There Is No Mechanism

by Dennis Edwards:

One of the major problems of the theory of evolution is that there is no mechanism that can transform one type of organism or animal into another. A fish cannot evolve into an amphibian. Darwin searched for the mechanism in his day and moved from the idea of acquired characteristics to natural selection and back to acquired characteristics. He knew there was a problem and optimistically hoped that the mechanism for evolution would be found. He reasoned that since evolution had occurred, there must be a mechanism. But, the proof of evolution is not the “fact” that it has happened, because the theory of evolution cannot be its own proof. 

The theory of Evolution is like the picture of the old car above. The car has no engine and no wheels to get it to move and go forward. Evolution has the same problem. No mechanism exists within the DNA which adds completely new genetic information which would be needed to change one organism into another. Mutations actually screw things up, while natural selection conserves, rather than adds, additional information. Scientists have been looking for over 150 years for the mechanism of evolution and have yet to come up with a viable theory, let alone proof. 

Darwin at first believed acquired characteristics was the answer. Acquired characteristics was idea that if an animal, like a deer, reached for food from places where it needed to stretch its neck, eventually, the neck would grow and the animal would pass on that growth to the next generation. Over a period of, maybe thousands or tens of thousands or millions of years, a deer could, with little changes in each generation, pass on its acquired characteristic, the elongated neck, to the next generation. Eventually, over time, a deer could evolve into a giraffe.[1]

The idea of acquired characteristics was laid to rest in 1889 through an experiment by August Weisman, a famous scientist of the day. Weisman cut off the tails of a hundred generations of mice. Yet, still, the next generation was born with a tail. Scientist concluded that acquired characteristic was not a valid mechanism.[2]

Being familiar with the breeding of birds, Darwin also realized that the variation that occurred through natural selection was similar to how a breeder selects for certain qualities when breeding his animals. He knew there was a limit to the amount of change possible. Yet, since he believed that evolution had occurred, he concluded there must be a mechanism. It just needed to be found. He hoped that in time the theory would be justified and the mechanism found.

Though Mendel´s work on genetics was published in 1866, seven years after Darwin´s work, it lay undiscovered until the beginning the 20th century.[3] At that time, scientists thought that Mendel´s genetics would perhaps justify Darwin´s theory. Scientists searched in genetics for the proof of evolution, looking for the missing mechanism. However, genetics proved to be a dead end, verifying that variation or the change in one generation to the next is limited to the available gene pool.

Statics have shown that students who have studied genetics are more likely to doubt the theory of evolution than those who don´t.

It was at this point that the idea of mutations was introduced by evolutionary scientists in an attempt to save the theory from destruction. If the genes mutated and then were selected for, they surmised, natural selection together with mutations could be the mechanism needed to transform from one kind of animal to another. However, all scientific evidence until today has yet to find one instance where mutations have added new genetic information.

Mutations may cause the information to be different and therefore “new” in that sense. Mutations may even have beneficial results as in the case of sickle-celled anemia, where malaria is incapable of attaching itself to the damaged sickle-anemic cell. It, thus, offers a beneficial protection against malaria. Nevertheless, the mutated sickle-celled is anemic and the carrier is debilitated because of it. But mutations do not add additional information capable of creating necessary body parts or organs. New additional genetic information would be needed for one type of animal, like a dinosaur, to change into another type of animal, like a bird.

Dr. Lee Spetner, who holds a PH.D in physics from MIT, said in his book Not by Chance! Shattering the Modern Theory of Evolution that “in all the reading that I have done in life-science literature, I have never found a mutation that added information…..All mutations that have been studied on a molecular level turn out to reduce the genetic information, not increase it.”[4]

British scientist Michael Pitman, also, has said “neither observation nor controlled experimentation has shown natural selection manipulating mutations so as to produce a new gene, hormone, enzyme or organ.”[5] Finally, famous geneticist, Dr. Wilder Smith concluded, “The chemistry of mutation in the genetic code has an effect similar to that of water on a text. Mutations modify or destroy already existing genetic information, but they never create new information. They never create an entirely new biological organ.”[6]

The error of modern day Neo-Darwinists is that they teach and insist that new information can be created by mutations. The truth is that natural selection working with mutations does not have creative power. There is still no mechanism for evolution. Evolution is not only improbable, but it is impossible. The theory should be laid to rest like the theory that the sun revolved around the earth. Eventually, the evidence got to be so overwhelming in favor of the Hellenistic system that science had to abandon the Earth-centered idea, which had been believed for thousands of years. It is time to do the same with evolution. The theory is not just dead, it was never really alive.[7] There is no mechanism!

