Who DO you Believe?

If I have got this right, whilst I sit in front of my laptop typing out this blog, a congregation of young people from churches around London and the Home Counties, including a large contingent from my home church in Ascot, are at this moment assembled at Westminster Chapel for a conference. "Conference", that is, a series of sermons delivered from the pulpit, usually on a specific subject in relation to the Bible. Rather like at the turn of the Millennium, when Alex and I attended the Prayer for Israel Conference at the same venue and hosted by that late great Israeli preacher and advocate, Lance Lambert.

At least that P.F.I. Conference was open for people of all ages, I assume, from teenager upwards, with no set upper age limit. It was also about the same time I took my young wife to the Holy Land to celebrate our first wedding anniversary. As such, the P.F.I. meant a lot for both of us. At Westminster Chapel, Lance Lambert spoke into our spirits. Therefore I have to admit of my puzzlement on why at this conference taking place at this moment, there is a set upper age limit, which is up to but not including one's fortieth birthday. In other words, the Westminster Chapel conference is for eighteen-to-thirties only. And so I ponder what will be taught from the pulpit which is so relevant for them but no longer relevant for oldies such as myself.

Westminster Chapel, London

Maybe I will ask one of the students tomorrow, after the morning service, that is with the hope that they will be able to get out of bed early enough to attend church after such a busy day. Maybe he will tell me that it was about Courtship, Marriage and Children. Or the conference may be about future church leadership. Not much use for those who regularly attend an Anglican church unless you are a student at Oxford or Cambridge. Far less if the ambition of those at the conference is to become the Bishop of Canterbury. For that, one has to post-graduate to a level of a doctorate at Oxbridge. Too bad that none of the twelve disciples of Jesus Christ had managed to reach such academic levels, although one of them, Judas Iscariot, might have come close.

But let's be fair. Saul of Tarsus was a well educated Jew, a rising Pharisee, a son of a Pharisee, from the tribe of Benjamin. He had the equivalent of a doctorate attained from Oxford or Cambridge. Not only was he a rising star at the Sanhedrin, but the throwing of a garment at his feet whilst Stephen was stoned to death was an indication of future leadership. Saul was thoroughly into the Scriptures. But like all the other Jews around him, Saul failed to discern the signs of the times. For example, he was well familiar with the writings of the prophet Daniel. So were the High Priest and all other members of the Sanhedrin. I know this, because when Jesus quoted from that scroll during his trial, the entire assembly had really got hot under the collar, so much so that the High Priest had to tear his cloak from top to bottom!  

What was the sign of the times found in Daniel's scroll? Some simple arithmetic would have made a connection between Daniel's prophecy and the timing of Jesus' triumphal entry into Jerusalem, his Death and Resurrection. If such experts were aware that Nehemiah's commission to rebuild the walls of Jerusalem took place in the month of Nisan, during the twentieth year into the reign of Persian King Artaxerxes, then those members of the Sanhedrin would have been able to work out that such a particular date occurred some 483 Hebrew years earlier, at 445 BC. By making such calculations, the Jews would have been far more likely to have made a connection between this Jesus of Nazareth and the awaited Messiah (Nehemiah 2:1-6, Daniel 9:20-27, Matthew 26:57-68).

But they all missed the point. Despite such learning, they failed to connect this Jesus as their awaited Messiah or Christ. And his authoritative teachings backed by many miracles performed, especially with the raising of Lazarus from the dead, yet still failed connect this Jesus as the Christ. As for myself, I have always felt inspired by such prophecy and its fulfilment in Jesus Christ. This led me to an interest in End Time Prophecy, particularly in the 1980's when I bought books on the subject, particularly by Hal Lindsey, Tim LaHaye and Norman Robertson, all three predicting the end of the present age by the turn of the Millennium. Unfortunately for them, we are still here and it's still business as usual, which has also led to the rise of doubters who had since poured scorn on this so-called "Dispensationalist Theory".

Not that I no longer believe in the "Rapture" or translation of all saints to heaven before the actual return of Jesus Christ to Earth. I still believe in the Rapture, which has always been held as imminent, or could happen at any moment, totally unexpected. I have always believed in it since the mid seventies when I bought and read The Late Great Planet Earth along with its sister book, There's A New World Coming, both by Hal Lindsey. But I need to be truthful about myself here, and ask: Has such gaining of knowledge made me a better man who is loving towards others? Sad to say, the answer to that question is No. Instead, I was tempted to feel smug. Like one evening in 1974 as I was walking through Brixton in South London, I passed a Unification Church with its doors open and people milling around. This type of church is part of a group which denies the reality of the Trinity. I felt a sense of smugness as I walked passed it, when maybe I should have been praying for the light of truth to shine into their hearts, if  I believed they were on the wrong tracks.

And the same can be applied to Creationism. I have already testified on my conversion from committing myself in Darwinian Evolution to Divine Creation, from one straight to the other, on one stormy evening. But there is a danger that I could feel smug about myself in my commitment to Creation and the Deluge of Noah's day, when I'm called to love others around me and to seek an opportunity to share the Gospel to those who don't yet know God.

