by Herbert W. Armstrong

1966 Edition

Who will rule Space? World leaders know the first nation to conquer SPACE will RULE THE WORLD! Fantastic advances are made almost daily in the race to send men to the moon—but what does it all mean?

WHY the expenditure of BILLIONS on the Space race? Is Space exploration only innocent “science” seeking to further its fund of knowledge concerning man’s environment?

Here are the shocking answers!

TODAY – you live in the SPACE AGE! Few realize what it means – where it’s taking us!

Look at the startling accomplishments of science! In just a few short years this world has been hurtled through the machine age, into the atomic age, and now the new plateau – the Space age!

This startling transition has begun to alter every aspect of our lives!

How far have we come in one lifetime? When I was a boy, we had horse-and-buggy transportation, unpaved streets and roads, gas street lights, kerosene lamps indoors. No automobiles seen on streets. Radio and TV unheard of. No man had ever flown.

Today science and technology climaxes its progress in an enormous new industry. The aerospace industry has zoomed past the automobile industry – now America’s largest industrial employer! Today it is turning out rockets and spacecraft soon to take men to the moon – and beyond!

In one recent year, this newest and biggest U.S. industry had a $9.2 billion payroll parceled out among 1,253,000 employees – 515,000 more than worked for all the nation’s automobile manufacturers put together.

The economic prosperity of whole towns, and even states, within the U.S., depends now upon the multibillion-dollar federal spending for aerospace and related defense development.

In California, the aerospace industry accounts for a third of all manufacturing. From coast to coast mammoth projects are swiftly moving from drawing boards onto production lines. Cessation of the Space effort would be a devastating blow to the burgeoning U.S. economy.

The major damper to even more massive space technology and progress on existing Space programs has been the ever-burgeoning cost of the war in Vietnam. As a result, some Space budgets have had to be cut and projects delayed.

WHY? Why the frantic scramble to be masters of Space, the moon, and beyond?

Why is the United States willing, urgently willing, to spend $20-40 billion just to get to the moon alone when poverty, disease and education problems in the nation are lacking funds? Think of it! Today 60,000 scientists and engineers are working for the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA), while only about 1,500 scientists at the National Institute of Health are working on heart disease, cancer and mental disorders – the nation’s leading health problems.

Why are 300,000 workmen in 50 states laboring on the Apollo project to put the first American on the moon? The cost of the moon program is running over 10 million dollars a day, every day of the year. And this has been called “just the first rung on the ladder to the stars.”

Yes, why this mad race for Space?

Today more than 1,000 objects are circling over your head in orbit, or are boring deep into Space toward distant planets.

Only 200 or so are “intact” satellites. The rest is “space junk”: burned-out rocket bodies, fine wire, fragments of rockets that blew up in attempts to orbit satellites, and other non-functioning scraps of space endeavors. Hundreds of other scraps of metal have rained down on earth during the few years of the Space Age!

Space, in fact, has become so debris-ridden that NORAD, the North American Defense Command in Colorado Springs, has to monitor and track all significant “space junk” objects so that one of them won’t be mistaken for an incoming ICBM – and trigger off World War III.

A vast array of satellites, sent up by increasingly more accurate rockets, has taken over near-Space, sending back secrets of the earth and the universe never dreamed possible a few years ago. There are communications satellites, star-scanning satellites, weather satellites, meteorite and cosmic ray detection satellites. However, what should not be lost after all the publicity given to the moon and satellite probes (which are basically civilian-run) is the military role in Space.

Although the U.S. budget for military Space projects has been running under $2 billion a year, compared with around $5 billion for civilian programs, the military has put over twice as many spacecraft into orbit. In fact, two of every three U.S. satellites are military in nature – chiefly “spy-in-the-sky’ satellites. These are sent up secretly and without publicity and send back detailed pictures of Russian and Red Chinese installations.

Also sent up are satellites for military communications, navigation for Polaris submarines and detection of outer Space atomic blasts.

Yet, despite these foreboding uses of outer Space, we are told that the conquest of Space is going to enrich everyone’s life immensely and that it already has begun to do so.

The conquest of Space, we are told, may well provide an answer to some of the earth’s biggest problems. We are told that the purpose of this vast program is to advance the sum of human knowledge – for peaceful purposes. But every dollar spent and every feat accomplished accent the MILITARY and POLITICAL nature of this race.

On October 4, 1957, the world was suddenly shocked with the announcement that Russia had orbited its first satellite. Sputnik I. United States prestige immediately took a serious tumble. How could the seemingly backward, ponderously moving Russians, without the vast technical capacity or know-how (or so we thought) surpass the U.S., economic juggernaut?

Then Sputnik II, carrying a live dog, was sent up a month later. Military in impact, it meant Russia had the technology to send an intercontinental ballistic missile anywhere on earth!