Footnotes:

1. Dr. Carl Werner, Evolution the Grand Experiment, 2007, page 28.

2. ibid, page 30.

3. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gregor_Mendel

4. James Perloff, Tornado in a Junkyard, 1999, page 26.

5. ibid.

6. ibid, page 27.

7. Dave A. Schoch, The Assumptions Behind the Theory of Evolution, 2008, subtitle.

Read More

Dawkins Tells Atheists to Mock Christians!

Read More

Beyond Armageddon

Read More

Science Defined to Exclude Creation

By Bruce Malone

The following strategy is repeatedly used by those who advocate “evolution only” education. They:

1. Define science to exclude the possibility of a creator.

2. Claim that all the evidence for our designer is “not science” and, therefore cannot be shown.

3. Repeat, like a mantra, statements such as “evolution is the basis of science” and imply that microbes to man evolution is a proven fact.

4. Then give examples of minor changes within organisms as “proof” that one organism can change

into a completely different type, while using the same word, ‘evolution’ for both the small and the

enormous changes. 

Actual scientific evidence for any major evolutionary transformation is non-existent. No experiment ever performed has come even remotely close to showing how life could form from chemicals. Major problems with origin of life experiments are systematically hidden from students – after all, we can’t have students considering the only other alternative (creation), can we? 

No experiment has shown how useful functioning information can be added to the DNA molecule by random changes. Yet, it can be experimentally demonstrated that every known mutation results in a net loss of original functioning information. Why aren’t we training students to ask the big question - where did all of this original functional information come from? Acknowledgment of a designer gives a mechanism that agrees with known scientific observations; evolution relies on faith that denies experimental reality.

It is commonly parroted by evolution believers that creation is not science because it is not testable or repeatable. In actuality, the creation model is far more testable than the concept that microbes turned into man by random mutational changes. Any sequence pattern even remotely similar in form or function to the DNA code, beamed to earth from outer space, would immediately be acknowledged as evidence of an intelligent originator. Yet, the same evidence for a designer, found in every DNA molecule, cannot be acknowledged as such in classrooms! Mutation rates have been accelerated a million-fold with fruit flies, yet no new creature or even any new functioning feature has ever developed. 

Fossils are an undeniable record of the sudden appearance of distinctly different animal forms with huge gaps between enormously diverse creatures. The Biblical creation model explains the fossil record as a consequence of a real worldwide flood and the reality of this ancient global flood has been repeatedly confirmed by careful scientific observations. Yet, these evidences are systematically suppressed because of a dogmatic faith in evolution, which survives by defining “science” so that it leaves out the better creation alternative. 

Those setting the standards for our public school science curriculum have merely replaced the acknowledgement of our Creator’s existence with a definition of “science” that excludes the possibility of God’s interaction with His creation. In essence modern man has decided to use the public education system to pretend that there is no God (at least not one worth mentioning). In reality what is being taught is that there is no God except naturalism. God, who desires for us to have a personal relationship with Him, has a response to this sad situation. Psalms 14:1 states, “The fool says in his heart, ‘There is no God.’ ” We have become a nation of fools in the way we have allowed our children to be educated.

Read More

Proof - Dzhokhar Tsarnaev's Back-Pack was photo-shopped out

Read More

What was Martin Luther's stand on Creation/Evolution?

The biblical scholar and Protestant reformer, Martin Luther believed in Creation and taught that the world was young. For example, Luther stated,

“We know from Moses that the world was not in existence before 6,000 years ago.”Luther insisted that Moses wrote about Creation in normal, literal language.

“He [Moses] calls 'a spade a spade,' i.e., he employs the terms 'day' and 'evening' without Allegory, just as we customarily do we assert that Moses spoke in the literal sense, not allegorically or figuratively, i.e., that the world, with all its creatures, was created within six days, as the words read. If we do not comprehend the reason for this, let us remain pupils and leave the job of teacher to the Holy Spirit.”

