+27 83 629-7690

First letter to a prisoner (prison ministry)

by | Feb 23, 2017 | Uncategorized

No! Don’t throw this pamphlet away. Just take a moment to read this message. You probably never expected earlier in your life that you would end up in prison. And now you wonder why you did. “Is there a God?” you ask deep inside yourself. Most people at some stage in their life will ask themselves this question. Let us assume you are either an atheist or agnostic. You say there is no God or you don’t know if there is a God. The question whether or not there is a God is a very important question indeed. For if there is no God, then there is no plan and there really is no purpose. Everything related to life then becomes a coincidence. You once were just one lucky sperm cell out of 250 million others competing. The fact that your parents met and loved: –  it was probably a one in a thousand chance or less of them meeting and loving which brought you into this world as a baby. How their parents met and loved, that was perhaps also a one in a thousand chance. That makes it less than a one in a million chance for you to be born, after only the 2nd generation!  Further, the off-chance on their parents meeting each other, and so forth, etc., until you reach the beginning of man. In total, that is a minute probability! Next, think of the process by which all the organs that form an intelligent person came together. Looking at it as a scientist, evolution really is a long chain of many, many chance meetings and interactions with nature, sometimes even collisions with celestial bodies like comets and asteroids, where it is believed that eventually intelligent life evolved from animal life and animal life from amphibian life and amphibian live from marine life and marine life from the first living cell. The thing is, if you do not believe that there was a plan to begin with, then everything connected to this chain of events really was just a lucky lotto draw and a one in a 100 billion chance or less in each of these stages. For example, consider this: How exactly do you think was the first living cell formed? What came first, the chicken or the egg? This is a relevant scientific question. Scientists have been able to do modifications on existing cells and seeds by genetic engineering but no scientist has ever been able to produce a living cell or seed out of the (dead) atoms and molecules that they consist of. Why is that, you ask? Well, scientists say, if you mix all the atoms and molecules that make up the first living biological cell or seed together, and you have the right conditions of temperature, light, concentration, electrical charge, radiation etc., then apparently you would still have to wait for millions and millions of years for a “chance reaction” to take place that would produce the first living cell. So, in fact no one has ever been able to make a “living” cell or seed synthetically. Some scientists simply claim that this is due to a lack of time. Taken altogether, though, statistically we can say that there really is only a very, very small probability indeed that you came into existence; in fact that chance is so small that we can call it near impossible. I think that is why I would say that life itself, and yes, your life in particular, is a miracle! 
Just forget about finding anything like “intelligent life” in the rest of the universe. It is just (statistically) impossible, because the chances of life developing elsewhere are so small that it outweighs the argument of there being enormous amounts of stars with planets available in the universe. Never mind all that, you still believe there is no God or you don’t know if there is a God. You think it is reasonable to believe that everything you see around you just came by accident. Life did not come forth by creation (a plan) but by evolution. You believe in Murphy’s law (Murphy’s law = given that there is a chance that something will happen, then, if there is enough time available, eventually it will happen). You still refuse to accept that the creation of the whole universe was part of God’s plan for us to be born. Now I will ask you: never mind the question about how life came into being and how incredibly small the chance is that you are alive today. What about the next question: where does matter itself come from? Where did all the atoms that form the person that you are and the earth that you are living on and the air that you are breathing, came from? If you believe there is no God, then obviously in the beginning there must have been absolutely nothing. Good for you if you believe in the Big Bang theory. But the question still remains: where did all the matter that forms the universe, originate from? You see what the problem is? It does not make sense to believe that there is no God because it is not logical. In fact, if you believe there is no God, you are actually saying that you believe that out of absolutely nothing and guided by absolutely nobody, an incredible intelligent and intellectual person (like yourself) with a material body came into being. Now, for you to believe that such a miracle could have happened, you must actually have a much bigger faith than that of a person simply believing and admitting that there is a Higher Power, a God who created him for a specific plan and purpose! 

So, now we come to the point, where you may acknowledge that there is in fact a God who created us. The bible teaches that every man should be able to see this if he just takes the time to observe nature, and watch the incredible miracles happening around on a daily basis. Somehow you also already knew instinctively that your sense of right and wrong, i.e. your conscience, is directly connected to the very fact whether you do - or do not believe there is a God... That is why when you are feeling remorseful for the sins that you committed, you are in fact on your way into believing in God! Immediately when you come to realize that there is a God, you will also note that now there is a plan and a purpose. 

