September 26, 2025 • 56 mins
Pastors' Perspective is a one-hour call-in program where listeners can call in and get answers to questions about the Bible, Christianity, family, and life. The program is live Monday through Friday from 3:00 PM - 4:00 PM Pacific. You can call 888-564-6173 to ask your questions.
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Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:17):
Hello and welcome to Pastor's Perspective. I'm your host, Brian Perez.
It is Friday, the last Friday of September, and we
are here live in the studio until 4 o'clock on
this overcast Friday. What is up with that? It's beginning
to look a lot like Christmas or fall or whatever
we're heading into. Give us a call with your questions
(00:37):
about the Bible, the
Christian faith, the weather will answer them all. 888-564-6173 is
our number. If you're watching on Facebook, YouTube, or Instagram,
you see the number there on the bottom of your screen.
You can call us or, um, you can scan that
QR code, and that'll take you to the pastor's perspective
page on Kwave.com where you can submit your questions.
(00:59):
And online, but the best way to get an answer
is to call in when we're here live because you
guys don't call in. Why are we here? Right, Pastor Brian?
We should just like take the day off if nobody's
gonna call. Well, yes, we, we want people to call that.
Yes we do. We are here, you know, I was
just thinking, Brian, it was a week ago today that the, um,
the love song.
(01:21):
Film was launched on Amazon and actually last Friday night,
Sheryl and I, we watched all three episodes and I
had seen it before, uh, her and I actually, we
saw the very first episode when it was still pretty rough.
They hadn't even finished it yet. We were, uh, invited,
(01:42):
you know, to, to a special showing and then, um,
and then about a month and a half ago, I,
I had the opportunity to watch everything, but then,
They did do some final touches and all that to say,
it was, I think, really, really good. And I, I
think if, if people want to get a, a good sense,
(02:04):
you know, we talk about the Jesus people movement and
of course with the history with Pastor Chuck and Calvert
Chapel and then, um, more recently with the Jesus revolution film.
And, um, where the Jesus Revolution film, of course, is
a dramatization of those events and the life of, of
Greg and Kathy Laurie. Um, this is all just, you know,
(02:28):
live footage of the various, um,
Times that Love Song would be on the road touring
or that they would be at Calver Chapel, Costa Mesa, and,
and you just get a real feel for what um
what was happening back then. So it's super cool, and
I think it's timely too. I think um with everything
(02:49):
going on and with um it seems like there's a
stirring in the in the culture. Um, I've been uh
a little bit of a sidetrack. I've been doing some
preparation because I'm teaching a a course on
Uh, church history, but I'm teaching the Great Awakening in
the 18th century revival. So,
It will, the course will be on revival, but I'm
(03:10):
just kind of revisiting, uh, what happened in the 1st
and 2nd Great Awakening here in the United States, or
wasn't even in the United States during the 1st Awakening,
it was still British colonies. And then the 18th century revival,
which was Wesley and Whitfield in um England, and then
there was stuff going on on the European continent and
(03:30):
all that. But anyway, just
Reading over that stuff again, it's like, wow, man, amazing
times and, you know, we've we've seen some of those
and maybe we'll see some again. So, so anyway, I
think uh a band called Love Song is a good
primer to remind us of what God can do and
get us encouraged to, you know, pray that he will do.
(03:53):
It is a good primer and in fact, it's available
on Prime Video. So, uh, check that out and you
can get more details at a band called Love Song.com,
but yeah, you can check it out on Prime Video.
Very good. All right, so we're supposed to have a
special guest in the studio today, and while we await
his arrival,
I guess we can answer some questions that were sent
in online. No, wait, wait, wait, hold on. There was
(04:13):
another announcement we needed to make. Well, first of all, the,
the course that you're teaching, the, the history course, that's
on Wednesday nights, tell people about starting on October the 8th.
So we have a, um, you know, 3 or 4
times a year we do, um, what's called the gathering,
and these are, um, these are a variety of different
courses that, that you can sign up for. Uh, I
think we have 10 or 12 different options, um, everything from,
(04:39):
you know, like.
Christian doctrine to formation to um family parenting finances and,
and I like I like uh church history, so I
have been doing a series. I think this will be
my 4th 1 on church history and I've I've just
(04:59):
sort of I started actually in the 2nd to 3rd century, so, um.
I'm making my way on through history and we are
in the 17 and 1800s.
And looking at revival. So I'm seeing two different history
classes here. One's the one that you're teaching, and then
there's one called Exploring Arts throughout church history. Yes, so
(05:22):
what's the difference, I mean,
Explain what that one's about. You're not teaching that one.
Well that one, you know what, I have wanted to
go to that one, but you can't because you're teaching. Yeah,
I'm either teaching or I'm out of town. Um, yeah, Alan,
who teaches that one is, um, Alan is really in
some senses a world renowned artist and he is also, uh,
(05:45):
a theologian and he is looking at, you know, art
in connection with church history.
And like I said, I've never been to it, but
I have every confidence that it is a fantastic course. So,
so one of these days I'm gonna get myself in there.
Very good. So yeah, like Brian said, there's about 10
or 12 different courses that you can sign up for
(06:08):
to get all the details. You can go to the
Calvary Chapel Costa Mesa website, CCCM.com/ Wednesday, Wednesday, and, uh,
that'll give you all the details. Look at it. It's interesting. The, uh, OK, so, um,
Bible Club.
Bible Book Club, uh, Class on Proverbs, and then I'm
doing the Great Awakening and revival of the 18th and
(06:30):
19th centuries, and then, um, do well in God's economy.
Ben is one of our board members who is also
a CPA, so he does a great job with that.
And then you mentioned, uh, Alan, um, Berner's class exploring
arts through church history, grounded in God's love. That's gonna
be kind of a
Bit of a new believers course as far as I
(06:53):
know from Jordan and that sounds fantastic uh habits of
a healthy marriage that's a good class, Richard and Valerie Cimino, uh,
they've got lots of years of marital experience and then
Miss and culture being bridge builder. Sean Havilar Shaw is
one of our, our, uh, mission pastors.
And then praying 101. Wow.
(07:13):
That's gonna be a good one. Honesty meeting holiness, yeah,
because we need to pray. Yes, we need to pray honesty. Yeah, honestly, honestly, yep. OK,
that's it. That is it. CCCM.com/ Wednesday to get all
those details. And one last thing that we can mention
is Sunday night at 6:30.
(07:35):
In the fellowship hall at Calvary Chapel, Costa Mesa, uh,
I am resuming our back to basics live through the Bible,
and we are in Acts chapter 19.
And Acts has been fantastic. I love the book of Acts,
so we're just, you know, kind of taking it a
chapter at a time and just digging down deep into
Into the history and then into the uh application for
(07:59):
us today. So, very good. Back to basics. No, back
to Basradio.com/live. That's how you can get details about that.
Sunday nights at 6:30. All right, so let's answer a
question that was sent in online. This one is from Edward.
And it's a follow up to what we were discussing
on yesterday's program, he starts off right away by saying
there is no free will. Why this passage says it's
(08:23):
not the will of men. John 1:12 and 13 states,
but as many as received him to them he gave
the right to become children of God, to those who
believe in His name, who were born not of blood,
nor of the will of the flesh, nor of the
will of man, but of God. So what would you
say to Edward about that passage?
Well, um, that has nothing to do with free will.
(08:45):
It's just expressing that the new birth is a birth
that comes from God. It's not something that we, um,
You know, conjure up, it's not something that we can
produce within ourselves. It is, as it says there, it
is of God, born of God. So, um,
(09:06):
And you're born of God by receiving Christ. So in
that same passage there, um, verse, I mean, uh, you know,
actually right there, uh, in the, in the verse before it,
it says as many as received him to them he
gave gave the power to become the children of God, um,
(09:29):
to those who believed in his name, who were born,
not of the will of the flesh nor the will
of man.
So forth. Um, so, you know, receiving Jesus is in
the context, that is how one is born, you know, earlier,
or not earlier, actually later, Jesus will say, uh, in
the third chapter, it's recorded for us when he's speaking
(09:50):
to Nicodemus, Jesus will say, uh, you must be born again,
and John is giving us a little bit of, uh,
Of a primer to that in in uh chapter one, so.
Has nothing to do with whether man has free will
or not. All right, Edward, thank you for sending in
your question through the pastor's perspective page on Kwave.com. Amber
(10:11):
and Lake Elsinore also has a question about, uh, the gospels, well,
not John, but, uh, Matthew chapter 15. Hey there, Amber,
thanks for calling in today. What's your question?
Hi, I was wondering, so Matthew chapter 15, um, basically
starting in verse 4, but um, where it talks, where
(10:31):
it says in verse 5, he says, um,
Um. Well, I've got it here. I'll just read it. Uh,
for God commanded saying, honor your father and your mother,
and he who curses father or mother, let him be
put to death. But you say, whoever says to his
father or mother, whatever profit you might have received from
me is a gift of God, then he need not
(10:52):
honor his father or mother. Thus you have made the
commandment of God of no effect by your tradition.
Yeah, I was wondering what that tradition was. I didn't
quite understand um the context. OK, that's, that's a good question, Amber. Yeah,
so the tradition that Jesus is talking about is a
tradition that um developed kind of during the inter Testamental period, um,
(11:18):
toward the end there, but it was a tradition that
was an oral tradition that claimed to have been passed
down from Moses as well.
And the Pharisees in particular were the ones who, um,
they were sort of like the gatekeepers of that tradition.
And what Jesus is pointing out to them is that
(11:39):
your tradition is
contradictory to what God said in his word. And Jesus
would say this to them on a few occasions, you know,
you've nullified the word of God by your tradition. Uh,
you teach for doctrine, the commandments of men.
And so it's this um oral law that was um.
(12:03):
Popularized by the rabbinical leaders at the time that Jesus
is referring to there.
Does this help you, Amber?
Yes, yeah, thank you. All right, thanks for calling in
today here on Pastor's Perspective and our very special guest
has arrived. Look
who's here.
Speaker 2 (12:21):
It was miraculous.
Speaker 1 (12:22):
I mean, the, yeah, the last thing we heard you
were like 7073 and something, so you must have got
like teleported.
Speaker 2 (12:28):
The internal portion of my wheel fell off, literally. So I'm,
you know, seriously, I may as well have been transported
here by the Holy Spirit. So obviously I'm supposed to
be here now. Well,
Speaker 1 (12:42):
what about your what about your wheel? Where's your
Speaker 2 (12:44):
wheel? It's being looked at as we speak.
Speaker 1 (12:46):
This is Doctor Liu Wang, by the way, everybody. He's
been on the program before and, uh, he's got a
new book coming out, and that's what we're gonna discuss
for the next several minutes and, uh, might get to
some more phone calls a little bit later on too.
It's been quite a while since we've been in the
studio
together.
Speaker 2 (13:03):
It has, yeah, gosh,
Speaker 1 (13:06):
yeah, a couple of years
Speaker 2 (13:07):
at least, probably, yeah.
Right, right. Well, it's,
Speaker 1 (13:12):
yeah, OK, well, you've been busy since you were here last,
and you wrote a book.
