What Christians lack

[Korean version of this posting is at http://crinje.wordpress.com/2010/01/17/기독교인에게-없는-것/]

What do you think do most Christians lack?

I think that is the generosity and grace of Christ.

Last year I biked almost everyday in the Winter – even at nights of 40C below freezing point. It was so cold and too much painful.

And this year, I drive a car – not my car. A friend of mine allowed me to drive and she’s not a Christian.

I cannot say enough how a car is cosy and comfortable. And warm. It protects me from the freezing wind and cold air.

And I said this to my sister who is very good Christian. “A car is this good, this good, and this much good….. etc.”

And guess what she said to me.

She said to me that a car is an idol to me and I am like an idol worshipper.

But this is not only my sister’s problem. Most Christians do the same thing. They push and drive somebody to the edge just because he or she says or is slight different from  what they think it is right.

Christians, be generous and gracious.

I mean, if you are real a Christian, please be like Christ for Christ’s sake.

Is NIV and NIV-UK different?

Last week, when I was using BibleGateWay.com, I found that in the end of Mark 15:1, NIV and NIV-UK use different words.

So, NIV says “led him away and handed him over to Pilate.” while NIV-UK uses turned instead of handed.

So I asked the BibleGateway about it, and I got an answer saying, “contact the publisher – www.biblica.com.”

And I wrote another email to www.biblica.com and am waiting for the answer.

I just really curious that this difference is supposed to be or just typo. I think NIV and NIV-UK is identical version just using different spelling rules.

Inspiration and the Bible

Bible is hard to know and understand.

Many times, even people think they knew, that could be just the illusion. Because the Bible is completely written in parables.

All these things spake Jesus unto the multitude in parables; and without a parable spake he not unto them: (Matthew 13:34, King James Version)

And he said, Go, and tell this people, Hear ye indeed, but understand not; and see ye indeed, but perceive not. Make the heart of this people fat, and make their ears heavy, and shut their eyes; lest they see with their eyes, and hear with their ears, and understand with their heart, and convert, and be healed. (Isaiah 6:9-10, King James Version)

And of course, to interpret or understand the Bible for the hidden meaning, we definitely need spiritual inspiration from God.

But the problem lies here:

Many times or most times, the one who had the inspiration and the listeners value the inspiration or the interpretation more than the Bible itself. What we have to believe is not the interpretation or the inspiration. We have to believe the Bible itself through the interpretation and the inspiration.

Any inspiration should be used only to interpret or explain the Bible, not to replace it.

Just let me make it easy: the Bible says the boys should be circumcised on eighth day (Genesis 17:12). Now,

if someone says, the eighth days means preparing for God and something like blah blah…, that’s fine.

if someone says, the Bible says 8th day, but actually it is 7th day. I got it by the inspiration from God., then this is wrong.

And I have to say this is how the most heresies and heterodoxies came out.

Any inspiration is NOT superior to the original Bible. It cannot replace or correct any part of the Bible.

Korean version of this posting is at (한글로 쓴 글의 위치는) http://crinje.wordpress.com/2009/05/17/%EC%98%81%EA%B0%90%EA%B3%BC-%EC%84%B1%EA%B2%BD/

Ancient population before the Noah’s flood

This posting is about the calculation of the ancient population before the great flood of Noah and is related to the previous posting.

First of all, all things in this posting is based on my imagination upon the Bible basis.

I know there is a formula to calculate the increasing of the population, but that is about the current world, so I thought it would be different from that of  ancient world for the people then lived at least over 900 years.

