One Glorious Proclamation!

 And so the scientists have spoken, our Government ministers have listened to them. No, the present one-size-fits-all national lockdown wasn't enough, according to these great academics. And that despite the Coronavirus infection rate is falling just about everywhere, which had started doing before the start of the lockdown. When this lockdown ends in the middle of the coming week, instead of breathing a sigh of relief and celebrating the return of something resembling normality, instead, the whole of England - except for Cornwall and a couple of offshore islands - will enter the 2nd and 3rd tier restrictions. This is just another lockdown but with a different name.

London under lockdown - Westminster Bridge.

Never mind the high probability that those who live in the neighbouring Devon city of Plymouth could cross the River Tamar into Cornwall for a drink at the first pub they come across - unless border controls resembling the old Checkpoint Charlie of the East/West Berlin frontier will be installed, complete with barbed wire and soldiers patrolling with guns - the ease with which the crossing is made could tempt anyone who has a car or even a cheap train ticket to make the crossing. After all, the view from the two bridges over the river is quite spectacular.

Then there will be cases of a small, isolated village trapped into Tier Three, the band with the severest restrictions, simply because it would be lumped with cities such as Manchester, some 25 miles away. At the same time, London gets away with Tier Two, a lesser restrictive band. After all, these City executives and slickers must be given all priorities to go about their business. After all, the entire British economy rests on their shoulders, does it not? Never mind that the virus could have a field day in a busy office, a crowded underground train or coffee bar.

All this makes me wonder whether wearing a facemask in enclosed public spaces such as a shop, train, taxi or bus, had really been a valuable asset. According to my observations, whenever I'm out and about, to take a glimpse of someone without a mask in an enclosed space is so rare, that I have a greater chance of being struck by lightning than seeing a maskless face. At least all this is where I live, in the Bracknell Forest area. Maybe there are other towns and cities where mask-wearing hadn't taken such a hold, hence allowing the virus to spread.

If there are any cries of protest going on, then the deafening silence I find overwhelming! Then again, this is Britain, the land of stoicism and submissive obedience - even to the point of banning hugs, handshakes, and yes, board games on Christmas Day, and the encouragement to wear a facemask whilst over the cooking stove or watching TV, while at the dinner table, each one should be given a place name and sit at his assigned seat, well away from the next person. If the large table happens to resemble the outline of Great Britain - something you see every day, of course - then sitting at coastal towns such as Brighton, Bournemouth, Plymouth, Blackpool, or Skegness would all be feasible. But trying to sit at inland places such as Birmingham, Manchester or even London could present a problem - the latter which not even the Thames Estuary would be able to solve!

Am I making all this up? Er - No. This seating arrangement according to geographical locations was a proposal put forward by one of the Government's scientists, and I wouldn't be at all surprised if our ministers look upon such a proposal with favour. After all, we must all play our part in keeping the virus from spreading. Not to mention the pro-lockdown crowd who accuse the rest of us as wimps, and feel obliged to compare the loss of our freedoms to our grandfather's compulsory call up to fight in World War II more than eighty years previously.

I sit and rest my head in my open palms. How much longer will this insanity go on? Until the Spring next year? Here I should make myself clear. I could be referred at as a Lockdown Sceptic, or if you like, a Covidiot. However, that is quite different from a Covid Sceptic, one who believes the virus doesn't exist. Rather, I'm fully aware that it does exist. Oh, I know that our ministers mean well. Personally, I'm sure that Boris Johnson, our Prime Minister, imposes such rules with a heavy, reluctant heart. It's the scientists who dream up all these rules and proposes them, to whom the onus ought to fall.

And so, to add to the stress, within the last two weeks, my wife and I had to pay for a taxi ride to an out-of-hours GP surgery for her to submit to a blood test. Her sample was sent to a hospital lab for analysis to see whether she can receive a special medicine through an intravenous dose - Zoledronic Acid. The benefit of this clear fluid is to strengthen her bones which might have been weakened by her cancer tumour. Zoledronic Acid can have some severe side-effects, which her neurological condition could well amplify, that is, intense muscle pain, possibly with flu-like symptoms.

Therefore I had a very heavy heart at the thought of her taking the dose, fearing the possible consequence. Listening to her scream in agonising pain is no novelty, such as happened in the past, yet I need to go with the flow. Therefore, with a reluctant heart, Alex and I took another taxi to Frimley Park Hospital, where, in a large ward-like room filled with other patients, all receiving the same treatment, Alex settled in. No sooner had the catheter had been inserted into her arm and the drip-feed began when her back flared up into intense pain, causing quite a scene in the otherwise quiet but busy ward.

Doctors and nurses flocked around my beloved, and I was questioned about her medical past. Her procedure was aborted, and while she afterwards lay on the bed within a side room, the doctors will have to decide the next move, to discuss whether she is still suitable for the dose. If so, then she would be called back in due course for a second attempt.

A catheter.

