Space… The Final Frontier (ft. Leo Greene)

Well, today is Friday, July the 21st. My name is Jon Galantis, and as always, I'm here with Dr. Abbadon Shah, and you're listening to Clearview Today with Dr. Abbadon Shah, the daily show that engages mind and heart through the gospel of Jesus Christ. You can find us online at ClearviewTodayShow.com, or if you have a question for Dr. Shah, anything you'd like to write in, suggest we talk about on the show, send us a text at 252-582-5028. You can also email us at contact at ClearviewTodayShow.com. You guys can help us keep the conversation going by supporting the show, sharing it online, leaving us a good review on iTunes or Spotify, anywhere you get your podcasting content from.

We're going to leave a link in the description of this podcast so you can do just that. Dr. Shah, today's verse of the day is coming to us from Psalm 8. This is a very spacey, sort of ethereal Psalm, and I think you guys are going to see why that's relevant here in just a second. Starting in verse three, it says this, when I consider your heavens, the work of your fingers, the moon and the stars, which you have set in place, what is mankind that you are mindful of them, human beings that you care for them? You have made them a little lower than the angels and crown them with the glory and honor. You made them rulers over the works of your hands.

You put everything under their feet. I love that verse three, when I consider your heavens, the work of your fingers, the moon and the stars, which you have ordained, which means this is David's Psalm, right? The superscript tells us that through the chief musician on the instrument of Gath, I have no idea what that means, is Psalm of David.

So David had some interest in studying the stars, not studying the stars in the sense of astrology, but astronomy. He could look up and see the magnificence of the heavens and just that awe, that wonder that he felt. And we still have that even thousands of years later. We can look up and see, gosh, God made all of this, how beautiful it is, how majestic. Yeah. And we tend to look at the ancients as if they were so enamored by the stars in the sense of worshiping them.

Not true. You know, we had the opportunity to go into Moses's tomb, the unfinished tomb. And what's amazing about it is that up in the ceiling is the constellation, things that he drew up there, that still to this day, scholars are going, we know what he's trying to do.

It's just hard to just quantify that or put it into our language today. But he knew a lot about the sky and the stars. And so it's also David here. Oh yeah, absolutely.

And it's so encouraging. And that's going to come into play a little bit later. We're going to talk about that in just a moment. We're going to start right after this ad.

If you have any questions or suggestions for a new topic, text us 252-582-5028 or you can visit us online at cleaviewtodayshow.com. We have a very special guest, so we're going to hop right in. We'll be right back after this. Hey there, listeners. I'm Jon Galantis.

And I'm Elli Galantis. And we just want to take a quick second and talk to you about Dr. Shah's and Nicole's book, 30 Days to a New Beginning, daily devotions to help you move forward. You know, this is actually the second book in the 30 Days series. And the whole point of this devotional is to help us get unstuck from the ruts of life. You know, when it comes to running the race of life, it matters how you start. But a bad start doesn't ultimately determine how you finish the race. You can have a good finish even with a bad start. And that's where this book comes in. No matter who you are or where you are in life, you're going to get stuck.

Instead of going out and buying some gadget or some planner, like I know I've done several times. I know that's right. 30 Days encourages you to find your fresh start in God's word. Life doesn't have a reset button, but our God is a God who does new things.

His mercies are new every day, which means every day is a new chance for you to start over. You can grab 30 Days to a New Beginning on Amazon.com. We're going to leave a link in the description box below. And if you already have the book, let us know what you think about it.

That's right. Send us a text, 252-582-5028. Share what God has done in your life through this devotional. Hey, maybe we'll even read your story on the air. Elli, you ready to get back to the show? Let's do it.

All right. Welcome back to Clearview Today with Dr. Abbadon Shah, the daily show that engages mind and heart for the gospel of Jesus Christ. You can find us online at ClearviewTodayShow.com. Or if you have any questions, anything that you'd like for us, Dr. Shah, to talk about on the show, send us a text at 252-582-5028. Or you can also email us at contact at ClearviewTodayShow.com.