My first attempt was about the pure increase without any kind of disaster, and I assumed that the ancient people did not know how to avoid the pregnancy, so they delivered a boy and a girl every five years. Then the formula is (I just added and made a formula out of the result):

1. x = 2
2. x = 2n
3. x = n(n+1)
4. x = n(n+1)(n+2) / 3
5. x=n(n+1)(n+2)(n+3) / (3×4)
6. x=n(n+1)(n+2)(n+3)(n+4) / (3×4x5)
7. x=n(n+1)(n+2)(n+3)(n+4)(n+5) / (3×4x5×6)
8. x=n(n+1)(n+2)(n+3)(n+4)(n+5)(n+6) / (3×4x5×6x7)
9. x=n(n+1)(n+2)(n+3)(n+4)(n+5)(n+6)(n+7) / (3×4x5×6x7×8 )
10. x=n(n+1)(n+2)(n+3)(n+4)(n+5)(n+6)(n+7)(n+8 ) / (3×4x5×6x7×8x9)
11. x=n(n+1)(n+2)(n+3)(n+4)(n+5)(n+6)(n+7)(n+8)(n+9) / (3×4x5×6x7×8x9×10)
12. x=n(n+1)(n+2)(n+3)(n+4)(n+5)(n+6)(n+7)(n+8)(n+9)(n+10) / (3×4x5×6x7×8x9×10x11)
13. x=n(n+1)(n+2)(n+3)(n+4)(n+5)(n+6)(n+7)(n+8)(n+9)(n+10)(n+11) / (3×4x5×6x7×8x9×10x11×12)
14. x=n(n+1)(n+2)(n+3)(n+4)(n+5)(n+6)(n+7)(n+8)(n+9)(n+10)(n+11)(n+12) / (3×4x5×6x7×8x9×10x11×12x13)
15. x=n(n+1)(n+2)(n+3)(n+4)(n+5)(n+6)(n+7)(n+8)(n+9)(n+10)(n+11)(n+12)(n+13) / (3×4x5×6x7×8x9×10x11×12x13×14)

The bullet number stands for the generation. So the first generation is always 2. And the Bible mentions just until the 10th generation, which is Noah, but Noah also had sons (which are 11th generation), and according to my calculation, there were 15th generation living just before  the flood (they just came out).

I calculated the increase of the population and subtracted the natural death in the same way to get the population of the generation in the specific year. And I can add up all the generation of the year to get the total population.

We can see the multiplying is increased by sequence and the dividing does also. This is because the lower generation has more parents than the generation before which means more powerful producing.

But I came to think this way is nothing but labour and also not correct. First of all, it is almost impossible to apply the death toll other than natural ones. So I made a extremely simple programme which does just adding.

I assume the following in this programme:

1. They did not know to avoid the pregnancy so when they have sex, they got pregnant. The birth interval should be able to be given by the argument.
2. They did not know the sex of the baby in the womb and they had no abortion. And the sex rate was half and half (boy:girl = 50:50).
3. The age of having first son is written in the Bible. So use it, but for the convenience, just let me say all the people in the same generation had their first son in the same age.
4. Age of natural death is written in the Bible. So use it, but for the convenience, just let me say all the people in the same generation died in the same age.
5. In the assumption above, Enoch and Lamech were excluded, and the average life expectancy were applied.
6. Infant death rate should be able to given by the argument.
7. Adult death (like murder) is included in the infant death rate just for the convenience.
8. They did not delivered the baby for the last few years in their life, and the number of years should be able to be given by the argument.
9. Output uses CSV format to make it simple.

With these assumption, I wrote a very very simple programme. It just adds up the people and subtracts.

I ran this programme with the three arguments like:

• Infant death rate is 50%
• One boy and one girl in every 10 years.
• No pregnancy for last 50 years of their life.

The result is in csv file of Ancient Population CSV and you have to rename its extension from ppt to csv after downloading it (because wordpress does not allow to upload csv file format, so I just renamed it to ppt). You can open it in MS Excel or Openoffice Spreadsheet to see the detailed population of each generation in every year before the flood of Noah.

The say the total population just before the flood, it was 2,307,854,883 (2.3 billion).

