WHAT DID JESUS LOOK LIKE? Useless Body Parts? The Elephant Bird. Update.

 

For “Scripture Sunday”:

WHAT DID AND DIDN’T JESUS LOOK LIKE?

“What image comes to your mind when you think of Jesus? Many imagine Jesus as artists have drawn Him, but is such an image supported or contradicted by the Bible?

Few people spent more time with Jesus Christ than the 12 disciples. Of those 12, three men formed His closest inner circle—Peter, James and John. They spent thousands of hours with Him—walking from town to town, socializing, eating meals and listening to Him teach.

Now imagine if those three men were raised from the dead today and shown traditional artistic images of Jesus (statues from Catholic churches, portraits from Protestant churches and maybe one or two movies about Christ’s life).ew people spent more time with Jesus Christ than the 12 disciples. Of those 12, three men formed His closest inner circle—Peter, James and John. They spent thousands of hours with Him—walking from town to town, socializing, eating meals and listening to Him teach.

Would they recognize the pale, long-haired man wearing a white robe portrayed in so many of those images? Or would they look puzzlingly, wondering who that man was supposed to be?  

In all likelihood, their reaction would be the latter! They would have no idea who was in the images and would likely tell you that nobody in their community looked anything like that.”  .

Complete article at: http://lifehopeandtruth.com/god/who-is-jesus/what-did-jesus-look-like/

Jesus looked like an average Jewish man of His time

WHAT DID A FIRST-CENTURY JEWISH MAN LOOK LIKE?

This bust of first-century Jewish historian Flavius Josephus shows that men of the time commonly wore short hair.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

• 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Sculpted busts show it was common for first-century Roman men to wear short hair. Paul even said it was a shame for a man to have long hair.

_______

An Evolutionary Fantasy

Useless Body Parts?

“Did chance evolution leave us with unneeded vestigial body parts— or did a Creator carefully design every part of us?

As it turns out, there are uses for body parts previously assumed to be useless!”

agsandrew/iStock/Thinkstock

The more research and study that’s done in the natural world around us and in understanding our bodies, the more obvious it becomes that evolution fails to account for the complexity and resiliency of life—life that God created.

If you sat down and counted all the cells in the human body, you would find more than 10 trillion (10,000,000,000,000) cells. About 12 billion of these are nerve cells linked by more than 10 trillion connections. The body’s cells make up groups of systems that work together to sustain life—the skeletal system, the muscular system, the digestive system, the nervous system, the reproductive system and the cardiovascular system.

All of these systems have subsystems. For example, the muscular system has involuntary and voluntary muscles. Involuntary muscles work without our conscious effort—such as the cardiac or heart muscle. Voluntary muscles are muscles that we have to think about to use—like a bicep muscle that helps us to pick up things.

Not only do the systems in the human body perform specific tasks, but they also work together to improve the work of each system. For example, the skeleton provides the framework to support the body and to protect vital organs. It also provides mobility to the body and produces red and white blood cells that move energy through the body, fight infection and remove waste material.

Are these “vestigial organs” really useless body parts, or did a Creator God Himself design them with important roles to play?

Despite how impressive and complex our bodies are, proponents of Darwinian evolution have long insisted that parts of the human body are useless. They assume these so-called “vestigial organs” are just leftovers of man’s evolutionary process that serve no useful bodily function.

A Discovery News article several years ago featured a list of supposed “useless” parts in the human body without any follow-up or consideration as to what value these body parts could have. Are these “vestigial organs” really useless body parts, or did a Creator God Himself design them with important roles to play? Let’s give them a closer look.”         Complete article at: https://www.ucg.org/beyond-today/beyond-today-magazine/an-evolutionary-fantasy-useless-body-parts

_______

The Elephant Bird

An Amazing Fact: Around the 1600s, early Arabian and Indian explorers began returning from the coast of east Africa with accounts of birds that were twice as tall as a man and three times as big as an ostrich. Naturally, their stories were scoffed at … until they brought evidence: eggs up to three feet in circumference! They were the eggs of an Aepyornis—a giant flightless bird found only on the island of Madagascar. Today the Aepyornis is better known as the elephant bird because of the stories Marco Polo told of a bird so strong that it could lift an elephant.

