Wednesday, July 30, 2008
Tuesday, July 29, 2008
The vast southwest desert region of North America contains many fascinating wild plants, but none are more intriguing than the Mexican jumping bean. Jumping beans are commonly sold in novelty shops and by street vendors on both sides of the border, and probably everyone has marveled at their erratic movements, or heard a fabulous tale about them. In the regions where they grow wild, they are often collected by children and sold to local dealers who export them to the United States. The actual jumping "bean" is not a bean at all. It is produced by a native shrub or small tree that grows wild in the deserts of mainland Mexico and in the rugged Cape region of Baja California.
An assortment of Mexican jumping beans. They are actually the separate sections (carpels) of seed capsules from the Mexican shrub (Sebastiana pavoniana).
The common jumping beans sold in novelty shops throughout the southwestern United States come from a deciduous shrub (Sebastiana pavoniana) with dark green, leathery leaves that turn red during the winter months. The jumping bean shrubs grow on rocky desert slopes and along arroyos in the region of the Rio Mayo in the states of Sonora and Chihuahua. One of the best places to see this shrub is in the vicinity of Alamos, Mexico, known locally as the "jumping bean capital of the world." Mr. WOLFFIA (the editor of WAYNE'S WORD) recently photographed this interesting shrub in canyons of the Sierra de la Laguna in the Cape region of Baja California. By late winter the shrubs become a blaze of red, in sharp contrast with the beautiful green fan palms (Erythea brandegeei). Another lesser-known jumping bean shrub (Sapium biloculare) is sometimes called the Arizona jumping bean, although it is by no means limited to Arizona. The Arizona jumping bean occurs along washes and rocky slopes from the vicinity of Ajo, Arizona, south through the desert areas of Sonora, Mexico and Baja California. It also occurs on some of the islands in the Gulf of California. Like many other members of the diverse Euphorbia Family (Euphorbiaceae), freshly cut stems of both species of jumping bean shrubs exude a poisonous milky sap. In fact, several tribes of native Indians reportedly used the sap to poison their arrow tips. In Mexico the shrubs are sometimes called "yerba de la flecha," which translated means herb of the arrow.
Showy red clumps of Mexican jumping bean shrubs (Sebastiana pavoniana) and stately fan palms (Erythea brandegeei) dot a canyon bottom of Sierra de la Laguna in the rugged Cape region of Baja California.
Probably the most interesting thing about Mexican jumping bean shrubs are the remarkable "beans" that jerk and roll about with seemingly perpetual motion. It is doubtful (or very rare) that they actually "jump" above the surface of the ground, but they can certainly roll and tumble along in different directions. Just as pineapples are not apples and peanuts are not nuts, the jumping bean is not a bean, nor is it a seed. It is actually a small, thin-shelled section of a seed capsule containing the larva of a small gray moth called the jumping bean moth (Laspeyresia saltitans). After consuming the seed within the capsule section, the robust, yellowish-white larva has the peculiar habit of throwing itself forcibly from one wall to the other, thereby causing the jumping movements of the capsule. Mexican jumping bean capsules typically separate into three parts or sections, some of which contain a moth larva. It is these separate sections (technically called carpels) that are sold as "jumping beans."
An assortment of Mexican jumping beans. They are actually the separate sections (carpels) of seed capsules from the Mexican shrub (Sebastiana pavoniana).
The common jumping beans sold in novelty shops throughout the southwestern United States come from a deciduous shrub (Sebastiana pavoniana) with dark green, leathery leaves that turn red during the winter months. The jumping bean shrubs grow on rocky desert slopes and along arroyos in the region of the Rio Mayo in the states of Sonora and Chihuahua. One of the best places to see this shrub is in the vicinity of Alamos, Mexico, known locally as the "jumping bean capital of the world." Mr. WOLFFIA (the editor of WAYNE'S WORD) recently photographed this interesting shrub in canyons of the Sierra de la Laguna in the Cape region of Baja California. By late winter the shrubs become a blaze of red, in sharp contrast with the beautiful green fan palms (Erythea brandegeei). Another lesser-known jumping bean shrub (Sapium biloculare) is sometimes called the Arizona jumping bean, although it is by no means limited to Arizona. The Arizona jumping bean occurs along washes and rocky slopes from the vicinity of Ajo, Arizona, south through the desert areas of Sonora, Mexico and Baja California. It also occurs on some of the islands in the Gulf of California. Like many other members of the diverse Euphorbia Family (Euphorbiaceae), freshly cut stems of both species of jumping bean shrubs exude a poisonous milky sap. In fact, several tribes of native Indians reportedly used the sap to poison their arrow tips. In Mexico the shrubs are sometimes called "yerba de la flecha," which translated means herb of the arrow.
Showy red clumps of Mexican jumping bean shrubs (Sebastiana pavoniana) and stately fan palms (Erythea brandegeei) dot a canyon bottom of Sierra de la Laguna in the rugged Cape region of Baja California.
Probably the most interesting thing about Mexican jumping bean shrubs are the remarkable "beans" that jerk and roll about with seemingly perpetual motion. It is doubtful (or very rare) that they actually "jump" above the surface of the ground, but they can certainly roll and tumble along in different directions. Just as pineapples are not apples and peanuts are not nuts, the jumping bean is not a bean, nor is it a seed. It is actually a small, thin-shelled section of a seed capsule containing the larva of a small gray moth called the jumping bean moth (Laspeyresia saltitans). After consuming the seed within the capsule section, the robust, yellowish-white larva has the peculiar habit of throwing itself forcibly from one wall to the other, thereby causing the jumping movements of the capsule. Mexican jumping bean capsules typically separate into three parts or sections, some of which contain a moth larva. It is these separate sections (technically called carpels) that are sold as "jumping beans."
snake facts
Loved, revered and feared, the snake is an awesome creature. Here are a few interesting facts about these slender slithering reptiles.
Snakes are more closely related to lizards than to other reptiles, and probably evolved from a single group of lizards. Curiously, they probably did not evolve from the group of legless lizards.
In ancient Greece, the sick and injured sought the aid of the god of healing and medicine, Asklepios. They took an offering to the temple and waited for the god to come to them in their dreams, or to send his sacred servants, the snakes. Ancient writings tell of the snakes healing with a touch of the tongue. The snake in question was the Aesculapian snake. The Romans chose to import this snake to their own temples, rather than to bring in Greek healers.
The snake today forms part of the symbol of physicians and veterinarians (the snake is wrapped around Asklepios' staff), linking snakes to millennia of healing and medical practice.
The hognosed snake (Heterodon sp.), grass snake and the spitting cobra can feign death by flipping on to their backs when threatened. They open their mouths, allow their tongues to loll and can empty a foul smelling substance from their anal glands, making them highly unappetizing to any potential predator.
Many snakes, such as vipers, boas and pythons have temperature-sensing organs on their heads. These heat pits are sensitive to changes in temperature of as little as 0.002 degrees Celsius, and effectively allow the snake to navigate and hunt in the dark.
Snakes can have over 300 pairs of ribs.
Snakes turn "blue" before a shed. This opaque change to the skin is actually due to the presence of a lymph-like layer of fluid between the old and new skins, prior to the shed of the old skin.
Reports of the longest, heaviest and oldest reptiles abound. Many cannot be verified. A reticulated python, shot in Indonesia in 1912, was said to be 32 feet 9 1/2 inches in length. One Burmese python weighed in at over 400 pounds. Although seldom as long as the giant pythons, the green anaconda is a heavier snake. Sir Percy Fawcett is said to have killed an anaconda measuring 62 feet in 1907, in Brazil. Since the early part of the last century, the New York Zoological Society has offered a reward of $50,000 for the capture of a live snake greater than 30 feet in length. The oldest recorded snake is a boa constrictor named Popeye, who died in 1977 at the age of 40 years, 3 months and 14 days.
The smallest snake may be the Martinique thread snake (Leptotyphlops bilineatus), which does not grow any bigger than 4 1/4 inches.
A snake's internal organs, although superficially different, have basically the same functions as those of a mammal. The difference lies in their arrangement. They are placed one after the other, to accommodate the tube-like body. All snakes have a right lung and associated air sacs that extend most of the way to the vent. In most species, the left lung is considerably shorter, or even missing.
The glottis, which is the entry to the trachea (breathing tube), can move to either side, to allow the snake to swallow prey. This is the tube you see when you look at the floor of a snake's mouth. Cartilage around the opening of the tube closes to prevent food from entering the respiratory tract, and produces the classic "hiss" in many snakes.
A snake's heart can slide 1 to 1 1/2 times its length from its normal position, to allow the passage of swallowed prey. This is because of the relative mobility of the pericardial sac, which surrounds the heart.
Venom glands have evolved independently in several species. Venoms are very complex substances, which may consist of a dozen or more toxic components. These can include substances poisonous to the heart, nerves and DNA as well as enzymes that break down natural tissue barriers, allowing the spread of venom within the body.
Spitting cobras can inject venom in their bites, but can also force venom out, under pressure, through tiny channels in their fangs. Raising the front half of its body, the snake can aim venom at the eyes and mucous membranes of its target, over 3 feet away.
Snakes have two rows of teeth on the top jaw, one row on the bottom jaw. The teeth, including fangs, in most cases are replaced throughout life.
When the tongue is in the mouth, it lies in a sheath beneath the glottis with its tip touching the vomeronasal or Jacobsen's organ. This is an organ of smell, so when your snake flicks out his tongue, he is, in fact, "tasting" or smelling the air. The forked design allows the snake to detect on which side the smell is strongest, and so to locate his prey, even in the dark.
The Brahminy blind snake are all females. When mature, they lay fertile eggs, and the young are clones of the mother. Although native to Asia, this snake is now found in warm countries all over the world.
The Emerald tree boa is born red or yellow, and changes to green after about a year.
The rattlesnake's rattle consists of six to 10 layers of scales, which fail to shed and make that distinctive sound when the tail is shaken as a warning. Eventually the older segments will slough as the rattle lengthens.
The tail of the Calabar ground boa is blunt, cylindrical and has white scales on the underside, and altogether appears very much like a head. When threatened, the snake coils into a ball, hides its head, leaving the less vulnerable tail exposed to confuse predators.
The common egg eater (Dasypeltis scabra) is a highly specialized snake. Although it is not venomous, the markings are sufficiently similar to those of the deadly cobra or viper that a potential predator will think twice before attacking. The egg eater can also expand its jaws to mimic the larger head of the venomous. To consume an egg, the jaws can expand to four or five times the size of the egg. Once engulfed, the egg is pierced by two specialized vertebrae. Other modified bones in the vertebral column stabilize it, prevent its slipping out of the mouth or further into the snake. Yet another set of unique vertebrae crush the egg. Once emptied of its contents, the shell is regurgitated.
The black mamba (Dendroaspis polylepsis) is brown, gray or olive, but never black. It is a particularly dangerous snake, with a bite that kills 95 to 100 percent of victims. The black mamba may also be the fastest snake, reaching speeds of 10 to 12 miles per hour. Other particularly dangerous snakes include the common krait, Russell's viper (both Asian snakes) and the taipan (Australian). Seven of the 10 most deadly snakes live in Australia.
Snakes move by relaxing and contracting muscles lengthwise along the body. Sidewinding is a specialized form of motion that allows a snake to travel with speed and relatively little expenditure of energy along loose desert sand. The snake lifts a loop of its body from the surface, using its head and tail. The loop is moved sideways and then back to the ground. This creates the typical series of unconnected parallel tracks.
The paired claw-like structures seen on either side of the vent of a snake such as a ball or royal python, are in fact, remnants of the legs present in the animals from which the modern species has evolved.
Snakes are more closely related to lizards than to other reptiles, and probably evolved from a single group of lizards. Curiously, they probably did not evolve from the group of legless lizards.
In ancient Greece, the sick and injured sought the aid of the god of healing and medicine, Asklepios. They took an offering to the temple and waited for the god to come to them in their dreams, or to send his sacred servants, the snakes. Ancient writings tell of the snakes healing with a touch of the tongue. The snake in question was the Aesculapian snake. The Romans chose to import this snake to their own temples, rather than to bring in Greek healers.
The snake today forms part of the symbol of physicians and veterinarians (the snake is wrapped around Asklepios' staff), linking snakes to millennia of healing and medical practice.
The hognosed snake (Heterodon sp.), grass snake and the spitting cobra can feign death by flipping on to their backs when threatened. They open their mouths, allow their tongues to loll and can empty a foul smelling substance from their anal glands, making them highly unappetizing to any potential predator.
Many snakes, such as vipers, boas and pythons have temperature-sensing organs on their heads. These heat pits are sensitive to changes in temperature of as little as 0.002 degrees Celsius, and effectively allow the snake to navigate and hunt in the dark.
Snakes can have over 300 pairs of ribs.
Snakes turn "blue" before a shed. This opaque change to the skin is actually due to the presence of a lymph-like layer of fluid between the old and new skins, prior to the shed of the old skin.
Reports of the longest, heaviest and oldest reptiles abound. Many cannot be verified. A reticulated python, shot in Indonesia in 1912, was said to be 32 feet 9 1/2 inches in length. One Burmese python weighed in at over 400 pounds. Although seldom as long as the giant pythons, the green anaconda is a heavier snake. Sir Percy Fawcett is said to have killed an anaconda measuring 62 feet in 1907, in Brazil. Since the early part of the last century, the New York Zoological Society has offered a reward of $50,000 for the capture of a live snake greater than 30 feet in length. The oldest recorded snake is a boa constrictor named Popeye, who died in 1977 at the age of 40 years, 3 months and 14 days.
The smallest snake may be the Martinique thread snake (Leptotyphlops bilineatus), which does not grow any bigger than 4 1/4 inches.
