June 2006

Flesh Versus Spirit

Where does a baby come from?
What are people doing here on this planet?
Where do humans go after physical death?
Do these questions ring any bells in memories?

Children need to be taught how to understand themselves in a way that conforms with Truth as revealed in Holy Scripture. They will then be able
to function in this earthly dimension in a way that’s pleasing to the Father Creator. He desires each baby born to reach maturity with understanding
of their value, purpose and destiny.

Throughout history, a variety of deceptions related to human identity have been passed along from one generation to another. Because of ignorance, corruptible ideas about human origin and composition have created confusion. This is why bad choices are made in life which bring experiences filled with turmoil.

When people fail to understand where they came from, what they are doing on this planet, and where they will go when departing this dimension of existence, they cannot possibly be qualified to make intelligent choices for themselves while attempting to survive within worldly systems. For this reason, it’s important for these words to be imparted into human consciousness. These ideas can become a catalyst for debate within
Christian communities where false preconceptions can be challenged!

Realizing the complexity of this esoteric subject might discourage a few readers, it’s with great care that an attempt is being made to simplify these ideas. All humans, including you, are multifaceted “beings” brought into existence by God; each person is a soul made of many spirits within a fleshly body made of many cells.

When people look in a mirror, they see a body – made of earthly substance. What most people fail to realize is that the soul is an invisible replica of the body – made of spiritual energy. Just as a body has trillions of cells, a soul
is capable of containing trillions of spirits. The brain is at the center of the nervous system where it is used to regulate bodily functions – serving as a conduit between a soul and body. The “mind” is another word to describe the “soul” – which is the seat of human intellect.

As created beings with a body made of “flesh,” people are capable of
living on this planet for a limited period of time. If you limit your thinking, believing that you will cease to exist when death comes to your body, you will not be able to make good choices for yourself. As a living creature with limited knowledge, you need to know that every baby born was created to exist eternally – either with God or separated from Him!

Words like “light” and “darkness” are important
if you are to receive insight into your self-identity
as it relates to God, Satan, life and death.

At this moment, your body is in this world – even though your soul is in another world. Depending upon choices made, your soul is either in the Kingdom of God – or in the domain of Satan.

Everything about your existence is dependent upon obedience to Spiritual Laws. When you conform yourself to the ways of God, you are living in
the Light; if you rebel against God, conforming yourself to the evil ways
of Satan, you are living in darkness. If your body dies while you are in the Light, you will awake to a view of the Kingdom; if your body dies while you are in darkness, you will awake to find yourself with Satan. Stepping out of spiritual darkness into Spiritual Light can only happen when you learn how to make the right choices.

Have you read the Bible more than once?
Have you repented of sins?
Have you accepted Jesus into your heart?

Did you allow the Holy Spirit to impart knowledge, inspire you and guide you during your past daily life?

Christians need to be taught how to use the power of Light to defeat the evil of darkness! Keep connected to the Holy Spirit with your thoughts. Speak words of life to defeat death, and take authority over demonic spirits that invade your environment. A heavenly army is standing ready to battle your enemies whenever you get ready. Speak your commands in the name of Jesus – and heavenly angels will be there to assist.

“Death and life are in the power of the tongue: and they that love it shall eat the fruit thereof.”   Proverbs 18:21

Keep your faith in God and in the power of His Word as you meet normal challenges of life! Do those good things that must be done to benefit yourself and others! The Kingdom of God can be manifested on Earth as it is in Heaven only when you use your “measure of faith” to make it happen!

Please relax, avoid distractions for a few hours, and begin doing serious research in the Bible. Open yourself up to Truth to confirm the essence of this information. Your journey to understanding can begin with these few scriptures: “In the beginning God created the heaven and the earth.”   Genesis 1:1

“So God created man in his own image, in the image of God created he him; male and female created he them.”   Genesis 1:27

“And the LORD God formed man of the dust of the ground, and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life; and man became a living soul.”   Genesis 2:7

“Furthermore we have had fathers of our flesh which corrected us, and we gave them reverence: shall we not much rather be in subjection unto the Father of spirits, and live?”   Hebrews 12:9