Did I have a premonition that something was about to go wrong? I was very unhappy about the dose of Zoledronic Acid, a feeling I did not have for any of her other treatments - the mastectomy itself, followed by a course of chemotherapy, then by her radiotherapy course and the daily transport problems which came with it. Neither any doubt about the hormone pills she presently takes. By the time all these were behind us, I felt hopeless, powerless and adrift in spirit. The next morning I joined a Zoom prayer meeting with other members of Ascot Life Church and I shared with them everything which occurred on the previous day. One of the Elders suggested that for some reason we are not aware of, God had interceded by causing her back to flare up and so, abort the dose.

I guess it's the Romans 8:28 ethic - which we know that all things work for good for those who love God and is called according to his purpose - all things, not just good things. Her sudden back pain might have saved her from a much worse condition which might have demanded hospitalisation for heaven knows how long.

We had a TV-free evening on that day and so we tuned into YouTube. We came across some videos under the title Our Daily Bread, and one series was presented by Dr Con Campbell, a devout Christian. He shot a series of videos tracing the life and journeys of the apostle Paul. It was essentially a Travel series, detailing some of the cities Paul stopped at, including Ephesus, with the ruin of its classic library, along with the Greek amphitheatre where a riot took place as a result of Paul's crusade. Both are still reasonably intact. As for the great Temple of Artemis, one of the largest in the ancient world, only one lonely column remains standing on swampy ground. The rest of the temple had vanished. Being into Travel myself, this series I found to be very edifying, as he diverts his devotion from the life of the apostle to Jesus Christ himself, with the Gospel of salvation thrown into his narration from time to time.

It was after the video had finished and Alex went upstairs to bed, by clicking onto the home page, a short extract from the atheist Alex O'Connor came up. The short clip, lasting about seven minutes, was about his denial of the Resurrection as history. O'Connor, or Cosmic Skeptic by username, was the highly successful graduate and full-time YouTuber with whom I had the privilege to meet in person and talk to in Oxford back in February. 

I checked through his comment forum under his video, There were many comments, but all of them fully agreeing with him in his stance against Christ and the Gospel. What a contrast between O'Connor and Dr Campbell! But I didn't allow the atheist's reasoning to bother me. Instead, I added my own comment to the forum:

Jesus of Nazareth: He has risen. HE HAS RISEN INDEED!

I went into the kitchen feeling jubilant, a vivid contrast to how I felt throughout the week. Jesus is alive. He has risen from the dead, proving He is the Christ and guaranteeing my salvation. I called out, Jesus has risen! Jesus has risen! Jesus has risen! Suddenly, I felt some kind of release from my fears, worries and anxieties. Jesus has risen. That is the centre point of everything in life.

Bringing the reality of Christ's Resurrection into daily reality is helping me cope better with our present Coronavirus situation and with our health as well. Yes, living with heart failure means trips for me to the hospital as well, like next week's visit for a cardio scan. But knowing the Resurrection of Jesus Christ of Nazareth I found to be a boost for morale.

But does that mean that I didn't believe in the Resurrection before then? Yes, of course, I did, as faith in the Resurrection is absolutely vital for a rebirth of the spirit. But this was a reminder as if God was saying, look, I'm here. My Son Jesus of Nazareth is alive, and this must be central to everything in your life.

Well at least someone read my comment, for he replied with the words:

HE HAS RISEN INDEAD.

It just goes to show how O'Connor and his follower's embracing of Darwin's evolutionary theories is absolutely exclusive with faith in Jesus Christ. As one who is wholehearted committed to Divine Creation as described in the first two chapters of Genesis, how easy this fits in with the death, burial and resurrection of Jesus Christ of Nazareth.

The Resurrection of Jesus Christ. The very proof of Him being God, the Second Person of the Holy Trinity. The Jewish Messiah, the one who came to fulfil the Promise made by God to our first parents as well as the expectation of the Jews. And here is something of a mystery for all who deny the reality. That is, close to two thousand years after the event, we are still talking about it. Surely, had it never happened, such an issue would never have arisen.

Indeed, as one example, at least I'm aware that Pythagoras existed and he was the one who worked out that the hypotenuse of a right-angled triangle is equal to the square root of the other two sides added together, eg, if side A is 4cm, side B is 3cm, then (4x4)+(3x3)= √25=5cm. This brilliant Greek discovered that regardless of the size of the right-angled triangle, the theorem is always the same. Another example, let's say, side A is 12cm, side B is 8cm, therefore the hypotenuse is (12x12)+(8x8)= √208=14.42cm approx.

The longest side is the Hypotenuse.

Pythagoras' theorem works well, indeed, professions such as architects and engineers can benefit well by using it, but no temples, churches or shrines were ever built to honour or worship him. Yet he died and has been dead for the last 2,500 years, yet we know about him to this day. So far, like all other humans deceased, he's still awaiting his resurrection. The very fact that a church building is easily found across the Western World (including Israel) testifies that something special must be attributed to Jesus of Nazareth. So far, He's the only human to have risen physically from the dead. So far, nobody else ever had, and I take it that after two millennia, we are still celebrating the event every Spring. How can the atheist be so blind?