The U.S. immediately went into frantic efforts to see where it had failed, where it had fallen behind. Only then did the U.S. technology gear itself all-out to catch up – the missile and Space Race was on in deadly earnest!

Then in April, 1961, came the shocking announcement that Russia had put the first man in orbit and brought him back safely to earth. A month later, Commander Alan B. Shepard became the first American in Space, but he made only a sub-orbital flight. The U.S., it seemed was always lagging behind. It wasn’t until February 20, 1962, that Lt. Col. John H. Glenn made his 3-orbital flight.

Since then, well over 30 men, Russian and American, and even a Russian woman, have orbited the earth.

Dr. Werner von Braun, former German rocket expert, now working for the U.S. missile program, has said: “Whether we like it or not, we are engaged in a worldwide popularity contest with the Soviets… I do not think we can dismiss this grim competition as a weight-lifting contest between rival rocket teams. When the whole world sits in the audience and the heavens are the stage, pride and prestige are real issues…“U. “I am convinced,” he also said, “that he who controls the open Space around us is in a position to control the earth.”

Since the launching of the Space Age with Russia’s Sputnik I, the U.S. has spent over $40 billion on Space, while Russia has spent about $35 billion. That’s over $75 billion dollars by two nations in a little over 10 years!

Vast space complexes have been built by both sides in a race to become the dominant leader in space technology. Billions of dollars of tracking and other installations have been spotted around the world.

One of the most awesome sights you could see is the immense hangar where the United States’ Saturn-Apollo project is assembled. It is the largest building in the world – with half again the 77-million-cubic-foot volume of the Pentagon.

The assembly building has four huge chambers to simultaneously handle the construction of four rockets. This building is so cavernous that a weather-control system is necessary to prevent clouds from forming and raining inside the structure.

One would gasp with amazement at the size of the U.S. moon rocket – the Saturn V – as tall as a 30-story building.

It has already flown (unmanned) with some success, but not without certain failures cropping up.

Here are a few statistics on its immensity:

Height: 363 feet; 60 feet taller than the Statue of Liberty and 13 times heavier.

Weight: 6,200,000 pounds; of which 5,575,000 is propellant.

Total thrust: 8.7 million pounds. (The 5-engine first stage itself develops 7,500,000 pounds of thrust and consumes 537,000 gallons of liquid fuel at a rate of 900 tons a minute. The liquid oxygen tanks in the first stage could fill 54 railroad tank cars.)

One national weekly news magazine reported that if a fully fueled Saturn V blew up, “it could produce a blast 50 times as powerful as that of the first atomic bomb dropped on Hiroshima.”

Can you imagine it! 6.2 million pounds! That’s over 3,000 tons! It would be like shooting a good-sized Navy destroyer (which weighs about 2,200 tons) into Space!

And can you imagine – 2,000,000 parts made by thousands of contractors and subcontractors – all interacting and meshing to hurtle this mammoth to the moon or elsewhere?

Dr. William Pickering, head of California Institute of Technology’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory, gave this “box score” of space achievement at a meeting in early 1968:

- The United States has orbited 500 satellites, had 13 successful moon missions (and returned 100,000 lunar photographs), accumulated almost 2,000 hours of manned flight, including 12 hours outside of spacecraft, and made 3 successful planetary probe flights.

- Russia has launched 250 satellites, had 8 lunar successes (and returned 100 lunar photographs), accumulated about 530 hours of manned flight, including 20 minutes outside spacecraft, and landed one instrumented package on Venus after an estimated 19 planetary attempts.

The U.S.’s Gemini series of 12 shots (the last of which was in November, 1966) was designed to discover the effects on men and spacecraft during long periods of time in the weightlessness of Space. Fortunately, the U.S. did not lose a single man in these shots.

Since the success of this series, the next planned stage – the Apollo project to land and return men from the moon – has taken most of the U.S. Space effort.

Also, preparatory to these flights, the Surveyor series engaged in landing photographic and sensory equipment on the moon has had good success. Detailed photos reveal the barrenness and bleakness of the moon surface. And small scoop shovels have dug into the moon’s surface and have shown that a manned craft could land there.

But on January 27, 1967, disaster and setback struck!

Three U.S. astronauts, Virgil Grissom, Edward White, and Roger Chaffee, were trapped and killed in a burning inferno during a routine capsule test on the ground. This catastrophe slowed down the U.S. race-to-the-moon effort.

Nevertheless, in November an unmanned Saturn V flew flawlessly. Enthusiasm grew again. Then in April, 1968, the second shot of the Saturn V produced several failures and caused uncertainties as to when man may go to the moon.

Despite these uncertainties the main U.S. impetus is still to get men on the moon and return them by the end of this decade.

It is important to first note that the Soviet Union’s Space program, unlike much of the United States’ is run wholly by military men, not civilians, with military objectives.