But is it right to do good to others whilst remaining unsure about my core beliefs? If, for example, there was an Indian Buddhist who not only shown hospitality to strangers but actually went out of his way to reach the poor and the hungry to help them. The sort of man who actually welcomes strangers and passing travellers into his home and feeds them, refreshes them and even provide a bed for the night if such a provision is necessary. Someone who is beginning to resemble Job of the Old Testament, whom God refers to as a righteous man. Then over here in England, where houses are regarded as castles, two Christians, each living across the street, squabble whether one is eternally saved or not, and ends up slamming the front door at each other and both feeling in a bit of a huff. One who holds Calvinist views, the other Arminian views. As words are thrown one from one to the other and back, any observer with neutral views will wonder who of the three is really doing the will of God and showing Christlike characteristics.

I can't help what Jesus had said on one occasion. He said,

Do not be amazed at this, for a time is coming when all who are in their graves will hear his voice and come out - those who have done good will rise to live, and those who had done evil will rise to be condemned. (John 5:28-29, Acts 24:15).

Of course, every evangelical Christian will say that the "good" done for a favourable resurrection are deeds done under the power of the Holy Spirit, whilst so-called "goodness" done "in the flesh" will still lead into perdition. This may even be backed by the conversion of Cornelius. He was well into good deeds before his conversion, but this did not excuse him and his household from the need to believe in Jesus and be filled with the Holy Spirit. If such an incident demonstrates the case, then every church should have the brightest light to shine in a dark world. Like moths attracted to candlelight, unbelievers would flock to these churches, at least for curiosity, if not to receive some form of benefit whether physical, spiritual, or even psychological. Even Jesus himself endorsed this a little later that unbelievers will know that we are his disciples if we have love for each other (John 13:35). The reality is that any just about every English church I have ever visited, I am sad to say that I have not come across such a level of goodness and love of the level indicated by Jesus Christ, or for that matter, that of Cornelius or even the Buddhist. 

Which makes me attempt to put myself in the neutral's position. To whom would he be most impressed, the Calvinist, the Arminian - or the Buddhist? Of course, the two quarrelling Christian believers will still go to heaven after they die, despite the constant bicker and even hatred fostered between them, whilst the Buddhist will end up in a fiery hell, and that after feeding the hungry, helped those in poverty, provided a bed for the wayward traveller, or even done something as simple as offering a cup of water to a thirsty passerby who happens to be a true Christian believer. 

It is something that would cause me to pull on my own hair in frustration. I have to be honest with myself, I would be far more impressed with the Buddhist, who most likely have some form of Divine Creation belief, which ever direction it takes in the world of Buddhism. But I have not found this among English, middle-class Christian graduates. Nor for that matter, on the universality of Noah's Flood. 

And the issue of a geographically universal flood has always intrigued me. Just think, the very ground I'm standing on - whether it would be on a mountain summit, on a hillside, in a valley, on an expanse of flat plain, in a forest, at a desert, in the countryside, on a meadow, at the beach, in the city street, at a slum area, whether it's here at home in the UK, or in Israel, North America, Singapore, Australia, or central Europe - every square inch of ground I ever stood on was once underwater. However, I have read of one 19th Century theologian, a person who is a true believer in Christ and preaches salvation by faith in Jesus Christ, yet adores the works of geologists Charles Lyell, Georges Cuvier, William Buckland, John Fleming, and other great academics of his day who all deny the reality of a universal deluge, and its geological implications, to have been sent by God to wipe out a corrupt antediluvian race. This person I'm referring to is John Pye-Smith, an English churchman who wanted to reconcile the works of these academics with the Scriptural testimony of Genesis. So he worked on a theory based on recorded hydrodynamics at work within local floods occurring around the world, and their potential to snuff out life of both animal and human unfortunate enough to be caught in such deluges.

Pye-Smith made such reconciliation between the two opposing parties - the Bible and Uniformitarian geology - by coming up with the concept of an anthropological universal but geographically local Flood theory, mainly that the Flood was the result of a rapid subsidence of the Mesopotamian basin to allow the waters of the Indian Ocean to rush in and at the same time drowning the entire antediluvian race. And this without a single person escaping the catastrophe by climbing one of many surrounding mountain ranges. Tied to this idea is the impossibility of the Ark resting on the summit of the traditional Mt. Ararat located in Eastern Turkey, for this location, is not only too far away from the Mesopotamian Basin but it's summit, at 1,537 metres high, would make such a local Flood improbable. Therefore John Pye-Smith had to relocate Mt. Ararat to one of the foothills within the Mesopotamian Basin.

The traditional Mt. Ararat, on the Eastern Turkish border.

John Pye Smith with his local-Flood theory was a typical English Christian who finds himself far more at home in his compromise than sticking his neck out in full support for the verity of Holy Scripture. This looks to be very much like many of our church-going graduates I have spoken to at present. And in addition, I can give a rather shocking surprise when I browsed through a book written by one of Britain's most famous and most popular itinerant preachers, Cambridge-educated Methodist David Pawson, one-time pastor of Millmeads Baptist Church in Guildford, Surrey, before relocating to another church in the Hampshire town of Basingstoke. Pawson is the author of many books, including two of his well known debunking Eternal Security. Another of his books, a volume called Unlocking the Bible, which is basically a commentary on all the books in the Bible, including, of course, Genesis. Turning to the section of Noah and the Deluge,  I couldn't help but noticing that Pawson is in keeping with John Pye-Smith, with his version of the map of a local flood covering the Mesopotamian Valley, with his emphasis on human morality and personal responsibility towards God rather than with any importance over the geographical extent of the Flood.

