President Obama – Life in the Spirit

The Sanctity of Science and its Limitations

“Science should be the final arbiter on all these issues.”

Response: I appreciate your respect for science, as it has yielded tremendous insight and progress for all of us. And yet, if we look deeper into science, we can discover what it can and cannot do.

Key Point #1: Science is driven by paradigms – world views that explain the world.

One of my favorite books is “The Structure of Scientific Revolutions” by MIT Professor Thomas Kuhn, written over 50 years ago. Kuhn made a compelling case for paradigms – a world view or way of looking at things. So political philosophies, religions, etc. are all paradigms. Kuhn contended that we don’t see the world as it is, but as we are – through our lens, which focuses on some information (that which reinforces our paradigm), and ignores information that does not. For example, an environmentalist, a business person, a labor organizer, and an engineer would all see a manufacturing plant in totally different ways, through their respective paradigms.

Kuhn attacks the notion that scientific knowledge accumulates like money in a bank account, and makes a compelling case that scientists (and everyone else) see the world through a lens, a paradigm. As time goes on, facts will emerge that don’t fit our paradigm. We can just ignore these anomalies, but true scientists would hold on to them, and if at some point the pile of anomalies overwhelms the current paradigm, the scientist would examine all of the evidence, and change paradigms to a paradigm that more effectively explains reality.

At one point in our history, scientists believed that the earth was flat. This flat earth paradigm was commonly held until more and more evidence accumulated that the earth was in fact round. So the paradigm shifted. At another point in our history, doctors believed that bleeding a person through leeches or cuts was a valid medical treatment. In all likelihood, this “best practice medical procedure” contributed to the death of our first president, George Washington. Over time, researchers discovered that this practice was harmful, and the paradigm shifted.

Key Point #2: What gets funded gets studied – the influence of vested interests and funding on establishing paradigms.

These paradigms (and their funding sources) directly impact the assumptions, methodologies, and conclusions of scientific studies. Furthermore, what is published in scientific journals is what scientists investigate. So a scientific study, funded by a multi-national pharmaceutical firm shows that some new drug reduces the chances of getting cancer. But the study does not reveal that a natural plant remedy has the same effect.

Our federal government has made tremendous funding available for studies of global warming. If you as a scientist believe that global warming is not caused by our current industrial era, you will not receive any funding for your research, and you may end up teaching high school science classes, or perhaps delivering pizza.

Key Point #3: Resistance to changing paradigms in science can emerge because of religious reasons.

The predominant paradigm in science today is the theory of evolution – the belief that our world started with nothing, or something that exploded and eventually became more and more complex, yielding the world as we see it today, with plants, animals, and people. There are more than 10,000 scientists in our nation that embrace creation science, and there is substantive evidence that exposes the fallacies of evolution. And yet there is tremendous resistance to creation science because it implies there is a God. To those who reject God, they will hold to evolution, or the notion that life came here from another planet.

At the same time, an Intelligent Design movement has emerged within the community of evolutionary scientists who have concluded that the complexity of nature could not have happened by chance, thus denying the validity of Darwinian evolution and contending that nature reveals design by some intelligence.

Key Point #4: If something looks crazy to you, it is because you don’t grasp the underlying paradigm.

A common reaction to unusual behavior is to describe it as crazy: “Oh, he is just crazy!” But what it really means is that you don’t understand the underlying paradigm that is driving that behavior. This can be very helpful, and it starts with the assumption (usually true) that there is an underlying paradigm, and it requires an inquisitiveness to discover what that paradigm is. Ask “Within what paradigm would this make perfect sense?”

For example, President Obama recently gave a speech before the United Nations and stated that the future belongs to those nations that respect the prophet (Mohammad). Your question for the day is this – within what paradigm would this make perfect sense?

Key Point #5: Ultimately, science cannot tell us what we should do.

Although science has obvious limitations, it does shed light on many facets of our lives, and has opened up many new opportunities for our nation and the world. There is one more limitation that is often overlooked, that science cannot tell us what we should do. Science only tells us what is; it cannot tell us what should be. That is our province as thinking, feeling, spiritual human beings.