And if this is your first time ever tuning into the show, you've picked a great episode to tune in for the first time. I want to let you know who's talking to you today. Dr. Abbadon Shah is a PhD in New Testament textual criticism, professor at Carolina University, author, full-time pastor, and the host of today's show.

You can find all of his work on his website. That's AbbadonShah.com. Dr. Shah, we've got a very, very special guest with us today. I am really excited because today's special guest is a good friend, a person I love, admire, a fellow believer, and one of the smarter guys I know in this world.

Yeah, that's right. And that's Leo. How you doing, my friend? Good to see you, Leo. Oh, I'm glad to be here with you guys. You're too kind. We've known each other a long time now. A long time now.

Close to 10 years. That's right. That's right. And I'll tell you this. Among many of the talents that he has, and we're going to talk about something very different today, but watching you play bass.

My goodness. First time I watched him play, and I know that Jon has and David has, I'm like, what in the world is he doing? Because it's phenomenal. I've never seen anybody play bass like that. How long have you been playing bass with us on that?

It's a passion. You can tell, right? How long have you been playing with us on the worship team here at Clearview? It was right around 2013.

2013? Wow. So almost 10 years. 10 years. Wow. You've been with us 10 years.

13, 14, right around there. Yeah. That's incredible. Well, we've been blessed. We've been blessed to have you.

I agree with Dr. Shaw. There are still times 10 years later where I'll be singing and leading and I'll hear, really, I'll feel you playing something. I'll feel it in my chest.

I don't try to do it, but I turn around, I'm like, oh my goodness. I felt that one. Well, that's what it's supposed to be.

That's right. I was going to say, that's how you know good bass when you feel it. You don't even hear it. You just feel it in your chest or in your shoes.

It's all about the bass. No trouble. Well, Dr. Shaw, today is a very special day, July 21st. Do you want to kind of set up our episode today? Yeah, of course. So July 20th, 1969.

Okay. This is when two American astronauts, Neil Armstrong, Buzz Aldrin, they landed the Apollo 11, which took off from Kennedy Space Station and traveled, get ready for this, 240,000 miles over a 76 hour period. Hundreds of millions of people watching this thing on television. In black and white.

In black and white. Did you watch it? Yeah, I did.

I didn't because I was in the mind and heart of God. So anyway, this was part of that space race that went on between United States and USSR, who was going to be the first. And of course they were, and this whole Apollo program, Leo, correct me if I'm wrong, $24 billion?

I don't know what the number is, but it was way up there. It was the sky's the limit that in that period, there was a passion and a will to make something extraordinary happen. And it was not limited. The limits came later on and there's significant limit and there's good reason for limits.

That's right. And today's money, I would say that's like $100 billion. If you're talking about $24 billion back then, just the way the economy is today, way, way more.

And it is, it is really amazing how they pulled that off with pencils and drafting boards and T-squares and slide rules. Calculators were a new thing. Yeah. I heard, I don't know how true this is, but I heard that like the data that they had at the space center was like, like the memory was like micro, like megabytes at best. It was less than that.

It was in the thousands called the K. Isn't that something? Yeah. And today we're sitting here, this is 2023. We're talking about AI, right?

The stuff of science fiction movies coming to pass in many ways, as well as the horror movies sadly, but that's part of it. That's incredible. So the next, so they landed on the 20th and the next day, those famous words, the famous words, which the next day was only a few hours later on the 21st. Well, they had to get their act together because you know, when they were coming in for a landing, they had it all planned out. There was a, there was a, there was a computer, a guidance computer that was in place, but it was coming down on a rocky area. And so he had to take the controls and fly it.

He manually flew the rocks, fly it over the rocks and found a place right when the fuel was running out. It was, it was a close call. I can imagine. Yeah.

And there was no do-overs there. Yeah. I mean, would you say life or death? Oh yeah, absolutely. Yeah. This is not something to play with.

Absolutely. It's so inhospitable. I'm excited about this episode to have Leo here today. I was going to say, so do you want to explain like why is, why, why Leo here? Because you actually worked for a good portion of your life for NASA. Well, yeah, I started, well, I was 10 years old when they landed and it made an impression on me. My dad was a mechanical engineer, so it was kind of set up in that area anyway. And coming up to high school, I had a choice. I was living in the New York metropolitan area place called Rockaway actually. And I had the choice to go to the local high school or I could go to the special technical high school, Brooklyn technical high school.

