Topics from a to z vol. 2

TOPICS FROM A TO Z VOL. 2
EDITED BY GLE PEASE
A
ABIDI G
In a discussion with a friend, the term abiding or to abide
came into the discussion. The discussion was about the Rapture and
who would be taken and if or who would be left. My friend brought
the subject of bearing fruit and this brought my thinking to John
15. In this chapter the word abide occurs no less than 15 times
in the first 10 verses, according A. Pink, a noted Bible Scholar.
This would seem to point out some importance in this word. Hence
this discussion, during which I am going to be quoting from A.H.
Pink's exposition of the Gospel of John. Much of my own thought
will also be mixed in. I will try to single out what is mine and
what comes from A.H. Pink .
To begin Pink quotes another in a very important area.
"Abide in Me and I in you" (15:4). These two things are
*quite distinct*, though closely connected. Just as it is
one thing to be "in Christ" and another to "abide in Him"
so there is a real difference between His being *in us*,
and His *abiding* in us. The one is a matter of His Grace
and the other of our responsibility .
This importance of receiving the grace to allow Him to abide in our
lives and soul is made quite clear by our Lord in His statement:
"As the branch cannot bear fruit of itself, except it abides in
the vine; no more can ye except ye abide in me". We could very
easily look for a moment at our past resolutions and many attempts
which have failed and over such that we have become discouraged and
despondent. All of this is met by an announcement of the Word:
"I am the vine and you are the branches". Pink makes this so clear
when he states:
"The branch bears the clusters, but it does not produce them. It
bears what *the vine* produces, and so the result is expressed by
the Apostle, *"to me to live is Christ"*. It is important that in
this respect, as well as with reference to righteousness before
God, we should be brought to **the end of self** with all its vain

efforts and strivings."
How clear this is. That in our own self, with our
insufficiency admitted, we are no better than the branch
**severed** from the vine dry-dead.
ow we need to ask was is this abiding. It is a matter of a
complete form of communion with Christ. A communion based on
perfect fellowship with Christ. Don't let that word perfect scare
you and don't use it as an excuse. It means a complete fellowship.
ow here is where problems begin. Consider the words of John in
I John 1:6
"If we say that we have fellowship with Him and yet walk
in darkness , we lie and do not practice the truth"
Darkness is willful sin. It stops the fellowship and communion and
abiding that has been spoken of. A continued practice of this sin
can cause the branch to be barren of fruit. Jesus Himself states
the effect of a lack of abiding when He said in John 15:6
"If anyone does not abide in Me, he is thrown away as a branch and
dries up; and they gather them and cast them into the fire and they
are burned."
otice the process. First, the loss of abiding. Second, the
period of drying up. Lastly, the awful result of burning.
Willful sin causes a lack of fellowship. Continuing in it or not
repenting and confessing it causes the drying up which results in
the final result of burning. The question we need to ask ourselves
is this. Are we abiding and bearing good fruit or are we severed
from the vine by acts of unconfessed sin or by a refusal to allow
Him to abide by giving up self and its desires?
In the study of abiding, still another point comes out. This
is brought out by the words of our Lord.
"Severed from me you can do nothing"
Pink again makes a very strong and related statement on this
subject.
" ot only will the allowance of any known sin break our
fellowship with Him, but concentration on any thing
but Himself will also surely do it. "
What an exhortation to never never take our eyes or thoughts off
of Jesus. What an exhortation to, as Paul put it, "avoid the very

appearance of sin. Old satan is very subtle in his ways. If he
can get us occupied with ourselves, he can hinder our fruit-bearing
or damage our fruit.
Thousands of Christians are complaining of barrenness, but
they fail to trace their barrenness to its right source. The lack
of communion and fellowship with Christ. What caused this may be
sin or rebellion to His claims. In both cases the result
is the same barrenness.
How dangerous this barrenness is. And how important this
fellowship and communion is. For without it in a Christians
life the danger of being "cast forth" is always there.
"If any one of the branches,any believer continues out
of fellowship with Me, he is cast out. It could not be
said of anyone *who had never come* to Christ that he
does abide in Him. This is made more apparent by the
limitation in this very verse; "he is cast forth as
a ***branch***" (A.H. Pink)
VA CE HAV ER, ""There are two remarkable promises related to the idea of
God's wants becoming yours. The first is from David: "Delight yourself in the
Lord; and He will give you the desires of your heart."
(Psa. 37:4). The second, from Jesus, is like it: "If you abide in me, and my words
abide in you, ask whatever you wish, and it shall be done for you" (John 15:7).
Both promised, ineffect, that God will give you whatever you want. ot bad. But
there's a catch: Both the promises apply only if you delight yourself in the Lord, if
you abide in Christ and His words abide in you. Well, if you delight yourself in the
Lord, what kinds of things ae likely to be the desires of your heart? Fame and
fortune? If so, then your delight is not first in the Lord, but in the world. If,
however, you delight in the Lord your desire will be the Lord and the things of the
Lord. Your desire will be to know Him, to enjoy His presence, to live His life, to be
His person. And if those sorts of things are your desire, you have His promise to
give them to you.
As you abide in Him and His words abide in you, you will be changed. And as
you begin to want what God wants, you can pray for what you desire, because you
will be praying for what He desires. You will be praying in His name. "It is God
who is at work in you, both to will and to work for His good pleasure" (Phil. 2:13).
He changes your work by changing your will. If you will for His good pleasure (that
is, delight yourself in the Lord). You will work for His good pleasure-because it will
now be your good pleasure too. The Lord will "direct your hearts into the love of
God and into the steadfastness of Christ" (II Thess. 3:5), and you can say with
David,
"I desire to do your will, O my God; your law is within my heart" (Psa. 40:8 IV).

ABSOLUTES
The real problem in politics, particularly for those with ideological loyalties, is to
sense when not to compromise. In a situation where some are arguing that 2+2=6,
while others assert the sum is 4, there can always be found the "moderates" who
want, in the interests of harmony, to split the difference and settle for 5. If one
begins with the assumption that all determinations are relative, this understandable,
even commendable; All good pragmatists will rally around 2+2=5 as a "focus of
consensus," and condemn with equal vigor the "estremists" who maintain tha 2+2=
6 and those who stand firm behind 4.
---John P.
A GELS
Study on Angels
This outline was made from the book "Angels, Angels, Angels" by
Landrum P. Leavell.
1. The Presence of Angels
1 Peter 3:22 "(Jesus Christ) who is at the right hand of
God, having gone into heaven, after angels and authorities and
powers had been subjected to Him."
a. The Bible teaches it. There are 108 places in the Old
Testament and 165 places in the ew Testament where angels are
mentioned.
b. Jesus believed in them and taught about them. Luke 15:10
"In the same way, I tell you, there is joy in the presence of the
angels of God over one sinner who repents."
c. Greek word 'angelos' means messenger.
2. The Production of Angels
a. The Spirit world began with time and was created by God.
Psalms 148:2-5 "Praise Him all His angels; Praise Him, sun and
moon; Praise Him, all stars of light! Praise Him, highest
heavens, and the waters that are above the heavens! Let them
praise the name of the Lord, for He commanded and they were
created."

b. The angels come into existence fefore the creation of
earth and man. Colossians 1:16 "For in Him all things were
created, both in the heavens and on earth, visible and invisible,
whether thrones or dominions or rulers or authorites - all things
ahve been created through Him and for Him."
c. There are 2 kinds of angels: Holy Angels and fallen angels.
Holy angels: Psalms 91:11 "For He will give His angels charge
concerning you..." Fallen angels: 2 Peter 2:4 "For if God did
not spare angels when they sinned, but cast them into hell and
committed them to pits of darkness, reserved for judgment..."
d. They neither marry or die. Luke 20:35-36 "but those who
are considered worthy to attain to that age and the resurrection
from the dead, neither marry, nor are given in marriage; for
neither can they die andmore, for they are like angels..."
3. The Personality of Angels
a. Appearance
(1) They are spirit (incorperal) Hebrews 1:14 "Are they
not all ministering spirits..."
(2) On occasion bear appearance of man. Hebrews 13:2 "Do
not neglect to show hospitality to strangers, for by this some
have entertained angels without knowing it."
(3) On occasion appear as a dazzling brilliance.
Matthew 28:2-4 "...for an angel of the Lord descended from
heaven...and his appearance was like lightning, and his garment
as white as snow"
(4) Differences between angels and Christians
(a) Holy angels have never sinned and have no need of
salvation. They have never been saved.
(b) Angels are not indwelt by the Holy Spirit.
(c) Angels are not heirs of God.
(d) Angels can not witness to salvation.
b. Abode is in heaven. Matthew 13:32 "...not even the angels

in heaven..."
c. Attributes
(1) They are individuals, not a mass. Luke 2:13 "And
suddenly there appeared with the angel a multitude of the
heavenly host..."
(2) They experience emotion. Luke 2:13 "...a multitude of
the heavenly host praising God..."
(3) They are inferior to Jesus Christ. Hebrews 1:3-4 "He
(Jesus) sat down at the right hand of the Majesty on high; having
become as much better than the angels, as He has inherited a more
excellent name than they."
(4) They are wise. 2 Samuel 14:20 "But my lord is wise,
like the wisdom of the angel of God, to know all that is in the
earth."
(5) They are powerful. Psalms 103:20 "Bless the Lord, you
His angels, Mighty in strength, who perform His word, Obeying the
voice of His word!"
d. They are innumerable. Hebrews 5:11 "And I looked, and I
heard the voice of many angels...and the number of them was
myrieads of myrieads, and thousnads of thousands."
4. The Purposes of Angels
a. They praise God. Revelation 5:11 "...I heard the voice of
many angels around the throne...saying, with a loud voice,
'Worthy is the Lamb'..."
b. They protect God's people. Acts 12:11 "And when Peter
came to himself, he said, " ow I know for sure that the Lord has
sent forth His angel and rescued me from the hand of Herod..."
c. They bring God's punishment. Acts 12:23 "And immediately
an angel of the Lord struck him because he did not give God the
glory, and he was eaten by worms and died."
d. Hebrews 1:14 "Are they not all ministering spirits, sent out
to render service for the sake of those who will inherit
salvation?"