“In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. The same was in the beginning with God. All things were made by him; and without him was not any thing made that was made. In him was life; and the life was the light of men. And the light shineth in darkness; and the darkness comprehended it not. There was a man sent from God, whose name was John. The same came for a witness, to bear witness of the Light, that all men through him might believe. He was not that Light, but was sent to bear witness of that Light. That was the true Light, which lighteth every man that cometh into the world. He was in the world, and the world was made by him, and the world knew him not. He came unto his own, and his own received him not. But as many as received him, to them gave he power to become the sons of God, even to them that believe on his name: Which were born, not of blood, nor of the will of the flesh, nor of the will of man, but of God. And the Word was made flesh, and dwelt among us, and we beheld his glory, the glory as of the only begotten of the Father, full of grace and truth. John bare witness of him, and cried, saying, This was he of whom I spake, He that cometh after me is preferred before me: for he was before me.” John 1:1-15

“Jesus answered, Verily, verily, I say unto thee, Except a man be born of water and of the Spirit, he cannot enter into the kingdom of God. That which is born of the flesh is flesh; and that which is born of the Spirit is spirit.”   John 3:5&6

“There is therefore now no condemnation to them which are in Christ Jesus, who walk not after the flesh, but after the Spirit. For the law of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus hath made me free from the law of sin and death.” Romans 8:1&2

“Now this I say, brethren, that flesh and blood cannot inherit the kingdom of God; neither doth corruption inherit incorruption.” 1 Corinthians 15:50

“For whosoever will save his life shall lose it: and whosoever will lose his life for my sake shall find it. For what is a man profited, if he shall gain the whole world, and lose his own soul? or what shall a man give in exchange for his soul?”   Matthew 16:25&26

“Jesus cried and said, He that believeth on me, believeth not on me, but on him that sent me. And he that seeth me seeth him that sent me. I am come a light into the world, that whosoever believeth on me should not abide in darkness.”   John 12:44, 45&46

As you study to increase your Spiritual knowledge, and as you listen to opinions of others who attempt to interpret meanings of words and ideas found in the Bible, always go to God in prayer to confirm right from wrong. You are living in a world where both Light and darkness exist. Only the
Holy Spirit can help you make distinctions between Truth and deception!

“But what I do, that I will do, that I may cut off occasion from them
which desire occasion; that wherein they glory, they may be found even
as we. For such are false apostles, deceitful workers, transforming themselves into the apostles of Christ. And no marvel; for Satan himself
is transformed into an angel of light. Therefore it is no great thing if his ministers also be transformed as the ministers of righteousness; whose
end shall be according to their works.”   2 Corinthians 11:12-15

Many more scriptures can be found in your Bible to support the reality of human physical and spiritual identity. Every one of us needs to learn as much as possible about our ultimate destiny – which is contingent upon a proper relationship with God. We need to be wise enough to consider our place in eternity rather than focusing limited time on the cares of this fleshly body we inhabit. Let’s always do our best to put first things first!

Let’s put God first in our Lives!

The following information is worthy of our study.
God by the Numbers

Coincidence and random mutation are not the most likely explanations for some things.
by Charles Edward White

Math and theology have had a long and checkered relationship. The Babylonians and Mayans both associated numbers with God. In fact, both societies named their gods with numbers. The Mayans used 13 and the Babylonians used 60. In the Greek world, followers of Pythagoras prayed to the first 4 numbers and thought they were the creator. On the other hand, in the 18th century, the French mathematician Laplace told Napoleon he had no need of God even as a hypothesis, and in 1744, John Wesley confessed: "I am convinced, from many experiments, I could not study either mathematics, arithmetic, or algebra … without being a deist, if not an atheist."

No one knows what Wesley saw in 18th-century mathematics that he feared would lead him away from the God of the Bible, but today, many Christian mathematicians think that numbers point to God. Three numbers in particular suggest evidence for God's existence. They are 1/1010123, 10162, and epi.

Fine-tuning the universe

The first recent number that points to God is 1 in 10 to the 10 to the 123. This number comes from astronomy. Oxford professor Roger Penrose discusses it in his book The Large, the Small, and the Human Mind. It derives from a formula by Jacob Beckenstein and Stephen Hawking and describes the chances of our universe being created at random. Penrose spoofs this view by picturing God throwing a dart at all the possible space-time continua and hitting the universe we inhabit. The Beckenstein-Hawking formula is too complicated to discuss here, but another approach to the same problem involves the fine-tuning of the universe and the existence of habitable planets.

