Pale Blue Eye

I've been watching some videos on the earth, universe, and cosmos.

One of these videos called "The Privileged Earth," put together from current scientific research, shows further evidence that the earth is not just the Sagan-esque "Pale Blue Dot" that the 1970s wished to teach us. Without going into much explanation, suffice to say the argument put forth is that...

"The most habitable places in the universe also offer the best opportunity for scientific discovery. I believe this implies purpose." ~ Astrobiologist Guillermo Gonzalez

In other words (although, he said it very clearly the first time), our universe is not only finely tuned to support life, our very position in the galaxy and the universe is also finely tuned to support this place for life. Not only that, but we are in a rare and intensely unique position for observation of the universe.

For instance, if we were not positioned perfectly between two arms of the Milky Way, but instead were nestled into one or the other, there would be too much cosmic dust and star clutter around us for our distinguishing other galaxies from our own. Also, our galaxy is unique in that it is very flat so as not to impede our view of the rest of the universe. Also, the earth's atmosphere is uniquely clear (as opposed to other atmospheric planets) so that we are able to observe the universe clearly. Also, the size of the moon and the sun during a solar eclipse are almost perfectly the same to our eyes, which allows us a privilege of observing the sun's atmosphere which helps us to understand the makeup of the sun and other stars. Also....other things...

I hadn't thought about all that before.

Something else:

One of the special features on this particular DVD is titled "Journey to the edge of the universe," and takes you on a CGI journey from earth to the outer edge of the known universe. Being a nerd, I love seeing all those stars and supernovas zooming past...

Then something hit me.

In the main portion of the video, the scientists came to a conclusion that if we are positioned in such a great place, not only for Darwinian acts such as procreation and base survival, but also in a position for observation for curiosity's sake--a completely unnecessary skill for survival--then that fact implies that perhaps we are supposed to reach out from our unique life-sustaining planet, study the beautifully simple laws of the complex universe, study the outer regions of the universe, and perhaps further realize our purpose for being in this specific position.

Consider this: If we (facing Earth) traveled at the speed of light toward Alpha Centauri, we would hit Mars in four minutes. If we arrived (still facing Earth) at Alpha Centauri, it would take us five years. Further travel would then take us 100 light years just to get to the point of seeing the patterns of light and dust from the two arms of the Milky Way converge. That's as far as we would get in 100 years. And that's without traveling back to the earth to share our findings, you realize.

We haven't yet built any spaceship capable of traveling at the speed of light, let alone sustaining our lives within it traveling that fast. We came to these light year conclusions based on mathematical systems that we figured out and super telescopic cameras we put in space from the safe confines of our little planet.

This is what hit me: we are the only known species of beings that can observe the universe from our little pale blue dot in the sky. Our planet is very like an eye. We were made to observe outwardly, yet....we are incapable (at least for the time being...until we learn to travel faster than the speed of light) of physically traveling outside our very galaxy.

It seems, therefore, that Something wants us to look outside ourselves, yet--at least for the time being--wants us to remain on this lovely finely tuned, uniquely beautiful planet.

Perhaps our best work is supposed to be done within.

Become As Children

Jesus repeatedly tells us that in order to get into the Kingdom of Heaven, we must first become as little children. This is a problem for most intellectuals because they feel that being a child is the opposite of being an open-minded adult.

Six Reasons for Becoming a Child:

First of all, "The Emperor's New Clothes." The Emperor was naked; however, the people were told that only stupid people could see him naked. The adults allowed the deeper, more intellectual argument to control them--because no one wanted to be thought a fool--till they convinced themselves that the Emperor was wearing the most beautiful garment they'd ever witnessed. Instead, the child--seeing the situation at face value and not caring whether he was called a fool--admits that the Emperor was, in fact, naked. Nakedness was the reality. The Truth lay in the simplest answer.

Secondly, humility is the only way that we can know real Truth. Why? This seems like such a simple-minded answer, yet it's the only answer that makes any shred of sense. Being stripped of agenda equals humility in its truest sense. Children are sponges and soak in what they are told. Talk to anyone who has taken a class anywhere. The ones who don't want to learn anything the professor has to teach, don't. Those who humble themselves--even if they do not agree with the professor--do the learning. How can one know Truth if he is not willing to learn?