Yet Pawson is popular, even among those in our church at Ascot. Here is the crutch. If someone with the likes of Pawson insist that the Flood of Noah was anthropologically universal but geographically local in extend, and I come along with the insistence that the Flood was both geographical and anthropologically universal, then Pawson's view, along with Pye-Smith's view in his attempt for reconciliation with the likes of Uniformitarian geologists William Buckland and Charles Lyell, such gentlemen would be favoured high and above my opinion set on Holy Scripture alone, because they were educated at a respectable university and I wasn't. This is indeed a melancholic situation I tend to face, which is not only here in the United Kingdom but more on a global scale, which is inclusive of our Christian-based British culture!

But for the truth of Holy Scripture would I lay down my life if I have to, even if I may be perceived by others as more of a mischievous child rather than a fully grown man of thinking and choice. But despite of this, I will always remain true to the Bible, even if it means that I'm seen as the only nutter in our fellowship and community alike.

The Rock of Ages - Yes Indeed.

I was alone in the house during a stormy evening of Spring, 1973. Lightning flashed, thunder rolled outside. I sat on the sofa with a King James Bible in my hand and I was curious to find in it how it had all started. As an avid believer in Evolution, I thought of no other alternative, as this was taught at school, along with stories of a six-day Creation and a family saving themselves in a boat shared with animals all confined to a fanciful myth.

Before that evening, I have read books on Darwin's theory. This was true especially during schooldays, when the weekly Look and Learn magazine-type periodical appeared in the newsagent's shelf alongside other magazines - TV Times, fashion magazines, cooking magazines, periodicals on domestics, Women's Own, as well as DIY and car magazines. I recall having Look and Learn delivered through the front door with the daily newspaper. For several weeks, it had a big, central feature on Evolution with colour illustrations spanning two whole pages, covering several weeks.

The artist based his pictures on the same site, with a large rock protruding from the ground at one side. The first set of pictures were based under the sea, with sponges, ammonites, trilobites, and primitive-looking fish, all flourishing around the submerged rock. In the next picture came fishes, including large, shark-like predators. After this the rock was on a beach crawling with amphibians. The following week, the boulder was located in thick jungle where a Brontosaur reached its long neck towards a nearby tree. After this, a carniverous Tyrannosaur crashes through the foliage, followed by mammals grazing in grasslands, and eventually Stone Age Neanderthals having set up home near the same rock, still on the same site surrounded by treeless ground which is covered with snow, and woolly mammoths can be seen sauntering in the background. Surely, by now the permanently fixed lump of stone can be referred to as the Rock of Ages as well as having a very long story to tell! 

Although the huge colourful illustrations and accompanying text were both informational and delightful to look at, the periodical was published with an authoritative, schoolmaster's format of communicating. The very front page title, Look and Learn was blazoned across the page with the intention of driving home some useful knowledge into the brains of us apathetic, out-of-school, leisure-minded teenagers of the mid-sixties. Yet I was fascinated by such a presentation of prehistoric life. The very illustrations were inspiring enough for me to have separated these pages from the rest of the magazine and tape them on the wall above my bed headboard, where they stayed on display for months to come. Never for a moment had it ever crossed my mind that any typical Uniformitarian Geologist would have disagreed with those pictures from the moment he would have set eyes on them. The constant presence of the exposed rock would have caused dissension.

Because the whole theory of Evolution has always been based on fossils found in stratified rock layers. So how was it that the rock protruding from the seabed throughout the whole of the Cambrian Period was not buried by layers of sedimentary rock by the time good old Brontosaur was grazing in the jungle during the Jurassic Period, let alone during the time the Neanderthal was lighting bonfires in the blizzard during the Quaternary, some 500,000,000 years later?* Going by what historical geologists would have insisted, this particular rock should have been buried underneath tens, maybe hundred of feet of sedimentary rock layers by the time the Neanderthals were walking around. Never mind. I was enthralled with primeval life on our planet. It gave me something to believe in, to be committed to, and even comparing and sharing my knowledge and interest with another pupil in our classroom. However, one thing that I instinctively knew: that favouring Darwinism was incompatible with religion. Without knowing why, somehow I could not mix evolution with anything to do with religion, especially Christianity. Not surprisingly, I had already declared myself to be a teenage atheist. In truth, deep in my heart there was no genuine questioning of God's existence. Rather, I hated him due to my Roman Catholic upbringing with the constant threat of Hell.

And so I should not be too surprised that the other, more intelligent classmate David, who also had a greater knowledge of Dinosaurs than I had, especially the carnivorous species, was also an atheist who debunked religion. And therefore, my youthful fascination with palaeontology walked hand-in-hand with my teenage rejection of religion, which I believe to be a setting to be looked back upon which is to be the underlying bedrock, so to speak, for the near-universal rejection of God in our country at present.

The Grand Canyon is an example of sedimentary rock strata.