Science and technology can show us how to build an atomic bomb; it does not tell us if we should build them or if we should use them.
Science and technology can show us how to do extraordinary medical procedures, some of which are extremely expensive. Science does not tell us if they should be used, and for whom – the very wealthy? Those with political connections? Only those under 50 years of age? First come, first serve?
Science and technology can prolong life via machines for a very long time, but it cannot tell us if we should do so.
Science and technology can now splice human genes into animals and vice versa; it does not tell us if we should.
Science and technology can record and scan all voice, text, fax, and e-mail communication across the world; it does not tell us if we should, and for what purpose.
Science and technology now has the means to implant a chip into our forearm that is a smart chip, able to be used as a credit card for buying and selling. But it does not tell us if we should.

Key Point #6: Science operates solely in the natural world, so it has no capability or authority in the supernatural world.

The Christian perspective is that we live in two overlapping worlds – the physical, material world, and the spiritual world. When Jesus appeared on the scene two thousand years ago, He announced that the Kingdom of Heaven is here. Empirical science is based on the ability to observe, to measure, and to manipulate things in the natural world. Similar to trying to measure temperature with a ruler, science is incapable of understanding or studying the supernatural world. Atheistic scientists may contend that there is no god, but they are on thin ice because nothing within science can prove that their assertion is true.

The Bible is a record of the sovereign, living God creating and intervening from the spiritual realm into the material universe over time. It is a special revelation of truth as revealed to us from God. Many early scientists believed that science was merely a new way to learn about the world as God created it.

The Sanctity of Life and Its Enemies

Hello

Great to see you here in Little Rock recently. We were relieved to hear that you made it home. I want to share some perspectives with you, but first want to let you know that nothing you do, say, or believe (or who you vote for) alters my love for you. Really! That should be freeing to you.

In this missive, I want to focus on one issue – human life. This is an attempt to describe a pro-life perspective and apply that perspective to what is going on in the U.S. and the world. This is a 5 year or perhaps a 10 year letter. You may dismiss it now, but five or ten years from now you may have an experience that connects with some element of this letter.

As you know, the Biblical perspective on human life is that we were created in the image of God; although He is a Spirit, we are like Him. We look like Him, we have a spirit that can connect with Him, as well as emotions, will, and reason, which He also has. We are not merely animals but are a special creation. This sanctity of life perspective shaped the foundation of our nation, and is in contrast to the cultures and political systems from which our forefathers and foremothers came.

Furthermore, God is not a respecter of persons, and we – both men and women – are all equal under the law of God. Under kings, the king and his cohorts are elite rulers who make all of the decisions; the people have little or no voice. The same is often true for sultans, czars, emperors, pharaohs, and chiefs. Many of these considered themselves to be gods, and some practiced human sacrifice.

So the rule of law, in which everyone is equal under the law, was a departure from historical precedents. One of the first to embrace this was when God gave Moses the Ten Commandments. Even Moses was treated as equal to other people by God, and was not allowed to enter the Promised Land because of his transgression. In most of the elitist systems, human life was cheap and expendable for the cause of the regime in power. In direct contrast, early Christians rescued abandoned babies off the trash heaps in ancient Rome because they believed in the sanctity of human life.

I would add that our nation’s history and treatment of Native Americans and African Americans has been a dark stain on our nation’s history, for which there is no excuse. Our Declaration of Independence laid out the basic premise that all men are created equal, but it has taken years and at least one war before that ideal has started to become more fully realized.

Although our nation is still a work in progress, the existence of slavery, persecutions, and lack of basic freedoms and economic opportunity in many other countries today may account for the continued flow of people into our nation from other nations.