Speaker 2 (13:16):
I did write a book amongst
Speaker 1 (13:17):
other things. Yes,
Speaker 2 (13:18):
that's right. Yeah, yes, San Diego is a different planet.
It's a
Speaker 1 (13:22):
different planet. Yes,
you were, you came here from planet San Diego.
The book is called Genes of Eden, and I love
what it says at the beginning here on on the
Amazon page. What if our deepest struggles with sin and
addiction are embedded in our very biology? And yet so
is the hope for redemption? So what are you saying
(13:44):
in this book, Lu Wing? Yes,
Speaker 2 (13:46):
well, this was one of those opportunities. I've been in
the drug development world for many, many years, and having
sort of come to that resolution that I can no
longer battle this issue any longer.
I have vice presidents selling gene therapies and at the
top of my game, and there was this gnawing sense
of my soul of recognizing that gene therapies, gene editing,
(14:08):
all of which we're doing to the genome, essentially is
a problem not only biologically, but we're messing with something
that I would consider divine.
And that's the human genome, and one of which came
about when we started realizing there was off target toxicity
with new genes that we'd like to introduce into the genome.
(14:28):
And we can never figure out what that toxicity concept
is like, are we turning other genes on? What are
we actually doing? is where is this gene you put
in with within the 6.4 billion base pairs, right? So,
as time went on, and I realized that there was
some phenomenon that's either turning this gene off or regulating it.
It all boiled down to this field of epigenetics, and
(14:50):
epigenetics is the study of how genes are expressed. It's
not the structure of the DNA, it's the actual function
and so it's like, you know, DNA is our hardware
and um epigenetics is a software, so it's all about
how certain molecules on top of DNA.
Are altered to make a gene function the way it is. Well,
(15:13):
that means that environment, whether it be internal or external,
can have a major impact on how this gene functions.
So I extrapolated that into theology, and I started to wonder, uh,
you know, we we're born in sin. As a matter
of fact, Romans 5:12 tells us that we're actually culpable
of the sin of Adam. And so one of the
(15:35):
theologians that explored that the most was Saint Augustine.
Who wrote several documents regarding original sin. It's a very
controversial theology, and yet one of the major factors of
it is, is that he, as a natural philosopher, he
would never have considered himself a theologian, saw that this
was an opportunity for him to explore it, and as
(15:56):
he explored it in 350 to 400 AD, he saw
that there was something somatic happening with genes that with
with um the.
Um, sin in us. He could never explore genomics or
genetics or anything like that, didn't come till centuries later
with Gregor Mendel. And so I looked at his work,
(16:17):
I understood it pre-enlightenment. This has nothing to do with evolution.
It has nothing to do with any of the current
science related to origins. It has everything to do with
how these genes function. And so is and how is
sin embedded in the genome, and further, how is the
soul actually in us?
Biologically, I mean, if we think about these ideas about biologically, like,
(16:42):
you know, how can we even dare ask that, but
now that we have the tools, specifically epigenetics, we can
actually explore this. And so my book explores the theology
first of original sin.
And then I look at epigenetics and look at sort
of how we can have imprinted genes and imprinted gene
function generationally. As a matter of fact, just like as
(17:03):
studies have been ongoing about Holocaust survivors and how there's
been generational sin.
generational trauma within generations, and so they're able to trace
dreams back 3 or 4 generations because there's been this
imprinting of trauma. Well, this imprinted trauma can also reflect
the imprinted soul, and there's aspects of our soul, specifically sin.
(17:26):
That is in our genome, and it is propagated, and
that means that instead of there being a soulmate like
a created soul, or God giving us a soul, this
would infer that there is a traducian concept where the
soul
Is transmitted by the father and the mother, and the
(17:46):
two of them form this unique soul because it's tainted
with sin, and we just know theologically that God, because
He knows no sin, he is not involved with the
the soul at all. He is literally a part of
the growth process and so on, but as far as
the implementation.
According to Romans 5:12, it's part of who we are
(18:09):
in Adam. So looking at that and understanding how that
would be displayed most prominently, especially looking at some of
Augustine's writing, addictive behavior seems to be the most, the
greatest of correlates, just showing and demonstrating that original sin
is really part of who we are. In other words,
we all have within us this moving away from God
(18:32):
at birth, and there's an inherent.
Understanding that this moving away process would be evidence that
we have fallen and even within the context of theology,
there are many examples of we're born in sin and
this um as my mother conceived me and so we
have this, you know, distorted soul and distorted behavior that
(18:55):
is this ongoing process until this concept of redemption.
And so redemptive qualities, and I sort of look at
the cycle of addiction versus the cycle of redemption. I
look at 2 Peter chapter 1 and looking at add
to your faith, virtue and virtue, knowledge and knowledge, self-control,
and so on. All of those segments, those eight different
(19:16):
segments that produce love is a cycle of redemption. It's
one of the best anecdotes for getting out of the
cycle of addiction. So all I have to say is
that within this book, this book is a primer.
It's one that I've done with a publisher called Whi
and Stock. It's a um a theology um focused primarily publisher,
(19:40):
and they believed me on the science and they struggle
with some of these concepts, and yet they finally came
to the realization that epigenetics is actually a science that
could absolutely explore this. And I've had some um validation
from theologians at Aberdeen University, at Fuller Seminary and so on.
And these individuals have provided um endorsements and so on.
Speaker 1 (20:02):
So
epigenetics means like on top of
genetics,
Speaker 2 (20:06):
yeah, yeah, that would be inferring that, yes. And so
it has nothing to do with the actual genes structure, right?
So like A T G and C are the molecules
make up DNA, right? And so that looks like Jurassic Park,
you saw that. And so what we see.
You know, the the sea of all those has a
little place where a methyl group can attach, and a
(20:29):
methyl group is where it would block any kind of
outside molecules from turning or tuning the gene. So you
can see how it's a gene can be silenced. What
does that say? That says you have the same exact
sequence of DNA in every single one of the cells
of your body.
Then how do you get a kidney cell? How do
(20:49):
you get a liver cell or a neuron with the
same sequence of DNA? It's an epigenetic phenomenon where certain
genes are silenced.
Meaning that an epigenetic phenomena, i.e., methylation or there can
be what are called noncoding RNAs, literally turn off a
gene that silences it completely. So like every man is
(21:12):
born with two X chromosomes, but one of the X's
is silenced.
Which brings up a lot of interesting concepts about some
of these problems we're having with the variations in this
choice of sex and so on, because there is this
challenge of epigenetics related to that. Also with any kind
of sexual deviations and and any kind.
(21:33):
There is an epigenetic phenomenon. Although the science may be complicated,
that's one of the reasons why I put out this
first book as a primer to give an overall picture
of what this paradigm is. And once I have that settled,
I'm moving to the next one that's going to bring
in the book of Leviticus to understand how this is
incorporated into a holy life.
Speaker 1 (21:54):
Wow,
Speaker 2 (21:55):
it's so I'm,
Speaker 1 (21:56):
I'm glad I'm looking at that book and I'm glad
it's is, um, I'm, I'm glad it's maybe like uh
120 pages, 150 pages, yeah, yeah, that's.
That
Speaker 2 (22:09):
I wrote it for you, Brian.
Speaker 1 (22:12):
Yeah, I
Speaker 2 (22:12):
like
Speaker 1 (22:13):
all, all books.
Speaker 2 (22:13):
You're actually in my acknowledgement, so I just, just, you know,
Speaker 1 (22:17):
OK,
so Lou, just let's just back up just a tiny
bit because I think it would be great for because,
you know, there's probably like 1% of the people that
are listening to us today.
That understood, uh, what you were saying. So I think
it would be good just to go back a little
bit and just tell us, you know, tell us a
(22:39):
little bit about yourself and how, I mean, you're talking
some serious science stuff here, you're obviously talking theology.
As well, so kind of give our listeners a little
bit of background and, and again, you've been on the
program before back back in 2020, we were on a
lot talking about COVID and all of that stuff, but
uh it's been a while. So could you reintroduce
(23:01):
yourself?
Speaker 2 (23:01):
Absolutely, yes, Lumen wing and I have been in the
ministry for over 30 years. Um, one of the fascinations
to me is the understanding of science and the Bible.
And so I have a PhD in biochemistry from the
University of Aberdeen in Scotland. I studied blood coagulation there,
(23:24):
and that opened up the door for understanding blood in
deeper ways, biologically and theologically. So that sort of tied
into this understanding and how we sort of positioned Leviticus
within the word of God. And then, you know, after
being in the biotechnology community for several years as a consultant.
Um, I'm a toxicologist by trade, and I studied cell
(23:45):
and gene therapies and so on. One of the areas
that it continued to really just eat my soul apart
was to try to solve this issue in in epigenetics
because it was such a biological issue in the drug
development world, which it still is. And I wanted to
know and understand how I could connect this the most
appropriately and the most with strengthening it with a theological paradigm.
(24:10):
So I went back to my alma mater. I went
to one of phenomenal theology school, and I studied under
Brian Brock, who was the um moral theology professor there,
and I worked alongside him. And as we developed this thesis,
and it was originally called theological epigenetics, and I thought
that's a little bit tough for the like you're saying,
(24:31):
the 1 percenter that was 0.01 percenter. So that, you know,
this is really looking at original sin and it's and it's.
Place and so after retirement, I finally was able to
take this this thesis that I had written for another
graduate degree and bring it into a practical application in
addiction and addictive discovery and so on and so that's
(24:53):
kind of where my truck has been and so.
Speaker 1 (24:56):
Yeah, and so, um, you know, this is so fascinating
because as you're talking about Augustine or Augustine, um, and
you're talking about, you know, a 4th century philosopher theologian,
and you're and and you're talking about that he was.
He was having insight into some of these things, even then, yet,
(25:21):
of course, the, the science hadn't yet arrived that would
give him the, of course, you know, the genome and,
and all of that. He didn't do any of that.
But he could, he could see it through observation,
Speaker 2 (25:36):
exactly, exactly, that's exactly right. And he struggled it within himself.
So when you look at and study.
Book of confessions, you see all this coming out, City
of God, and some of his writings to the Pelagians
and even as as unfinished work to Julian is what
I really use the most. And in one paragraph, he
even says just that, he says, who could ever even
(25:57):
explain in words this understanding of how sin is in us?
And by even saying that, I take that literally, literally,
I said, here is an opportunity to actually answer that dilemma.
Millennia later, and that's why this book, I believe is
so profound because it brings about this connection pre-enlightenment. It
(26:17):
has nothing to do with how we got here from
the origin's perspective. It has everything to do with the
human condition as it has been known. Since the time
of Jesus, there was never an inference of any kind
of phylogenic origins or so on. It had everything to
do with his person. I've had many discussions, many debates with.
Colleagues of mine who just simply can't let go of
(26:40):
their the theistic evolution or the people even pinned me
as that. I said, this has nothing to do with
that concept, has everything to do with how God designed
our genome to be in fellowship with him. They're they're
tuned to him, literally. So there's a spiritual factor involved.
So when we confess our sin, he's faithful and just
(27:00):
to forgive, and that concept of forgiveness actually has an epigenetic.
Uh, in the concept, there's one gene called the brain
derived neurotropic factor that's involved with neuroplasticity and like how
we learn and so on. It's very dynamic, it's very
malleable in terms of environment that we live in.