e. Gives physical direction. Acts 8:26 "But an angel of the
Lord spoke to Philip saying, 'Arise and go south to the road that
descens from Jerusalem to Gaza.'"
f. Gives physical sustenance. Psalms 78:25 "Man did eat the
bread of angels; He sent them food in abundance."
g. Aid in physical healing. John 5:4 "for an angel of the
Lord went down at certain seasons into the pool, and stirred up
the water; whoever then first, after the stirring up of the
water, stepped in was make well from whatever disease with which
he was afflicted."
h. Brings physical protection. Daniel 6:22 "My God sent His
angel and shut the lions' mouth and they have not harmed me..."
i. Brings deliverance. Psalms 34:7 "The angel of the Lord
encamps around those who fear Him, And rescues them."
j. Brings the righteous to heaven. Luke 16:22 " ow it came
about that the poor man died and he was carried away by the
angels to Abraham's bosom..."
k. Matthew 18:10 "...for I say to you, that their angels in
heaven continually behold the face of My Father who is in heaven."
6. Angelic Provision for Jesus Christ.
a. Preparation for His birth. Luke 1:19 "And the angel
answered and said to him, 'I am Gabriel, who stands in the
presence of God; and I have been sent to speak to you, and to
bring you this good news.'"
b. Provision for his earthly life. Matthew 4:11 "...and
behold, angels came and began to minister to Him."
c. In prophecy. Matthew 25:31 "But when the Son of Man comes
in His glory, and all the angels with Him, then He will sit on
His glorious throne."
7. Profile of Angels
a. Archangel Michael, associated with judgment.
Revelations 12:7 "And there was war in heaven, Michael and his
angels waging watr with the dragon...."

b. Chief Princes. Daniel 10:13 "...Then behold, Michael, one
of the chief princes..."
c. Ruling Angels. Ephesians 3:10 "...to the rulers and the
authorities in the heavenly places."
d. Guardian Angels. Hebrews 1:14 "Are they not all
ministering speirits, sent out to render service for the sake of
those who will inherit salvation?"
1
e. Elect Angels. 1 Timothy 5:21 "I solemnly charge you in
the presence of God and of Christ Jesus and of His chosen
angels,..."
f. Seraphim, associated with purification. Isaiah 6:2
"Seraphim stood above Him..."
g. Cheribim, proctors of God's glory. Gen 3:24 "So He drove
the man out; and at the east of the garden of Eden He stationed
the cherubim, ... to guard the way to the tree of life. U K OW
A GER
Oh, the saddness of her sadness when she's sad!
Oh, the gladness of her gladness when she's glad!
But the sadness of her sadness,
And the gladness of her gladness,
Are nothing to her madness when she's mad!
Paul S. Rees wrote, (1) Christ was never angry for personal or self-regarding
reasons. Therein may be seen immediately the difference between His anger and the
kind so common among us.
Was He angry when He was personally insulted? ever. When He was falsely
accused and slandered? ever. When they spit in HIs face? o. When they
plucked at His beard? o. When they mocked Him as a make-believe king? o.
When they whipped Him with a scourge? o. When they nailed Him to a cross? o
Ot a trace of it?
Our stupid anger is usually shot through with selfishness or occasioned by
pettiness as when somebody knocks our hat off, a motoist cuts in ahead of us, a bus
driver fails to stop for us, a clerk behind the counter doesn't please us, a member of
the family contradicts us.
As Dr. Charles Jefferson, of Broadway Tabernacle fame, once said We
become indignant over trifles.......Reaellings and shavings can set us blazing. But in
the presence of gigantic out-rages perpetrated on the helpless and the weak, some of

us are as calm as a summer morning. To our shame!
Three different motives can thus be distinguised in Jesus' cleansing of the temple.
There was first his indignationwhenhe saw the holy place profanced. He did not
pretend this zeal for the temple, nor was it due to a mere sentiment, springing from
old memories and assocations. He reverenced the earthly building because it stood
for the eternal fact that God was over the world and men had access to him. Again,
he wished to assert his own Messiahship. God had appointed him to this office, and
he had the right to act in the name of God. He was Lord of the temple and his
authority in all that concerned it had to be accepted as the final one. Once more, he
meant by his action to force his enemies out of theirhiding-places. It was the chief
priests who had been seeking by crafty methods to fustrate his work and who would
do their utmost to crush him now that the had come within their reach. He would at
least make sure that the conflict would be an open one. THose secret enemies must
unmask, themselves, and he offered them a defiance which they could not refuse to
answer. His cause had nowto be decided and the adversaries must stand face to
face.
The mind of man is vastly like a hive;
His thoughts are busy ever--all alive;
But here the simile will go no further;
For Bees are making Honey, one and all;
Man's thoughts are busy in producing Gall,
Committing, as it were, Self-murther.
A OI TED
CHRIST---THE A OI TED O E
The Hebrew word `mashach', which occurs about seventy times in the
Old Testament, means to anoint, smear, consecrate. The basic thrust
of the term simply suggests the smearing of a substance (e.g., oil or
paint) on another object. Jeremiah spoke of a man who had his house
painted red (22:14).
But the word also is used of an anointing which consecrates. At
Bethel, Jacob had anointed a pillar in connection with a vow which he
had made to Jehovah (Genesis 31:13). Most generally, however, `mashach'
denotes an anointing that has to do with setting something apart for an
office or function.
In the Old Testament, PROPHETS, PREISTS, and KI GS were anointed in

preparation for their services (cf. I Kings 19:16; Exodus 28:41; I
Samuel 10:1). These offices of the Old Testament pictured the three-
fold work of Jesus.
In the ew Testament, our Lord is called the Christ, which means
the anointed one. He serves as our Prophet, for He speaks the Word of
God to man (Acts 3:22). He is our Priest, making atonement of the sins
of humanity (Hebrews 3:1). And He is our King, speaking with royal
authority from Heaven (Revelation 17:14). How wonderfully the Old
Testament prepared the way for the coming of the Anointed One (see Acts
10:38).
Those in the first century who were obedient to the Gospel plan
became known (by divine authority) as Christians, i.e., A OI TED O ES
(Acts 11:26; I Peter 4:16; II Corinthians 1:21). As such, we have a
three-fold function: (1) We SPEAK FORTH the truth to the lost world
(Mark 16:15); (2) We offer ourselves as SACRIFICES to God (Romans
12:1); and, (3) We walk in KI GLY splendor with our Lord (Revelation
1:6).
Reason from Revelation Vol.II, o.2 February, 1990
This file may be copied, but is distributed on the understanding that
it will not be modified or edited, and will not be used for commercial
purposes. Further, it may not be copied without due reference to the
original publication source, author, year, and name and address of the
publisher.
Apologetics Press
230 Landmark Drive
Mongomery, AL 36117-2752
Downloaded from:
The Christian Connection of Palm Beach
300/1200/2400 bps
407/533/5216
APPEARA CE OF JESUS
1. GOD'S The Bible is rather silent about God's looks and in fact, de-emphasizes
what God looks like. Jesus told the woman at the well that God

was a spirit, which among other things means, he has no particular
look. So the description of him being stately with a long flowing
beard and piercing eyes--as in Michelangelo's painting--those
are all human conceptions of what a person with God's character
should look like, but God Himself has never found it necessary
to reveal himself in a way that we can actually make out a physical
image. (I know you're probably thinking of Jesus. Yes, Jesus was
what God would be as a man, but we don't say that Jesus is what
God looks like, do we?) evertheless,;in God's image;
does not mean that Creator and man look alike physically.
2. Jesus. The founder of Forest Lawn Cemetery in Calif. searched for a smiling face
of Jesus for he knew Jesus loved children and nature and delighted in life and so
looked for such an image, but he found that artists pictured him only as a man of
sorrows and always serious. The ew Testament was not the basis for art but rather
the traditions of men.
3. There are many who take the verse in Isa. 53:2 and read into it that Jesus was
homely. But this is a false idea taken out of context. Jesus was beaten and crucified
and he had to look terrible and very unappealing and even repulsive with wounds
and blood. The most handsome of men would not look good after what Jesus went
through. To use this as a basis for what he looked like all the time is very unfair and
will not be supported by other Scripture.
Jesus was the express image of the Father, and are we to assume that God is
homely, who created all that is beautiful. When God took on the form of a man he
took on the body of a strong and healthy man, and we can assume a nice looking
man. The Father is portrayed as beautiful in Ps. 27:4 and Isa. 33:17. Jesus
impressed both men and women and he grew in favor with them and children
flocked to sit on his lap and be near him. He was attractive to all people. He made all
that is beautiful and it is logical he who loves beauty would make his own body a
thing of beauty. St. Augustine and St. Ambrose, and Chrysostom agreed that Jesus
was handsome. St. Jerome wrote, The brightness and majesty of His divinity
hidden under the veil of His flesh, shed its rays over His human countenance, and
subdued all who had the happiness to gaze upon it. Jesus had the inner beauty of
holiness also.
When one discovers Him
it never occurs to him
that he should ever ask again:
What is beauty?
For He is the essence of the beautiful-
in His purity,
in His never-failing love,
in His vicarious death
and glorious resurrection-
our blessed assurance of life
and victory in Himself.
ow my search for Beauty
has lost its restless power.

