BRUCE LICHT
FOUNDER OF MY ELEVATOR PITCH FOR GOD, ENTREPRENEUR, AND AUTHOR
Bruce grew up in Lafayette, California and received a BA in Political Science from UCLA as well as a Graduate Gemologist degree from the Gemological Institute of America. After graduating, Bruce operated his family’s 100 year-old retail fine jewelry business for twenty-two years. Bruce had a passion for computers and graphic arts, so he changed careers and joined his best friend at a national technical publishing company for seventeen-years as the company’s Publisher, where they invented the modern labor law poster industry, including the first “All- On-One Labor Law Poster” and “Labor Law Poster Compliance Plan.”
Aside from being the Founder of this website, My Elevator Pitch for God, Bruce was the co-editor of the book titled, Elevator Pitches For God: Volume 1, and author of the cookbook titled, Immediate Chef: No Previous Experience Required.
Bruce’s goals for this website are: To introduce more people all around the world to God and strengthen the faith of those who already believe in a non-political and non-religious way, to bring people together, find common ground between different faiths, create meaning in people's lives, and start to move the world in a better direction.
You can help by sending this website to friends and family and posting it on social media!
You can also connect with the website project’s LinkedIn page below:
Asleep at the Wheel
BRUCE LICHT
We have all heard about miracles that occurred in the distant past. Some that come to mind are the “Ten Plagues” (1) the splitting of the Red Sea, (2) and God’s Revelation at Mount Sinai. (3)
One would think that those amazing events would have been enough to make every single Jew of the time a fervent “believer.” But how could it possibly be that just forty days after the Sinai Revelation in 1312 BCE, the most live-witnessed historic event in human history, (4) the Golden Calf idol was made. (5) I guess a large group of them just couldn’t recognize those miracles for what they were?
What about modern day miracles? Has anything changed? Do we recognize them now when we see them? Sadly, most people do not.
It is a mathematical fact that the odds of a single, fair coin flip landing on heads are 50% because a coin has two sides, heads and tails. When multiple independent “flips” occur, their probabilities are multiplied to find the probability of all events occurring in sequence. (6)
What do you think the odds are of flipping a fair coin 300 times and having it land on heads 295 times of the 300 flips? Wouldn’t you see this as something way out of the ordinary and a miracle? The odds can be expressed as 1/2295 and its value as a decimal basically approaches zero. (6)
It is also a mathematical fact that the odds of rolling a “6” on a single, fair six-sided die are 1/6, or approximately 16.7%, because there is only one “6” out of six equally likely, possible outcomes. When multiple independent “rolls” occur, their probabilities are multiplied to find the probability of all events occurring in sequence. (7)
What do you think the odds are of rolling a fair six-sided die 300 times and having it land on “6” 295 times of the 300 rolls? Wouldn’t you see this as something way out of the ordinary and a miracle? The odds can be expressed as 1/6295 and its value as a decimal is basically zero. (7)
Now consider Israel’s “Iron Dome” missile defense system, which has intercepted over 5,000 rockets and drones since 2011. According to official Israeli figures and defense analysis, the system has a time-tested interception success rate of 90%. (8)
At least that was the case until Saturday, April 13, 2024, when Iran fired 300 missiles and drones at Israeland 295 of them were shot down. (9) That was a success rate of nearly 99%. (10) If the Iron Dome operated as it normally, always had, 10%, meaning thirty missiles, would have gotten through their defenses, likely causing an untold amount of destruction and loss of life. But this was not the case. Reports state that there was only four to five, causing hardly any damage and no loss of life.
And what happened? Most people just yawned, as if it was nothing out of the ordinary and an everyday occurrence, rather than seeing this as a modern-day miracle. It’s clear that nothing has changed from ancient times. Seems like most people are still “asleep at the wheel.” (11)
Footnotes:
1) The verses that discuss the Ten Plagues (or Ten Miracles) are in the Book of Exodus and are detailed in Chapters 7 through 12. The specific verses are as follows:
Blood (Exodus 7:14-24),
Frogs (Exodus 8:1-15),
Lice (Exodus 8:16-19),
Pestilence (Exodus 8:20-32),
Wild Animals (Exodus 9:1-7),
Boils (Exodus 9:8-12),
Hail (Exodus 9:13-35),
Locusts (Exodus 10:1-20),
Darkness (Exodus 10:21-23),
Death of the Firstborn (Exodus 12:29-30).
As a side note, to exemplify that there is so much about God’s ways that we just don’t understand:
Rabbi Yaakov Wolbe, from Torchweb.org, in his podcast titled, “Parshas Vaeira (Rebroadcast) January 14, 2023” starting at 54:10, discussed (as was observed by the commentators) how:
There is a pattern among the Ten Plagues where two come with warning (that have a threat to life) and the 3rd one does not come with any warning (and does not have a threat to life).
And in the Commentary on the Torah by Rabbi Ovadiah ben Jacob Sforno (1475-1550) – a 16th-century Italian rabbi and physician – he said that the first four plagues (Blood, Frogs, Lice, Swam of Wild Animals) effects lingered on and on. The last six plagues (Pestilence, Boils, Hail, Locusts, Darkness, Death of Firstborn) were terribly painful – Lots of suffering for the Egyptians – but once they were over, their affects ended with them. Whereas the effects of the final four plagues lasted for many months and years after the plague was finished.