Remember, God sees the beginning and the end all at the same time, because He is beyond time and space. The interesting part of life really is to find out what God’s plan and purpose for your life is! At times you may feel insecure and inadequate, but remember that God never makes mistakes. He does not make misfits. He has a plan and a purpose with each and everyone of us, His children. Just think of a few biblical figures like Joseph and Paul. If it were not for them having been in prison, where would we be today? Through the imprisonment of one man, Joseph, a whole nation was saved from starvation (see Gen. 45:5-8). The apostle Paul wrote all his letters to the believers from prison. Imagine the New Testament without Paul’s letters! (see Phil.1:12-14).  
Your time in prison is not the end of your life. In fact, God wants to use the prison circumstances in your life. He wants to be with you, right there in prison! Our God is a God of miracles. At this stage you may ask me: I accept that there is a God, who created me, and who cares about me, but how do I know which religion is the right religion? This is an interesting question. If you want to, you can study a number of religions and decide for yourself. The five major world religions are Buddhism, Hinduism, Judaism, Islam and Christianity. I did not really study Buddhism or Hinduism. I do know that in Buddhism there is no God, so that is really a dead end to start with. In Hinduism, there is a great number of Gods – that could be a bit of a labyrinth. Many religions and even some sects in Christianity believe in imposing on their members and believers a multitude of rules and regulations, as if it were possible to please God by stepping up on an imaginary ladder and trying to reach Him or get closer to Him by keeping to more and more religious rules. The real Christian faith is different. Christianity really is: God revealing Himself to us (you), in the person of Jesus Christ. You can say it is like: God coming down that (imaginary) ladder to earth, picking us up where we were injured or broken, putting us together again and showing and revealing Himself and His character to us. The bible teaches that Jesus Christ is the image of the living God. God has left us His picture, in the form of the example of the life that He lived on earth. After that, He also proclaimed that His Spirit, the Spirit of God, is in all of us who accepts Him! Millions of people all over the world who became Christian can testify to this fact. One day soon, you too will acknowledge this. At the same time He challenges us to become more and more like Him, to live like He lived His life on earth, doing miracles in the lives of other people.….

If you want to learn more about God, Jesus Christ and the Holy Spirit, please ask the person who distributed this tract for more information. He may have some books and guides for you that you can use to study. May God bless you and help you in the life ahead. 

Jesus said: I am the Door. If anyone enters by Me, he will be saved and will go in and out and find pasture. The thief does not come except to steal, and to kill and to destroy. I have come that they may have life, and that they may have it more  abundantly! (John 10: 9 & 10).

http://www.fathersloveletter.com/

If God exists, why cannot we see him?

by | Feb 20, 2017 | News

If God exists, why cannot we see Him? This is a question that is often heard and I think it is as relevant today as it was at anytime in the past. Without running into clichés, nor making any quotations from the bible, I have been trying to formulate an answer to this particular trying question.

First, we have to acknowledge that God is the Creator of all things. In a way, to compare, He is like the Artist, and we, and everything that lives, are the works of His hands. So the question posed is really very much similar as to asking an earthly artist, like, let us say, Picasso, why we cannot see him personally in his artwork. Indeed, we cannot actually see him in any of his works. However, we do “recognise” his paintings as (works of) “Picasso”.  And so it is here. We are His work and we can see God in all that He made around us; e.g.  for fish, God is like the sea and its contents, but the fish themselves are also made of water and the components from the sea. They are of God and in God. Likewise, we are from God and in God…

Second, using the same analogy of a human artist, the best a painter-artist can do, to show him, would be to paint himself, and show to the world on canvas what he looks like. This is how we know today what Rembrandt looked like. Funny you should ask. This is exactly what God did. He did come to earth as one of us and lived a life showing us what our Creator is like. Indeed, His love for us can be compared with the love of an earthly parent for his child. Despite our mistakes, His love for us is unconditional. Unreasonably so, it seems. Should we have lived during His time here on earth, I am sure many of us would have been exactly like one of His disciples:  e.g. not being prepared to do any of the dirty jobs (wash feet), dropping your friend when they were at their worst time in need on earth (Simon Peter & others), and not having any faith whatsoever when it really mattered (Thomas & others). In the end, He was condemned to die by crucifixion, suffering the worst kind of pain anyone of us could possibly endure….