Modern attacks on the sanctity of human life and the notion that we were created in the image of God come from:

Charles Darwin, who favored evolution (really macro-evaluation from one species to another) as the best explanation of origins, leading to the perspective that we are merely animals, albeit smart animals. If we are merely animals, then there is no creator with a purpose for our lives, and we can make up our own rules. This is taught in most public schools and universities as “scientific”, ignoring the substantial body of knowledge in creation science that confirms the Biblical world view. The Intelligent Design Movement consists of a group of evolutionary scientists, some of them quite prominent, who have concluded that the data, and the intricate nature of nature forces them to conclude that nature (like Mount Rushmore) did not happen by chance, but by design from some kind of intelligence.

Radical environmentalists embrace evolution and are more concerned for the future of the earth and its ecosystem than people. This leads to laws that protect endangered species (such as the spotted owl) at the expense of the jobs and livelihoods of thousands of people in Oregon, Washington, and other states.

The New World Order, espoused by every U.S. president since George H. Bush, is a movement toward a one world government, one world economy, one world financial system, and one world religion. New World Order advocates are globalist elitists – leaders of multi-national corporations, foundations, banks, and governments, who see population reduction as an essential part of their agenda. The New World Order people are ruthless criminals who start wars and have absolutely no regard for human life.

Hitler also embraced evolution, and sought to eliminate those people who he did not view as highly as the Aryan race (Jews, gypsies, handicapped, etc.), as well as individuals who opposed his regime (Christians, priests, traditional German patriots, etc.)

Karl Marx and Frederich Engels founded Marxism, a materialistic, totalitarian system which advocates replacing God with the state (federal government), and destroying or co-opting all intermediary associations between the individual and the state, including families, the church, businesses, and voluntary organizations. (This is exactly the agenda described by the Communist Party USA, when they met in the 1960s).

Based on the faulty presupposition that we are by nature good, Marx contended that as capitalism is replaced by socialism (government control of the means of production), which then evolves to communism (government control of the entire society), there will be no crime because everyone’s needs will be met, and the state will “wither away”. The reality is that communist states become repressive, totalitarian states ruled by ruthless thugs, with a track record of murdering tens of millions of their own people, even during peace time.

That is why millions of people have fled those countries to come to the U.S., while a much smaller number of Marxist idealists have chosen to move there. These totalitarian societies eliminate freedom of speech, freedom of religion, freedom to bear arms, and freedom to own private property. (It is alarming that these freedoms are now under assault in this country and in the world.) It is not uncommon among Marxists (even in this country) to discuss the need for millions of people to die (particularly those opposed to their regime), which they see as a necessary evil if the “dictatorship of the capitalists” is to be replaced by the “dictatorship of the proletariat” i.e. the working people.

Although they have the same goal – a totalitarian communistic state, there are two camps within Marxism – those who advocate violent overthrow of existing capitalist systems, and those who favor the gradual takeover of a society’s institutions from within. Antonio Gramsci, an Italian Marxist count, advocated the latter. One of his ardent students was Saul Alinsky, the infamous community organizer from Chicago, who wrote “Rules for Radicals” and dedicated it to “the first rebel, Lucifer”. Alinsky has a famous pupil in very high political office, Barack Hussein Obama. As you may know, I was a Marxist for a time, studied Marx and Alinsky in grad school, and have visited five communist countries. I also presented a paper on Marxism at a national conference. A close friend lost her position in the University of California – Davis History Department when the Marxists took over and she would not toe the party line.

Hinduism has a system of castes that people are born into and from which there is no escape (without leaving that system). Unlike Christianity, with its admonition to feed the poor, the Hindu perspective is that if you help someone in dire poverty, you will interfere with his/her karma, in which he must suffer in this life for wrong-doing in his previous life, in order to be reincarnated at a higher station of life in the next life. New Agers basically embrace Hinduism, its reincarnation, and pantheism.