My eyes have seen
And now I know:
Christ Jesus, my Lord-
He is beauty.
Millions of years your wond'ring eyes
Shall o'er His beauties rove:
And endless ages you'll adore
The glories of His love.
Charles Allen tells of the man who lost his billfold and in it he had a picture of
Jesus. The man who found it intended to keep the money but when he saw the
picture of Jesus he had to return it. The very appearance of Jesus touched his
conscience.
In a prison is the Southern state is a commercial artist serving a life sentence and
he painted a portrait of Jesus smiling and called it The Smiling Christ. He sent
them all over the world and it is very popular with people for Jesus was likely the
most radiant personality ever to walk this planet.
4. Jonathan Edwards described the believer's seeing Christ in glory this way: The
seeing God in the glorified body of Christ, is the most perfect way of seeing God
with the bodily eyes that can be; for in seeing a real body, which one of the Persons
of the Trinity has assumed to be His body, and in which He dwells forever as his
own, the divine majesty and excellency appear as much as it is possible for them to
appear in outward form or shape...They shall see Him, as appearing in His glorified
human nature, with their bodily eyes; and this will be a most glorious sight.The
loveliness of Christ as thus appearing will be a most ravishing thing to them; for
though the bodies of the saints appear with an exceeding beauty and glory, yet the
body of Christ will without doubt immensely surpass them, as much as the
brightness of the sun does that of the stars. The glorified body of Christ will be the
masterpiece of all God's workmanship in the whole material universe. There shall
be in his glorious countenance the manifestations of His glorious spiritual
perfections, His majesty, His holiness, His surpassing grace, and love, and meekness.
The eye will never be wearied with beholding this glorious sight.
AUTHORITY OF CHRIST
BY WHAT AUTHORITY?
By what authority are you doing these things? And who gave you
this authority? These were two questions put to Jesus by the religious
leaders of His day (Matthew 21:23). Although they were unwilling to
accept His sovereignty, they did recognize that the question of

authority in religion was of utmost importance. Very few people would
argue for anarchy (in religion or otherwise). Intelligent people
realize that standards of some description are necessary for a peaceful
existence among beings who possess free moral agency.
Strangely, however, Bible-believers are embarrassingly divided over
what is and is not authorized in religion. Skeptics gleefully draw
attention to such disharmony and impugn the Bible as being at fault.
But those who accept the divine authorship (inspiration) of Scripture
realize that the fault has its origin in humanity's rebellion. It
stands to reason that the God Who created this intricately precise
Universe has the capacity to reveal His will in a way that all men
could understand it alike.
Indeed, He has---in the Bible. Man must approach that holy book
with the desire to learn what God has for Him, rather than to confirm
man-made creeds (cf. John 5:39).
The Bible speaks of the possibility that a man may twist the
Scriptures to his destruction (II Peter 3:16), and exhorts men to
handle aright the word of truth (II Timothy 2:15). Logically, if all
men approach the Bible in the same way, they may attain the same basic
understanding of it. There are several principles which will help one
come to an understanding of God's Word and thereby aid in ascertaining
religious authority.
(1)It is important that man approach the Bible with good common
sense. The Bible is a book about real people, for real people. One
should expect to understand it.
(2)Man should approach the Bible with confidence in its verbal,
plenary inspiration. The Bible came from God (II Peter 1:20,21). Its
very words are inspired (I Corinthians 2:13), and it is completely
inspired (II Timothy 3:16). [Belief in the inspiration of God's Word is
based firmly upon sound evidence. One needs to approach the Scriptures
for guidance after he has been persuaded of their inspiration.]
(3)In order to understand the Bible properly, a man must employ his
God-given abilities to think and reason. He should not expect to
understand the Scriptures without exerting mental industry.
(4)The Scriptures must be approached honestly, and with a pure
heart, so as to avoid doctrinal perversions.
(5)In order to understand God's Word one must study from a
dependable translation of the Bible. Although good translations are
available, many books which bear the name Holy Bible are so polluted
with human doctrines that they do not accurately convey the meaning of
God's Word.
(6)A general, thorough, and correctly used education will be a
valuable asset in understanding God's Word. This is not to say that
only scholars understand the Bible, but that a well-rounded knowledge
of language, history, and geography will aid one in comprehending the
divine message.
(7)In order to determine biblical authority for a given practice or

belief, one must understand the distinction between the Bible's major
covenant divisions. Just because a practice was authorized under the
Mosaic covenant does not mean that it is acceptable today.
While other similar principles may be enumerated, it is sure that
if all men would follow even these few guidelines there would be far
less confusion over what the Bible teaches. How can one apply biblical
authority to a particular practice or doctrine? There are basically
three ways by which God authorizes things through His Word. First,
Jehovah authorizes through commands and statements. For example,
because Peter commanded his audience to repent and be baptized...for
the remission of sins (Acts 2:38) we know that God requires repentance
and baptism of those who desire salvation from sin. Often, the means of
carrying out a command is left up to man. Such is the case relative to
preaching the gospel. That we are to preach is explicitly required
(Matthew 28:19,20); what we are to preach is explicitly stated (i.e.,
the Gospel---Galatians 1:6-9); but how we are to go is left up to us.
We may use all legal and appropriate means. Much of ew Testament
Christianity is conveyed through commands and statements. Second, God
authorizes through implications of Scripture. For example, we know that
the great commission (Go ye into all the world, and preach the gospel
to every creature. He that believeth and is baptized shall be saved; he
that believeth not shall be damned---Mark 16:15,16) applies to us by
implication (after all, we are creatures in need of salvation---Romans
3:23). Third, if we find an approved example for an action, then we can
be sure that it is authorized. A prime illustration of this relates to
the Communion. Luke reported: upon the first day of the week...the
disciples gathered together to break bread... (Acts 20:7). When is the
Lord's Supper to be observed (I Corinthians 11:23-29)? By approved
example we know we must partake of it the first day of every week.
If a practice or doctrine is not taught by command or statement, or
by implication, and if there is no approved example of it in God's
Word, then we are bound by the Scripture's silence to view it as
unauthorized. Hence the plea: Speak where the Bible speaks and be
silent where the Bible is silent (cf. I Peter 4:11).
Some have disregarded this prohibitive power of silence, and
suggested that where the Bible is silent there is liberty. This
position is neither logical nor biblical. How many doubt the
prohibitive power of silence in everyday life? If a man asks his
druggist for ibuprofin, must he also enumerate all the things he does
not want (e.g., cyanide)? Obviously, what he specifies excludes all
else. Just so, when God specifies, He thereby rules out everything
else. This is the lesson of adab and Abihu (Leviticus 10:1-3). Jehovah
specified the type of fire the priests were to use; they tried to use
strange fire. For this rebellion, God consumed them with fire.
If a man wishes to please his Creator he must respect His Word. If
all men would approach the Bible in the same honest, humble fashion, we
could have the unity for which Jesus prayed (John 17), and would

squelch the skeptic's criticism of religious confusion.
This file may be copied, but is distributed on the understanding that
it will not be modified or edited, and will not be used for commercial
purposes. Further, it may not be copied without due reference to the
original publication source, author, year, and name and address of the
publisher.
Apologetics Press
230 Landmark Drive
Montgomery, AL 36117-2752
Downloaded from:
The Christian Connection of Palm Beach
300/1200/2400 bps
407/533/5216
B
BEST
1. If you can't be a pine on the top of the hill
Be a scrub in the valley---but be
The best little scrub by the side of the rill;
Be a bush if you can't be a tree.
If you can't be a bush be a bit of the grass,
And some highway some happier make;
If you can't be a muskie then just be a bass---
But the livliest bass in the lake!
We can't all be captains, we've got to be crew,
There's something for all of us here,

There's big work to do and there's lesser to do,
And the task we must do is the near.
If you can't be a highway then just be a trail,
If you can't be the sun be a star;
It isn't by size that you win or you fail---
Be the best of whatever you are! ---------Douglas Malloch
2. Anderson M. Baten wrote:
With doubt and dismay you are smitten,
You think there's no chance for you, son?
Why, the best books haven't been written,
The best race hasn't been run,
The best score hasn't been made yet,
The best song hasn't been sung,
The best tune hasn't been played yet,
Cheer up, ofr the world is young!
o chance? Why the world isjust eager
For things that you ought to create,
Its store of true wealth is still meager,
Its needs are incessant and great,
It yearns for more power and beauty,
More laughter and love and romance,
More loyalty, labor and duty,
o chance--why there's nothing but chance!
For the best verehasn't bene rhymed yet,
The best house hasn't been planned,
The highest peak hasn't been climbed yet,
The mightiest rivers aren't spanned,
Don't worry and fret, faint hearted,
The chances have just begun,
For the best jobs haven't been started,
The best work hasn't been done. --------Berton Braley.
BODY
1. A soul confined with bars and bands
Cries, help! O, help! And wrings her hands...
It was not I that sinned the sin,
The ruthless body dragged me in;
Thou I long I strove courageously,
The body was to much for me.
2. Earl D. Radmacher wrote, Arthur Jr. Snider, science editor of the Chicago
Daily ews, reports that biochemist Harold J. Morowitz of Yale University has

computed the value of elements in thehuman body to be $6,000,015.44. He arrived
at this astounding figure after examinining prices in a supply company's catalog. So
it appears we are all six-million-dollar men and women, even without bionic parts.
BOY
1. A pair of very chubby legs
Encased in scarlet hose;
A pair of little stubby boots,
With rather doubtful toes;
A little kilt, a little coat,
Cut as a mother can---
And lo! before us stand in state
The future's coming man.
His eyes, perchance, will read the stars,
And search their unknown ways;
Perchance the human heart and soul
Will open to their gaze;
Perchance their keen and flashing glance
Will be a nation's light--
Those eyes that now are wistful bent
On some big fellow's kite.
Those hands--those little hands--
So sticky, small and brown;
Those hands whose only mission seems
To pull all order down--
Who knows what hidden strength may be
Hidden in their clasp,
Tough now 'tis but a taffy stick
In sturdy hole they grasp.
Ah, blessings on those little hands,
Whose work is yet undone!
And blessings on those little feet.
Whose race is yet unrun!
And blessings on the little brain
That has not learned to plan!
Whate'er the future holds in store,
God bless the coming man! Philadelphia Press
BUR OUT
1. Harold Kushner wrote, I am often asked to speak to medical staffs, hospice

