Bruce Szwast October 23rd, 2010

Zippity doo dah, Zippity aye,
My oh my what a wonderful day
Plenty of sunshine coming my way,
Zippity doo dah, Zippity aye.

Mister blue bird's on my shoulder,,
it's the truth, it's actual,
everything's satisfactual!
Zippity doo dah, zippity aye,
zippity doo dah, zippity aye!

Well, I ended my work week as usual yesterday. I leave work early (30 hr week), blow off a bucket of golf balls at the driving range, make my way home thru traffic, do yard work, or coax our 92 Honda back to life, and have a bottle and a half of Newcastle. Why should Calvinists have all the fun, and I don't wait until Sunday afternoon – actually Polish blood requires an occasional brew to maintain a proper genetic balance.

After dinner we sat down to watch Hal Lindsey tell us how bad things really are and where our hope should be. I got into my lazy boy with our 18 year old cat, which has been very sick lately on my lap. We had planned to watch High Noon and see all that evil get justice, but the cat and I fell asleep. My wife is a very understanding soul and she fell asleep during the following program. What a way to spend Creation Day Eve – resting for a new dawn, dreaming about the first one.

Before dozing off however, she (not the cat) posted notes all over the house. Not things to do tomorrow, but verses from Genesis 1. She knew that 'when there was light', I would be up and reading all those wonderful verses. Oh what a beautiful morning, with a full moon setting in the west. And just think, we have 6 more days to dream about and remember what God did on each day.

Next Thursday at work (Day 6 by the way) is our annual 'fall picnic (not Halloween) in the parking lot'. Nancy and I are planning to make dinosaur cookies for desert – this ought to frost Larry the Evolutionist. But he is a real cookie monster and is willing to talk about his dysfunction – how can anyone who knows what is true spend so much time and effort trying to disprove it? Got me! Well:

Romans 1: 18. The wrath of God is being revealed from heaven against all the godlessness and wickedness of men who suppress the truth by their wickedness, 19. since what may be known about God is plain to them, because God has made it plain to them. 20. For since the creation of the world God's invisible qualities–his eternal power and divine nature–have been clearly seen, being understood from what has been made, so that men are without excuse.

This morning we went to Julie's Waterfront Restaurant for breakfast (19 years in a row) and I gave Abel the one time cook, and immigrant, and now American owner, with his family are doing a bang (not big) up job – you otter come, a Creation Day Card. It had a graphic of the 7 Days with Genesis 1 plus 2:1 on the reverse side. He appreciates my cards; he even delivered our breakfast personally.

While we were eating and discussing the seven days, looking out over the waters, watching the birds flying, the fish brimming, the otters swimming, the sky with broken white clouds, an old cat under the deck, the waving trees, all through a jasmine window frame, with other people enjoying God's beautiful creation, I thought:

Zippity doo dah, Zippity aye, My oh my what a wonderful day.

Ps: I also gave another Creation Day Card to a lonely lady at the restaurant who had the same view we had. She looked at it and said 'this place is like heaven on earth'. I said this is heaven away from earth – pray for her.

Ps: I also listened to the ETC show today: esoterically delightful.

philip November 1st, 2010

Thanks for having Dr. Ross on again. I don't necessarily get everthing he says but he explains it so I get close. Love listening to this him and thinking about how God is beyond what my feeble mind can fathom. Bring Dr. Ross back soon. Thanks.

Bruce Szwast November 5th, 2010

What good does it do to tell about Jesus and His Love if you never speak to the Beginning?

Well I survived another Creation Week (10/23-29/10 -Year 6014) Evangelism experiment at work. Some people were surprisingly positive (even my 2 alternative life style coworkers and friends – don't ask, don't tell, works for all of us), and some where negative (you are violating the Constitution's tenet of 'separation of church and office'), but I still have my job. It was worth the risk.

Daily, I lined up individual days on the hallway cube wall, and waited for an onslaught that never came (except from Larry the evolutionist). I also had some illustrative pictures, but I cannot post them here. Please use your imagination:

Genesis 1

1. In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth.
2. Now the earth was formless and empty, darkness was over the surface of the deep, and the Spirit of God was hovering over the waters.
3. And God said, "Let there be light," and there was light.
4. God saw that the light was good, and he separated the light from the darkness.
5. God called the light "day," and the darkness he called "night." And there was evening, and there was morning–THE FIRST DAY.
6. And God said, "Let there be an expanse between the waters to separate water from water."
7. So God made the expanse and separated the water under the expanse from the water above it. And it was so.
8. God called the expanse "sky." And there was evening, and there was morning–THE SECOND DAY

• Day 1 (Saturday) and Day 2 (Sunday) – I am happy they fell on the weekend. I wish we had more cooperation in finding more definitive scientific information about the scholarly and spectacular and spiritual reality of 24 hour days – we still can do that for next year: all the matter does matter!

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9. And God said, "Let the water under the sky be gathered to one place, and let dry ground appear." And it was so.
10. God called the dry ground "land," and the gathered waters he called "seas." And God saw that it was good.
11. Then God said, "Let the land produce vegetation: seed-bearing plants and trees on the land that bear fruit with seed in it, according to their various kinds." And it was so.
12. The land produced vegetation: plants bearing seed according to their kinds and trees bearing fruit with seed in it according to their kinds. And God saw that it was good.
13. And there was evening, and there was morning–THE THIRD DAY.