Maybe as a lockdown sceptic, I'm asking whether this two-tier restriction farce is sensible. Maybe I'm as blind to Science, especially in virology, as the atheist is blind to the Resurrection of Jesus Christ.

Stern Reprimand or Gentle Love?

Last week I opened my weekly blog with a testimony of our trip to Eilat back in 2000 as a couple, together with a bunny in the oven, after recently watching this YouTube presenter dive-bomb from the pierhead into the coral-rich turquoise sea. But today I would like to go back even further, to the Summer of 1970, when I was a seventeen-year-old teenager. Back then I spent a couple of weeks at Butlin's Holiday Camp located on the Sussex coast, close by to the traditional-style Victorian seaside resort of Bognor Regis. It was my first ever away-break taken without my parents.

Butlins Holiday Camp around the 70s.

To every reader who doesn't live in the UK, maybe a little insight might help define a holiday camp. It's a typical British institution, the original idea dreamt up by a fairground lover and entrepreneur William Butlin, who established a holiday camp, I believe, near the Lincolnshire resort of Skegness, on the North Sea coast sometime in the 1930s. Overnight accommodation originally consisting of tents, along with a nearby fairground, the camp soon began to develop into a full resort with chalets replacing tents and many other facilities added to the fairground, including a roller-skating rink, swimming pool, a table tennis hall, other games facilities, several theatres, two ballrooms (one for Old Time dancing, the other for modern ballroom, and there was also a discotheque.) All these facilities were free to use by the holidaymaker once the booking and cover fee for chalet hire was paid for.

Back in 1970, each chalet was a small self-contained room with a bed, a table-and-chair and a small bathroom, but no kitchen, as it was required to eat at the resort restaurant at given set times. It was the home for the vacationer for the whole of his stay. Had I gone with a friend, then we would have had a separate chalet, one for each of us. Nowadays, the chalets are greatly improved with kitchens for self-catering guests and larger family accommodation, in other words, what we would call holiday homes. 

For all the residents, in 1970, there was a huge restaurant, accommodating several hundred people at a time, where three meals were served, free, each day throughout the stay. Also nowadays, there are a variety of cafes and coffee bars catering for all, but especially for day visitors.

Set in a time when dishwashing machines weren't yet installed and thus crockery was washed by hand, in the kitchen behind the service hatch and out of sight from all the guests, the staff was busy in both in the preparation of the food and the washing up during and after each mealtime. Looking back, I tend to believe that many of the kitchen workers were undergrads on Summer leave from their universities. The stress which goes into such seasonal work is often revealed by a sudden loud POFF! - followed by a cheer from the guests - "Hurrah!"

These accidents tended to be quite frequent, hardly a day passes without one plate, cup or saucer dropping to the floor and shattering. And so the wheels of the machine keeps on turning - the famous Redcoats kept us all entertained, especially in the evenings, other staff were lifeguards at the swimming pool, others supervised each ride on the fairground, and still others pushed brooms, mops, and the daily use of detergent keeping the Environmental Officer happy and everyone, staff members and guests alike, enjoying the minimal risk of picking up a bug on the campsite.

And not to forget back in 1970 when it was quite fashionable for a lounge to be sited in the same building as the swimming pool, and below the water level. Huge tough-glazed observation windows lined the pool, giving a fabulous sub-aquatic view of the swimmers as each thrashes his legs about at the deep end of the pool. It was just like looking into an aquarium. As the loungers relax in their comfortable armchairs watching all the goings-on underwater, so the continuous, almost melodic low hum of the pool chlorinators ensure that its hygiene safety was kept to the right level.  

What a pity it is for such sub-aquatic views not to exist anymore! Watching swimmers and bathers through a sub-aquatic window was so relaxing, indeed, even therapeutic, hence the presence of fish tanks in some public venues to this day. Could it be the case of underwater flatulence be the cause of many prudish spectators taking offence and complaining to the staff? And even causing others to snigger? Not to mention the embarrassment felt by the bather himself. Indeed, the 1960s and 70s was a very different era, an era of innocence, even naivety, perhaps. Our last visit to a Butlin's holiday camp was at Minehead in 2003, with Alex and our baby daughter. It was to attend a Spring Harvest Christian festival, and the upgraded swimming pool, complete with flumes and a space bowl, is housed in a building of its own, without any observation windows.

Camp Restaurant around the 1970s.

I suppose these days when huge dishwashing machines now line the kitchen walls and far fewer dishes break, all this make kitchen work considerably easier, as even now the large restaurant for overnight guests is still fully functional. But going back to 1970, it has never crossed my mind just how often a van arrives with new crockery to replace those constantly broken. And so, such a vehicle may arrive rather discreetly in the staff car park and out of sight from any guests.