The Soviet Space program at first became an all-out effort to do things first.

In rapid succession their Sputniks, Lunas, Vostoks and Cosmos spacecraft became the first to carry a man (and woman) into Space; to photograph the moon; to hit the moon; to orbit and soft-land on the moon. Nevertheless, U.S. technology caught up in the mid-1960’s with more refined and successful systems.

And, the Soviet Space effort has not been without tragedies.

It is suspected that several Soviet cosmonauts have died in the Russian Space drive. On April 24, 1967, Vladimir Komarov was killed when his spaceship became entangled in its parachute cords after re-entry from orbit and plunged to earth.

It was Russia’s first attempt at a man in Space spectacular in two years and since then there has been a slowdown in activity of such attempts.

However, NASA officials have noticed fears that the Soviets may be developing a booster rocket even more powerful than the Saturn V.

And Russian Space activity has been picking up.

In April, 1968, the Russians surprised the U.S. by sending up two unmanned spaceships that automatically linked up in Outer Space. Such a feat is viewed as an important step toward Space stations orbiting above the earth or as floating “gas stations” for trips to the moon. NASA realizes that a manned earth-orbiting Space station is the next logical, practical and necessary step in the continuing development of manned Space flight.

Both the U.S. and Russia are still in a race for the moon – and it is uncertain who is ahead. U.S. officials fear the Russians may have some surprising Space shots coming up.

In the meantime, gigantic new weapons are being developed – weapons fantastically more awesome and powerful than when the two great powers were first thrust into the Space Race!

Now there is official concern about U.S. neglect in not pouring enough research into developing advanced Space-age weapons such as “gigaton” bombs, neutron bombs, death-ray weapons, antimatter weapons, plasma bombs, and doomsday machines.

The field of radically new weapons is virtually without limit for a first-class power that wants to make the effort!

All these fantastic weapons would be additions to the already incomprehensible power of H-bomb weaponry.

Today’s awesome facts must be faced! The prospect of war in Space has moved out of the realm of fantasy into the realm of frightening possibility. Military planners envision men in reconnaissance vehicles, in satellite interceptors, in nuclear dreadnoughts able to destroy Earth targets.

We are looking exclusively to material science to rescue us from the threat of Communism.

We are in a frenzy over methods of training future scientists who can develop even greater weapons of destruction and death!

Have we gone utterly mad?

For the past few years, the United States educational system has been on a crash program to accelerate the influx of science students in American colleges, universities and institutes of technology.

And THIS VERY THING – looking to physical, material, science – is our COLOSSAL ERROR!

And what almost nobody seems to realize, Britain, the U.S., and the entire western free world, are suffering from Russian competition, even in the colleges and universities.

Soviet tentacles reach far beyond the ordinary propaganda. The student rebellions and riots that have paralyzed so many universities were not just spontaneous outbursts. They were PLANNED! They were carefully ORGANIZED by the “Old” and so-called “NEW LEFT” – Communist organization.

The Paris student rebellion spread to nationwide strikes, riots and violence. It was an effort to overthrow the government of France – and almost succeeded. Even before this uprising had entirely subsided, there was a Marxist-Leninist “Teach-In” behind closed doors at the London School of Economics. The student-revolt leaders from ten countries were there. Many disgruntled British students were there – being taught by the “professionals.”

Newsmen were locked out. But The PLAIN TRUTH news team was there. The “Teach-In” was simply an instruction session on the art and tactics of REVOLUTION – using student revolt to spread to the overthrow of NATIONS! They are only starting. The 1968-69 school year will see much more!

Meanwhile, with all this space flight reaching into outer space – reaching to “heaven” – it might be well to ask, “What’s happened to GOD?” In this frantic race to control space, we never see any mention of God, who was supposed to control outer space.

Since the infusion of “German rationalism” into the educational bloodstream, all mention of God, or the Bible, or anything supernatural, has been tabu. Never mentioned. Never even considered.

But, more recently, something else has happened, almost totally unnoticed. Actually, it’s all Communist planned. Yet today there is a new generation – a sort of new breed – of Marxist-Leninist Leftists. It’s propagated by the younger generation – college age and slightly over. They call themselves “the NEW Leftists.” Yet it’s the same revolutionary activity, with a new facade, utilizing certain new tactics. The revolutionary objectives are the SAME!

Both this “New” and the “Old” brands of Communism have worked feverishly within the western democracies. They have promoted NEW MOVEMENTS designed to UNDERMINE democratic society. It is THEY, primarily, who have propagated the “New Morality.” They have sown the seeds in western society of homosexuality, propagated pornography among adolescents, spread the use of marijuana and narcotics. They promoted the “God is Dead” movement. They have promoted the new distorted degeneration in various forms of art – in music, painting, sculpture, literature.