The fine-tuning of the universe is shown in the precise strengths of four basic forces. Gravity is the best known of these forces and is the weakest, with a relative strength of 1. Next comes the weak nuclear force that holds the neutron together. It is 1034 times stronger than gravity but works only at subatomic distances. Electromagnetism is 1,000 times stronger than the weak nuclear force, and the strong nuclear force, which keeps protons together in the nucleus of an atom, is 100 times stronger yet. If even one of these forces had a slightly different strength, the life-sustaining universe we know would be impossible.

If gravity were slightly stronger, all stars would be large, like the ones that produce iron and other heavier elements, but they would burn out too rapidly for the development of life. On the other hand, if gravity were weaker, the stars would endure, but none would produce the heavier elements necessary to form planets.

The weak nuclear force controls the decay of neutrons. If it were stronger, neutrons would decay more rapidly, and there would be nothing in the universe but hydrogen. However, if this force were weaker, all the hydrogen would turn into helium and other elements.

The electromagnetic force binds atoms to one another to form molecules. If it were either weaker or stronger, no chemical bonds would form, so no life could exist.

Finally, the strong nuclear force overcomes the electromagnetic force and allows the atomic nucleus to exist. Like the weak nuclear force, changing it would produce a universe with only hydrogen or with no hydrogen.

In sum, without planets, hydrogen, and chemical bonds, there would be no life as we know it.

Besides these 4 factors, there are at least 25 others that require pinpoint precision to produce a universe that contains life. Getting each of them exactly right suggests the presence of an Intelligent Designer.

The second component to be considered when calculating the likelihood of this life-supporting universe is the presence of habitable planets. In addition to the fine-tuning of the whole universe, there needs to be a carefully specified place where life can reside. Life as we know it can only exist within certain limits. There are at least 45 parameters, from the size of our galaxy to the mass of the moon, which permit the presence of life on a planet. A huge galaxy erupts with too many stars and thus disturbs planetary orbits, but a tiny galaxy does not produce enough heavy elements for a planet to form. At the other end of the spectrum, too large a moon destabilizes a planet's orbit, while having no moon or one that is too small permits a planet to wobble as it spins and disrupts the planet's climate.

From these 45 planetary characteristics alone, Hugh Ross, in his chapter in Mere Creation, calculates there is less than 1 chance in 1069 of habitable planets occurring at random.

The fine-tuning of the four physical forces and the presence of one habitable planet are just two of the components that would go into a formula to predict the probability of a life-supporting universe. The first one to try to calculate this number was Frank Drake in 1961, when he listed fewer than ten factors. Coming at the same problem from a different direction by calculating the entropy of black holes, Penrose says the number is 1 in 10 to the 10 to the 123. This number is beyond human comprehension. 10 to the 10 to the 3 would be written as 10 followed by 999 zeros.

To write 10 to the 10 to the 123 in one line would extend beyond the bounds of the universe. If Penrose is right in calculating the odds of a life-supporting universe at 1 in 10 to the 10 to the 123, then a strong case for a Creator emerges.

Not enough time

The second number that points to God comes from the field of biology. William Dembski, in The Creation Hypothesis, suggests the following argument.

Darwin thought that all life, including humans, arose from a one-celled organism. But to get from a one-celled organism to a human being with a least a trillion cells, there would have to be many changes. Darwin says these changes were produced at random, but they would have had to occur in the right order. It doesn't do any good to give an organism a leg until it has a nervous system to control it. Even if we limit the number of necessary mutations to 1,000 and argue that half of these mutations are beneficial, the odds against getting 1,000 beneficial mutations in the proper order is 21000. Expressed in decimal form, this number is about 10301.

10301 mutations is a number far beyond the capacity of the universe to generate. Even if every particle in the universe mutated at the fastest possible rate and had done so since the Big Bang, there still would not be enough mutations.

There are about 1080 elementary particles in the universe. The fastest they could mutate would be Planck time, or 10-42 seconds. Planck time is the smallest unit of time and can be approximated as the time it would take two photons traveling at 186,000 miles per second to pass each other. If every particle in the universe (1080) had been mutating at the fastest possible rate (1042) since the Big Bang about 15 billion years ago, or 1017 seconds ago, it would produce 1080 x 1042 x 1017 or 10139 mutations. But to have a chance at even 1,000 beneficial mutations takes 10301 tries. Thus, the chance of getting 1,000 beneficial mutations out of all the mutations the universe can generate is 10139 divided by 10301, or 1 chance in 10162.