It was a big deal. And so I had the opportunity. So I said, well, if I take the test, at least I have the opportunity.

So I took the test and I passed the test. So I said, well, I'll go there and if I like it, I'll stay. And if I don't, I can still go to my local high school. I ended up going there for four years. And so after two years, you have to choose a major in this technical high school. And I chose mechanical engineering and I was kind of set up from that time, 13 years old. I mean, leave your life's work decision up to a 13 year old.

Go figure. And thank God you made the right turn. It turned out to be good for me. It's not good for everybody, but it was good for me. I love the knowledge of how things work.

I mean, it's beautiful. I see a light bulb glow and I know why. How did you get from there to aeronautics? Well, I went to college, studied mechanical engineering, figuring out what am I going to do. And that's when I dropped out. Oh, really?

You want to talk about that one? Sorry, kids. Stay in school. Stay in school. Like you can work for NASA, but you do got to stay in school. Well, this is how it worked out.

You know, it's kind of a funny thing. I was doing well, but you mentioned I was a bass player. Well, I started picking up bass in high school. I went with some friends who were not doing so well in school, but I liked them anyway.

You should come over and watch us. We have a band. And so I went on the subway to their place in Brooklyn all by myself in high school. You don't do those things.

But I did that. High school just hopped on the subway, went over to the place and they were playing some songs that I was familiar with. I liked music. And I could tell the bass player was messing up. I could tell. And so I said, I could do that. And that came through in my mind.

I could do that. So had you played bass before? No. So I was familiar with the songs and I heard them play. Guitar player, that sounds about right. Drummer, that sounds about right. The bassist wouldn't hit no much.

That sounds not quite right. And I was watching what music could do, what he was doing. I said, I could do that. And so I talked my parents into picking up a used bass. And in two weeks I was playing in that band. Wow. That's incredible. This is crazy. This is crazy. I don't know what happened to the bass player. They can't even find him.

I think he's gone. I was playing bass in different bands all through high school and in through college. And although I was doing well in my grades, pretty good.

I mean, I was a high two point something average, not terrible. But I looked like I should be on stage someplace. I was not looking like a regular engineering student. And so by the time I was about ready to graduate with a mechanical engineering degree, the bands were getting better and better and better. And I had the opportunity to go full time. We were in a band playing and we had pain gigs and the opportunity to go full time.

This is a fun story. And so I went to my college advisor. I explained the situation and he pushed back in his chair. He looked up into the corner of the room and he says, you know, I wanted to go when I was your age and I didn't. So let me tell you something. If you graduate and do this thing, people are going to ask, what were you doing?

If you do this thing and then graduate, you'll be a graduating senior like everybody else and no one will ask a question. And so I dropped out that day. Of course, my parents didn't understand. My dad was upset. My mom believed in me.

I like to say she believed in me even when I was unbelievable. So I dropped out and we went Arizona, New Mexico, Colorado, Texas. We were a good bar band. We had a record and we tried our best, that kind of thing. So I had met my wife and decided, let's give that engineering thing a try.

So we loaded up the car. I figured, well, I'll just go to a college locally here. And they said, well, no, if you want to graduate from our college, you've got to spend two plus years.

So I called my old alma mater and the curriculum hadn't changed. They said, no, you come back. Your credits will be reinstated. No problem. And so I had to go back to Arizona where I had dropped out from. Okay. All right.

Back in now. So I went back to Arizona. I went back in the summertime and so I took calculus summer school to kind of refresh because I had senior level classes left. I had dynamics of machines, second semester thermodynamics.

I had my senior project to do. I mean, it was a big deal. But I went back and I took it seriously. I raised my QM. I graduated a little over 3-0, cut my hair, got a suit from Sears, did the interview shuffle.

And just like the college advisor said, I got hired by Douglas Aircraft in Long Beach, California. Wow. Now at what point was your conversion? Because that also happened. That was later still.