Let us think about the argument that I gave again:

1. 50%of death rate
   • I don’t think it was 50%. I know there was no modern medical service but there also was no pollution of the environment. I think the death rate must be lower than this.
   • For the current world, Angola has the highest infant death rate which is 18.2%. So I believe 50% of death rate makes no sense.
   • So I think the ancient population was bigger than this calculation.
2. Two kids in every 10 years
   • If we agree that there was no way of avoiding the pregnancy, and they were so much lustful as is written in the Bible, they must had sex so much. And they got pregnant almost each time, and I don’t think they had abortion.
   • If so, we also can guess that  they had their babies in every four or five years, not ten years.
   • So I think the ancient population was bigger than this calculation.

The current total population of this earth is 6.7 billion. And if I run this programme with the increased survival rate of 69% (which is also extremely low) from 50%, the programme says the ancient population just before the flood was 24.5 billion.

For your information, here is the programme source code – Ancient Population Programme source. Download this link and rename the extension of this file from .ppt to .c. I wrote and compiled it on Ubuntu GNU/Linux but I am pretty sure it will be compiled and run on Windows too because it is very simple.

Usage of this programme:

Programme_Name [birth Number] [unproductive Number] [survival Number]

1. Without the any arguments: use default value
2. birth Number: set the birth interval (5 means two kids in every five years)
3. unproductive number: set the unproductive years (10 means they did not gave birth for the last 10 years in  their lives)
4. survival number: set the survival rate (which is 100 – infant death rate)

This is very simple programme having GPL as its licence – use it and modify it as you wish. If you have any suggestion, do not tell me – but make the suggestion and improvement then tell me.

You can read the same article at my another blog.

Thoughts on Ancient World before the flood

This posting is also available in Korean.

Table of the ancient world

Generation	Name (1)	Birth Year	Age (2)	Death Year	Years of life	Years of Producing (3)
1	Adam	0	130	930	930	750
2	Seth	130	105	1,042	912	757
3	Enos	235	90	1,140	905	765
4	Cainan	325	70	1,235	910	790
5	Mahalaleel	395	65	1,290	895	780
6	Jared	460	162	1,422	962	750
7	Enoch	622	65	987	365	250
8	Methuselah	687	187	1,656	969	732
9	Lamech	874	182	1,651	777	545
10	Noah	1056	500	2,006	950	400
Ave.			117.3 (4)		912.2 (5)	733.6 (6)

1. From the second generation, the name of the first son only.
2. Age when the one in the name had his first son.
3. The period of producing began at the year of the first son’s birth and ended 50 years before his death. (So unproductive years are 50.)
4. Noah was excluded for the average age of first son’s birth because he was too holy, and not having sex until he became 500 years old. He was exceptional.
5. Enoch was excluded for the average years of life (so called life expectancy) for he was brought up to heaven only when he was 365 years old.
6. Enoch and Noah were excluded also for the same reason above.

High school boy became a father!

The average life expectancy was 912 years and most people had their first son after he became over 100 years old. Jared at 162, and Methuselah at 187.

And Mahalaleel and Enoch had their first son when they were only 65 years old. I think it was like, to say for current world, the high school boys make their girl friends pregnant and had the baby.

What would the people at that time say? Kids in these days! eh?

Repented trouble boy?

Enoch was brought up to heaven by God because he was so holy and righteous. But I guess, he was not righteous from his birth. Like I wrote above, he had his first son when he was just 65. I guess he was, so to say like in these days, a trouble high school boy. Then he might repent. When? I don’t know, possibly when he turned 100 years old (Probably 100 would be the turning point to adults )

Shock and terror of the community

In my calculation, there were 643,866 people living when Adam died (For this calculation, it will be posted shortly). And being the first death which was known to the community, all the people surely got quite much shock and terror. Of course they knew the death of Abel, but that is not natural death.

And because they did not eat meat at that time (read Genesis 9:3 – God allowed people to eat meat after the flood), they did not see many even the death of the animals. So by the first natural death in history, all of them must get terrified and shocked. So they possibly began to think about the death seriously. And some of them became pessimistic, and I think there is some possibility this caused the people in the ancient world fallen – which called the flood of judgement.

