Sunday, September 11, 2011

SCIENCE PROVES THE BIBLE YET ATHEISTS CONTINUE TO DENY- WHY?

Submitted by: Doris Parker

Seven scientific discoveries that
PROVE the Bible's credibility!


Can scientific discoveries CONFIRM the Bible's credibility?

On the one hand we have atheists, Bible scoffers, and others who say the Bible was written by ignorant shepherds writing fables that had been passed down from generation to generation. They contend the Bible has little credibility.
On the other hand we have Christians who believe the Bible is the accurate word of God and that it explains God's way of salvation. They believe the Bible also has instructions from the Creator advising his human creatures how to live their lives for maximum happiness and contentment
Somewhere in the middle are those who believe PARTS of the Bible are true but not all of it. Suprisingly, included among those who only partly believe in what the Bible says are many ministers whose job it is to support and expound the word of God.

Which is it? Is the Bible all true, partly true, or mostly fables with little credibility? Is there anything in the Bible that would prove it was DIVINELY inspired? Are there any facts or knowledge in the Bible that was clearly above and beyond the understanding of those who originally authored its pages?
This article takes a look at seven scientific principles and facts that were written in the Bible LONG BEFORE man "discovered" and verified their existence!

Biblical Scientific Fact #1
What holds up the earth?

Imagine yourself living 3,000 years ago writing a book.
Like everyone else in your day, you would wonder what holds up the earth. Surely it has to rest on something! We know about the force of gravity only because modern scientists have discovered it. Aside from that knowledge, living on the earth, observing only what a human can see and feel, wouldn't it be the logical conclusion that the earth rests on or is supported by SOMETHING?



Picture of the earth as seen from the Apollo 17 space mission.
Picture of the earth as seen
from the Apollo 17 space mission.
What did ancient man believe the earth rested on? The book World Mythology  says:
"The world was often said to rest on the back of a turtle".
Wouldn't that make sense to human beings living thousands of years ago? Wouldn't it seem logical that the earth would rest on something slow and steady? Yes it would. So, not knowing better, a giant turtle might be thought of as an ideal platform for the earth.
Not all cultures believed in the turtle answer though. The book Myths & Legends  tells us more:
"When one examines the writings of the Hindu, Buddhist or Greek pagan worships, for example, one finds clear reference to the concept of the earth being held up by a man, elephant, catfish, or some other physical support."

What did ancient man believe the earth rested on? The book World Mythology  says:
"The world was often said to rest on the back of a turtle".
Wouldn't that make sense to human beings living thousands of years ago? Wouldn't it seem logical that the earth would rest on something slow and steady? Yes it would. So, not knowing better, a giant turtle might be thought of as an ideal platform for the earth.
Not all cultures believed in the turtle answer though. The book Myths & Legends  tells us more:


"When one examines the writings of the Hindu, Buddhist or Greek pagan worships, for example, one finds clear reference to the concept of the earth being held up by a man, elephant, catfish, or some other physical support."
Whatever the particular answer, ancient logic and belief was that the earth had some kind of physical support.
How then was the Bible able to get it right? How could a man writing a book 2,800 years BEFORE the discovery of gravity, possibly get it right? Notice what the Bible says in Job 26:
"He stretches out the north over EMPTY SPACE. He hangs the earth on NOTHING." (Job 26:7, NKJV throughout unless noted).
All of us have seen pictures of the earth taken from outer space. Doesn't the earth look like it is hung out in space by NOTHING? And indeed, isn't gravity, the force we now know holds up the earth, something that is NOT seen?
This scientific statement, written thousands of years ago, was against all logic and knowledge known at the time of its writing. The Bible stated a scientifically established fact that could only have been divinely revealed.