A snake's internal organs, although superficially different, have basically the same functions as those of a mammal. The difference lies in their arrangement. They are placed one after the other, to accommodate the tube-like body. All snakes have a right lung and associated air sacs that extend most of the way to the vent. In most species, the left lung is considerably shorter, or even missing.
The glottis, which is the entry to the trachea (breathing tube), can move to either side, to allow the snake to swallow prey. This is the tube you see when you look at the floor of a snake's mouth. Cartilage around the opening of the tube closes to prevent food from entering the respiratory tract, and produces the classic "hiss" in many snakes.
A snake's heart can slide 1 to 1 1/2 times its length from its normal position, to allow the passage of swallowed prey. This is because of the relative mobility of the pericardial sac, which surrounds the heart.
Venom glands have evolved independently in several species. Venoms are very complex substances, which may consist of a dozen or more toxic components. These can include substances poisonous to the heart, nerves and DNA as well as enzymes that break down natural tissue barriers, allowing the spread of venom within the body.
Spitting cobras can inject venom in their bites, but can also force venom out, under pressure, through tiny channels in their fangs. Raising the front half of its body, the snake can aim venom at the eyes and mucous membranes of its target, over 3 feet away.
Snakes have two rows of teeth on the top jaw, one row on the bottom jaw. The teeth, including fangs, in most cases are replaced throughout life.
When the tongue is in the mouth, it lies in a sheath beneath the glottis with its tip touching the vomeronasal or Jacobsen's organ. This is an organ of smell, so when your snake flicks out his tongue, he is, in fact, "tasting" or smelling the air. The forked design allows the snake to detect on which side the smell is strongest, and so to locate his prey, even in the dark.
The Brahminy blind snake are all females. When mature, they lay fertile eggs, and the young are clones of the mother. Although native to Asia, this snake is now found in warm countries all over the world.
The Emerald tree boa is born red or yellow, and changes to green after about a year.
The rattlesnake's rattle consists of six to 10 layers of scales, which fail to shed and make that distinctive sound when the tail is shaken as a warning. Eventually the older segments will slough as the rattle lengthens.
The tail of the Calabar ground boa is blunt, cylindrical and has white scales on the underside, and altogether appears very much like a head. When threatened, the snake coils into a ball, hides its head, leaving the less vulnerable tail exposed to confuse predators.
The common egg eater (Dasypeltis scabra) is a highly specialized snake. Although it is not venomous, the markings are sufficiently similar to those of the deadly cobra or viper that a potential predator will think twice before attacking. The egg eater can also expand its jaws to mimic the larger head of the venomous. To consume an egg, the jaws can expand to four or five times the size of the egg. Once engulfed, the egg is pierced by two specialized vertebrae. Other modified bones in the vertebral column stabilize it, prevent its slipping out of the mouth or further into the snake. Yet another set of unique vertebrae crush the egg. Once emptied of its contents, the shell is regurgitated.
The black mamba (Dendroaspis polylepsis) is brown, gray or olive, but never black. It is a particularly dangerous snake, with a bite that kills 95 to 100 percent of victims. The black mamba may also be the fastest snake, reaching speeds of 10 to 12 miles per hour. Other particularly dangerous snakes include the common krait, Russell's viper (both Asian snakes) and the taipan (Australian). Seven of the 10 most deadly snakes live in Australia.
Snakes move by relaxing and contracting muscles lengthwise along the body. Sidewinding is a specialized form of motion that allows a snake to travel with speed and relatively little expenditure of energy along loose desert sand. The snake lifts a loop of its body from the surface, using its head and tail. The loop is moved sideways and then back to the ground. This creates the typical series of unconnected parallel tracks.
The paired claw-like structures seen on either side of the vent of a snake such as a ball or royal python, are in fact, remnants of the legs present in the animals from which the modern species has evolved.
DOGGY FACTS
Dog Facts
Dogs (and wolves and foxes) are descended from a small, weasel-like mammal called Miacis which was a tree-dwelling creature and existed about 40 million years ago. Dogs, as we know them today, first appeared in Eurasia about 13,000 years ago, and were probably a direct descendant of a small, grey wolf. The dingo is not native to Australia but was introduced thousands of years ago by the first immigrants. Dogs were first domesticated by cavemen in the Palaeolithic age and gradually developed (or were bred) into the breeds known today.
Dogs have been used as guards, hunters, draught animals, eyes for the blind, drug and explosive detectors, rodent controllers - and even weapons! In Roman times and the Middle Ages, mastiffs wearing light armor, carrying spikes and pots of flaming sulphur and resin ran into battle against mounted knights. In World War II the Russians trained dogs to run suicide missions between the tracks of German tanks with mines strapped on their backs.
Dogs naturally have a wonderful sense of smell. They have many more sensory 'smelling' cells than a man's 5,000,000. A Dachshund has 125,000,000, a Fox Terrier 147,000,000 and an Alsation (often used as a 'sniffer' dog) has 220,000,000.
The oldest reliable age recorded for a dog is 29 years, 5 months for a Queensland 'heeler' called Bluey in Victoria, Australia. The average dog lives to around 15 years of age.
The tallest dogs are the Great Dane and the Irish Wolfhound.
The average dog's mouth exerts 150 to 200 pounds of pressure per square inch. Some dogs can apply up to 450 pounds.
Puppies can't control their bladders overnight until they are at least four months old. Until then, cover the floor around the puppy's bed with newspapers.
Dogs are omnivorous. They need more than just meat to flourish.
People with more than one dog shouldn't try to treat them all as equals. Because pack position is important to a dog, this only encourages jealousy games.
Dogs chew up your underwear because it smells like you. One in every three US families owns one or more dogs.
A one-year-old dog is physically as mature as a 15 year-old human
THE HUMPBACK WHALE
Average Length: (Adult) 35-50 ft (Newborn) 13-16 ft
Average Weight: (Adult) 23-30 tons (Birth) 1-2 tons
Population: 18,000-20,000 (2002 figure)
Lifespan: estimated to be around 40 years (1998 figure)
Threats: Caught in fishing nets, human disturbance, and being tangled in marine pollution
The flukes (tails) have a distinct pattern on the underside, much like our fingerprints
The humpback whale breaches more frequently than other baleen whales
The Pacific humpback's pectoral fins are white underneath & black on top..
The Atlantic humpback's pectoral fins are white on both sides- which makes it easier for us to see them
While in their breeding grounds- the whales do NOT eat!
Some humpbacks feed in the Southern Ocean and go north to their reproductive areas!
Can stay underwater for 30 minutes but often dives for much shorter periods of time, usually 5 to 10 minutes
Humpbacks emit high frequency "clicks" reaching 30,000 Hz
The males produce, in frequencies between 20 and 9,000 Hz, songs that are the longest and the most varied in all the animal kingdom, with repeated sequences about 15 minutes long
When they are in cold waters, the humpback whale eats 2 tons of fish and planktonic crustaceans a day, in 2 to 4 meals
Where to Look (Summer): Alaska, Cape Cod, Vancouver (B.C.), ...
Where to Look (Winter): Dominican Republic, Turks & Caicos Islands , Hawaii, Costa Rica, Tonga, ...
FISH FACTS
Fish have been on the earth for more than 450 million years.
Fish were well established long before dinosaurs roamed the earth.
There are over 25,000 identified species of fish on the earth.
It is estimated that there may still be over 15,000 fish species that have not yet been identified.
There are more species of fish than all the species of amphibians, reptiles, birds and mammals combined.
40% of all fish species inhabit fresh water, yet less than .01% of the earth's water is fresh water.
The spotted climbing perch is able to absorb oxygen from the air and will crawl overland using its strong pectoral fins.
Some fish like sharks don't posses an air bladder to help keep them afloat and must either swim continually or rest on the bottom.
Some fish make sounds by grating their teeth and others like some catfish make sounds from their air filled swim bladder.
Some species of fish can fly (glide) others can skip along the surface and others can even climb rock.
Fish have a specialized sense organ called the lateral line which works much like radar and helps them navigate in dark or murky water.
The largest fish is the great whale shark which can reach fifty feet in length.
The smallest fish is the Philippine goby that is less than 1/3 of an inch when fully grown.
Some species of fish have skeletons made only of cartilage.
Fish have excellent senses of sight, touch, taste and many possess a good sense of smell and 'hearing'.
Fish feel pain and suffer stress just like mammals and birds.
Tropical fish are one of the most popular pets in the U.S.
95% of tropical fish mortality results from improper housing and nutrition.
Many tropical fish sold in the United States are harvested from the wild in Africa, Asia, and Central and South America
Fish were well established long before dinosaurs roamed the earth.
There are over 25,000 identified species of fish on the earth.
It is estimated that there may still be over 15,000 fish species that have not yet been identified.
There are more species of fish than all the species of amphibians, reptiles, birds and mammals combined.
40% of all fish species inhabit fresh water, yet less than .01% of the earth's water is fresh water.
The spotted climbing perch is able to absorb oxygen from the air and will crawl overland using its strong pectoral fins.
Some fish like sharks don't posses an air bladder to help keep them afloat and must either swim continually or rest on the bottom.
Some fish make sounds by grating their teeth and others like some catfish make sounds from their air filled swim bladder.
Some species of fish can fly (glide) others can skip along the surface and others can even climb rock.
Fish have a specialized sense organ called the lateral line which works much like radar and helps them navigate in dark or murky water.
The largest fish is the great whale shark which can reach fifty feet in length.
The smallest fish is the Philippine goby that is less than 1/3 of an inch when fully grown.
Some species of fish have skeletons made only of cartilage.
Fish have excellent senses of sight, touch, taste and many possess a good sense of smell and 'hearing'.
Fish feel pain and suffer stress just like mammals and birds.
Tropical fish are one of the most popular pets in the U.S.
95% of tropical fish mortality results from improper housing and nutrition.
Many tropical fish sold in the United States are harvested from the wild in Africa, Asia, and Central and South America
Sixty Amazing-but-True Facts!
Sixty Amazing-but-True Facts!
In the weightlessness of space a frozen pea will explode if it comes in contact with Pepsi.
The increased electricity used by modern appliances is causing a shift in the Earth's magnetic field. By the year 2327, the North Pole will be located in mid-Kansas, while the South Pole will be just off the coast of East Africa.
The idea for "tribbles" in "Star Trek" came from gerbils, since some gerbils are actually born pregnant.
Male rhesus monkeys often hang from tree branches by their amazing prehensile penises.
Johnny Plessey batted .331 for the Cleveland Spiders in 1891, even though he spent the entire season batting with a rolled-up, lacquered copy of the Toledo Post-Dispatch.
Smearing a small amount of dog feces on an insect bite will relieve the itching and swelling.
The Boeing 747 is capable of flying upside-down if it weren't for the fact that the wings would shear off when trying to roll it over.
The trucking company Elvis Presley worked at as a young man was owned by Frank Sinatra.
The only golf course on the island of Tonga has 15 holes, and there's no penalty if a monkey steals your golf ball.
Legislation passed during WWI making it illegal to say "gesundheit" to a sneezer was never repealed.
Manatees possess vocal chords which give them the ability to speak like humans, but don't do so because they have no ears with which to hear the sound.
SCUBA divers cannot pass gas at depths of 33 feet or below.
Catfish are the only animals that naturally have an ODD number of whiskers.
Replying more than 100 times to the same piece of spam e-mail will overwhelm the sender's system and interfere with their ability to send any more spam.
Polar bears can eat as many as 86 penguins in a single sitting.
The first McDonald's restaurant opened for business in 1952 in Edinburgh, Scotland, and featured the McHaggis sandwich.
The Air Force's F-117 fighter uses aerodynamics discovered during research into how bumblebees fly.
You *can* get blood from a stone, but only if contains at least 17 percent bauxite.
Silly Putty was "discovered" as the residue left behind after the first latex condoms were produced. It's not widely publicized for obvious reasons.
Approximately one-sixth of your life is spent on Wednesdays.
The skin needed for elbow transplants must be taken from the scrotum of a cadaver.
The sport of jai alai originated from a game played by Incan priests who held cats by their tails and swung at leather balls. The cats would instinctively grab at the ball with their claws, thus enabling players to catch them.
A cat's purr has the same romance-enhancing frequency as the voice of singer Barry White.
The typewriter was invented by Hungarian immigrant Qwert Yuiop, who left his "signature" on the keyboard.
The volume of water that the Giant Sequoia tree consumes in a 24-hour period contains enough suspended minerals to pave 17.3 feet of a 4-lane concrete freeway.
King Henry VIII slept with a gigantic axe.
Because printed materials are being replaced by CD-ROM, microfiche and the Internet, libraries that previously sank into their foundations under the weight of their books are now in danger of collapsing in extremely high winds.
In 1843, a Parisian street mime got stuck in his imaginary box and consequently died of starvation.
Touch-tone telephone keypads were originally planned to have buttons for Police and Fire Departments, but they were replaced with * and # when the project was cancelled in favor of developing the 911 system.
Human saliva has a boiling point three times that of regular water.
Calvin, of the "Calvin and Hobbes" comic strip, was patterned after President Calvin Coolidge, who had a pet tiger as a boy.
Watching an hour-long soap opera burns more calories than watching a three-hour baseball game.
Until 1978, Camel cigarettes contained minute particles of real camels.
You can actually sharpen the blades on a pencil sharpener by wrapping your pencils in aluminum foil before inserting them.
To human taste buds, Zima is virtually indistinguishable from zebra urine.
Seven out of every ten hockey-playing Canadians will lose a tooth during a game. For Canadians who don't play hockey, that figure drops to five out of ten.
A dog's naked behind leaves absolutely no bacteria when pressed against carpet.
A team of University of Virginia researchers released a study promoting the practice of picking one's nose, claiming that the health benefits of keeping nasal passages free from infectious blockages far outweigh the negative social connotations.
Among items left behind at Osama bin Laden's headquarters in Afghanistan were 27 issues of Mad Magazine. Al Qaeda members have admitted that bin Laden is reportedly an avid reader.