And so, according to a video I watched recently on Creation.com website, one answer was given for why such a large contingent of mainly younger people leave their churches every year. For example, according to a faith survey website, the numbers who regularly attend church here in the UK has declined significantly between the years 1980 to 2016. The Roman Catholic Church number of attendees declined from 2,064,000 in 1980 to a mere 608,000 by 2016. That is a loss of 1,456,000 in 36 years. Likewise, the Anglican Church numbers declined from 1,370,400 to 660,000 - a fall of 710,400 in the same time period, and looks to be totally nonexistent by the year 2033. Our denomination, the Baptists, had an attendance number totalling 286,900 in 1980. Thirty six years later it had fallen to 226,000 - a drop of just 60,900. This is small compared to the others, but still in the wrong direction. Likewise, the Methodists suffered a fall from 606,400 attendees in 1980 to 200,000 in 2016 - a fall of 406,400. On the positive side, however, it is the Pentecostals who has enjoyed an increase in the past 36 years, from 221,000 in 1980 to 298,000 in 2016, which is an increase by 77,000. To total up, the total loss of church attendance among the four listed denominations is 2,633,700 in 36 years, or averaging 73,158 annually. And all these statistics apply to the UK only.

A video on Creation.com had listed the belief in Darwinism as one of the main reasons for the decline. And if going by my own experience is of any value, then the belief in evolution over divine creation can destroy the faith of one who grew up in a Christian household. I can see the connection. With secular websites such as Wikipedia calling Young-Earth Creationism a pseudoscience, I can't help how adult believers at work in an office would feel if he was to admit his belief in such Biblical revelation. Among all the suited colleagues, he would be regarded something of an idiosyncratic, or a nutcase, and he would not be taken seriously. There is a possibility of even losing his job. If the office employee can feel rather foolish in believing in Young-Earth Creationism, along with a universal Flood with a family and all land animals confined in a large barge, then such embarrassment can be justified in an environment populated with secular graduates. This could be the backbone behind the thinking of young Christian graduates I have associated with in the last four decades.

Their "Halfway House" belief in Theistic Evolution looks to me to be an escape, or at least a partial escape, from office embarrassment. In regard to his Christian faith, if he was asked his opinion on what he perceives to be the dawn of history, he would answer with some confidence that he does believe in Evolution, albeit theistic. Saves a lot of embarrassment that way! Just about every graduate I have crossed paths with inside the church building believed in theistic evolution, which is essentially Darwinism under the control and supervision of God, as opposed to pure chance. Ironically, it is atheists such as Richard Dawkins who has greater respect for the literal Young-Earth Creationist than for one believing in Theistic Evolution. Furthermore, I have been around long enough to realise that the graduate's belief in Theistic Evolution has robbed him of any spiritual vitality, which was meant to set him apart from the secularist, and to live out his life as a citizen of Heaven.

Therefore I have found it difficult to tell the difference between a Christian graduate from a non-believing academic. Both are well-educated, both are in respectable professions, both are patriotic, both are conscious of social class, which leads to both being cliquey and having an in-group/out-group subconscious need to mix with and fellowship among those of the same characteristic model. Or in other words, I never felt that I truly belonged, but kept to the fringes of the fellowship, with any opinion or contribution offered not taken with any higher degree of seriousness.

I'm convinced that rejection of literal Divine Creation for Theistic Evolution, or even straightforward Darwinism can have devastating repercussions. Belief in Evolution, theistic or otherwise, undercuts faith in Jesus Christ who was Crucified, Buried, and Resurrected for the Atonement of our sins gotten through the Fall of Adam and Eve in the Garden of Eden. This is a major foundation for the faith which can only be borne from Divine Creation. Many offspring of Christian parents, who grew up believing in Evolution, having been taught this at school and endorsed at home, more likely tend to have hearts resembling rocky ground. The word of God from the pulpit may fall on such ground, and lacking proper soil for the shoots to take root properly, when social pressure builds, they quit, leaving the church and renouncing their faith (Matthew 13). And believe me, I have seen it.

The acceptance of Young Earth supernatural Creation is what makes a believer a true Christian. Such a believer in Divine Creation will know that every person he sees and relates with is a creation of God and the one whom Jesus died for. This changes all perception of fellow human beings. Just by reading Psalm 139 should be enough to eradicate any thoughts of inequality, whether it'll be racial, cultural, or national. Also believing in Divine Creation will eliminate any thoughts of Eugenics, an offshoot of Darwinism, as discussed last week. This is serious stuff, so much so that God himself had to challenge me.

Referring back to that stormy evening back in 1973. I was alone in the house. The thunder rolled outside. I opened the Bible I had on me, and turned to its beginning, and read the first three chapters of Genesis. I reeled back in wonder. It was then when I felt the Lord as if confronting me with a stark choice. What am I to believe? Divine Creation or Darwin's Evolution? One or the other, there was no halfway house. No option for Theistic Evolution. Immediately and without hesitation, I chose the Divine Creation revelation, and completely repudiated Evolution. Just like that. But there was no other option. God would not allow it. But once the decision was made, I knew that I had to stick with it. This meant being fully open about it among work colleagues. According to experience, I have found factory shop floor workers to be more tolerating of my Creation conviction than had I worked in an office among clerical employees. From time to time I had serious discussions with work colleagues on the shop floor. At worst, they may have poked fun at me, which is not as bad as having a feeling of ostracism and being ignored - even by fellow church-going graduates.