Biblical Scientific Fact #2

Are there SPRINGS in the Oceans? Let's look at more scientific-based Bible statements. This time about fountains, or springs, or wells, in the oceans.
In the book of Genesis we learn how the great flood (Noah's flood) was created:
"In the six hundredth year of Noah’s life, in the second month, the seventeenth day of the month, on that day all the FOUNTAINS OF THE GREAT DEEP WERE BROKEN UP, and the windows of heaven were opened." (Genesis 7:11)
The word translated as "fountains" in the above verse (Hebrew: מעינה מעינו מעין, Strong's Concordance #H4599) can mean springs or wells in addition to fountains. Are there really fountains or springs in the oceans? If your answer is that the Bible was wrong about that, you would have seemed correct for some 3,000 years. Correct until 1977 that is. Despite sixty years of modern submarine activity, ocean springs were unknown and undiscovered until 1977.
In 1977, with only 5% of the ocean floor explored, scientists found springs in the ocean off the coast of Ecuador. ( They were found at an ocean depth of 1 1/2 miles (2.4 kilometers)! These springs contained super-heated water of about 450 degrees.
Additionally, scientists exploring another section of ocean floor expected to find springs 125 to 200 miles apart. Instead, they were much closer. The scientists found six springs about 60 miles apart. How many more springs might there be vast ocean yet unexplored?
Some Bible skeptics claim the oceans and the atmosphere together do not contain enough water to cover the earth to the depth needed to reach above the mountains, as was the case in the great flood. This criticism does not hold up because the Bible says the springs in the oceans were broken up at the time of the flood, which would increase their flow.
How much extra water could the broken up springs produce? Notice this quote:
"There is probably as much water circulating under the sea floor as there is in the oceans above."
Isn't that remarkable? You might want to ponder that a moment.
The Bible statements about springs in the oceans, written 3,000 years ago, were against all logic and all that was known at the time. This scientific knowledge had to come from someone or something higher and greater than man. This knowledge had to come from God.

Biblical Scientific Fact #3
Are no NEW cells created?

A speaker at our local church recently stated that there were no NEW cells being created today. The speaker based his comment on the research of several scientists who stated that "All cells come only from existing cells."
One of the people listening to the message asked the speaker after his talk: "If no new cells are being created today, where do the trillions of our body cells of our body   come from?" The answer to this question is the third scientific fact that proves the Bible's credibility.
In Genesis 35 the Bible tells us:
"And God said unto him, I am God Almighty; be fruitful and multiply; a nation and a company of nations shall be of you, and kings shall come OUT OF YOUR LOINS." (Genesis 35:11, KJV)
The New King James Version translation of the verse is:
"Also God said to him: 'I am God Almighty. Be fruitful and multiply; a nation and a company of nations shall proceed from you, and kings shall come FROM YOUR BODY.' " (Genesis 35:11, NKJV)
There are other references to "coming out of your loins" or coming out of the body in the books of Genesis, Exodus, Kings, and Chronicles.
Let's also notice what Hebrews 7 says:
"And indeed those who are of the sons of Levi, who receive the priesthood, have a commandment to receive tithes from the people according to the law, that is, from their brethren, though they have come from THE LOINS OF ABRAHAM; " (Hebrews 7:5)
Abraham was the father of Issac. Issac  was the father of Jacob, who was later renamed ISRAEL. Jacob had twelve sons, each of which would grow into its own tribe. They are collectively referred to as the twelve tribes of Israel. Levi was one of the twelve sons.
Now let's take a look at verses 9 and 10 of the same chapter:
"Even Levi, who receives tithes, paid tithes through Abraham, so to speak, for he was STILL IN THE LOINS OF HIS FATHER when Melchizedek met him." (Hebrews 7:9-10)
In other words, the Bible is stating that Levi, who was born after Abraham, was in a sense present at the meeting between Abraham and Melchizedek since he was in the loins or body of his great-grandfather.
Are the verses we just read from Genesis 35 and Hebrews 7 SCIENTIFIC? Was Levi REALLY present in the loins of his ancestor Abraham? For that matter, were WE, in a very real way, present in the loins of OUR grandfather or great-grandfather? Are these statements in the Bible merely a metaphor or allegory? A further study of cells shows that what is stated in Genesis 35 / Hebrews 7 is a scientific FACT.

What does it mean that no NEW cells are created?

A bit of clarification is needed by what is meant that no NEW cells are being created today. True enough, our bodies create cells all the time and in that sense they are new. But where did the cells that currently make up our bodies COME FROM? Did they just POP into existence out of NOTHING? Were they created out of some random CHANCE of the right molecules coming together at the right time in exactly the right order, etc. etc. . . . as evolutionists believe the basic building blocks of all life were created? NO! The current cells in our body were made from the splitting of cells that ALREADY EXISTED! In short, our existence was made possible by those (our parents) who ALREADY existed!
The book Cell and Molecular Biology states:
"Cells can only arise by division from a PRE-EXISTING cell."
Lewis Thomas  puts it this way,
"You start out as a single cell derived from the coupling of a (already existing!) sperm and an egg".