And this particular gene can get stuck with concepts with unforgiveness.
(27:26):
There's like literally a scientific paper that's looked at religiosity, forgiveness,
and the BDNF gene, and it's all an epigenetic phenomenon.
So there is current science that already addressing this. I'm
bringing in the theology to do just that.
Speaker 1 (27:41):
And, and so I mean, it sounds like this there's
a little bit of that idea that um you can
actually alter your brain.
Chemistry or whatever it is through behaviors or through thought
processes,
Speaker 2 (27:55):
precisely, it's choices and it's a willingness to really what
happens when we're still and know that he's God. There's
an epigenetic alteration that really because there's a plasticity to it,
it is able to be altered and this is how
we develop sanctification, how that actually is within our body.
Speaker 1 (28:13):
Wow, did you get that, bro? Yes, of course.
I'm gonna come up with my paper afterwards. Um, no,
so if you've got questions about this, give us a
call at 888-564-6173. I think it's good to talk about
the fact that, and we're coming up to our break, but, um, uh,
like when it comes to addictions and things like that,
and these are things, let's just, let's just take, you know,
(28:35):
drinking as an example, and people have been doing this
for years, 30, 40 years. They have that come to
Jesus experience.
And some of their addictions go away, but there's the
ones that just stick around and they're just like wondering
what is it? So you're saying that the brain can
be taught to not want those things anymore.
Speaker 2 (28:55):
Your
brain can be rewired literally following an epigenetic.
Speaker 1 (29:01):
And, and I think Lou too, this will be great
to talk about.
Um, you know, the idea, I mean, we, you know,
I think most of us understand like addiction to a substance,
but of course we've discovered that there's addictions to non-substances. There's,
you know, pornography is not, you know, or gambling or something.
Like that, exactly.
Speaker 2 (29:22):
So
Speaker 1 (29:22):
can't
Speaker 2 (29:22):
wait
Speaker 1 (29:23):
to have it. Yeah, let's talk about that or our
phones or social media or man, there's just, there's just
so many things now that we can get addicted to. Yeah,
the phone is, uh, you talk to my wife and
she will tell you that I am, she thinks I'm addicted.
I don't. I think she's addicted to her phone.
All right, gonna take a quick break and then we will, uh,
come back with our guest, Doctor Liu Wang. His new
(29:44):
book is available on Amazon. It is called Gans of Eden, and, uh,
Lou's full name, his first name is Luman. You can, uh,
find him L U M A N, Lumen Wing on Amazon,
and this book is titled Gans of Eden. We'll be
back in just a little bit, 888-564-6173.
(30:17):
All right, we're back on Pastor's Perspective, 888-564-6173. Brian Perez
here along with Pastor Brian Broderson from Echoes of Mercy.com.
He also teaches on Sunday nights at Calvary Chapel, Costa Mesa.
6:30 is the start time, and you hear him here
on the radio back to Basics Radio, uh, 3 times
a day, Monday through Friday here on Kwave. And we've
(30:40):
got a special guest in the studio. It's Doctor Liu Wang,
who has written a new
book called Jeans of Eden, and, uh, jeans, as in
G E N E S, not blue jeans, not denim.
That's not what we're talking about here on the program today.
Jeans of Eden, and you can also, I mentioned you
can get it on Amazon, but it's also available on
Doctor Wing's website, which is lumenwing.org. And again, Lumen is
(31:04):
spelled L U M A N. So Lumen Wing.org. You
can find out all about Dr. Wing there and, uh,
purchase his book.
OK, so, um, coming back to some of the stuff
that we were talking about a moment ago, um, Lou, I, OK, I,
you said something and I wanna, I wanna see if
I got what you were saying about, um, about the soul.
(31:28):
So it seemed like what you said, because this of
course has been a massive mystery. What is the soul? Where,
where does the soul come into the life, you know,
does God
Uh, you know, the, the, the body is created within
the womb, and then is there a certain point where God,
(31:50):
you know, literally supernaturally touches and imparts the soul. So those,
these are like theological and philosophical questions that have been
asked for centuries. So it sounded like you were saying
that through these ideas, you would come to maybe the conclusion.
That it's through the biological process that the soul is
(32:13):
brought into being. Is that what you were saying?
Speaker 2 (32:15):
Right, exactly. What I do is
The soul is divided into three different theories. And one
comes from origin, one comes from Tertullian, these early theologians
that were back in the 100 to 280. And these individuals,
these guys were smart. They're smart, they had plenty of
(32:37):
time to really
Speaker 1 (32:37):
they were like 1 percenters we were talking
about
Speaker 2 (32:39):
0.001 and this individual, OK, so origin.
had the idea that the soul was created and it
was placed inside of us by God and it sort
of ran around that that track.
Then Aquinas comes along and says, no, that there is
(33:01):
more to it than that. There is a materiality and
an immateriality.
Meaning that there is some substance to it, and there
is some nonsubstance, so we call it a subsistence. And
he said that there is God is involved. So this
Aquinas or this Aquinas, yeah, yeah. And so with Aquinas
was similar to that as well. And that's right. And
so and then you have this Tertullian, who was around
(33:23):
the same time as origin, and his idea was that
there was a materiality and he's one that sort of
set the whole standard for traducing.
And he called it that from the onset. What does
that mean? In the materiality of the soul is exclusive materiality.
And so Norm Geisler holds to that, as well as
some of the other leading the current theologians today. And
(33:45):
so because when we have the 23 chromosomes from the sperm,
23 from the egg, and they fuse together, and within
that fusion, interestingly, the zygote.
I made an impermeable cell at the moment that this
the acrosome or the the portion of the sperm enters
(34:06):
in to the ovum, there is an enzymatic cascade that
happens throughout the membrane so that no other cell or
anything else can enter in, and that individual unit is
where we start to see the emergence of the two
sets of chromosomes forming that 4846 chromosomes.
(34:26):
Um, together, meaning that they're merging, and as these chromosomes
match up, there's a lot of crossing over, meaning that
certain traits from dad, certain ones from mom, are all
coming together and that uh all the 20,000 genes then
become the unique individual. And it's within that space that
(34:47):
all of the punctuation marks, and I say that because
I don't want to say methylation without giving a qualification but,
but it's simply
A lot of these, these um methyl groups come onto
the cytosines of the 4, they have A, T, GNC,
it's the sea that has this open spot that allows
this methyl group to attach and in certain regions, and
(35:09):
it's actually goes from being called a genome, which is
the structure, to now it's the methylome, meaning that's all
of where these methyl groups are scattered in the different
20,000 genes.
That make them unique for the given cells that they
were diff they will differentiate into. So you have the
ovum has none of the punctuation marks. There are some
(35:32):
imprinted punctuation marks from the sperm. So when the father
with some of the punctuation marks coming over to this
clean egg that has none.
There is this imprinted genes can often come across that
will be unique from the father, that will make this
a certain genes silenced in the mom.
(35:54):
And then, OK, so at that moment, the zygo forms,
as I said, that there's 256 different cells that emerge
from that one cell, and all those different cell types
are what are epigenetically driven to make us this unique
being that we have. The challenge can often happen, particularly
in our generations these days, is that in this zygo process,
(36:17):
moving into the individual cells and and ultimately moving into
the various tissues that we have.
Any adversity that occurs either by the mom and the
and the babies in the womb all the way to
7 years old as a child, and because these punctuation
marks are very movable at this point, certain genes can
(36:39):
get affected, i.e., this is kind of where we're seeing
a lot of the uprise, OK, of autism.
And if you're gonna notice, one thing that's really interesting
is the folate was brought up as one of the anecdotes.
Folate is a methylate methyl donator. That's what methyl is
or folates are. Folic acid folate is where we get
(37:01):
the punctuate. That's why it's one of the prenatal vitamins
because it's what gives the access to a number of
these punctuation marks, so that the zygote has enough of
them to punctuate a lot of the genes accurately.
If you don't have enough some genes can get altered
or not turned on or tuned appropriately. The tuning process
is how the proteins are made and generated to make
(37:25):
up who we are and distinctions of who we are.
So a lot of this carryover happens not only in utero,
but all the way up to this early phase of life.
Now also,
If the mom doesn't have much time with the child,
and it doesn't spend, you know, this, there's can be
often these attachment disorders. Well, there are certain genes that
(37:46):
are affected, like oxytocin gene, for example, that will be
altered and the attachment disorders can result in other sort
of maladies as mental disorders as a child grows.
So attachment is so important. So it's these, these concepts
is diet, exercise, all these kind of variables play a
(38:06):
major role in how the genes are accurately punctuated for
the health of the child.
And it's interesting that some of these behavioral genes are
the most malleable, meaning that, you know, like I said,
the brain derived neurotrophic factor has a number of ways
that it could be altered epigenetically and it environment factors
(38:31):
play a major role as well. So, um,
I, I mean, I could go on it, but you
need to read the book, OK, but anyway, are you
followed some of that though?
Speaker 1 (38:42):
You have to read it to me and then,
Speaker 2 (38:43):
OK, I'll make a Kendal version of it. I know
we have one, so yeah,
Speaker 1 (38:47):
um.
OK, so,
So going back to the um
just the idea of um epi epigenetics, you know, something on,
on top of the the genes. So we are um
we are our genes, right? I mean, that's been kind
(39:08):
of the, the theory. And so this is, this is
taking it kind of to a little bit of a
different level. We are our genes, but we might be
something in addition to our genes as well. Is that
it like something that is
Uh, impacted our genes that then results in.
(39:29):
The way we
Behave or or whatever the case might be.
Speaker 2 (39:33):
OK? So in genetics, we have something called the genotype,
and then we have the expression of those genes called
the phenotype. That's been the classic genetics concept. But even
within this phenotype, this expression of the genes, that process
about how this gene goes from the DNA to the RNA,
(39:53):
which also ultimately produces a protein, those basics in
Biochemistry, biology, and so on. Although it sounds confusing initially,
those stages of those acts, environments such as food, it
could be anything, loud noises.
Situations that all of these factors play a major role
(40:19):
in the production of how that protein actually comes out.
And it's because, like you're saying, on top of the genes,
it's a methyl groups, you have another chemistry that is
involved with the chromosomes. And then as I mentioned, this
noncoding RNA which is fascinating because, OK, there's another biological comment,
(40:39):
is that your genome is made up of 6.4 billion
base pairs. That's a lot, if you think about that.
And right, 6.4 billion, and only 20,000 genes on that.
That means that
The genes on this massive genome represent less than 1%
of the entire genome.
(41:01):
This was found out in the 1950s, at the same
time that the genome was solved by Craig Venter and,
you know, this um Francis Collins, they came together in
in 2000, they came up with the human genome and
they realized, oh my gosh, there's so much of the
genome that is just repeat sequences. There's just these little
(41:23):
regions that make no sense whatsoever because there's so many
thousands of repeats, when in fact, they thought that was
junk DNA.
And they realized that, oh my gosh, that doesn't make sense.
Why would it be junk? Why would God make junk
on this? Why would he only put 20,000 genes and
they're only that segment, because all of that other DNA
is facilitating the function of how these genes are expressed,
(41:48):
and that's an epigenetic process.