Urine from male cape water buffaloes is so flammable that some tribes use it for lantern fuel.
At the first World Cup championship in Uruguay, 1930, the soccer balls were actually monkey skulls wrapped in paper and leather.
Every Labrador retriever dreams about bananas.
If you put a bee in a film canister for two hours, it will go blind and leave behind its weight in honey.
Due to the angle at which the optic nerve enters the brain, staring at a blue surface during sex greatly increases the intensity of orgasms.
Never hold your nose and cover your mouth when sneezing, as it can blow out your eyeballs.
Centuries ago, purchasing real estate often required having one or more limbs amputated in order to prevent the purchaser from running away to avoid repayment of the loan. Hence an expensive purchase was said to cost "an arm and a leg."
When Mahatma Gandhi died, an autopsy revealed five gold Krugerrands in his small intestine.
Aardvarks are allergic to radishes, but only during summer months.
Coca-Cola was the favored drink of Pharaoh Ramses. An inscription found in his tomb, when translated, was found to be almost identical to the recipe used today.
If you part your hair on the right side, you were born to be carnivorous. If you part it on the left, your physical and psychological make-up is that of a vegetarian.
When immersed in liquid, a dead sparrow will make a sound like a crying baby.
In WWII the US military planned to airdrop over France propaganda in the form of Playboy magazine, with coded messages hidden in the models' turn-ons and turn-offs. The plan was scrapped because of a staple shortage due to rationing of metal.
Although difficult, it's possible to start a fire by rapidly rubbing together two Cool Ranch Doritos.
Napoleon's favorite type of wood was knotty chestnut.
The world's smartest pig, owned by a mathematics teacher in Madison, WI, memorized the multiplication tables up to 12.
Due to the natural "momentum" of the ocean, saltwater fish cannot swim backwards.
In ancient Greece, children of wealthy families were dipped in olive oil at birth to keep them hairless throughout their lives.
It is nearly three miles farther to fly from Amarillo, Texas to Louisville, Kentucky than it is to return from Louisville to Amarillo.
The "nine lives" attributed to cats is probably due to their having nine primary whiskers.
The original inspiration for Barbie dolls comes from dolls developed by German propagandists in the late 1930s to impress young girls with the ideal notions of Aryan features. The proportions for Barbie were actually based on those of Eva Braun.
The Venezuelan brown bat can detect and dodge individual raindrops in mid-flight, arriving safely back at his cave completely dry.
In the weightlessness of space a frozen pea will explode if it comes in contact with Pepsi.
The increased electricity used by modern appliances is causing a shift in the Earth's magnetic field. By the year 2327, the North Pole will be located in mid-Kansas, while the South Pole will be just off the coast of East Africa.
The idea for "tribbles" in "Star Trek" came from gerbils, since some gerbils are actually born pregnant.
Male rhesus monkeys often hang from tree branches by their amazing prehensile penises.
Johnny Plessey batted .331 for the Cleveland Spiders in 1891, even though he spent the entire season batting with a rolled-up, lacquered copy of the Toledo Post-Dispatch.
Smearing a small amount of dog feces on an insect bite will relieve the itching and swelling.
The Boeing 747 is capable of flying upside-down if it weren't for the fact that the wings would shear off when trying to roll it over.
The trucking company Elvis Presley worked at as a young man was owned by Frank Sinatra.
The only golf course on the island of Tonga has 15 holes, and there's no penalty if a monkey steals your golf ball.
Legislation passed during WWI making it illegal to say "gesundheit" to a sneezer was never repealed.
Manatees possess vocal chords which give them the ability to speak like humans, but don't do so because they have no ears with which to hear the sound.
SCUBA divers cannot pass gas at depths of 33 feet or below.
Catfish are the only animals that naturally have an ODD number of whiskers.
Replying more than 100 times to the same piece of spam e-mail will overwhelm the sender's system and interfere with their ability to send any more spam.
Polar bears can eat as many as 86 penguins in a single sitting.
The first McDonald's restaurant opened for business in 1952 in Edinburgh, Scotland, and featured the McHaggis sandwich.
The Air Force's F-117 fighter uses aerodynamics discovered during research into how bumblebees fly.
You *can* get blood from a stone, but only if contains at least 17 percent bauxite.
Silly Putty was "discovered" as the residue left behind after the first latex condoms were produced. It's not widely publicized for obvious reasons.
Approximately one-sixth of your life is spent on Wednesdays.
The skin needed for elbow transplants must be taken from the scrotum of a cadaver.
The sport of jai alai originated from a game played by Incan priests who held cats by their tails and swung at leather balls. The cats would instinctively grab at the ball with their claws, thus enabling players to catch them.
A cat's purr has the same romance-enhancing frequency as the voice of singer Barry White.
The typewriter was invented by Hungarian immigrant Qwert Yuiop, who left his "signature" on the keyboard.
The volume of water that the Giant Sequoia tree consumes in a 24-hour period contains enough suspended minerals to pave 17.3 feet of a 4-lane concrete freeway.
King Henry VIII slept with a gigantic axe.
Because printed materials are being replaced by CD-ROM, microfiche and the Internet, libraries that previously sank into their foundations under the weight of their books are now in danger of collapsing in extremely high winds.
In 1843, a Parisian street mime got stuck in his imaginary box and consequently died of starvation.
Touch-tone telephone keypads were originally planned to have buttons for Police and Fire Departments, but they were replaced with * and # when the project was cancelled in favor of developing the 911 system.
Human saliva has a boiling point three times that of regular water.
Calvin, of the "Calvin and Hobbes" comic strip, was patterned after President Calvin Coolidge, who had a pet tiger as a boy.
Watching an hour-long soap opera burns more calories than watching a three-hour baseball game.
Until 1978, Camel cigarettes contained minute particles of real camels.
You can actually sharpen the blades on a pencil sharpener by wrapping your pencils in aluminum foil before inserting them.
To human taste buds, Zima is virtually indistinguishable from zebra urine.
Seven out of every ten hockey-playing Canadians will lose a tooth during a game. For Canadians who don't play hockey, that figure drops to five out of ten.
A dog's naked behind leaves absolutely no bacteria when pressed against carpet.
A team of University of Virginia researchers released a study promoting the practice of picking one's nose, claiming that the health benefits of keeping nasal passages free from infectious blockages far outweigh the negative social connotations.
Among items left behind at Osama bin Laden's headquarters in Afghanistan were 27 issues of Mad Magazine. Al Qaeda members have admitted that bin Laden is reportedly an avid reader.
Urine from male cape water buffaloes is so flammable that some tribes use it for lantern fuel.
At the first World Cup championship in Uruguay, 1930, the soccer balls were actually monkey skulls wrapped in paper and leather.
Every Labrador retriever dreams about bananas.
If you put a bee in a film canister for two hours, it will go blind and leave behind its weight in honey.
Due to the angle at which the optic nerve enters the brain, staring at a blue surface during sex greatly increases the intensity of orgasms.
Never hold your nose and cover your mouth when sneezing, as it can blow out your eyeballs.
Centuries ago, purchasing real estate often required having one or more limbs amputated in order to prevent the purchaser from running away to avoid repayment of the loan. Hence an expensive purchase was said to cost "an arm and a leg."
When Mahatma Gandhi died, an autopsy revealed five gold Krugerrands in his small intestine.
Aardvarks are allergic to radishes, but only during summer months.
Coca-Cola was the favored drink of Pharaoh Ramses. An inscription found in his tomb, when translated, was found to be almost identical to the recipe used today.
If you part your hair on the right side, you were born to be carnivorous. If you part it on the left, your physical and psychological make-up is that of a vegetarian.
When immersed in liquid, a dead sparrow will make a sound like a crying baby.
In WWII the US military planned to airdrop over France propaganda in the form of Playboy magazine, with coded messages hidden in the models' turn-ons and turn-offs. The plan was scrapped because of a staple shortage due to rationing of metal.
Although difficult, it's possible to start a fire by rapidly rubbing together two Cool Ranch Doritos.
Napoleon's favorite type of wood was knotty chestnut.
The world's smartest pig, owned by a mathematics teacher in Madison, WI, memorized the multiplication tables up to 12.
Due to the natural "momentum" of the ocean, saltwater fish cannot swim backwards.
In ancient Greece, children of wealthy families were dipped in olive oil at birth to keep them hairless throughout their lives.
It is nearly three miles farther to fly from Amarillo, Texas to Louisville, Kentucky than it is to return from Louisville to Amarillo.
The "nine lives" attributed to cats is probably due to their having nine primary whiskers.
The original inspiration for Barbie dolls comes from dolls developed by German propagandists in the late 1930s to impress young girls with the ideal notions of Aryan features. The proportions for Barbie were actually based on those of Eva Braun.
The Venezuelan brown bat can detect and dodge individual raindrops in mid-flight, arriving safely back at his cave completely dry.
In the weightlessness of space a frozen pea will explode if it comes in contact with Pepsi.
The increased electricity used by modern appliances is causing a shift in the Earth's magnetic field. By the year 2327, the North Pole will be located in mid-Kansas, while the South Pole will be just off the coast of East Africa.
The idea for "tribbles" in "Star Trek" came from gerbils, since some gerbils are actually born pregnant.
Male rhesus monkeys often hang from tree branches by their amazing prehensile penises.
Johnny Plessey batted .331 for the Cleveland Spiders in 1891, even though he spent the entire season batting with a rolled-up, lacquered copy of the Toledo Post-Dispatch.
Smearing a small amount of dog feces on an insect bite will relieve the itching and swelling.
The Boeing 747 is capable of flying upside-down if it weren't for the fact that the wings would shear off when trying to roll it over.
The trucking company Elvis Presley worked at as a young man was owned by Frank Sinatra.
The only golf course on the island of Tonga has 15 holes, and there's no penalty if a monkey steals your golf ball.
Legislation passed during WWI making it illegal to say "gesundheit" to a sneezer was never repealed.
Manatees possess vocal chords which give them the ability to speak like humans, but don't do so because they have no ears with which to hear the sound.
SCUBA divers cannot pass gas at depths of 33 feet or below.
Catfish are the only animals that naturally have an ODD number of whiskers.
Replying more than 100 times to the same piece of spam e-mail will overwhelm the sender's system and interfere with their ability to send any more spam.
Polar bears can eat as many as 86 penguins in a single sitting.
The first McDonald's restaurant opened for business in 1952 in Edinburgh, Scotland, and featured the McHaggis sandwich.
The Air Force's F-117 fighter uses aerodynamics discovered during research into how bumblebees fly.
You *can* get blood from a stone, but only if contains at least 17 percent bauxite.
Silly Putty was "discovered" as the residue left behind after the first latex condoms were produced. It's not widely publicized for obvious reasons.
Approximately one-sixth of your life is spent on Wednesdays.
The skin needed for elbow transplants must be taken from the scrotum of a cadaver.
The sport of jai alai originated from a game played by Incan priests who held cats by their tails and swung at leather balls. The cats would instinctively grab at the ball with their claws, thus enabling players to catch them.
A cat's purr has the same romance-enhancing frequency as the voice of singer Barry White.
The typewriter was invented by Hungarian immigrant Qwert Yuiop, who left his "signature" on the keyboard.
The volume of water that the Giant Sequoia tree consumes in a 24-hour period contains enough suspended minerals to pave 17.3 feet of a 4-lane concrete freeway.
King Henry VIII slept with a gigantic axe.
Because printed materials are being replaced by CD-ROM, microfiche and the Internet, libraries that previously sank into their foundations under the weight of their books are now in danger of collapsing in extremely high winds.
In 1843, a Parisian street mime got stuck in his imaginary box and consequently died of starvation.
Touch-tone telephone keypads were originally planned to have buttons for Police and Fire Departments, but they were replaced with * and # when the project was cancelled in favor of developing the 911 system.
Human saliva has a boiling point three times that of regular water.
Calvin, of the "Calvin and Hobbes" comic strip, was patterned after President Calvin Coolidge, who had a pet tiger as a boy.
Watching an hour-long soap opera burns more calories than watching a three-hour baseball game.
Until 1978, Camel cigarettes contained minute particles of real camels.
You can actually sharpen the blades on a pencil sharpener by wrapping your pencils in aluminum foil before inserting them.
To human taste buds, Zima is virtually indistinguishable from zebra urine.
Seven out of every ten hockey-playing Canadians will lose a tooth during a game. For Canadians who don't play hockey, that figure drops to five out of ten.
A dog's naked behind leaves absolutely no bacteria when pressed against carpet.
A team of University of Virginia researchers released a study promoting the practice of picking one's nose, claiming that the health benefits of keeping nasal passages free from infectious blockages far outweigh the negative social connotations.
Among items left behind at Osama bin Laden's headquarters in Afghanistan were 27 issues of Mad Magazine. Al Qaeda members have admitted that bin Laden is reportedly an avid reader.
Urine from male cape water buffaloes is so flammable that some tribes use it for lantern fuel.
At the first World Cup championship in Uruguay, 1930, the soccer balls were actually monkey skulls wrapped in paper and leather.
Every Labrador retriever dreams about bananas.
If you put a bee in a film canister for two hours, it will go blind and leave behind its weight in honey.
Due to the angle at which the optic nerve enters the brain, staring at a blue surface during sex greatly increases the intensity of orgasms.
Never hold your nose and cover your mouth when sneezing, as it can blow out your eyeballs.
Centuries ago, purchasing real estate often required having one or more limbs amputated in order to prevent the purchaser from running away to avoid repayment of the loan. Hence an expensive purchase was said to cost "an arm and a leg."
When Mahatma Gandhi died, an autopsy revealed five gold Krugerrands in his small intestine.
Aardvarks are allergic to radishes, but only during summer months.
Coca-Cola was the favored drink of Pharaoh Ramses. An inscription found in his tomb, when translated, was found to be almost identical to the recipe used today.