REFERENCE 

Martin Luther in Jaroslav Peliken, editor, “Luther's Works,” Lectures on Genesis Chapters 1-5, Vol. 1 (St. Louis: Concordia Publishing House, 1958), pp. 3, 6.

Read More

A 75-Year Harvard Study Finds What It Takes To Live A Happy Life

Scott Stossel, The Atlantic, Apr. 25, 2013
In June 2009, The Atlantic published a cover story on the Grant Study, one of the longest-running longitudinal studies of human development.

The project, which began in 1938, has followed 268 Harvard undergraduate men for 75 years, measuring an astonishing range of psychological, anthropological, and physical traits—from personality type to IQ to drinking habits to family relationships to “hanging length of his scrotum”—in an effort to determine what factors contribute most strongly to human flourishing.

Recently, George Vaillant, who directed the study for more than three decades, published Triumphs of Experience, a summation of the insights the study has yielded. Among them: “Alcoholism is a disorder of great destructive power.” Alcoholism was the main cause of divorce between the Grant Study men and their wives; it was strongly correlated with neurosis and depression (which tended to follow alcohol abuse, rather than precede it); and—together with associated cigarette smoking—it was the single greatest contributor to their early morbidity and death.

But the factor Vaillant returns to most insistently is the powerful correlation between the warmth of your relationships and your health and happiness in old age. After The Atlantic’s 2009 article was published, critics questioned the strength of this correlation. Vaillant revisited the data he had been studying since the 1960s for his book, an experience that further convinced him that what matters most in life are relationships.

For instance, the 58 men who scored highest on measurements of “warm relationships” earned an average of $141,000 a year more at their peak salaries (usually between ages 55 and 60) than the 31 men who scored lowest; the former were also three times more likely to have achieved professional success worthy of inclusion in Who’s Who.

Vaillant’s key takeaway, in his own words: “The seventy-five years and twenty million dollars expended on the Grant Study points … to a straightforward five-word conclusion: ‘Happiness is love. Full stop.’”

Read More

He Answers!

By Rosalind Goforth

Download Audio (7.9MB)

I am convinced that God has intended prayer to be as simple and natural, and as constant a part of our spiritual life, as the [interaction] between a child and his parent in the home. And as a large part of that [interaction] between child and parent is simply asking and receiving, just so is it with us and our Heavenly Parent.

Perhaps, however, the most blessed element in this asking and getting from God lies in the strengthening of faith which comes when a definite request has been granted. What’s more helpful and inspiring than a ringing testimony of what God has done?

As I have recalled the past in writing these incidents, one of the most precious memories is that of an evening when a number of friends had gathered in our home. The conversation turned on answered prayer. For more than two hours we vied with one another in recounting personal incidents of God’s wonderful work, and the inspiration of that evening still abides.

A Christian minister once said to me: “Is it possible that the great God of the universe, the Maker and Ruler of mankind, could or would, as you would make out, take interest in such a trifle as the trimming of a hat! To me it is preposterous!”

Yet did not our Lord Jesus Christ say: “The very hairs of your head are all numbered”; and “not one sparrow is forgotten before God”; and again, “Your heavenly Father knoweth what ye have need of before ye ask him”?

It is true that “There is nothing too great for God's power,” and it is just as true that “There is nothing too small for His love!”

If we believe God's Word we must believe, as Dan Crawford has tersely and beautifully expressed it, that “The God of the infinite is the God of the infinitesimal.” Yes, he

“Who clears the grounding berg
And guides the grinding floe,
He hears the cry of the little kit fox
And the lemming of the snow!”

No more wonderful testimony, perhaps, has ever been given of God’s willingness to help in every emergency of life than that which Mary Slessor gave, when asked to tell what prayer had meant to her. “My life,” she wrote, “is one long daily, hourly record of answered prayer. For physical health, for mental overstrain, for guidance given marvellously, for errors and dangers averted, for enmity to the Gospel subdued, for food provided at the exact hour needed, for everything that goes to make up life and my poor service. I can testify, with a full and often wonder-stricken awe, that I believe God answers prayer. I know God answers prayer!”

I have been asked the question: “Has God always given you just what you have asked for?”