The Way Life Works  says,
"We each began as an egg fertilized by a sperm, a single cell."
Biologist Gerald Karp explains it this way,
"The production of offspring by sexual reproduction includes the union of two (already existing!) cells,"
Every human starts out as ONE CELL that quickly divides and multiplies. This one cell, with our entire genetic makeup, was created when two EXISTING cells - one from each of our parents - combined. But that begs another question. Where then did the two cells that combined to form the one cell that led to our existence COME FROM? The cells in our parents that created us ultimately came from cells that already existed in THEIR parents (our grandparents)! And so on and so on as we go back through our ancestors.
In fact, science states that all life - including animals and plants - came from cells that existed in their parents.

Is it all about ANCESTORS?

So it's all about ancestors, isn't it? Just as the Bible said!
The book The Medusa and the Snail  supports these conclusions when it says:
"All of today's DNA, strung through all the cells of the earth, is simply an extension and elaboration of that first molecule."
Substitute cell for molecule and it goes back to the first cell, even to Adam and Eve.
The book Cell and Molecular Biology sums it up when it says,
"Cell division, therefore, forms the link between a parent and its offspring; between living species and their extinct ancestors."
So the many Bible statements about a person "being in the loins or body of" someone else are accurate AND scientific!
But how did the Bible writers know this scientific principle thousands of years ago?
It was not until 1855 that a German scientist named Rudolf Virchow learned about cells. He stated that:
"All cells come from existing cells." 
Even then Virchow's statement about cells was not universally accepted until it was finally proven correct with the explosion of modern cell research in the 1950's.
Virchow's book adds that in 1880 A.D. August Weismann pointed out that, since cells come from pre-existing cells,
"all cells today can trace their origins back to ancient cells."
Yes, science says we can trace our present day cells back to the ancient cells of our ancestors.
The Bible statements written thousands of years ago were based on cell knowledge not known at the time. I submit that this accurate scientific knowledge came from something or someone higher than man and HAD to be divinely revealed.


Biblical Scientific Fact #4
Did the ancient city of Ur EXIST?

For centuries, skeptics stated that the Bible was nothing more than a collection of stories, myths, legends and fanciful tales created out of the imaginative minds of ignorant shepherds and nomads. Therefore, is was reasoned, statements in the Bible should not be considered factual, true or verifiable (like statements made by science!). For example, the skeptics taunted, where is the ancient city of Ur that the Bible states existed?
Ur was the city the Biblical patriarch Abraham, by command of God, was said to have left for another place (Canaan) God wanted him to live:
"Then He (God) said to him (Abraham), 'I am the Lord, who brought you out of Ur of the Chaldeans, to give you this land to inherit it.' " (Genesis 15:7)
"You are the Lord God, who chose Abram, and brought him out of Ur of the Chaldeans, and gave him the name Abraham;" (Nehemiah 9:7)
The entire account of Abraham's journey can be found in Genesis 12. The New Testament refers to this journey in Hebrews 11:9-10.
For years the skeptics used the fact that Ur had not been found as a justification for believing the entire Bible is wrong, until . . . .

The city of Ur is FOUND!

In 1854 A.D. the city of Ur was found!
Not much excavation work was done however. It took an Englishman named Leonard Wooley to excavate Ur. He labored there from 1922 until 1934 A.D. What Wooley found amazed scholars and laymen alike. It was discovered that Ur had been a powerful, prosperous, colorful and busy capital that was a major hub for trading. Ur, it turns out, not only existed but was a sophisticated, highly organized city!
In a surprising contrast, the city of Babylon was found to have had only simple mud buildings. But Ur, which was built 1,200 years BEFORE Babylon, had homes made of burnt brick, much like ours today! But were these homes simple dwelling places with a few rooms? NO! Wooley found homes that were actually two-story villas with thirteen to fourteen rooms surrounding a courtyard. These homes also had a modern lavatory. These residences had more than enough room for a family, their servants, and guests.
The excavations of Ur also produced a workshop were TWELVE kinds of clothing were made. Also found recorded were the names of the mill girls and their quota of rations, even to the weight of wool given each worker, and what each produced. Tax receipts were found that had been meticulously kept by week, month, and year.
The Ziggurat (the translated name means "house whose foundation creates terror") of Ur, which was the city's main religious structure, was built four hundred years before Abraham. It was three stories high, with walls that all sloped inward - there was not a straight line in it!
The discovery and excavation of Ur is another important confirmation that the Bible was accurate in its details.