If you part your hair on the right side, you were born to be carnivorous. If you part it on the left, your physical and psychological make-up is that of a vegetarian.
When immersed in liquid, a dead sparrow will make a sound like a crying baby.
In WWII the US military planned to airdrop over France propaganda in the form of Playboy magazine, with coded messages hidden in the models' turn-ons and turn-offs. The plan was scrapped because of a staple shortage due to rationing of metal.
Although difficult, it's possible to start a fire by rapidly rubbing together two Cool Ranch Doritos.
Napoleon's favorite type of wood was knotty chestnut.
The world's smartest pig, owned by a mathematics teacher in Madison, WI, memorized the multiplication tables up to 12.
Due to the natural "momentum" of the ocean, saltwater fish cannot swim backwards.
In ancient Greece, children of wealthy families were dipped in olive oil at birth to keep them hairless throughout their lives.
It is nearly three miles farther to fly from Amarillo, Texas to Louisville, Kentucky than it is to return from Louisville to Amarillo.
The "nine lives" attributed to cats is probably due to their having nine primary whiskers.
The original inspiration for Barbie dolls comes from dolls developed by German propagandists in the late 1930s to impress young girls with the ideal notions of Aryan features. The proportions for Barbie were actually based on those of Eva Braun.
The Venezuelan brown bat can detect and dodge individual raindrops in mid-flight, arriving safely back at his cave completely dry.
In the weightlessness of space a frozen pea will explode if it comes in contact with Pepsi.
The increased electricity used by modern appliances is causing a shift in the Earth's magnetic field. By the year 2327, the North Pole will be located in mid-Kansas, while the South Pole will be just off the coast of East Africa.
The idea for "tribbles" in "Star Trek" came from gerbils, since some gerbils are actually born pregnant.
Male rhesus monkeys often hang from tree branches by their amazing prehensile penises.
Johnny Plessey batted .331 for the Cleveland Spiders in 1891, even though he spent the entire season batting with a rolled-up, lacquered copy of the Toledo Post-Dispatch.
Smearing a small amount of dog feces on an insect bite will relieve the itching and swelling.
The Boeing 747 is capable of flying upside-down if it weren't for the fact that the wings would shear off when trying to roll it over.
The trucking company Elvis Presley worked at as a young man was owned by Frank Sinatra.
The only golf course on the island of Tonga has 15 holes, and there's no penalty if a monkey steals your golf ball.
Legislation passed during WWI making it illegal to say "gesundheit" to a sneezer was never repealed.
Manatees possess vocal chords which give them the ability to speak like humans, but don't do so because they have no ears with which to hear the sound.
SCUBA divers cannot pass gas at depths of 33 feet or below.
Catfish are the only animals that naturally have an ODD number of whiskers.
Replying more than 100 times to the same piece of spam e-mail will overwhelm the sender's system and interfere with their ability to send any more spam.
Polar bears can eat as many as 86 penguins in a single sitting.
The first McDonald's restaurant opened for business in 1952 in Edinburgh, Scotland, and featured the McHaggis sandwich.
The Air Force's F-117 fighter uses aerodynamics discovered during research into how bumblebees fly.
You *can* get blood from a stone, but only if contains at least 17 percent bauxite.
Silly Putty was "discovered" as the residue left behind after the first latex condoms were produced. It's not widely publicized for obvious reasons.
Approximately one-sixth of your life is spent on Wednesdays.
The skin needed for elbow transplants must be taken from the scrotum of a cadaver.
The sport of jai alai originated from a game played by Incan priests who held cats by their tails and swung at leather balls. The cats would instinctively grab at the ball with their claws, thus enabling players to catch them.
A cat's purr has the same romance-enhancing frequency as the voice of singer Barry White.
The typewriter was invented by Hungarian immigrant Qwert Yuiop, who left his "signature" on the keyboard.
The volume of water that the Giant Sequoia tree consumes in a 24-hour period contains enough suspended minerals to pave 17.3 feet of a 4-lane concrete freeway.
King Henry VIII slept with a gigantic axe.
Because printed materials are being replaced by CD-ROM, microfiche and the Internet, libraries that previously sank into their foundations under the weight of their books are now in danger of collapsing in extremely high winds.
In 1843, a Parisian street mime got stuck in his imaginary box and consequently died of starvation.
Touch-tone telephone keypads were originally planned to have buttons for Police and Fire Departments, but they were replaced with * and # when the project was cancelled in favor of developing the 911 system.
Human saliva has a boiling point three times that of regular water.
Calvin, of the "Calvin and Hobbes" comic strip, was patterned after President Calvin Coolidge, who had a pet tiger as a boy.
Watching an hour-long soap opera burns more calories than watching a three-hour baseball game.
Until 1978, Camel cigarettes contained minute particles of real camels.
You can actually sharpen the blades on a pencil sharpener by wrapping your pencils in aluminum foil before inserting them.
To human taste buds, Zima is virtually indistinguishable from zebra urine.
Seven out of every ten hockey-playing Canadians will lose a tooth during a game. For Canadians who don't play hockey, that figure drops to five out of ten.
A dog's naked behind leaves absolutely no bacteria when pressed against carpet.
A team of University of Virginia researchers released a study promoting the practice of picking one's nose, claiming that the health benefits of keeping nasal passages free from infectious blockages far outweigh the negative social connotations.
Among items left behind at Osama bin Laden's headquarters in Afghanistan were 27 issues of Mad Magazine. Al Qaeda members have admitted that bin Laden is reportedly an avid reader.
Urine from male cape water buffaloes is so flammable that some tribes use it for lantern fuel.
At the first World Cup championship in Uruguay, 1930, the soccer balls were actually monkey skulls wrapped in paper and leather.
Every Labrador retriever dreams about bananas.
If you put a bee in a film canister for two hours, it will go blind and leave behind its weight in honey.
Due to the angle at which the optic nerve enters the brain, staring at a blue surface during sex greatly increases the intensity of orgasms.
Never hold your nose and cover your mouth when sneezing, as it can blow out your eyeballs.
Centuries ago, purchasing real estate often required having one or more limbs amputated in order to prevent the purchaser from running away to avoid repayment of the loan. Hence an expensive purchase was said to cost "an arm and a leg."
When Mahatma Gandhi died, an autopsy revealed five gold Krugerrands in his small intestine.
Aardvarks are allergic to radishes, but only during summer months.
Coca-Cola was the favored drink of Pharaoh Ramses. An inscription found in his tomb, when translated, was found to be almost identical to the recipe used today.
If you part your hair on the right side, you were born to be carnivorous. If you part it on the left, your physical and psychological make-up is that of a vegetarian.
When immersed in liquid, a dead sparrow will make a sound like a crying baby.
In WWII the US military planned to airdrop over France propaganda in the form of Playboy magazine, with coded messages hidden in the models' turn-ons and turn-offs. The plan was scrapped because of a staple shortage due to rationing of metal.
Although difficult, it's possible to start a fire by rapidly rubbing together two Cool Ranch Doritos.
Napoleon's favorite type of wood was knotty chestnut.
The world's smartest pig, owned by a mathematics teacher in Madison, WI, memorized the multiplication tables up to 12.
Due to the natural "momentum" of the ocean, saltwater fish cannot swim backwards.
In ancient Greece, children of wealthy families were dipped in olive oil at birth to keep them hairless throughout their lives.
It is nearly three miles farther to fly from Amarillo, Texas to Louisville, Kentucky than it is to return from Louisville to Amarillo.
The "nine lives" attributed to cats is probably due to their having nine primary whiskers.
The original inspiration for Barbie dolls comes from dolls developed by German propagandists in the late 1930s to impress young girls with the ideal notions of Aryan features. The proportions for Barbie were actually based on those of Eva Braun.
The Venezuelan brown bat can detect and dodge individual raindrops in mid-flight, arriving safely back at his cave completely dry.
WHY DID JESUS DIE?
Why did Jesus have to die?
Jesus had an amazingly productive ministry, teaching and healing thousands. He attracted large crowds and had potential for much more. He could have healed thousands more by traveling to the Jews and gentiles who lived in other areas.
But Jesus allowed this work to come to a sudden end. He could have avoided arrest, but he chose to die instead of expanding his ministry. Although his teachings were important, he had come not just to teach, but also to die — and he accomplished more in his death than in his life.
Death was Jesus’ most important ministry. This is the way we remember him, through the cross as a symbol of Christianity or through the bread and wine of the Lord’s Supper. Our Savior is a Savior who died.
Born to die
The Old Testament tells us that God appeared as a human being on several occasions. If Jesus wanted only to heal and teach, he could have simply appeared. But he did more: he became a human. Why? So he could die. To understand Jesus, we need to understand his death. His death is a crucial part of the gospel and something all Christians should know.
Jesus said, “The Son of Man did not come to be served, but to serve, and to give his life as a ransom for many” (Matthew 20:28). He came to give his life, to die, and his death would purchase salvation for others. This was the primary reason he came to earth. His blood was poured out for others (Matthew 26:28).
Jesus warned his disciples that he would suffer and die, but they didn’t seem to believe it. “Jesus began to explain to his disciples that he must go to Jerusalem and suffer many things at the hands of the elders, chief priests and teachers of the law, and that he must be killed and on the third day be raised to life. Peter took him aside and began to rebuke him. ‘Never, Lord!’ he said. ‘This shall never happen to you!’” (Matthew 16:21-22).
Jesus knew that he must die, because the Scriptures said so. “Why then is it written that the Son of Man must suffer much and be rejected?” (Mark 9:12; 9:31; 10:33-34). “Beginning with Moses and all the Prophets, he explained to them what was said in all the Scriptures concerning himself…. ‘This is what is written: The Christ will suffer and rise from the dead on the third day’” (Luke 24:26-27, 46).
It had all been according to God’s plan: Herod and Pilate did only what God “had decided beforehand should happen” (Acts 4:28). In the Garden of Gethsemane, Jesus asked if there might be some other way, but there was none (Luke 22:42). His death was necessary for our salvation.
The suffering servant
Where was it written? Isaiah 53 is the clearest prophecy. Jesus quoted Isaiah 53:12 when he said: “It is written: ‘And he was numbered with the transgressors’; and I tell you that this must be fulfilled in me. Yes, what is written about me is reaching its fulfillment” (Luke 22:37). Jesus, although without sin, was to be counted among sinners. Notice what else is written in Isaiah 53:
Surely he took up our infirmities and carried our sorrows, yet we considered him stricken by God, smitten by him, and afflicted. But he was pierced for our transgressions, he was crushed for our iniquities; the punishment that brought us peace was upon him, and by his wounds we are healed. We all, like sheep, have gone astray, each of us has turned to his own way; and the Lord has laid on him the iniquity of us all.
For the transgression of my people he was stricken.... Though he had done no violence ... it was the Lord’s will to crush him and cause him to suffer ... the Lord makes his life a guilt offering.... He will bear their iniquities.... He bore the sin of many, and made intercession for the transgressors (verses 4-12).
Isaiah describes a man who suffers not for his own sins, but for the sins of others. And though this man would be “cut off from the land of the living” (verse 8), that would not be the end of the story. “He will see the light of life and be satisfied; by his knowledge my righteous servant will justify many.... He will see his offspring and prolong his days” (verses 11, 10).
What Isaiah wrote, Jesus fulfilled. He laid down his life for his sheep (John 10:15). In his death, he carried our sins and suffered for our transgressions; he was punished so that we might have peace with God. Through his suffering and death, our spiritual illness is healed; we are justified—our sins are taken away.
These truths are developed in more detail in the New Testament.
Dying an accursed death
“Anyone who is hung on a tree is under God’s curse,” says Deuteronomy 21:23. Because of this verse, Jews considered any crucified person to be condemned by God. As Isaiah wrote, people would consider him “stricken by God.”
The Jewish leaders probably thought that Jesus’ disciples would give up after their leader was killed. And it happened just as they hoped — the crucifixion shattered the disciples’ hopes. They were dejected and said, “We had hoped that he was the one who was going to redeem Israel” (Luke 24:21). But their hopes were dramatically restored when Jesus appeared to them after his resurrection, and at Pentecost, the Holy Spirit filled them with new conviction to proclaim salvation in Jesus Christ. They had unshakable faith in the least likely hero: a crucified Messiah.
Peter told the Jewish leaders, “The God of our fathers raised Jesus from the dead—whom you had killed by hanging him on a tree” (Acts 5:30). By using the word tree, Peter reminded the leaders of the curse of crucifixion. But the shame was not on Jesus, he said—it was on the people who crucified him. God had blessed him because he did not deserve the curse he suffered. God had reversed the stigma.
Paul referred to the same curse in Galatians 3:13: “Christ redeemed us from the curse of the law by becoming a curse for us, for it is written: ‘Cursed is everyone who is hung on a tree.’” Jesus became a curse on our behalf so we could escape the curse of the law. He became something he was not, so that we could become something we were not. “God made him who had no sin to be sin for us, so that in him we might become the righteousness of God” (2 Corinthians 5:21).
He became sin for us, so that we might be declared righteous through him. Because he suffered what we deserved, he redeemed us from the curse of the law. “The punishment that brought us peace was upon him.” Because he suffered death, we can enjoy peace with God.
Message of the cross
The disciples never forgot the shameful way that Jesus died. Indeed, sometimes that was the focus of the message: “We preach Christ crucified: a stumbling block to Jews and foolishness to Gentiles” (1 Cor¬inthians 1:23). Paul even called the gospel “the message of the cross” (verse 18). Paul reminded the Galatians that “before your very eyes Jesus Christ was clearly portrayed as crucified” (Galatians 3:1). That was how he summarized the gospel.
Why is the cross good news? Because on the cross we were redeemed. Paul focused on the cross because it is the key to Jesus being good news for us. We will not be raised into glory unless our sins are removed from the record, unless in Christ we are made “the righteousness of God.” Only then can we join Jesus in his glory. The crucifixion makes it possible.