For Darwin's theory to have a chance of being right, the universe would have to be a trillion quadrillion quadrillion quadrillion quadrillion quadrillion quadrillion quadrillion quadrillion quadrillion quadrillion times older than it is. Because the universe is so young, Darwin's argument fails, and William Paley's contention that design presupposes a designer
becomes more persuasive.

Connecting the constants

The final number comes from theoretical mathematics. It is Euler's (pronounced "Oiler's") number: epi. This number is equal to -1, so when the formula is written epi+1 = 0, it connects the five most important constants in mathematics (e, p, i, 0, and 1) along with three of the most important mathematical operations (addition, multiplication, and exponentiation).

These five constants symbolize the four major branches of classical mathematics: arithmetic, represented by 1 and 0; algebra, by i; geometry, by p; and analysis, by e, the base of the natural log. epi+1 = 0 has been called "the most famous of all formulas," because, as one textbook says, "It appeals equally to the mystic, the scientist, the philosopher, and the mathematician."

The reason for this wide-ranging appeal is its utter serendipity. First, there is the ubiquitous number e, which pops up in the most unexpected places. It was first discovered in an attempt to make multiplication easier. In 1614, John Napier figured that adding exponents was easier than multiplying multi-digit numbers, so he (and others) calculated the logarithms of all integers from 1 to 100,000, expressing these numbers as powers of 10. Later mathematicians found it more convenient to express logarithms as powers of the natural log e, a number close to 2.71828.

This number also appears in banking, because it is the limit for growth of compound interest. Let's say one invested $1,000 in a very generous bank that paid an annual interest of 100%. If interest were compounded annually, at the end of the year, the money would have grown to $2,000. If, however, the bank compounded interest four times a year, the money would grow to $2,441.41. If the bank compounded interest continually, the deposit could grow to $2,718.28, which just happens to be the value of e times the original investment.

Finally, e turns up at the origin of calculus, where it is the function equal to its own derivative (if y = ex then dy/dx = ex), and it equals the limit of (1+ 1/n)n as n approaches infinity. e is irrational, so it can never be written exactly in decimal form, but it is a very useful and fascinating number in its own right.

When we combine e with p, we are introducing the oldest irrational number. Two thousand years before Christ, the Greeks knew that p was the ratio of the circumference of a circle to its diameter and that it could not be expressed as the ratio of any two integers. It is essential in geometry, but it also turns up in waves of air, water, electricity, and light, and it even helps actuaries calculate how many 50-year-old men will die this year.

The number i is a relative latecomer, proposed in the 1600s as an imaginary number and defined as the square root of -1. It was proposed to help solve equations like x2+ 1 = 0, but today it is useful in science and engineering. George Gamow, in his book One, Two, Three … Infinity, even uses i to locate buried treasure with an outdated map.

The idea that these two irrational numbers should combine with an imaginary one to yield so utilitarian a result is breathtaking. It is like deconstructing a chemical necessary for life (salt) and finding that it consists of two deadly poisons (sodium and chlorine). That these three strange numbers with such diverse origins should work together to produce a result so basic to mathematics argues that there is a profound elegance or beauty built into the system.

The discovery of this number gave mathematicians the same sense of delight and wonder that would come from the discovery that three broken pieces of pottery, each made in different countries, could be fitted together to make a perfect sphere. It seemed to argue
that there was a plan where no plan should be.

Because of the serendipitous elegance of this formula, a mathematics professor at MIT, an atheist, once wrote this formula on the blackboard, saying, "There is no God, but if there were, this formula would be proof of his existence."

Today, numbers from astronomy, biology, and theoretical mathematics point to a rational mind behind the universe. To be sure, they do not point to the personal God of the Bible as such. Yet they are not inimical to the biblical God, either. The apostle John prepared the
way for this conclusion when he used the word for logic, reason, and rationality—logos—to describe Christ at the beginning of his Gospel: "In the beginning was the logos, and the
logos was with God, and the logos was God." When we think logically, which is the goal
of mathematics, we are led to think of God.