Oh, no! For Him to have done so would have been great unkindness. For instance: when I was a young woman I prayed for three years that God would grant me a certain petition. Sometimes I pleaded for this as for life itself, so intensely did I want it. Then God showed me very clearly that I was praying against His will. I resigned my will to His in the matter, and a few months later God gave what was infinitely better. I have often praised Him for denying my prayer; for had He granted it I could never have come to China.

Then, too, we must remember that many of our prayers, though always heard, are not granted because of some sin harboured in the life, or because of unbelief, or of failure to meet some other Bible-recorded condition governing prevailing prayer.

The following incidents of answered prayer are by no means a complete record [referencing the book this is excerpted from]. How could they be, when no record of prayer has been kept all these fifty years? Had there been, I doubt not that volumes could have been written to the glory of God’s grace and power in answering prayer. But even from what is recorded here I, too, can say from a full heart, I know God answers prayer.

“He answered prayer: so sweetly that I stand
Amid the blessing of his wondrous hand
And marvel at the miracle I see,
The favours that his love hath wrought for me.
Pray on for the impossible, and dare
Upon thy banner this brave motto bear,
‘My Father answers prayer.’”

*

In October 1887, my husband was appointed by the Canadian Presbyterian Church to open a new field, in the northern section of the Province of Honan, China. We left Canada the following January, reaching China in March 1888. Not till then did we realize the tremendous difficulties of the task before us.

Dr. Hudson Taylor, of the China Inland Mission, writing to us at this time, said: “We understand North Honan is to be your field; we, as a mission, have tried for ten years to enter that province from the south, and have only just succeeded. It is one of the most anti-foreign provinces in China. … Brother, if you would enter that province, you must go forward on your knees.”

These words gave the key-note to our early pioneer years. Would that a faithful record had been kept of God’s faithfulness in answering prayer! Our strength as a mission and as individuals, during those years so fraught with dangers and difficulties, lay in the fact that we did realize the hopelessness of our task apart from divine aid.

*

The following incident occurred while we were still outside Honan, studying the language at a sister mission. It illustrates the importance of prayer from the home base for those on the field.

My husband was finding great difficulty in acquiring the language; he studied faithfully many hours daily, but made painfully slow progress. He and his colleague went regularly together to the street chapel, to practise preaching in Chinese to the people; but, though Mr. Goforth had come to China almost a year before the other missionary, the people would ask the latter to speak instead of Mr. Goforth, saying they understood him better.

One day, just before starting as usual for the chapel, my husband said: “If the Lord does not give me very special help in this language I fear I shall be a failure as a missionary.”

Some hours later he returned, his face beaming with joy. He told me that he realized most unusual help when his turn came to speak; sentences came to his mind as never before; and not only had he made himself understood, but some had appeared much moved, coming up afterward to have further conversation with him. So delighted and encouraged was he with this experience that he made a careful note of it in his diary.

Some two months and a half later a letter came from a student in Knox College, saying that on a certain evening a number of students had met specially to pray for Mr. Goforth. The power of prayer was such, and the presence of God so manifestly felt, that they decided to write and ask Mr. Goforth if any special help had come to him at that time. Looking in his diary, he found that the time of their meeting corresponded with that time of special help in the language.

“I cannot tell why there should come to me
A thought of someone miles and years away,
In swift insistence on the memory,
Unless there is a need that I should pray.
We are too busy to spare thought
For days together of some friends away;
Perhaps God does it for us—and we ought
To read his signal as a sign to pray.
Perhaps just then my friend has fiercer fight,
A more appalling weakness, a decay
Of courage, darkness, some lost sense of right;
And so, in case he needs my prayers—I pray.”

Abridged from “How I Know God Answers Prayer—The Personal Testimony of One Life-Time” by Rosalind Goforth, missionary to China (New York: Harper & Brothers, 1921). Read more at Project Gutenberg:
http://www.gutenberg.org/files/26033/26033-h/26033-h.htm.

Published on Anchor April 2013. Read by Bethany Kelly.

