Everlasting Place - Eternal eyes: a blog about forever

Proof of God? Consider the puffin.

11/12/2019

Since becoming a Christian at the turn of the millennium, I have been repeatedly overwhelmed at how blind I had been for my entire adult life. How could I have looked at the world around me and missed the hand of the Creator? How in particular could I have failed to see Him, and His supreme sense of beauty, design and humor, in critters such as the puffin -- like the one shown here, from a spectacular portfolio of Farne Island photos published by The Atlantic.

I have no excuse. I was raised on puffins by a mother who often recited this little poem:

There Once Was a Puffin
by Florence Page Jaques

Oh, there once was a Puffin
Just the shape of a muffin,
And he lived on an island
In the bright blue sea!

He ate little fishes,
That were most delicious,
And he had them for supper
And he had them for tea.

But this poor little Puffin,
He couldn't play nothin',
For he hadn't anybody
To play with at all.

So he sat on his island,
And he cried for awhile, and
He felt very lonely,
And he felt very small.

Then along came the fishes,
And they said, "If you wishes,
You can have us for playmates,
Instead of for tea!"

So they now play together,
In all sorts of weather,
And the Puffin eats pancakes,
Like you and like me.

My mother was famous for reciting this little poem, at least in our family. So perhaps it was no surprise when we found that she'd left an audio tape on her bedside table, just before she went Home to the Lord -- and that on it, she had recorded herself reciting this very poem just days earlier. Her goal in doing so, she said, was to always remind us that in death as in life, "your mother was the font of all wisdom."

When He formed her, her Creator had obviously given her more than a smattering of His sense of humor. How could I have missed that, too?

Absolute opinion vs. absolute truth

11/6/2019

"He has made everything beautiful in its time. Also He has put eternity in their hearts ..." (Ecclesiastes 3:11a)

I've long thought that this is one of the most beautiful verses that wise King Solomon ever wrote. Pondering it tonight, I wondered if the world would at least grant us that it's a natural instinct -- that belief in an afterlife seems to be something that most people, in most cultures, have embraced over history.

So I did a little Internet investigation. No surprise, I came across a lot of atheist bilge about weak-minded people inventing God to soothe their fears about death.

But then I stumbled across a CNN report from 2011 -- a report entitled "Religious belief is human nature, huge new study claims."

The subject of this very sketchy article was a three-year Oxford University study which concluded that a belief in purpose and afterlife is pretty much universal. And apparently this wasn't the first time such researchers have come to this conclusion: "Studies around the world came up with similar findings," the article reports, "including widespread belief in some kind of afterlife and an instinctive tendency to suggest that natural phenomena happen for a purpose."

This study did not attempt to prove or disprove God's existence, according to one of its co-directors.

No surprise there, either, but what a pity: A bunch of academics spend three years studying whether a belief in the afterlife is common ... yet apparently spend not a moment trying to determine whether such a belief is true.

Wouldn't it have been more profitable for everyone concerned if they'd searched for absolute truth rather than wasting their time on what is, at least to an unbeliever, absolute opinion?

I guarantee that any reasonably intelligent researcher -- one who was willing to follow the evidence wherever it led -- would discover the truth in far less than three years. And it would lead him or her directly to that narrow gate, with an eternally important decision to make.

The death of absolute truth

10/29/2019

Silly me. Since my conversion to Christ in 2000, I’ve been obsessed with the modern world’s refusal to even acknowledge God – let alone to repent and trust in Him for eternal life. I’ve thought of it as a special kind of stubbornness reserved exclusively for Him, a Satan-driven love of sin that blinds the majority of people to the truth about where we came from, what we’re doing here and where we’re going.

“If we can only get these people to consider Christ,” I’ve thought time and time again, “then the Holy Spirit can point them once and for all to God and His word. Absolute truth will win!”

Now I’m wondering how I could have been so blind to the flaw in this strategy: Because in today’s world, absolute truth no longer exists.

What woke me up was reviewing a Family Policy Institute of Washington video in which a short white guy interviewed students on the campus of the University of Washington.