Another one being loved by God

We all know that Enoch and Noah were loved by God quite much because they were righteous.

But if Noah was so righteous and holy, it would be because of the home education he got when he was young (under 100?). And who do you think taught Noah? Yes, his parents – one of them is Lamech, his father.

I think Lamech also loved by God. I have two reason to think like this. He lived 777 years old. In the Bible, sometimes the number is used very importantly like 666 or 12. And 777 is not normal number. He was blessed three times than other people. What was the blessing he got? The short living. He lived 777 years which is very much below than the average of 912 at that times. Lamech died even before his own father!

OK, how can the short living be the blessing? Noah’s flood began 1656 and Lamech died five years before it. I think God saved Lamech from the judgement. My guess goes further – if Lamech was really righteous, he might help Noah to build the ark.

Noah’s grandfather

Noah’s grandfather is Methuselah who lived the longest in the Bible – 969 years. But I guess he was not righteous like his son Lamech or grandson Noah. Because he died 1656 and the flood began 1656 (according to the Bible, the flood began when Noah was 600 years old and Noah was born in 1056).

And the flood began at second month seventeenth day, for the current term, February 17th. If we think that date is one and half month, then the possibility for Noah’s grandfather to be dead naturally just before the flood is 12.5% which is 87.5% of possibility for him to drown.

Here is the sad story. Noah surely went to his grandfather and preached the word of God but he would not listen. Noah insisted him to get aboard but he refused. Even Noah, one of the most righteous man in history, failed to save his own grandfather.

Adam’s sons

According to my calculation, there were 28 sons of Adam living when the Noah’s flood began. Not Adam’s descendants nor grandsons but the sons of his own body.

I think they also did not listen to Noah and moreover I guess they disturbed Noah’s preaching and mission. “Hey, listen to me, Noah is Adam’s 10th generation and I am the very son of Adam. If God tells one of us His judgement, who would be the one? It must be one of the sons of Adam!”

It is not possible to thank in advance

In my last posting of Nothing to thank is most thankful, I finished it by the phrase – be thankful in advance.

But now, I thought it again and realised that it is not possible to thank God in advance.

For instance, can we thank God about the air we breathe in advance? No!

I think it is not possible absolutely to thank God for anything in advance. But we have to thank God what we should thank which we regard for grant.

Nothing to thank is most thankful

Many times I listened to the testimonies of other people whose major story is:

1. They faced a big trouble or needed something very much – emergency kind of situation.
2. They prayed to God about this.
3. God provided that thing which they need just as much as they needed and that was accurately on time.

I like that kind of story, and also I have many similar experiences – even these days!

But let us think about it:

God is omnipotent which means He can do anything he wants. He can save us from the trouble but also he can keep us being in trouble, right?

But the ordinary, normal situation, we feel nothing because that is normal – just as we do not feel the air and its thankfulness until we got water (drowning) tortured. So I think it is most  thankful not to have anything to thank specially.

But God gives us some trouble to let us know the thankfulness and to raise our faith up, and to realise His almighty-ness and his caring us in every situation.

I think if we have good faith and are thankful in all things already, God will never give us any problem or trouble. So be faithful and be thankful in advance.

What should be the missionaries’ prayer?

First of all, let us look at the Bible – Acts 4:29

And now, Lord, behold their threatenings: and grant unto thy servants, that with all boldness they may speak thy word, (KJV)

Now, Lord, consider their threats and enable your servants to speak your word with great boldness. (NIV)

Let me explain the situation of that prayer:

St. John and Peter were arrested and threatened by the (high) priests and pharisees which is to say for these days, they were arrested and got judged at the Supreme Court of their country. And they came back to their company and told everything what happened. And the above verse is a part of their company’s prayer.