Thirdly, if the simple could not receive Truth, then Truth would be elitist. Therefore God would be a prejudiced bastard and not loving at all. People from all walks of life are Christians: doctors, lawyers, tribesmen, vegans, NRA members, college professors, toddlers, etc. God must design Truth so that the simplest people can grasp it immediately and the intellectual can grasp it eventually.

Fourthly, God is smarter than we are. If this is really true, then we must be at least children before Him, in that we cannot fathom Him. If God is not smarter than we are, then He is not fit to be called God.

Fifthly, children trust more readily than adults. Tell a child he is a sinner and he understands. Tell an adult, and you have just offended him.

Lastly, Jesus tells us that we have to become as children. In other words, He realizes that there will be many people who do not naturally think as children, but rather want to think deeply--seeing all sides of something. Seeing all sides of something is wonderful and needful; however, as history has shown us, a person can get completely off-track in his thinking quite easily (Copernicus, Nazis, cults, etc.). He tells us to become like children so that we don't veer off the path and buy into a lie. But the point is that He tells us. That means that we, as adults, need to evaluate His reasoning for telling us to do so. Is He trying to brainwash us? Is He trying to pull one over on us? Is He actually telling us the Truth? The fact that He tells us and doesn't force us to become like children shows that the decision is up to us, but that the answer will be always be there staring us in the face until we simply open our eyes to look at it.

Satan: The Clever Idiot

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Mat. 4:1-11; Luke 4:1-14

Above are two parallel passages about Christ's temptations in the wilderness. If you ever went to Sunday School, you are familiar with this story: Christ is in the wilderness for 40 days and receives three temptations from the Devil.

Teachings of this story tend to focus on two things: (1) that Jesus was in a weak state (hunger) from fasting yet did not give into temptation, and so therefore He is an example to us of passing a hard test with shining colors, and (2) that when we are tempted, we have but to quote Scripture and that will make the temptations go away.

I'm being kind of flippant, I realize, and my purpose is not to offend anyone. If those two points are all you get from this story, then you have probably gotten a good thing to some extent: We should use Christ as our example, and we should memorize Scripture. However, I think there is much more to be gained from this than the surface teachings. I am not trying to be esoteric here, but when I looked at this passage for myself the other day, I felt like I needed to share what I learned, because it all hit me like a ton of bricks.

First of all, let's look at where this story happens in the chronology of Christ's life. Both passages happen right after John the Baptist had baptized Jesus. Not only that, but God Himself had openly hailed Jesus as His Son, proclaimed He loved Him, and He was pleased with Jesus.

This is interesting because the last time God had said He was pleased with something was in the Garden of Eden before the fall. God looked at what He created and said that everything was very good. Maybe this is not worth bringing up, but . . . I just think it's interesting that God is similarly pleased with perfect things--both in the Garden and then with Christ.

Since the beginning of time, God has made a way for us to please Him. Originally, He created man without sin, so that pleased Him. But after sin, man had no way to please God, so what did God do? He gave the pleasing Person of Himself to us: Jesus (Phil 2:5-11).

Now, this is something really important to think about, what I'd never thought about before, and what jumped out at me when I was studying these passages: At the start of both Matthew 4 and Luke 4, Satan now had conclusive evidence that Jesus was the Messiah. I mean, of course He knew that the Messiah would be born sometime around the time Christ was born, because of Daniel's 70 Weeks--a prophecy that, strangely enough, you don't hear preached very often today, yet is a prophecy that conclusively points to a date around A.D. 30-34 as the time that the Messiah would be "cut off, but not for Himself" (Daniel 9).

Jewish scholars of that age all knew about this prophecy and other similar prophecies or else Herod wouldn't have freaked out so much when the wise men told him about the star (Matthew 2). Everyone knew a Messiah was due to come around the time Christ came, yet no one really had any idea how it would happen (Anna and Simeon at the end of Luke 2). This is why movies like Monty Python's Life of Brian are funny to only the uninformed. Sure, it seems funny for a bunch of ancient people to be expecting a Messiah all at once, but . . . like . . . they were, so it's not actually that funny. (It's like saying: "Knock knock" "Who's there?" "Red" "Red who?" "Red Apple! Hahahahah!" It's not funny because apples are red and it's not even a play on words. You would hope that no one over the age of seven would say something as sub-juvenile, because below seven it would be cute, but over seven you'd start to wonder if the kid had mental problems . . . Frankly, I think seven is pushing it.)

