Study for the Month, May, 2010
Water & Blood
The Physical/Natural Laws, Part III
By Nathaniel Fajardo
Email:[email protected]
——————————————————————
“THEN they came and broke the legs of the first and of the other who was crucified with Him. But when they came to Jesus and saw that He was already dead, they did not break His legs. But one of the soldiers pierced His side with a spear, and immediately blood and water came out.” John 19: 33, 34, N.K.J.V.
In the plan of salvation water and blood are the means of forgiveness, purification, and redemption of the penitent sinner. Even in the physical realm the inextricably-linked relation of blood and water is established as this interesting quote says:
“Doctors say human blood has to stay very near 94% water. If you lose 5 percent of it, you can’t see anymore; 10 percent, you can’t hear and you can go insane;12 percent and your blood is as thick as molasses and your heart can’t pump the thick stuff. It stops, and you’re dead.” – Bob Devine, “The Dromedary Camel,” Moody Press.
Against all the assertions made by those who repeat the lie of that Christ did not really die is the established medical evidence that He died—both water and blood immediately flowed from the deep puncture caused the spear thrust at His side by the Roman soldier. All the animal sacrifices offered in the Old Testament sacrificial services typifying Christ’s sacrifice at Calvary were killed before its blood could be obtained and used for the atoning work of the priests.
The Origin of Water
In the East, water was called “the gift of God.” Following the injunction laid down in Deuteronomy 29:29 that says, “The secret things belong to the Lord our God, but those things which are revealed belong to us and our children forever, that we may do all the words of words of this law,” we must take water, the second most important element for life, after air, as simply “the gift of God.” The Biblical account is silent—not regarding its origin for all things were created or made by God Creator–but how it came into being. All other things created were by divine fiat, i.e., by simply by speaking them into existence up until the creation of man, whom God formed out of the dust of the ground with His own hands as the crowning act of creation.
In presenting the Sabbath truth more fully we must begin with the Genesis account of Creation for there we see the origin and the purpose of the Sabbath. When someone asks you when water was created, what do you tell them? First, according to Webster, water is the liquid which descends from the clouds in rain, and which forms rivers, lake, seas, etc. Pure ordinary water (H20) consists of hydrogen (11.8 percent by weight), and oxygen (88.812 percent).” – Collegiate Edition, 1942.
The King James Version says: “The earth was without form and void; and darkness was upon the face of the deep. And the Spirit of God moved upon the waters.” Only then does it say, “And the God said, let there be light and there was light. And the evening and the morning were the first day.” The NKJV has it: “And the Spirit of God was hovering over the face of the waters.” The NIV says, “And the Spirit of God was hovering over the waters.”
All three versions use the English plural form “waters” from the Hebrew noun mayin (used in the singular sense) with the following meanings: “juice (figuratively); euphemistically, urine, semen, piss; wasting water.” – Strong’s Hebrew Dictionary. Without spiritual discernment, these definitions may initially bother the reader, let alone that it appears that these “waters” were already existing upon which the Holy Spirit, an agency in Creation, “moved upon,” or hovered over the face of the waters,” depending on the Bible version one is reading.
I inquired from three other persons—an elder of a church in who studies deep into the Bible, a pastor who is still actively shepherding a church, and a seasoned, retired pastor and author—as to how they would explain the passage, “and the earth was without form and void, and darkness was upon the face of the deep. And the Spirit of God moved upon the face of the waters” (Gen. 1: 2, 3, K.J.V.).
One of them invoked the principle laid down in Deuteronomy 29:29, which of course I always turn to when adequate inquiry in the spirit of seeking truth from the Bible and the Spirit of Prophecy, leaving out any preconceived opinions, apparently produces no additional information than that is already given. (For instance, I have tried looking up any SOP commentary on 1 John 3: 7, 8, KJV, and up to now found none. If you have, please email or write me where such quotes may be found). The latter’s reply to me via email is as follows:
“The earth in its origin was an ‘abusos’ which implies a place with matter but in disorder. Isaiah 45:18 tells us that ‘the earth was established (created) to be inhabited.’ There is no life without water. Therefore the Lord must have had all ‘prime material’ on hand when He ‘organized’ the rest of creation during the following six days. Genesis 1: 6 refers to the fact that water must have been in existence if ‘the water from the firmament was separated from the waters below.”
I found this explanation satisfactory. But when I gave it more thought the following questions persisted, such as:
(1) Did God really start with “a place with matter but in disorder?” Is this the very first illustration that God can put in order in the disorder made by sin and Satan in our lives?
(2) That He had to first have “prime material on hand” before He could start creation? These, at best, are inferred, not clear, unequivocal Biblical facts. But the passage in the Bible that says, “the foundations of the earth” may have included both water and the original material called “ground” from which the man was created from on the sixth day. These “foundations” should be differentiated from “the foundations of many generations,” since this foundation is the Sabbath.
(3) That He “organized” the rest of creation during the following six days?” Organizing and creating are two different actions, that is, as we currently understand the meanings of these two words, particularly the Biblical definition of creation, which is, except for the creation of man on the sixth day, He spoke everything into existence. “Let there be,” and it “stood fast.” His word and voice was the creative power in itself.