And so with the new revelation about supernatural creation, I had to accept the truth about the universal, earth destroying Deluge. And so I had no quibbles in my acceptance of such a revelation. From 1973 onward I entered into studies for geological and biological evidence of Creation and the Flood, alongside for the tangible proof for the veracity of the Bible by visiting the Holy Land, particularly Jerusalem. But even if I had never set foot in Israel, being sure about the truthfulness of the Bible would have still make me stand my stead among mocking unbelievers.

And to round up, when it comes to browsing Google Maps on the laptop, or better still, browsing at Google Earth, I was astonished at the sight of a dendroid image of undersea river courses flowing across the edge of the continental shelf exactly southwest of the Irish Republic.  If you were to switch to Google Earth, and pan the satellite version of the map to an area of the Atlantic Ocean directly southwest of Cork, you will come across a valley, now partly filled in with silt, but with river courses forming underwater canyons emptying out into the abyss. In the past there were many of them, even up to 300 km 185 miles long, all eventually joining to empty at the one mouth. But over the course of time, silt has filled in the majority of these canyons, with only a couple still visible south of the valley. The depth of the valley is from 1,400 feet to 10,200 feet 430-3,110 metres approx below the surface, which strongly suggest that that part of the Continental Shelf was once above sea level. Is this now submerged valley an echo of the later stages of Noah's Flood, when the floodwaters gushed into the oceans as "the mountains rose and the valleys sunk down" of Psalm 104:6-9?

Maybe so, maybe not. But whatever the case might have been, this has stronger correlations with the truthfulness of Holy Scripture than Charles Darwin could have ever come up with.

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*John C. Whitcomb Jr. and Henry M. Morris, The Genesis Flood, Baker Book House, 1975, page  133.

Angry at God.

Poor Noah! He was pretty well screwed up during the years following the Flood. How just one or two verses can reveal a great deal about a saint's personal life. No matter how faithful a believer can be, God is always patient and accepting.

When I first started to read the Old Testament book of Genesis, three issues had crossed my mind. First this Noah in a large houseboat featuring the long necks of two giraffes peering over the parapet wasn't quite a complete fairy tale after all, since the narrator writes with serious historical intention. Secondly, Noah appears to be alone, rather like an orphan, in a hostile antediluvian society. And thirdly, I assumed that his father Lamech has been dead for decades, and he is the last of his generation, alone with his wife and his three already-married but still childless sons. However, back in those days a question still loomed in my mind, recently asked by a sneering atheist at work, on where Cain had gotten his wife.

Getting stuck into this first book of the Bible, it is the provision of carefully-preserved genealogical records which has thrown much light into the narration. Not only can the question of Cain's wife be adequately answered, but the issue also hints of a massive population explosion not long after the Fall. Adam must have fathered far more than just Cain and Abel before the birth of Seth. Within the first 130 years of his life, an unspecified number of unnamed sons and daughters must have been born from Eve's womb. Not to have done so would have violated the specific commandment given to them by God himself - to procreate and populate the Earth (Genesis 1:26-28).

By the time Noah was born, both his father Lamech, along with his unnamed mother were alive and well, together with his peculiarly-named grandfather Methuselah, and his unnamed grandmother. The name Methuselah might well have raised the curiosity of young Noah, combined with the revelation given at his birth that he is destined to bring relief from the hard toil resulting from the cursed ground. Even from a young age, Noah already knew that the name Methuselah means At my death comes the waters. Combined with his own destiny, he was aware that something drastic will happen later in his life. Just a casual reading of the genealogical records narrated in the fifth chapter will reveal that right up to the start of the Flood, Noah was not the lonely orphan I first perceived him to have been. Here we are told that apart from the birth of Lamech, Methuselah had other sons and daughters, therefore the youngster growing up into a family of aunts and uncles. Then Lamech himself had other sons and daughters, supplying Noah with brothers and sisters, and perhaps nephews and nieces too. Indeed, if cousins are to be included, Noah grew up in a very large family.

The sudden death of Lamech after a comparatively moderate age of 777 years might well have answered Noah's begging question: Would his parents drown in the Flood? With the Ark nearing completion, all eyes were on his grandfather Methuselah. As the white-haired and white bearded grandfather's face displayed more wrinkles by the day, Noah had no option but to ensure the timely completion of his vessel, and that despite the ridicule thrown at him by those he loved, and the shaking of heads by other relatives who had confined him to the realm of lunacy. Then suddenly one morning, Methuselah was found dead in his bed. Noah flew into panic. His ark wasn't quite ready. That was when God revealed to him that seven more days were to elapse before the waters arrived, enough time to cross the t's and dot the i's, five years after the death of his father Lamech.

As the storms raged outside, Noah must have felt very lonely and disturbed as the ark rocked about whilst afloat on the shoreless ocean. It wasn't that long after the door finally closed, sealing them in, when massive earthquakes, roaring rumbles of thunder, water and even volcanic lava gushing out of the ground, that he heard his own panicking brothers and sisters, along with their screaming offspring, grandchildren, and maybe even their great grandchildren, together with his aunts, uncles, and cousins, all calling out his name and begging for the door to be opened. But as fists punched the outside of the hull, Noah knew well enough that the door cannot be opened. Such would jeopardise everyone else within, along with all the livestock. His own wife tried to comfort him, along with attempted encouragement from his three sons and their wives. But as the livestock drifted into hibernation for the duration, a certain stillness ensued, save from the turbulence of the waters outside. If only his relatives believed his message and entered the Ark whilst there was still time, instead of mocking and ridiculing! Now it was too late. 