Islam is a special case. We can learn a lot by studying the founder of a religion. While Jesus treated women with respect and taught his followers to love their enemies, Mohammad personally led multiple raids on passing caravans for booty, women, and slaves. Observing the gradual increase in Muslims in a Western nations, the pattern that is emerging is that rather than assimilate within the culture, Muslims increase their demands for sharia law, with its barbaric treatment of criminals and women. A few other clues:
- Within Islam, the only sure way you know you are going to Paradise when you die is when you die in Jihad – holy war. Perhaps that is why a Palestinian mother exclaimed a few years ago that the happiest day of our life was when her son blew himself up as a suicide bomber in Israel. Amazing – this describes a culture of death!
- During the Iran-Iraq war, a war between two Muslim nations, Iran sent out thousands of its teenagers to clear the minefields prior to a military battle. They became human fodder in this tragic war.
- Honor killings takes place in the Middle East and this country when a family member, usually the father, kills another member of the family who has shamed the family. If a young woman is raped, she is killed by her father because she has shamed her family. Meanwhile, the rapist faces far lesser charges. Unbelievable. So the family’s “honor” is more important than human life.
- In similar fashion, an Egyptian professor at Cairo University converted to Christianity and had to flee because his father was about to kill him to restore honor to the family.

Abortion – with the perspective that human life is just a blob of tissue, abortionists have killed an estimated 70 million babies in the U.S. since Roe vs. Wade in 1973. The tide turned somewhat when “Silent Scream” came out – a video that shows the pain that an unborn child experiences during an abortion. Under President Obama, our government pressures other nations to embrace abortion. I heard an interview with a pastor from Kenya, in which he described how the U.S. government pressured Kenya to change its constitution to accept abortion. President Obama has also sought to force Christian health organizations (Catholic hospitals, etc.) to provide abortion services, in direct conflict with their fundamental beliefs. Worldwide, approximately a billion babies have been killed since 1973, for which our nation bears some responsibility. The blood of these murdered babies cries out from the ground against our nation and our government.

Abortion leads to bizarre things happening. I recently read that 400-500 babies every year are alive due to botched abortions. I saw a video clip of one of these individuals, in which she told her story of how her mother and abortion “doctor” tried to kill her, but she survived. Now that is a dysfunctional family!

In contrast, the Word of God states:

“Where can I go from Your Spirit? Or where can I flee from Your presence? If I ascend into heaven, You are there; if I make my bed in hell, behold, You are there. If I take the wings of the morning, and dwell in the uttermost parts of the sea, even there Your hand shall lead me, And Your right hand shall hold me… for You formed my inward parts; You covered me in my mother’s womb.

I will praise You, for I am fearfully and wonderfully made;marvelous are Your works, that my soul knows very well. My frame was not hidden from You, when I was made in secret, and skillfully wrought in the lowest parts of the earth. Your eyes saw my substance, being yet unformed. And in Your book they all were written, the days fashioned for me, when as yet there were none of them.” Psalm 139:7-16

Unlike materialistic/communistic systems, in which people have no transcendent or special purpose other than utility, or systems that embrace evolution in which we are just animals, the Biblical world view describes a world in which we were created by God teleologically – with a purpose.

Just as nature is a product of design (as opposed to evolutionary chance), so was human life was designed with a purpose. We – you and I, were created by God with a purpose, and that purpose is to draw close to Him on earth, to reflect His love and truth to all people, and to enjoy His presence here on earth and in heaven when we die. But He won’t force anyone to be there who does not want to be in the presence of God.

God invites us to into a relationship (not just a belief) with Him, in which we fellowship and can be led by the Holy Spirit of the sovereign, living God. And this is truly amazing.

Many people’s experience with Christianity has not been positive. Perhaps they encountered a dead church or Christians who did not walk the walk, or were stuck in stifling social roles. Or perhaps they were just seeking a social organization, and became tired of hearing about Jesus, sin and guilt. (False guilt comes from man and is often manipulative; true guilt comes from the Lord and is redemptive.)

Most people don’t like to be called sinners – it is like telling someone they are a bad person. I find it more useful (and Biblically accurate) to note that teleologically, sin is merely missing its mark, like a car that runs off the road and hits a tree. Cars were not designed to hit trees; they are designed to drive down the road. In like manner, we were not created to crash off the road; we were created with the capacity and desire to know the Lord. This is expressed in the following – the Greatest Danger.