Though now extinct, the elephant bird was the largest bird that has ever lived. Scientists estimate that it stood 11 feet tall and weighed 900 pounds. By comparison, an exceptionally large ostrich might reach 9 feet and 300 pounds. By the time the French settled in Madagascar in the 1640s, the elephant bird had already become very rare. The last sighting of a live elephant bird was in 1649. The natives’ histories on Madagascar describe the elephant bird as a shy, peaceful giant.

It was likely driven to extinction by people raiding its nests for the extraordinary eggs. In fact, its eggs were even bigger than the largest dinosaur eggs. One of the largest intact specimens is 35 inches in circumference around its long axis, and probably had a capacity of more than two gallons. Some biologists have calculated that these eggs were as large as a functional egg possibly could be, meaning the eggs of the extinct elephant birds were the largest single cells to have ever existed on Earth.

Many people thought the elephant bird was just a myth until they saw the undeniable evidence. Unfortunately, in spite of the obvious biblical evidence, some people still think that the devil is a mythical beast with goat hooves and a forked tail. But the Bible makes it clear that the devil is real—and a formidable foe. Peter describes him as a “roaring lion, seeking whom he may devour” (1 Peter 5:8). Yet the devil can be resisted! Peter also warns us to be watchful, vigilant, and steadfast in our faith and promises that eventually “the God of all grace” will “perfect, establish, strengthen, and settle” us (1 Peter 5:9, 10).
KEY BIBLE TEXTS
And the great dragon was cast out, that old serpent, called the Devil, and Satan, which deceiveth the whole world: he was cast out into the earth, and his angels were cast out with him. Revelation 12:9

_______

Update:

The days fly by so fast, and are crammed with things to do, so it is difficult to remember everything that happens.  We did some more work on the extra outlets and lights for the new kitchen, as well as getting things ready to go to the consignment shop and things to be donated.  Two mornings were spent taking my disabled neighbor for his doctor appointments, so Roy and I didn’t work those days.  Anyway one was Roy’s birthday and so he spent it with his family.

Finally, my new passport arrived from England, so that I could use it as an ID instead of waiting the expected six months more for my Green Card.  But first it had to be taken to Houston to be certified by Homeland Security, so I had an appointment to do that.  The day before my appointment, my Green Card arrived.  It had been expedited, so one afternoon was spent in Social Security Office’s waiting room.  I might hear about my increase in Social Security next week. 

Two afternoons were trips to Conroe to get some banking business done with someone who won’t use the branch of the same bank in our hometown of Willis.  They had sat in our branch for over an hour waiting to see a banker, BUT hadn’t signed in, therefore they didn’t get seen in turn, so they don’t like that bank!  That’s like cutting off your nose to spite your face, and a big waste of time and gas going the extra 24 miles.

As I was going down the steps of the fifth wheel, a gust of wind caught the door and the sharp bottom metal corner cut my right hand between my thumb and first finger.  It wouldn’t stop bleeding for quite a while.  It is difficult to cook with bandages on, as they get wet and are very unsanitary, so I have been using some vinyl hospital gloves on that hand.  But the glove gets all sweaty and wet inside so I can’t wait to get it off.

That really became important when the pastor’s wife was sick with a cold and I had to ramrod the potluck again.  One of the elders who usually helps me was out with a cold, too.  As I am a certified Food Manager I know that I must wear a glove over a bandage when preparing food for other people.  I use a dish brush, so I didn’t have to put my right hand in water to wash the few pots, pans and serving utensils.

The Bible Readings were Psa.103, 104, Num. 33:1-36:13, Jer. 2:4-28, James 4:1-12.  We were given homework to read Psa. 105!  It is during the Teaching that the last of the preparations of the potluck have to be made, like putting the garlic bread in the oven, putting the cooked veggies on the buffet, and getting the salads out of the fridge.   I couldn’t hear all of the Teaching through the loud speaker in the kitchen as one of the kids was talking to me, but it was more about Prophesies, Signs of End Times.

As usual, the car was like an oven when I left the church, as it was another hot TX day.