I guess might be quite easy for someone in his own home, having accidentally dropped and broken a valuable plate, to be criticised and be called a clumsy fool, especially when the offender is a child. Of course, the one making the accusation had never dropped any breakable item, and he believes that he never will. But then again, there is a difference between a plain white plate, cup or saucer, one of many in a large restaurant, and a highly valued antique handed down over several generations of a family.

One more-recent incident occurred while I was at a leisure pool restaurant following a gym and sauna session. A family was seated at a table directly in front of my table. Suddenly, the young daughter of the family, a girl I guess to be three or four years old, accidentally dropped a white side plate and broke it. She immediately burst into tears, perhaps with the realisation of it happening before and receiving a telling-off from one of her relatives. One of the staff members then approached and calmly cleaned up the shrapnel, probably even smiling and reassuring the little girl that nothing was really amiss.

The result was it didn't take long for the girl to calm down and cease her weeping, and the rest of the family was able to finish their post-swim refreshments without any further ado.

The incident of the little girl directly in front of me was out of an unexpected and unintentional circumstance, as with the worker who accidentally drops a dish at the restaurant kitchen. There is quite a difference between this little girl and say, a rebellious son who deliberately smashes a plate out of anger and frustration from not getting his own way. In the boy's case, a firm reprimand is needed to teach him the difference between right and wrong and that the world doesn't revolve around him, maybe with further punishment in withholding treats or favours and even to be sent up to his bedroom for a while.

Therefore, I could ask, what has inspired me to write a blog such as this one? Earlier today, my beloved was cooking in the kitchen whilst I remained in the lounge, reading the paper. We have an agreed rule here about not having two people in the kitchen at the same time. Suddenly there was this almighty "POFF", and I was startled. Alarmed, I made a dash into the kitchen, expecting my wife to be in a neurological fit, something which can happen quick and unexpected. But instead, she looked up at me very apologetically, a smashed bowl of stew all over the floor. The vessel had slipped through her fingers as she took it out of the microwave oven.

But did I reprimand her? Not at all! Having been married to each other for more than two decades, I knew perfectly well that this was purely an accident. In fact, I can say for sure that this is the first time something like this has ever happened. All I did was to take her in my arms and reassured my love for her. The same attitude Jesus Christ has for His Church, which is seen as His bride.

I suppose this incident is a kind of picture. Just as I was able to feel no need to reprimand her for such a misdemeanour but instead reassured her of my love, I believe that is how God sees me whenever I slip up. And I slip up all the time. Even King David once wrote that if God was to take account of all his sins, how would he stand? (Psalm 130:3). And considering what James says in his letter, that if someone keeps the Law perfectly but stumbles at just one point, he is guilty of breaking the whole Law (James 2:10) - and such he must be taken to Court, just as any car driver who was unfortunate enough to be caught speeding. He might plead to the magistrate that he had never driven in excess speed before, but his plea would be of no use. He has broken the law and must face a penalty.

That is unless someone pays the penalty on the driver's behalf. Once paid, the driver is free to go. In judicial terms, the driver was forensically acquitted. Praise be to God, the penalty for my sins, and there are plenty of them, have all been paid for by the crucifixion of the One who had no sin, His death and burial, then His Resurrection to prove that the atonement was effective and anyone who believes can receive this forgiveness of all sin - past, present and future. Are all my future sins already forgiven? Well, how many of my sins were committed after the Crucifixion? All of them, for there were nearly two thousand years between His death and Resurrection, and my birth.

Camp chalets, around 1980.

But being what I am, I can, and do sin in the same way as that boy throwing a tantrum for not getting his own way. In my childhood day, I would have gotten a smack from Dad (and indeed, I was smacked!) Such discipline was well deserved. As the Bible says, we will all stand before God (Romans 14:10, 2 Corinthians 5:10.) But this will be a judgement of rewards, not salvation, as every saint have been forensically acquitted. Therefore, all will either be rewarded or suffer loss. And I believe there will be plenty of tears, but all will live. Because forensic acquittal got by the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ, not a single saint will lose his salvation, but instead, he will suffer the loss of heavenly rewards.

However, God the Father has promised that He will wipe every tear, according to Revelation 21:4. After giving my account to God at the Judgement seat, I can imagine some tears will be shed. But God Himself will produce His heavenly hanky and wipe the tears away in tender loving care. It would be like the little girl who accidentally broke a dish at the pool restaurant. The member of staff who swept up the shatterings gave her a smile of reassurance and she made a rapid recovery. Or in the case of my own beloved, who thought I would upbraid her for her clumsiness and the waste of a complete lunch, but all I felt was love and tenderness for her. She quickly pulled through, and I went out to our local superstore to buy two identical replacement bowls.

Oh, to pour out my heart to God, and to throw all my burdens, anxieties and worries on Jesus Christ, because He cares for me - 1 Peter 5:7.  

