That’s a great goal, and one I’ve been trying to aim at myself. I have to admit though, when was a YEC I didn’t understand that kind of thinking at all – I saw it as an all-or-nothing proposition, where taking a hard-line stance was proof of devotion. I didn’t know what to do with people who didn’t dig their heels in one way or another. 
But if done well it is an opportunity to point people to Christ with fewer peripheral stumbling blocks in the way.
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Me too, though I have a pretty good idea why my thoughts were fuzzy in college. On the kids and info, it depends what comments on reddit happen to be trending on any particular day. Ugh.
Edit: Stop bringing out the old fogey in me, Phil!
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That’s a very interesting observation! Part of the answer to that might be more clear if we see people going through various stages of acceptance - like picking stepping stones as you try to hop across the river while staying dry. We may be glancing back at a friend and recommending what would seem a good “stepping stone” for where he’s at, but that doesn’t mean we want to “travel back” to that stone from where we’re currently at. We each tend to think of where we are now as “an arrival” - we like to think we’re home now! So we are disingenuous if we mislead our friend into thinking that would be a great permanent perch. It might be better than where they’re at now! Our friend, though, wants to think he’s finally where he needs to be if he makes the jump. Don’t we all with where we’re at!
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I agree with this. I read the book and found it interesting, but while I do think Adam and Eve are historical people, I don’t have a theological reason for them to be our ancestors. I assume people who believe in inherited Original Sin might care? I don’t think we’re born with sin, so I don’t feel like it’s necessary to be related to Adam.
GAE isn’t really much different from what I already believed… that Adam and Eve were called by God amongst an existing population. Whether they were specially created or born, I can go either way. I just don’t have the “everyone is descended from Adam and Eve” part. I don’t think that matters.
I also felt like he didn’t address Noah very well, and when I asked about it, it devolved into a back and forth between two people who don’t even believe there was a flood. Not helpful. 
I had previously thought the flood was killing the line of Adam, but if the line of Adam spreads all over the world by Noah’s time, that breaks down. So who exactly is being killed? With realistic ages for Genesis 5, it might still work that Adam’s line is still mostly in that region, and I don’t believe in the long ages - I think there is numerology going on there. The flood bothers me more than Adam and Eve. God’s creation clearly tells me of a long history without a global flood and with human civilizations continuing without all being wiped out all at once, so that suggests to me that a regional flood is being discussed. I’m still left with the question of exactly who is condemned in that flood.
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That’s definitely something to ponder. Even if the flood was regional (which I believe also), Genesis 6 says that God regretted creating the human race, which still has a fairly universal connotation to it. Do you give any credence to the idea that the flood had to do with the Nephilim as much as humans? That’s one passage that’s always confused me. 
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According to the literal meaning of the words, inerrant and infallible claim too much. But at least in the following way we can support them…
inerrant: The Bible ain’t broke, so don’t take it on yourself to fix it. There may be any number of insignificant errors but they should not be changed to what you think it should say.
infallible: You can trust the Bible to tell people what Christianity is about. And leave it to God to correct any misunderstandings according to His will. This is not to say that individuals cannot learn from other sources, but perhaps it is best left to God to know what other sources might be needed for particular persons.
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I think the Nephilim were humans.
Though have you read Many Waters, in the Wrinkle in Time series? That was certainly an interesting take on Noah. I know the angel breeding idea is a common one.
I did read that book after college sometime, but I don’t remember much about it… were the Nephilim more like demons than angels? The little I remember painted them as not-so-virtuous characters.
Yes, they were. It’s been a few years since we read it. I remember thinking it was really going outside the biblical story.
There did seem to be a lot of “literary license” taken. Plus the whole “getting human women pregnant” seemed a bit out of place for a children’s series, but I guess it depends on the ages of the children. 
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I sometimes struggle with the notion as to why there would be errors in scripture in the first place. If God inspired the biblical authors, why didn’t he give them a helping hand? It’s possible these are merely transmission errors, but I’d like to see more evidence for this.
My personal belief is that God was under no obligation to help them. If God has any obligations, that implies God is subject to a higher lawgiver.
All that matters to me is that the commandments to love God and love our neighbour are consistent throughout scripture.
Thank you for that very helpful clarification of how people think about inerrancy! I was beginning to start to feel attacked on this thread for trying to defend pastors, theologians, and lay people who attend their churches. I am not officially trained in theology, but I greatly respect their work. I don’t think we should so easily dismiss them.
@Jay313 @Relates
If we strive to follow Jesus Christ, we should also strive for humility. And Christ loves His church.
Paul’s teachings also encourage humility, e.g. 1 Corinthians 8
“Now about food sacrificed to idols: We know that “We all possess knowledge.” But knowledge puffs up while love builds up.”
…and later on…
“When you sin against them in this way and wound their weak conscience, you sin against Christ.”
Paul also teaches love of church (even though the church can be imperfect on this side of heaven) in Hebrews 10:24-26
So I think we should all be able to humbly try to understand each other’s perspectives, rather than belittling people who have different opinions. Please remember that your tone of speech can greatly affect people’s ability to listen to you and hear your arguments.
I am also of the strong opinion that none of us can fully know all of the answers to some of the questions that arise at the intersection of science and faith. So let us be humble about what we know and what we cannot know. God seems to want to leave room for faith to come in and fill those gaps, because he wants to give us freedom to choose to believe in Him. We will all be able to see how the details fit together when we get to heaven, but for now we can accept both evolutionary science and accept the Bible as God’s revealed Word to us as true, even when there are gaps in our understanding about how they precisely fit together.