Paul says that Jesus died “for us” (Romans 5:6-8; 2 Corinthians 5:14; 1 Thessalonians 5:10); he also says that he died “for our sins” (1 Corinthians 15:3; Gal. 1:4). “He himself bore our sins in his body on the tree” (1 Peter 2:24; 3:18). Paul also says that we died with Christ (Romans 6:3-8). Through faith in him, we participate in his death.
It is as if we were on the cross, receiving the curse that our sins deserved. But he did it for us, and because he did it, we can be justified, or counted as righteous. He takes our sin and death; he gives us righteousness and life. The prince became a pauper, so that we paupers might become princes.
Although Jesus used the word ransom to describe our rescue, the ransom wasn’t paid to anyone in particular—this is a figure of speech to indicate that it cost Jesus an enormous amount to set us free. In the same way, Paul talks about Jesus redeeming us, buying our freedom, but he didn’t pay anyone.
Some have said that Jesus died to pay the legal demands of his Father—but it can also be said that the Father himself is the one who paid the price, by sending his Son for this very purpose (John 3:16; Romans 5:8). “By the grace of God he might taste death for everyone” (Hebrews 2:9).
God loves people—but he hates sin, because sin hurts people. God wants everyone to repent (2 Peter 3:9), but those who don’t will suffer the result of their sin.
In the death of Jesus, our sins are forgiven. But this does not mean that a loving Jesus appeased or “paid off” an angry God. The Father is just as merciful as Jesus is, and Jesus is just as angry about sin as the Father is. He is angry at sin because sin hurts the people he loves. Jesus is the Judge who condemns (Matthew 25:31-46), as well as the Judge who loves sinners so much that he dies for them.
When God forgives us, he does not simply wipe away sin and pretend it never existed. He teaches us throughout the New Testament that sins are taken care of through the death of Jesus. Sins have serious consequences—consequences we can see in the cross of Christ. It cost Jesus pain and shame and death.
The gospel reveals that God acts righteously in forgiving us (Romans 1:17). He does not ignore our sins, but takes care of them in Jesus Christ. God presented Jesus as a sacrifice for our forgiveness. “He did this to demonstrate his justice” (Romans 3:25). The cross reveals that God is just; it shows that sin is too serious to be ignored. Sin has consequences, and Jesus volunteered to suffer the consequences on our behalf. The cross demonstrates God’s love as well as his justice (Romans 5:8).
As Isaiah says, we have peace with God because of what Christ did. We were once enemies of God, but through Christ we have been brought near (Ephesians 2:13). In other words, we have been reconciled to God through the cross (verse 16). It is a basic Christian belief that our relationship with God depends on the death of Jesus Christ.
Christianity is not a list of things to do—it is faith that Christ has done everything we need to be right with God—and he did it on the cross. “When we were God’s enemies, we were reconciled to him through the death of his Son” (Romans 5:10). God reconciled the universe through Christ, “making peace through his blood, shed on the cross” (Colossians 1:20). If we are reconciled through him, all our sins are forgiven (verse 22)—reconciliation, forgiveness and justification all mean the same thing: peace with God.
Victory!
Paul uses an interesting image of salvation when he writes that Jesus “disarmed the powers and authorities” by making “a public spectacle of them, triumphing over them by the cross” (Colossians 2:15). He uses the word for a military parade: the winning general brings captured enemy soldiers in a victory parade at home. They are disarmed, humiliated, put on display. Paul’s point here is that Jesus did this on the cross.
What looked like a shameful death for Jesus was actually a glorious triumph for God’s plan, because it is through the cross that Jesus won victory over enemy powers, including Satan, sin and death. Their claim on us has been fully satisfied in the death of the innocent victim. They cannot demand any more than what he has already paid. They have nothing further to threaten us with.
“By his death,” we are told, Jesus was able to “destroy him who holds the power of death—that is, the devil” (Hebrews 2:14). “The reason the Son of God appeared was to destroy the devil’s work” (1 John 3:8). Victory was won on the cross.
Sacrifice
Jesus’ death is also described as a sacrifice. The idea of sacrifice draws on the rich imagery of Old Testament sacrifices. Isaiah 53:10 calls our Savior a “guilt offering.” John the Baptist calls him the Lamb “who takes away the sin of the world” (John 1:29). Paul calls him a “sacrifice of atonement,” a “sin offering,” a “Passover lamb,” a “fragrant offering” (Romans 3:25; 8:3; 1 Corinthians 5:7; Ephesians 5:2). Hebrews 10:12 calls him a “sacrifice for sins.” John calls him “the atoning sacrifice for our sins” (1 John 2:2; 4:10).
Several terms are used to describe what Jesus accomplished on the cross. Different New Testament authors use different words or images to convey the idea. The exact terminology or mechanism is not essential. What is important is simply that we are saved through the death of Jesus. “By his wounds we are healed.” He died to set us free, to remove our sins, to suffer our punishment, to purchase our salvation. “Dear friends, since God so loved us, we also ought to love one another” (1 John 4:11).
Michael Morrison
Jesus had an amazingly productive ministry, teaching and healing thousands. He attracted large crowds and had potential for much more. He could have healed thousands more by traveling to the Jews and gentiles who lived in other areas.
But Jesus allowed this work to come to a sudden end. He could have avoided arrest, but he chose to die instead of expanding his ministry. Although his teachings were important, he had come not just to teach, but also to die — and he accomplished more in his death than in his life.
Death was Jesus’ most important ministry. This is the way we remember him, through the cross as a symbol of Christianity or through the bread and wine of the Lord’s Supper. Our Savior is a Savior who died.
Born to die
The Old Testament tells us that God appeared as a human being on several occasions. If Jesus wanted only to heal and teach, he could have simply appeared. But he did more: he became a human. Why? So he could die. To understand Jesus, we need to understand his death. His death is a crucial part of the gospel and something all Christians should know.
Jesus said, “The Son of Man did not come to be served, but to serve, and to give his life as a ransom for many” (Matthew 20:28). He came to give his life, to die, and his death would purchase salvation for others. This was the primary reason he came to earth. His blood was poured out for others (Matthew 26:28).
Jesus warned his disciples that he would suffer and die, but they didn’t seem to believe it. “Jesus began to explain to his disciples that he must go to Jerusalem and suffer many things at the hands of the elders, chief priests and teachers of the law, and that he must be killed and on the third day be raised to life. Peter took him aside and began to rebuke him. ‘Never, Lord!’ he said. ‘This shall never happen to you!’” (Matthew 16:21-22).
Jesus knew that he must die, because the Scriptures said so. “Why then is it written that the Son of Man must suffer much and be rejected?” (Mark 9:12; 9:31; 10:33-34). “Beginning with Moses and all the Prophets, he explained to them what was said in all the Scriptures concerning himself…. ‘This is what is written: The Christ will suffer and rise from the dead on the third day’” (Luke 24:26-27, 46).
It had all been according to God’s plan: Herod and Pilate did only what God “had decided beforehand should happen” (Acts 4:28). In the Garden of Gethsemane, Jesus asked if there might be some other way, but there was none (Luke 22:42). His death was necessary for our salvation.
The suffering servant
Where was it written? Isaiah 53 is the clearest prophecy. Jesus quoted Isaiah 53:12 when he said: “It is written: ‘And he was numbered with the transgressors’; and I tell you that this must be fulfilled in me. Yes, what is written about me is reaching its fulfillment” (Luke 22:37). Jesus, although without sin, was to be counted among sinners. Notice what else is written in Isaiah 53:
Surely he took up our infirmities and carried our sorrows, yet we considered him stricken by God, smitten by him, and afflicted. But he was pierced for our transgressions, he was crushed for our iniquities; the punishment that brought us peace was upon him, and by his wounds we are healed. We all, like sheep, have gone astray, each of us has turned to his own way; and the Lord has laid on him the iniquity of us all.
For the transgression of my people he was stricken.... Though he had done no violence ... it was the Lord’s will to crush him and cause him to suffer ... the Lord makes his life a guilt offering.... He will bear their iniquities.... He bore the sin of many, and made intercession for the transgressors (verses 4-12).
Isaiah describes a man who suffers not for his own sins, but for the sins of others. And though this man would be “cut off from the land of the living” (verse 8), that would not be the end of the story. “He will see the light of life and be satisfied; by his knowledge my righteous servant will justify many.... He will see his offspring and prolong his days” (verses 11, 10).
What Isaiah wrote, Jesus fulfilled. He laid down his life for his sheep (John 10:15). In his death, he carried our sins and suffered for our transgressions; he was punished so that we might have peace with God. Through his suffering and death, our spiritual illness is healed; we are justified—our sins are taken away.
These truths are developed in more detail in the New Testament.
Dying an accursed death
“Anyone who is hung on a tree is under God’s curse,” says Deuteronomy 21:23. Because of this verse, Jews considered any crucified person to be condemned by God. As Isaiah wrote, people would consider him “stricken by God.”
The Jewish leaders probably thought that Jesus’ disciples would give up after their leader was killed. And it happened just as they hoped — the crucifixion shattered the disciples’ hopes. They were dejected and said, “We had hoped that he was the one who was going to redeem Israel” (Luke 24:21). But their hopes were dramatically restored when Jesus appeared to them after his resurrection, and at Pentecost, the Holy Spirit filled them with new conviction to proclaim salvation in Jesus Christ. They had unshakable faith in the least likely hero: a crucified Messiah.
Peter told the Jewish leaders, “The God of our fathers raised Jesus from the dead—whom you had killed by hanging him on a tree” (Acts 5:30). By using the word tree, Peter reminded the leaders of the curse of crucifixion. But the shame was not on Jesus, he said—it was on the people who crucified him. God had blessed him because he did not deserve the curse he suffered. God had reversed the stigma.
Paul referred to the same curse in Galatians 3:13: “Christ redeemed us from the curse of the law by becoming a curse for us, for it is written: ‘Cursed is everyone who is hung on a tree.’” Jesus became a curse on our behalf so we could escape the curse of the law. He became something he was not, so that we could become something we were not. “God made him who had no sin to be sin for us, so that in him we might become the righteousness of God” (2 Corinthians 5:21).
He became sin for us, so that we might be declared righteous through him. Because he suffered what we deserved, he redeemed us from the curse of the law. “The punishment that brought us peace was upon him.” Because he suffered death, we can enjoy peace with God.
Message of the cross
The disciples never forgot the shameful way that Jesus died. Indeed, sometimes that was the focus of the message: “We preach Christ crucified: a stumbling block to Jews and foolishness to Gentiles” (1 Cor¬inthians 1:23). Paul even called the gospel “the message of the cross” (verse 18). Paul reminded the Galatians that “before your very eyes Jesus Christ was clearly portrayed as crucified” (Galatians 3:1). That was how he summarized the gospel.
Why is the cross good news? Because on the cross we were redeemed. Paul focused on the cross because it is the key to Jesus being good news for us. We will not be raised into glory unless our sins are removed from the record, unless in Christ we are made “the righteousness of God.” Only then can we join Jesus in his glory. The crucifixion makes it possible.
Paul says that Jesus died “for us” (Romans 5:6-8; 2 Corinthians 5:14; 1 Thessalonians 5:10); he also says that he died “for our sins” (1 Corinthians 15:3; Gal. 1:4). “He himself bore our sins in his body on the tree” (1 Peter 2:24; 3:18). Paul also says that we died with Christ (Romans 6:3-8). Through faith in him, we participate in his death.
It is as if we were on the cross, receiving the curse that our sins deserved. But he did it for us, and because he did it, we can be justified, or counted as righteous. He takes our sin and death; he gives us righteousness and life. The prince became a pauper, so that we paupers might become princes.
Although Jesus used the word ransom to describe our rescue, the ransom wasn’t paid to anyone in particular—this is a figure of speech to indicate that it cost Jesus an enormous amount to set us free. In the same way, Paul talks about Jesus redeeming us, buying our freedom, but he didn’t pay anyone.
Some have said that Jesus died to pay the legal demands of his Father—but it can also be said that the Father himself is the one who paid the price, by sending his Son for this very purpose (John 3:16; Romans 5:8). “By the grace of God he might taste death for everyone” (Hebrews 2:9).
God loves people—but he hates sin, because sin hurts people. God wants everyone to repent (2 Peter 3:9), but those who don’t will suffer the result of their sin.
In the death of Jesus, our sins are forgiven. But this does not mean that a loving Jesus appeased or “paid off” an angry God. The Father is just as merciful as Jesus is, and Jesus is just as angry about sin as the Father is. He is angry at sin because sin hurts the people he loves. Jesus is the Judge who condemns (Matthew 25:31-46), as well as the Judge who loves sinners so much that he dies for them.
When God forgives us, he does not simply wipe away sin and pretend it never existed. He teaches us throughout the New Testament that sins are taken care of through the death of Jesus. Sins have serious consequences—consequences we can see in the cross of Christ. It cost Jesus pain and shame and death.
The gospel reveals that God acts righteously in forgiving us (Romans 1:17). He does not ignore our sins, but takes care of them in Jesus Christ. God presented Jesus as a sacrifice for our forgiveness. “He did this to demonstrate his justice” (Romans 3:25). The cross reveals that God is just; it shows that sin is too serious to be ignored. Sin has consequences, and Jesus volunteered to suffer the consequences on our behalf. The cross demonstrates God’s love as well as his justice (Romans 5:8).
As Isaiah says, we have peace with God because of what Christ did. We were once enemies of God, but through Christ we have been brought near (Ephesians 2:13). In other words, we have been reconciled to God through the cross (verse 16). It is a basic Christian belief that our relationship with God depends on the death of Jesus Christ.