Because it isn't affecting the structure of those genes, it's
helping them be expressed in that very unique way for
your body, who you are, your family upbringing, the life
you're living, the foods you're eating, the people you're around,
all the variables in my life are conducted by how
(42:11):
our genes function this way.
Speaker 1 (42:13):
So how
does, like practically speaking, what, what would you say? How
does this knowledge.
Help, how is this gonna help? How, how is it
applied like, I mean, this is all, you know, like
heavy science here. And so, you know, for the average person, um,
(42:34):
How, how are you going to apply this and of
course in relation to the gospel salvation.
Speaker 2 (42:45):
So tell us, right, right. And so we often think
that we're just a spirit.
And that's all we are. But when it says in
1 Thessalonians 5:23, it says, Now may this Jesus himself
sanctify you completely, my body's soul and spirit, right? And
so that whole concept means that being sanctified means that
(43:06):
it's doing something yes to my spirit, hungering for the Lord.
It's doing something in my body and my mind by
giving me a greater capacity to learn. What happens when
I meditate on God's word? What is happening to me
biologically when that actually is happening and I'm still and
know that he's God. What it really means in in
Isaiah 263, when it, you know, he will give you
(43:28):
perfect peace when your mind is stayed on him. So
these behavioral genes are very attuned to the spirit.
And it affects the way I grow and understand who
he is in my life. It facilitates my ability to
hear his voice. And it gives me a greater sense
of not only the Holy Spirit.
But it gives me a greater sense of how to
(43:48):
be to respond to conviction and not just develop this
conviction addiction which can often happen when we're so convicted
that we don't do anything about it. It gives us
a knowledge of the impetus to change because they we
see ourselves changing. If we recognize what our bodies are
and what they're doing.
And and being content with your body, that's one of
(44:11):
the key factors here because that discontentedness gives us this
rationale that oh my goodness, this is not the body
I should be in. I should be in a different
body because this is there's a reason why I'm not content.
Well this is where the spiritual warfare all comes in
and how God's designed us to have that level of contentment,
knowing how we take care of our bodies, literally.
(44:32):
And it has a lot to do with our diet,
has a lot to do with exercise, it has a
lot to do with the people we're around. I mean,
Psalm one is very profound when it just starts off
with blessed is the man who walks not in the
counsel of the ungodly. That's the first step, who doesn't
sit with the sinners or uh stands with the sinners
or sits with the scornful. That process is an ongoing.
(44:55):
Situation in our lives all of the time. It's a
constant process as we sort of move our way through
understanding who Jesus is in our life. So it's transformational, literally.
That's why I believe so strongly that that's like you say,
it's a complicated science and it's just some of the
theologies behind, you know, is down there, but we actually
(45:16):
pull it up and look at what it is and
what it's doing to us, the power of confession.
The power of prayer, the power of being in the
presence of God, being with other believers, growing and understanding
the gospel in a different way, gives us a greater
potential to experience who he really is.
Speaker 1 (45:34):
So do you think, like, I'm, I'm thinking of it
from the standpoint of, say, you know, pastoral ministry, counseling,
things like that. So for, for me, if I, um, if,
if I kind of have this as a perspective.
So I'm talking to somebody and they're, uh, you know,
(45:56):
and we've we've both talked to people like this, uh,
many times over the many years that we've been in ministry,
people who just
Don't seem to be able to get over a a hump,
you know, they kind of just keep, you know, sort of,
you know, they, they, they seem to make some progress
and then they just sort of slide back into the,
(46:16):
the same old behaviors and things like that. So if I,
if I have this perspective, it seems to me like
It it would give you more of a holistic approach
to your ministry to that person. So, so versus just saying, um, OK,
(46:38):
you know, that sin, uh, let's, you know, confess that sin,
take your Bible home, read it more, pray more, and
everything is gonna be good. God bless you. And, and we,
we've done that, and then we see, you know, people
struggling still.
But if, if, if I come at it with this perspective,
I realize, and I've done this times, you know, where
(46:59):
I'm talking to somebody and somebody might think that their
problem is rooted in a particular thing, but you get
an insight from the Lord's like, no, that's really not
the problem. The problem is actually over here. And do
you see that as, as this helps you sort of
have a broader
(47:19):
Picture of what might be behind the behavior, so you
can attack it from a bit of a different angle.
Speaker 2 (47:30):
Yeah, exactly. And so like that word of knowledge, for example,
or or the gifts of the spirit in general, that
that sense of, you know, yes, this is probably not
going to be good for you or something along those lines,
but the key being is that.
Taking care of our bodies and our minds specifically is
going to have a consequence. If I'm only going to
(47:52):
be focused on my phone the whole time or I'm
only focused on these kind of things, the learning process, yes,
we know that that's what we always kind of minimize
that because that's just what the way our culture is.
When the fact of the matter is, it does affect
our entirety, it is very holistic. What if I continue
to eat this type of food all the time without thinking.
(48:14):
About what it's doing to me, for example, because you know,
this is why I brought up the folates idea is that,
you know, there is a reason why God designed our
bodies to have a need for vitamin B12, for example,
and ways in which I would integrate that into my
diet and or why blood flow is so important and
why it's important to have my heart rate go up
(48:36):
periodically because it's going to help my lymphatic system. So
all these kind of variables that happen within my body.
Have a big influence on how I think and what
I'm doing with my body in general. So, um,
Speaker 1 (48:51):
and, and then what about something more? I mean, you know,
some of that obviously in our cultural context, we can
control a lot of that we can eat the right
stuff or we can get up and exercise, you know,
some people in the world don't have the.
They don't have the nutritional, um, resources, you know, that
are available to us. So, so let's talk about something
a little more like that we might, you know, be
(49:14):
doing to ourselves like with, uh, phones and those kinds
of things because everybody's acknowledging now that there is a
serious problem in our culture, uh, you know, Jonathan Hay,
you know, wrote that book about the, um, you know, the,
what do they call it, the
Not the age of anxiety, but it's, um, you know,
(49:37):
it just has to do with all of these, these
young kids, the anxious generation, yeah, who basically their whole
lives have been taken over by social media and their
phones and they're, they're all a wreck. So there's some
application
Speaker 2 (49:50):
there is absolutely, absolutely. And this is why we get
to this concept of neuroplasticity and this idea of what
happens with learning, we call it synaptic strengthening. Like if
you practice something and you practice it.
Enough, you develop a greater connection with neurons and you
start to become part of what we call a habit.
And that habit, whether good or bad is going to
(50:13):
be something that just to go to. It's amazing how
often we'll find a phone in our hand. We have
no idea how it got there. And why am I
even looking at this? Because we've trained it so well,
it becomes literally like one of our organs. It is
an organ transplant and that concept though is really becomes
something we've learned. And so the learning mechanism.
It is all based on what an epigenetic phenomenon is,
(50:36):
because it's geared around these molecules, like I said, the
BDNF gene.
That produces this protein that's very involved in how we
get synapses to stick and and and grow new ones,
new connections. So if we change from a phone to
a watch and we started changing it only to a
watch or some other vehicle to do it, our bodies
(50:57):
would adapt to that because we have this addiction to
something that is giving us the pleasure response. So we
get into the dopamine serotonin discussion.
About this idea that, you know, the God I have
it versus that I got it and learning that concept
of contentment and how does that concept come right? Because
you know, one of the greatest ways of explaining the
(51:19):
contentment is looking at some of these early studies that
looked at dopamine and addiction and studying these animals that
were bred for OK for cocaine and they looked at this.
They, they thought, well, that's just the way we're going
to show how we give the cocaine to them at
a certain time of the day, and the rats would
all come running up to it, and they, they always
(51:39):
thought that it was the cocaine that made them addicted
when they realized that the dopamine spike happened just before
the dopamine was given because it was the anticipation that
they're addicted to, not the cocaine.
So there's something about God's implantation of anticipation, like the
presence of God, like we we are addicted to his
(52:01):
presence and the sin that can be so prevalent in
our lives, distorts that and takes down a different path.
So we're anticipating something else instead of the true nature
of who he is when we worship. So.
Um, it's a distorted worship.
Speaker 1 (52:17):
Yeah, amazing. Let's see if we can take one phone
call here before the program ends. Jack and Claremont, go ahead,
we're running out of time, but what's your question for
Doctor Liu Wing?
Thank,
Speaker 2 (52:27):
thank you for taking my call and I appreciate everything. Uh, great,
great conversation. I'm hoping I can add to the conversation. Um,
just more to the future in medical ethics was that, uh,
what would prevent us from, you know, the possibilities of,
you know, going in the right direction, but also to
go in the wrong directions, uh, biblically saying, hey, you know, um,
(52:47):
the addictions we can get erased, but we can splice
in something else that would.
Um, needs something else like, uh, you know, the mark
of the beast type thing, uh, you know, where's the
medical ethics lie in this and religion, where does it
all cross? OK, this is John.
(53:08):
Uh, Jack, Jack, sorry, Jack. OK, Jack, that's a great question.
And let me just encourage you on that gene splicing concept. Remember,
that's the hardware of your DNA. It's different than what
we're talking about now is epigenetics, which is not the
gene itself. It's what's, it's causing the gene to do.
So it's the idea that, like I said earlier, it's
(53:31):
The gene that you're describing is the hardware. And what
I'm talking about with epigenetics is the software, ways that
our environment can change. So the concept of the mark
of the beast being part of the genome is fairly
unlikely because that's that gene getting spliced into us really
isn't going to do anything. It's most likely it will
(53:51):
be turned off because it's your genome knows what belongs
and what doesn't.
I wouldn't worry about that so much as your response
to the mark of the beast in terms of is
there going to be the fear factor that's going to
keep you from it? Is there a fear of God
that's going to keep you from it, or the fear
of man? And often the fact that we're believers right now,
(54:12):
and we're still around during that time, if that actually happens,
we'll make a choice to not take it and let
our consequences be in God's hands and not the enemy's hands.
Speaker 1 (54:23):
So, we just have a minute or so left, but
just so.
With um
Uh, you know, say, say somebody that is struggling with addiction.
What do you say to them in kind of from
this perspective, like what, what would your encouragement be? We
have about
Speaker 2 (54:43):
45 seconds. My encouragement would be is just to look
at your life, look at the environment you're in, and
ask yourself as a believer.
How have I let the word of God dwell in me?
And let God's word come in and practice meditating on
it and see the power that it has by the
(55:04):
power of the Holy Spirit. Give God access to your heart.
That's the greatest I think I can give them right now.
Speaker 1 (55:10):
It's a great way to that's a great moment for
the music to come on. Yes, indeed.
Doctor Liu Wang has been our guest. You can find
his book on Amazon or on his website, which is lumenwing.org.
Lumen is spelled L U M A N, Lumenwing.org, and
you can find the book there again. It's called Jeans
of Eden. This book is a good book about genes. Good,
(55:34):
I was trying to make a reference to that.
Commercial from a few months ago, but anyway, didn't work out.
I should have thought of it. But anyway, Jeans of Eden,
pick it up at lumenwing.org. And, uh, Doctor Wing, great
to see you here in the studio again today. Pastor
Brian Broderson, good to see you as always. Yes, we'll
do it again next week. Yeah, OK, God bless you guys.
