Are these the false prophets God warned us about?

Faith & Science Conversation
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Banning has happened in the past. One case was when the intent of the organization was directly challenged.

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Dear All,

Please accept my unreserved apology if anything I have said has offended anyone, that has never been my intention in contributing to the discussions on this website.

First and foremost, and above all else, is the Lord Jesus, Who is, the Way, the Truth and the Life and Who is the great I AM. Without His great Love for us all, we would all be doomed to eternal separation from Him.

I came across the video at the top of this post by accident, and when I realised that it was about the teaching of Theistic evolution that inserts ‘deep time’ and ‘evolution’ into the Holy Bible, I was compelled to share this video with the people here on this forum as it was to some degree about the Biologos teaching and beliefs.

I did not expect that the forum warriors would accept this video, and I fully expected that they would claim that ‘science’ proves that ‘deep time’ and ‘evolution’ are real; I wasn’t too far off the mark with my expectations.

I know that when I defend the Holy Bible to be God’s inerrant Word to mankind,
that clearly tells us about the real historical events, of the supernatural creation by God speaking and it was so, and God’s judgement against ALL the evil being given physical expression by mankind on the face of the Earth through the catastrophic Global Flood of Noah’s day, that left volumes of sedimentary evidence almost everywhere on the planet, that I will be attacked and ridiculed. That is a given, and is just as it is in the wider world, so it is exactly the same here.

I do not in any way look forward to participating here on these forums, they are time consuming and seem to cause people to say things that are not good demonstrations of Christian love, I include myself in that too, as I am an unworthy sinner myself and know full well that I have many faults and if it wasn’t for the Grace and Love freely given towards me by our Creator, Lord and Saviour, Jesus Christ, I would be condemned forever.
I hope I am not compelled to post any more on this website, and I guess that hope will be mutual, judging by the replies I receive, each time I attempt to state as precisely as I can, what I honestly believe to be the Truth as revealed to me in the Holy Bible; I’m reminded of the words of Paul to the church in Rome:

17 Now I beseech you, brethren, mark them which cause divisions and offences contrary to the doctrine which ye have learned; and avoid them. 18 For they that are such serve not our Lord Jesus Christ, but their own belly; and by good words and fair speeches deceive the hearts of the simple. Romans 16:17-18

As I said to Jay on Post 166:

“The reality is that it is not possible to be absolutely certain about the age of the Earth, or the rocks or biological life. I know there are many here that think that we humans are ever so clever we can prove that fossils and rocks are millions of years old, and within their worldview, I understand they completely believe that they are correct. What they do not appear to understand, is that this world is against God, Jesus told us:

18 If the world hate you, ye know that it hated me before it hated you. 19 If ye were of the world, the world would love his own: but because ye are not of the world, but I have chosen you out of the world, therefore the world hateth you. John 15:18-19

Do they really think that the forces of darkness and spiritual wickedness, have been around us humans for thousands of years now and haven’t learned how to manipulate philosophies and control beliefs. It’s more efficient for them to send the masses off down a rabbit hole that leads many to atheism quite rapidly than it is to attack individuals one on one.

12 For we wrestle not against flesh and blood, but against principalities, against powers, against the rulers of the darkness of this world, against spiritual wickedness in high places. Ephesians 6:12

The exclusion of anything to do with God from science by decree, is not an accident and it is not in the best interest of discovering the truth, wherever it may lead, is it?

The uniformitarian, ‘deep time’, evolution embalmed naturalism masquerades as ‘forensic science’, that doesn’t tolerate any dissent whatsoever. If anyone as much as questions, ‘deep time’ or 'evolution, they’re ostracised, derided, attacked, vilified and mocked as being of lesser intellect, or of being dishonest and telling lies, even though there are some very eminent scientists and highly intelligent people amongst them.

I changed from being an evolutionist Christian who believed in deep time because I could see all the enormous holes in that belief, and that was well prior to dinosaur soft tissue remnants, dinosaur protein remnants and dinosaur DNA remnants being discovered.”

The only reliable way to know about the events that God is telling us about the creation week and the Global Flood of Noah, is to absolutely trust the honesty and the faithful accuracy of God’s Word to all of us, in the Holy Bible.

Our time here in the land of the living is brief, and I have many responsibilities to attend to, that makes contributing to the forums on this website difficult at the best of times.