Here is a description of the “New Morality” in its all-inclusive aspects, by artist Salvador Dali, in his Dali on Modern Art: The typical Dionysian art critic of today, he wrote, is “negativistic to the nth degree, and hating classicism like any self-respecting sewer-rat, discovers the biological agitations of the ugly, and its unavowable attractions.” He terms these “artists” sewer-rat intellectuals. To them, he says, “all ambiguities become possible, including that of savage objects, ugly as mortal sins, which is what they really are.”

In the supposed intellectualism of this degeneration of a decadent society, it has not been popular to speak of God. Except in profanity, that is! And, after all, human vanity does want to BELONG!

Notwithstanding, some serious scholars and researchers have recently been astonished to discover that these very trends and conditions of our day are vividly pictured in plain and simple Biblical prophecies!

In parts of that volume scarcely ever read, they are discovering prophecies describing the very things happening before our eyes right now! It’s like an archaeologist digging suddenly out of the ground mute evidence of existences hidden from human knowledge for centuries.

Further, these ignored writings carry on from this rather frightening present. They strip back the curtain of the future to reveal what’s immediately ahead! It may seem incredible, but there is one source, and one only, that describes – AND EXPLAINS – these changes in today’s world that would not have been dreamed of fifty short years ago!

Isn’t it incongruous that the world’s sum of KNOWLEDGE has doubled in ten short years – yet the world’s TROUBLES have doubled also in that same decade? What’s the answer to that frightening knowledge gap?

Could it be hidden in vital passages overlooked and unread by scholars, educators, clergymen? After all, even those who have professed the Christian religion, in the main, have used only fragmentary verses of the Bible, scattered here and there, and taken largely out of context. Biblical prophecy has been almost entirely ignored and unread. Yet an approximate third of that Book is devoted to it.

For example, in a major book of prophecy – Isaiah – a Personage is quoted, saying He is GOD. Now is this quote a fiction? Did it sprout only from the imagination of the human writer? What this God is quoted as saying is extremely challenging!

WHO is this speaking? – a self-deceived human writer, or could it be the very Creator Himself? “I am the ETERNAL,” He is quoted, “and there is none else, there is no God beside me… Ask me of things to come… I have made the earth, and created man upon it: I, even my hands, have stretched out the heavens, and all their host have I commanded… I am God, and there is none like me, declaring the end from the beginning, and from ancient times the things that are not yet done, saying, ‘My counsel shall stand, and I will do all my pleasure: …yea, I have spoken it, I will also bring it to pass: I have purposed it, I will also do it” (Isaiah 45:5, 11-12; 46:9-11).

This same Personage here quoted challenges the doubters. To them He says: “CONSIDER and agree that the ETERNAL’S hand has done it, that Israel’s Majesty has made it all. ‘Now,’ the ETERNAL cries, ‘Bring your case forward. Now,’ Jacob’s King cries, ‘state your PROOFS. Let us hear what happened in the past, that we may ponder it, or show me what is yet to be, that we may watch how it turns out; yes, let us hear what is coming, that we may be sure you are gods; come, do something or other that we may marvel at the sight! – why, you are things of naught, you can do nothing at all!’ ” (Isaiah 41:20-24, Moffatt translation.) (Emphasis mine.)

Thus the one quoted as God challenges the scoffer – shows that ability to FORETELL and bring to pass world events is PROOF of being God. For no human can do it.

WAS this merely the human imagination of a writer named Isaiah? Or was it, in fact, the Great GOD speaking? This same Personage is quoted, in other writings of Isaiah and other prophets, FORETELLING in writings of 1900 to 2500 years ago, what was to happen to every major city of those days, and every nation. They were AMAZING prophecies that then seemed impossible of occurrence. YET EVERY ONE OF THOSE PROPHECIES ACTUALLY HAPPENED!

COULD it be, then, that the Book called the Bible is, in actual fact, the message of the real CREATOR GOD to mankind?

Notice what this Book prophesied the educators, philosophers and scientists would do – in their thinking regarding the existence of GOD:

He says it is revealed from heaven against those who hold back the truth from the people, “Though they knew God, they have not glorified Him as God nor given thanks to Him; they have turned to futile speculations till their ignorant minds grew dark. They claim to be wise, but they have become fools” (Romans 1:21-22 – Moffatt translation).

Further: “…they have exchanged the TRUTH of God for an UNTRUTH” (verse 25) – their speculative theory of Evolution. Then again: “And even as they did not like to retain God in their knowledge, God gave them over to a reprobate mind” (verse 28).

They – the scientists, the philosophers, the educators – have SUPPRESSED the truth (verse 18, R.S.V.), exchanged the TRUTH for an UNTRUTH – turned to vain and futile speculations- their unproved and unprovable theory of evolution – and refused to retain GOD in the KNOWLEDGE they disseminate in their system of education!