Read More

The Heart of It All: The Holy Spirit & the Messiah

http://directors.tfionline.com/

By Peter

April 30, 2013
The Holy Spirit and the Messiah

In the previous article, we saw how the Spirit of the Lord was manifested in the Old Testament. God’s Spirit moved in the lives of specific individuals, empowering them, causing them to prophesy, and anointing them with other abilities. In the Old Testament, the Spirit of the Lord generally came upon or interacted only with specific individuals and only on a temporary basis. It was prophesied, however, that a time would come when God would pour out His Spirit in abundance upon all His people.[1]
The Messiah

The Old Testament also includes prophecies about the Messiah who was to come, who would be powerfully filled with the Spirit of God and would do great things in God’s name. While the Jewish people did not think that this Messiah would be the Son of God, as they had no concept that God was a Trinity, they understood that the Messiah, an anointed king, would be greatly empowered by God’s Spirit.

The Dictionary of Jesus and the Gospels states:

A major strand of Judaism anticipated a Messiah mightily endowed with the Spirit, as both the Spirit of prophecy (affording unique wisdom and knowledge of the Lord as the basis of dynamic righteousness) and the Spirit of power.[2]

Referring to the Messiah, the book of Isaiah says:

There shall come forth a shoot from the stump of Jesse, and a branch from his roots shall bear fruit. And the Spirit of the Lord shall rest upon Him, the Spirit of wisdom and understanding, the Spirit of counsel and might, the Spirit of knowledge and the fear of the Lord.[3]

This prophecy tells us that the Messiah would descend from the lineage of David, the son of Jesse, and that God’s Spirit would rest upon Him, meaning that the Spirit would remain on Him. He would be endowed with wisdom, understanding, counsel, knowledge, and the fear of God. Isaiah prophesied further about the Messiah, declaring again that God’s Spirit would be upon Him.

Behold My servant, whom I uphold, My chosen, in whom My soul delights; I have put My Spirit upon Him; He will bring forth justice to the nations … He will not grow faint or be discouraged till He has established justice in the earth.[4]

Later it was again prophesied in the book of Isaiah that God’s Spirit would be mightily upon the Messiah and that He would be anointed and do His work with the power of the Spirit of the Lord.

The Spirit of the Lord God is upon Me, because the Lord has anointed Me to bring good news to the poor; He has sent Me to bind up the brokenhearted, to proclaim liberty to the captives, and the opening of the prison to those who are bound; to proclaim the year of the Lord’s favor, and the day of vengeance of our God; to comfort all who mourn; to grant to those who mourn in Zion—to give them a beautiful headdress instead of ashes, the oil of gladness instead of mourning, the garment of praise instead of a faint spirit; that they may be called oaks of righteousness, the planting of the Lord, that He may be glorified.[5]
Fulfillment of Prophecy

These prophecies were fulfilled in the life of Jesus, the promised Messiah. All four of the Gospels speak of Jesus being filled with the Spirit at the beginning of His ministry, when He was baptized by John the Baptist.[6]

Now when all the people were baptized, and when Jesus also had been baptized and was praying, the heavens were opened, and the Holy Spirit descended on Him in bodily form, like a dove; and a voice came from heaven, “You are My beloved Son; with You I am well pleased.”[7]

John [the Baptist] bore witness: “I saw the Spirit descend from heaven like a dove, and it remained on Him. I myself did not know Him, but He who sent me to baptize with water said to me, ‘He on whom you see the Spirit descend and remain, this is He who baptizes with the Holy Spirit.’ And I have seen and have borne witness that this is the Son of God.”[8]

Later, when asked about Jesus, John the Baptist said:

He whom God has sent utters the words of God, for He gives the Spirit without measure. The Father loves the Son and has given all things into His hand.[9]

On the advent of Jesus’ ministry, the Holy Spirit descended upon Him without measure and remained on Him permanently. Immediately after this, the Spirit led Him into the wilderness, where the Devil tried to defeat Him, to no avail.

Then Jesus, being filled with the Holy Spirit, returned from the Jordan and was led by the Spirit into the wilderness for forty days, being tempted by the Devil.[10]

After overcoming the temptations, Jesus began ministering to others in the power of the Spirit. He gained popularity and was highly praised by all.

Jesus returned in the power of the Spirit to Galilee, and a report about Him went out through all the surrounding country. And He taught in their synagogues, being glorified by all.[11]

When Jesus returned to Nazareth, the village where He grew up, He was chosen to read from the Scriptures in the synagogue. The passage He read was from Isaiah, about the ministry of the Messiah, and at the end of the reading, Jesus made it clear that it was speaking about Him—that He was the Messiah upon whom the Spirit of the Lord had fallen.