To set the stage, he asked them about the current debate over the accessing bathrooms and locker rooms based on “gender identity” and “gender expression.”

Their comments were eye-opening. “Bathrooms should be gender neutral,” said one, and the others agreed, using frighteningly similar language.

The interviewer then turned it up a notch.

“What would you say,” he asked each student, “if I told you I was Chinese?”

The consensus? “Good for you.”

And so on.

“How about if I told you I was seven years old?” the interviewer said.

“If you feel seven at heart,” replied an oh-so-tolerant co-ed, “so be it.”

The interviewer was clearly looking for something that would cause someone to say “No, that’s not true!” He tried this, noting elsewhere that he is actually 5’9”: “If I said I was 6’5”, what would you say?”

“If you truly believe it,” replied one student, “that’s fine.”

“It’s not my place to say someone is wrong,” said another.

And there you have it. Faced with an obvious lie, these college students are unwilling -- perhaps unable -- to expose it. Whatever you say, buddy; who am I to tell you you’re wrong? It doesn’t hurt me if you want to think that.

It’s true that there are other contemporary influences shaping people’s thinking these days – most notably, the suppression of competing ideas in the public square and, increasingly, even in private conversation. Perhaps that’s why the world has been so quick to embrace false narratives on everything from Marxism to climate change to gender liberation – all while celebrating tolerance as the ultimate good.

But at the heart of such Orwellian “goodthink” is the persistent rejection of absolute truth.

And if you reject absolute truth, you are by definition rejecting the One who is “the way, the truth, and the life.”

I guess our only hope, if the Lord tarries, is that something will cause a future generation to cry out to Him in repentance and faith. After all, it happened repeatedly with the children of Israel in the days of the judges, when everyone “did what was right in his own eyes.” And the Lord was faithful to forgive them, and deliver them from whatever evil threatened to destroy them.

Maybe it’s not too late for us.

Got questions? Get the right answers right here.

10/23/2019

It was in the summer of 2001 that a very godly woman brought me to a life-changing realization about truth, and where to find it.

Here’s the scoop.

I’d joined the choir in the church I was attending in those days. The director put me in the tenor section with the guys; rightfully so, since I have a range of about five notes and they’re all below middle C.

Usually, we stuck to fellowshipping in our own sections. But one evening during practice, I somehow found myself chatting with our star soprano, a beautiful little redhead named Gail. Still a baby Christian in those days, I asked her a silly question or two or three about the faith. Can’t remember what those queries were, but she suggested we have coffee together to discuss them.

I will never forget sitting in a booth in Baker’s Square with this woman, lobbing very tough questions at her. At least I thought they were tough, perhaps even unanswerable.

But Gail didn’t hesitate. She responded to every query by flipping to a new section in her Bible, reading me a verse or two, explaining it when it wasn’t quite obvious to a novice, and showing me additional passages whenever necessary.

I was blown away. Using only her Bible, she had answered all the questions I’d brought to the table that morning. We met several more times in the weeks that followed. Each time I brought her a slew of challenging new questions. And each time, she found the answer to every last one in the pages of her Bible.

Not that every answer incorporated the specific details that had prompted my questions, or outlined a simple course of action. For instance, I asked Gail if I should continue seeing atheist friends who were mocking my newfound faith. She showed me what the Bible said about loving our enemies, sharing the gospel and shining our lights for God’s glory. She also showed me its warnings about, for instance, what bad company can do to good habits and how we are to keep ourselves unspotted from the world.

So unlike the Magic 8 Balls of our childhoods, the Bible’s response isn’t always a simple “yes” or “no.” But as this godly woman demonstrated for me in those early days of my walk with Jesus, there’s not an issue in our lives that the Bible doesn’t address for anyone with ears to hear and a heart to obey.

I lost touch with Gail years ago. But I look forward to seeing her again one happy day in heaven, and to thanking her for her life-changing investment in me. The Lord used her to open my eyes to His word. And I will be forever grateful.

Hear the hisssss?

10/15/2019

Encounter any interesting euphemisms lately? There certainly are plenty of them around these days.