Lastly, incredibly so, it seems, seeing as that we are talking about “pictures” and “seeing God”, it appears He did decide to leave us with an actual image of Himself. Somehow, He reckoned that we needed to have this. Here you can examine Him. http://www.shroud.com/examine.htm

The Shroud of Turin is a centuries old linen cloth that bears the image of a crucified man. Is it really the cloth that wrapped His crucified body, or is it simply a medieval forgery, a hoax perpetrated by some clever artist? Modern science has completed hundreds of thousands of hours of detailed study and intense research on the Shroud. It is, in fact, the single most studied artefact in human history, and we know more about it today than we ever have before. And yet, the controversy still rages on. People from all walks of life have devoted their time and efforts to researching, investigating, experimenting on – and writing about – the Shroud of Turin. http://www.shroud.com/reflections.htm  To summarise, the cloth bears the photographic image as a NEGATIVE, in THREE  dimensions, of a CRUCIFIED man, clearly,  very much beaten on his back, with head wounds (remember the thorn crown?), and other wounds specific only to Roman crucifixion (remember the wound in His side?). Blood- and DNA analysis showed that this must have been from a REAL life person.

 As far as I can remember back to 1978, Dr. Max Frei, before his passing, recognised some pollen on the Shroud that are specific to plants that grow exclusively in Palestine e.g. see also here: http://www.shroud.com/danin2.htm

Many forensic experts, who analysed the Shroud’s (positive) pictures (back and front), concluded that  this must have been the person named as Jesus of Nazareth in the bible, after (all) the applications of the Roman punishments and crucifixion exactly as described concerning Him, including the very number of lashings on His back and the wound in His side. For example, (and this is just ONE example), there are no thumbs visible on the Shroud. The way Romans crucified criminals, was by hammering big nails through the wrists, near to the hands, onto the wooden cross. Consequently, because of this, the thumbs would fall numb, behind the other fingers. These types of forensic details have led most of the experts that looked at all the scientific evidence coming from the Shroud’s investigations of having subsequently to become believers.

Yet, contrary to all expectations, carbon dating in 1988 by various laboratories showed the cloth is from the 13th or 14th century… exactly around the same time when it was displayed in Europe for the first time in history. Despite this, many researchers seem to disagree with the measurements, e.g. see here

 http://www.shroud.com/pdfs/rogers2.pdf

To quote from the conclusions from the above (very lengthy!) report,

“Linen-production technology indicates that the Shroud of Turin is probably older than indicated by the date obtained in 1988. There seems to be ample evidence that an anomalous area was sampled for the radiocarbon analysis; therefore, the reported age is almost certainly invalid for the date the cloth was produced. The image was definitely not painted. The observed characteristics of the image rule out any mechanism for colour formation that involves high temperatures or energetic, penetrating radiation…..” etc

We know from the account in the Gospel of John that there is talk of some 75 or 100 pounds of spices being used, a mixture of myrrh and aloes, to embalm the corpse. That sounds like an extraordinary large amount. Together with the humidity in the tomb, to me, everything seemed set for some as yet unknown chemical or physical reaction. I wonder if anyone ever did some testing with those two chemicals.

Personally, after evaluating a lot of the evidence, it is my honest opinion that the Shroud is genuine and that it does bear the image of Jesus Christ. I think it is impossible that the image could have been a painted forgery, much less a medieval one. If it really were a fake, it would have required a real crucifixion to have taken place, orchestrated in exactly the way as Jesus died, with all its particular sordid details, including, amongst other things, the use of Roman whips, a thorn crown, etc. All of this would then have to be recorded in some specifically ingenious way, just so as to get all the specific forensic details correct and to achieve a photographic negative image with the particular 3 dimensional properties exactly as depicted on the Shroud of Turin. This is statistically impossible.

 Anyway, either way, in fact, we do know that a burial cloth from Jesus did exist in 0 AD. The Scriptures tell us the cloth was there, in the empty tomb, neatly folded up. I think there is a message in that too. But even if the Shroud of Turin were dated exactly back to 0 AD, where would that leave us?

 In fact, that places all of us at exactly the same point in history as where the disciples were when they arrived at the empty tomb. There was only one disciple who saw the empty tomb with the cloth neatly folded up, who immediately “believed”. He just knew.  The rest of them remained skeptical, probably like you and me would have been, thinking that somebody must have stolen the body. Only when they had seen His appearance did their doubt fade … Doubt seems to be a good beginning….

God’s love (energy) is so big you cannot get over it and you cannot get around of it. You have to come in at the Door. Jesus is the Door. He is standing with His arms open wide, there, just like a real Father, worried about where you were.  Faith is the key that you need.

Perhaps I have interested you to do some research so as to see what your heavenly Father is like.

http://breadonthewater.co.za/2017/02/20/hello/