The scroll of the prophet Isaiah was given to Him. He unrolled the scroll and found the place where it was written, “The Spirit of the Lord is upon Me, because He has anointed Me to proclaim good news to the poor. He has sent Me to proclaim liberty to the captives and recovering of sight to the blind, to set at liberty those who are oppressed, to proclaim the year of the Lord’s favor.” And He rolled up the scroll and gave it back to the attendant and sat down. And the eyes of all in the synagogue were fixed on Him. And He began to say to them, “Today this Scripture has been fulfilled in your hearing.”[12]

Jesus was stating that His ministry had begun, that He would proclaim the good news, bringing liberty to the captives, healing and freeing those who were oppressed, with God’s Spirit upon Him. The apostle Peter later stated that Jesus did these very things through the anointing of the Holy Spirit.

You yourselves know what happened throughout all Judea, beginning from Galilee after the baptism that John proclaimed: how God anointed Jesus of Nazareth with the Holy Spirit and with power. He went about doing good and healing all who were oppressed by the Devil, for God was with Him. And we are witnesses of all that He did both in the country of the Jews and in Jerusalem.[13]
The “Promise of the Father”

The Holy Spirit, who descended upon Jesus, played a major role in His ministry—leading, guiding, and empowering Him. Right before Jesus ascended into heaven, He told His disciples that He would send the “promise of the Father,” which was the Holy Spirit, the power of God, and that they were to wait in Jerusalem until they received this power from on high.

Behold, I am sending the promise of My Father upon you. But stay in the city until you are clothed with power from on high.[14]

While staying with them He ordered them not to depart from Jerusalem, but to wait for the promise of the Father, which, He said, “you heard from Me; for John baptized with water, but you will be baptized with the Holy Spirit not many days from now.”[15]

The Holy Spirit which led, guided, and empowered Jesus was going to do the same things for His disciples. Jesus prepared His disciples for His departure, saying that in order for the Holy Spirit to come upon them, He had to leave, but that once He was gone the Spirit would come to them.

It is to your advantage that I go away, for if I do not go away, the Helper will not come to you. But if I go, I will send Him to you.[16]

Jesus said it was necessary that He ascend to heaven, to return to the Father and be glorified, before the Holy Spirit—the Comforter, the Helper—could come. This was exactly what happened, as the apostle Peter testified to the crowd on the day of Pentecost, right after being filled with the Spirit.

Being therefore exalted at the right hand of God, and having received from the Father the promise of the Holy Spirit, [Jesus] has poured out this that you yourselves are seeing and hearing.[17]

On the last day of the feast, the great day, Jesus stood up and cried out, “If anyone thirsts, let him come to Me and drink. Whoever believes in Me, as the Scripture has said, ‘Out of his heart will flow rivers of living water.’” Now this He said about the Spirit, whom those who believed in Him were to receive, for as yet the Spirit had not been given, because Jesus was not yet glorified.[18]

Jesus had been with His disciples for about three and a half years. They had traveled with Him, lived with Him, learned from Him, heard Him preach to and teach the crowds. They had seen Him heal the sick, raise the dead, and cast out demons. They had private instruction from Him and watched how He interacted with others—the rich, the poor, the outcasts, the religious. They saw Him get arrested and crucified. They knew He was dead, yet He stood before them in the upper room alive again. Then came the time for Him to go. He had been many things to them, and now He was going to depart. He had told them He would ask the Father to send them another Comforter or Helper.

I will ask the Father, and He will give you another Helper, to be with you forever …[19]
The Paraclete

The word Helper or Comforter used in this verse is translated from the Greek word paraklētos, (pronounced parr ra clee tas), which is defined as called to one’s side, to one’s aid, a helper, aider, assistant; as well as one who pleads another’s cause before a judge, counsel for defense, an advocate.

Jesus is saying the Father will give the disciples another Comforter, which infers they presently have one. Jesus, the Helper, Comforter, Counselor, and Advocate they presently have is going to depart and in His place the Father is sending the Holy Spirit, the “Paraclete.” (The word Paraclete is used in many modern Christian writings in the place of Helper, Comforter, etc.)