As I have previously stated on this thread, I am not judging anyone, indeed I cannot judge anyone, nor am I worthy to judge anyone, but it is my heartfelt desire that the pure and honest Truth faithfully given to us by our Merciful Loving God be accepted in Faith as Real as written.

The majority of eminent Hebrew scholars around the world (both of faith and secular), attest that the creation and Global Flood accounts written in Genesis are intended to be read as REAL HISTORY.

Any denial of that reality, that Genesis is to be understood as REAL HISTORY reveals the spirit behind such denial.

As I stated to T_aquaticus here on Post 228:

“I’m sure that within the ‘deep time’, and ‘evolution’ paradigm you believe is real, you truly believe what you are saying, but please recognise that such beliefs are Not operational science, they are a religiously held philosophy, that is supported by tests that have been conceived within that same paradigm, it’s a version of circular reasoning, though I am absolutely certain you will tell me it’s mathematics and objective empirical science, with no worldview or assumptions anywhere.”

I wish all here, the very best and pray that God blesses each one of you.

Your brother in Jesus Christ our Lord,

jon

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Jon,

Being told that you are not getting your facts straight, having it explained to you why your facts are not straight, being told the criteria by which your facts have been determined not to be straight, and being told what you need to do in order to make sure your facts are straight, is not being persecuted or mocked for being a Christian.

By all means believe the Bible. By all means defend the Bible. By all means preach the Gospel. By all means stand firm in your faith. But if in the process of doing so, you are coming out with claims that are not only demonstrably false but easily shown to be demonstrably false, you have only yourself to blame if it goes down badly.

1 Peter 2:20: "But how is it to your credit if you receive a beating for doing wrong and endure it? But if you suffer for doing good and you endure it, this is commendable before God. "

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You aren’t being accused of dishonesty because you’re questioning deep time, you’re being accused of dishonesty because you are making claims that are known to be false and then refusing to support or retract them.

For example:

That appears to be untrue. Citation needed.

You haven’t shown that it is reality. So the sprit behind denial is just a refusal to accept your unsupported claims as absolute truth.

You also need to somehow get from Genesis being intended as real history to Genesis actually being real history.

Meanwhile, have you found any examples of unmineralised dinosaur bones sticking out of the surface of the ground in locations with a mean temperature exceeding 25C yet?

You said there were many such cases, but haven’t provided a single example and haven’t admitted you can’t. That’s not a sign of being honest, it’s a sign of having repeated a lie and being unwilling to admit that you made an assertion that you can’t back up.

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Dear James,
thank you for your reply. I would be interested to hear from you as to what you actually believe.
Do you believe that there were millions of years of evolution of death and suffering BEFORE Adam?
Do you believe that death FIRST entered the world when Adam sinned?
Do you believe that there was a judgement by God, (to end the evil being perpetrated upon the face of the Earth by sinful mankind), through a catastrophic Global Flood?
Do you believe the Earth is about 4 billion years old?

God Bless,
jon

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  • A young earth creationist to the very end, eh? No thanks. Not interested.
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Dear Roy,

Hebrew scholars concur that Genesis was written as history.

For example, the Oxford Hebrew scholar James Barr wrote:

‘ … probably, so far as I know, there is no professor of Hebrew or Old Testament at any world-class university who does not believe that the writer(s) of Genesis 1–11 intended to convey to their readers the ideas that:

  1. creation took place in a series of six days which were the same as the days of 24 hours we now experience;
  2. the figures contained in the Genesis genealogies provided by simple addition a chronology from the beginning of the world up to later stages in the biblical story;
  3. Noah’s flood was understood to be world-wide and extinguished all human and animal life except for those in the ark.’

Barr, consistent with his neo-orthodox views, did not believe Genesis, but he understood what the Hebrew writer clearly intended to be understood. Some criticize our use of the Barr quote, because he does not believe in the historicity of Genesis. That is precisely why we use his statement: he is a hostile witness. With no need to try to harmonize Genesis with anything, because he does not see it as carrying any authority, Barr is free to state the clear intention of the author. This contrasts with some ‘evangelical’ theologians who try to retain some sense of authority without actually believing it says much, if anything, about history—‘wrestling with the text’, we’ve heard it called.