We'll see you at church on Sunday and we'll be
back here on Pastor's Perspective on Monday.
Hello and welcome to Pastor's Perspective. I'm your host, Brian Perez.
It is Friday, the last Friday of September, and we
are here live in the studio until 4 o'clock on
this overcast Friday. What is up with that? It's beginning
to look a lot like Christmas or fall or whatever
we're heading into. Give us a call with your questions
(00:37):
about the Bible, the
Christian faith, the weather will answer them all. 888-564-6173 is
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you see the number there on the bottom of your screen.
You can call us or, um, you can scan that
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page on Kwave.com where you can submit your questions.
(00:59):
And online, but the best way to get an answer
is to call in when we're here live because you
guys don't call in. Why are we here? Right, Pastor Brian?
We should just like take the day off if nobody's
gonna call. Well, yes, we, we want people to call that.
Yes we do. We are here, you know, I was
just thinking, Brian, it was a week ago today that the, um,
the love song.
(01:21):
Film was launched on Amazon and actually last Friday night,
Sheryl and I, we watched all three episodes and I
had seen it before, uh, her and I actually, we
saw the very first episode when it was still pretty rough.
They hadn't even finished it yet. We were, uh, invited,
(01:42):
you know, to, to a special showing and then, um,
and then about a month and a half ago, I,
I had the opportunity to watch everything, but then,
They did do some final touches and all that to say,
it was, I think, really, really good. And I, I
think if, if people want to get a, a good sense,
(02:04):
you know, we talk about the Jesus people movement and
of course with the history with Pastor Chuck and Calvert
Chapel and then, um, more recently with the Jesus revolution film.
And, um, where the Jesus Revolution film, of course, is
a dramatization of those events and the life of, of
Greg and Kathy Laurie. Um, this is all just, you know,
(02:28):
live footage of the various, um,
Times that Love Song would be on the road touring
or that they would be at Calver Chapel, Costa Mesa, and,
and you just get a real feel for what um
what was happening back then. So it's super cool, and
I think it's timely too. I think um with everything
(02:49):
going on and with um it seems like there's a
stirring in the in the culture. Um, I've been uh
a little bit of a sidetrack. I've been doing some
preparation because I'm teaching a a course on
Uh, church history, but I'm teaching the Great Awakening in
the 18th century revival. So,
It will, the course will be on revival, but I'm
(03:10):
just kind of revisiting, uh, what happened in the 1st
and 2nd Great Awakening here in the United States, or
wasn't even in the United States during the 1st Awakening,
it was still British colonies. And then the 18th century revival,
which was Wesley and Whitfield in um England, and then
there was stuff going on on the European continent and
(03:30):
all that. But anyway, just
Reading over that stuff again, it's like, wow, man, amazing
times and, you know, we've we've seen some of those
and maybe we'll see some again. So, so anyway, I
think uh a band called Love Song is a good
primer to remind us of what God can do and
get us encouraged to, you know, pray that he will do.
(03:53):
It is a good primer and in fact, it's available
on Prime Video. So, uh, check that out and you
can get more details at a band called Love Song.com,
but yeah, you can check it out on Prime Video.
Very good. All right, so we're supposed to have a
special guest in the studio today, and while we await
his arrival,
I guess we can answer some questions that were sent
in online. No, wait, wait, wait, hold on. There was
(04:13):
another announcement we needed to make. Well, first of all, the,
the course that you're teaching, the, the history course, that's
on Wednesday nights, tell people about starting on October the 8th.
So we have a, um, you know, 3 or 4
times a year we do, um, what's called the gathering,
and these are, um, these are a variety of different
courses that, that you can sign up for. Uh, I
think we have 10 or 12 different options, um, everything from,
(04:39):
you know, like.
Christian doctrine to formation to um family parenting finances and,
and I like I like uh church history, so I
have been doing a series. I think this will be
my 4th 1 on church history and I've I've just
(04:59):
sort of I started actually in the 2nd to 3rd century, so, um.
I'm making my way on through history and we are
in the 17 and 1800s.
And looking at revival. So I'm seeing two different history
classes here. One's the one that you're teaching, and then
there's one called Exploring Arts throughout church history. Yes, so
(05:22):
what's the difference, I mean,
Explain what that one's about. You're not teaching that one.
Well that one, you know what, I have wanted to
go to that one, but you can't because you're teaching. Yeah,
I'm either teaching or I'm out of town. Um, yeah, Alan,
who teaches that one is, um, Alan is really in
some senses a world renowned artist and he is also, uh,
(05:45):
a theologian and he is looking at, you know, art
in connection with church history.
And like I said, I've never been to it, but
I have every confidence that it is a fantastic course. So,
so one of these days I'm gonna get myself in there.
Very good. So yeah, like Brian said, there's about 10
or 12 different courses that you can sign up for
(06:08):
to get all the details. You can go to the
Calvary Chapel Costa Mesa website, CCCM.com/ Wednesday, Wednesday, and, uh,
that'll give you all the details. Look at it. It's interesting. The, uh, OK, so, um,
Bible Club.
Bible Book Club, uh, Class on Proverbs, and then I'm
doing the Great Awakening and revival of the 18th and
(06:30):
19th centuries, and then, um, do well in God's economy.
Ben is one of our board members who is also
a CPA, so he does a great job with that.
And then you mentioned, uh, Alan, um, Berner's class exploring
arts through church history, grounded in God's love. That's gonna
be kind of a
Bit of a new believers course as far as I
(06:53):
know from Jordan and that sounds fantastic uh habits of
a healthy marriage that's a good class, Richard and Valerie Cimino, uh,
they've got lots of years of marital experience and then
Miss and culture being bridge builder. Sean Havilar Shaw is
one of our, our, uh, mission pastors.
And then praying 101. Wow.
(07:13):
That's gonna be a good one. Honesty meeting holiness, yeah,
because we need to pray. Yes, we need to pray honesty. Yeah, honestly, honestly, yep. OK,
that's it. That is it. CCCM.com/ Wednesday to get all
those details. And one last thing that we can mention
is Sunday night at 6:30.
(07:35):
In the fellowship hall at Calvary Chapel, Costa Mesa, uh,
I am resuming our back to basics live through the Bible,
and we are in Acts chapter 19.
And Acts has been fantastic. I love the book of Acts,
so we're just, you know, kind of taking it a
chapter at a time and just digging down deep into
Into the history and then into the uh application for
(07:59):
us today. So, very good. Back to basics. No, back
to Basradio.com/live. That's how you can get details about that.
Sunday nights at 6:30. All right, so let's answer a
question that was sent in online. This one is from Edward.
And it's a follow up to what we were discussing
on yesterday's program, he starts off right away by saying
there is no free will. Why this passage says it's
(08:23):
not the will of men. John 1:12 and 13 states,
but as many as received him to them he gave
the right to become children of God, to those who
believe in His name, who were born not of blood,
nor of the will of the flesh, nor of the
will of man, but of God. So what would you
say to Edward about that passage?
Well, um, that has nothing to do with free will.
(08:45):
It's just expressing that the new birth is a birth
that comes from God. It's not something that we, um,
You know, conjure up, it's not something that we can
produce within ourselves. It is, as it says there, it
is of God, born of God. So, um,
(09:06):
And you're born of God by receiving Christ. So in
that same passage there, um, verse, I mean, uh, you know,
actually right there, uh, in the, in the verse before it,
it says as many as received him to them he
gave gave the power to become the children of God, um,
(09:29):
to those who believed in his name, who were born,
not of the will of the flesh nor the will
of man.
So forth. Um, so, you know, receiving Jesus is in
the context, that is how one is born, you know, earlier,
or not earlier, actually later, Jesus will say, uh, in
the third chapter, it's recorded for us when he's speaking
(09:50):
to Nicodemus, Jesus will say, uh, you must be born again,
and John is giving us a little bit of, uh,
Of a primer to that in in uh chapter one, so.
Has nothing to do with whether man has free will
or not. All right, Edward, thank you for sending in
your question through the pastor's perspective page on Kwave.com. Amber
(10:11):
and Lake Elsinore also has a question about, uh, the gospels, well,
not John, but, uh, Matthew chapter 15. Hey there, Amber,
thanks for calling in today. What's your question?
Hi, I was wondering, so Matthew chapter 15, um, basically
starting in verse 4, but um, where it talks, where
(10:31):
it says in verse 5, he says, um,
Um. Well, I've got it here. I'll just read it. Uh,
for God commanded saying, honor your father and your mother,
and he who curses father or mother, let him be
put to death. But you say, whoever says to his
father or mother, whatever profit you might have received from
me is a gift of God, then he need not
(10:52):
honor his father or mother. Thus you have made the
commandment of God of no effect by your tradition.
Yeah, I was wondering what that tradition was. I didn't
quite understand um the context. OK, that's, that's a good question, Amber. Yeah,
so the tradition that Jesus is talking about is a
tradition that um developed kind of during the inter Testamental period, um,
(11:18):
toward the end there, but it was a tradition that
was an oral tradition that claimed to have been passed
down from Moses as well.
And the Pharisees in particular were the ones who, um,
they were sort of like the gatekeepers of that tradition.
And what Jesus is pointing out to them is that
(11:39):
your tradition is
contradictory to what God said in his word. And Jesus
would say this to them on a few occasions, you know,
you've nullified the word of God by your tradition. Uh,
you teach for doctrine, the commandments of men.
And so it's this um oral law that was um.
(12:03):
Popularized by the rabbinical leaders at the time that Jesus
is referring to there.
Does this help you, Amber?
Yes, yeah, thank you. All right, thanks for calling in
today here on Pastor's Perspective and our very special guest
has arrived. Look
who's here.
Speaker 2 (12:21):
It was miraculous.
Speaker 1 (12:22):
I mean, the, yeah, the last thing we heard you
were like 7073 and something, so you must have got
like teleported.
Speaker 2 (12:28):
The internal portion of my wheel fell off, literally. So I'm,
you know, seriously, I may as well have been transported
here by the Holy Spirit. So obviously I'm supposed to
be here now. Well,
Speaker 1 (12:42):
what about your what about your wheel? Where's your
Speaker 2 (12:44):
wheel? It's being looked at as we speak.
Speaker 1 (12:46):
This is Doctor Liu Wang, by the way, everybody. He's
been on the program before and, uh, he's got a
new book coming out, and that's what we're gonna discuss
for the next several minutes and, uh, might get to
some more phone calls a little bit later on too.
It's been quite a while since we've been in the
studio
together.
Speaker 2 (13:03):
It has, yeah, gosh,
Speaker 1 (13:06):
yeah, a couple of years
Speaker 2 (13:07):
at least, probably, yeah.
Right, right. Well, it's,
Speaker 1 (13:12):
yeah, OK, well, you've been busy since you were here last,
and you wrote a book.
Speaker 2 (13:16):
I did write a book amongst
Speaker 1 (13:17):
other things. Yes,
Speaker 2 (13:18):
that's right. Yeah, yes, San Diego is a different planet.
It's a
Speaker 1 (13:22):
different planet. Yes,
you were, you came here from planet San Diego.
