A Consuming Fire

[Bob Crowley]

Hebrews 12:28-29 "Therefore, since we are receiving an unshakable kingdom, let us be filled with gratitude, and so worship God acceptably with reverence and awe. For our God is a consuming fire.”

I don't know why but I was moved to find out how much matter was actually converted to energy in a nuclear explosion. I suppose Putin and his nuclear sabre waving regarding the war in Ukraine may have been one factor.

I found out that the amount of mass converted to energy in the Hiroshima and Nagasaki bombings was about 700 milligrams or .7 of a gram. This is less that one-third of an American dime or about the mass of a butterfly.

Numbers: Nuclear Weapons, From Making a Bomb to Making a Stockpile to Making Peace

0.1 Approximate percentage of the mass of a uranium atom converted to energy during nuclear fission. The amount of matter converted to energy in the atomic bomb dropped on Hiroshima was about 700 milligrams, less than one-third the mass of a U.S. dime.

(The) Estimated energy .... released from the Hiroshima bomb (was) the equivalent of 15,000 tons of TNT.

We've got a rather powerful God. The Big Bang explosion fits Genesis right down to a T - God said "And let there be light!".

"BOOM!!!".

And then He encapsulated this energy according to Einstein's incredibly simple formula E=mc^2.

Everything that has been made is constructed of just four fundamental forces - Gravity, Electro-magnetic, Strong Nuclear and Weak Nuclear - what you might call economy of design.

I get the feeling that when the writer of Hebrews wrote "It is a fearful thing to fall into the hands of the living God", he knew what he was talking about.

 

[Tolworth John]

get the feeling that when the writer of Hebrews wrote "It is a fearful thing to fall into the hands of the living God", he knew what he was talking about.

It is not a question of atomic power, but about his Holiness, which is greater than we can imagine and it is the offence against his Holiness and the rejection of his mercy that is responsible for unbelievers being condemned.

 

[Bob Crowley]

I was using atomic energy as an example of His power. If 15 kilotons of explosive energy (that is to say the equivalent of 15,000 tons of TNT) is bound up in less than a single gram of matter, what's God's power like since He is the one who made it all out of nothing?