By this process, now being actively propagated in a manner few realize by the Communist conspiracy, they have made it UNPOPULAR to believe in GOD, or to look into the Bible.

Yet, incredible though it may seem to those who have fallen victim to this false education, the Bible paints the vivid and detailed picture of TODAY, in writings that described it 1900 to 2500 years IN ADVANCE!

Yet, you can prove, by the facts and definite laws of science, as well as by sound reason and the very fact of the existence of things, that God does exist! (Write for our free booklet, Does God Exist?)

You can prove, by the very tools of science that the Holy Bible is the inspired WORD of the living Almighty GOD. (Write for our free booklet, The PROOF of the Bible. )

In your Bible is One – speaking in the first person – who claims to be the RULER of this entire world, and – the RULER OF ALL SPACE!

He says, “Behold, the nations are as a drop of a bucket, and are counted as the small dust of the balance… All nations before him are as nothing; and they are counted to him less than nothing, and vanity” (Isa. 40:15-17).

Your Bible says “all nations before him are as NOTHING – ” and reveals that it is HE who guides and controls the course of the major nations on this earth!

Men, in their feeble efforts – concentrating on physical and material sciences- scurrying frantically here and there, searching for the acquisition of new MATERIAL knowledge, are striving frantically to RULE SPACE!

They are totally heedless, UNAWARE that a Great Creator God is in heaven above – and that He THUNDERS to man from His exalted position on high, “Have ye not known? have ye not heard? Hath it not been told you from the beginning? have ye not understood from the foundations of the earth? It is he that sitteth upon the circle of the earth, and the inhabitants thereof are as grasshoppers; that stretcheth out the heavens as a curtain, and spreadeth them out as a tent to dwell in… To whom then will ye liken me, or shall I be equal? saith the Holy One”! (Isa. 40:21-25.)

There is the thundering challenge of your Creator, who gives you every breath of air you breathe – the RULER of Space!

He says to puny man, “Lift up your eyes on high, and behold who hath created these things [all of the planets, and the limitless expanse of the unfathomable universe], that bringeth out their host by number: he calleth them all by names by the greatness of his might, for that he is strong in power; not one faileth”! (Isa. 40:26.)

Think of it!

Almighty God says He knows all of the stars, comets, planetoids, and astral bodies of all descriptions – and calls them all BY NAME!

Man, still probing the unsearchable heavens by the most powerful types of telescopes, is able only to arrive at a mere guess as to the NUMBER of the myriads of planets in the heavens.

But the Great God in heaven above, YOUR RULER, calls them all “by name”!

Yes – what’s happened to God?

Apparently, carnal man has allowed no place for the possibility of the EXISTENCE of an All-wise, All-powerful Creator, who has the power to intervene in the course of human affairs, and who is the present RULER of Space!

Instead, he is going about his own carnal pursuits, standing on the threshold of invading God’s own heavens, blindly and superstitiously assuming there is no God!

What a shock is in store for puny man!

Man, it seems, has always been trying to “get to heaven.” Following the Biblical account of the flood, we read of men building a city, and believing their culture should reach out into the heavens. They were of three basic races. They wanted to integrate, to prevent being spread around the world in geographical segregation. Originally, God had set the bounds of racial and national habitation (Acts 17:26). But they rebelled. So they amalgamated to pool their efforts in science. They set out to build an enormous tower as a symbol of getting up into the heavens of their pagan gods. To this day men like to build “skyscrapers,” and erect steeples on their cathedrals and houses of worship.

The account of this, found in Genesis 11:4, says: “Then they said, ‘Come, let us build ourselves a city, and a tower with its top in the heavens, and let us make a name for ourselves, lest we be scattered abroad upon the face of the whole earth.’ And the ETERNAL came down to see the city and the tower, which the sons of men had built. And the ETERNAL said, ‘Behold, they are one people, and they have all one language, and this is only the beginning of what they will do; and nothing that they propose to do will now be impossible for them. Come, let us go down, and there confuse their language, that they may not understand one another’s speech.’ So the ETERNAL scattered them abroad from there over the face of all the earth, and they left off building the city.” (Gen. 11:4-9 R.S.V.).

So that was the end of the attempt to build the world’s first “skyscraper.”

But did you notice, God is quoted as saying: “This is only the beginning of what they will do; and NOTHING that they propose to do will now be impossible for them.”

God knew the SPACE AGE would have come CENTURIES ago, had He permitted this plan to succeed.

But God observed the doings of man – his attempt at the amalgamation of the races, the cooperation in scientific effort, and said: “Behold, the people is one, and they have all one language; and THIS THEY BEGIN TO DO: and now NOTHING will be restrained from them, which they have imagined to do”!

Can your mind begin to comprehend the all-inclusive meaning of these startling words?