People were expecting the Christ to come at this point in history. They even asked John the Baptist if he was the Messiah. This is also why there are a few men recorded in history at this time claiming to be the Christ, but the only one that held any validity was Jesus, which was why the Gospels were written in the first place. People of that day all knew of Jesus first-hand, but what about the generations to follow? The Gospel writers didn't want people to get confused over a different Messiah (Jn. 20:31).

If you read all the prophecies about Jesus' coming, you will see that they kind of fall into two groups: a Suffering Servant, and a Coming King. Some people thought this meant there were going to be two Messiahs, and you can see why, because kings and servants are so utterly opposite one another--especially back then. Most people disregarded the suffering prophecies entirely. I mean, a suffering servant doesn't seem Messiah-like at all. No wonder none of the disciples understood Jesus when He blatantly told them over and over, "I'm going to be put to death soon, and then I will rise from the dead." (Mk. 9:31; Mt. 16:21). It doesn't make sense for someone who will ultimately conquer evil to suffer and die, so we can understand the disciples confusion. Of course nowadays, Christians realize that the prophecies point to two times that Christ has and will come to earth: first, the Servant; next, the King.

So the obvious question is why did God make these prophecies so open to interpretation? The answer I once heard a pastor offer is that God knew that Satan was and is a Bible scholar. This makes perfect sense. God specifically presents His prophecies in such a way that those with open eyes can watch for them and realize them when they happen, and so that the Devil and his followers will be completely baffled. The Devil is really clever. He knows His Bible better than any Jew or Christian. He knows the signs, he just doesn't know where they point all the time. Why not? Because fortunately his arrogance completely blinds him up until the point that it is too late for him to do anything about it. For instance, the point I just made about Jesus' telling the disciples that He would be killed. He told his disciples this in confidence, but when He talked to the masses He always said that they would destroy "this temple" and in three days He would raise it again (Jn 2:19). Of course Judas, even though he was a disciple and ostensibly on the inside, had dealings directly with Satan (Lk 22:3; Jn. 13:2), but this didn't give Satan any more information than he already had, and probably confused him even more. If Satan had ever realized what Christ was going to do, he would have done what he could to stop Christ from dying on the cross. As it turned out, Satan played a HUGE role in actually sending Christ to the death that would atone for sin. . . which is the kind of irony that I find hilarious.

Now, with all this in mind, these passages seem ten times clearer to me. Why did Satan tempt Jesus with bread, falling from the temple, and kingdoms of the earth? Simply this: because He thought Jesus was coming as a reigning King and could be flattered into failure--not just to get Jesus to fail in a moment of weakness. I have various reasons for believing this.

First of all, as I've already mentioned, God had basically hung a big blinking neon "Messiah" sign on Jesus at his baptism. Jesus was now out in the open and on display. So Satan had no more reason to wonder who the Messiah was. I'm sure he'd had a pretty good idea that He was Jesus because of the angels, shepherds, wise men, star, and the "I have to be about My Father's business" episodes. But if there was any doubt as to Jesus' being legit, the baptism pretty much put it to rest. (Probably another and better conclusion would be to say that God simply didn't let Satan near Jesus until this point in the wilderness.) Anyway, Satan knew how easy it had been to get Adam to fall. I mean, Jesus is the Son of God, right? Does that mean He's going to be as consistent as God or can He be tripped up like Adam? Would he almost crack like Job? You wonder these things when you are Satan. (This shows that the 100% God and the 100% man conundrum is hard for the spirit world to fathom too, so don't feel bad if you can't wrap your head around it. You are a created being, so it's hard. I know. That's why God gives us Biblical prophecy and faith.)

Both passages talk about Jesus being in the wilderness for 40 days and nights and how hungry He was. I have heard many pastors focus on this so that they could point out that the evils of this world are so strong and that we should never underestimate the power of the Devil, because even Christ Himself had to struggle and fight against temptation. However, I find that point to be completely extra-Biblical. Jesus wasn't weak because He was hungry. He was hungry because he had no food in His system. There is no way Jesus was weakened in this situation. In fact, science has shown us that after an extended period of time of fasting, the body actually stops desiring food. But besides that and the point that is so often missed is that Jesus was fasting on purpose. A Christian doesn't fast by mistake. He fasts for the express purpose of spending time alone with God (or maybe for health reasons . . . but still there is a purposeful reason). This was a time of spiritual strengthening.