Prosperity Gospel is Heresy.

 As we spent the evening together browsing YouTube - there was nothing worth watching that particular evening on either of the BBC channels, neither does commercial TV grab our interest either - we tuned onto a video of this young Christian couple exploring Eilat. And I was disappointed with their footage. His wife, already in the sea and using a waterproof video camera, filmed him leaping off the pier to dive-bomb into the turquoise sea. True enough, where they filmed, it was at a location further south along the coast to where we were two decades earlier. Yet, we were still intrigued as we watched him plunge into the sea bum-first over and over again, so close to the Egyptian border.

Coral Beach, Eilat, taken October 2000

Eilat is situated on the most southerly tip of Israel, where one of the two "fingers" of the "arm" of the Indian Ocean floods into the rift valley separating Israel from Jordan, the Gulf of Aqaba. Eilat is right at the "fingertip". The other "finger" branching out to the west is the Gulf of Suez. Both are extensions of the Red Sea, itself the "arm" of the Indian Ocean. The landmass between the two "fingers", the southern tip of the Negev Desert, is a mountainous area, believed by many to be the Mt Sinai where the Decalogue, or the Ten Commandments, was delivered to the Hebrew nation from Heaven. 

The resort of Eilat was the furthest location we had ever travelled as a couple, and despite being so far from Jerusalem, Galilee and the Mediterranean coast, (where all three we had already visited) it was possible to spend several hours there on a day trip by bus from Jerusalem. As Alex was nearly twenty weeks pregnant with our first daughter, she felt a little too cautious to snorkel, but having hired the equipment from the hotel kiosk, I enjoyed the full experience of subtropical coral reef wonders while she relaxed at the pierhead, keeping her eye on me.

The tranquil beauty of the reef, with little fishes darting to and fro, either unaware or unafraid of the human hovering just above them, it was a fulfilment of my dreams, also an echo of the Great Barrier Reef snorkelling experience just three years earlier, when I thought back then that I would be a confirmed bachelor for life.

Therefore to watch someone divebombing over an area where marine life is so precious, I have found unnerving. I can imagine any fish swimming peacefully in the vicinity instantly vanish at the moment of impact. Whether both are graduates I can only guess, but going by their more serious set of presentations elsewhere, I tend to think they are. But who am I to judge them over their apparent lack of concern for the delicate semitropical marine life?

The Red Sea, the Great Barrier Reef, even the black basaltic outcrop of the Lanzarote coast plunging into the Atlantic, forming a natural underwater cove brimming with life, I have got to admit how I was incredibly fortunate to see such marine splendour through glass goggles and breathing through a tube. And all such experiences are further enhanced by using a cheap underwater camera, its cardboard structure sealed in a transparent plastic case, at all three destinations. I was somewhat surprised that even with trashy equipment, the resulting underwater photos are good enough to grace any enthusiast's album. 

And such beautiful thoughts and memories, laced with a dash of disappointment, filled our heads and our hearts as we watched the video. Indeed, I consider all these experiences as undeserved privileges, although one can argue that by working hard and saving up hard, I deserve them all.

In Proverbs 16:9 Solomon writes that although man may devise in his heart, it is God who directs his paths. His father David also wrote that although I may reach to heaven, you are there. If I were to make my bed in the depths, you are there. If I was to rise on the wings of the dawn, you are there. If I were to settle on the far side of the sea, even there your right hand will guide me (Psalm 139:8-10).

As far as I'm aware, how can I prove that there was no Travel Agent near to where he lived and reigned? The hint of prophecy, if that was intended, was certainly accurate! As he had also written,

Oh, that I had wings like a dove! For then I would fly away and be at rest. - Psalm 55:6.

Had that always been my wish? Although King David had only dreamed of travel, how fortunate I am to actually fulfil his prophecy. It's as if God had wanted to show me His glory of creation, allowing me to fly away like a bird to see such distant wonders, such dramatic beauty, both land and sea alike, as well as the stars in their full glory from the bottom of the Grand Canyon in 1995. The purpose of all this is to glorify God.

The reef at Coral Beach, Eilat, taken 2000.

If I have something to boast about, then allow me to boast in the Lord. What does it mean, "boasting in the Lord?" It simply means giving God the credit and thanks for allowing me to make such trips.

Indeed, I can look back and acknowledge that God has blessed me well. And I certainly didn't deserve it! As one who by nature always sees the glass as half-empty rather than thank the Lord that there is some water in it, and tend to ask why God has blessed some more than others, here I will say that God has blessed me well without trying to make myself worthy of these blessings. Instead, they came by God's grace.