The Greatest Danger

The greatest danger facing all of us is not that we shall make an absolute failure of life, nor that we shall fall into outright viciousness, nor that we shall be terribly unhappy, nor that we shall feel that life has no meaning at all – not these things.

The danger is that we may:

fail to perceive life’s greatest meaning,
fall short of its highest good,
miss its deepest and most abiding happiness,
be unable to tender the most needed service,
be unconscious of life ablaze with the light of the Presence of God,
and be content to have it so.

That is the danger – that some day we may wake up and find that always we have been busy with husks and trappings of life and have really missed life itself.

For life without god, to one who has known the richness and joy of life with Him, is unthinkable, impossible. That is what one prays one’s friends may be spared – satisfaction with a life that falls short of the best, that has no tingle or thrill that comes from a friendship with the Father. Phillip Brooks (1835-1893)

Political Solutions to Spiritual Problems

“If we could only get the right people in Washington, our nation could be turned around.”

Response: There are many pundits and political animals who contend that the real battle today in our nation is between Democrats and Republicans, or perhaps the establishment parties vs. the Tea Party. Is that really true that the profound challenges facing our nation are merely political in nature, and therefore can be solved by getting the right people into office?

Perhaps, but ultimately the leaders of our nation reflect the values of our citizens. We elect people who espouse our vision for America, and we vote out those who don’t share our vision, or are inept at implementing that vision. Look at what has happened in our nation in recent years:

The seven leading problems in public schools in the 1940s were chewing gum, talking, running in the hallways, making noise, getting out of place in line, wearing improper clothing, and not putting paper in wastebaskets. Seventy years later, the seven leading problems have become alcohol abuse, drug abuse, pregnancy, rape, suicide, arson/bombing, and assault/burglary. We’ve gone from gum chewing and talking to rape and school bombing. But what do we expect when we teach our kids they are just smart animals?
Our nation has engaged in continuous warfare against other nations, promoting regime change in multiple countries (such as Iraq, Libya, Egypt, Ukraine, Syria, and Iran) and killing millions of innocent people (over 1 million people have died in Iraq because of “weapons of mass destruction”).
Our political leaders have created a federal debt that is so massive, it will never be repaid, and will burden our children and grandchildren for generations to come.
Over 50 million unborn babies have lost their lives since Roe vs. Wade in 1973. This is the equivalent to an atomic bomb wiping out the population of the states of New York, Virginia, Massachusetts, Connecticut, New Hampshire, Vermont, Rhode Island, and New Jersey.
Our nation promotes abortion and homosexuality in our foreign policy, often tying foreign aid to other nations’ willingness to adopt policies supporting these practices (Kenya is just one example).
President Obama, the most pro-homosexual president in our history, was re-elected, in part due to a solid voting bloc of Christians.
He also stated that we are no longer a Christian nation, and “the future must not belong to those who slander the Prophet of Islam”.
Over 30 states (and many churches) have now embraced homosexual marriage, in spite of the Biblical admonitions against homosexuality.
When the planes hit the World Trade Towers on 9-11, the response from the American people was righteous indignation, almost a demand that “God bless America”, and a religious service for our leaders in the Washington cathedral that featured leaders from Christian, Catholic, Jewish, and Muslim faiths. Incredible. The most prestigious center of commerce and our defense establishment are attacked by unknown forces, and we respond with the religion of universalism! What did not happen was the people of our nation crying out to God, repenting of our sins, and seeking the protection and guidance from the sovereign, living God of the universe.

So it appears that we have the leadership that we want, and are moving along the path we have chosen.

From the Word of God we read:

“For the time has come for judgment to begin at the house of God; and if it begins with us first, what will be the end of those who do not obey the gospel of God?” I Peter 4:17

“If My people who are called by My name will humble themselves, and pray and seek My face, and turn from their wicked ways, then I will hear from heaven, and will forgive their sin and heal their land.” II Chronicles 7:14

The Word does not say “if you elect the right person to be your leader”, or “if all of the people”; it says “If My people will humble themselves and pray and seek My face and turn from their wicked ways…”

We need to repent, to turn back to the Lord, and pray for our nation, for God is just.