Hebrew scholar Dr Stephen Boyd has shown, using a statistical comparison of verb type frequencies of historical and poetic Hebrew texts, that Genesis 1 is clearly historical narrative, not ‘poetry’. He concluded, ‘There is only one tenable view of its plain sense: God created everything in six literal days.’

Some other Hebrew scholars who support literal creation days include:

  • Dr Andrew Steinmann, Associate Professor of Theology and Hebrew at Concordia University in Illinois;
  • Dr Robert McCabe, Professor of Old Testament at Detroit Baptist Theological Seminary in Allen Park, MI;
  • Dr Ting Wang, lecturer in biblical Hebrew at Stanford University.

The article at:

is referenced, should you wish to investigate further.

God Bless,
jon

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Providing five examples (one of whom is dead) says nothing at all about the majority, and copying text from an AiG article by Batten, Weiland and Sarfati is worthless.

Have you bothered to check whether James Barr actually wrote what Sarfati et al say he did?

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Dear Roy,
no matter what I write, it is clear you will pedantically pick it to pieces.
I have neither the time nor the interest to engage in an ENDLESS argument with you.
I have told you what I believe. What you believe is entirely up to you…

God Bless,
jon

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You didn’t write anything. You copied some text from an article from AiG without bothering to validate it. Describing that post as something that you wrote is blatant dishonesty on your part.

Added: Even if one

  • accepts an unpublished letter from one person now deceased to another person now deceased
  • ignores that it’s one person’s unverifiable opinion of the consensus and not necessarily the actual consensus
  • skips over the source being tentative (“probably”, “as far as I know”)
  • fails to notice that it’s four decades old and may no longer be true
  • misses that the source doesn’t actually say that Genesis was written as history, only that it conveys ideas, and
  • doesn’t realise that we don’t know what question Barr was answering

there’s still an issue that text that is written as history is not always intended to be read as history.

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  • Risky doing that, … my source says
    “What James Barr actually said is not that Genesis is real history, but that the writers intended it to be read as such. Barr himself rejected its historicity. That’s a very different claim.”
    • In other words, there are two questions here:
      1. Literary intent – Did the writers shape Genesis 1–11 as if telling history? Yes, many scholars agree with Barr on that point.
      2. Historical fact – Do modern Hebrew Bible scholars believe Genesis 1–11 records literal events (six 24-hour days, a global flood, etc.)? No, the majority do not. They classify it as “primeval history”—a narrative using mythic and theological imagery.

The handful of scholars Jon cited are, young earth creationists, so it would be kind of surprising if they didn’t believe what they say they believe. Jon’s problem is that a conservative evangelical minority, does not a mainstream of Hebrew scholarship worldwide make.

  • From The Literal Week of Creation - by Henry Morris Phd. Friday, May 1, 1988

    • "Liberal theologians don’t accept it, as a matter of fact. One leading Hebrew scholar is James Barr, Professor of Hebrew Bible at Vanderbilt University and former Regius Professor of Hebrew at Oxford University in England. Although he does not believe in the historicity of Genesis 1, Dr. Barr does agree that the writer’s intent was to narrate the actual history of primeval creation. Others also agree with him.

      • Probably, so far as I know, there is no professor of Hebrew or Old Testament at any world-class university who does not believe that the writer(s) of Genesis 1-11 intended to convey to their readers the ideas that (a) creation took place in a series of six days which were the same as the days of 24 hours we now experience; . . . Or, to put it negatively, the apologetic arguments which suppose the “days” of creation to be long eras of time, the figures of years not to be chronological, and the flood to be a merely local Mesopotamian flood, are not taken seriously by any such professors, as far as I know.3"
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Yeah, a conclusions I often find myself making as well.

As a counter example (that isn’t always fully appreciated), the RCC priests who vociferously argued against Galileo and Heliocentrism based on its alleged conflict with scripture, those priests (or at least one of them) were humble enough to say that if the facts (i.e. science) demonstrated Heliocentrism then it is better to believe they got their interpretations of scripture wrong than to allow facts to falsify the Bible. It’s an example I think we all wish YECs would take to heart.

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Jon’s problem is that he is parrotting what AiG and ICR tell him without considering the possibility that it may not be true, and then getting in a jam when he finds he can’t provide any verification of what he’s been spoon-fed.

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If the shoe fits, wear it. From your statements, you are not open to any scientific analysis and evidence contrary to your dogma and sweeping grand statements, and reject the necessity of abiding by the rules of science.