workers, and other caregivers about how to deal with victims of tragedy and
mistfortune. I always spend the last few minutes of my talk dealing with the
problem of caregiver burnout, that sense of emotional exhaustion which causes
teachers, soical workers, and even doctors and nurses to stop giving to those in need
becasue it takes so much out of me. I suggest that burnout is not the result of
hard work but of a sense of futility. People can work hard for long hours if they feel
that they are making a difference. But if they feel that their efforts are being
wasted, that no matter how hard they work it won't make any difference, then any
task becomes too hard.
Do you remember the story from the Book of Exodus of how Moses was carrying
the tablets of the Law down from Mount Sinai, an dwhen he saw the Israelities
worshiping the Golden Calf he threw the tablets to the ground and broke them?
There is a Jewish legend abouthow that happened. Moses was already an old man
at the time. Climbing down a mountain while carrying two large stone tablets must
have been difficult for him. But because the tablets were engraved with God's
words, he found the strength to do it. He felt he was doing something important.
But when Moses saw the Israelites dancing around the Golden Calf, the legend tells
us the writing disappeared from the tablets, and they became just two heavy stones.
At that point, Moses could no longer hold them, and they fell from his hands and
broke. When Moses realized that the people were not going to live by God's laws, he
no longer had the strength to do what he had been able to do before.
I tell doctors and other caregivers that the first thing they have to do to avoid
that sense of futility is to redefine success. Success may not mean that the patient
survives the operation or walks out with her problem solved. Some illnesses will be
incurable, some problems insolvable. Instead, I tell them, success should mean
giving every patient, every client, the feeling that he or she is cared about, no matter
how desperate the situation.
I met a clergyman once who told me that he had recently conducted a healing
service for AIDS. Suspicious that he was one of those miralce-working television
husksters, I said to him, I didn't know you could cure AIDS by prayer. He
answered, Of course you can't cure AIDS by prayer. That's not what I try to do.
I try to heal families, to bring recnciliation between the AIDS patient and his often
embarrassed, often angry parents, between the patient and his former lover who has
moved away and doens't return phone calls, and most important, to heal his
relationship with himself and with God. I understand that my prayers can't keep
him from dying, but they may be able to keep him from feeling condemned and
abandoned ashe faces death.
And then I tell the caregivers: You are in a profession that calls on you to give to
others, to care for people, to feel their pain and their anger, and to do this you have
to have a religious commmitment. You need ther resources of a religious faith.
Otherwise yo will run dry. If you spend your love and your strength and your
compassion on others, and you have no Source from which to replenish it, then one
day you will find yourself depleted of love and depleted of strength. You will start
to resent people for bringing you their problems. You will end up short-changing
your family, and you will find your job more than you can handle. If you have no
source of strength other than yourself, you will end up like Jermiah's desert plant.
But if you learn to turn to God to refill what you use up, if you let yourself

become the channel through which God's love and caring flow on their way to help
others, then your strengh will be continually renewed.
C
CHILDRE
They seem to know by instinct
When it is baking day,
And they troop into the kitchen;
Quite forgotten is their play--
Shourting: Mother's baking cookies,
Get a spoon and hurry quick.
Then begins their watchful waiting,
Waiting for a pan to lick.
They ask a thousand questions,
Till I have to call a halt,
For I don't know if I'm putting
In some sugar or some salt,
And they tease for nuts or raisins;
It's a wonder they're not sick,
When they hang around the kitchen
Waiting for a pan to lick.
Yes, it makes me kind of nervous,
But it's pleasant, too, you know,
Just to see their happy faces,
Smeared with frosting or with dough.
And I know there's lots of people
Who would give a million quick
Just to have three husky youngsters
Waiting for a pan to lick. Charlotte ewcomb Parker
CHRISTMAS

Christmas isn't Christmas, till it happens in your heart.
Somewhere deep inside you is where Christmas really starts.
So give your heart to Jesus; you'll discover when you do,
that it's Christmas, really Christmas, for you. Jimmy and Carol Owens
Hell began when Satan said, I will be first and number one, and he fell. Heaven
began when Jesus said I will stoop to serve and lift man. Heaven began in the
humility of the Highest.
From the throne of highest glory
To the cross of deepest woe,
That's what makes the Christmas story
Shine with universal glow.
Church and the Kingdom
Joel Stephen Williams
There is frequently confusion on the relationship between the church and the
kingdom. The term kingdom is primarily a term used in the Four Gospels while
the term church is primarily used in the book of Acts and the epistles. While
the two are not to be equated, neither are they to be totally separated.
Kingdom primarily refers to the reign of God, not the territory over which he
reigns. Kingship would be a useful translation in many verses. Thus the
kingdom of God, his royal reign, is what creates the church when individuals
accept his rulership over their lives.
Everett Ferguson, professor of Bible at Abilene Christian University, recently
authored a study of ecclesiology (the doctrine of the church). This study is
being welcomed by scholars across our brotherhood as the finest study ever
written on this topic. In his book Ferguson discusses the kingdom on pages 18-36
and draws these conclusions by way of summary:
1) The kingdom is active. It refers to the kingly activity of God, the rule of
God among people. Thus the kingdom is present.
2) The kingdom is God's reign over all his realms, and this is without beginning
and end. His rule over Israel and over the church are manifestations on earth
and occur within a time frame, but neither exhausts the reign of God, for his
reign is in heaven as well as on earth.
3) The kingdom is present wherever Jesus is present. He represents the kingdom
of God in the present age. Where Jesus was, there was the power of God; so,
where the Spirit of Christ is, the power of God is at work.
4) The kingdom of God is associated in the Gospels with breaking the power of
evil. The kingdom was connected with the preaching and miracles of Jesus. It
continues to be present where he is preached.
5) The rule of God comes to persons when Jesus forgives their sins. He manifests
his power in forgiveness (Mark 2:5- 12). He gives new life, eternal life. When

sins are forgiven, the power of Satan over that person's life is broken.
6) Acceptance of the kingdom is obedient response to Jesus.
7) The kingdom of God creates a people.
8) Final victory of God's kingdom is certain. God's kingdom is an eternal
kingdom. The present blessings are a pledge of the ultimate fulfillment of hope.
Back to Kerygma Short Articles Page
COME
1. Come, says the sea to the river. Come, says the magnet to the steel.
Come, says the spring to the sleeping life of the forest. And like the obedience of
the river to the sea, the steel to the stone, the earth's atoms to the spring's call, so the
obedience of the soul to Christ,--Standford.
All great souls attract smaller souls. Strength is an irresistible magnet to
weakness. Every good impulse in a sinner's heart, however weak it may be, is
drawn by admiration and love to the strong-hearted Christian, and to Christ
himself.
LIFE'S REMEDY
The world is weary of new tracks of thought
That lead no naught;
Sick of quack remedies prescribed vain
For mortal pain;
Yet still above them all One Figure stands
With outstretched Hands.
Man's ears are deafened with conflicting cries;
Here wisdom lies!
Here rest and peace are found! Lo here, lo there.
Are all things fair!
Yet still On Voice repeats the tender Plea:
Come unto Me!
Fools stumble on strange paths their fathers trod
In search of God,
But found him not, and in the defeat died
Unsatisfied;
Yet now, as then, One ceases not to say:
I am the Way.
Would-be philosophers make blind our eyes
With sophistries,
And bid our faith by scinece stand appalled
(Falsely so called);

Yet still ring out those words of tender truth:
I am the Truth.
Men seek in vain some charm whereby to flee
Mortality--
Some magic potion which to them shall give
The power to live;
Yet still On Message sounds above the strife;
I am the Life. -----Ellen Thornycroft Fowler.
COMMO MA
1. Perhaps few people today know why the face of Lincoln is on the penny rather
than on a larger coin. The reason for this goes back to the boyhood days of David
Brenner, who had known nothing of liberty and much of hunger and want in
Russia. After coming to America, where he found both liberty and opportunity,
Brenner became a famous sculptor, and was the man responsible for the placing the
face of the man who said, The Lord must love the common man, for he made so
many of them, on the most lowly coin of the U.S. His idea was that there would be
more pennies minted than any other and thus there would be more of them in the
pockets of the common man.
COMPA IO SHIP
1. It isn't that we talk so much,
Sometimes the evening through
You do not say a word to me,
I do not talk to you.
You sit beside your reading lamp,
I like my easy chair
And it is joy enough for me to know
That you are there.
It isn't that we go so much.
Sometimes we like to roam
To correct or to theatre,
But best of all is home.
I sew a bit or read aloud
A book we want to share
And it is joy enough for me to know
That you are there.
It isn't that you tell to me
The things I've come to know.

It goes too deep for words I think
The fact you love me so.
You only have to touch my hand
To know how much I care!
But it is joy enough for me to know
That you are there. ----Anne Campbell
COMPARISO S BY Joel Stephen Williams
Barney Colson was an elder for University City Church of Christ in Gainesville,
Florida, for thirty-three years until his death in 1998. During World War II at the
age of twenty-one, Barney Colson was a skipper of an amphibious ship in the South
Pacific. His and three other ships had unloaded their cargo on an island near the
end of the day. They backed away from the shore and dropped anchor as the sun
was setting. An anchor watch was assigned to make sure the ships did not drift.
Everyone else went to sleep. When morning light came, all four ships were within
sight of one another with about a quarter of a mile of spacing for safety. When
Colson questioned the sailor on anchor watch, the sailor pointed to each of the ships
nearby. But then Colson asked him: Where is the island?
During the night with the limited light available on the dark ocean, the watch had
been able to discern the nearby ships. He did not think they were drifting, because
the other boats were nearby all night long. What he did not realize was that all four
ships had drug their anchors and were drifting together. They drifted over twenty
miles, so that the island was completely out of sight over the horizon the next
morning. By comparing themselves with one another instead of a fixed point such as
the island, they were able to drift all night long while thinking they were securely
anchored. When we as humans compare ourselves with one another, we are likely to
be deceived into thinking we are doing well. If we are at least average, we think we
are making progress, even though we may be drifting away from the standard. If we
compare ourselves to a reprobate, even the lukewarm person will be deceived in a
smug self-satisfaction.
Paul warned against such comparisons: We do not dare to classify or compare
ourselves with some of those who commend themselves. But when they measure
themselves by one another, and compare themselves with one another, they do not
show good sense (2 Cor. 10:12). If we are going to compare ourselves with others,
we ought to pick the very best, the holiest, and the most devout persons we know.
This will show us where we need to improve and grow. Best of all, we ought to
compare ourselves with God and Christ. We ought to strive to be perfect,
therefore, as your heavenly Father is perfect (Mt. 5:48; cf. 1 Pet. 1:15-16). Beware
of improper comparisons with an inadequate standard.