The book is called Genes of Eden, and I love
what it says at the beginning here on on the
Amazon page. What if our deepest struggles with sin and
addiction are embedded in our very biology? And yet so
is the hope for redemption? So what are you saying
(13:44):
in this book, Lu Wing? Yes,
Speaker 2 (13:46):
well, this was one of those opportunities. I've been in
the drug development world for many, many years, and having
sort of come to that resolution that I can no
longer battle this issue any longer.
I have vice presidents selling gene therapies and at the
top of my game, and there was this gnawing sense
of my soul of recognizing that gene therapies, gene editing,
(14:08):
all of which we're doing to the genome, essentially is
a problem not only biologically, but we're messing with something
that I would consider divine.
And that's the human genome, and one of which came
about when we started realizing there was off target toxicity
with new genes that we'd like to introduce into the genome.
(14:28):
And we can never figure out what that toxicity concept
is like, are we turning other genes on? What are
we actually doing? is where is this gene you put
in with within the 6.4 billion base pairs, right? So,
as time went on, and I realized that there was
some phenomenon that's either turning this gene off or regulating it.
It all boiled down to this field of epigenetics, and
(14:50):
epigenetics is the study of how genes are expressed. It's
not the structure of the DNA, it's the actual function
and so it's like, you know, DNA is our hardware
and um epigenetics is a software, so it's all about
how certain molecules on top of DNA.
Are altered to make a gene function the way it is. Well,
(15:13):
that means that environment, whether it be internal or external,
can have a major impact on how this gene functions.
So I extrapolated that into theology, and I started to wonder, uh,
you know, we we're born in sin. As a matter
of fact, Romans 5:12 tells us that we're actually culpable
of the sin of Adam. And so one of the
(15:35):
theologians that explored that the most was Saint Augustine.
Who wrote several documents regarding original sin. It's a very
controversial theology, and yet one of the major factors of
it is, is that he, as a natural philosopher, he
would never have considered himself a theologian, saw that this
was an opportunity for him to explore it, and as
(15:56):
he explored it in 350 to 400 AD, he saw
that there was something somatic happening with genes that with
with um the.
Um, sin in us. He could never explore genomics or
genetics or anything like that, didn't come till centuries later
with Gregor Mendel. And so I looked at his work,
(16:17):
I understood it pre-enlightenment. This has nothing to do with evolution.
It has nothing to do with any of the current
science related to origins. It has everything to do with
how these genes function. And so is and how is
sin embedded in the genome, and further, how is the
soul actually in us?
Biologically, I mean, if we think about these ideas about biologically, like,
(16:42):
you know, how can we even dare ask that, but
now that we have the tools, specifically epigenetics, we can
actually explore this. And so my book explores the theology
first of original sin.
And then I look at epigenetics and look at sort
of how we can have imprinted genes and imprinted gene
function generationally. As a matter of fact, just like as
(17:03):
studies have been ongoing about Holocaust survivors and how there's
been generational sin.
generational trauma within generations, and so they're able to trace
dreams back 3 or 4 generations because there's been this
imprinting of trauma. Well, this imprinted trauma can also reflect
the imprinted soul, and there's aspects of our soul, specifically sin.
(17:26):
That is in our genome, and it is propagated, and
that means that instead of there being a soulmate like
a created soul, or God giving us a soul, this
would infer that there is a traducian concept where the
soul
Is transmitted by the father and the mother, and the
(17:46):
two of them form this unique soul because it's tainted
with sin, and we just know theologically that God, because
He knows no sin, he is not involved with the
the soul at all. He is literally a part of
the growth process and so on, but as far as
the implementation.
According to Romans 5:12, it's part of who we are
(18:09):
in Adam. So looking at that and understanding how that
would be displayed most prominently, especially looking at some of
Augustine's writing, addictive behavior seems to be the most, the
greatest of correlates, just showing and demonstrating that original sin
is really part of who we are. In other words,
we all have within us this moving away from God
(18:32):
at birth, and there's an inherent.
Understanding that this moving away process would be evidence that
we have fallen and even within the context of theology,
there are many examples of we're born in sin and
this um as my mother conceived me and so we
have this, you know, distorted soul and distorted behavior that
(18:55):
is this ongoing process until this concept of redemption.
And so redemptive qualities, and I sort of look at
the cycle of addiction versus the cycle of redemption. I
look at 2 Peter chapter 1 and looking at add
to your faith, virtue and virtue, knowledge and knowledge, self-control,
and so on. All of those segments, those eight different
(19:16):
segments that produce love is a cycle of redemption. It's
one of the best anecdotes for getting out of the
cycle of addiction. So all I have to say is
that within this book, this book is a primer.
It's one that I've done with a publisher called Whi
and Stock. It's a um a theology um focused primarily publisher,
(19:40):
and they believed me on the science and they struggle
with some of these concepts, and yet they finally came
to the realization that epigenetics is actually a science that
could absolutely explore this. And I've had some um validation
from theologians at Aberdeen University, at Fuller Seminary and so on.
And these individuals have provided um endorsements and so on.
Speaker 1 (20:02):
So
epigenetics means like on top of
genetics,
Speaker 2 (20:06):
yeah, yeah, that would be inferring that, yes. And so
it has nothing to do with the actual genes structure, right?
So like A T G and C are the molecules
make up DNA, right? And so that looks like Jurassic Park,
you saw that. And so what we see.
You know, the the sea of all those has a
little place where a methyl group can attach, and a
(20:29):
methyl group is where it would block any kind of
outside molecules from turning or tuning the gene. So you
can see how it's a gene can be silenced. What
does that say? That says you have the same exact
sequence of DNA in every single one of the cells
of your body.
Then how do you get a kidney cell? How do
(20:49):
you get a liver cell or a neuron with the
same sequence of DNA? It's an epigenetic phenomenon where certain
genes are silenced.
Meaning that an epigenetic phenomena, i.e., methylation or there can
be what are called noncoding RNAs, literally turn off a
gene that silences it completely. So like every man is
(21:12):
born with two X chromosomes, but one of the X's
is silenced.
Which brings up a lot of interesting concepts about some
of these problems we're having with the variations in this
choice of sex and so on, because there is this
challenge of epigenetics related to that. Also with any kind
of sexual deviations and and any kind.
(21:33):
There is an epigenetic phenomenon. Although the science may be complicated,
that's one of the reasons why I put out this
first book as a primer to give an overall picture
of what this paradigm is. And once I have that settled,
I'm moving to the next one that's going to bring
in the book of Leviticus to understand how this is
incorporated into a holy life.
Speaker 1 (21:54):
Wow,
Speaker 2 (21:55):
it's so I'm,
Speaker 1 (21:56):
I'm glad I'm looking at that book and I'm glad
it's is, um, I'm, I'm glad it's maybe like uh
120 pages, 150 pages, yeah, yeah, that's.
That
Speaker 2 (22:09):
I wrote it for you, Brian.
Speaker 1 (22:12):
Yeah, I
Speaker 2 (22:12):
like
Speaker 1 (22:13):
all, all books.
Speaker 2 (22:13):
You're actually in my acknowledgement, so I just, just, you know,
Speaker 1 (22:17):
OK,
so Lou, just let's just back up just a tiny
bit because I think it would be great for because,
you know, there's probably like 1% of the people that
are listening to us today.
That understood, uh, what you were saying. So I think
it would be good just to go back a little
bit and just tell us, you know, tell us a
(22:39):
little bit about yourself and how, I mean, you're talking
some serious science stuff here, you're obviously talking theology.
As well, so kind of give our listeners a little
bit of background and, and again, you've been on the
program before back back in 2020, we were on a
lot talking about COVID and all of that stuff, but
uh it's been a while. So could you reintroduce
(23:01):
yourself?
Speaker 2 (23:01):
Absolutely, yes, Lumen wing and I have been in the
ministry for over 30 years. Um, one of the fascinations
to me is the understanding of science and the Bible.
And so I have a PhD in biochemistry from the
University of Aberdeen in Scotland. I studied blood coagulation there,
(23:24):
and that opened up the door for understanding blood in
deeper ways, biologically and theologically. So that sort of tied
into this understanding and how we sort of positioned Leviticus
within the word of God. And then, you know, after
being in the biotechnology community for several years as a consultant.
Um, I'm a toxicologist by trade, and I studied cell
(23:45):
and gene therapies and so on. One of the areas
that it continued to really just eat my soul apart
was to try to solve this issue in in epigenetics
because it was such a biological issue in the drug
development world, which it still is. And I wanted to
know and understand how I could connect this the most
appropriately and the most with strengthening it with a theological paradigm.
(24:10):
So I went back to my alma mater. I went
to one of phenomenal theology school, and I studied under
Brian Brock, who was the um moral theology professor there,
and I worked alongside him. And as we developed this thesis,
and it was originally called theological epigenetics, and I thought
that's a little bit tough for the like you're saying,
(24:31):
the 1 percenter that was 0.01 percenter. So that, you know,
this is really looking at original sin and it's and it's.
Place and so after retirement, I finally was able to
take this this thesis that I had written for another
graduate degree and bring it into a practical application in
addiction and addictive discovery and so on and so that's
(24:53):
kind of where my truck has been and so.
Speaker 1 (24:56):
Yeah, and so, um, you know, this is so fascinating
because as you're talking about Augustine or Augustine, um, and
you're talking about, you know, a 4th century philosopher theologian,
and you're and and you're talking about that he was.
He was having insight into some of these things, even then, yet,
(25:21):
of course, the, the science hadn't yet arrived that would
give him the, of course, you know, the genome and,
and all of that. He didn't do any of that.
But he could, he could see it through observation,
Speaker 2 (25:36):
exactly, exactly, that's exactly right. And he struggled it within himself.
So when you look at and study.
Book of confessions, you see all this coming out, City
of God, and some of his writings to the Pelagians
and even as as unfinished work to Julian is what
I really use the most. And in one paragraph, he
even says just that, he says, who could ever even
(25:57):
explain in words this understanding of how sin is in us?
And by even saying that, I take that literally, literally,
I said, here is an opportunity to actually answer that dilemma.
Millennia later, and that's why this book, I believe is
so profound because it brings about this connection pre-enlightenment. It
(26:17):
has nothing to do with how we got here from
the origin's perspective. It has everything to do with the
human condition as it has been known. Since the time
of Jesus, there was never an inference of any kind
of phylogenic origins or so on. It had everything to
do with his person. I've had many discussions, many debates with.
Colleagues of mine who just simply can't let go of
(26:40):
their the theistic evolution or the people even pinned me
as that. I said, this has nothing to do with
that concept, has everything to do with how God designed
our genome to be in fellowship with him. They're they're
tuned to him, literally. So there's a spiritual factor involved.
So when we confess our sin, he's faithful and just
(27:00):
to forgive, and that concept of forgiveness actually has an epigenetic.
Uh, in the concept, there's one gene called the brain
derived neurotropic factor that's involved with neuroplasticity and like how
we learn and so on. It's very dynamic, it's very
malleable in terms of environment that we live in.
And this particular gene can get stuck with concepts with unforgiveness.