Okay. So at this point you did not know Christ. I knew who he was. But you hadn't made a decision to follow him. Well, I had. I had decided it was a fraud.

I had decided it was a fraud and it was a crutch for weak people who did not know any better. That's where I was. I've known this story for a long time and I've heard it several times, but to our listeners, our viewers, man, you know, when people say only, you know, simple-minded people follow Jesus Christ, that's just not true. Well, that's where I believed. And I used to try to convince people.

I would argue, I would debate with believers to try to convince them that they were wrong. Wow. So how do you end up from there to working for NASA? Right.

Okay. So I'm working in aerospace and meeting a bunch of people. I started a little side business because I was building a little family. We had one kid, we had another boy, we had three boys all together. And I started to be involved in our own business where we got together with other like-minded people and I was excited about the way they saw life.

I could see some, like a peace, a stability, a strength, and I wanted what that was. Right. That's right.

And I did some research and they thought that it was Jesus. I said, wait a second, that can't be the case. That's right. But it can't be the case. Right. Because hard guys do this. And so since I had the technical background and I started to ask the question, why is it that they believe?

Why? And so that was the beginning. That was the conception, I guess.

That was the conception. Right. And so that would have been about 1990.

1990. Yeah. Okay. Okay. And in the meantime, now you're working more and more with space? Well, I didn't.

Well, you could say that. I left aerospace direct and I started working for a software company. And so we were selling engineer software to all the companies that do engineering all throughout Southern California. Oh, is this the software that you still use?

And it's the software I still use. It was from a company, I guess it doesn't really matter, but I was going to the Lockheed's TRW, Hughes Space and Com, Skunk Works. We would go to all the different high-end space companies and I would show them how to do what they were already doing faster, better, and cheaper. More efficiently. Okay.

Okay. And so I got to see all these different engineering environments in aerospace and space satellites all the way down to, I did Barbie's Miata at some point. Barbie's Miata?

What does that mean? Like the toys? Like the toys?

You engineered the toys? Yeah. Same program. Yes. Wow. So all these things you're doing, you're becoming the premier expert on this program. Right.

I started to develop a reputation for being the hired gun that I could go to these space aerospace companies and I could see something on the table that they're currently designing and I would get it on the screen before we'd left. Amazing. And they, of course, they were impressed and they'd be more likely to buy the software. Sure. Wow. We were selling software.

That's right. The software though was very good and an American success story became the dominant player in about 10 years period. And I was there through that period. But you did eventually leave that software company.

I did. Where did you go from there? I went out on my own.

Get my own job or find another place of employment and I started my own company. So I think that's what's kind of the key is that when we say that you work for NASA, you were not a NASA employee. You were a contractor that NASA sought out for these projects. Yeah.

Because you were really good at what you did. That's how that worked out. Yeah. And we talked about that a little bit on, I think on Monday's episode, like when people are skillful at what they do, when they're competent, people will seek those people out.

Right. Word of mouth spreads. People start to wave your flag.

You think I'm good? You should see this guy. You know, that kind of thing. And so I got a call from Boeing in Huntsville and I ended up helping them with some difficult problems that they were having with a spaceship that they're making. And then they were asked by NASA to put in a bid for their, the successor to the space shuttle. And I ended up putting together the database for that bid. Boeing got the contract to build and it's called SLS.

They call it different names, but it's what it's called. And so that was, that was a big deal. Is there anything, and this is just us talking, this is just you and me, is there anything sort of kind of juicy or exciting that is declassified that you can talk about without getting in? Well, the, the industry, the science of going fast is really, really cool. And these things go really fairly fast.

You mentioned how far they went in just those few, just think of how fast that is. 30,000 miles. Yeah. That's incredible.

A quarter of a million miles in three days. That's insane. That's right. Wow.

Right. You can do the math and figure out how fast that is. And just, just think, just think about an orbiting satellite is roughly 15 to 17,000 miles an hour. I think it just kind of goes, it does, it is, it really is. And it's something that goes back to something you've said, Dr. Shah, before just since the beginning of time, we've been fascinated by the heavens. We've looked up to the stars and we've seen that, man, this testifies to God's grace and glory. Well, the very first verse in the entire Bible is in the beginning, God created the heavens and the earth. So heavens come first and heavens are not just a place where God sits.