COMPASSIO
1. One couple lived in London 130 years ago. For the first 10 years of their
marriage, William Booth, especially, was in a quandary: What was God calling him
to do?
Then his wife, Catherine, a skillful Bible teacher, was invited to preach in London.
While they were there, William took a late-night walk through the slums of
London's East End. Every fifth building was a pub. Most had steps at the counter so
little children could climb up and order gin. That night he told Catherine, I seemed
to hear a voice sounding in my ears, 'Where can you go and find such heathen as
these, and where is there so great a need for your labors?' Darling, I have found my
destiny!
Later that year, 1865, the couple opened the Christian Mission in London's
slums. Their life vision: to reach the down and outers that other Christians
ignored. That simple vision of two people grew into the Salvation Army, which now
ministers through 3 million members in 91
countries.
CO FESSIO
1. Harold Kushner wrote, There are two reasons why we find it hard to shed the
burden of gult when we have done something wrong. The first is that we make
ourselves feel so ulnerable when we admit our imperfections. Somewhere along the
way, we have picked up the idea that in order to be deserving of love and
admiration, we have to be perfect. If we can only manage to be perfect, everyone
even God, will have to love us. Admitting any weakiness, any mistake, we think, will
give people reason to reject us. As a result of this outlook, we have truble admitting
that we are ever wrong. Ever alleged mistake on our part has to be explained as
someone else's fault. (It reminds me of a bumper sticker I saw: The man who can
smile when things are going badly has just thought of someone to blame it on.)
The sad part is, we never even notice how unpleasant and unearable we become
when we insist we are always right. And the equally sad corollary is that the more
we suspect we may in fact have been wrong the more stubbornly we fight to justify
ourslevs. So the doctor who feels he shoul dhave handled a case differently can't
admit it to this patient or to his supervisor. The husband wh did something he is
embarrassed about can't admit it to his wife. The worker who has made a mistakeis
afraid to admit it to the boss. They are all fariad that, if they take off their
protective armor and admit they were wrong, if they make themselves vulnerable in

the name of honest self-disclosure, the other person will take advantage of them and
hurt them. We are all afraid to admit our weaknesses, for fear that other people
will use them against us. Husbands and wives have hurt each other so often
(because they are so bulnerable to each other), employers have fired or punished
workers, patients have sued doctors, for honestly admitting a mistake, to the point
where we have learned to be afraid of admitting our faults.
COST
Page 124-125,J. Wallace Hamilton The cost of hate is getting higher. A United
States senator figured out what it costs to kill an enemy soldier. In Caesar's wars
you could get a good enemy corpse for seventy-five cents. In apoleon's wars the
price went up to three thousand dollars, in the Civil War to five thousand, in World
War I to twenty-one thousand, in World War II to fifty thousand dollars. Other
statisticians, looking at the whole show, taking the total costs and the total killed in
all lands, figured that now it costs the world a million and a half to kill one man.
How much to save him? A distinguished official of the ational Broadcasting
Company, commenting on that, said, When we get through with exploiting our
resources and exercising our utmost ingenuity in killing men at a million and a half
a head, we ought to have brains enough to know how to help men live. And be able
to show a profit on the operation.
COURTESY
1. Henry Clay said, In all the affairs of life, social as well as political, courtesies of
a small and trival character are the ones which stike deepest to the grateful and
appreciating heart.
2. Lawrence Sterne said, Hail the small sweet courtesies of life, for smooth do they
make the road of it.
3. Bovee said, The small courtesies sweet in life; the greater, ennoble it.
4. Goethe said, There is a courtesy of the heart; it is allied to love.-From it springs
the purest courtesy in the outward behavior.
5. Emerson said, Life is not so short but that there is always time for courtesy.
6. Montaigne said, Courtesy is a science of the highest importance.-It is like grace
and beauty in the body, which charm at first sight, and led on to further intimacy
and friendship.
7. Frank Hogan said, Courteous treatment is a recognition by one person that
another person has the same dignity as a human being. The practice of courtesy
develops the habit of treating others as equals. It is the small blows to our self-
esteem, the indignities, the little jolts to our vaniety which cause half the heartaches

in the world...life is full of little things--full of small pains and petty grievances
which little remedies can cure. If ordinary civility, the courtesy we expect to be
shown, were extended to every person with whom we come in contact in our daily
lives, would it not be a real contribution to human brotherhood?
8. The fifth law of a boy scout is courtesy. Courtesy is the fine art of being polite.
Courtesy is taking our manners with us wherever we go.
9. Henry Ward Beecher, the great American preacher said, Courtesy in life should
be such that should have most kindness who need most; but kindness is so
distributed in society that those who need the most have the least.
10. I Peter 3:8-12 * Finally, all of you, have unity of spirit, sympathy, love of the
brethren, a tender heart and a humble mind.
Do not return evil for evil or reviling for reviling; but on the contrary bless, for to
this you have been called, that you may obtain a blessing.
For He that would love life and see good days, let him keep his tongue from evil
and his lips from speaking guile;
let him turn away from evil and do right; let him seek peace and pursue it.
For the eyes of the Lord are upon the righteous, and his ears are open to their
prayer. But the face of the Lord is against those that do evil.
11.
COURAGE
1. The word courage takes on added meaning if you keep in mind that it is
derived fromt the Latin term cor meaning heart.
The dictionary defines it as a quality which enables one to pursue a course
deemed eight through which one may incur contempt, disapproval, or
opprobrium.
Some 300 years ago La Rochefoucauld went a step further when he said: Perfect
courage is to do unwitnessed what we should be capable of doing before all men.
COURTI G
1. Esther B. Tiffany wrote:
He took me out to see the stars,
That astronomic bore;
He said there were two moons near Mars,
While Jupiter had four.
I thought of course he'd whisper soon
What fourfold bliss 'twould be
To stroll beneath that fourfold moon
On Jupiter with me.
And when he spoke of Saturn's ring,

I was convinced he's say
That was the very kind of thing
to offer me some day.
But in a tangent off he went
To double stars. ow that
Was most suggestive, so content
And quite absorbed I sat.
But no, he talked a dreary mess,
Of which the only fraction
That caught my fancy, I confess,
Was mutual attraction.
I said I thought it very queer
And stupid altogether,
For stars to be so very near,
And yet not come together.
At that he smiled, and turned his head;
I thought he'd caught the notion;
He merely bowed good-night and said,
Their safety lay in motion.
CREATIO
1. Anderson M. Baten wrote, I think I love and reverence all arts equally, only
putting my own just above the others; because in it I recongize the union and
culmination of my own. TO me it seems as if when God conceived the world, that
was poetry; He formed it, and that was sculpture; He colored it, and that was
painting; He peopled it with living beings, and that was the grand, divine, eternal
drama.
----Charlotte Cushman (1816-1876
ORDER
Albert Einstein in a letter to a friend expressed his amazement that the universe
takes such a form (Einstein 1956), saying:
You find it strange that I consider the comprehensibility of the world to the degree
that we may speak of such comprehensibility as a miracle or an eternal mystery.
Well, a priori one should expect a chaotic world which cannot be in any way
grasped through thought. . . . The kind of order created, for example, by ewton's
theory of gravity is of quite a different kind. Even if the axioms of the theory are

posited by a human being, the success of such an enterprise presupposes an order in
the objective world of a high degree which one has no a priori right to expect. That
is the miracle which grows increasingly persuasive with the increasing
development of knowledge.
Alexander Polykov (1986), one of the top physicists in Russia, commenting on the
mathematical character of the universe, said: We know that nature is described by
the best of all possible mathematics because God created it. Paul Davies, an
astrophysicist from England, says, The equations of physics have in them
incredible simplicity, elegance and beauty. That in itself is sufficient to prove to me
that there must be a God who is responsible for these laws and responsible for the
universe (Davies 1984). Successful development of a unified field theory in the
future would only add to this remarkable situation, further reducing the number of
equations required to describe nature, indicating even further unity and integration
in the natural phenomena than have been observed to date.
The order of our universe is just what it must be for life as we know it to exist.
Some say it is just chance that the earth is just the right distance from the Sun for
life, and that the Sun has just the right kind of energy at the right level for life on
earth. There are hundreds of relationships in the world that are just right or there
could be no life on earth, and yet there are those who say it is all luck.
However, many scientists are no longer willing to attribute these coincidences to
chance, as is evidenced by a much more recent quotation from Hoyle: Such
properties seem to run through the fabric of the natural world like a thread of
happy coincidences. But there are so many odd coincidences essential to life that
some explanation seems required to account for them (Hoyle 1983, 220). Arno
Penzias, obel laureate in physics and the director of Bell Laboratories until its
recent fragmentation, makes this observation about the enigmatic character of the
universe: Astronomy leads us to a unique event, a universe which was created out
of nothing, and delicately balanced to provide exactly the conditions required to
support life. In the absence of an absurdly-improbable accident, the observations of
modern science seem to suggest an underlying, one might say, supernatural plan
(Brock 1992).
It was fashionable in the middle part of the twentieth century to attribute biological
information and complexity to chance plus time (Monod 1972). However, as our
understanding of the enormous biochemical complexity associated with the origin of
life and the development of more complex life forms has matured, appeals to chance
have gradually lost credibility. Appeals to chance have been further hurt by the
recognition that the universe is not infinitely old. In fact the widespread acceptance
of the big bang cosmology after the discovery of background radiation in 1965
caused chance to lose favor very quickly as a suitable explanation for the origin of
life (Kenyon and Steinman 1969). It would be fair to say that chance is nothing more
than the God of the gaps of the atheist, expressing as an article of faith what reason
cannot demonstrate.
Two Kinds of Order
You may recognize this argument for an intelligent cause of life. It is a form of the
design argument that has been popular among theists for centuries. The design
argument makes use of the same mode of reasoning used in the historical sciences

