At this time, the doctrine held by, at least, the majority of Christians was that species never changed, they were immutable. Animals were fixed; a bird could not vary even its beak size. At the extremes, some even believed God, from time to time created new species.

Darwin, on these islands, saw finches that were different from each other on each island. A thought came to his mind, and this thought, as it began to take hold of his mind, eventually began to become a book. But that book belongs in Part 2: Charles Darwin: the book. The little boy who liked to create stories was about to create the ultimate story.

Through His Strength We Will Conquer,

Andrew C. Abbott

The surgeon who first said to wash our hands

In the eighteen hundreds, before surgeries, the instruments usually were not sterilized, the physicians did not wash their hands, and masks were not worn. Dr. Ignaz Semmelweis, a Hungarian doctor, set about to change all of that. In his writings he urged for a reform of the medical system, with cleanliness as a high priority. Because of such radical ideas, in 1865, Dr. Semmelweis was thrown into an insane asylum, where he died fourteen days later, killed by the guards.

Now the medical establishment would, if not throw you into an asylum, at least take away your licenses and freedom to practice, if you did not wash your hands before surgery.

 

Reformations sometimes take a long time. We may be branded insane at first, we may be attacked. When the reformers went up against the Catholic Church they were burned at the stake. When men such as Samuel Rutherford dared to say the law was king rather than the king was law they were radical.

The reason many reformations take so long is because people may be willing to challenge the system a little bit, but not bring it all down at once. Many would have agreed with Luther, perhaps even Pope Leo, that the church had some problems that needed to be remedied. Yet to say the entire system must be toppled was too radical. Instead of being willing to die, or instead being willing to look for the truth rather than what was accepted, they said that was going too far.

Today people say we are going too far, we are taking the Scriptures too literally, making the law of God of too much importance. There is none that understandeth. (Romans 3:11 a) Radicals are usually labeled at first as insane, (Galileo was for saying the earth revolves around the sun). May I remind you of something? Christianity is radical.

Through His Strength We Will Conquer,

Andrew C. Abbott

Red Hour

The teenage years. We have our own culture. Music, games, movies, books. We are our own world, frozen, stratified. Our icon is rebellion. We are not supposed to be respectful. We are supposed to live eight to ten years of games, and then go to college, play some more, and then we are expected to grow up suddenly, get a job, and get married.

I once heard of an old episode to a show in which the people were like zombies. I guess they had to obey whatever their control told them to do, go where they were told, think as they were told. However, for one hour a day, to keep their sanity, they were allowed red hour, in which they could smash windows, scream, and run around like madmen, until red hour was over, and then they had to become zombies again. Is that teenage rebellion, and is that why such rebellion is accepted and expected? Are we zombies walking around until the red hour of the teen years, allowed to let everything go until red hour is over? Is the time to let out all of our feelings so we may blindly submit to an empty and dead Christianity for the rest of our lives. And if anyone questions our religion we can say “hey, all I know is when I was coming off of red hour, it was a great rehab club to get back on my feet, so, let it alone man, I could never have survived red hour rehabilitation without it.”

Modern Churchianity does breed a culture of zombies. Many do not know what they believe, and to question is dangerous for your social standing. “Movement Leaders” have become elevated to the level of the scriptures, and to not bow blindly to their commands is rebellious. That is because it is Churchianity, not something found in the scriptures. It is fast paced and entertainment packed. Big Mac worship; fast and easy. (Did I ever mention the church in Texas I saw that had drive thru prayer?) Much of it is about teaching people how to look different from everybody else. So the children, (who, often times, are the only ones who think through things) see that the zombie state is not such a good thing, and rebel against it. Red Hour sets in. When they have run wild for a few years their crop begins to come up and they need somewhere or somthing to help them with their withdrawal. So they go to the church again. Nothing has changed here, but the kid really lived it up during red hour and now he needs someplace to help him rehabilitate. They get married, and have children. They expect their kids to go through red hour, everybody does, but they will come back to Churchianity, after all there is nowhere else to go.

That is not the scriptural model. Seize the day young men, seize the day. The night is coming in which no man can work. You are not promised tomorrow. You have today. Churchianity is not the answer. Christianity is.

Through His Strength We Will Conquer,

Andrew C. Abbott

The Ambulance Down in the Valley

'Twas a dangerous cliff, as they freely confessed, Though to walk near its crest was so pleasant; But over its terrible edge there had slipped A duke and full many a peasant. So the people said something would have to be done, But their projects did not at all tally; Some said, "Put a fence 'round the edge of the cliff," Some, "An ambulance down in the valley." But the cry for the ambulance carried the day, For it spread through the neighboring city; A fence may be useful or not, it is true, But each heart became full of pity For those who slipped over the dangerous cliff; And the dwellers in highway and alley Gave pounds and gave pence, not to put up a fence, But an ambulance down in the valley. "For the cliff is all right, if you're careful," they said, "And, if folks even slip and are dropping, It isn't the slipping that hurts them so much As the shock down below when they're stopping." So day after day, as these mishaps occurred, Quick forth would those rescuers sally To pick up the victims who fell off the cliff, With their ambulance down in the valley. Then an old sage remarked: "It's a marvel to me That people give far more attention To repairing results than to stopping the cause, When they'd much better aim at prevention. Let us stop at its source all this mischief," cried he, "Come, neighbors and friends, let us rally; If the cliff we will fence, we might almost dispense With the ambulance down in the valley." "Oh he's a fanatic," the others rejoined, "Dispense with the ambulance? Never! He'd dispense with all charities, too, if he could; No! No! We'll support them forever. Aren't we picking up folks just as fast as they fall? And shall this man dictate to us? Shall he? Why should people of sense stop to put up a fence, While the ambulance works in the valley?" But the sensible few, who are practical too, Will not bear with such nonsense much longer; They believe that prevention is better than cure, And their party will soon be the stronger. Encourage them then, with your purse, voice, and pen, And while other philanthropists dally, They will scorn all pretense, and put up a stout fence On the cliff that hangs over the valley. Better guide well the young than reclaim them when old, For the voice of true wisdom is calling. "To rescue the fallen is good, but 'tis best To prevent other people from falling." Better close up the source of temptation and crime Than deliver from dungeon or galley; Better put a strong fence 'round the top of the cliff Than an ambulance down in the valley. -- Joseph Malins (1895)