Notice – God said NOTHING would be restrained from man! Yes – man actually WOULD be able to travel in Space, to manufacture SPACESHIPS, to journey to OTHER PLANETS – IF God would allow it!

God restrained man in that day – by confusing their language, and scattering them abroad upon the face of the Earth!

Today, men are breaking down the language barrier. Today, instant worldwide communication and air travel eliminate space barriers.

Today, there is a large, widespread movement toward the amalgamation of races – intermarriage being sanctioned and openly practiced in many parts of the world. There is the pooling of atomic and nuclear research, military effort, scientific endeavor, in order to avoid the duplication of scientific development by different countries!

Today – man once again stands poised on the brink of Space!

Today, scientists are envisioning even the creation of a “Space-age Noah’s ark”!

Fully realizing this Earth may become an incinerated relic in a few more years, as the result of an all-out atomic and hydrogen bomb war, scientists are fearfully planning the building of huge spaceships, or Space platforms to be put high above the Earth into orbit around it! Science actually envisions such craft being put into orbit around the sun – becoming a miniature planet, filled with people!

These “Space-age Noah’s arks” would be filled with all types of human beings, animals, various types of plants, and many scientific implements – equipment of all descriptions.

Theoretically, these individuals would be in a self-contained “world” completely detached from our own, able to repopulate and repeople SPACE should the Earth blast itself out of existence!

Can your mind comprehend it?

Can you begin to understand what men are trying to do?

Mankind – utterly incapable and totally inadequate to solve his own problems on this Earth here below, besmirching it and befouling it with his filth and vile practices, is now thinking of carrying his decaying society into all of the far-reaching areas of the unsearchable universe!

Will God ALLOW MAN to trample all over His heavens above? This is the really BIG question – THE BIG “IF”!

Man has proved himself capable of startling scientific capacity!

Today, he is concerning himself only with the problems of reentry into the Earth’s atmosphere.

He possesses the actual rocket thrust powerful enough to enable him to put into orbit satellites large enough to contain men!

So far, man’s orbital flights have been confined to the immediate Space around the Earth – but science now stands ready to start men on a long journey into Space itself.

Startling though it may seem – there is no question that man could launch himself into outer Space!

God has revealed: “Thou madest him [man] a little lower [or, “for a little time lower”] than the angels; thou crownedst him with glory and honour, and didst set him over the works of thy hands.” God has put into the hands of man the power to manipulate, refashion and reform, to devise and create from the physical material Earth under his feet. God goes on to reveal, “Thou hast put ALL THINGS in subjection under his feet. For in that he put all in subjection under him, he left NOTHING that is not put under him” (Heb. 2:7-8).

Did you get it?

God says He has put ALL things in subjection under man! “But surely,” you might reason, “God doesn’t mean ALL, including even Space, does He?”

Yes, indeed He does!

God says there is NOTHING that is NOT put under him – showing that man’s ultimate destiny is the rulership of ALL, with all that the word “all” includes, which is totality, all-inclusive – everything!

But notice the rest of this revealing scripture in the second chapter of Hebrews: “But NOW we see NOT YET all things put under him!”

Ah! There it is!

Human beings were CREATED to rule the universe – God reveals that goal as our ultimate destiny – but we are NOT YET READY! Human nature drives us to attempt to achieve this goal without being qualified for it.

Man is striving vainly to change or protect the human body to withstand the environment of Space. God’s Plan involves changing men’s MINDS – qualifying them to rule – then creating for them SPIRIT BODIES thoroughly equipped for Earth or Space.

While it is in God’s intent and purpose to eventually put ALL under the feet of man, allowing him even to rule over other planets in the entirety of the UNIVERSE – God has decreed that it is not “yet” time for such all-encompassing powers to be given into the hands of man.

At this present time, Almighty God has RESTRAINED man, placed definite limits and boundaries upon him – made man a distinctly Earthbound creature!

Inside the atmosphere of the Earth man finds comfort, even luxury. Here he has protection from the known dangers of Space – cosmic radiation, meteorites, extremes of heat and cold. And it is admitted there are many dangers not yet fully realized in the awesome vacuum of Space.

Though generally taken for granted, the food man eats, the water he drinks, the air he breathes are in a precarious life-giving balance on earth. Gravity holds him down and gives him orientation without which he would soon lose physical and even mental balance. But Space is a hostile and devastating environment to the life we take for granted.

Yes, the greatest barrier to Space flight is man himself. He is flesh, blood and bone – made of 16 elements of this Earth’s matter. He is fragile in the face of the soul-freezing obstacles that are known to await him in prolonged Space flight. If man is to conquer Space he must figure out how to take a piece of his Earthly environment with him wherever he goes.

Yes, startling though it may seem, God has decreed He WILL NOT ALLOW man to RULE Space in his present carnal, physical, God-rejecting condition!