(4) “There is no life without water.” What about the 40 days and nights that Moses was at the top of Mount Sinai without food and water? What about the 40 days and nights Jesus was in the Wilderness of Temptation without food and water? I know the answer will be: because God performed a miracle on both instances; and I fully agree. But the presence of water, or oxygen for that matter does not guarantee that there is life for life itself remains a mystery. It comes alone from God, the Life-giver. I have no doubts that water was already in existence before God began the orderly and progressive work of creation of six literal days. That’s what Genesis says.
I noticed that even as I was reminded to refer to Deuteronomy 29:29, each one still volunteered their opinion but had “to assume” their own view—although all were united in the idea that water was already there before God started Creation.
The National Geographic’s Special Issue, April 2010 is on: ‘WATER, Our Thirsty World.” I recommend every one gets a copy of it. Here are various quotes I thought would highlight two things (a) that our earth, like an oven being heated up to bake or broil food, is heating up for the final cleansing by fire (b) the “drying up” of the waters on which billions of people depend for life and power helps us better understand that meaning of the “drying up of the Euphrates” in the sixth plague of Revelation 16: 12-14 in preparation for the “battle of Armageddon,” “the battle of that great day of God Almighty.” The seven last plagues fall only after the close of probation, and only upon those who have received the “mark of the beast in their foreheads and in their hands”—the false sabbath. The living saints at this time, the 144,000, are protected by the promise of Psalm 91.
- “The glaciers in the heart of Asia feed its greatest rivers, lifelines for 2 billion people. Now the ice and snow are diminishing.”
- “Americans use about 100 gallons of water at home each day. Millions of the world’s poorest subsist on fewer than 5 gallons. Forty-six percent of people on earth do not have water piped to their homes. Women in developing countries walk an average of 3.7 miles to get water. In 15 years [20205] , 1.8 billion will live in regions of severe water scarcity.”
- “The weight of China’s Three Gorges Reservoir will tilt the earth’s axis by nearly an inch.”
- “The longest water tunnel, supplying New York City, is 85 miles and leaks up to 35 million gallons a day.”
- The Itaipu Dam in South America cost $18 billion and took 17 years to build.’
- Dam projects have displaced up to 80 million people worldwide.”- 128.
- “High Marks for Clean Water, Energy.- “Retrieve a discarded water bottle. Tear off the label and fill with any water that’s not too murky from creek, standpipe or puddle. Place the bottle on a piece of metal in full sun. In 6 hours the UVA radiation will kill viruses, bacteria, and parasites in the water, making it safe to drink. SODIS, the acronym for the Swiss-pioneered water-disinfection program, is now being used all over the world to provide drinking water for some 4 million people. ‘Its simple, its free, and its effective,’ says Ibelatha Mhelela, principal of the Ndoleia Primary School in Tanzania. In 2006 her school started using SODIS to disinfect contaminated tap water, placing bottles in the building’s corrugated metal roof. The result? Absenteeism due to diarrhea dropped considerably, and examination scores soared. ‘Before we started SODIS, only 10 to 15 percent of the children passed the national sixth-grade exams,’ says Mhelela. ‘Now 90 to 95 percent of the students pass.’”- Mark Jenkins.
“We worship the sources of the mighty rivers; we erect altars at places where great streams burst suddenly from hidden sources; we adore springs. . . .and consecrate certain pools.” –Seneca the Younger, 4 B.C. – A.D. 65; Ad Lucilum Epistulae Morales, p. 83.
- “Mayas believed that natural wells, such as the Ykeken cenote in Mexico’s Yucatan, led to the underworld.” –p. 80.
- “Symbol of creation, harbor of all seeds, water becomes a supreme magic and medicinal substance; it heals, it restores youth, it ensures eternal life.” – Mircea Eliade, 1907-1986, Patterns in Comparative Religion, p. 93.
“If I were called in/To construct a religion/I should make use of water, wrote the English poet Philip Larkin in 1954—and most religions do.
Waters, religious historian Mircea Eliade explained in the 1950s, are ‘spring and origin, the reservoir of all the possibilities of existence; they precede every form and support every creation.’ So it has been since human history began and, by legend, before. The world, Genesis says, was brought to life by a God who created a ‘firmament in the midst of the waters.’ Babylonians believed in a world made from a commingling of fresh and salt water. Pima Indians have said Mother Earth was impregnated by a single drop of water. The cataclysmic flood that destroys a civilization is also an aqueous archetype and part of Hebrew, Greek, and Aztec cultures.
“The body thirsts. So does the spirit. ‘I must live near a lake,’ wrote Swiss psychiatrist Carl Jung, who waded into the depths of the psyche and equated water with the unconscious. ‘Without water, I thought, nobody could live at all.’
“From our worldly entrance in a burst of amniotic fluid to the ritual washing of the dead (taharah in Judaism; ghust al-mayyit in Islam) water flows through our lives, scribing a line between sacred and profane, life and death. We are doused, dunked, dipped, sprinkled—and blessings flow, deep and wide as the River Jordan of Scripture, wondrous as the spring at Lourdes, cathartic as tears.”- Cathy Newman, p. 84, National Geographic, April Special Issue on Water.
Finally, as to what other “prime material,” in addition to water, if any, God had to have first in place in an abusos, will be one of the many questions I will ask Jesus to explain, that is, if and when I am eternally saved. I now leave the matter on water at that.
(to be continued)