ARE WE ALONE?
by John T. Webb
Most of the words in bold are links from Word Study Links.
How big is your God? Does the creator of the universe have such a need to impress you that he would create billions upon billions of stars just for YOU to LOOK AT? Or are you big enough to allow that He might have created other intelligent life in the universe?
Why should we think that this planet is civilized? Just how intelligent is intelligent life?
The following is given as speculation, as food for thought, since I have not seen or heard of a similar scenario proposed elsewhere.
It is intended as a reasonable hypothesis for the existence of, AND lack of significant contact with, intelligent extraterrestrials. And I believe, given the history of human nature, not an unreasonable supposition. Until there is corroborated and publicly documented contact with extraterrestrials, I don't think it can be disproven.
Our basis of communication is words. Our civilization learns, advances, and expresses emotions through the spoken and written word. But words are simply a means of conveying thoughts--mental processes--to those around us. Therefore, if our minds are to comprehend a concept, there must be words known to us that define that concept.
Imagine, if you can, a world where there are no words for love, compassion, peace, joy, happiness, contentment, giving. These are simply a way of life without a way - or need - to express it. But there are also no feelings or concept of, or words for, hate, anger, violence, fear, sorrow, disappointment, selfishness. Is it possible to have only good feelings, without even knowing what "good" is?(A) Why do we have these feelings, both good and bad? Are they simply innate human qualities, qualities which any species of intelligent, reasoning life form would have? Are they inherited and natural? Or are they instilled in us by a power greater than our own?(B)
Imagine yourself as a citizen of another planet, a people who do not know what war is. You and your friends (another word you don't know, because you have no enemies) from other planets in other star systems have often visited the third planet of a medium-sized star about one-third of the way from the edge of the galaxy. Because of lack of disease and personal, both physical and mental, conflicts, you have attained an age which, on this strange blue planet, would be considered EIGHT HUNDRED YEARS OLD (and you are not quite "middle-aged" yet)! Imagine how much you could learn with three hundred years of schooling. Your species is so intelligent that you have developed equipment that can receive and decipher radio-wave transmissions from this world. But even with this longevity and the knowledge and wisdom it brings (wisdom may not apply if we consider that it involves understanding good and evil), you cannot comprehend what you see of these things called "movies" and "drama" on "television" where people are killing (another unknown word) each other. Wouldn't you hesitate to land in a city, step out and say, "Take me to your leader."?
Reports have been made of contacts with beings who landed on Earth in "flying saucers." These are creatures sufficiently intelligent to be capable of interstellar travel, and yet there have been no widely publicized overt acts of aggression from them. Surely beings such as these could have developed weapons which could, at the push of a button (if not mere thought), destroy entire cities. Why don't they, in "War of the Worlds" fashion? If they could, could their civilization have developed enough to travel the galaxy? Wouldn't they have destroyed each other as the nations of the earth sometimes seem wont to do?
Picture the earth as a whole, on a flat plane, with time flashing before your eyes at a vastly accelerated rate, as if it was a video game, with every skirmish, every battle, every war of the past five thousand years just a brief flash of light. Now, compress the entire five thousand years into five minutes, and the scene would be constantly dotted with flashes.
We assume that, if there are other civilizations in the universe, they are like us with regard to life-span, jealousies, desire to colonize--aspects that our science-fiction writers propound in the likes of "Star Wars" and "Start Trek." The gentle visitor in "E.T." is probably much closer to reality.
Consider the world if Cain had not slain Able. The two of them, working together, could have grown more and fatter cattle, and larger and more diversified crops. If the people of Noah's day had heeded his words and turned to God, civilization would have continued uninterrupted, and Noah's sons wouldn't have had to start the world all over again. If Saul had not been so moody and could have shared his authority with the anointed David, working together their kingdom would have been even greater than it was. If Greece and Rome had been allies, with their advances in democracy, medicine and art, their achievements would have been truly phenomenal. Carrying this idea down to today, the communist world could have allowed its people freedom to work for themselves and in turn to work with the west.
If man could love his fellow man, then in the past five thousand years, there is NOTHING that could not have been achieved in the way of science. Where would our technology be if men trusted each other, helped and nurtured each other without divisiveness and squabbling? If all nations could work together without petty, childish haggling over who should get credit and rewards (ME), and who should do the work (YOU), and who this property should belong to (ME), and who's going to get hurt if I don't get it (YOU), then science, technology, individual welfare, health, all aspects of daily activity and generations of advancement would have increased so much that our present knowledge would constitute only the first page of a tremendous encyclopedia!
