Friday Morning Manna April 19, 2019
Nathaniel Fajardo email:[email protected]
Mystery of Literal and Spiritual ‘Black Holes’Revealed
And without controversy great is the mystery of godliness; God was manifested in the flesh, justified in the Spirit, seen by angels, preached among Gentiles, believed on in the world, received up in glory. 1 Timothy 3: 16, N.K.J.V.
I’m an alumnus of PUCA Class ‘67. I fondly remember the late Reuel Reyes whom I know many of you fellow alumni do as well. During those halcyon years he, to me, was the second budding younger genius of the campus to the primary one, Dr. Richli. Reuel was the assistant Physics class instructor (a subject I had zero love for, not much to the delight of my aunt, the late Ester G. Manalaysay AKA as the “Miss Man” to her students of College Physics and other PUCIANs).
II was from Reuel that I first heard about “back holes.” It sounded too esoteric and mysteriously delectable to ignore, or forget.
I don’t recall if Reuel tried to explain what he knew about black holes. If he did, not much entered my ears and registered in my brain either because it was too profound for me to handle or the time to do so had not yet arrived.
Over 51 years later, I still don’t think I know what black holes really are, i.e., according to the Bible–if it does ever say anything close the breathtaking details that human science, technology and research claim they do, especially after April 17 of this year. Einstein’s and Stephen Hawking’s geniuses had much to do with all these recent breakthroughs of what is known in their august circles as “one of the most mystifying phenomena of the universe.”
I was, and still am (like most of you are in varying degrees) was very much curious about all kinds of mysteries, mystifying phenomena, and the otherworldly, perhaps coming all the way from the mother of mankind that I share with you, Eve.
In the quiet stillness of that white, glass-pane-windowed home by the Quonset houses (where we once lived in, too) leading to the famous auditorium, surrounded by mango trees, nestled in my larger world of the bucolic settings of the old PUC campus, I read all the National Geographic articles on science I could. Luckily for me and my dear sisters, we received an annual supply of it together with Readers’ Digest, Life Magazine, chocolates, fruit cake, etc., that came by way of the much-anticipated Christmas brown package from Auntie Lily (the late Emila Manalaysay) that released that unmistakable smell of “America” once you opened the package.
But at my age now and at this stage of what I didn’t realize back then, was a yet-unrecognized, underlying urge to seek for the ultimate truths but was yet immaturely expressed and crudely framed in raw curiosity and a penchant for the mysterious, I am quite satisfied that I have finally found the mystery of mysteries, the greatest of them all which explains and places in their proper spaces, spheres and perspectives all other mysteries, genuine or counterfeit.
This mystery of mysteries, however, occupies a different realm of the “unknown.” First, this is what it is not: It is not to be found in wisdom of man; not in highest of the heights of mortal man’s acquired knowledge in science, philosophy and technology; nor in the lower nebulous mesmerizing realms of the occult, spiritualism, theosophy or the wisdom of the ages of sages and avatars of eastern religions. It is not and cannot be carnal and temporal in content, substance and purpose.
And though both are thought to be literally “out-of-this-world” achievements, exploits and experiences in terms of progress, heightened awareness or expanding lateral vision, whatever, in God’s word they are all simply and gently exposed as inescapably earth-bound and are spiraling out of the control of common sense and rationality, causing the gospel-prophet to prophesy of the very times in which we “live, move, and have our being” in these doleful words:
“We look for light, but there is darkness! We grope for the wall like the blind, and we grope as if we had no eyes; we stumble at noonday, as at twilight; we are as dead men in desolate places. We all growl like bears, and moan sadly like doves’ we look for justice but there is none; for salvation, but it is far from us. For our transgressions are multiplied before You, and our sins testify against us; for our transgressions are with us, and as for our iniquities, we know them.” Isa. 59: 10-12. “For behold, the darkness shall cover the earth; and gross darkness the people.” Ch.60: 2. N.K.J.V.
According to the divinely-endowed spiritual and intellectual mind of a converted and transformed apostle Paul, the greatest of all mysteries which was kept secret for ages and even withheld from angels, and all such other lesser mysteries surrounding it, are preserved and protected in the eternal and infallible Word of God awaiting its appointed time and manner of unsealing.
Such cannot be understood, appreciated, much less desired by the “carnal” or “fleshly” mind, a “mind that is conformed to this world” and not yet “transformed by the renewing of the mind.” In this spiritual “dark hole” state, the mystery of mysteries and its ilk, will naturally and logically remain “closed” or “sealed” to such minds entrapped in gross spiritual darkness amidst the greatest revelation of the light of truth given to the final generation. This truth-light can never be sucked into any imagined inescapable “dark holes.”
It is now claimed that with the April 17 breakthrough of finally capturing, and thus proving mankind a visible picture, no longer through mathematical formulas translated into the artist’s rendering that “black holes” do exist and are found in the center of every galaxy of the universe including our own Milky Way, that we are now better informed on how to understand “how the universe started and how it will end.” Think about that conclusion, fellow Bible student!