That is too bad, because Gutsick Gibbon, who attended a YEC private school with Ken Ham school books, does a thorough job of dismantling the claims of YEC spokepeople such as Nathniel Jeanson, Christopher Rupe, John Sanford, Jason Lisle, Rob Carter, and Jeffrey Tomkins.

You say you are not judging anyone, then immediately post verses concerning divisiveness which you evidently believe apply to those who differ with you, but not to yourself. Then, when responded to with posts such as this one, you assume the mantle of martyrdom. Your halo is your horizon.

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I wouldn’t say it was risky, but it is difficult. I managed to track down what may be the full text, which suggests that this quote is genuine but lacks necessary context. Not that it matters because it’s still just one person’s opinion and not a concurrent view.

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They are against YEC, not against God. You need to separate those two.

What we are asking for is YEC explanations for the observable facts. We are also asking what evidence it would take to disprove YEC. You don’t seem to be able to supply either of these things which is why many Christians here don’t accept YEC. If you want to convince people YEC is true then address the data, show how YEC is a logical and reasoned conclusion that is derived from facts instead of dogmatic belief.

But that’s not what you are doing. You are asking us to believe your interpretation of scripture, an interpretation that is shown to be false by demonstrable facts. Your interpretation of scripture does nothing but cast doubt on the accuracy of scripture in the same way Christians demanding belief in Geocentrism or a flat Earth would cast doubt on the accuracy of scripture.

There were major Christian scholars around the world that attested to Biblical Geocentrism being true.

Yes, you stated. Not God. Those aren’t God’s words, so why should anyone follow them?

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Dear Roy,
as I stated, you have done, ergo, no matter what I write, it is clear you will pedantically pick it to pieces. I put the link to the article in my post so that if you wished to do so, you could check the references, as you asked me to provide a citation.
God Bless,
jon

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Dear Ron,
complete nonsense typical of the many inaccurate accusations that abound on this website when anyone honestly states they put their unswerving trust in the Holy Bible far above the fallible conjectures of man.

Jesus said:
17 Think not that I am come to destroy the law, or the prophets: I am not come to destroy, but to fulfill. 18 For verily I say unto you, Till heaven and earth pass, one jot or one tittle shall in no wise pass from the law, till all be fulfilled. Matthew 5:17-18

God Bless,
jon

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Dear Roy and Terry,
of course it matters.
One of the most eminent scholars of Hebrew of his time, stating ever so clearly that:

so far as I know, there is no professor of Hebrew or Old Testament at any world-class university who does not believe that the writer(s) of Genesis 1–11 intended to convey to their readers the ideas that:

creation took place in a series of six days which were the same as the days of 24 hours we now experience;

the figures contained in the Genesis genealogies provided by simple addition a chronology from the beginning of the world up to later stages in the biblical story;

Noah’s flood was understood to be world-wide and extinguished all human and animal life except for those in the ark.’

I would have thought that what professor’s of Hebrew or Old Testament at any world-class university at that time TRULY BELIEVED to be the case, about the authors intended meaning of the Biblical Text to anyone reading it, would make it abundantly clear to the contributors on this website, that it is written as HISTORICAL NARRATIVE, but as I have observed each and every time I have joined these Biologos community discussions, the plethora of inconvenient FACTS that don’t align with the Theistic evolution worldview, when raised by honest Christian brothers and sisters, are pounced upon with reckless abandon, and the person exposing the TRUTH is attacked, mocked and made fun of, and the inconvenient FACT relegated to being wrong, they say, it doesn’t matter, we can just forget about it and continue believing what so obviously contradicts the faithful reading of the Holy Scriptures.
I have observed frequent unjustified attacks on this website against the honesty and integrity of kind, gentle Christian men and women and that alone is shameful.

God Bless,
jon

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Dear Terry,
yes, and I wholeheartedly agree with Professor Barr’s words.
And please don’t forget to include that the flood was a GLOBAL FLOOD.
These are matters of VITAL IMPORTANCE and RELEVANCE to just about everything to do with the creation ‘ex nihilo’ by God in six normal days and the Global Flood that extinguished ALL TERRESTRIAL NEPHESH CHAYYAH LIFE under heaven on the surface of the Earth.

God Bless,
jon