And does man really “RULE” Space, simply because he is able to intrude, briefly, into it? Does he “RULE” Mt. Everest? He has climbed it, to be sure, but today the thunderous storms lash its heights, just as they have for thousands of years!

Interstellar Space has been likened to a cubic inch of water, vaporized into steam and spread through 40 trillion cubic miles of Space!

Each tiny, microscopic globule of mist would represent the comparative size of the vast supergiants, stars immensely larger than our sun – and the almost limitless Space between would represent the true distance from one such star to another!

CONQUER SPACE? Ridiculous!

No, man will never RULE Space – but he can intrude into it!

Actually – the very fact of man’s almost daily new discoveries in the realm of science is a thundering, ominous warning that the end of man’s self-governing society upon this Earth is drawing rapidly near!

Then who WILL rule Space?

God has decreed: “The heaven, even the heavens, ARE THE ETERNAL’S: but the earth hath he given to the children of men”! (Psalm 115:16.)

How much dominion has the Creator-Ruler of the universe given to man? He reveals it in the very first chapter of His Instruction-Book for mankind: To man, He says: “Have dominion over the fish of the sea and over the birds of the air, and over every living thing that moves upon the earth.” (Genesis 1:28).

Man is given dominion over THE EARTH. The earth is composed of matter. Matter is present in three states – solid, liquid, gaseous. Take H20 – water. Below 32 degrees Fahrenheit, it is a solid – ice. Between 32 and 212 degrees it is liquid. Above 212 it is converted into steam – the gaseous state.

The air above the solid and water surface of the earth is part of the earth, in the gaseous state. Webster describes it as the invisible, odorless, and tasteless mixture of gases which surrounds the earth – (that is, its solid and liquid surface). It is composed mostly of two very common elements – nitrogen and oxygen. As altitudes become higher, the air becomes “thinner,” containing less oxygen.

Thus God has given man dominion over the solid surface of the earth – over its rivers, lakes and oceans – and over the air. I have flown at altitudes of 41,000 feet and above. At that point we begin to emerge into the stratosphere. Beginning about 25 miles above sea level is the ionosphere. Finally the elements of the earth become altogether absent, and beyond is OUTER SPACE.

Man has dominion over the oceans. Not only on their surface, but even to penetrate in depth. However, as we go lower, the pressure builds up where it becomes difficult if not impossible to go deeper. Likewise it becomes more and more difficult for man to penetrate the upper altitudes of air. From the Biblical revelation, man is within his assigned jurisdiction when he flies in aircraft. That is notwithstanding a few rare crashes or accidents. They, however, are far more rare than crashes and accidents in automobiles on the solid ground. Accident insurance companies will tell you that the highest incidence of accidents occurs in bathtubs in the “safety” of one’s home.

God has assigned this earth to MAN – in man’s present human state.

God has decreed the heavens belong to Him! God has placed a “reserved” sign in the heavens, and has decreed there is “no trespassing” there!

But why, then, do the heavens even exist? Why do planets, so far out in the distant reaches of outer Space that they just barely appear as a faint flicker on the most powerful telescopes, even EXIST?

Certainly, they have nothing directly to do with the atmosphere of the Earth! They have no direct effect, as such, on life here on this Earth! It is only within our own peculiar solar system that there is any real effect upon man.

Is there a PURPOSE in the creation of these things?

A famous scientist said recently on television, that we cannot know the real PURPOSE of life! Poor, ignorant scientist! He could know – if he did not reject the only SOURCE of that most basic of all knowledge!

That SOURCE is your Bible! God reveals there is a PURPOSE being worked out here below! He is the supreme RULER, seated on His throne in the vast realm of the heavens, ruling the entirety of the universe!

And God has a purpose in the existence of all things, including Space!

The real reason for human life, and man’s ultimate destiny is so fantastic – so awesome – so overpowering, that it literally staggers the imagination! (Write for our free booklet, Why Were You Born?)

God is reproducing Himself! Man was made to become a very son of God!

Jesus Christ, who is the FIRSTBORN of God, is said to be the “firstborn among MANY BRETHREN”! (Rom. 8:29.)

Carnal human beings, through total repentance, baptism in water for the remission of their sins, and the receiving of God’s Holy Spirit, are to live lives of growing in grace and knowledge, overcoming daily by the power of God’s Spirit within them, finally to be BORN of God!

Jesus said, “Ye must be born again”! How far human beings misunderstand this awesome and remarkable scripture!

Jesus revealed a family relationship between Himself and the Father. The Church is likened as the bride of Christ, and, on other occasions, as the “mother of us all”! Those are terms denoting FAMILY relationship!

Your Bible reveals the startling, glorious truth that human kind can, through the Master Plan Almighty God is working out here below, become God kind!

Think of it!

That means being born, changed into, MADE a very member of God’s own divine Family!