It was over a year later, after having received reassurance, that Noah, his family, and all preserved livestock disembarked somewhere on a high mountain. But even with the happy announcement of the birth of his first grandson Canaan, sired by Ham, he could not alleviate his sorrows as he looked around the deserted land, bereft of all humans other than his own family. Even though he busied himself farming and harvesting grapes, his combined twist of torrid emotions of loneliness and family loss caused him to drink to excess. Whilst lying drunken in his tent, it was likely that his grandson Canaan sexually molested him, making him believe that it was his wife who was trying to revive the old man, while the boy's father looked on with some amusement before calling in his brothers Shem and Japheth.

Then there was no Government ministers to lay the blame on, no street protests, no media, thus there was nobody to blame. As it was, Noah and his family survived a natural disaster, this one so grand that it wiped out the entire human population. Because of their wickedness. And yet, as God made a covenant of the rainbow with Noah and his descendants, God also makes a statement that although the whole of humanity was given a fresh start, the human heart remains evil from youth (Genesis 8:20-22). It was as if the Flood has failed to reform the heart over the coming generations. So why promise never to bring another deluge, despite the natural heart remaining unreformed? I believe that an invasion of fallen angels interbreeding with antediluvian women had very nearly eliminated the Messianic Line, starting with Adam, through Seth, Noah, and through to Jesus Christ (Genesis 6:1-4). This interbreeding between fallen angels and human women produced a race of Nephilim - giants, and maybe together with those weird, cone-headed offspring who had high, above-average intelligence and greater evil, and therefore grew up to be men of great infamy. If the entire human population became infected with such offspring, the Promise of Genesis 3:15 would not have been fulfilled. Since after the Flood, the birth of such offspring apparently remained restricted to the line of Ham through Canaan, and they were to play a role in the discipline of the fledgling nation of Israel, which eventually eliminated them entirely, particularly from Joshua's day through to King Saul's reign. If all this is true, the need for a global Deluge has played a role towards our salvation. 

Since then, natural disasters as unleashed its powers throughout history, although never again to wipe out the entire human race. The natural phenomenon which demolished the Tower of Babel was a natural disaster, along with the eruption of Mt. Vesuvius in AD 79, wiping out the cities of Pompeii, Stabiae, Oplontis, and Herculaneum. Then there was that explosive eruption of Mt. Krakatoa in the Sunda Strait, on August 26, 1886, which wiped out at least 36,417 people at surrounding coast-lands. Then not to mention the San Francisco earthquake in 1906, killing around 3,000 people and flattening 80% of the city. Then within our lifetimes there was the tsunami which epicentre took place in the Indian Ocean on Boxing Day 2004, taking up to 280,000 casualties. Then there was the destruction of New Orleans by a tsunami stirred up by Hurricane Katrina on August 29, 2005. This disaster took at least 1,245 lives.

Here in the UK nature is far less harsh, befitting the gentle rolling hills and pastures green of rural England. Therefore, disasters here tend to be man-made rather than from the pure wrath of nature. Perhaps the worst was the bubonic plague which struck London between the years 1665 and 1666, taking 100,000 lives, about a quarter of London's population. This disease was spread by fleas biting people after being in contact with infected rats. Natural disaster? In a way, yes, but easily avoidable if only a better knowledge of sanitation was in force. The Bible teaches that human excrement, for example, should be buried in a hole already dug in the ground outside the camp, and then covered over with the soil (Deuteronomy 23:12-13). Instead, human excrement, rotting food and other sources of filth were thrown out from the windows to the street below, festering vermin which spread such fatal illnesses. The Great Fire of London of 1666 was, as I see it, an act of God's grace and mercy. This disaster took very few casualties, but destroyed property in abundance - along with the rats which carried the bubonic plague.

However, other than terrorist attacks occurring in America, Europe and Britain alike, the latest disaster now dominate the news bulletins. That is the fire which quickly consumed Grenfell Tower, a residential block occupying the poorer area of London North Kensington, with the wealthy area of Notting Hill just a stone's throw away. Here, the poorer, hard up residents lived cheek by jowl with the mansions owned by the rich. When I read about this, yes I was angry at God himself for allowing the fire to rage the way it did. Why always the poorer people suffer like this? And why such a special favour shown to the better off? Like as in most evangelical churches where the Gospel is shared among the middle classes, graduates and professionals, while at the same time, Islamic and other non-Christian refugees, immigrants, struggling families, and the plebs of society are left to burn alive or die from smoke inhalation without ever a chance to hear the Gospel for themselves. Salt is further rubbed into the wound when I consider that many of the wealthier occupy the pews of Anglican churches - giving the impression that God favours the wealthy and the better educated.

This craziness, this unfairness, this picture of a posh lady praying to God over her choice of a new dress while two to three thousand miles down the road the life of a starving child ebbs away while his mother looks on helplessly. Ditto of another child suffering from malnutrition and AIDS, with no fault of his own, slowly passes away while at that same moment over here, the patriotic Englishman and churchgoer prays and even fast for England to win the World Cup. Something seems rotten here.

Until the full truth comes out.