Our friends from far away places seem to have this advantage. Can this great difference possibly be biophysical? Certainly not! Believing that the world's ills are genetic is surely naive. Besides being physical entities, we are spiritual, and each of the qualities mentioned before is mental--i.e., spiritual. Just as some physical persons take, or are allowed, authority over others, there are spiritual persons who have powers over other spirits. We call the greatest of these powers God, over the powers of good, and the next greatest satan, or the devil, over the powers of evil.(C)
The primary source we have for studying how these two spirits work in this world is the Bible. This book describes both God and satan in great detail. In the chronology of spiritual history, which is boundless as we measure time, the first mention of satan involves a time when his pride, the first sin, prompted him to declare that he would exalt himself over God, his Creator. Because of this, God cast satan and one-third of the angels, those who chose to follow satan, out of Heaven and down to the Earth, where, the Bible says, satan is "Prince of the powers of the air."(D)
After man was created in the spiritual image of God with a will of his own, satan shared his sin with man, a sin that says, "I don't owe God, my Creator, anything. He has told me that there are things I'm supposed to do and things I'm not supposed to do, but I'M going to do what I want to do." This has been the cause of ALL of mankind's troubles. Self-centeredness is the reason behind greed, anger, lust; the reason for thousands of laws when there should be only two: love God, and love your neighbor. Because of his disobedience, Man lost his one-on-one closeness with God. From that time on, Man's pride, egotism, and selfishness have prevented him from progressing by bringing calamitous wars, whether man against man or nation against nation. War--men fighting against men--has diverted civilization from fighting disease, famine, and other human problems.(E) Preparations for war create some beneficial products, but energy is primarily directed toward destruction which progressively lowers individual and collective potential for good. When good people are eliminated, the overall morality of a group is diminished, and the potential for further destruction increases proportionately.
Is it possible that:
satan is confined to this planet??(F)
he is incapable of visiting other solar systems?
earth has truly been visited by people from other places?
these people have a PERSONAL COMMUNICATION WITH GOD, unhampered
by interference from satan?
WE are afraid of THEM when they have NO IDEA WHAT AGGRESSION IS?
(A) Gal. 5:19-23 Now the works of the flesh are manifest, which are these; Adultery, fornication, uncleanness, lasciviousness, idolatry, witchcraft, hatred, variance, emulations, wrath, strife, seditions, heresies, envyings, murders, drunkenness, revellings, and such like: of the which I tell you before, as I have also told you in time past, that those who do such things shall not inherit the kingdom of God. But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, longsuffering, gentleness, goodness, faith, meekness, temperance: against such there is no law. Return
(B) 2 Tim. 1:7 For God has not given us the spirit of fear; but of power, and of love, and of a sound mind. Return
(C) Gal. 5:16-17 This I say then, walk in the Spirit, and you shall not fulfil the lust of the flesh. For the flesh lusts against the Spirit, and the Spirit against the flesh: and these are contrary the one to the other: so that you cannot do the things that you would. Return
(D) Eph. 2:2 Wherein in time past you walked according to the course of this world, according to the prince of the power of the air, the spirit that now works in the children of disobedience. Return
(E) James 4:1-10 From where come wars and fightings among you? do they not come from here, even from your lusts that war in your members? You lust, and have not: you kill, and desire to have, and cannot obtain: you fight and war, yet you have not, because you do not ask. You ask, and do not receive, because you ask amiss, that you may consume it upon your lusts. You adulterers and adulteresses, do you not know that the friendship of the world is enmity with God? whosoever therefore will be a friend of the world is the enemy of God. Do you think that the scripture says in vain, The spirit that dwells in us lusts to envy? But he gives more grace. Wherefore he says, God resists the proud, but gives grace to the humble. Submit yourselves therefore to God. Resist the devil, and he will flee from you. Draw near to God, and he will draw near to you. Cleanse your hands, you sinners; and purify your hearts, you double minded. Be afflicted, and mourn, and weep: let your laughter be turned to mourning, and your joy to heaviness. Humble yourselves in the sight of YHWH, and he shall lift you up. Return
(F) Job 1:7 And YHWH said to satan, Where are you coming from? Then satan answered YHWH, and said, From going to and fro in the earth, and from walking up and down in it.
Return
How big is God! How big and wide his vast domain,
To try to tell, these lips can only start;
He's big enough to rule His mighty universe,
Yet small enough to live within my heart.
--Stuart Hamblen, How Big Is God?
Some interesting and (somewhat) related links:
The Age of the Universe
The Design Argument
The age of things IN the universe.
Design? or Chance?????
For comments, questions, or broken links, please e mail me at johnt204(at)webname.com.
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6/22/13
Last update 14 December 2023