How DECEIVED mankind has been, as to the very PURPOSE of his being – as to his DESTINY!

The “Christian Religion” is supposed to have come from the Bible – to be BASED on this Book which is the world’s best seller. Yet this very Book says the MANY would be DECEIVED! It says all nations are deceived!

WHY do not professing “Christians” UNDERSTAND what their Bible says about their “salvation”? It says Jesus Christ was made a Son of God by a resurrection from the dead. It says He was glorified – now composed of SPIRIT, not of physical matter. It reveals His appearance in this state, with eyes like flames of fire, His face shining like the very SUN, full strength! (Rev. 1:13-16.)

It says true Christians, begotten of God by having received His Spirit (Rom. 8:9), will, also, as Jesus was, be converted from mortal to immortal – from human composed of physical matter to divine, composed of spirit, IF God’s Holy Spirit dwells in them (Rom. 8:11). And it says they are NOT Christ’s – NOT truly Christians – UNLESS God’s Spirit has been received and dwells within them (Rom. 8:9).

But, further, it says that IF God’s Spirit (which is God’s very divine life, God’s attitude of mind, God’s love and power) is leading them – IF they are following in THIS WAY (which is obedience to God’s Law), then they are already – NOW – sons of God. They are now HEIRS of God – not yet INHERITORS, but HEIRS (verses 16-17) and that we shall be (at time of resurrection) GLORIFIED, even as Jesus Christ has been glorified.

Even as Jesus Christ was made a Son of GOD by a resurrection from mortal to immortality (Rom. 1:4), He was the first-BORN of “many brethren” (Rom. 8:29). And, at the time of resurrection for those who actually are Christ’s, our flesh and blood physical human bodies will be changed, and made like Christ’s GLORIFIED body, composed of spirit. (Philippians 3:20-21.)

The New Testament is FULL of this wonderful truth. It is supported in the Old Testament. WHY have nations been so deceived they are blinded to man’s true potential – his real destiny?

Man is not ready to RULE SPACE – UNTIL two things are accomplished.

1) He must master, rule, and overcome human nature! Human nature is a PULL toward vanity, self-centeredness, lust, greed, envy, hatred, hostility toward God and God’s authority over him. It PULLS man in the way that produces unhappiness, pain, suffering, evils. He must have this nature replaced by GOD’S nature, the attitude of humility, living faith in God, obedience to God, love for – outgoing concern for – neighbor – the desire to serve, help, share, not to take, concerned only for self. In man’s present state he produces only unhappiness and evils. He is not competent to rule space, when he has not learned properly to rule his own SELF!

2) He must be CONVERTED – CHANGED from mortal to immortal – from physical human flesh and blood to spiritual composition. Then he shall have self-sustaining LIFE inherent. Then he shall not be dependent on breathing this earth’s AIR for his existence. Then he shall not be dependent on food and water from this earth for continued life. Then he shall not be affected by extremes of heat and cold. Then he shall be equipped, within himself, to RULE, under God – under the living Christ’s administration of God’s Government – the whole of the vast universe!

Yes, there is a REASON why the stars, galaxies and astral bodies are placed in far-flung outer space! There is PURPOSE to this, and to human life upon this planet EARTH!

There is a MASTER PLAN working out that divine PURPOSE here below. And it WILL BE accomplished!

When that is accomplished, when the last, final human being has had opportunity to CHOOSE which way he will go, when God has increased His own family by millions and millions, the apostle Paul reveals “then cometh the end [the total end of man’s way of life, of his organized society on this Earth], when he [Christ] shall have delivered up the kingdom to God, even the Father; when he shall have put down all rule and all authority and power”! (I Cor. 15:24.)

THEN comes the inspiring thunder of the voice of the Great Creator of all things who says, “Behold, I MAKE ALL THINGS NEW… HE THAT OVERCOMETH SHALL INHERIT ALL THINGS; and I will be his God, and he shall be my son”! (Rev. 21:5-7.)

Can you envision it? Can you comprehend it?

Can you now begin to understand? God is offering YOU, not through the promises of science, not by travel in a Spaceship, not by military, political or man-made means, but by the very power of God, through being BORN of Him, as His OWN SON, RULERSHIP OVER SPACE!

Yes – it is the reborn SONS OF GOD, who are going to RULE the entirety of the universe under God, the great Ruler over all! We shall be no longer mortal, material – but born again – of GOD – spirit beings!

Don’t be caught up in the excitement of man’s feeble physical effort to “conquer” Space. Man’s effort is only another MILITARY and POLITICAL plan to extend his power – without right knowledge.

Learn God’s Truth. Begin to equip yourself God’s way – and you will be “MORE THAN CONQUERORS”! (Rom. 8:37.)

God wants YOU to rule Space! But we must first learn to rule our own human persons – according to the Maker’s Instruction Book!