There's the "certified pre-owned" car that's really simply used.

Or the "tipsy" fellow who caused such a scene at the wedding last week, who was just plain drunk.

Or the "physical" linebacker who's actually a dirty player.

But euphemisms like these are relatively innocent compared to some of the whoppers we're exposed to today -- the ones that are delivered by wolves in sheep's clothing.

Most notably, "self-deliverance." Have you heard that term yet?

It means "suicide."

It means "killing yourself."

It means deciding that your life might become an unbearable burden to someone else -- or quite possibly to yourself.

It means "taking the easy way out."

It is making the supreme sacrifice to the gods of comfort and convenience -- the same gods that have claimed the lives of tens of millions of babies in American wombs over the the last four blood-spattered decades.

I've read about "self-deliverence" here and there and have finally taken the time to look it up.

Yup, there it is, presented as an act of courage, of selflessness, of supreme self-sacrifice.

Satan has apparently been working overtime since the first strains of Zionism were heard in the 19th century, when he began inventing false religions to satisfy every taste. He has stepped it up since the restoration of Israel in 1948. And now that the final pieces of biblical prophecy are falling into place -- those presented in Ezekiel 38, for instance -- he has gone hog wild with deceptions that would take any marketer's breath away.

Just consider his track record.

He repositioned "infanticide" as "choice."

He transformed "selfishness" into "self-actualization."

He changed "greed" into "financial responsibility."

And now he is succeeding in repositioning "suicide" as courageous and sacrificial "self-deliverance," something that we do as the ultimate expression of love for family, country, and culture.

He has even raised up generations of "professionals" to make it easy on everyone concerned, complete with well-funded associations and beautifully designed web sites to talk our legislators into legalizing it, and to talk us into taking this route ourselves when the time comes.

God help us.

Are you trusting in the real Jesus?

10/8/2019

Several years ago, I received a starchy email from an acquaintance whose God is all love and nothing else. She refused to believe that He’d ever judge anyone for “just being human,” and she accused me of blasphemy for implying that He would.

“He understands why we do the things we do,” she wrote. That much is true. But then she added, “He is love. That means He loves everyone and we are all going to heaven.”

I replied with the truth: Of course He is love, I said. But He is also perfectly holy, just, merciful, omniscient, and omnipotent; He is the way, the truth and the life; He is the good shepherd; He is the resurrection and the life; He is infinitely more than even a million words could convey.

Was she convinced? Beats me -- I never heard back from her. Guess we're no longer acquaintances.

But hold on, Foth-Regner. What difference does it make if she wants to limit her understanding of Him to a single word?

Just this: In the Bible, God has told us all we need to know about Himself. Yet many people – including this woman, apparently – are singularly disinterested in Him.

What does that say about her love for Him? And what impact will it have on her for all eternity?

Fact is, the Bible tells us repeatedly what's required of us: We must repent of what the Lord says is sin, and trust in Him to have paid the penalty for that sin on the cross.

Is that really asking so much? Apparently so, for some people.

I wonder what will happen to this woman if she continues to reject this truth, and instead clings to her “God is nothing more than love” theology?

When she stands before Him in judgment, will He say “Well done, good and faithful servant”? (Matthew 25:21)

Or will she hear “I never knew you; depart from Me, you who practice lawlessness”? (Matthew 7:23)

If the latter, will she argue with Him? Will she say, as she said to me, “I’ve been a good person, I never hurt anyone”? Or will she finally be forced to acknowledge that our good works are not what gets us into heaven, and that His standards are higher than our own?

I’m glad I’m not the judge. After all, the Lord knows our hearts better than we do; it could be that hers is more submitted to Him than anyone else’s, and that she’s merely the blameless victim of some faulty instruction.

But her email really made me think about how important it is that we seek and trust the real Jesus – not some idol that we have created in our own imaginations, or that some self-proclaimed prophet has imagined for us.

He’s the only One who can save us. Why take a chance on trusting in anyone, or anything, else?

What's in your closet?

