Best of 2016

(4 Minute Read)

It’s the last day of 2016, and this is the 52nd and last weekly blog post of the year. I hope that the Bible-Science Guy Blog has informed, challenged, and perhaps even stirred you in 2016.

I used this picture of one of my roaring campfires from this fall to highlight the Best of 2016, because most of this year’s blog posts were written in close proximity to a campfire. We camped more during 2016 (over 100 days) than in any previous year. Camping is so much fun that I sometimes wonder how people ever got started living in houses.

Here are some of the statistical highlights for this year’s blog. Don’t miss the recap below of the Best Bible-Science Guy Articles from 2016.

In 2016, 66,072 distinct readers from 182 countries viewed this blog 105,156 times. This is a 20% increase in distinct readers and an 18% increase in views over 2015. And that does not count all the blog subscribers who read the blog posts by email. This year the blog followers have increased by over 100 to reach 1,713 blog followers at year’s end.

The top ten countries in descending order of total views in 2016 were USA (78,971 views), Canada, UK, Australia, India, South Africa, Philippines, Germany, Malaysia, and Norway (579 views).

Sunday was the most popular day of the week to read the blog in 2016 with 17% of the blog views occurring on that day. This means viewership is probably fairly evenly spread throughout the week, since an equal distribution of views throughout the week would have 14.3% per day of the week. October was the busiest month with 9,750 views.

Click 2016 Bible-Science Guy Articles for a list of the 52 new articles posted on the Bible-Science Guy Blog in 2016. Additionally, 46 blog articles from 2008 were migrated from a defunct previous host to BibleScienceGuy.wordpress.com.

The Bible-Science Guy Blog started in October 2007. It now comprises 518 posts, 87 newspaper articles, and 10 tab pages for a total of 615 items. During 2016, 611 of these items were viewed at least once. Over the life of the blog, 177,258 different visitors have viewed the blog 347,498 times.

The five articles with the most views during 2016 were all published in prior years. Of the 140 articles with 100 or more views during 2016, only 27 were published in 2016. This illustrates the continuing relevance of the Bible-Science Guy blog articles.

Here are the Top Five articles with the most views during 2016:

How Many Died in Noah’s Flood?	(Jun 18, 2014)	– 24,731 views.
Tower of Babel – What Did It Look Like?	(Mar 20, 2013)	– 6,649 views.
Tower of Babel – Where?	(Mar 13, 2013)	– 5,583 views.
Could Noah Fill the Earth?	(May 28, 2014)	– 4,717 views.
Tower of Babel – When?	(Apr 3, 2013)	– 2,946 views.

 

The Best Bible-Science Guy Articles from 2016

Here are my choices for the best Bible-Science Guy Blog posts from 2016, listed in order of publication date. I chose the posts I liked best — the ones I found most interesting, most important, or best written. I included those that accumulated the most views or stimulated the most comments.

Where Was Adam’s Garden of Eden? (Jan 6)
Genesis is a hotly debated book. For a decade or so Genesis has been under a new assault. The claim is that Adam never existed. According to those who imagine that mankind evolved over millions of years, Adam and Eve are mythical and have no place in human history. Does the historical existence of Adam matter? Was there a real Garden of Eden? What does the Bible teach about Adam? This is one of a series of 42 articles on Adam that I began in Sept 2015 in which I discuss such questions. This Where? article on the Garden of Eden was the second-most viewed 2016 blog post this year. Other intriguing questions covered this year include:
Was Adam Backward or Brilliant? (with video)
Adam’s Dream Girl
How Many Children Did Adam Have?
Whom Did Adam’s Sons Marry?
Did Adam’s Garden Have a Talking Snake?
Why Should Adam’s Sin Affect Me?
Did Roses Have Thorns in Adam’s Garden?
Adam the Image-Bearer & Harambe the Gorilla (with video)
Did Adam Know Earth Is Round?
Did Jesus Say When Adam Was Created?
Did Adam See Dinosaurs?
Could Adam Read & Write?
Did God Use Evolution to Make Adam?
Adam and the Gospel (with video)

Risen, the Movie (Feb 24) (with video)
The body of Jesus Christ is missing from its tomb after the Crucifixion. Where is it? This mystery is the heart of the movie Risen — an investigation into the disappearance of Christ’s body by a high-ranking Roman tribune. This post reviews one of the best Bible movies I’ve ever seen while presenting a cogent defense of the Resurrection of Jesus of Nazareth. This was the most-viewed 2016 blog post this year.

