God, Aliens, and Other Stuff

 God is not always in the lobby. Picture a bright, sunny lobby with posters on all the walls. The inhabitants there are fairly tribal, hailing each other with pride and solidarity. Once you get in the lobby, there is only one way out, through a door to the dark hallway of unintended concequences. The hallway is full of more doors. It's scary and complicated, a place of woe and pain, so many denizens of the lobby just stay there. It's a happy place of rigid moral rectitude, a place where simple bromides make so much sense, they couldn't possibly be wrong. The fetus/child poster Take for instance, the poster that reads, "It's not a choice, it's a child." Wow, how could anyone refute that? If you believe in God, that little fetus is a reflection of God. Killing it is murder, and fighting it is to offend God, the Creator of all mankind. Even that gooey blob of protein has the DNA of a human being in it. I admit, for a believing Christian, it's a tough call...

 At least mine weren't. And I was 40 and 43. My faith sustained me. A little backstory first. I married at 39. Being a devout Christian, I felt I had a promise of marriage and kids, so when I met my lovely geologist husband at the Division of Mines and Geology in San Francisco, I didn’t hesitate to, you know, do what you do to make babies. I got married in a $70 creamy off-white dress that you could wear to dinner, which looked great on my size 10 body. However, 2 months later, it was clear I wouldn’t be wearing it for a while. So I put on the pounds right away. By the ninth month, when a woman sees her gynecologist once a week, I was huge and extremely uncomfortable. I could hardly turn over in bed, which is about when some women grab their doctors’ coat collars and shout, “Get this thing out of me!” “I’m so biiiig,” I wailed to my doctor. “No, not really,” he would always reply. “You’re fine.” “What’s happening down here, that’s going back and forth?” “That’s the head.” “The head...

  Was it an instantaneous poof, a straight line, or a mass of squiggles? Blending common sense, science, and theology provides a solid answer.   Psalm 139:13-16 NKJV:  “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, And 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.” We are designed. You could metaphorically say that King David was planned on a drawing board, put together in a secret vault, and came forth with a manual. We are a magnificent, brilliant reflection of God’s engineering genius and of His eternal character. With our efficient bodies, our intellect, and o...

  A 2021 report from the journal  PLOS One  tells how researchers from the University of Groningen used AI technology to detect very minute differences in the style, curvature, and shape of letters in the Great Isaiah Scroll of the Dead Sea Scrolls (DDS). Scholars have dated the scroll to the second century BCE (before the common era, or BC before the birth of Christ). The AI scan found two different scribes, one who did the first half and another who finished it. That does not mean that these two scribes authored the scroll. Scholars argue about how many Isaiahs contributed to the writings of the book. A strong argument could be made for at least two, meaning that one or more of Isaiah’s followers or disciples may have written in his name. Critics, of course, will say all so-called “prophecies” are just reports after an event has happened. The trouble with all of that historical critique is that there are incredibly specific prophecies of the coming Messiah, Jesus Ch...

 When is a diamond not a diamond? I’ve blogged many times about the differences in the two creation stories in Genesis one and two. You can read about them here  and here . I’m married to a geologist. My coursework for my BA degrees included Geology courses, so of course Hubby and I are old earth Christians, which has caused gasps of shock from friends who think we are slipping away from Jesus. I’ve written about creation from the standpoint of the actual possible scribal authors, and yes, my postgraduate education made all the difference in my outlook. Before those studies, I asked the right questions, but afterward I confidently acquired the answers.   A quick rehash: Gen. 1 has a different style. Poetic, repetitive, orderly. Gen. 2 is more conversational and lacks a linear timeline. In Gen. 1, God’s title is Elohim. In Gen. 2, He is called Yahweh-Elohim. In Gen. 1, God “creates” by His word, out of nothing. Things poof into existence. In Gen. 2, God forms manki...