10/1/2019

Have you taken a close look at Revelation 18 lately? This key chapter from the last book of the Bible talks about the sorrow of the world’s kings and merchants who have not become children of God through repentance and trust in Christ. Specifically, it describes how they mourn the destruction of Babylon the great, symbol of all the world’s wealth, greed and pleasure.

“The kings of the earth who committed fornication with her and lived luxuriously with her will weep and lament for her … And the merchants of the earth will weep and mourn over her, for no one buys their merchandise anymore: merchandise of gold and silver, precious stones and pearls, fine linen and purple, silk and scarlet … and bodies and souls men.” (Revelation 18:9a, 11-12a, 13b)

Does this make you even a little uncomfortable?

It does me. I certainly have more than my share of clothing stuffed in an eight-foot closet; in fact, in winter, it’s so jammed with heavy duds that it’s hard to get at anything. But my closet is nothing like the walk-in versions I admire in even low-end dwellings featured on HGTV. And I know a few women who have dedicated entire rooms to their wardrobes.

I hadn’t really thought about this until last night, when, trying to fall asleep, I took a virtual tour of the house I grew up in.

It was a magical house, an old brick Victorian with graceful rooms, lovely natural woodwork, elaborate newel posts, a mysterious basement, leaded-glass pocket doors, built-in cabinets and lots of closets – albeit very small closets, by today’s standards.

I pictured my mother’s. It was perhaps six feet wide. It housed all her cold- and warm-weather clothing very comfortably, leaving plenty of room for hiding Christmas presents every December.

My dad’s closet contained his entire collection of suits. Even though he was a civil engineer with his own company, and even though men of the ‘50s and ‘60s wore suits everywhere, even on vacation, he must not have had many; the closet was only about four feet wide.

The closets in my bedroom and my sisters’ featured pull-out poles, each accommodating no more than four feet of hangers.

Curious, I revisited the closets in various apartments I rented over the years. They weren’t much larger, although they became increasingly jammed. Somewhere along the line I picked up a used dresser to expand my storage possibilities.

Could an American adult survive with so little closet space today? I doubt it.

So what has happened to us over the last half century?

Perhaps the root of the problem is our nationwide abandonment of the Bible and its unmatched wisdom, thanks at least in part to the ‘60s-era destruction caused by Madalyn Murray O’Hair and her fellow atheists.

Consider how different our closets might look today if we’d only ignored Madalyn and instead listened to Jesus’ advice in Matthew 6:28-33:

“So why do you worry about clothing? Consider the lilies of the field, how they grow: they neither toil nor spin; and yet I say to you that even Solomon in all his glory was not arrayed like one of these. Now if God so clothes the grass of the field, which today is, and tomorrow is thrown into the oven, will He not much more clothe you, O you of little faith?

“Therefore do not worry, saying, ‘What shall we eat?’ or ‘What shall we drink?’ or ‘What shall we wear?’ For after all these things the Gentiles seek. For your heavenly Father knows that you need all these things. But seek first the kingdom of God and His righteousness, and all these things shall be added to you.”

Of course, it’s not just our wardrobes that would be entirely different if we Americans had clung to our Bibles instead of giving the thumbs up to rebels like Madalyn. But they’re certainly a good indicator of where we are as a nation, spiritually speaking.

They may also be a pretty good predictor of the devastation many Americans will experience, perhaps fairly soon. After all, one of these days, all the material things we so prize will vanish, along with the impressive closets that house them.

It could happen on the day that the angel proclaims, “Babylon the great is fallen, is fallen, and has become a dwelling place of demons, a prison for every foul spirit, and a cage for every unclean and hated bird!” (Revelation 18:2)

If you’re not looking forward to that day, I hope you’ll take a few moments to consider how you might avoid it -- and instead assure yourself of joy forevermore.

And yet another way to trash the Bible

9/25/2019

I just caught a couple minutes of a Discovery channel program entitled “Expedition Unknown: Mysteries of Jesus,” and was once again appalled at the way the “stars” of the show misled the unwary viewer.

The onscreen expert was apparently flying the host to Galilee where, he said, Jesus may have been born rather than Bethlehem. The host quickly pulled out his pocket Bible to verify the possibility. He turned to and read a verse that said something along the lines of “Jesus from Galilee.”