A psychologist once wrote in a newspaper that personal experience is more fulfilling than owning possessions. I fully agree with him. Here I'm not talking about whether owning a television, a cooking stove, and a washing machine as all luxury goods. These are essential to our modern way of living. After all, with shorter working hours than in Victorian times, a television will help alleviate idleness and boredom. A cooking stove saves us from having to roast meat on a spit in cold and wet weather or to boil vegetables over an open fire. And a washing machine is certainly labour-saving - another burden for the Victorian housemaid lumbered with a stack of dirty linen. And we need a bank account to meet all our needs. But whether there is enough money in the account to meet all one's needs or aiming to stack up millions is another matter.

Or the car, wristwatch or even a bicycle. Surely, there is a difference between owning a Skoda and a Lamborghini! Yet both serve the same purpose - to take the owner from A to B. I could own a £20 digital wristwatch bought from Argos catalogue store, or I can work hard to buy a Patek gentleman's watch for £100,000 from one of London's top jewellers. But both will tell exactly the same time. Or with a bicycle, I can buy a second-hand runabout from someone's private garage for £30 or I can go to a specialist bike shop and come out with an S-Works Shiv Disc triathlon bicycle for more than £10,000. Yet both would get me from A to B by pedal power. The snag is, I have no problem locking up the cheap bike in the street. But I have yet to see a Shiv locked up in the street - as if I ever will.

Or, for that matter, leave a Lamborghini parked overnight in a rough estate? Or even wear the Patek wristwatch whilst walking through a dark alley?

By now you must get the gist. Prosperity. And there is, what seems to me to be strange teaching going around in some churches. It often referred to as the Prosperity Gospel. If I have got its meaning right, then it basically means that prosperity and wealth will follow everyone who walks with God. And if a Christian is struggling with his finances, then he is either not walking entirely within God's will or he needs to "claim the blessing" which may include "rebuking the poverty demon" which is afflicting the believer's life. Again, Jesus does not seem to side with the rich man throughout his ministry.

On one occasion, a young man who is a ruler of a synagogue came up to Jesus and admit that even obeying the Commandments has not reassured him of eternal life. The young man asks, What do I still lack?

To which Jesus replied, Sell everything you have and give the money to the poor and come, follow me, and you will have riches in heaven. The rich man walked away sad, and watching him go, Jesus then declared how hard it is for a rich man to enter the kingdom of God. Indeed, it's easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle than for a rich man to enter the kingdom of God. No wonder his disciples asked, that if that was the case, then who can be saved. To which Jesus answered, What is impossible with men is possible with God - Luke 18:18-30.

Or the rich fool of Luke 12:13-21. It begins with the younger of two brothers asking Jesus to arbitrate for him concerning his older brother's inheritance. According to Jewish law, it's the eldest son who receives the greater from his father's will. This fellow did not believe this was fair.

To which Jesus tells the story of a rich farmer whose field produced abundantly. Figuring out that his present barn is too small to store his abundance, he decides to tear it down and build a much bigger one. After this, it's a life of ease, eating drinking and being merry. But God called him a fool and that night his soul will be required of him. Then who will inherit his wealth?

Yet supposing this man was a lot wiser and fell to his knees and thanked God for the abundance of crops, then asked Him on how he can distribute to the poor and share in his abundance to those not so well off. Would have died that night? Very unlikely. Rather, his life would not only have greater fulfilment but he would be highly regarded by the community.

The young rich ruler walks away sad...

Prosperity Gospel is a subject my Creationist friend Andrew Milnthorpe and I have been discussing, after having left a church which taught such heresy. If only we all realise that we cannot take a single crumb with us when we die. But I believe we will take our memories with us. I believe that once in Heaven, all bad memories will be eliminated, completely wiped out. But I believe that good memories will remain, and be a talking point among redeemed saints. 

Of course, God wants to bless us. To me, God has given me the tremendous privilege to live in a hostel right in the heart of Jerusalem Old City, the City of the Great King, and to walk through its streets. All this to bolster my faith in Him and to assure me that the Bible is true and also to gain a better understanding. Then all the natural places God has shown me, such as the mangroves in Australia, palm trees and tropical and Mediterranean vegetation in Singapore and Australia, Israel, southern Europe and the USA, the dynamic Niagara Falls in Canada, the majestic Grand Canyon of the Colorado River, the magnificent view of the stars in full glory from inside the Canyon, the coral reefs and marine life of Eilat, the Great Barrier Reef and Lanzarote. Yes, I have a lot to thank God for.

But as for material blessings, God may indeed bestow such on a person or family. But it's not to be stored away in barns but to share with the less fortunate.  Praise God for the death of Jesus Christ on the cross to atone for our sins, His burial, and His Resurrection to give us a new life with imputed righteousness credited to us, turning us from sad young men and greedy rich farmers into benevolent saints of God.

Running Against A Strong Headwind...

A second lockdown is back with us here in good old England. And four weeks of it too. And so the media, especially the Daily Mail national newspaper, seem to report contradictory evidence. Do we need a lockdown or not? According to our Prime Minister Boris Johnson and his three-men-in-a-tub: Chris Whitty, Matt Hancock and Pat Vallance, another lockdown is necessary to contain the virus and to slow down its spreading. Others insist that a second lockdown will do more harm than good and it's nothing more than kicking the empty tin can further down the road. Furthermore, accusations of false information and figures deliberately inflated to give us all the creeps, instead, making all us further confused.