Biblical Scientific Fact #5
Are there WIND CURRENTS?

The book of Ecclesiastes was written about 3,000 years ago. Imagine yourself living in that time. What would you know about the WIND? Only what you could see and feel, right? You would know it blows some days very strong, some days very weak, and some days not at all. Sometimes the wind comes from the north, other days it might come from the south in the morning then later change to blowing from the west. The wind, given the understanding at the time, would seem not to have any pattern as to where it blows from, how strong and long it might blow, etc. In short, the wind would be seen as unpredictable.
In the book of Ecclesiates there is a very interesting statement about the wind:
"The wind goes toward the south, and turns around to the north. The wind whirls about continually, and comes again on its circuit." (Ecclesiastes 1:6)
How could anyone, thousands of year ago, have known about the pattern of the earth's winds? This statement, against everything that could have been observed, has stood by itself for nearly three thousand years.
It took a French mathematician named Coeriolis, who died in 1843, to study and identify wind circuits. What Coeriolis discovered supported the Bible statement in Ecclesiastes - not just in one way, but in THREE ways!
First notice the Bible says the wind goes south then turns to the north. Coeriolis found the wind goes clockwise in the Northern Hemisphere, and then turns about and goes counter clockwise in the Southern Hemisphere! Named for him, the Coriolis effect is very important in understanding wind and ocean currents.
Second, are there in fact wind circuits? The World Book Encyclopedia has a diagram showing the known wind systems, or circuits. Their diagram is a map of the earth with little arrows showing the location and direction of each wind circuit. How many are there? Their diagram has plotted 28 circuits!
But there's more. You may have heard of a weatherman refer to the "jet stream" and how it affects your local weather. Jet streams do exist and do have established circuits. The jet streams have winds at speeds of up to 200 mph and were first discovered by World War II fighter pilots.
Third, the Bible said the wind whirls about continually. How could an observer on the ground possibly know that winds can move constantly since such consistent winds occur only at high altitudes?
Ecclesiastes 1:6 made no sense, from a human observable point of view, until the research of Coeriolis in the early 1800's. The Bible's statement about the winds was against all that was known at the time. The statement in Ecclesiastes presents a scientifically accurate picture that could only have originated from a divine source.

Biblical Scientific Fact #6
What is MATTER made of?


A scientific revealing statement in Isaiah 40 says:
"Behold, the nations are as a drop in a bucket, and are counted as the small dust on the scales. Look, He (God) lifts up the isles as a very little thing." (Isaiah 40:12)
What do you think about this verse? Is it silly? Is it folly to say that whole nations are like a "drop in a bucket?" We know those descriptions can't possibly be literal, don't we? What reason could Isaiah have had to write such seeming nonsense?
Those reactions, or something like them, made perfect sense - until the twentieth century that is. For it was only during the past one hundred years that scientists were able to look into the atom, which is the building block of all the matter in the universe. And what did they find? They found - as incredible as it sounds - that atoms are mostly EMPTY SPACE!
What does that mean? It means there is very little actual substance or mass in everything around us.

Picture of an Atom.
Picture of an Atom.

Compare the size of the nucleus
to the size of the space between it
and the molecules that orbit it!
Most of the mass of an atom is in the tiny, tiny nucleus:
"At least 99.995% of the mass of each atom resides in a tiny nucleus composed of protons and neutrons."
How big is an atom's nucleus, which contains almost all its mass, compared to the space between it and its molecules?
"If the typical atom were the size of a football field, the nucleus would be a grain of salt at midfield."  "If a hydrogen atom were about 4 miles in diameter, its nucleus would be no bigger than a tennis ball."
"If the atom were to be inflated until it filled an Olympic stadium, the nucleus would be the size of a pea lying alone in the center of the track."


The Empty Atom

Since almost all of the mass of an atom is in an even tinier, tinier nucleus, what is the rest of an atom filled with?