How do I know He wasn't weak? Because He shows no signs of being weak. He doesn't skip a beat after Satan offers each lie. He doesn't falter or hesitate or consider Satan's ramblings for one second. After all, the only time in the Bible when we see Christ in a stressed out, perhaps faltering state is in the Garden of Gethsemane when He was sweating, "as it were, drops of blood" (Lk. 22:44) and asking the Father to "let this cup pass from Me." Even then, He wasn't weak. A weak man does not deliver Himself into the hands of the enemy to be slaughtered. So to say Jesus was somehow in a state of weakness in the wilderness, disgusts me to say the least.

Okay, so now let's get into the temptations themselves. I find some strange things when I study these temptations. Something especially odd is that there seems to be an obvious temptation missing. Think about these two words: "Temptation" and "Man." What pops into your head? Probably something like "lust" or "sex." However, none of Satan's temptations have to do with sex--at least not on the surface. It seems kind of weird of me to bring this up, and this is where I hope I'm not being esoteric, because no one can prove anything based on what Satan didn't say to Jesus. I just find this omission really interesting. If I had been Satan and Jesus had actually been in a weakened state, I would have appeared as a beautiful woman, because the success rate of the temptation working would have been so much more likely. Who really knows. At the very least, in my mind, this omission further negates the whole "Jesus being in a weakened state" theory. We all know what men can do in a moment of weakness--it's cliche--and Satan didn't even bother with it. Be that as it may, I realize the lack of a sexual temptation is not a great point, because it's actually a non-point; I just find it interesting.

Actually, before I leave this sexual temptation conundrum alone, I want to make one more point about it. Satan is the Father of Lies. He's not the Father of Fornication. He uses lies to tempt people into sins that he is almost 100% sure they will give into. He probably knew that fornication would never work on Christ since Christ views marriage as a picture of Himself and the church, and so he went for temptations that would be more compelling to a potential King wandering in the wilderness without food.

. . . Okay . . . Enough speculations.

As foolish as it would be for Satan to appear as a beautiful woman, the three actual temptations seem extremely foolish as well. I'm going to point out their foolishness first and then I will tell you how Satan was actually pretty clever.

The first temptation was for Jesus to turn the rocks around Him into bread. How stupid is that? First of all, wouldn't that have occurred to Jesus, Creator of the Universe, within the 40 days prior to this temptation? As I've said, Jesus' purpose was to make Himself physically hungry so He could become spiritually strong. In other words, He was in something of a more focused spiritual state than if He'd been physically full.

So why did Satan offer such a dumb temptation? Well, first of all, Satan doesn't understand the strength of the Holy Spirit. If he did, he never would have thought himself capable of being as great as God (Isaiah 14). All Satan can see is physical and emotional strength and weakness. Look at his tormenting of Job. He was 100% sure that he could get Job to curse God if he made his life a living hell, but it didn't work because of the strength of the Holy Spirit. The Holy Spirit is the person of God who works directly with our faith; we give Him a little, and He does a lot. He does this great lot for our sakes, but most importantly so that He will receive glory through us even though we are sinners (Rom. 8:12-17).

So imagine a Being who doesn't just have that "mustard seed" of faith, but rather is the Culmination of All Faith; then imagine Him being full of the Holy Spirit. That's not really a Force to reckon with, is it? . . . Yet, Satan did, because he is not wise. Still, you have to hand it to Satan. Jesus was 100% man, so I guess tempting Him with bread was worth a shot. However, Jesus didn't even blink an eye, so Satan had to try something else.

(Now, if you read both passages, you will notice that the second and third temptations are switched. [By the way, I am going to explain them in the Matthew order]. Why is that? If the order really bothers you, please study the texts and let me know what you discover. Currently, this order problem doesn't bother me, because I think that in God's sovereignty He knows that the order of the temptations is not important. I mean, that has to be the answer because Luke wrote his book after Matthew, and Luke would have read Matthew's account before writing his own--especially since Matthew's account was first-hand and Luke had never met Jesus. The point of Luke's book was to inform his friend, Theophilus--which is an honorary title and probably denotes that this friend was some kind of educated person [especially if he had the ability to read this letter]--and would not have made that big of a mistake in a letter to an educated person, so there is little to no reason to think that it even is a mistake. [Look, just read Luke 1:1-4. He explains himself better than I am here, anyway. He's a doctor for heaven's sakes . . .] Therefore, the point is not the order of the temptations, but rather the fact that the temptations had no effect on Christ.