Thus we need to cite—not Einstein or Stephen Hawkings nor the truly awesome, accumulated advances made by the combined efforts of past and present astronomers and scientists of NASA and all their direct and indirect partners working in synchronicity—but quickly bring to the fore (because we are literally running out of time and space, thus opportunity) the trampled-upon, thus little-known and even mischaracterized secret (which is free to all, not costing billions in research dollars) for acquiring the tools and means for understanding the divine mysteries having everything to do with our eternal salvation: First of all, to acquire now, the mind, not the body of Christ, in our sinful, fallen human nature. Imperishable, eternal saving truths that can never be extinguished or swallowed up by forces greater than the living, not dead Creator, is spiritual in nature and substance. It does not have humanly-limited measurable or even immeasurable “molecules” or “sub-atomic particles or properties” or whatever may yet may be discovered, named, and entered into scientific nomenclature of whatever remains of earth time. Bible prophecy reveals very little of that remains now.
In quick summary, Solomon, John and Paul, spiritually synchronized, testified thus: Not philosophy but Christ; not science but Christ: not religion but Christ; not the “wisdom of this world” or of the “kings and great men of the earth,” which are all “in vain” and are “ foolishness to God”— when they contradict the Word of God, but Christ; not the carnality of man but the spiritual reality of the Son of man. Here’s just a few compelling reasons Scriptural reasons why (emphasis mine):
Col. 1: 1-16, 19, 20: “Giving thanks to the Father who has qualified us to be partakers of the inheritance of the saints in the light. He has delivered us from the power of darkness and translated us to into the kingdom of the Son of His love. . . . For by Him all things were created that are in heaven and that are on earth, visible and invisible, whether thrones or dominions or principalities or powers. All things were created through Him and for Him. He is before all things, and in Him all things consist.” Col. 1: 12, 13, 16, 17.
1 Cor. 2: 6-14: “However, we speak the wisdom of God among those who are [spiritually] mature, yet not the wisdom of this age [world, KJV], nor of the rulers of this age [world, KJV], who are come to nothing.
But we speak the wisdom of God in a mystery, the hidden wisdom which God ordained before the ages for our glory, which none of the rulers of this age knew; for had they known, they would not have crucified the Lord of glory.
But as it is written: ‘Eye has not seen, nor ear heard, nor have entered into the heart of man, the things which God has prepared for those who love Him.’ Isa. 64: 4.
But God has revealed them to us though His Spirit. For the Spirit searches all things, yes, the deep things of God.
For what man knows the things of a man except the spirit of the man which is in him? Even so no one knows the things of God except the Spirit of God. Now we have received, not the spirit of the world, but the Spirit who is from God, that we might know the things that have been freely given to us by God.
These things we also speak, not in the words which man’s wisdom teaches but which the Holy Spirit teaches, comparing spiritual things with spiritual.
But the natural man [the carnal, unrenewed mind] does not receive the things of the Spirit of God, for they are foolishness to him; nor can he know them, because they are spiritually discerned.
But he who is spiritual judges [discerns] all things, yet he himself is rightly judged by no one. For ‘Who has the mind of the Lord that he may instruct Him? (Isa. 40: 13). But we have the mind of Christ.”
Thus, we are instructed: “Let this mind be in you which was also in Christ Jesus.” Phil. 2: 5. Rom. 8: 5-9: “For those who live according to the flesh set their minds according to the flesh, but those who live according to the Spirit, the things of the Spirit.
For to be carnally-minded is death, but to be spiritually-minded is life and peace.
Because the carnal mind is enmity against God [the Creator]; for it is not subject to the law of God [but the laws and wisdom of mortal man], nor can be.
So then, those who are in the flesh [carnal mind] cannot please God [the Creator].
But you are not in the flesh but in the Spirit [no longer conformed to this world by the renewing of the mind], if indeed the Spirit of God dwells in you. Now, if anyone does not have the Spirit of Christ, he is not of His [but of the world’s].”
Spiritual things are spiritually discerned. The spiritual, not the carnal mind is rendered capable of discerning and distinguishing between what a literal dark hole and a spiritual dark hole are, and what kind of spaces, galaxies, and universes they are located in.
I give preference to this mystery of mysteries—the mystery of godliness—before we dwell on the “one of the most mystifying phenomena of the universe”—black holes.
The length, breadth, depth and height of the mystery of godliness is worthy of the highest aspirations and pursuit of whatever remains of a lifetime. It is, doubtless, needing no exaggeration or whatever fluff in order to convey its value, more precious than diamonds, gold, silver, bitcoin or any of the so-called global treasures (really “worldly,” though considered otherworldly in content and substance), whether the venerated relics housed in France’s Notre Dame Cathedral that almost got burned down last week. Or again, the first-ever real picture ever seen by human eyes of a “black hole” located in the center of our Milky Way Galaxy, and all the other mysteries and man-made “seven” or how many and what they are by now, “wonders of the world.” We have been considering the mysteries and the wonders of God’s Word.
Next issue, we will discuss more of the Black Hole and what is being taught to your children as early as grade K-4 in the schools of the world. If you don’t get your children started on the Biblical record of creation, beginning in Genesis which is an important focus of the Fourth Commandment, you are leaving them to be educated in mysteries and wonders of the world are designed to diminish the importance, if not totally ridicule, reject and replace the divine mysteries and wonders of God’s word. But it must begin with the parents. You cannot give your children what you do not own.
(Continued next week)