So, the 10 Plagues of Egypt and the patterns are:
1) Blood
• the plague came with warning and was a threat to life
• terribly painful for Egyptians but their affects ended with end of plague
2) Frogs
• the plague came with warning and was a threat to life
• terribly painful for Egyptians but their affects ended with end of plague
3) Lice
• the plague came without warning and did not have a threat to life
• terribly painful for Egyptians but their affects ended with end of plague
4) Wild Animals
• the plague came with warning and was a threat to life
• terribly painful for Egyptians but their affects ended with end of plague
5) Pestilence
• the plague came with warning and was a threat to life
• terribly painful for Egyptians but their affects ended with end of plague
6) Boils
• the plague came without warning and did not have a threat to life
• terribly painful for Egyptians but their affects ended with end of plague
7) Hail
• the plague came with warning and was a threat to life
• the plague’s effects lingered on and on
8) Locusts
• the plague came with warning and was a threat to life
• the plague’s effects lingered on and on
9) Darkness
• the plague came without warning and did not have a threat to life
• the plague’s effects lingered on and on
10) Death of The Firstborn
• the plague came with warning and was a threat to life
• the plague’s effects lingered on and on
2) The primary verses that discuss the splitting of the Red Sea are in the Book of Exodus from Chapter 14, verse 1 through Chapter 15 verse 21.
3) The most detailed account of God’s Revelation at Mount Sinai is in the Book of Exodus within Chapters 19 through 24. Further details on this event appear in the Book of Deuteronomy within Chapter 4, verses 10–13 and Chapter 5, verses 4–22, where Moses recounts the events at Mount Sinai as he prepares the Jews to enter the Promised Land.
4) In order to make it clear to everyone that the Sinai Revelation was legitimate, the Almighty did something unprecedented. He revealed Himself to a nation of three million people, and they all survived to tell the tale, and to perpetuate it to their children, grandchildren, great-grandchildren, and so on until today so we know for sure that this event happened. There were more in-person, eyewitnesses to this event than to any other event in world history. Therefore, there is no event that has as much reliability as this one.
Of course, modern technology has enabled many more people now to “view” events taking place via telecommunications, such as the finals of the 2022 World Cup in France, or in 1986, in the most famous episode in the “Dallas” TV show’s history, where Bobby Ewing (played by Patrick Duffy) was discovered in the shower after his supposed death – but no event has ever been witnessed “live and in-person” by more people than the Sinai Revelation.
5) The main passage that discusses the Golden Calf is found in Exodus Chapter 32, where the Israelites create an idol to worship while Moses is on Mount Sinai receiving the two tablets containing the Ten Commandments. Moses later recalls the Golden Calf incident when addressing the Israelites in Deuteronomy, Chapter 9, as a reminder of their past transgressions
6) Google AI Overview: The odds of flipping a fair coin and getting heads are theoretically 50% (or 1 in 2) because a coin has two sides, heads and tails. This probability assumes the coin is perfectly balanced and the flip is performed in ideal, fair conditions. While real-world factors and repeated flips can show slight variations, the 50/50 probability remains the fundamental theoretical chance for a single, fair coin flip. This probability is the same for every individual flip, regardless of previous results, because each flip of a fair coin is an independent event. When multiple independent events occur, their probabilities are multiplied to find the probability of all events occurring in sequence.
The odds of flipping a fair coin 300 times and having it land on heads 295 times can be calculated using the binomial probability formula (considerably simplified below):
P (X=295) = (1725839700 / 2300)
This value is incredibly small, indicating an extremely low probability.
7) Google AI Overview: The odds of rolling a “6” on a fair six-sided die are 1/6, or approximately 16.7%, because there is only one “6” out of six equally likely, possible outcomes. This probability is the same for every individual roll, regardless of previous results, because each roll of a fair die is an independent event. Therefore, the probability is calculated as the number of favorable outcomes divided by the total number of possible outcomes: 1 (the number “6”) / 6 (total faces) = 1/6. When multiple independent events occur, their probabilities are multiplied to find the probability of all events occurring in sequence.
The odds of rolling a fair six-sided die 300 times and having it land on the number “6” 295 times can be calculated using the binomial probability formula (considerably simplified below):
P (X=295) = (17,875,386,000 X 3125) / (6295 X 7776)
multiplied by:
P (X=295) = 17,875,386,000 X (1 / 6295) X (3125 / 7776)
Resulting in a probability of:
55,860,581,250,000 / 6300
This value is so incredibly small, indicating an extremely low probability.
8) The Iron Dome Missile Defense System intercepts short-range rockets and artillery shells. It has all-weather capabilities and is able to function night or day and under all conditions, including fog, rain, dust storms and low clouds. The system doesn't use algorithms to prevent its own missiles from colliding with each other; instead, it uses "shoot-look-shoot" engagements where it launches multiple interceptors for each threat if necessary to ensure destruction and prevent one missile from accidentally hitting another. Israel is protected by ten Iron Dome batteries, functioning to protect the country's infrastructure and citizens, saving lives since 2011. It was developed for Israel by Rafael Advanced Defense Systems and Israel Aerospace Industries, with additional support from Raytheon. The project was headed by Rocket Scientist, Iron Dome Development Team Leader, Ari Sacher (who wrote an essay for this website).
9) NBC News
https://www.nbcnews.com › politics › national-security
Apr 18, 2024 — Out of 300 missiles and drones Iran fired, only four or five hit Israel, and none caused major damage, William Burns said.
Israeli military officials stated that 99% of the projectiles were intercepted.
NBC News
Apr 18, 2024 — CIA Director, William Burns, said Iranian attack on Israel was a “spectacular failure.”
10) The fraction represented by 295 out of 300 is 295/300. This can also be expressed as a decimal as 0.98333…%.
11) The phrase, “Asleep at the wheel” is a metaphorical expression that means someone isn't paying attention when they should be or isn't doing their job properly. It can also mean that someone is negligent or unaware of important events happening around them.