[This is yet another reason why I don't hold to every word of the Bible being somehow mystically perfect. The Bible has proven glitches in it--the end of Mark, the story of the adulteress in John, etc.--but those mistakes never destroy the message as a whole. However, you can only see that message if you read the Bible systematically--applying every verse against every other verse in the Bible. If there is a verse that negates your interpretation of another verse, then your interpretation needs to be reworked. Likewise, it does no good to nit pick semantics when there is a bigger picture. That's how cults start.])

Since Jesus proved Himself stronger than physical hunger, Satan had to try something else. Perhaps if Jesus were coming as a King, He had the arrogance of a king? All earthly kings that Satan knew had high opinions of themselves. Since Jesus' arrogance was (and is) non-existent, this temptation failed too, but let's delve a bit into this second temptation and see exactly why it is so foolish.

I mean, think about how stupid it was to tell Jesus to jump off a building.

You know? I've always thought that was a dumb temptation even when I was little, because why would Jesus even need angels to protect Himself? Jesus could have flown by Himself. Jesus could have landed soft as a daisy. He could have fallen, brushed Himself off, and then walked away. I think this really just shows Satan to be the father of the unsaved theologians of the world. They have all this Biblical knowledge, yet . . . they still somehow reject Christ, because they read the Bible with blinded eyes. He, like those theologians, just wanted to show Jesus that he knew the Bible inside and out in hopes of intimidating Jesus. Satan has the knowledge of a scholar, but the brains of a five-year-old bully when it comes to application of that knowledge. I think Satan figured on one hand that if Jesus did it and the angels did save Him then He was indeed God, but if he wasn't God, Jesus would at the very least kill Himself (?!). Why anyone would think Jesus would be dumb enough to fall into that obvious trap, is beyond me. Even the Pharisees and Sadducees came up with more thought-out ways to stump Jesus.

This is such a big let-down to those of us expecting more from Satan, because his first lie to humanity was so intelligent! Start out speaking truth, flatter the hearer, and then mix in a little white lie. Fool-proof. No doubt Satan was hoping that jumping off the temple would flatter Jesus. I mean, the temple was like the biggest, most well-known structure in Jerusalem. Of course jumping off it and surviving would be huge proof one's Messiah-hood. This is might work on other humans, but doing tricks wasn't Christ's purpose.

The third lie is the dumbest of all. Here, Satan tells Jesus that he will give Him all the kingdoms of the earth if Jesus will bow to him. This is totally stupid for three main reasons. First of all, God created all the kingdoms of the earth by and for Jesus (John 1) . . . so Jesus already owned them. However, maybe Satan was talking about the parts of the kingdoms that Jesus didn't own? Maybe he was telling Jesus that He could have all the sinful pleasures of the world? But what would a Man who spends most of His time at the right-hand of the Almighty want with transient worldly treasures? Stupid. Lastly, and the dumbest of all, is that the qualification for gaining these kingdoms was prostration before Satan. So . . . if Jesus had worshipped Satan, this act would have made Satan not only master of Jesus, but also supreme master of all the kingdoms that he had just promised to give Jesus--so Jesus would actually gain nothing and lose everything. Grrrrrreat. Any five-year-old could see right through this plan! This seems to be the cheapest and most unlikely attempt of all for Satan to get Jesus to fail. It causes one to wonder if maybe Satan made these temptations up at the last minute . . .?

Now, I can't just leave it there, and I hope you realize when I'm being "tongue in cheek," because Satan is actually, in fact, not an idiot. So why did He offer Christ such stupid temptations? Well, I believe that Satan was testing Jesus--not to get Him to crack in a moment of weakness--but to see exactly of what Christ was made. He wanted to see what he really was up against. Any information you can gain about your enemy will potentially help you to know how to attack them later. The really funny thing is that Jesus didn't give him much to work with! I mean, all of these temptations would have had potential if Jesus were indeed a mere man. All three of Satan's temptations had worked on real men before. Men eat when they are hungry, so Satan tested Christ's physical endurance--(see: Esau's Birthright). Men like to show off, so Satan tested Christ's humility (see: David Counts his Fighting Men). Men like to get power the easiest way possible, so Satan offered Him ultimate power for one small act of failure (see: The Fall of Man).