Poor Boris Johnson! Receiving advice from both directions, there he stands in the middle, and had I been him, I would fall on my knees in prayer and asked other Christians to pray for me to lead the country in the right way, maybe even put out a nationwide prayer request.

The snag with this is such a request for prayer guidance would be met with delirious mockery from some, apathetic silence from others, from others still, to be regarded as a write-off, unfit to lead a country without some "help" from some fictitious old bearded man in the sky. And then there will be still others who would pray. Not all are atheists. 

And the lockdown gives plenty of opportunities to meditate, especially while I'm out and about.

With an area of high pressure at this moment sitting over the UK, the Autumn sky is clear of clouds, the sun, quite low over the horizon, nevertheless bring cheer to the deciduous trees as their leaves turn a golden brown over a calm surface of the lake over which the trees border, creating a mirror-image reflection. All this just a short walk from my home. As the leaves of the trees turn golden yellow, orange and red, the contents of the lake which I'm standing by flows through an underground stream which will eventually meet with the River Thames, pass through London and eventually empty into the North Sea. Over many months, that is.

South Lake, close to my home.

The cycle of nature continues to circulate. The sun evaporates the sea, the vapour condenses into clouds while drifting towards the hills and mountains and fall as rain, nourishing all vegetation which will, in turn, provide food and shelter for all life, wildlife, domesticated, and man alike. The rainwater collects as rivers, in some, cascading over high ledges as spectacular waterfalls, and then meandering over flat plains, whether forested or agricultural, even through cities, to empty back into the ocean. As the Hydraulic Cycle never ceases, neither will the world ever stop turning, night always follows day, as the sphere whizzes through space to complete a slightly elliptical and eccentric orbit around the sun, adding each year to our age.

And yet we batten down our hatches as the infection rate keeps on rising, and even now, actually ordered from the powers above not to let anyone, whether friend or distant relative, into my own home. Thus I sit in quietness, with my mind filled with curiosity on why our nation remains apathetic to God, who holds all things together and keeps the mechanics of nature well-oiled, as well as sustain our lives.

Like in one of our Zoom virtual prayer meetings held every weekday mornings, run by Ascot Life Church. Longing, oh, longing for a hug, nevertheless, I gaze at the pigeonhole set-up on our computer screen and listen to one of our elders read out Psalm 139. After he had finished with the verses describing God's omnipresence, I shine a spotlight onto the verses highlighting on how we are secretly and wonderfully made "in the depths of the earth" (v. 15.) I then went on to remind the group about our superb immune system, how we breathe in germs at all times and how the body can fight them without falling ill ourselves, how we eat food and then allow the digestive tract do its work without our conscious efforts, how electric cells near our heart regulates the muscular contractions as the "red river of life" flows through the bloodstream.

And yet we seem to be alone, living in a world which is hostile to God and in full reliance on Science to solve the problem of this virus and to bring the pandemic to an end. And YouTube and television keep on insisting in Darwinian evolution as factual, with Wikipedia referring to Divine Creation as a pseudoscience, with all its followers portrayed as somewhat delirious. Therefore, I have respect for scientists who holds a large question mark over this evolutionary theory which seems to have robbed our minds of genuine scientific knowledge and common sense. Therefore, in preparation for this blog, I had to brush up on what I had already learnt in the past, together with some new information.

For example, the huge Deoxyribonucleic Acid molecule (DNA), or the chromosome, is about 88 millimetres in length if straightened out, yet just over half a trillionth of a centimetre in width. Although it resembles a twisted ladder, it's so small, it fits well inside the nucleus of a cell, normally in the form of an X. There are 44 chromosomes in each cell, 22 from each parent, along with a pair of X or Y chromosomes, depending on the gender of the individual, thus making 46 chromosomes in a cell altogether.

Each chromosome consist of nucleotides, the rungs which make up the ladder, while the two parallel "rails" are the polynucleotides. The rungs are set in pairs, one rung consisting of Thymene, paired with Adenine, while Guanine is paired with Cytosine. Thus these rungs are referred to as Base Pairs.

In Chromosome 1, for example, 247,199,719 base pairs are making up the ladder. Each pair must be arranged in exactly the right sequence to produce the right code required for the production of the protein appropriate to the cell, or else it could malfunction and even die.

Scientists and academics such as Michael Bere, William A. Dembski, Fred Hoyle, N. Chandra Wickramasinghe and Emile Borel have made mathematical calculations on the probabilities on the cell having evolved without an intelligent designer. Take the DNA molecule. If the mathematical formula was calculated based on factors, say, for example, 6x5x4x3x2, the answer would be 720. This form of calculation is referred to as 6! - thus 6!=720. The probability of a DNA molecule having evolved by chance or without a Designer would equal to one chance out of 1x10^40,000. That is one, followed by 40,000 zeroes.