What If the Bible Is True? (Mar 2)
This post featured a guest contributor who responded to a column by a philosophy professor titled Life from an Atheist’s Perspective that appeared in the Colorado Springs Gazette. The essay answering the professor was a beautiful dismantling of the atheist position using logic, analysis, and philosophy.
This blog post generated the most comments of any 2016 blog post. There is a lot of good material in the comment section as well, as people argue back and forth.

What I Fear (Mar 23)
What phobias do you have? I do not have any phobias except one — theophobia, fear of God! I fear Yahweh, the Almighty Creator God of the Bible. This article explains why.

Kepler

Kepler’s Complaint (May 11)
This is a blog written by our Jack Russell terrier Kepler. He feels like his Master and Missus do not treat him as an equal member of the family. He gives examples of how he is treated like a dog. Kepler believes the bumper sticker he sees that reads “Dogs Are People Too.” Sometimes he has trouble accepting his place in the created order of things. The Creator made each creature, from amoeba to man, for its own purpose and place in Creation.

Big Dipper — Clock in the Sky (Sept 21)
The Big Dipper reflects the Creator’s glory as it fulfills the purpose for which He created it — measuring the passage of time. This post explains how to tell time at night from the position of the Big Dipper relative to the North Pole.

Orion’s Belt

Orion & the Pleiades Speak Truth (Nov 23)
The grandeur of Orion and the sparkling beauty of the Pleiades point to a Maker, to One who made heaven and earth. He is the One who announced to Job that Orion’s stars are “bound” but those of the Pleiades are “loosed” long before the astronomers of today discovered it.

The Milky Way (Dec 14)
No matter how far out into the universe man peers, he sees order and structures of increasing complexity and magnitude. From where did it all come? Who designed it all? Who made this huge expanse of space in which the galaxies swim? Who made all the stars? Who organized them into more than two trillion galaxies? Who arranged the clusters, superclusters, sheets, and walls of galaxies? Who hung the Milky Way galaxy with more than 100 billion stars on nothing in space? Who placed numerous galaxies in orbit around the Milky Way? The vast immeasurable extent of the universe, the incomprehensibly enormous energy of innumerable stars … these far surpass the human mind’s ability to comprehend them. They speak of the glory, majesty, and power of their Creator.

Genealogies of Jesus (Dec 21) (with video)
Both Matthew and Luke recorded genealogies of Jesus. But they give different fathers and ancestors for Joseph, the husband of Mary and adoptive father of Jesus. How can the discrepancies between them be resolved? Why do the genealogies matter? What is their significance?

 
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Questions to Ponder

1. Which is your favorite of all the 2016 Bible-Science Guy Articles? Why?
   (It does not have to be one from this Best of 2016 list.)
2. Which do you think is the best article to share with unbelievers to stimulate their consideration of Jesus of Nazareth?
3. Which do you think is the best article to share with believers to spur them to honor, worship, and glorify the Creator?
4. What topics would you like to see addressed in 2017?

Share your thoughts on these questions in the comments below. It could encourage or help another reader.

Soli Deo Gloria.

Peruse the other Best of Bible-Science Guy lists:
Best of 2007-2012
Best of 2013
Best of 2014
Best of 2015
Best of 2017
Best of 2018
Best of 2019
Best of 2020
Best of 2021
Best of 2022

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©William T. Pelletier, Ph.D.
“contending earnestly for the faith”
“destroying speculations against the knowledge of God”
“for the defense of the gospel”
(Jude 1:3; 2 Cor 10:5; Phil 1:16)
Saturday December 31, 2016 A.D.

For in six days the LORD made the heavens and the earth, the sea and all that is in them, and rested on the seventh day; therefore the LORD blessed the sabbath day and made it holy. (Exodus 20:11)

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