Writing about the rest of an atom outside of its nucleus, one author put it like this,
"A cloud of electrons marks the atom's outer bounds. The rest is a void. "
Since the building blocks of all matter are themselves mostly empty space, can you see how scientifically accurate Isaiah's statement is? Remember, he said,
"Behold, the nations are as a drop in a bucket, and are counted as the small dust on the scales. Look, He (God) lifts up the isles as a very little thing." (Isaiah 40:12)
Do modern scientists say much the same thing?
"All matter is like this [empty]. Take a man and squeeze the empty spaces out of him, like the holes in a sponge, and you are left with a little pile of solid substance, no larger than a flyspeck."
The author added this observation,
"We are like hollow men and our insubstantial bodies are strung together with electromagnetic and nuclear forces that do no more than create the illusion of matter."
Another source  says this,
"Scientists describe a black hole as a single point in space that is infinitely dense. That is hard to grasp, but think about the head of a pin. Now imagine everything on the Earth, the trees, the houses, the beaches, the oceans, [we might say the nations] everything fitting into the head of that pin. The point in space where a black hole exists is infinitely smaller than the head of that pin, yet anything can be compressed and fit into it."
So it seems the latest scientific discoveries confirm that all of the matter that makes up a man, or makes up the whole earth, with the emptiness removed, would be the size of a flyspeck or fit into the head of a pin!
What do humans see as they look around at their physical world? Don't we see objects that appear solid and substantial? Is not it the furthest thing from their minds is that they are made up of atoms - atoms that are mostly EMPTY SPACE?
But if you were the creator of that physical matter, wouldn't you see them for what they really are? Wouldn't you see them as trillions and trillions of atoms - atoms that are mostly empty space?
What Isaiah wrote did not come from the active imagination of a mere human. It came from the Creator God. The same Creator who can look at the earth and everything on it and see them for what modern science says they really are: innumerable atoms that contain very little actual mass or substance.

Biblical Scientific Fact #7
What SHAPE is the earth? Is the earth FLAT?

The Encyclopedia Americana  tells us this about what early man thought was the shape of the earth:
"The earliest known image that men had of the earth was that it was a flat, rigid platform at the center of the universe".
Yet, we find written in the pages of the Bible:
"It is He (God) who sits above THE CIRCLE OF THE EARTH, and its inhabitants are like grasshoppers . . ." (Isaiah 40:22)
This verse was written about two thousand eight hundred years ago when it was believed the earth is flat.
When did the idea of a circular earth finally become accepted? The concept of a spherical earth was not widely accepted until the Renaissance!
Isaiah's writing about a circular earth two thousand plus years ago is yet another proof of the scientific accuracy and credibility of the Bible.

Why is the Bible IMPORTANT?

Why is the Bible important? Why is it important to have the credibility and authority of the Bible verified? Because the Bible serves these major purposes:
  • It explains life and death.
  • It gives history humans should know about.
  • It reveals Jesus as a personal Savior who voluntarily died a very humiliating and painful death so that the humans God created might have eternal life.
  • It explains God's plan and purpose for the entire human race.
  • It contains instructions from the Creator advising humans how to live their physical lives so that they can obtain the most fulfillment and happiness.

A final review

Let's review the scientific discoveries that verified the accuracy of statements found in the Bible:
  1. The earth is hung on nothing just as today's space photos so clearly show.
  2. There are springs in the oceans. They were discovered even though only 5% of the ocean bottom has so far been explored. The problem for Bible scoffers is they were not discovered until 1977.
  3. The scientific study of cells has shown that we came from our parent's cells, and that those cells came from THEIR parent's cells and so on.
  4. The city of Ur was finally discovered in 1854, much to the dismay of the Bible skeptics!
  5. Coriolis discovered that winds turn about at the equator - going clockwise in the Northern Hemisphere, and going counter clockwise in the Southern Hemisphere. It was also discovered that there were wind circuits - 28 of them - as diagrammed in the World Book Encyclopedia. Also, it was found that the wind blows almost continuously in the atmosphere.
  6. Twentieth century discoveries into the atom reveal that all matter is mostly empty space.
  7. The Bible talked about a circular earth while mankind still believed the earth was flat.
Written by:  C. Frazier Spencer

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