(27:26):
There's like literally a scientific paper that's looked at religiosity, forgiveness,
and the BDNF gene, and it's all an epigenetic phenomenon.
So there is current science that already addressing this. I'm
bringing in the theology to do just that.
Speaker 1 (27:41):
And, and so I mean, it sounds like this there's
a little bit of that idea that um you can
actually alter your brain.
Chemistry or whatever it is through behaviors or through thought
processes,
Speaker 2 (27:55):
precisely, it's choices and it's a willingness to really what
happens when we're still and know that he's God. There's
an epigenetic alteration that really because there's a plasticity to it,
it is able to be altered and this is how
we develop sanctification, how that actually is within our body.
Speaker 1 (28:13):
Wow, did you get that, bro? Yes, of course.
I'm gonna come up with my paper afterwards. Um, no,
so if you've got questions about this, give us a
call at 888-564-6173. I think it's good to talk about
the fact that, and we're coming up to our break, but, um, uh,
like when it comes to addictions and things like that,
and these are things, let's just, let's just take, you know,
(28:35):
drinking as an example, and people have been doing this
for years, 30, 40 years. They have that come to
Jesus experience.
And some of their addictions go away, but there's the
ones that just stick around and they're just like wondering
what is it? So you're saying that the brain can
be taught to not want those things anymore.
Speaker 2 (28:55):
Your
brain can be rewired literally following an epigenetic.
Speaker 1 (29:01):
And, and I think Lou too, this will be great
to talk about.
Um, you know, the idea, I mean, we, you know,
I think most of us understand like addiction to a substance,
but of course we've discovered that there's addictions to non-substances. There's,
you know, pornography is not, you know, or gambling or something.
Like that, exactly.
Speaker 2 (29:22):
So
Speaker 1 (29:22):
can't
Speaker 2 (29:22):
wait
Speaker 1 (29:23):
to have it. Yeah, let's talk about that or our
phones or social media or man, there's just, there's just
so many things now that we can get addicted to. Yeah,
the phone is, uh, you talk to my wife and
she will tell you that I am, she thinks I'm addicted.
I don't. I think she's addicted to her phone.
All right, gonna take a quick break and then we will, uh,
come back with our guest, Doctor Liu Wang. His new
(29:44):
book is available on Amazon. It is called Gans of Eden, and, uh,
Lou's full name, his first name is Luman. You can, uh,
find him L U M A N, Lumen Wing on Amazon,
and this book is titled Gans of Eden. We'll be
back in just a little bit, 888-564-6173.
(30:17):
All right, we're back on Pastor's Perspective, 888-564-6173. Brian Perez
here along with Pastor Brian Broderson from Echoes of Mercy.com.
He also teaches on Sunday nights at Calvary Chapel, Costa Mesa.
6:30 is the start time, and you hear him here
on the radio back to Basics Radio, uh, 3 times
a day, Monday through Friday here on Kwave. And we've
(30:40):
got a special guest in the studio. It's Doctor Liu Wang,
who has written a new
book called Jeans of Eden, and, uh, jeans, as in
G E N E S, not blue jeans, not denim.
That's not what we're talking about here on the program today.
Jeans of Eden, and you can also, I mentioned you
can get it on Amazon, but it's also available on
Doctor Wing's website, which is lumenwing.org. And again, Lumen is
(31:04):
spelled L U M A N. So Lumen Wing.org. You
can find out all about Dr. Wing there and, uh,
purchase his book.
OK, so, um, coming back to some of the stuff
that we were talking about a moment ago, um, Lou, I, OK, I,
you said something and I wanna, I wanna see if
I got what you were saying about, um, about the soul.
(31:28):
So it seemed like what you said, because this of
course has been a massive mystery. What is the soul? Where,
where does the soul come into the life, you know,
does God
Uh, you know, the, the, the body is created within
the womb, and then is there a certain point where God,
(31:50):
you know, literally supernaturally touches and imparts the soul. So those,
these are like theological and philosophical questions that have been
asked for centuries. So it sounded like you were saying
that through these ideas, you would come to maybe the conclusion.
That it's through the biological process that the soul is
(32:13):
brought into being. Is that what you were saying?
Speaker 2 (32:15):
Right, exactly. What I do is
The soul is divided into three different theories. And one
comes from origin, one comes from Tertullian, these early theologians
that were back in the 100 to 280. And these individuals,
these guys were smart. They're smart, they had plenty of
(32:37):
time to really
Speaker 1 (32:37):
they were like 1 percenters we were talking
about
Speaker 2 (32:39):
0.001 and this individual, OK, so origin.
had the idea that the soul was created and it
was placed inside of us by God and it sort
of ran around that that track.
Then Aquinas comes along and says, no, that there is
(33:01):
more to it than that. There is a materiality and
an immateriality.
Meaning that there is some substance to it, and there
is some nonsubstance, so we call it a subsistence. And
he said that there is God is involved. So this
Aquinas or this Aquinas, yeah, yeah. And so with Aquinas
was similar to that as well. And that's right. And
so and then you have this Tertullian, who was around
(33:23):
the same time as origin, and his idea was that
there was a materiality and he's one that sort of
set the whole standard for traducing.
And he called it that from the onset. What does
that mean? In the materiality of the soul is exclusive materiality.
And so Norm Geisler holds to that, as well as
some of the other leading the current theologians today. And
(33:45):
so because when we have the 23 chromosomes from the sperm,
23 from the egg, and they fuse together, and within
that fusion, interestingly, the zygote.
I made an impermeable cell at the moment that this
the acrosome or the the portion of the sperm enters
(34:06):
in to the ovum, there is an enzymatic cascade that
happens throughout the membrane so that no other cell or
anything else can enter in, and that individual unit is
where we start to see the emergence of the two
sets of chromosomes forming that 4846 chromosomes.
(34:26):
Um, together, meaning that they're merging, and as these chromosomes
match up, there's a lot of crossing over, meaning that
certain traits from dad, certain ones from mom, are all
coming together and that uh all the 20,000 genes then
become the unique individual. And it's within that space that
(34:47):
all of the punctuation marks, and I say that because
I don't want to say methylation without giving a qualification but,
but it's simply
A lot of these, these um methyl groups come onto
the cytosines of the 4, they have A, T, GNC,
it's the sea that has this open spot that allows
this methyl group to attach and in certain regions, and
(35:09):
it's actually goes from being called a genome, which is
the structure, to now it's the methylome, meaning that's all
of where these methyl groups are scattered in the different
20,000 genes.
That make them unique for the given cells that they
were diff they will differentiate into. So you have the
ovum has none of the punctuation marks. There are some
(35:32):
imprinted punctuation marks from the sperm. So when the father
with some of the punctuation marks coming over to this
clean egg that has none.
There is this imprinted genes can often come across that
will be unique from the father, that will make this
a certain genes silenced in the mom.
(35:54):
And then, OK, so at that moment, the zygo forms,
as I said, that there's 256 different cells that emerge
from that one cell, and all those different cell types
are what are epigenetically driven to make us this unique
being that we have. The challenge can often happen, particularly
in our generations these days, is that in this zygo process,
(36:17):
moving into the individual cells and and ultimately moving into
the various tissues that we have.
Any adversity that occurs either by the mom and the
and the babies in the womb all the way to
7 years old as a child, and because these punctuation
marks are very movable at this point, certain genes can
(36:39):
get affected, i.e., this is kind of where we're seeing
a lot of the uprise, OK, of autism.
And if you're gonna notice, one thing that's really interesting
is the folate was brought up as one of the anecdotes.
Folate is a methylate methyl donator. That's what methyl is
or folates are. Folic acid folate is where we get
(37:01):
the punctuate. That's why it's one of the prenatal vitamins
because it's what gives the access to a number of
these punctuation marks, so that the zygote has enough of
them to punctuate a lot of the genes accurately.
If you don't have enough some genes can get altered
or not turned on or tuned appropriately. The tuning process
is how the proteins are made and generated to make
(37:25):
up who we are and distinctions of who we are.
So a lot of this carryover happens not only in utero,
but all the way up to this early phase of life.
Now also,
If the mom doesn't have much time with the child,
and it doesn't spend, you know, this, there's can be
often these attachment disorders. Well, there are certain genes that
(37:46):
are affected, like oxytocin gene, for example, that will be
altered and the attachment disorders can result in other sort
of maladies as mental disorders as a child grows.
So attachment is so important. So it's these, these concepts
is diet, exercise, all these kind of variables play a
(38:06):
major role in how the genes are accurately punctuated for
the health of the child.
And it's interesting that some of these behavioral genes are
the most malleable, meaning that, you know, like I said,
the brain derived neurotrophic factor has a number of ways
that it could be altered epigenetically and it environment factors
(38:31):
play a major role as well. So, um,
I, I mean, I could go on it, but you
need to read the book, OK, but anyway, are you
followed some of that though?
Speaker 1 (38:42):
You have to read it to me and then,
Speaker 2 (38:43):
OK, I'll make a Kendal version of it. I know
we have one, so yeah,
Speaker 1 (38:47):
um.
OK, so,
So going back to the um
just the idea of um epi epigenetics, you know, something on,
on top of the the genes. So we are um
we are our genes, right? I mean, that's been kind
(39:08):
of the, the theory. And so this is, this is
taking it kind of to a little bit of a
different level. We are our genes, but we might be
something in addition to our genes as well. Is that
it like something that is
Uh, impacted our genes that then results in.
(39:29):
The way we
Behave or or whatever the case might be.
Speaker 2 (39:33):
OK? So in genetics, we have something called the genotype,
and then we have the expression of those genes called
the phenotype. That's been the classic genetics concept. But even
within this phenotype, this expression of the genes, that process
about how this gene goes from the DNA to the RNA,
(39:53):
which also ultimately produces a protein, those basics in
Biochemistry, biology, and so on. Although it sounds confusing initially,
those stages of those acts, environments such as food, it
could be anything, loud noises.
Situations that all of these factors play a major role
(40:19):
in the production of how that protein actually comes out.
And it's because, like you're saying, on top of the genes,
it's a methyl groups, you have another chemistry that is
involved with the chromosomes. And then as I mentioned, this
noncoding RNA which is fascinating because, OK, there's another biological comment,
(40:39):
is that your genome is made up of 6.4 billion
base pairs. That's a lot, if you think about that.
And right, 6.4 billion, and only 20,000 genes on that.
That means that
The genes on this massive genome represent less than 1%
of the entire genome.
(41:01):
This was found out in the 1950s, at the same
time that the genome was solved by Craig Venter and,
you know, this um Francis Collins, they came together in
in 2000, they came up with the human genome and
they realized, oh my gosh, there's so much of the
genome that is just repeat sequences. There's just these little
(41:23):
regions that make no sense whatsoever because there's so many
thousands of repeats, when in fact, they thought that was
junk DNA.
And they realized that, oh my gosh, that doesn't make sense.
Why would it be junk? Why would God make junk
on this? Why would he only put 20,000 genes and
they're only that segment, because all of that other DNA
is facilitating the function of how these genes are expressed,
(41:48):
and that's an epigenetic process.
Because it isn't affecting the structure of those genes, it's
helping them be expressed in that very unique way for
your body, who you are, your family upbringing, the life
you're living, the foods you're eating, the people you're around,
all the variables in my life are conducted by how
(42:11):
our genes function this way.