What Jesus had been to the disciples, and what the Holy Spirit was going to be to them, were very similar.
Both “come forth”/“are sent” from the Father into the world.

Jesus: I have come in My Father’s name … I came from the Father … For this purpose I have come into the world—to bear witness to the truth.[20]

Holy Spirit: The Holy Spirit, whom the Father will send in My name … When the Helper comes, whom I will send to you from the Father … When the Spirit of Truth comes …[21]
Both are called “Holy” and are characterized by “the truth.”

Jesus: We [Jesus’ disciples] have believed, and have come to know, that You [Jesus] are the Holy One of God ...[22]

Holy Spirit: The Helper, the Holy Spirit …[23]

Jesus: I am the way, and the truth, and the life.[24]

Holy Spirit:He will give you another Helper, to be with you forever, even the Spirit of Truth …[25]
Both teach.

Jesus: You call Me Teacher and Lord, and you are right, for so I am.[26]

Holy Spirit: The Holy Spirit … will teach you all things and bring to your remembrance ...[27]
Jesus bears witness of God and reveals things about Himself and the Father. The Holy Spirit bears witness of and reveals God the Son.

Jesus: No one has ever seen God; the only God, who is at the Father’s side, He has made Him known … For He whom God has sent utters the words of God.[28]

Holy Spirit: The Spirit of Truth, who proceeds from the Father, He will bear witness about Me: When the Spirit of Truth comes … He will glorify Me, for He will take what is Mine and declare it to you. All that the Father has is Mine; therefore I said that He will take what is Mine and declare it to you.[29]
Jesus came to convince and to convict the world, though many did not receive Him, as is also the case with the Holy Spirit.[30]

Jesus: He came to His own, and His own people did not receive Him. But to all who did receive Him, who believed in His name, He gave the right to become children of God …[31]

Holy Spirit: I will send Him [the Holy Spirit] to you. And when He comes, He will convict the world concerning sin and righteousness and judgment: concerning sin, because they do not believe in Me; concerning righteousness, because I go to the Father, and you will see Me no longer; concerning judgment, because the ruler of this world is judged. … The Spirit of Truth, whom the world cannot receive, because it neither sees Him nor knows Him. You know Him, for He dwells with you and will be in you.[32]

While Jesus was Helper and Comforter to the disciples, as well as teacher and truth-teller, and a witness, He said that after He departed He and the Father would send another Comforter who would do these things as well. This Comforter would mightily anoint the disciples in their mission. That was exactly what happened, as we’ll see in the next article.



[1] It shall come to pass afterward, that I will pour out My Spirit on all flesh; your sons and your daughters shall prophesy, your old men shall dream dreams, and your young men shall see visions. Even on the male and female servants in those days I will pour out My Spirit (Joel 2:28–29).


[2] Joel B. Green, Scot McKnight, Dictionary of Jesus and the Gospels (Downers Grove: InterVarsity Press, 1992), 342.


[3] Isaiah 11:1–2.


[4] Isaiah 42:1,4.


[5] Isaiah 61:1–3.


[6] Matthew 3:13–17, Mark 1:9–11.


[7] Luke 3:21–22.


[8] John 1:32–34.


[9] John 3:34–35.


[10] Luke 4:1–2 NKJV/ESV.


[11] Luke 4:14–15.


[12] Luke 4:17–21.


[13] Acts 10:37–39.


[14] Luke 24:49.


[15] Acts 1:4–5.


[16] John 16:7.


[17] Acts 2:33.


[18] John 7:37–39.


[19] John 14:16.


[20] John 5:43, 16:28, 18:37.


[21] John 14:26, 15:26, 16:13.


[22] John 6:69.


[23] John 14:26.


[24] John 14:6.


[25] John 14:16–17.


[26] John 13:13.


[27] John 14:26.


[28] John 1:18, 3:34.


[29] John 15:26, 16:13–15.


[30] Points 1–5 are from Joel B. Green, Scot McKnight, Dictionary of Jesus and the Gospels (Downers Grove: InterVarsity Press, 1992), 349.


[31] John 1:11–12.


[32] John 16:7–11, John 14:17.



Copyright © 2013 The Family International.

Read More

Contagem Regressiva para o Armagedom

Read More