The simple prayer can be more simplified by:

1. God, we got threatened.
2. God, so let us speak more boldly.

Now, let us read one more verse which is Acts 5:40-42:

(40)And to him they agreed: and when they had called the apostles, and beaten them, they commanded that they should not speak in the name of Jesus, and let them go. (41)And they departed from the presence of the council, rejoicing that they were counted worthy to suffer shame for his name. (42)And daily in the temple, and in every house, they ceased not to teach and preach Jesus Christ. (KJV)

(40)His speech persuaded them. They called the apostles in and had them flogged. Then they ordered them not to speak in the name of Jesus, and let them go. (41)The apostles left the Sanhedrin, rejoicing because they had been counted worthy of suffering disgrace for the Name. (42)Day after day, in the temple courts and from house to house, they never stopped teaching and proclaiming the good news that Jesus is the Christ. (NIV)

The apostles, which are missionaries today, were beaten (think that there was no concept of human right) but what did the apostles do?

In their prayer written on the top, they did not pray for the safety and security of themselves. They did not pray “God, please get rid of all the threats,” nor “God, keep us safe,” and of course NOT “God, you know, it is quite dangerous these days. So, we’ll cease for a while. I know you’re going to understand us.”

But they did pray “God, it is dangerous but please let us speak more with boldness.”

As we all know, Jesus taught us how we should pray, and as you see, the apostles showed us how the missionaries should pray.

And in Acts 5:40-42, the apostles were beaten (or tortured) but they did not cease nor stop preaching and teaching about Jesus Christ. And if any missionary or other servant of God ceases or postpones his/her job, he or she is not a missionary at all, not a servant of God at all.

If, as it is written in Romans 8:35 and 39, anything cannot separate us from the love of God and Christ Jesus, if really so, the missionaries and servants of God should not cease their job in any case, in any situation. For them, Jesus already said something:

Whosoever therefore shall be ashamed of me and of my words in this adulterous and sinful generation; of him also shall the Son of man be ashamed, when he cometh in the glory of his Father with the holy angels. (Mark 8:38, KJV)

But I am not saying that anyone should not pray for the missionaries. All other people around a missionary must pray for their safety and security of the missionary who they know. I am saying the missionaries must pray to overcome and endure all the dangers and difficulties rather praying to escape and for their safety. And the missionaries must not try to avoid the danger by stopping what they should do.

Remember that Jesus told us to deny ourselves and to take our cross. Like St. Peter, we must go into the heart of the world and carry our own cross. Quo Vadis Domine?

Through a glass, darkly?

In the 1 Corinthians 13:12, we can see the verse saying:

(King James Version) For now we see through a glass, darkly; but then face to face: now I know in part; but then shall I know even as also I am known.

(New International Version) Now we see but a poor reflection as in a mirror; then we shall see face to face. Now I know in part; then I shall know fully, even as I am fully known.

I did not understand why it says the reflection of the mirror is poor. Mirror shows the exactly the same image of the original object.

But I found the current mirror which is silver coated one was invented in mid-19C. The people at that time when St. Paul wrote that letter probably used a bronze mirror which has really poor reflection in current judgement (which could be best at that time).

One of the hard thing is  that we should be knowledgeable of  the time when the Bible was written to understand it correctly.

I hope to see Jesus face to face soon.

Communication with God

[This article was originally written for Westwind - the seasonal magazine of Westwood Presbyterian Church.]

The theme of the last youth retreat camp was ‘communication.’ The communication becomes more difficult especially the language you using is not your native tongue. Let me give you two episodes (both are true stories) first.

Mori was the Prime Minister of Japan when Bill Clinton was the President of the US. He came to America and met Clinton. At first greeting, he wanted to say “How are you?” but he accidentally said “Who are you?” He became the first person in this earth that asked who he was to the President of the US, and Mr. Clinton replied that he is Hilary’s husband.