Speaker 1 (42:13):
So how
does, like practically speaking, what, what would you say? How
does this knowledge.
Help, how is this gonna help? How, how is it
applied like, I mean, this is all, you know, like
heavy science here. And so, you know, for the average person, um,
(42:34):
How, how are you going to apply this and of
course in relation to the gospel salvation.
Speaker 2 (42:45):
So tell us, right, right. And so we often think
that we're just a spirit.
And that's all we are. But when it says in
1 Thessalonians 5:23, it says, Now may this Jesus himself
sanctify you completely, my body's soul and spirit, right? And
so that whole concept means that being sanctified means that
(43:06):
it's doing something yes to my spirit, hungering for the Lord.
It's doing something in my body and my mind by
giving me a greater capacity to learn. What happens when
I meditate on God's word? What is happening to me
biologically when that actually is happening and I'm still and
know that he's God. What it really means in in
Isaiah 263, when it, you know, he will give you
(43:28):
perfect peace when your mind is stayed on him. So
these behavioral genes are very attuned to the spirit.
And it affects the way I grow and understand who
he is in my life. It facilitates my ability to
hear his voice. And it gives me a greater sense
of not only the Holy Spirit.
But it gives me a greater sense of how to
(43:48):
be to respond to conviction and not just develop this
conviction addiction which can often happen when we're so convicted
that we don't do anything about it. It gives us
a knowledge of the impetus to change because they we
see ourselves changing. If we recognize what our bodies are
and what they're doing.
And and being content with your body, that's one of
(44:11):
the key factors here because that discontentedness gives us this
rationale that oh my goodness, this is not the body
I should be in. I should be in a different
body because this is there's a reason why I'm not content.
Well this is where the spiritual warfare all comes in
and how God's designed us to have that level of contentment,
knowing how we take care of our bodies, literally.
(44:32):
And it has a lot to do with our diet,
has a lot to do with exercise, it has a
lot to do with the people we're around. I mean,
Psalm one is very profound when it just starts off
with blessed is the man who walks not in the
counsel of the ungodly. That's the first step, who doesn't
sit with the sinners or uh stands with the sinners
or sits with the scornful. That process is an ongoing.
(44:55):
Situation in our lives all of the time. It's a
constant process as we sort of move our way through
understanding who Jesus is in our life. So it's transformational, literally.
That's why I believe so strongly that that's like you say,
it's a complicated science and it's just some of the
theologies behind, you know, is down there, but we actually
(45:16):
pull it up and look at what it is and
what it's doing to us, the power of confession.
The power of prayer, the power of being in the
presence of God, being with other believers, growing and understanding
the gospel in a different way, gives us a greater
potential to experience who he really is.
Speaker 1 (45:34):
So do you think, like, I'm, I'm thinking of it
from the standpoint of, say, you know, pastoral ministry, counseling,
things like that. So for, for me, if I, um, if,
if I kind of have this as a perspective.
So I'm talking to somebody and they're, uh, you know,
(45:56):
and we've we've both talked to people like this, uh,
many times over the many years that we've been in ministry,
people who just
Don't seem to be able to get over a a hump,
you know, they kind of just keep, you know, sort of,
you know, they, they, they seem to make some progress
and then they just sort of slide back into the,
(46:16):
the same old behaviors and things like that. So if I,
if I have this perspective, it seems to me like
It it would give you more of a holistic approach
to your ministry to that person. So, so versus just saying, um, OK,
(46:38):
you know, that sin, uh, let's, you know, confess that sin,
take your Bible home, read it more, pray more, and
everything is gonna be good. God bless you. And, and we,
we've done that, and then we see, you know, people
struggling still.
But if, if, if I come at it with this perspective,
I realize, and I've done this times, you know, where
(46:59):
I'm talking to somebody and somebody might think that their
problem is rooted in a particular thing, but you get
an insight from the Lord's like, no, that's really not
the problem. The problem is actually over here. And do
you see that as, as this helps you sort of
have a broader
(47:19):
Picture of what might be behind the behavior, so you
can attack it from a bit of a different angle.
Speaker 2 (47:30):
Yeah, exactly. And so like that word of knowledge, for example,
or or the gifts of the spirit in general, that
that sense of, you know, yes, this is probably not
going to be good for you or something along those lines,
but the key being is that.
Taking care of our bodies and our minds specifically is
going to have a consequence. If I'm only going to
(47:52):
be focused on my phone the whole time or I'm
only focused on these kind of things, the learning process, yes,
we know that that's what we always kind of minimize
that because that's just what the way our culture is.
When the fact of the matter is, it does affect
our entirety, it is very holistic. What if I continue
to eat this type of food all the time without thinking.
(48:14):
About what it's doing to me, for example, because you know,
this is why I brought up the folates idea is that,
you know, there is a reason why God designed our
bodies to have a need for vitamin B12, for example,
and ways in which I would integrate that into my
diet and or why blood flow is so important and
why it's important to have my heart rate go up
(48:36):
periodically because it's going to help my lymphatic system. So
all these kind of variables that happen within my body.
Have a big influence on how I think and what
I'm doing with my body in general. So, um,
Speaker 1 (48:51):
and, and then what about something more? I mean, you know,
some of that obviously in our cultural context, we can
control a lot of that we can eat the right
stuff or we can get up and exercise, you know,
some people in the world don't have the.
They don't have the nutritional, um, resources, you know, that
are available to us. So, so let's talk about something
a little more like that we might, you know, be
(49:14):
doing to ourselves like with, uh, phones and those kinds
of things because everybody's acknowledging now that there is a
serious problem in our culture, uh, you know, Jonathan Hay,
you know, wrote that book about the, um, you know, the,
what do they call it, the
Not the age of anxiety, but it's, um, you know,
(49:37):
it just has to do with all of these, these
young kids, the anxious generation, yeah, who basically their whole
lives have been taken over by social media and their
phones and they're, they're all a wreck. So there's some
application
Speaker 2 (49:50):
there is absolutely, absolutely. And this is why we get
to this concept of neuroplasticity and this idea of what
happens with learning, we call it synaptic strengthening. Like if
you practice something and you practice it.
Enough, you develop a greater connection with neurons and you
start to become part of what we call a habit.
And that habit, whether good or bad is going to
(50:13):
be something that just to go to. It's amazing how
often we'll find a phone in our hand. We have
no idea how it got there. And why am I
even looking at this? Because we've trained it so well,
it becomes literally like one of our organs. It is
an organ transplant and that concept though is really becomes
something we've learned. And so the learning mechanism.
It is all based on what an epigenetic phenomenon is,
(50:36):
because it's geared around these molecules, like I said, the
BDNF gene.
That produces this protein that's very involved in how we
get synapses to stick and and and grow new ones,
new connections. So if we change from a phone to
a watch and we started changing it only to a
watch or some other vehicle to do it, our bodies
(50:57):
would adapt to that because we have this addiction to
something that is giving us the pleasure response. So we
get into the dopamine serotonin discussion.
About this idea that, you know, the God I have
it versus that I got it and learning that concept
of contentment and how does that concept come right? Because
you know, one of the greatest ways of explaining the
(51:19):
contentment is looking at some of these early studies that
looked at dopamine and addiction and studying these animals that
were bred for OK for cocaine and they looked at this.
They, they thought, well, that's just the way we're going
to show how we give the cocaine to them at
a certain time of the day, and the rats would
all come running up to it, and they, they always
(51:39):
thought that it was the cocaine that made them addicted
when they realized that the dopamine spike happened just before
the dopamine was given because it was the anticipation that
they're addicted to, not the cocaine.
So there's something about God's implantation of anticipation, like the
presence of God, like we we are addicted to his
(52:01):
presence and the sin that can be so prevalent in
our lives, distorts that and takes down a different path.
So we're anticipating something else instead of the true nature
of who he is when we worship. So.
Um, it's a distorted worship.
Speaker 1 (52:17):
Yeah, amazing. Let's see if we can take one phone
call here before the program ends. Jack and Claremont, go ahead,
we're running out of time, but what's your question for
Doctor Liu Wing?
Thank,
Speaker 2 (52:27):
thank you for taking my call and I appreciate everything. Uh, great,
great conversation. I'm hoping I can add to the conversation. Um,
just more to the future in medical ethics was that, uh,
what would prevent us from, you know, the possibilities of,
you know, going in the right direction, but also to
go in the wrong directions, uh, biblically saying, hey, you know, um,
(52:47):
the addictions we can get erased, but we can splice
in something else that would.
Um, needs something else like, uh, you know, the mark
of the beast type thing, uh, you know, where's the
medical ethics lie in this and religion, where does it
all cross? OK, this is John.
(53:08):
Uh, Jack, Jack, sorry, Jack. OK, Jack, that's a great question.
And let me just encourage you on that gene splicing concept. Remember,
that's the hardware of your DNA. It's different than what
we're talking about now is epigenetics, which is not the
gene itself. It's what's, it's causing the gene to do.
So it's the idea that, like I said earlier, it's
(53:31):
The gene that you're describing is the hardware. And what
I'm talking about with epigenetics is the software, ways that
our environment can change. So the concept of the mark
of the beast being part of the genome is fairly
unlikely because that's that gene getting spliced into us really
isn't going to do anything. It's most likely it will
(53:51):
be turned off because it's your genome knows what belongs
and what doesn't.
I wouldn't worry about that so much as your response
to the mark of the beast in terms of is
there going to be the fear factor that's going to
keep you from it? Is there a fear of God
that's going to keep you from it, or the fear
of man? And often the fact that we're believers right now,
(54:12):
and we're still around during that time, if that actually happens,
we'll make a choice to not take it and let
our consequences be in God's hands and not the enemy's hands.
Speaker 1 (54:23):
So, we just have a minute or so left, but
just so.
With um
Uh, you know, say, say somebody that is struggling with addiction.
What do you say to them in kind of from
this perspective, like what, what would your encouragement be? We
have about
Speaker 2 (54:43):
45 seconds. My encouragement would be is just to look
at your life, look at the environment you're in, and
ask yourself as a believer.
How have I let the word of God dwell in me?
And let God's word come in and practice meditating on
it and see the power that it has by the
(55:04):
power of the Holy Spirit. Give God access to your heart.
That's the greatest I think I can give them right now.
Speaker 1 (55:10):
It's a great way to that's a great moment for
the music to come on. Yes, indeed.
Doctor Liu Wang has been our guest. You can find
his book on Amazon or on his website, which is lumenwing.org.
Lumen is spelled L U M A N, Lumenwing.org, and
you can find the book there again. It's called Jeans
of Eden. This book is a good book about genes. Good,
(55:34):
I was trying to make a reference to that.
Commercial from a few months ago, but anyway, didn't work out.
I should have thought of it. But anyway, Jeans of Eden,
pick it up at lumenwing.org. And, uh, Doctor Wing, great
to see you here in the studio again today. Pastor
Brian Broderson, good to see you as always. Yes, we'll
do it again next week. Yeah, OK, God bless you guys.
We'll see you at church on Sunday and we'll be
back here on Pastor's Perspective on Monday.
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