This is what I plan on teaching my children:
love God, love Jesus, love God’s word, and love science. Treat people with kindness and respect. Be humble and comfortable with not having all of the answers.
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I think if I’d been raised to assimilate the Bible and put in the work to draw out its meaning, this would be my stance too. Personally I think that which supports belief in God can speak to us through many books. But those who grow up with special emphasis placed on the Bible will have a common vocabulary. Regardless of the medium what we will hear is what we are ready to hear and what we need to hear, and even that will change in our lifetimes. As @Mervin_Bitikofer said, each step along the way will feel like an arrival, not just a bump on a road to somewhere else; and it does no one any good to disparage the place where they’ve only just begun to move in.
Nonetheless I think there is something to be said for valuing movement and remaining receptive to new insights.
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I looked back over my words, and I don’t see how I belittled you or anyone else. Nevertheless, thanks for the reminder. I’ll try to do better, but I’m a particularly blunt instrument, even in the Lord’s hands.
I’m running behind on my podcast thanks to this! I was tracking down some stuff on inerrancy and wound up ditching what I had planned and doing a piece on it instead. It explains a bit of my own journey along with the doctrine. Dr. Ols might even like it, if she’s willing to give me another chance. 
I’ll come back and let you know when it’s up.
Very true. I was unable to find such problems in a quick review of posts, but we encourage participants to flag any posts that are not within our guidelines, and would encourage anyone with problems to let the moderators know. Tone is hard to discern in written forums, and tongue in cheek comments can come across as snark. At times it is difficult to tell what is personal and what is a legitimate arguement as sincere and honest disagreement over a point cannot help but be taken as a personal attack when the position is one we “own.”
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I like your thoughts and your question, Michelle. There is an interesting book describing the author’s research into the development of the “modern” creationist movement…the book is by Ronald Numbers and called The Creationists. I will not try to summarize. I was quite intrigued and contacted a well-known creationist group for their perspective on his assertions. They were dismissive. Nevertheless, I have seen his work cited by other academics occasionally.
And as for your remark that “not all churches” who hold to the doctrine of inerrancy are YEC…quite correct. I have been reading this paper by Hendel. It looks to me as though the early Reformationists “assumed” that when everyone had a Bible, the ubiquitous “everyone” would read it to mean the same sort of things.
They did not… I may be combining Hendel’s thoughts with what I have read elsewhere about the Reformation. But since people have sometimes or often seen things to mean different things, perhaps this also has driven some of this discussion…
And I think you have a point in your response to Relates who thinks the focus of Christianity should b e on Jesus and not on the Bible. I am only supposing I know how he meant that. But yes, the Bible speaks of Jesus and spoke of His coming and His crucifixion and resurrection and also of His deity long before He actually showed up at that manger/feeding trough in Bethlehem. Without the biblical predictions, the expectations of a messianic figure that dominated that age, and the resultant compilation in biographical form of aspects of His teaching – we would know nothing about Him and He would have slipped into and out of this world unnoticed.
As
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Sounds great Korvexius!! I make notes in the margins of my Bible when I come across things that relate to the text or customs in the Bible – or to discoveries of the sort you are referencing…and I will click on your reference in a moment!!
That helps me as much as anyone else.
Wanted to say that I retrieved the paper from academia.edu…and it is great. This is a great site, but yes, I am now regularly bombarded with messages about my name being cited somewhere or other…
Thank you for that. I’m glad someone understands my perspective, and it was helpful to read yours.
So do I. I think the most straightforward reading of Genesis 6 is that this is the answer to the age old question of who did Cain and Seth marry? The sons of God are the sons of Adam, God’s chosen people just like in the vast majority of the rest of the OT. Resorting to incest with daughters inserted into the Bible, the invention of breeding human women with angels to get fairytale giants and coming up with bizarre excuses to ignore Cain’s fear in Gen 4 of a world full of people who might kill him just goes to show how far people will go to force a creationist view on the Bible.
In the straightfoward reading, when Cain and Seth took wives from the other people in the world they had children who were men of renown, leaders of human civilization. And the spread of evil to dominate the world was not genetic contamination from evil angels but simply the spread of such bad habits as murder from the examples of Cain and Tubal Cain.
Yes and along with the newest Noah movie and many other books and films, this shows that this is all great stuff for science fiction and fantasy – but not for those who want to take both scientific discovery and the Bible seriously.
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Nice thoughts, Reggie…I believe that it is said that most of the “errors” are copyists’ problems that are easily resolved…try copying the Book of Genesis by hand and see how well you do!! I suppose that would be something of an apt analogy. Most of those who speak publicly on that issue admit that the vast majority of “errors” are easily seen through and corrected …
There are, as we know, other “issues.” But if one issue is why God did not give His authors a helping hand — it is quite likely that He did. But He did not grab their hands with His and force them to write a certain way — except perhaps in the case of that Ten Commandments re-write.
Evidently it was once believed that God did exactly as you wish He had done —inspired and “breathed” every jot, title, and/or/but and comma — and this has caused a number of people great problems when the study of ancient texts arouse, as it was bound to do.
That He allowed people to write in their own vocabulary – this is not the same as Him being under no obligation. If you believe the Bible to be from God, it would stand to reason that He has had enormous interest in the project from start to finish. It just happens that He let us decide how to spell various words and what the meaning of ‘is’ is — and so on.
But yes, loving God and our neighbor (in that order) are consistent throughout Scripture and quite important…
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