It will cost you everything

Luke 18:18-22 And a certain ruler asked him, saying, Good Master, what shall I do to inherit eternal life? Jesus said unto him, Why callest thou me good? none is good, save one, that is, God. Thou knowest the commandments, Do not commit adultery, Do not kill, Do not steal, Do not bear false witness, Honour thy father and thy mother. And he said, All these have I kept from my youth up. Now when Jesus heard these things, he said unto him, Yet lackest thou one thing: sell all that thou hast, and distribute unto the poor, and thou shalt have treasure in heaven: and come, follow me. And when he heard this, he was very sorrowful: for he was very rich.

I recall reading of a quote from a great Christian theologian, when asked what the three greatest tenets of Christianity were, he said that it was “humility, humility, humility. All you have to call your own is your sin.”

Christianity will cost you everything. You do not only have to be willing to give God everything, you have to give God everything. You have to give yourself over so much to Him that, if he tells you to sell all that you have, there is no discussion. The Christian life is about giving everything for Christ, and, maybe, in this life, getting nothing in return but death. I have heard sermons on giving everything which end with saying that for doing so you will be greatly blessed, and, don’t worry, God will not tell you to sell everything. They make God to be some sort of genie in a bottle, who has to have everything laid out in front of him so he can multiply it. Tell the early church that, Christians such as Perpetua, when, after giving up lives of immense wealth and status, she was killed in the Arena by a gladiator. Tell that to a man named Paul, once the great learned man, with a position, and ask him, as he was about to have his head cut off, in the city of Rome, if Christianity cost him everything. He was beaten, robbed, left for dead, lashed, and thrown is prison. And yet counted "it but dung, to obtain excellency of the knowledge of Christ Jesus." ( Philippians 3:7-8)

The fact is Christianity will cost you everything. All is given to God, He is recognized as the owner of everything. That is the only way we can in everything give thanks, by realizing that we have given everything into the hands of God, and that you are only to use anything you may have been entrusted to you as a steward to glorify Him. It is only in this spirit that we can say “If we live we praise You, and if we die, we praise You.” God may not take all of your wealth out of your hands, He may want you to use it for His purposes as the steward. Wealth, used properly to advance the Kingdom of Heaven is not a wrong, but a good thing.

Luke 14:26-35  If any man come to me, and hate not his father, and mother, and wife, and children, and brethren, and sisters, yea, and his own life also, he cannot be my disciple. And whosoever doth not bear his cross, and come after me, cannot be my disciple. For which of you, intending to build a tower, sitteth not down first, and counteth the cost, whether he have sufficient to finish it? Lest haply, after he hath laid the foundation, and is not able to finish it, all that behold it begin to mock him, Saying, This man began to build, and was not able to finish. Or what king, going to make war against another king, sitteth not down first, and consulteth whether he be able with ten thousand to meet him that cometh against him with twenty thousand? Or else, while the other is yet a great way off, he sendeth an ambassage, and desireth conditions of peace. So likewise, whosoever he be of you that forsaketh not all that he hath, he cannot be my disciple. Salt is good: but if the salt have lost his savour, wherewith shall it be seasoned? It is neither fit for the land, nor yet for the dunghill; but men cast it out. He that hath ears to hear, let him hear.

Through His Strength We Will Conquer,

 Andrew C. Abbott

A quote by Augustine

"If you plan to build a tall house of virtues, you must first lay deep foundations of humility."
-Augustine

Willing to live for it?

John 15:13  Greater love hath no man than this, that a man lay down his life for his friends.

To die for your friends is a great deed. But to die takes but a moment, a single choice, one act. But can you lay down your life as you live? Can you make those many choices, those small decisions, those hard things you have to do to lay down your life for others?

The Scriptures say that, though I give my body to be burned, and have not charity, it profits me nothing. If I would live for Christ I must love Him, and I must love my neighbor. If a man say, I love God, and hateth his brother, he is a liar: for he that loveth not his brother whom he hath seen, how can he love God whom he hath not seen? (1 John 4:20)

The Christian life is a life of selflessness. It is a life of love. Selfless love, love so great you are willing to lay down your life. The sermon on the mount was for all Christians, not “graduates.” In it Jesus tells us a Christian is to turn to the other cheek, if someone takes his coat, he is to give his shirt. Love your enemies, bless them that curse you, do good to them that hate you, and pray for them which despitefully use you, and persecute you; That is how you lay down your life.

Christ said in Luke 9 that we are to lay our lives down daily, to take up his cross. The only reason we exist is to glorify God, lets live like we believe it. Being nailed to a cross is hard, it is not enjoyable, and Christ demands that we give ourselves up to it willingly.

I have heard young men say they would die for Christ, but will they live for Him? To die for a cause is fine, yet how did you live for that cause? That is what I want to know. That is what we will follow. Dying to life takes a single choice, but dying to self takes many. We must die daily if we would live in Christ. Greater love hath no man than this, that a man lay down his life for his friends. Can you do this every single day?

 

Through His Strength We Will Conquer,

Andrew C. Abbott