Christianity is not a list of things to do—it is faith that Christ has done everything we need to be right with God—and he did it on the cross. “When we were God’s enemies, we were reconciled to him through the death of his Son” (Romans 5:10). God reconciled the universe through Christ, “making peace through his blood, shed on the cross” (Colossians 1:20). If we are reconciled through him, all our sins are forgiven (verse 22)—reconciliation, forgiveness and justification all mean the same thing: peace with God.
Victory!
Paul uses an interesting image of salvation when he writes that Jesus “disarmed the powers and authorities” by making “a public spectacle of them, triumphing over them by the cross” (Colossians 2:15). He uses the word for a military parade: the winning general brings captured enemy soldiers in a victory parade at home. They are disarmed, humiliated, put on display. Paul’s point here is that Jesus did this on the cross.
What looked like a shameful death for Jesus was actually a glorious triumph for God’s plan, because it is through the cross that Jesus won victory over enemy powers, including Satan, sin and death. Their claim on us has been fully satisfied in the death of the innocent victim. They cannot demand any more than what he has already paid. They have nothing further to threaten us with.
“By his death,” we are told, Jesus was able to “destroy him who holds the power of death—that is, the devil” (Hebrews 2:14). “The reason the Son of God appeared was to destroy the devil’s work” (1 John 3:8). Victory was won on the cross.
Sacrifice
Jesus’ death is also described as a sacrifice. The idea of sacrifice draws on the rich imagery of Old Testament sacrifices. Isaiah 53:10 calls our Savior a “guilt offering.” John the Baptist calls him the Lamb “who takes away the sin of the world” (John 1:29). Paul calls him a “sacrifice of atonement,” a “sin offering,” a “Passover lamb,” a “fragrant offering” (Romans 3:25; 8:3; 1 Corinthians 5:7; Ephesians 5:2). Hebrews 10:12 calls him a “sacrifice for sins.” John calls him “the atoning sacrifice for our sins” (1 John 2:2; 4:10).
Several terms are used to describe what Jesus accomplished on the cross. Different New Testament authors use different words or images to convey the idea. The exact terminology or mechanism is not essential. What is important is simply that we are saved through the death of Jesus. “By his wounds we are healed.” He died to set us free, to remove our sins, to suffer our punishment, to purchase our salvation. “Dear friends, since God so loved us, we also ought to love one another” (1 John 4:11).
Michael Morrison
Jesus had an amazingly productive ministry, teaching and healing thousands. He attracted large crowds and had potential for much more. He could have healed thousands more by traveling to the Jews and gentiles who lived in other areas.
But Jesus allowed this work to come to a sudden end. He could have avoided arrest, but he chose to die instead of expanding his ministry. Although his teachings were important, he had come not just to teach, but also to die — and he accomplished more in his death than in his life.
Death was Jesus’ most important ministry. This is the way we remember him, through the cross as a symbol of Christianity or through the bread and wine of the Lord’s Supper. Our Savior is a Savior who died.
Born to die
The Old Testament tells us that God appeared as a human being on several occasions. If Jesus wanted only to heal and teach, he could have simply appeared. But he did more: he became a human. Why? So he could die. To understand Jesus, we need to understand his death. His death is a crucial part of the gospel and something all Christians should know.
Jesus said, “The Son of Man did not come to be served, but to serve, and to give his life as a ransom for many” (Matthew 20:28). He came to give his life, to die, and his death would purchase salvation for others. This was the primary reason he came to earth. His blood was poured out for others (Matthew 26:28).
Jesus warned his disciples that he would suffer and die, but they didn’t seem to believe it. “Jesus began to explain to his disciples that he must go to Jerusalem and suffer many things at the hands of the elders, chief priests and teachers of the law, and that he must be killed and on the third day be raised to life. Peter took him aside and began to rebuke him. ‘Never, Lord!’ he said. ‘This shall never happen to you!’” (Matthew 16:21-22).
Jesus knew that he must die, because the Scriptures said so. “Why then is it written that the Son of Man must suffer much and be rejected?” (Mark 9:12; 9:31; 10:33-34). “Beginning with Moses and all the Prophets, he explained to them what was said in all the Scriptures concerning himself…. ‘This is what is written: The Christ will suffer and rise from the dead on the third day’” (Luke 24:26-27, 46).
It had all been according to God’s plan: Herod and Pilate did only what God “had decided beforehand should happen” (Acts 4:28). In the Garden of Gethsemane, Jesus asked if there might be some other way, but there was none (Luke 22:42). His death was necessary for our salvation.
The suffering servant
Where was it written? Isaiah 53 is the clearest prophecy. Jesus quoted Isaiah 53:12 when he said: “It is written: ‘And he was numbered with the transgressors’; and I tell you that this must be fulfilled in me. Yes, what is written about me is reaching its fulfillment” (Luke 22:37). Jesus, although without sin, was to be counted among sinners. Notice what else is written in Isaiah 53:
Surely he took up our infirmities and carried our sorrows, yet we considered him stricken by God, smitten by him, and afflicted. But he was pierced for our transgressions, he was crushed for our iniquities; the punishment that brought us peace was upon him, and by his wounds we are healed. We all, like sheep, have gone astray, each of us has turned to his own way; and the Lord has laid on him the iniquity of us all.
For the transgression of my people he was stricken.... Though he had done no violence ... it was the Lord’s will to crush him and cause him to suffer ... the Lord makes his life a guilt offering.... He will bear their iniquities.... He bore the sin of many, and made intercession for the transgressors (verses 4-12).
Isaiah describes a man who suffers not for his own sins, but for the sins of others. And though this man would be “cut off from the land of the living” (verse 8), that would not be the end of the story. “He will see the light of life and be satisfied; by his knowledge my righteous servant will justify many.... He will see his offspring and prolong his days” (verses 11, 10).
What Isaiah wrote, Jesus fulfilled. He laid down his life for his sheep (John 10:15). In his death, he carried our sins and suffered for our transgressions; he was punished so that we might have peace with God. Through his suffering and death, our spiritual illness is healed; we are justified—our sins are taken away.
These truths are developed in more detail in the New Testament.
Dying an accursed death
“Anyone who is hung on a tree is under God’s curse,” says Deuteronomy 21:23. Because of this verse, Jews considered any crucified person to be condemned by God. As Isaiah wrote, people would consider him “stricken by God.”
The Jewish leaders probably thought that Jesus’ disciples would give up after their leader was killed. And it happened just as they hoped — the crucifixion shattered the disciples’ hopes. They were dejected and said, “We had hoped that he was the one who was going to redeem Israel” (Luke 24:21). But their hopes were dramatically restored when Jesus appeared to them after his resurrection, and at Pentecost, the Holy Spirit filled them with new conviction to proclaim salvation in Jesus Christ. They had unshakable faith in the least likely hero: a crucified Messiah.
Peter told the Jewish leaders, “The God of our fathers raised Jesus from the dead—whom you had killed by hanging him on a tree” (Acts 5:30). By using the word tree, Peter reminded the leaders of the curse of crucifixion. But the shame was not on Jesus, he said—it was on the people who crucified him. God had blessed him because he did not deserve the curse he suffered. God had reversed the stigma.
Paul referred to the same curse in Galatians 3:13: “Christ redeemed us from the curse of the law by becoming a curse for us, for it is written: ‘Cursed is everyone who is hung on a tree.’” Jesus became a curse on our behalf so we could escape the curse of the law. He became something he was not, so that we could become something we were not. “God made him who had no sin to be sin for us, so that in him we might become the righteousness of God” (2 Corinthians 5:21).
He became sin for us, so that we might be declared righteous through him. Because he suffered what we deserved, he redeemed us from the curse of the law. “The punishment that brought us peace was upon him.” Because he suffered death, we can enjoy peace with God.
Message of the cross
The disciples never forgot the shameful way that Jesus died. Indeed, sometimes that was the focus of the message: “We preach Christ crucified: a stumbling block to Jews and foolishness to Gentiles” (1 Cor¬inthians 1:23). Paul even called the gospel “the message of the cross” (verse 18). Paul reminded the Galatians that “before your very eyes Jesus Christ was clearly portrayed as crucified” (Galatians 3:1). That was how he summarized the gospel.
Why is the cross good news? Because on the cross we were redeemed. Paul focused on the cross because it is the key to Jesus being good news for us. We will not be raised into glory unless our sins are removed from the record, unless in Christ we are made “the righteousness of God.” Only then can we join Jesus in his glory. The crucifixion makes it possible.
Paul says that Jesus died “for us” (Romans 5:6-8; 2 Corinthians 5:14; 1 Thessalonians 5:10); he also says that he died “for our sins” (1 Corinthians 15:3; Gal. 1:4). “He himself bore our sins in his body on the tree” (1 Peter 2:24; 3:18). Paul also says that we died with Christ (Romans 6:3-8). Through faith in him, we participate in his death.
It is as if we were on the cross, receiving the curse that our sins deserved. But he did it for us, and because he did it, we can be justified, or counted as righteous. He takes our sin and death; he gives us righteousness and life. The prince became a pauper, so that we paupers might become princes.
Although Jesus used the word ransom to describe our rescue, the ransom wasn’t paid to anyone in particular—this is a figure of speech to indicate that it cost Jesus an enormous amount to set us free. In the same way, Paul talks about Jesus redeeming us, buying our freedom, but he didn’t pay anyone.
Some have said that Jesus died to pay the legal demands of his Father—but it can also be said that the Father himself is the one who paid the price, by sending his Son for this very purpose (John 3:16; Romans 5:8). “By the grace of God he might taste death for everyone” (Hebrews 2:9).
God loves people—but he hates sin, because sin hurts people. God wants everyone to repent (2 Peter 3:9), but those who don’t will suffer the result of their sin.
In the death of Jesus, our sins are forgiven. But this does not mean that a loving Jesus appeased or “paid off” an angry God. The Father is just as merciful as Jesus is, and Jesus is just as angry about sin as the Father is. He is angry at sin because sin hurts the people he loves. Jesus is the Judge who condemns (Matthew 25:31-46), as well as the Judge who loves sinners so much that he dies for them.
When God forgives us, he does not simply wipe away sin and pretend it never existed. He teaches us throughout the New Testament that sins are taken care of through the death of Jesus. Sins have serious consequences—consequences we can see in the cross of Christ. It cost Jesus pain and shame and death.
The gospel reveals that God acts righteously in forgiving us (Romans 1:17). He does not ignore our sins, but takes care of them in Jesus Christ. God presented Jesus as a sacrifice for our forgiveness. “He did this to demonstrate his justice” (Romans 3:25). The cross reveals that God is just; it shows that sin is too serious to be ignored. Sin has consequences, and Jesus volunteered to suffer the consequences on our behalf. The cross demonstrates God’s love as well as his justice (Romans 5:8).
As Isaiah says, we have peace with God because of what Christ did. We were once enemies of God, but through Christ we have been brought near (Ephesians 2:13). In other words, we have been reconciled to God through the cross (verse 16). It is a basic Christian belief that our relationship with God depends on the death of Jesus Christ.
Christianity is not a list of things to do—it is faith that Christ has done everything we need to be right with God—and he did it on the cross. “When we were God’s enemies, we were reconciled to him through the death of his Son” (Romans 5:10). God reconciled the universe through Christ, “making peace through his blood, shed on the cross” (Colossians 1:20). If we are reconciled through him, all our sins are forgiven (verse 22)—reconciliation, forgiveness and justification all mean the same thing: peace with God.
Victory!
Paul uses an interesting image of salvation when he writes that Jesus “disarmed the powers and authorities” by making “a public spectacle of them, triumphing over them by the cross” (Colossians 2:15). He uses the word for a military parade: the winning general brings captured enemy soldiers in a victory parade at home. They are disarmed, humiliated, put on display. Paul’s point here is that Jesus did this on the cross.
What looked like a shameful death for Jesus was actually a glorious triumph for God’s plan, because it is through the cross that Jesus won victory over enemy powers, including Satan, sin and death. Their claim on us has been fully satisfied in the death of the innocent victim. They cannot demand any more than what he has already paid. They have nothing further to threaten us with.
“By his death,” we are told, Jesus was able to “destroy him who holds the power of death—that is, the devil” (Hebrews 2:14). “The reason the Son of God appeared was to destroy the devil’s work” (1 John 3:8). Victory was won on the cross.
Sacrifice
Jesus’ death is also described as a sacrifice. The idea of sacrifice draws on the rich imagery of Old Testament sacrifices. Isaiah 53:10 calls our Savior a “guilt offering.” John the Baptist calls him the Lamb “who takes away the sin of the world” (John 1:29). Paul calls him a “sacrifice of atonement,” a “sin offering,” a “Passover lamb,” a “fragrant offering” (Romans 3:25; 8:3; 1 Corinthians 5:7; Ephesians 5:2). Hebrews 10:12 calls him a “sacrifice for sins.” John calls him “the atoning sacrifice for our sins” (1 John 2:2; 4:10).
Several terms are used to describe what Jesus accomplished on the cross. Different New Testament authors use different words or images to convey the idea. The exact terminology or mechanism is not essential. What is important is simply that we are saved through the death of Jesus. “By his wounds we are healed.” He died to set us free, to remove our sins, to suffer our punishment, to purchase our salvation. “Dear friends, since God so loved us, we also ought to love one another” (1 John 4:11).
Michael Morrison
Jesus had an amazingly productive ministry, teaching and healing thousands. He attracted large crowds and had potential for much more. He could have healed thousands more by traveling to the Jews and gentiles who lived in other areas.
But Jesus allowed this work to come to a sudden end. He could have avoided arrest, but he chose to die instead of expanding his ministry. Although his teachings were important, he had come not just to teach, but also to die — and he accomplished more in his death than in his life.
Death was Jesus’ most important ministry. This is the way we remember him, through the cross as a symbol of Christianity or through the bread and wine of the Lord’s Supper. Our Savior is a Savior who died.