When I was in Korea, I once managed the schedule of Richard Stallman, the founder of Free Software Foundation. And he once made a speech at a university and he held the mike too far so that the people could not listen well. Because I was in charge, I went close to him and intended to say “Hold it close to your mouth” but what came out of my mouth was “Hey, close your mouth.”

Like the two episodes above, communication is not easy if it is not done in your native language. It was not that Mori and I were ignorant of English. He and I knew exactly what to say. The communication fail or mistake came from lack of practice.

We use English to communicate with our neighbour, then what do we use to communicate with our God? You may think it is English but I am sorry it is not. It also is not French nor Korean. It is the language of Prayer. It can be done in English but totally different. There are so many people who has very big mouth and talk without resting, and still cannot say even one word of Prayer.

If the language of Prayer is not our native tongue and only the sufficient practice can prevent the communication mistake, then what shall we do to make smooth and satisfactory communication with our God? Yes, practice every day.

It is not easy to learn even our native language. Think about a new born baby today. When do you expect he or she can spit the extremely simple word – mama? Roughly one year. How many times do you guess the mother whispers that word to the baby’s ear? Thousands, or probably tens of thousands, or much more. We all just forgot how we struggled to be able to say that word – practising everyday repeatedly.

After I became a Christian, I found that it is not easy to communicate with God because of lack of practice, and also found it is not easy to spend even just five minutes on praying.

We, especially I, have to struggle and practise repeatedly until the prayer becomes our (my) native language.

Is the world designed?

[This was moved from my previous blog, originally written on September 1st, 2008]

To say the conclusion first, I believe creation.

Let us watch a Youtube video clip first:

Isn’t this awesome? Let me ask you a question. Are the domino blocks and billiard balls located by themselves? Did the subtle wind in the indoor raise the blocks and locate the balls? Or someone did it by his or her complex calculation and design?

The answer is absolutely the latter one. It is hard to say that something complex is made by itself. Let me say another instance: If I pile the complete set of tens of thousands of Auto parts in the field, then the wind, coming and going, can assemble the car perfectly in thousands or millions of years? No, I don’t think so.

I am not professional about the science, but I have interest in it: According to the second law of thermodynamics, entropy is always increasing not decreasing. Entropy can be described as how chaos it is.

We can say the state when domino blocks fell down and the balls down to the halls as high entropy. We can say also it is low entropy when the blocks stand in position and the balls at right location. As I said above, the entropy cannot move from high to low. To do that, we need some help from outside. That small world cannot lower its entropy by itself but someone having intelligence should lower it by accurate calculation and design. It is the same in the example of the Auto parts.

Therefore I, seeing how complex, accurate and wonderful the ecosystem is and the life system in a individual living body, do not think anything is become like today by itself. I think evolution is one of the most stupid idea that human has ever made.

I believe in intelligent design theory, more specific I believe in the creation of Christianity.

In memory of my father: 007. Out of the bus

[This was moved from my previous blog, originally written on September 18th, 2008]

April 19th 1960, there was a civil revolution in South Corea. This is not about the revolution itself but about my father, so for more information, please refer Wikipedia.

On that day, my father was in the bus – he was at the rear door to get off at next bus stop. The bus stopped and my father was about to step down when a man behind pulled my father back shouting, “Let me get off first.” My father almost fell down in the bus.

As soon as the guy got off out of the bus, he was shot probably by a police and killed.

My father said he could not understand why the guy suddenly got off first by pulling my father back. If he wanted to get off first, he would ask of my father before the bus stopped.

Anyway, the guy died in my father’s place and God saved my father even when he was not a Christian.

I thank God about it. And fifteen years later, I was born.

Read the postings in Series:

• In memory of my father: 001. Pilot
• In memory of my father: 002. Birth
• In memory of my father: 003. First shock
• In memory of my father: 004. In the Buddhist temple
• In memory of my father: 005. Crossing the River
• In memory of my father: 006. Bullet Disappeared