“Ah,” said the host, assuring us that he always checks these things against the Bible, “the gospels contain conflicting information.” Or something like that. I didn’t have a pen in hand, poised to take notes, and my fury over this deliberate deception may have distorted my memory of his exact words.

But his message was clear: The gospels can’t even get Jesus’ birthplace straight. How can you possibly trust anything they say?

Never mind that the gospels are clear: Jesus was born in Bethlehem of Judea; Joseph and Mary had gone there for the census. After a detour to Egypt to escape the murderous Herod, they headed back to Israel with the infant Jesus and settled in Nazareth of Galilee—the town where Jesus grew up, lived and worked. Hence, subsequent references to Jesus said He came from Nazareth or Galilee.

It’s not really rocket science. I was born in Green Bay, Wisconsin, but if someone asks me today where I’m from, I name my current town.

But the host of “Expedition Unknown”didn’t bother to investigate. Instead, he left hanging the implication that the Bible is inaccurate.

“Don’t pretty your little heads about the Bible,” he might as well have said. “It’s filled with error. We’ll tell you all you need to know about this Jesus.”

I’ll bet 90% of the audience for this program consists of people who have some level of interest in Jesus Christ, and almost no knowledge of scripture. And I’ll bet that very few, having watched this hatchet job, will bother to crack open a Bible in the future.

In short: mission accomplished, Discovery channel.

It’s hardly the first time such deception has distorted coverage of the Bible. I’ve blogged about such incidents in the past – for instance, one that occurred on the History Channel and another perpetrated by our local newspaper. And I’m sure someone out there is amassing daily examples of such blasphemous reporting.

I suppose we'd better get used to it. Satan knows he’s running out of time, and he’ll do whatever it takes to keep his disciples from consulting the word of God.

Can your worldview explain this?

9/17/2019

Our world is in free fall these days. And there are probably as many explanations for all our problems as there are people.

But it occurred to me this morning that no matter what happens, it doesn't surprise me. Oh, sure, there are new outrages coming out of Washington every day, new natural disasters to gape at, horrifying new examples of evil being called good and good evil, new acts of incredible human kindness or courage to warm the heart.

But I can’t remember the last time I was really astounded by any development.

The reason? My worldview is entirely biblical. And when you view the world through the lens of the Bible, everything makes sense.

Take, for example, the deterioration in how we deal with each other. Rudeness and violence are on the upswing, civility is long gone. Abortion is a right. Drug addiction is the fault of Big Pharma. The “do your own thing” siren call of the ‘60s has matured into a way of life for most people. And the very idea of obeying or even respecting a higher authority has become a joke.

Or consider the death of truth. Hardly anyone believes in it anymore, at least not the absolute kind. Everything’s relative, everything’s conditional, and we have grown used to hearing partial truths put forth as explanations when we know, if we’ll just think about it, that a partial truth is most often nothing more than a lie.

Or think about our love affair with the material, our obsession with outward appearance, our worship of celebrities, our demand for 24x7 entertainment, our glorification of the intellect.

Or even the way old cars rust out and fall apart.

I could cite Bible passage after Bible passage explaining each of these phenomena, and just about everything else that we see happening today. That’s because, quite simply, the Bible is truth, and the biblical worldview is the only way to recognize it in this post-modern world.

That’s the thing about truth. It always rings ... true.

Am I wrong? Does your non-biblical worldview do an equally fine job of explaining this world? Or does it explain part of it, but require a lot of “just so” stories to make sense of the rest?

Let’s give it a test.

Does your non-biblical worldview explain poverty in America, in spite of the trillions of dollars that have been poured into eradicating it over the last 50+ years?

Does it explain the dramatic increase in crime, in suicide, in mental illness?

How about the drive to globalization?

Or the dramatic increase in information and travel?

How about the growth of greed? Or the escalating tensions in the Middle East and the return of the horrors of antisemitism?

And how about the stubborn refusal of man to quit believing in a purpose for this life, and an afterlife to follow?