Also, maybe Satan was actually smarter than it seems. Maybe he was playing the fool so that Jesus would get over-confident and fail? Maybe he was fronting stupid arrogance in hopes that Christ wouldn't see his real motives? Either way, it didn't work.

I think this story is really the fabric of the point C.S. Lewis made in the Screwtape Letters. Temptations of this world are actually ridiculously foolish because we have been offered so much more from God. Demons don't realize this, so they tempt us with what they do understand. This is why we should read our Bibles. On the surface, this story shows us that a memorized Bible verse can go a long way in fighting Satan, but that's not what makes Satan go away. I mean, Satan knows Bible verses too, but he leaves Jesus alone after a mere three temptations?! Is his leaving really because Jesus threw three in-context Bible verses at Him? I mean, when you talk to someone of a different faith, do they ever leave you alone after you quote three Bible verses? No. So that's not the real point here. Satan didn't leave because of the verses Christ quoted. He left because, well, for one thing, Jesus commands Him to leave (Mt. 4:10 "Go Satan!. . ." and Lk. 4:12, ". . . you shall not put the Lord your God to the test."). Satan, whether he wants to admit it or not, is actually a slave to Christ's commands and had no other alternative but to leave. But besides that, I think the reason Satan left was because Christ wasn't acting like the conquering hero he was expecting and this puzzled him. Luke 4:13 says that he left until he could come back at an opportune time. This denotes that he had enough information to think about, he was probably frustrated because nothing was working like he'd hoped, and he needed time to rethink some things . . . Also, and this is just my opinion, but I'm pretty sure that Satan was petrified after he saw what he was up against. I'd get out of there as soon as I could too.

Now let me get back to why I don't like the use of Bible verses as some magic wand to fight temptations. First of all, I don't think that memorizing Scripture is bad. It isn't bad; it's good. It's the Word of God. Is there anything better with which to fill your mind? Absolutely not. However, this does not mean using the Bible as a big debate forum with which to cut people down to size. Yes, Hebrews 4:12 says that the Bible is a two-edged sword, but in context this verse is saying that God's Word is Truth so much so that it can cut through the most skeptical of hearts, change lives, and has staying-power throughout history. It is not, however, telling us that we should run around using Bible verses as holy hand grenades. That is immature at least and malicious at worst.

Have you ever been in a debate with someone where you both just hurled verses at each other? If you want this experience, find a Jehovah's Witness or Mormon. If all you do is hurl verses, you end up not getting anywhere. You are both hurling verses and no one ends up backing down, because each side is more interested in one-upping the other rather than helping the other side to find Truth. Trust me; I've (ashamedly) been there, done that. If the interpretation of this story is merely that we should fight the Devil with Bible verses, then why does the Devil, who is sooooo much stronger than we, leave after only three verses? I mean, discussions I have with mere people last much longer than three.

The main and final reason that Satan left Christ after three temptations (which Lk 4:13 kind of leaves room for perhaps more than three, but still...) was because Christ had a perfect understanding of what His Father had to offer and what the world had to offer. Everything versus nothing. There was no reason for Jesus to crack. This is why Jesus is our example in this situation. Yes, it's good to fight temptations in our minds with a Bible verse, but that's not what gives God glory (Obviously just quoting Scripture alone doesn't give God glory because Satan does it!). God is glorified when we realize that ultimately there was no reason for Jesus to give in to temptation because temptations are empty traps, so there is no reason for us to give into them either. C.S. Lewis said it best: "Choose the world and you get nothing. Choose Christ and you get Him and the world thrown in" (paraphrased).




addendum:

Something else occurs to me when reading this. Both passages refer to Christ having the Holy Spirit with Him before Satan enters the scene. Also, He tells Satan that "You will worship the Lord your God, and Him only will you serve." Now thinking about us Christians, it makes perfect sense why we should not worship anyone but God. Of course worshippers of a deity would probably only worship that deity . . . but a Christian especially should, because by bowing before another god, he is actually making the indwelling Holy Spirit bow before another god! Therefore, anyone who says they are a Christian, yet worships another god, is obviously not a Christian because the Holy Spirit cannot worship anything lower than Himself! (This is not to say that we shouldn't treat people of other religions with respect! There is a huge different between respecting someone created in God's image and worshipping a false god.)