today -- namely, the argument from analogy. The design argument assumes that the
order we see in the world around us bears an analogy to the kind of order exhibited
by human artifacts, by tools and machines and works of art. Since the two kinds of
order are similar, the cause of one must be similar to the cause of the other. The
order in human artifacts is the result of human intelligence. Therefore, the order in
the world must be the result of an intelligent being we call the creator.
The argument from molecular biology is a modern restatement of the argument
from design, with a few significant refinements. The older design argument went
straight from order in the universe to the existence of God. From time immemorial,
the beauty of birds and flowers, the cycle of the seasons, the remarkable adaptations
in animals, have led people to posit some type of intelligent cause behind it all. ot
just Christians but a wide range of believers in some form of intelligence have
buttressed their belief by appealing to the wonderful order and complexity in the
world.
During the Scientific Revolution of the seventeenth century, the argument from
order took on even greater force. Scientists studied the intricate structures in nature
in a depth and detail unknown in previous ages. Many became more convinced than
ever that such order required an intelligent cause. Isaac ewton expressed a
common sentiment when he declared, this most beautiful system of the sun,
planets, and comets, could only proceed from the counsel and dominion of an
intelligent and powerful Being.{11}
http://www.origins.org/offices/thaxton/docs/thaxton_dna.html The argument
from design has always been the argument most widely accepted by scientists. It is
the most empirical of the arguments for God, based as it is on observational
premises about the kind of order we discover in nature.{12}
http://www.origins.org/offices/thaxton/docs/thaxton_dna.html Ironically, it was
also the Scientific Revolution which eventually led many to reject the argument
from design. Repeatedly, scientists discovered natural causes for events which until
then had been mysterious. If natural causes could explain these things, perhaps they
could explain everything else too. Do we really need an intelligent cause to explain
the order of the world?
Take, for example, the structure of a snowflake. The intricate beauty of a snowflake
has led many a believer to exclaim upon the wisdom of the creator. Yetthe
snowflake's structure is nothing mysterious or supernatural. It is explained by the
natural laws that govern the crystallization of water as it freezes.
The argument from design claims that the order we see around us cannot have
arisen by natural causes. The snowflake seems to refute that claim. It demonstrates
that at least some kinds of order can arise by natural causes. And if matter alone
can give rise to order in some instances, why not in all others as well? Why do we
need to appeal to an intelligent being any more to explain the origin of the world?
We need only continue to search for natural causes. Many materialists today use
this argument.
What is coming to light through the application of information theory is there are
actually two kinds of order. The first kind (the snowflake's) arises from constraints
within the material the thing is made of (the water molecules). We cannot infer an
intelligent cause from it, except possibly in the remote sense of something behind the
natural cause. The second kind, however, is not a result of anything within matter

itself. It is in principle opposed to anything we see forming naturally. This kind of
order does provide evidence for an intelligent cause.
The Difference It Makes
Let's explain these two kinds of order in greater detail. As you travel through
various parts of the United States, you may come across unusual rock formations. If
you consult a tourists' guide, you will learn that such shapes result when more than
one type of rock make up the formation. Because their mineral composition varies,
some rocks are softer than others. Rain and wind erode the soft parts of the
formation faster than the hard parts, leaving the harder sections protruding. In this
way, the formation may take on an unlikely shape. It may even come to resemble a
familiar object like a face.
In other words, the formation may look as though it was deliberately carved.
However, on closer inspection, say from a different angle, you notice the
resemblance is only superficial. The shape invariably accords with what erosion can
do, acting on the natural qualities of the rock (soft parts worn away, hard parts
protruding). You therefore conclude the rock formed naturally. atural forces
suffice to account for the shape you see.
ow let's illustrate a different kind of order. Say in your travels you visit Mount
Rushmore. Here you find four faces on a granite cliff. These faces do not follow the
natural composition of the rock: the chip marks{14}
http://www.origins.org/offices/thaxton/docs/thaxton_dna.html cut across both
hard and soft sections. These shapes do not resemble anything you have seen
resulting from erosion. In this case the shape of the rock is not the result of natural
processes. Rather, you infer from uniform experience that an artisan has been at
work. The four faces were intelligently imposed onto the material.
one of us finds it difficult to distinguish between these two kinds of order, the one
produced naturally and the other by intelligence. To come back to the argument
from design, the question is: which kind of order do we find in nature?
If we find only the first kind, then our conclusion will be that natural causes suffice
to explain the universe as we see it today. An intelligent cause, if there is one, is
merely a distant First Cause. It is a deistic kind of God who created matter with
certain tendencies and then stood back to let these work themselves out
mechanically.
If, on the other hand, we find any instances of the second kind of order, the kind
produced by intelligence, these will be evidence of the activity of an intelligent cause.
Science itself would then point beyond the physical world to its origin in an
intelligent source.
It is easy enough to find examples of the first kind of order. The snowflake was one.
The properties of the atoms that compose a snowflake determine its crystalline
structure. Wind and temperature explain cloud shapes. Ripples of sand on a beach
result from the impact of wind and waves. The waves of the sea form by wind,
gravity, and the fluid properties of water. one of these goes beyond what we expect
to result naturally, given the properties of the material itself. The beauty of a sunset
may inspire poets, but natural causes suffice to explain it.
The most pervasive example of the second kind of order is life itself.
A Code In Miniature
One of the greatest scientific developments of the twentieth century has been the

discovery of the D A code. D A is the famous molecule of heredity. Each of us
begins as a tiny ball about the size of a period at the end of a sentence. All our
physical characteristics, i.e., height, hair color, eye color, etc., are 'spelled out' in our
D A. It guides our development into adulthood.
The D A code is quite simple in its basic structure (although enormously complex
in its functioning). By now most people are familiar with the double helix structure
of the D A molecule. It is like a long ladder, twisted into a spiral. Sugar and
phosphate molecules form the sides of the ladder. Four bases make up its 'rungs.'
These are adenine, thymine, guanine, and cytosine. These bases act as the 'letters' of
a genetic alphabet. They combine in various sequences to form words, sentences,
and paragraphs. These base sequences are all the instructions needed to guide the
functioning of the cell.
The D A code is a genetic 'language' that communicates information to the cell.
The cell is very complicated, using many D A instructions to control its every
function. The amount of information in the D A of even the single-celled bacterium,
E. coli, is vast indeed. It is greater than the information contained in all the books in
any of the world's largest libraries. The D A molecule is exquisitely complex, and
extremely precise: the 'letters' must be in a very exact sequence. If they are out of
order, it is like a typing error in a message. The instructions that it gives the cell are
garbled. This is what a mutation is.
The discovery of the D A code gives the argument from design a new twist. Since
life is at its core a chemical code, the origin of life is the origin of a code. A code is a
very special kind of order. It represents specified complexity.{15}
http://www.origins.org/offices/thaxton/docs/thaxton_dna.html To understand
that term, we need to take a brief excursion into information theory as it applies to
biology.
Measuring Information
One if by land, two if by sea. Paul Revere did not know information theory, but
he was using its principles correctly. A simple but effective code informed the
Patriots of the British route of approach.
Information theory realizes an important goal of mathematicians, to make
information measurable. It finds its place in biology through its ability to measure
organization and to express it in numbers. Biology has long recognized the
importance of the concept of organization. However, little practical was possible
until there was a way to measure it. Organization stated in terms of information
does this. Roughly speaking, says Leslie Orgel, the information content of a
structure is the minimum number of instructions needed to specify the
structure.{16} http://www.origins.org/offices/thaxton/docs/thaxton_dna.html
The more complex a structure is, the more instructions needed to specify it.
Random structures require very few instructions at all. If you want to write out a
series of nonsense letters, for example, here is all you do. The only instructions
necessary are write a letter between A and Z, followed by now do it again, ad
infinitum.
A highly ordered structure likewise requires few instructions if its order is the result
of a constantly repeating structure. A whole book filled only with the sentence I
love you repeated over and over is a highly ordered series of letters. A few
instructions specify which letters to choose and in what sequence. These instructions

followed by now do it again as many times as necessary completes the book. By
contrast with either random or ordered structures, complex structures require
many instructions. If we wanted a computer to write out a poem, for example, we
would have to specify each letter. That is, the poem has a high information content.
Specifying a Sequence
Information in this context means the precise determination, or specification, of a
sequence of letters. We said above that a code represents specified complexity.
We are now able to understand what specified means. A thing is more highly
specified the fewer choices there are about fulfilling each instruction. In a random
situation, options are unlimited and each option is equally probable. In generating a
list of random letters, for instance, there are no constraints on the choice of letters at
each step. The letters are unspecified.
An ordered structure, on the other hand, like our book of I love you's, is highly
specified. Each letter is specified. onetheless, it has a low information content, as
noted before, because the instructions needed to specify it are few. Ordered
structures and random structures are similar in that both have a low information
content. However, they differ in that ordered structures are highly specified.
A complex structure like a poem is likewise highly specified. It differs from an
ordered structure, however, in that it is not only highly specified, but also has a high
information content. Writing a poem requires new instructions to specify each
letter.
To sum up, information theory has given us tools to distinguish between the two
kinds of order we spoke about at the beginning. Lack of order -- randomness -- is
neither specified nor high in information.
The first kind of order is the kind found in a snowflake. Using the terms of
information theory, a snowflake is specified but has a low information content. Its
order arises from a single structure repeated over and over. It is like the book filled
with I love you. The second kind of order, the kind found in the faces on Mount
Rushmore, is both specified and high in information.
Life Is Information
Molecules characterized by specified complexity make up living things. These
molecules are, most notably, D A and protein. By contrast, nonliving things fall
into one of two categories. They are either unspecified and random (like lumps of
granite and mixtures of random nucleotides), or they are specified but simple (like
snowflakes and crystals). A crystal fails to qualify as living because it lacks
complexity. A chain of random nucleotides fails to qualify because it lacks
specificity.{17} http://www.origins.org/offices/thaxton/docs/thaxton_dna.html o
nonliving things (except D A and protein in living things, human artifacts and
written language) have specified complexity.
For a long time biologists overlooked the distinction between two kinds of order
(simple, periodic order versus specified complexity). Only recently have they
appreciated that the distinguishing feature of living systems is not order but
specified complexity.{18}
http://www.origins.org/offices/thaxton/docs/thaxton_dna.html The sequence of
nucleotides in D A, or of amino acids in a protein, is not a repetitive order like a
crystal. Instead it is like the letters in a written message. A message is not composed
of a sequence of letters repeated over and over. It is not, in other words, the first