Born to die
The Old Testament tells us that God appeared as a human being on several occasions. If Jesus wanted only to heal and teach, he could have simply appeared. But he did more: he became a human. Why? So he could die. To understand Jesus, we need to understand his death. His death is a crucial part of the gospel and something all Christians should know.
Jesus said, “The Son of Man did not come to be served, but to serve, and to give his life as a ransom for many” (Matthew 20:28). He came to give his life, to die, and his death would purchase salvation for others. This was the primary reason he came to earth. His blood was poured out for others (Matthew 26:28).
Jesus warned his disciples that he would suffer and die, but they didn’t seem to believe it. “Jesus began to explain to his disciples that he must go to Jerusalem and suffer many things at the hands of the elders, chief priests and teachers of the law, and that he must be killed and on the third day be raised to life. Peter took him aside and began to rebuke him. ‘Never, Lord!’ he said. ‘This shall never happen to you!’” (Matthew 16:21-22).
Jesus knew that he must die, because the Scriptures said so. “Why then is it written that the Son of Man must suffer much and be rejected?” (Mark 9:12; 9:31; 10:33-34). “Beginning with Moses and all the Prophets, he explained to them what was said in all the Scriptures concerning himself…. ‘This is what is written: The Christ will suffer and rise from the dead on the third day’” (Luke 24:26-27, 46).
It had all been according to God’s plan: Herod and Pilate did only what God “had decided beforehand should happen” (Acts 4:28). In the Garden of Gethsemane, Jesus asked if there might be some other way, but there was none (Luke 22:42). His death was necessary for our salvation.
The suffering servant
Where was it written? Isaiah 53 is the clearest prophecy. Jesus quoted Isaiah 53:12 when he said: “It is written: ‘And he was numbered with the transgressors’; and I tell you that this must be fulfilled in me. Yes, what is written about me is reaching its fulfillment” (Luke 22:37). Jesus, although without sin, was to be counted among sinners. Notice what else is written in Isaiah 53:
Surely he took up our infirmities and carried our sorrows, yet we considered him stricken by God, smitten by him, and afflicted. But he was pierced for our transgressions, he was crushed for our iniquities; the punishment that brought us peace was upon him, and by his wounds we are healed. We all, like sheep, have gone astray, each of us has turned to his own way; and the Lord has laid on him the iniquity of us all.
For the transgression of my people he was stricken.... Though he had done no violence ... it was the Lord’s will to crush him and cause him to suffer ... the Lord makes his life a guilt offering.... He will bear their iniquities.... He bore the sin of many, and made intercession for the transgressors (verses 4-12).
Isaiah describes a man who suffers not for his own sins, but for the sins of others. And though this man would be “cut off from the land of the living” (verse 8), that would not be the end of the story. “He will see the light of life and be satisfied; by his knowledge my righteous servant will justify many.... He will see his offspring and prolong his days” (verses 11, 10).
What Isaiah wrote, Jesus fulfilled. He laid down his life for his sheep (John 10:15). In his death, he carried our sins and suffered for our transgressions; he was punished so that we might have peace with God. Through his suffering and death, our spiritual illness is healed; we are justified—our sins are taken away.
These truths are developed in more detail in the New Testament.
Dying an accursed death
“Anyone who is hung on a tree is under God’s curse,” says Deuteronomy 21:23. Because of this verse, Jews considered any crucified person to be condemned by God. As Isaiah wrote, people would consider him “stricken by God.”
The Jewish leaders probably thought that Jesus’ disciples would give up after their leader was killed. And it happened just as they hoped — the crucifixion shattered the disciples’ hopes. They were dejected and said, “We had hoped that he was the one who was going to redeem Israel” (Luke 24:21). But their hopes were dramatically restored when Jesus appeared to them after his resurrection, and at Pentecost, the Holy Spirit filled them with new conviction to proclaim salvation in Jesus Christ. They had unshakable faith in the least likely hero: a crucified Messiah.
Peter told the Jewish leaders, “The God of our fathers raised Jesus from the dead—whom you had killed by hanging him on a tree” (Acts 5:30). By using the word tree, Peter reminded the leaders of the curse of crucifixion. But the shame was not on Jesus, he said—it was on the people who crucified him. God had blessed him because he did not deserve the curse he suffered. God had reversed the stigma.
Paul referred to the same curse in Galatians 3:13: “Christ redeemed us from the curse of the law by becoming a curse for us, for it is written: ‘Cursed is everyone who is hung on a tree.’” Jesus became a curse on our behalf so we could escape the curse of the law. He became something he was not, so that we could become something we were not. “God made him who had no sin to be sin for us, so that in him we might become the righteousness of God” (2 Corinthians 5:21).
He became sin for us, so that we might be declared righteous through him. Because he suffered what we deserved, he redeemed us from the curse of the law. “The punishment that brought us peace was upon him.” Because he suffered death, we can enjoy peace with God.
Message of the cross
The disciples never forgot the shameful way that Jesus died. Indeed, sometimes that was the focus of the message: “We preach Christ crucified: a stumbling block to Jews and foolishness to Gentiles” (1 Cor¬inthians 1:23). Paul even called the gospel “the message of the cross” (verse 18). Paul reminded the Galatians that “before your very eyes Jesus Christ was clearly portrayed as crucified” (Galatians 3:1). That was how he summarized the gospel.
Why is the cross good news? Because on the cross we were redeemed. Paul focused on the cross because it is the key to Jesus being good news for us. We will not be raised into glory unless our sins are removed from the record, unless in Christ we are made “the righteousness of God.” Only then can we join Jesus in his glory. The crucifixion makes it possible.
Paul says that Jesus died “for us” (Romans 5:6-8; 2 Corinthians 5:14; 1 Thessalonians 5:10); he also says that he died “for our sins” (1 Corinthians 15:3; Gal. 1:4). “He himself bore our sins in his body on the tree” (1 Peter 2:24; 3:18). Paul also says that we died with Christ (Romans 6:3-8). Through faith in him, we participate in his death.
It is as if we were on the cross, receiving the curse that our sins deserved. But he did it for us, and because he did it, we can be justified, or counted as righteous. He takes our sin and death; he gives us righteousness and life. The prince became a pauper, so that we paupers might become princes.
Although Jesus used the word ransom to describe our rescue, the ransom wasn’t paid to anyone in particular—this is a figure of speech to indicate that it cost Jesus an enormous amount to set us free. In the same way, Paul talks about Jesus redeeming us, buying our freedom, but he didn’t pay anyone.
Some have said that Jesus died to pay the legal demands of his Father—but it can also be said that the Father himself is the one who paid the price, by sending his Son for this very purpose (John 3:16; Romans 5:8). “By the grace of God he might taste death for everyone” (Hebrews 2:9).
God loves people—but he hates sin, because sin hurts people. God wants everyone to repent (2 Peter 3:9), but those who don’t will suffer the result of their sin.
In the death of Jesus, our sins are forgiven. But this does not mean that a loving Jesus appeased or “paid off” an angry God. The Father is just as merciful as Jesus is, and Jesus is just as angry about sin as the Father is. He is angry at sin because sin hurts the people he loves. Jesus is the Judge who condemns (Matthew 25:31-46), as well as the Judge who loves sinners so much that he dies for them.
When God forgives us, he does not simply wipe away sin and pretend it never existed. He teaches us throughout the New Testament that sins are taken care of through the death of Jesus. Sins have serious consequences—consequences we can see in the cross of Christ. It cost Jesus pain and shame and death.
The gospel reveals that God acts righteously in forgiving us (Romans 1:17). He does not ignore our sins, but takes care of them in Jesus Christ. God presented Jesus as a sacrifice for our forgiveness. “He did this to demonstrate his justice” (Romans 3:25). The cross reveals that God is just; it shows that sin is too serious to be ignored. Sin has consequences, and Jesus volunteered to suffer the consequences on our behalf. The cross demonstrates God’s love as well as his justice (Romans 5:8).
As Isaiah says, we have peace with God because of what Christ did. We were once enemies of God, but through Christ we have been brought near (Ephesians 2:13). In other words, we have been reconciled to God through the cross (verse 16). It is a basic Christian belief that our relationship with God depends on the death of Jesus Christ.
Christianity is not a list of things to do—it is faith that Christ has done everything we need to be right with God—and he did it on the cross. “When we were God’s enemies, we were reconciled to him through the death of his Son” (Romans 5:10). God reconciled the universe through Christ, “making peace through his blood, shed on the cross” (Colossians 1:20). If we are reconciled through him, all our sins are forgiven (verse 22)—reconciliation, forgiveness and justification all mean the same thing: peace with God.
Victory!
Paul uses an interesting image of salvation when he writes that Jesus “disarmed the powers and authorities” by making “a public spectacle of them, triumphing over them by the cross” (Colossians 2:15). He uses the word for a military parade: the winning general brings captured enemy soldiers in a victory parade at home. They are disarmed, humiliated, put on display. Paul’s point here is that Jesus did this on the cross.
What looked like a shameful death for Jesus was actually a glorious triumph for God’s plan, because it is through the cross that Jesus won victory over enemy powers, including Satan, sin and death. Their claim on us has been fully satisfied in the death of the innocent victim. They cannot demand any more than what he has already paid. They have nothing further to threaten us with.
“By his death,” we are told, Jesus was able to “destroy him who holds the power of death—that is, the devil” (Hebrews 2:14). “The reason the Son of God appeared was to destroy the devil’s work” (1 John 3:8). Victory was won on the cross.
Sacrifice
Jesus’ death is also described as a sacrifice. The idea of sacrifice draws on the rich imagery of Old Testament sacrifices. Isaiah 53:10 calls our Savior a “guilt offering.” John the Baptist calls him the Lamb “who takes away the sin of the world” (John 1:29). Paul calls him a “sacrifice of atonement,” a “sin offering,” a “Passover lamb,” a “fragrant offering” (Romans 3:25; 8:3; 1 Corinthians 5:7; Ephesians 5:2). Hebrews 10:12 calls him a “sacrifice for sins.” John calls him “the atoning sacrifice for our sins” (1 John 2:2; 4:10).
Several terms are used to describe what Jesus accomplished on the cross. Different New Testament authors use different words or images to convey the idea. The exact terminology or mechanism is not essential. What is important is simply that we are saved through the death of Jesus. “By his wounds we are healed.” He died to set us free, to remove our sins, to suffer our punishment, to purchase our salvation. “Dear friends, since God so loved us, we also ought to love one another” (1 John 4:11).
Michael Morrison
HOW DEEP IS THE OCEAN???
Challenger Deep in the Mariana Trench is the deepest point in Earth's oceans. The bottom there is 10,924 meters (35,840 feet) below sea level. If Mount Everest, the highest moutain on Earth, were placed at this location it would be covered by over one mile of water. The Challenger Deep is named after the British survey ship Challenger II, which discovered this deepest location in 1951.
HOW IS METAL MADE??
All elements that occur in nature can be divided into metals and non metals. Metals conduct heat and electricity, are hard, deformable, shiny, etc. Copper, gold, silver tin and zinc are all metals.
All metals are found in the earth, but most are not found in their pure state. Gold, platinum and sometimes copper and silver are found in their pure state. Gold, platinum and sometimes copper and silver are found in their pure states, but most are found as ores.
An ore is a combination of metal and other elements such as oxygen, sulfur and carbon, which are removed by heating the metal, called smelting.
Most of the metals we use are not pure of elemental metals; they are alloys. Alloys are prepared from two or more metals. Copper and tin are mixed to form bronze. Copper and zinc make up brass, used in many musical instruments. Alloys are made by heating up each of the solid metals until they form a liquid. This liquid is then mixed and cooled.
All metals are found in the earth, but most are not found in their pure state. Gold, platinum and sometimes copper and silver are found in their pure state. Gold, platinum and sometimes copper and silver are found in their pure states, but most are found as ores.
An ore is a combination of metal and other elements such as oxygen, sulfur and carbon, which are removed by heating the metal, called smelting.
Most of the metals we use are not pure of elemental metals; they are alloys. Alloys are prepared from two or more metals. Copper and tin are mixed to form bronze. Copper and zinc make up brass, used in many musical instruments. Alloys are made by heating up each of the solid metals until they form a liquid. This liquid is then mixed and cooled.
HOW WAS COFFEE INVENTED???
The history and development of the beverage that we know as coffee is varied and interesting, involving chance occurrences, political intrigue, and the pursuit of wealth and power.
According to one story, the effect of coffee beans on behavior was noticed by a sheep herder from Caffa Ethopia named Kaldi as he tended his sheep. He noticed that the sheep became hyperactive after eating the red "cherries" from a certain plant when they changed pastures. He tried a few himself, and was soon as overactive as his herd. The story relates that a monk happened by and scolded him for "partaking of the devil's fruit." However the monks soon discovered that this fruit from the shiny green plant could help them stay awake for their prayers.
Another legend gives us the name for coffee or "mocha." An Arabian was banished to the desert with his followers to die of starvation. In desperation, Omar had his friends boil and eat the fruit from an unknown plant. Not only did the broth save the exiles, but their survival was taken as a religious sign by the residents of the nearest town, Mocha. The plant and its beverage were named Mocha to honor this event.
Originally the coffee plant grew naturally in Ethopia, but once transplanted in Arabia was monopolized by them. One early use for coffee would have little appeal today. The Galla tribe from Ethiopia used coffee, but not as a drink. They would wrap the beans in animal fat as their only source of nutrition while on raiding parties. The Turks were the first country to adopt it as a drink, often adding spices such as clove, cinnamon, cardamom and anise to the brew.
Coffee was introduced much later to countries beyond Arabia whose inhabitants believed it to be a delicacy and guarded its secret as if they were top secret military plans. Transportation of the plant out of the Moslem nations was forbidden by the government. The actual spread of coffee was started illegally. One Arab named Baba Budan smuggled beans to some mountains near Mysore, India, and started a farm there. Early in this century, the descendants of those original plants were found still growing fruitfully in the region.