That is: The fire at Grenfell Tower was the result of cheap flammable cladding covering the outer masonry, so that this 1970's built structure will look more appealing to the nearby wealthy residents. The result of shoddy administration of the authorities plus the sheer greed of the contractors - putting profit above the safety of these pleb residents - extricates any accusation from man's perception of divine unfairness.

Noah had no reason to feel deluded by God's apparent injustice, especially to his wider family. Neither was there a need to harbour and feed those twisted emotions which tormented him. Rather, he should have realised that the terrible catastrophe he was saved from was brought upon antediluvian mankind by their own evil deeds and their own unbelief.

Noah's Flood Just a Folklore? Then No Salvation For Us!

Richard Dawkins stood on the podium at the middle of the stage, addressing a large audience inside the Sydney Opera House. He was purposely making mockery of any historical credit given to Noah and his family remaining safe by floating in a barge while the whole world lies underwater in a global flood.

He ridiculed those "religious nuts" who still believe in the reality of this folklore, while the better educated and the enlightened had long discarded such fables and adhered to scientific facts of organic evolution which had shaped us for the last 200,000,000 years, give or take.

The audience chuckled. Every hearer took delight in the speaker's ridicule of the Biblical narration. And I doubt that anyone in that audience had given a moment's thought on the repercussions if Dawkins was right all along and the Noachian Deluge (as the Biblical Flood is often addressed) was pure fiction after all.

As we shall see, the early chapters of Genesis hold the key to first, the very existence of the Jewish people and the nation of Israel. Along with this, the Bible tells us that Jesus Christ himself was born into a Jewish family. At his very birth, his final destiny was to become King of Israel (Matthew 2:6, Luke 1:32-33). But before this, Jesus Christ had to die a criminal's death on a cross to atone for the sins of not only Israel but for the whole world.

After his death and his resurrection, he would become head of the Church, consisting of all people (mainly Gentile but open to any Jewish believer as well). In other words, us - all those who believe in him for our redemption and the eternal enjoyment of eternal life in God's presence. So we need to ask, where is the connection between Adam and Eve and the Noachian Deluge, the nation of Israel and the Church at present? Through what is called the Messianic Line, that is, from Adam his descendants includes Seth, Enoch, Methuselah, Noah, Abraham, Isaac, Jacob (i.e. Israel), Judah, King David, Joseph husband of Mary (thus a legal guardian) and Mary herself, also a descendant of King David, who became the mother of Jesus, future King of Israel and the head of all true believers who make up all the churches in the world to this day.

Which leads to a major problem. If the Noachian Deluge, along with all the people and events recorded in the early chapters of Genesis, were fable and simply folklore, then all the churches we see around us to this day would have been non-existent, since the birth, death and resurrection of Jesus Christ would not have occurred either. And without the Crucifixion of Christ, there would be no hope for any of us. Our lives would be extremely futile. Educated? Yes. Ambitious? Yes. But we would just live for a short while, die and tumble into Hell wondering just where we've gone wrong. Instead of blaming sin, inherited from the Fall of Adam and Eve, the explanation would be that something went seriously wrong in the final, explosive stages of our evolution, resulting in that all wrongdoing is not our fault, but due to "environmental factors".

Is this beginning to sound familiar?

As for the Summer riots which took place just a couple of weeks before this was written, one Politician, "Red" Ken Livingstone, ex-Mayor of London, began to blame the riots with an attractive explanation of "Government draconian cuts, lack of youth clubs and rising costs and unemployment." Not sin then, but shortfalls in the environment.

In this article I wish to discuss the plausibility of the Noachian Deluge and ask, is such an event scientifically viable?

In the last blog, we looked at the feasibility of Adam and Eve, Cain, Abel, the time of the murder amidst a growing population. Here we'll look at the narrator's chronology leading to the Flood, and ask, why such detail? Then we take a brief look at the animals within the Ark, and then the genealogical line from Noah to Abraham.

Genesis chapter 5 gives the genealogical record from Adam to Noah, which is also part of the Messianic line from Adam to Christ. If Jesus Christ existed, died for our sins and risen from the dead three days later, then not only the beginning of his origin and the source of our salvation detailed, but also for existence for the nation of Israel, and its justification for its existence in the Middle East at present, to which Jesus Christ will return as its King sometime in the future. In short, without the historical truth of the events recorded in the early chapters of Genesis, the whole of the two Abrahamic faiths - Judaism and Christianity, together with the existence of the nation of Israel, would all crumble to dust.

The antediluvian chronicle is as follows:

Adam fathered Seth at 130 years of age, lived 800 years more, died at 930
Seth - Enosh at 105 - 807 years more, died at 912.
Enosh - Kenan at 90 - 815 years more, died at 905.
Kenan - Mahalalel at 70 - 840 years more, died at 910.
Mahalalel - Jared at 65 - 830 years more, died at 895.
Jared - Enoch at 162 - 800 years more, died at 962.
Enoch - Methusalah at 65 - 300 years, - was taken to Heaven alive at 365.
Methusalah - Lamech at 187 - 782 years more - died at 969.
Lamech - Noah at 182 - 595 years more, died at 777.
Noah - aged 600 when the Flood arrived.