kind of order.
Indeed, the letters that make up a message are in a sense random. There is nothing
inherent in the letters g-i-f-t that tells us the word means present. In fact, in
German the same sequence of letters means poison. In French the series is
meaningless. If you came across a series of letters written in the Greek alphabet and
didn't know Greek, you wouldn't be able to read it. or would you be able to tell if
the letters formed Greek words or were just groupings of random letters. There is
no detectable difference.
What distinguishes a language is that certain random groupings of letters have come
to symbolize meanings according to a given symbol convention. othing
distinguishes the sequence a-n-d from n-a-d or n-d-a for a person who doesn't know
any English. Within the English language, however, the sequence a-n-d is very
specific, and carries a particular meaning.{19}
http://www.origins.org/offices/thaxton/docs/thaxton_dna.html
There is no detectable difference between the sequence of nucleotides in E. coli D A
and a random sequence of nucleotides.{20}
http://www.origins.org/offices/thaxton/docs/thaxton_dna.html Yet within the E.
coli cells, the sequence of letters of its D A is very specific. Only that particular
sequence is capable of biological function.
The discovery that life in its essence is information inscribed on D A has greatly
narrowed the question of life's origin. It has become the question of the origin of
information. We now know there is no connection at all between the origin of order
and the origin of specified complexity. There is no connection between orderly
repeating patterns and the specified complexity in protein and D A. We cannot
draw an analogy, as many do, between the formation of a crystal and the origin of
life. We cannot argue that since natural forces can account for the crystal, then they
can account for the structure of living things. The order we find in crystals and
snowflakes is not analogous to the specified complexity we find in living things.{21}
Are we not back to a more sophisticated form of the argument from design? With
the insights from information theory we need no longer argue from order in a
general sense. Order with low information content (the first kind) does arise by
natural processes. However, there is no convincing experimental evidence that order
with high information content (the second kind or specified complexity) can arise by
natural processes. Indeed, the only evidence we have in the present is that it takes
intelligence to produce the second kind of order.
The Present As the Key to the Past
Scientists can synthesize proteins suitable for life. Research chemists produce things
like insulin for medical purposes in great quantities. The question is, how do they do
it? Certainly not by simulating chance or natural causes. Only by highly
constraining the experiment can chemists produce proteins like those found in living
things. Placing constraints on the experiment limits the 'choices' at each step of the
way. That is, it adds informataion. If we want to speculate on how the first
informational molecules came into being, the most reasonable speculation is there
was some form of intelligence around at the time.
The scientists searching for extra-terrestrial intelligence (ETI) would recognize the
kind of order inherent in a decodable signal{22}

http://www.origins.org/offices/thaxton/docs/thaxton_dna.html from space as
evidence of an intelligent source. These scientists have never seen an extra-
terrestrial creature. However, they would recognize the similarity of a message from
space to messages generated by human intelligence. In the same way, we note that
the structure of protein and of D A has a high information content. We recognize
its similarity to information (like poems and computer programs) generated by
human intelligence. Therefore we may properly infer that the source of information
on the molecular level was likewise an intelligent being.{23}
http://www.origins.org/offices/thaxton/docs/thaxton_dna.html Furthermore, we
know of no other source of information. Efforts to produce information-bearing
molecules by chance or natural forces have failed. We have not seen the creator, nor
observed the act of creation. However, we recognize the kind of order that only
comes from an intelligent being.
With the new data from molecular biology and information theory, we can now
argue for an intelligent cause of the origin of life. It is based on the analogy between
the D A code and a written message. We cannot identify that source any further
from the scientific data alone. We cannot supply a name for that intelligent cause.
We cannot be sure from the empirical data on D A whether the intelligence is
within the cosmos but off the earth as asserted by Hoyle and Wickramasinghe.{24}
http://www.origins.org/offices/thaxton/docs/thaxton_dna.html It might be beyond
the cosmos as historic theism maintains. All we can say is that, given the structure of
a D A molecule, it is certainly legitimate to conclude that an intelligent agent made
it. Life came from a who rather than a what. We may be able to identify that agent
in greater detail by other arguments. We may, for example, gain insight from
historical, philosophical, or theological argument, or by considering the relevant
lines of evidence from other areas of science. However, from scientific data on D A
alone we can argue only to an intelligent cause.
Let's spell out the steps of the argument more explicitly. Does it in fact satisfy the
principle of analogy? Yes, it does. First, we establish that an analogy does exist
between the kind of order we see in living things and the kind we see in some other
phenomena made by human intelligence.{25}
http://www.origins.org/offices/thaxton/docs/thaxton_dna.html We have an
abundance of examples of specified complexity: books, machines, bridges, works of
art, computers. All these are human artifacts. In our experience only human
language and human artifacts match the specified complexity exhibited by protein
and D A. Second, we ask what is the source of the order in these modern examples?
We know by uniform experience that its source is human intelligence.
The only remaining question is whether it is legitimate to use this reasoning to infer
the existence of an intelligent cause before the existence of human beings. I would
argue it is. A phenomenon from the past, known by uniform experience to be like
that caused only by an intelligent source, is itself evidence that such a source existed.
Even the simplest forms of life, with their store of D A, are characterized by
specified complexity. Therefore life itself is prima facie evidence that some form of
intelligence was in existence at the time of its origin.{26}
It is true that our actual experiential knowledge of intelligence is limited to carbon-
based organisms, particularly human beings. However, scientists already speculate

on some other kinds of intelligence, i.e., non-human, when they seriously seek to
discover ETI's.{27}
http://www.origins.org/offices/thaxton/docs/thaxton_dna.html Some even argue
that intelligence exists in complex non-biological computer circuitry. Scientists
today conceive of intelligence freed from biology as we know it. Then why can we
not conceive of an intelligent being existing before the appearance of biological life
on this planet?
Uniform Experience
In scientific terms, the analogy criterion is the same thing as the principle of
uniformity. It is the dictum that our theories of the past must invoke causes similar
to those acting in the present. David Hume was getting at the same idea with his
phrase, uniform experience.{28}
As regards the origin of life, our uniform experience is that it takes an intelligent
agent to generate information, codes, messages. As a result, it is reasonable to infer
there was an intelligent cause of the original D A code. D A and written language
both exhibit the property of specified complexity. Since we know an intelligent cause
produces written language, it is legitimate to posit an intelligent cause as the source
of D A.
We have now defined the D A code as a message. It is now clear that the claim that
D A arose by material forces is to say that information can arise by material forces.
However, the material base of a message is completely independent of the
information transmitted. The material base could not have anything to do with the
message's origin. The message transcends chemistry and physics.{29}
When I say a message is independent of the medium which conveys it, I mean that
the materials used to send a message have no affect whatever on the content of the
message. The content of Apples are sweet does not change when I write it in
crayon instead of ink. It is unaffected by a switch to chalk or pencil. I can say the
same thing if I use my finger and write it in the sand. I can also use smoke and write
it in the sky. I can translate it into the dots and dashes of Morse code. Even people
holding up posters at a baseball game can transmit the same information.
The point is, there is no relationship at all between information and the material
base used to transmit it. The ink or chalk I use to write Apples are sweet does not
itself look red, nor taste sweet like an apple. There is nothing in the ink molecules
that compels me to write precisely or only that particular sentence. The information
transmitted by my writing is not within the ink I use to write it. Instead, an outside
source imposes information upon the ink using the elements of a particular
linguistic symbol system.
The information within the genetic code is likewise entirely independent of the
chemical makeup of the D A molecule. The information transmitted by the
sequence of bases has nothing to do with the bases themselves. There is nothing in
the chemicals themselves that originates the communication transmitted to the cell
by the D A molecule.
These rather obvious facts are devastating to any theory that assumes life first arose
by natural forces. Such theories dominate the intellectual landscape today. Some
theories assume that self-organizing properties within the chemicals themselves

created the information in the first D A molecule.{30}
http://www.origins.org/offices/thaxton/docs/thaxton_dna.html Others assume
external self-organizing forces created D A.
Yet this is tantamount to saying the material used to transmit information also
produced it. It is as though I were to say it was the chemical properties of the ink
itself that caused me to write Apples are sweet.
We can state our case even more strongly. To accept a material cause for the origin
of life actually runs counter to the principle of uniformity. Uniform experience
reveals that only an intelligent cause regularly produces specified complexity. To be
sure, we may still posit a non-intelligent, material cause as the source of specified
complexity, even though we do not regularly observe it. We may argue that in the
rare occurrence, in spite of its trivially small probability, such an event might
happen. The problem is, however, that to argue this way is no longer to do science.
Regular experience not negligible probabilities and remote possibilities is the basis
of science.
Darwin convinced many of the leading intellectuals in his time that design in the
world is only apparent, that it is the result of natural causes. ow, however, the
situation has taken a dramatic turn, though few have recognized its significance.
The elucidation of D A and unravelling the secrets of the genetic code have opened
again the possibility of seeing true design in the universe.
all of the above from Charles B. Thaxton, Ph.D.
This paper was presented as part of the conference, Jesus Christ: God and Man, an
international conference in Dallas, Texas, ovember 13-16, 1986. Dr. Thaxton was
then Director of Research, The Julian Center, P.O. Box 400, Julian, CA 92036.
©©©© 1986 by Charles B. Thaxton
D A molecule Complexity
Due to advances in molecular biology, the process of reproduction, or self-
replication, has become better understood. At the core of this process is the D A
molecule. Though not itself alive, D A is usually regarded as the sine qua non of
life. D A is considered the identifying mark of a living system. We judge something
as living if it contains D A.
Molecular biology has shown us how extremely intricate living things are, especially
the genetic code and the genetic process. Interestingly enough, the genetic code can
be best understood as an analogue to human language. It functions exactly like a
code -- indeed, it is a code: it is a molecular communication system within the cell.
A sequence of chemical 'letters' stores and transmits the communication in the cell.
Communication is possible whatever symbols used as an alphabet. The 26 letters we
use in English, the 32 Cyrillic letters used in the Russian language, or the 4-letter
genetic alphabet -- all serve in communication.
In recent years, scientists have applied information theory to biology, and in
particular to the genetic code. Information theory is the science of message
transmission developed by Claude Shannon and other engineers at Bell Telephone
Laboratories in the late 1940s. It provides a mathematical means of measuring