Coffee was believed by some Christians to be the devil's drink. Pope Vincent III heard this and decided to taste it before he banished it. He enjoyed it so much he baptized it, saying "coffee is so delicious it would be a pity to let the infidels have exclusive use of it."
Coffee today is grown and enjoyed worldwide, and is one of the few crops that small farmers in third-world countries can profitably export.
Coffee Timeline:Excerpt from UTNE READER, Nov/Dec 94, by Mark Schapiro, "Muddy Waters"Prior to 1000 A.D.: Members of the Galla tribe in Ethiopia notice that they get an energy boost when they eat a certain berry, ground up and mixed with animal fat. 1000 A.D.: Arab traders bring coffee back to their homeland and cultivate the plant for the first time on plantations. They also began to boil the beans, creating a drink they call "qahwa" (literally, that which prevents sleep). 1453: Coffee is introduced to Constantinople by Ottoman Turks. The world's first coffee shop, Kiva Han, open there in 1475. Turkish law makes it legal for a woman to divorce her husband if he fail to provide her with her daily quota of coffee. 1511: Khair Beg, the corrupt governor of Mecca, tries to ban coffee for feat that its influence might foster opposition to his rule. The sultan sends word that coffee is sacred and has the governor executed. 1600: Coffee, introduced to the West by Italian traders, grabs attention in high places. In Italy, Pope Clement VIII is urged by his advisers to consider that favorite drink of the Ottoman Empire part of the infidel threat. However, he decides to "baptize" it instead, making it an acceptable Christian beverage. 1607: Captain John Smith helps to found the colony of Virginia at Jamestown. It's believed that he introduced coffee to North America. 1645: First coffeehouse opens in Italy. 1652: First coffeehouse opens in England. Coffee houses multiply and become such popular forums for learned and not so learned - discussion that they are dubbed "penny universities" (a penny being the price of a cup of coffee). 1668: Coffee replaces beer as New York's City's favorite breakfast drink. 1668: Edward Lloyd's coffeehouse opens in England and is frequented by merchants and maritime insurance agents. Eventually it becomes Lloyd's of London, the best-known insurance company in the world. 1672: First coffeehouse opens in Paris.1675: The Turkish Army surrounds Vienna. Franz Georg Kolschitzky, a Viennese who had lived in Turkey, slips through the enemy lines to lead relief forces to the city. The fleeing Turks leave behind sacks of "dry black fodder" that Kolschitzky recognizes as coffee. He claims it as his reward and opens central Europe's first coffee house. He also establishes the habit of refining the brew by filtering out the grounds, sweetening it, and adding a dash of milk. 1690: With a coffee plant smuggled out of the Arab port of Mocha, the Dutch become the first to transport and cultivate coffee commercially, in Ceylon and in their East Indian colony - Java, source of the brew's nickname.1713: The Dutch unwittingly provide Louis XIV of France with a coffee bush whose descendants will produce entire Western coffee industry when in 1723 French naval officer Gabriel Mathieu do Clieu steals a seedling and transports it to Martinique. Within 50 years and official survey records 19 million coffee trees on Martinique. Eventually, 90 percent of the world's coffee spreads from this plant.1721: First coffee house opens in Berlin.1727: The Brazilian coffee industry gets its start when Lieutenant colonel Francisco de Melo Palheta is sent by government to arbitrate a border dispute between the French and the Dutch colonies in Guiana. Not only does he settle the dispute, but also strikes up a secret liaison with the wife of French Guiana's governor. Although France guarded its New World coffee plantations to prevent cultivation from spreading, the lady said good-bye to Palheta with a bouquet in which she hid cuttings and fertile seeds of coffee.1732: Johann Sevastian Bach composes his Kaffee-Kantate. Partly an ode to coffee and partly a stab at the movement in Germany to prevent women from drinking coffee (it was thought to make them sterile), the cantata includes the aria, "Ah! How sweet coffee taste! Lovelier than a thousand kisses, sweeter far than muscatel wine! I must have my coffee."1773: The Boston Tea Party makes drinking coffee a patriotic duty in America.1775: Prussia's Frederick the Great tries to block inports of green coffee, as Prussia's wealth is drained. Public outcry changes his mind.1886: Former wholesale grocer Joel Cheek names his popular coffee blend "Maxwell House," after the hotel in Nashville, TN where it's served.Early 1900's: In Germany, afternoon coffee becomes a standard occasion. The derogatory term "KaffeeKlatsch" is coined to describe women's gossip at these affairs. Since broadened to mean relaxed conversation in general.1900: Hills Bros. begins packing roast coffee in vacuum tins, spelling the end of the ubiquitous local roasting shops and coffee mills.1901: The first soluble "instant" coffee is invented by Japanese-American chemist Satori Kato of Chicago.1903: German coffee importer Ludwig Roselius turn a batch of ruined coffee beans over to researchers, who perfect the process of removing caffeine from the beans without destroying the flavor. He markets it under the brand name "Sanka." Sanka is introduced to the United States in 1923.1906: George Constant Washington, an English chemist living in Guatemala, notices a powdery condensation forming on the spout of his silver coffee carafe. After experimentation, he creates the first mass-produced instant coffee (his brand is called Red E Coffee).1907: In less than a century Brazil accounted for 97% of the world's harvest.1920: Prohibition goes into effect in United States. Coffee sales boom.1938: Having been asked by Brazil to help find a solution to their coffee surpluses, Nestle company invents freeze-dried coffee. Nestle develops Nescafe and introduces it in Switzerland.1940: The US imports 70 percent of the world coffee crop.1942: During W.W.II, American soldiers are issued instant Maxwell House coffee in their ration kits. Back home, widespread hoarding leads to coffee rationing.1946: In Italy, Achilles Gaggia perfects his espresso machine. Cappuccino is named for the resemblance of its color to the robes of the monks of the Capuchin order.1969: One week before Woodstock the Manson Family murders coffee heiress Abigail Folger as she visits with friend Sharon Tate in the home of filmmaker Roman Polanski.1971: Starbucks opens its first store in Seattle's Pike Place public market, creating a frenzy over fresh-roasted whole bean coffee.1979: Mr Cappuccino opens for business!2007: NEW STA IMPAINTI COFFEE ROASTER
According to one story, the effect of coffee beans on behavior was noticed by a sheep herder from Caffa Ethopia named Kaldi as he tended his sheep. He noticed that the sheep became hyperactive after eating the red "cherries" from a certain plant when they changed pastures. He tried a few himself, and was soon as overactive as his herd. The story relates that a monk happened by and scolded him for "partaking of the devil's fruit." However the monks soon discovered that this fruit from the shiny green plant could help them stay awake for their prayers.
Another legend gives us the name for coffee or "mocha." An Arabian was banished to the desert with his followers to die of starvation. In desperation, Omar had his friends boil and eat the fruit from an unknown plant. Not only did the broth save the exiles, but their survival was taken as a religious sign by the residents of the nearest town, Mocha. The plant and its beverage were named Mocha to honor this event.
Originally the coffee plant grew naturally in Ethopia, but once transplanted in Arabia was monopolized by them. One early use for coffee would have little appeal today. The Galla tribe from Ethiopia used coffee, but not as a drink. They would wrap the beans in animal fat as their only source of nutrition while on raiding parties. The Turks were the first country to adopt it as a drink, often adding spices such as clove, cinnamon, cardamom and anise to the brew.
Coffee was introduced much later to countries beyond Arabia whose inhabitants believed it to be a delicacy and guarded its secret as if they were top secret military plans. Transportation of the plant out of the Moslem nations was forbidden by the government. The actual spread of coffee was started illegally. One Arab named Baba Budan smuggled beans to some mountains near Mysore, India, and started a farm there. Early in this century, the descendants of those original plants were found still growing fruitfully in the region.
Coffee was believed by some Christians to be the devil's drink. Pope Vincent III heard this and decided to taste it before he banished it. He enjoyed it so much he baptized it, saying "coffee is so delicious it would be a pity to let the infidels have exclusive use of it."
Coffee today is grown and enjoyed worldwide, and is one of the few crops that small farmers in third-world countries can profitably export.
Coffee Timeline:Excerpt from UTNE READER, Nov/Dec 94, by Mark Schapiro, "Muddy Waters"Prior to 1000 A.D.: Members of the Galla tribe in Ethiopia notice that they get an energy boost when they eat a certain berry, ground up and mixed with animal fat. 1000 A.D.: Arab traders bring coffee back to their homeland and cultivate the plant for the first time on plantations. They also began to boil the beans, creating a drink they call "qahwa" (literally, that which prevents sleep). 1453: Coffee is introduced to Constantinople by Ottoman Turks. The world's first coffee shop, Kiva Han, open there in 1475. Turkish law makes it legal for a woman to divorce her husband if he fail to provide her with her daily quota of coffee. 1511: Khair Beg, the corrupt governor of Mecca, tries to ban coffee for feat that its influence might foster opposition to his rule. The sultan sends word that coffee is sacred and has the governor executed. 1600: Coffee, introduced to the West by Italian traders, grabs attention in high places. In Italy, Pope Clement VIII is urged by his advisers to consider that favorite drink of the Ottoman Empire part of the infidel threat. However, he decides to "baptize" it instead, making it an acceptable Christian beverage. 1607: Captain John Smith helps to found the colony of Virginia at Jamestown. It's believed that he introduced coffee to North America. 1645: First coffeehouse opens in Italy. 1652: First coffeehouse opens in England. Coffee houses multiply and become such popular forums for learned and not so learned - discussion that they are dubbed "penny universities" (a penny being the price of a cup of coffee). 1668: Coffee replaces beer as New York's City's favorite breakfast drink. 1668: Edward Lloyd's coffeehouse opens in England and is frequented by merchants and maritime insurance agents. Eventually it becomes Lloyd's of London, the best-known insurance company in the world. 1672: First coffeehouse opens in Paris.1675: The Turkish Army surrounds Vienna. Franz Georg Kolschitzky, a Viennese who had lived in Turkey, slips through the enemy lines to lead relief forces to the city. The fleeing Turks leave behind sacks of "dry black fodder" that Kolschitzky recognizes as coffee. He claims it as his reward and opens central Europe's first coffee house. He also establishes the habit of refining the brew by filtering out the grounds, sweetening it, and adding a dash of milk. 1690: With a coffee plant smuggled out of the Arab port of Mocha, the Dutch become the first to transport and cultivate coffee commercially, in Ceylon and in their East Indian colony - Java, source of the brew's nickname.1713: The Dutch unwittingly provide Louis XIV of France with a coffee bush whose descendants will produce entire Western coffee industry when in 1723 French naval officer Gabriel Mathieu do Clieu steals a seedling and transports it to Martinique. Within 50 years and official survey records 19 million coffee trees on Martinique. Eventually, 90 percent of the world's coffee spreads from this plant.1721: First coffee house opens in Berlin.1727: The Brazilian coffee industry gets its start when Lieutenant colonel Francisco de Melo Palheta is sent by government to arbitrate a border dispute between the French and the Dutch colonies in Guiana. Not only does he settle the dispute, but also strikes up a secret liaison with the wife of French Guiana's governor. Although France guarded its New World coffee plantations to prevent cultivation from spreading, the lady said good-bye to Palheta with a bouquet in which she hid cuttings and fertile seeds of coffee.1732: Johann Sevastian Bach composes his Kaffee-Kantate. Partly an ode to coffee and partly a stab at the movement in Germany to prevent women from drinking coffee (it was thought to make them sterile), the cantata includes the aria, "Ah! How sweet coffee taste! Lovelier than a thousand kisses, sweeter far than muscatel wine! I must have my coffee."1773: The Boston Tea Party makes drinking coffee a patriotic duty in America.1775: Prussia's Frederick the Great tries to block inports of green coffee, as Prussia's wealth is drained. Public outcry changes his mind.1886: Former wholesale grocer Joel Cheek names his popular coffee blend "Maxwell House," after the hotel in Nashville, TN where it's served.Early 1900's: In Germany, afternoon coffee becomes a standard occasion. The derogatory term "KaffeeKlatsch" is coined to describe women's gossip at these affairs. Since broadened to mean relaxed conversation in general.1900: Hills Bros. begins packing roast coffee in vacuum tins, spelling the end of the ubiquitous local roasting shops and coffee mills.1901: The first soluble "instant" coffee is invented by Japanese-American chemist Satori Kato of Chicago.1903: German coffee importer Ludwig Roselius turn a batch of ruined coffee beans over to researchers, who perfect the process of removing caffeine from the beans without destroying the flavor. He markets it under the brand name "Sanka." Sanka is introduced to the United States in 1923.1906: George Constant Washington, an English chemist living in Guatemala, notices a powdery condensation forming on the spout of his silver coffee carafe. After experimentation, he creates the first mass-produced instant coffee (his brand is called Red E Coffee).1907: In less than a century Brazil accounted for 97% of the world's harvest.1920: Prohibition goes into effect in United States. Coffee sales boom.1938: Having been asked by Brazil to help find a solution to their coffee surpluses, Nestle company invents freeze-dried coffee. Nestle develops Nescafe and introduces it in Switzerland.1940: The US imports 70 percent of the world coffee crop.1942: During W.W.II, American soldiers are issued instant Maxwell House coffee in their ration kits. Back home, widespread hoarding leads to coffee rationing.1946: In Italy, Achilles Gaggia perfects his espresso machine. Cappuccino is named for the resemblance of its color to the robes of the monks of the Capuchin order.1969: One week before Woodstock the Manson Family murders coffee heiress Abigail Folger as she visits with friend Sharon Tate in the home of filmmaker Roman Polanski.1971: Starbucks opens its first store in Seattle's Pike Place public market, creating a frenzy over fresh-roasted whole bean coffee.1979: Mr Cappuccino opens for business!2007: NEW STA IMPAINTI COFFEE ROASTER
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