• Day 3 – Monday: The wife surprised us at work with a very large basket of various kinds of fruit. I carried it around to everyone and discussed 'the vegetation concept'. My boss saw me coming and said "oh no, not Creation Week again! – just keep it down".

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14. And God said, "Let there be lights in the expanse of the sky to separate the day from the night, and let them serve as signs to mark seasons and days and years,
15. and let them be lights in the expanse of the sky to give light on the earth." And it was so.
16. God made two great lights–the greater light to govern the day and the lesser light to govern the night. He also made the stars.
17. God set them in the expanse of the sky to give light on the earth,
18. to govern the day and the night, and to separate light from darkness. And God saw that it was good.
19. And there was evening, and there was morning–THE FOURTH DAY.

• Day 4 – Tuesday: God creates time and its limitations – science only measures it. The Red Shift measurement only reflects the inevitable ravages of time, or what little there is of it. They say the universe is expanding (Doppler Effect), but we do not know how fast or how distant, except for triangulation – give me a break! Looks flat line from a very limited angle and with any assumption of age. What happens when the readings go negative? Maybe the big bang is placed at the wrong end of time – 2 Peter 3:10-12.

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20. And God said, "Let the water teem with living creatures, and let birds fly above the earth across the expanse of the sky."
21. So God created the great creatures of the sea and every living and moving thing with which the water teems, according to their kinds, and every winged bird according to its kind. And God saw that it was good.
22. God blessed them and said, "Be fruitful and increase in number and fill the water in the seas, and let the birds increase on the earth."
23. And there was evening, and there was morning–THE FIFTH DAY.

• Day 5 – Wednesday: So what is for dinner tonight, chicken or fish? Where is the beef? Tomorrow!

• Which came first, the chicken or the egg? Actually it was a rooster and a hen.

• Evolutionist answer? It was a Chickeroo!

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• Day 6 – Thursday (by the way, Larry the evolutionist ate a whole stegosaurus – I ordered 7 dinosaur cookie cutters for the day – he got the point).

24. And God said, "Let the land produce living creatures according to their kinds: livestock, creatures that move along the ground, and wild animals, each according to its kind." And it was so.
25. God made the wild animals according to their kinds, the livestock according to their kinds, and all the creatures that move along the ground according to their kinds. And God saw that it was good.
26. Then God said, "Let us make man in our image, in our likeness, and let them rule over the fish of the sea and the birds of the air, over the livestock, over all the earth, and over all the creatures that move along the ground."
27. So God created man in his own image, in the image of God he created him; male and female he created them.
28. God blessed them and said to them, "Be fruitful and increase in number; fill the earth and subdue it. Rule over the fish of the sea and the birds of the air and over every living creature that moves on the ground."
29. Then God said, "I give you every seed-bearing plant on the face of the whole earth and every tree that has fruit with seed in it. They will be yours for food.
30. And to all the beasts of the earth and all the birds of the air and all the creatures that move on the ground–everything that has the breath of life in it–I give every green plant for food." And it was so.
31. God saw all that he had made, and it was very good. And there was evening, and there was morning–THE SIXTH DAY.

• I posted a beautiful painting of what the Garden may have looked like – 'an earthly paradise'. Too bad I cannot post it here – it said billions of words.

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• Then the toughest decision of all: should I fast forward to Day 8 or 9 or soon thereafter? Too late to turn back:

• but, then came the inevitable decision to eat of the forbidden fruit, the knowledge of good and evil, and of life and death among the thorns and thistles:

Genesis 3

12. The man said, "The woman you put here with me–she gave me some fruit from the tree, and I ate it."
13. Then the LORD God said to the woman, "What is this you have done?" The woman said, "The serpent deceived me, and I ate."
14. So the LORD God said to the serpent, "Because you have done this, "Cursed are you above all the livestock and all the wild animals! You will crawl on your belly and you will eat dust all the days of your life.
15. And I will put enmity between you and the woman, and between your offspring and hers; he will crush your head, and you will strike his heel."

22. And the LORD God said, "The man has now become like one of us, knowing good and evil. He must not be allowed to reach out his hand and take also from the tree of life and eat, and live forever."
23. So the LORD God banished him from the Garden of Eden to work the ground from which he had been taken.
24. After he drove the man out, he placed on the east side of the Garden of Eden cherubim and a flaming sword flashing back and forth to guard the way to the tree of life.

• but, then came the meaning of Christmas and Easter:

John 3

16. "For God so loved the world that he gave his one and only Son, that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life.
17. For God did not send his Son into the world to condemn the world, but to save the world through him. 18. Whoever believes in him is not condemned, but whoever does not believe stands condemned already because he has not believed in the name of God's one and only Son.

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Day 7: Genesis 2

1. Thus the heavens and the earth were completed in all their vast array.
2. By THE SEVENTH DAY God had finished the work he had been doing; so on the seventh day he rested from all his work.
3. And God blessed the seventh day and made it holy, because on it he rested from all the work of creating that he had done.
4. This is the account of the heavens and the earth when they were created. When the LORD God made the earth and the heavens–

• I posted a sign on the cube wall on the eve of: Day 7 – The defense rests.

• I was told "don't you know only the prosecution rests?". I said "in God's court the defense rests for those whose lives are entrusted to Christ and His Work – the prosecution never rests".

• I took Friday off to rest.