information. Information theory applies to any symbol system, regardless of the
elements of that system. The so-called Shannon information laws apply equally well
to human language, Morse code, and the genetic code.
The conclusion drawn from the application of information theory to biology is there
exists a structural identity between the D A code and a written language. H.P.
Yockey notes in the Journal of Theoretical Biology:
It is important to understand that we are not reasoning by analogy. The
sequence hypothesis [that the exact order of symbols records the
information] applies directly to the protein and the genetic text as well as to
written language and therefore the treatment is mathematically identical
This development is highly significant for the modern origin of life discussion.
Molecular biology has now uncovered an analogy between D A and written human
languages. It is more than an analogy, in fact: in terms of structure, the two are
mathematically identical. In the case of written messages, we have uniform
experience that they have an intelligent cause. What is uniform experience? It
simply means that people everywhere observe a certain type of event always in
association with a certain type of cause. When we find evidence that a similar event
happened in the past, it is reasonable to infer it had a similar cause. As I shall argue,
based on uniform experience there is good reason to accept an intelligent cause for
the origin of life as well
ATURAL THEOLOGY A D DESIG
Even before the time of Darwin and his theories of natural selection, nineteenth
century Anglican clergyman William Paley was hard at work writing numerous
scholarly articles in defense of design and its evidence in nature. While highly
revered in his day, he would eventually be ridiculed for his ideas by the scientific
community. One of his most famous works, atural Theology, would also become
one of the most vehemently opposed. In the opening statement he writes:
In crossing a heath, suppose I pitched my foot against a stone, and were
asked how the stone came to be there, I might possibly answer, that for any
thing I knew to the contrary it had lain there for ever... But suppose I had
found a watch upon the ground, and it should be inquired how the watch
happened to b in that place, I should hardly think of the answer which I had
before given, that for any thing I knew the watch might have always been
there. Yet why should this answer not serve for the watch as well as for the
stone?....namely, that when we come to inspect the watch, we perceive...its
several parts are framed and put together for a purpose, e.g. that they are so
formed and adjusted as to...point out the hour of the day; that if the different
parts had been differently shaped from what they are, or placed after any
other manner or in any other order than that in which they are placed, either
no motion at all would have been carried on in the machine, or none which
would have answered the use that is now served by it...the inference we think
is inevitable, that the watch must have had a maker...who formed it for the
purpose which we find it actually to answer, who comprehended its
construction and designed its use.

Recent scientists (Darwinists) have taken great delight in attempting to discredit
Paley's ideas. Evolutionist Richard Dawkins actually wrote an entire book, The
Blind Watchmaker{2} http://www.origins.org/science/mondore-designer.html,
attempting to refute him. Dawkins claimed that it is actually evolution and not an
intelligent designer that created the watch saying, Paley's argument is made with
passionate sincerity and is informed by the best biological scholarship of his day,
but it is wrong, gloriously and utterly wrong...If [natural selection] can be said to
play the role of watchmaker in nature, it is the blind watchmaker. With a tone that
completely writes off Paley's beliefs as outdated, Dawkins could lead the reader to
believe that he somehow scientifically disproved Paley's original point. As some
scientists have pointed out, he did not.
Biochemisist, Michael Behe easily dismisses Dawkins' rebuttal saying, But exactly
where, we may ask, was Paley refuted? Who has answered his argument? How was
the watch produced without an intelligent designer? It is surprising but true that the
main argument of the discredited Paley has actually never been refuted. either
Darwin nor Dawkins, neither science nor philosophy, has explained how an
irreducibly complex system such as a watch might be produced without a
designer.{3} http://www.origins.org/science/mondore-designer.html Behe is not
alone in his rejection of Dawkins' attack on Paley's ideas. In their book, Evolution
from Space, astronomers Fred Holye and Chandra Wickramasinghe wrote, It is
ironic that the scientific facts throw Darwin out, but leave William Paley, a figure of
fun to the scientific world for more than a century, still in the tournament with a
chance of being the ultimate winner.{4} http://www.origins.org/science/mondore-
designer.html What have these scientists discovered that would make them choose
to take the side of a 19th Century clergyman in opposition to one of their own fellow
20th scientists? What proofs do they have to make such strong statements? Hoyle,
for one, reached his conclusion based on his own mathematical calculations. In fact,
Sir Fred Hoyle is one of the world's leading astronomers and mathematicians.
Unlike Paley, whose studies were based on his deep faith in God, Hoyle considers
himself both an evolutionist and an agnostic. Hence, he did not arrive at his
conclusions because of any religious bias but strictly through his own mathematical
calculations. We now know that even the simplest living creature is extremely
complex. Hoyle attempted to calculate the probability of one of the simplest of these
complex beings coming into existence by chance.{5}
http://www.origins.org/science/mondore-designer.html Assuming the first living
thing would have been smaller and simpler than any present day creatures, he still
calculated a 1 in 1020 (that is, a 1 with 20 zeros behind it) probability of occurring
by chance. That is the probability for just one simple enzyme. However, even the
simplest life form requires literally thousands of different enzymes with each one
tailor-made to perform a specific function. That ups the probability to 1 in 1040,000
(or 1 followed by 40,000 zeros). Mathematicians generally agree anything with a
probability of less than 1 in 1050 is equivalent to total impossibility. That these
complex substances exist despite the fact that it is impossible for them to have
formed by chance, Hoyle concludes, A commonsense interpretation of the facts
suggests that a superintellect has monkeyed with physics, as well as chemistry and
biology, and that there are no blind forces worth speaking about in nature.{6}
http://www.origins.org/science/mondore-designer.html Hoyle is not alone in this

conclusion. He wrote, Quite a number of my astronomical friends are considerable
mathematicians, and once they become interested enough to calculate for
themselves, instead of relying upon hearsay argument, they can quickly see the
point.{7} http://www.origins.org/science/mondore-designer.html One of Hoyle's
associates, Chandra Wickramasinghe stated, The chances that life just occurred on
earth are about as unlikely as a typhoon blowing through a junkyard and
constructing a Boeing 747.{8} http://www.origins.org/science/mondore-
designer.html Hoyle and Wickramasinghe worked together to mathematically
calculate probabilities on development of even the smallest chemicals needed for life.
Dealing first with hemoglobin they concluded that, even believing the earth was
billions of years old, there simply has not been nearly enough time for this process
to have evolved.{9} http://www.origins.org/science/mondore-designer.html The
also studied the origin of genes with the same conclusion stating, Mutations just
don't occur often enough to account for all the hundreds of thousands of
fundamentally different genes there are. They found it absurd to think that chance
mutations could ever produce 組組組組enes which were to prove capable of writing the
symphonies of Beethoven and the plays of Shakespeare.{10}
http://www.origins.org/science/mondore-designer.html Murray Eden, a Professor
at M.I.T. came to a similar conclusion based on his own gene studies. He explains
that human genes contain about a billion nucleotides (the smallest unit in our
genes-like a letter in the alphabet) and however you made the calculations, the
length of time life has been on earth was not nearly long enough for all those
nucleotides - all that information to have been generated by chance mutations.{11}
http://www.origins.org/science/mondore-designer.html British physicist Alan
Hayward also believes there is ample scientific proof to have thrown Darwin out.
He writes that one major objection to Darwinism is its sheer improbability. All
that natural selection does is to destroy the unfit; the 素素素素it' have to be produced by
mutation which is known to be the result of pure chance. And the idea that chance
could create all the manifold wonders of nature is preposterous - so preposterous
that a great many mathematicians, as well as quite a few biologists, have rejected
Darwinism on statistical grounds.{12} http://www.origins.org/science/mondore-
designer.html While the total improbability is proof enough, there is another
factor that further negates the concept of Darwinian evolution. Even if natural
selection were to have occurred despite the insurmountable odds, the problem of
design must be dealt with if Darwinists are to have any reasonable defense for their
position. A watch, based on its multiplicity of essential parts all working together to
fulfil a specific purpose, clearly points to a watchmaker. An entire city of highly
developed buildings insists upon the need for a developer. And even beyond the
complexity of genes is the issue of the genetic information those genes contained.
How does one explain a single cell leading to the Symphonies of Beethoven and plays
of Shakespeare? Even unbelieving scientists are coming to see that the only rational
explanation is an intelligent designer.
For every house is built by someone, but God is the builder of everything (Heb
3:4). Every life form exists, not by chance, but by the skillful hand of God who
declares, I will put in the desert the cedar and the acacia, the myrtle and the olive.
I will set pines in the wasteland, the fir and the cypress together, so that people may
see and know, may consider and understand, that the hand of the LORD has done

Topics from a to z vol. 2

Recommended

Recommended

More Related Content

What's hot

What's hot (19)

Similar to Topics from a to z vol. 2

Similar to Topics from a to z vol. 2 (20)

More from GLENN PEASE

More from GLENN PEASE (20)

Recently uploaded

Recently uploaded (20)

Topics from a to z vol. 2