It was Fred Hoyle who was astonished by such a calculation. He reckoned that the chance of picking by random just one electron out of the entire universe, the chance would be 1x10^80. If each electron becomes a universe in itself, then to pick one electron out of all those universes would be 1x10^160.

Yet, despite the evidence, Fred Hoyle preferred to remain an atheist and an evolutionist. To bring any reality to his preferred theory, he rejected the Big Bang theory of how the Universe had begun and favoured an eternal existence, thus accommodating the idea that life on Earth originated by amino acid molecules hitching a ride on a meteorite which plunged into the primaeval ocean. He coined up the theory of Panspermia. This idea was given a boost when in 1969 a meteor fell near the Australian town of Murchison in New Victoria. The fact that it was packed with amino acid molecules gave credit to the evolutionary idea of Panspermia as the source of all life's origins.

But Michael Bere had other ideas. Seeing the same calculations, he wrote in Evolution's Black Box that it was time for Darwinism to be thrown out to the garbage and teaching it in schools should cease. Then William A. Dembski's Criterion had made a calculation for the probability of the whole living cell to evolve without any intelligent intervention.  

If it's considered that between all 46 chromosomes in the cell containing up to 6,159,687,494 basic pairs of nucleotides, then with all the other molecular machinery making up the perfect functioning of the life of the cell, the probability of it evolving by chance is 1x10^4,478,146. That is, one chance in one, followed by 4,478,146 zeroes!

Such impossibility was demonstrated by Emile Borel in the context of time. To accommodate such a probability, on a basis of one billion trials a day, itself a tremendously big number, the wait would be 1x10^91 days or 2.74x10^88 years. If secular science dates the age of the Solar System as only five billion years, then it's still a tiny fraction of the wait required for the cell to fully evolve.

Secular scientists have branded all this as a pseudoscience, as they reckon the maths is wrong. But with even Wikipedia classifying Creationists as living in a dreamland, as a Creationist myself, I can't help feeling somewhat lonely. Indeed, it may be a lot easier to give in to peer pressure and accept theistic evolution, but I, for one would prefer to stick with the truthfulness of the Bible. As I have mentioned in my previous blogs, many atheists at YouTube fancy the idea of a flat earth as one of the beliefs of Christian Creationists.

As as I have said before, rather than to believe that the earth is a flat disc covered by a glass-like dome known as the firmament, I rather believe what the Bible itself hints, which is that the Hebrew word translated as "Firmament" actually indicate an expanse, a sphere of water vapour within the earth's antediluvian atmosphere, yet it's not there now.

Could the trapped heat generated by this ancient expanse of water vapour had been responsible for the giantism found among various species of Dinosaur, especially that of the Sauropods? If such beasts were alive before the Flood and that the water vapour in the antediluvian atmosphere was also responsible for the longevity of man - after all, Adam lived to 930 years, Seth 912 years, Enosh 905 years, Kenan 910 years, Mahalalel 895 years, Jared 962 years, Methuselah 969 years, Lamech 777 years, Noah 950 years.

After the Flood, Shem lived to 600 years, Arphaxad 438 years, Shelah 433 years, Eber 464 years, Peleg 239 years, Reu 239 years, Serug 230 years, Nahor 148 years, Terah 205 years, Abraham 175 years, Isaac 180 years, Jacob 147years, and Joseph 110 years. The writer of Genesis wanted us to know the chronology of our ancestors, as well as the ancestry of the Hebrews, with the emphasis that the collapse of the canopy or expanse during the Flood had a devastating impact on all land animal species and human longevity.

Although I tend to favour the canopy theory, that the thick expanse of water vapour had resulted in both antediluvian giantism of various animal species and the extreme longevity of mankind, my doctor friend Andrew Milnthorpe, also a devout Creationist, prefer the Genome bottleneck theory. But whichever the case may be (and both could apply) one piece of evidence here becomes obvious, the law of entropy causing the genome of all postdiluvian life to deteriorate. Present-day land animals are much smaller in size and human longevity is less than a tenth of antediluvian longevity. Indeed, entropy seems to work against evolution, not for it. 

Fragment of Murchison Meteorite

And the atheist reaction to the veracity of the Bible is a throwback to an incident which took place in the garden of Eden. Soon after Adam and Eve ate the fruit from the forbidden tree and fell into sin, guilt bade them hide behind a bush when the presence of God was felt. Fear of judgement. At present, atheists are doing exactly the same thing - hiding behind the theory of evolution to blank out from their reality the fear of judgement. Adam and Eve ran behind the bush, the atheist runs behind Charles Darwin. Not much of a difference there.

As this lockdown takes its course, nothing is better than to reflect on the truthfulness of the Bible and give our Saviour God all the glory he deserves.