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Our intrinsic worth comes from God's loving us, not the other way around.

just an "aside".... up until just recently, I thought the participants in this thread, though in disagreement, were being very respectful and courteous to each other. I hope it doesn't deteriorate into a "my opinion is the only opinion that is right" type of dialog. That would be very unproductive...

Your problem is in not seeing that my position talks of us as being ALREADY in Christ, because of what God through Christ has done for us ALL at the cross. Is that not personal relationship? Does the infant have no personal relationship with his mom just because the infant does not know her mother's name yet?

Daniel 7:25-27 “He (the little horn Antichrist power) shall speak pompous words against the Most High, shall persecute the saints of the Most High, and shall intend to change time law. Then the saints will be given into his hand for a time and times and half a time. “The saints” are persecuted by the “little horn”Antichrist power for three and a part years. At the END of this time period (1260 days, 42 months), the kingdom is “given to the saints of the Most High” by the Heavenly Court. The prophecy of Revelation sounds very similar. Revelation 13:4-5 [The deadly would was healed and AFTER that] “So they worshiped the dragon who gave authority to the beast; and they worshiped the beast, saying, ‘Who is like the beast? Who is able to make war with him?’ And he was given a mouth speaking great things and blasphemies, and he (the beast) was given authority to continue for forty-two months” (v. 7-8). “And it was granted to him to make war with the saints and to overcome them. And authority was given him over every tribe, tongue, and nation. And all who dwell on the earth will worship him, whose names are not written in the Book of Life of the Lamb slain from the foundation of the world.” Where SDA prophetic interpretation got messed up, was in putting the 1260 before the "deadly wound" rather than AFTER that wound was healed. I guess - UNTIL we can identify the Beast, we won't know what the "deadly wound" was. According to Rev. 17:10, the 7th "head" would continue only a short time. I don't know whether that time period applies to the entire existence of that 7th "head", or to the period during which that "head" persecuted Israel. I prefer to think of the heads as "persecuting heads". I don't believe one rises immediately after the previous. The periods of persecution may be widely spaced. Islam has continued for some 1400 years - longer than Egypt, or Assyria, or Babylon, or Rome, ruled the (then known) world. Islam is STILL persecuting the people of God, whether Jewish or Christian. Now - Hitler persecuted for only a "short time". So maybe Hitler is the 7th head. The Papacy - which has continued for some 1600 years, has lasted LONGER than any of them, though she has not persecuted the literal nation of Israel during all of that period. The nation of Israel was GONE, and her people scattered BEFORE the Papacy arose to power. Of course she HAS persecuted God's redeemed Israel - of all believers. Also her reach was/is wider than any other Beast. She does NOT seem to currently be persecuting. The 8th "head" is the Beast. And he "is of the seven". Exactly WHAT that means??? Does it mean that the Beast must rule over the same territory which was ruled by one of the previous heads? Does it mean that the final Beast will be of the same character, as the previous Beasts? I believe so.... Does it mean that the final Beast will actually BE the resurrection of one of the previous Beasts? Possible. I still think it possible that Islam (two horns of the Ram would be Sunni and Shia) could be used of Satan as a counterfeit Beast, leading the world to follow Satan's true Beast power, who will "save" the world from the Islamic Beast, but then impose economic control, and religious control. Most have no idea how RICH the Vatican really is. She could loan the Western nations enough money to keep fighting against ISLAM. She would then want payback, of course.

Wingnut and Rachel - I have no problems with either of your hypotheses. I have no problem with dinsaurs being millions of years old. I don't dismiss the possibility of one or more "extinction events" prior to Genesis 1:2 which required God to rehabilitate earth's environment to support life. Kinda like what I envision He will do when He creates a new heaven and earth sometime during the 8th Millennium. I find it entirely plausible that God "rehabilitated" (created the current environment of) the planet using what was already there.

I have believed something very similar to your hypothesis for many years. To make the land "appear", God "divided the waters" - creating waters above, and waters below. I think that HE caused evaporation of a huge amount of the "waters", to create a firmament above. There was no "sea" - as we know it now - after the land appeared. I like Dr Baugh's hypothesis that the H2O was split into H, which crystallized about 12 miles up, and O2 (making the pre-flood atmosphere very rich in oxygen). In this biosphere, the weather was mild, and the atmospheric pressure was roughly twice what we know now. Wounds healed almost overnight. Anaerobes were non-existent. Snakes were not poisonous. It was like living in a hyperbaric chamber. Pterodactyls could fly. At the flood of Noah, an asteroid crashed into the crystalline biosphere. As the fragments were pulled toward the earth, the hydrogen combined with the oxygen, creating water from the sky. Water once AGAIN covered the face of earth. Some of the water then evaporated, until 1/4 (of the former amount) of land appeared. And the rest is history - as they say.....

I was hoping folks would examine the logic of this explanation irrespective of the time period between Gen 1:1 and Gen 1:2. If folks wish to believe that "In the beginning God created the heaven(s) and earth" also occurred on day 1, then that is OK with me.

May I add my condolences to the others. Our mothers are very special and I am sure yours was dear to you. May God give you comfort. Thank you for sharing the pictures and memories. Courage and blessings.

Also sorry to hear about your Mom. Loved the photos, thanks for sharing

I am very sorry for the loss of your mother. Thank you for sharing the photos (and a peek at yourself ) as well as the tribute. I enjoyed reading it! ((( Aliensanctuary )))

Wow!

I understand that friendly negotiations are still taking place between Scandinavian leaders and the GC.

(Sorry, I accidentally posted this in the public figure obituary folder.) In the second photo, Mom is on the right, next to her sister. Third photo, she's wearing a blue jacket. I'm standing next to my dad who is wearing an Iowa shirt. Even at 85 y.o. she was still active in the SDA church that she attended in TX. By maintaining a vegetarian, low-fat, low-sugar diet she outlived her 4 siblings, all drinkers and smokers, by decades. Back in the 50's, while washing clothes in a laundromat, she said she had a vision of hell. After that, she sent me and my siblings to a Lutheran church in Milwaukee, WI. After moving to IA, we attended the Wesleyan Methodist Church, a fundamentalist denomination, for many years. After finding a job working for an SDA doctor, she joined that denomination. No one else in the family was interested in attending the SDA church. After moving to TX, I began attending church in Keene, TX where I met my future wife, a California girl. We soon packed up and moved out there to begin our family.