It is interesting to realise that Methusalah is a prophetic name. It means, "The Flood comes when I die." By calculating the figures given above, we can see that Noah was 600 years when the flood came. Methusalah was 187 when his son Lamech was born, and Lamech was 182 years when Noah was born. So we can work out:

182+187=369 years - the age Methusalah was when Noah was born.
Noah's antediluvian lifespan right up to the Flood - 600 years.
Thus 600+369=969 years - the total age of Methusalah at the time of the Flood.

As for Lamech, he was 182 years old when his son Noah was born. He died at 777 years of age. Therefore Lamech lived 595 years after Noah's birth, which is five years short of the Flood which occurred in Noah's 600th year of his life. In other words, Methusalah outlived his own son by five years.

There is a likelihood that at the death of Methusalah, Noah panicked when he saw that the Ark was not quite ready. Therefore God assured him of seven more days before the catastrophe (Genesis 7:4). It seems odd to me if the event was merely folklore, why the narrator took so much effort in chronicling the age of each patriarch and the timing of the Flood since Creation.

But did every species of animal as we know them today entered the Ark. Unlikely. For a start, there was no need for marine life to enter the Ark. This not only include fishes, but marine mammals - Whales, Dolphins, and Porpoises. Also animals that have survived outside the Ark included Crustaceans, coral, sponges, along with insects and possibly amphibians.

Then it has been demonstrated that many species of animal could have arisen from as little as one pair. Let us give a couple of examples:

There are up to nine related to the horse family. They are
Horse
Quagga
Zebra
Zebroid (cross between Horse and Zebra)
Onager
Kiang
Ass
Kianger (cross between Onager and Kiang)
Mule (cross between Horse and Ass)

Likewise, the Canine family has eight varieties:
Artic Fox
Grey Fox
Red Fox
Wolf
Dog (with its many varieties and sizes)
Coyote
Jackal
Hyena

Source: John C. Whitcombe and Henry M. Morris, The Genesis Flood.

The point is, each of these two families could have each arisen from a single pair.

This raises the likelihood that out of the total of seventeen animals listed above, only four entered the Ark, two of each family, the male and female. If this is true, then the number of species in the Ark would have been much fewer than the varieties we see today. Then again, it was very possible that the animals within the Ark would have spent much of their time in hibernation during the duration of the Flood.

After the Flood abated, and Noah's family along with all the life stock had disembarked from the Ark, we are told that Noah planted a vineyard and became drunk with the wine the fruit the harvest produced. This seemed to be out-of-step with the normal character of Noah! What made him turn to alcohol, after experiencing the salvation and deliverance God had performed for him? His loneliness.

We seem to forget that right up to the Flood itself, Noah had brothers and sisters, aunts and uncles and many cousins. This we know because in Genesis 5, we are told that Methusalah became the father of Lamech, and fathered other sons and daughters. (v.26). So Noah had aunts and uncles. And in verse 30, we are told that Lamech had other sons and daughters. Therefore we can assume that Noah, prior to the Flood, was surrounded by his family. They most likely loved him enough to care for him, even if they disbelieved in God's revelation, perhaps thinking that their brother was a little nutty. Noah's heart must have been pining for his wider family to believe God's revelation and act accordingly. After the Flood, Noah and his seven adult family members were the only humans on the planet. His loneliness and loss of his wider family must have hit him hard! Little wonder he turned to alcohol. But does this mean that he has fallen away and lost his salvation? A pretty silly question to ask. Rather, his name appears in the Hall of Fame of faithful men in Hebrews 11:7. But the Scriptures show how human even the greatest saints can be.

Next, we shall take a look at the genealogy of post-deluge patriarchs, and how their longevity declined rapidly after the Flood. Although there may be several reasons for this, it is believed that the vast change of global climate had played a role in this, namely, the collapse of the antediluvian vapour canopy during the Flood which played a role in filtering out the more harmful of the sun's rays.

The list is as follows, and it's found in Genesis 11:
The lifespan of Noah - 950 years.
Of son Shem - 600 years.
Of son Arphaxad - 438 years.
Of son Shelah - 433 years.
Of son Eber - 464 years.
Of Son Peleg - 239 years.
Of son Rue - 239 years.
Of son Serug - 230 years.
Of son Nahor - 148 years.
Of son Terah - 205 Years.
From there we need to go further into the book to record the ages of Abraham, Isaac, Jacob and Joseph.
Abraham - 175 years (Genesis 25:7).
Isaac - 180 years (Genesis 35:28).
Jacob (Israel) - 147 years (Genesis 47:28).
Joseph - 110 years - (Genesis 50:26).

So we see the dramatic drop of longevity from Noah's 950 years to Joseph's 110, which is much closer to today's reality than Noah's and his forefathers. But we see the continual lines of both the formation of the nation of Israel from Adam, and the Messianic line from Adam to Jacob, who was renamed Israel. Only Joseph branched off from the Messianic line, as this passed through his brother Judah, the fourth son of Jacob with his first wife Leah.

So the early chapters of Genesis are absolutely vital for the existence and survival of Israel, for the believing on Jesus Christ for our salvation and for the survival of the churches. Also, as was discussed in the last blog, the teaching and institution of marriage, children and the family are based on these early chapters.

Educated professors such as Richard Dawkins, Sam Harris and Christopher Hitchens do us no favours whatsoever in their books and theatrical speeches. It is about time too that Christians study and believe these chapters to strengthen their own faith and to encourage others.