This is heavens as in the sky, heavens as in all the celestial bodies we're talking about, the sun, the moon, the stars, the planets. Thousands of years ago, people recognized the sun comes up and goes down. It goes up and comes down, but it changes. Every day. It's a little different. Some days it's longer.

Some days it's shorter. And they start to figure out exactly what day that was. How'd they figure that out? The idea of a calendar. They were watching, they were watching, they were seeing the seasons come and go, but they come back every year. It's not just a random occurrence. And they started figuring things out and that happened thousands, thousands of years ago.

And it really, really is cool. Do you think that played a part in your ultimate conversion when you finally kind of gave your life to Christ? Well, I know what happened. The question, why do they believe? And so, okay, so there is a Jesus. Who did he say he was? And okay, so how do we know why or who he said he was? We have no recordings or anything, but there is something recording and that is the Bible. So there is a Bible.

There is a Jesus. Why should we think that they are what they say they are? That's right. Okay. So I was quite the skeptic as I mentioned. Oh, I'm sure. And so I started to try to find out why all these people throughout history think it's what they, it says it is.

And how could they be all wrong? But that wasn't enough. It took more. But at least you were an honest skeptic. I'd like to think that I was honest.

I came around eventually. And so this is what it came down to. The Bible is a book. It says it is what it says it is. The breathe. God breathed the word of God.

Word of God. But how could that be? Well, people had to write it.

Okay. So if people wrote it, maybe they had their own influence involved, but that was part of what it started. But how could it be what it says it is and not change over all these years and not be what it says it is?

Because if it was written and inspired by people, they would always be influencing the message. And it would be changing. It'd be adulterated. It'd be corrupted.

It'd be corrupted. And that was the main thing. So, okay. So if the Bible is what it says it is, what does the Bible say Jesus said and who he said he was? That's right.

His self-identification as a son of God, as God incarnate. I am. I am. Yes.

Holy cow. And then did it change the way you went back to your program, your drawing board, looking at the heavens? How did that impact you? Oh, it changed how I felt about other people.

It changed how I felt about my place in this world about my wife and my family and why it is that I do what I do. Wow. Yeah.

And it yields a very strong sense of responsibility. Oh, wow. Yeah. And so that was a big deal. I can imagine.

So you don't have to be somebody like Leo who's designing machines that work in space. I mean, isn't that what you do? I mean, that's pretty cool.

That's what I do. Yeah. I've seen some of your work and I'm like, wow. Just wow. Hey, somebody's got it. That's right.

Look at that. But you can be just anybody. And once you meet the God of creation, you meet Jesus Christ, it changes you and it changes and impacts your life, your relationships, the way you see the world. It changes everything. You think you're a big shot?

No way. Now you realize you're not. Yeah. You meet the person who created all of this, all of this stuff that you're studying. I have my place and I appreciate the gifts that I have been given. That's right. Amen. That's an important thing. Yeah. I love it. Your testimony is such an inspiration to me personally.

I know to Dr. Shah as well. It's so encouraging to see that the people of God are not who the world paints us out to be. The simple minded people who just, you know, they believe against belief and just try to do the best they can to believe in something they know may not be true. That's not the case. Right.

And I need to mention also science does not disprove a belief in a demon. Wow. That's right. Wow. It does not. Wow.

If you look at it more closely, you might find that science proves. That's right. The other.

That's right. All right. I almost feel like we need to have another show.

I know. I feel like it's... Our time is up. Our time is up. But listen, if you guys enjoyed today's topic and I know full well that you did, or if you have any suggestions for stuff that we can talk about in future episodes, make sure you let us know. Send us a text, 252-582-5028, or you can visit us online at ClearviewTodaysShow.com. And don't forget, you can support us financially on that same website.

That's ClearviewTodaysShow.com. Every time that you give, every time you donate, you are making an impact for God's kingdom here on earth. Thank you so much for listening. Leo, thank you for being here today, my friend. Glad to be here. We'll see you guys next time on Clearview Today.