If your non-biblical worldview can explain all of these phenomena, I’d love to hear about it.

But if it doesn’t, I invite you to take a close look at mine.

One of the best introductions I’ve ever come across is in James Sire’s amazing book The Universe Next Door. You’ll find a glimpse of a synopsis of it in my library, and used and new copies of it wherever books are sold.

Why not give it a shot? What have you got to lose, except a view of the world that leaves you scratching your head whenever you pause to ponder it?

There's definitely something wrong here

9/11/2019

To create a coherent picture from jigsaw-puzzle pieces, you have to have all the pieces in hand. Or most of them, anyway; we have learned that it is possible to complete a puzzle even after the cats have fed the dogs a half-dozen or so.

Trouble is, when it comes to biblical Christianity, you aren’t going to get most of the pieces unless you search them out. Jesus has been banned from our public institutions, and the news media are largely silent on any topic that might paint the Bible in a positive light.

Dr. Hitchcock’s book got me to thinking about news coverage of topics related to faith – especially, since it’s sort of my thing these days, the play given to pronouncements by evolutionists. And here’s the truth: Every couple of weeks, I see or hear a prominent story on some new evolutionary discovery that promises to be the missing link. At the same time, pronouncements about vast ages – the old “millions and millions of years” bit – are presented as fact, with nary an attribution to provide even a hint of opinion being mixed in with fact.

I grumble to Dave about this regularly over the morning newspaper.

“Listen to this,” I usually begin, forcing him to bear witness to yet another unattributed paragraph or two.

He normally just sips his coffee and nods and buries himself further in the section he’s reading, no doubt hoping I’ll be quiet. Neither of us likes to be read to, especially not from a story we’ll soon have the opportunity to read ourselves, or one we’ve already taken a pass on. But I usually toss such concerns aside when I’m hot on the trail of yet another evolutionary fairy tale.

“What kills me,” I then say, “is that when they finally figure out this isn’t what they thought it was, we won’t see any follow-up stories to let us know we’ve been misled by these clowns. And the clowns themselves don’t care; by that time they’ll have used this alleged discovery to get themselves fat new grants.”

“Terrible,” Dave typically agrees, wise enough to let me run with it.

“And in the meantime, the public is left with the impression that evolution is fact.”

“They should really all be shot, just as soon as possible.”

He doesn’t mean this, of course. But it always makes me laugh, putting an end to my complaint.

But it doesn’t put an end to this problem of the news media presenting paleontologists’ just-so tales as fact. Even when the claims are highly controversial – for example, there’s no small debate raging about whether Lucy was a human relative or simply an extinct chimp – conventional news channels never bother to point it out.

This would be somewhat tolerable if news relating to Christianity received the same treatment: Unquestioning publicity, with no follow up if things turn out to be not quite as they seemed at first blush.

But as long as I’ve been watching, I haven’t seen that happen, not once.

For instance, the ossuary that might have contained the bones of Jesus’ brother James, unearthed in Israel in 2002, was reported on amidst repeated charges of fraud. Whether or not it was genuine didn’t matter; readers were left with the impression that biblical artifacts should be viewed with suspicion that is rarely leveled against evolutionary claims.

Or consider the 2006 discovery of a 400+-foot object in the mountains of Iran, more than 13,000 feet above sea level. Its finders believe it might be the remains of Noah’s Ark. They had it tested by a Houston lab – one that the Smithsonian itself uses – and supposedly learned that it is indeed made of petrified wood, complete with fossilized sea critters buried inside.

I have no idea if this discovery will turn out to be anything more than another false alarm. But what’s really interesting about it to me is the lack of interest it has generated in the news media. For weeks after the initial announcement, which I came across via a Christian news service, I searched the Internet diligently to see how the nation’s big news organizations handled the story.

Surprise: Most ignored it.

Why is that? A few bones can be declared evidence that we evolved from slime, and the newspapers are all over it; an archeological finding may prove the story of the Genesis Flood true, and it’s greeted with a big yawn.

There’s definitely something wrong here.

–From Heaven Without Her, pages 260-262