I wrote what I did with all migrations in mind - whether, for example, from YEC to OEC or from OEC to YEC - and with all tribes in mind. It is disappointing, therefore, to see that you read me as oblivious to the pain of the situation you describe.
What an irony, @pevaquark! You made two individuals a tribe when they weren’t even seeking to be one!
This is equally disappointing. I have commended a number of people in this forum when I was particularly struck with the wisdom in something they wrote. Most of these people do not share my views. For all I know @r_speir does not share my views either as I could not tell from his comments if he is a current YEC or a former one.
I don’t even like the labels YEC and OEC, but they are helpful shorthand in discussions like these. Even so, I don’t think of myself as a YEC. My views are similar enough to theirs that I can understand why someone would call me that, and therefore, don’t complain when they do. But social labels can be so very distracting. This was the main evil I was decrying. If I can be this misunderstood on that fundamental point, I am surely misunderstood on other points I try to make here.
When I said, "@r_speir has counseled wisely, I was speaking of the specific statement of his I was quoting. Most of the rest of the stuff he writes is so far over my head I couldn’t see it with a pair of binoculars.
Migrations can be painful no matter which direction they go. Nor do they require a large tribe to be involved for there to be great pain, for even the single estrangement of a spouse or a parent can bring enormous pain.
I agree that it not worthwhile to try to convince you of the science supporting the theory of evolution. What I hope to facilitate is an understanding that it is completely possible for people of my viewpoint (I believe God created THROUGH evolution) to still love our Savior, Jesus Christ and believe that the Bible is the authoritative Word of God, certainly without any bashing. In my conversations with @Mike_Gantt, he has affirmed this possibility. Yet, by your professed “hatred” of evolution, I suspect you might see my viewpoint differently.
I personally keep asking you to finish or share the rest of your idea. So that’s not true
Sometimes that can happen. But at the same time, I’ve learned a lot of very good science by chatting with folks on these forums so far as well as been challenged in uncomfortable ways that’s been a big blessing.
Yeah we kind of go there due to loads of scientific evidence but by all means, a Christian doesn’t have to go there and many don’t. I’ve met many Christians who also hate evolution yet have no idea what it’s even about, what evidence we have, etc (not saying this is you, just anecdotal evidence that many don’t). Shucks I used to hate evolution too as if it was evil or something.
Geez, nice way to belittle others by claiming you obey your Apostle and other apparently don’t. I would press that you do go beyond what is written quite a bit, even in Genesis 1-3. Shucks even probably further in Genesis. Anytime you read Scriptures that were written from a geocentric point of you, you go beyond what was plainly written.
Can you share it again? I keep asking you to share it here.
Buying into a liberal theologian or historian? Gee whiz. How about someone who looks at real data and artifacts and interprets them objectively? I do appreciate your desire to await further archaeological clarification (like with Battle of Jericho - Wikipedia), but the question is… when should we wait out for more data to vindicate or viewpoint or when should we rethink our interpretation of Scripture in light of the data?
And BioLogos does this? That’s a pretty ridiculous claim. Especially on the main site… People on the forums have a wide view of how to look at the Scriptures, but all take it seriously.
It’s perhaps good to take a presuppositionalist approach to some thing, but I wouldn’t be so dogmatic about it.
In the marketplace of ideas, it is ideas that that command interest. I strongly doubt that the reception of your ideas here on these pages was influenced at all by who posted them!
Are you really sure, Mike, that your question is about proving (or hoping to prove) God’s lack of deceitfulness? Perhaps the question you’re unable to ask yourself involves human deceitfulness – specifically, the ability of the human brain to become so addicted to status and so addicted to “the right to be right” that there’s nothing to be said and nothing to be done to overcome the brain’s ability to choose denial over faith?
One of the things I find so interesting about the Gospel of Mark is the almost complete absence of any interest in the Book of Genesis, although Genesis was certainly known to Mark’s author. It’s referred only once in Mark 10:5-9, and even that short passage is mediated through the words of Moses. The Markan passage teaches us that God is more interested in committed, loyal, heart-based relationships than in legal oaths that bind us to each other without heart, fidelity, or faith.
If, as you believe, the world is only a few thousand years old, then Jesus himself was even “closer” to the date of Earth’s origin than we are, and presumably closer to the “true” timeline you think is hidden out there somewhere. Yet, according to Mark, Jesus isn’t remotely interested in either the timeline of Earth’s creation or the hidden facts that might support it. Jesus clearly trusted God enough to let go of any such worries.
As we can be quite certain that Jesus himself didn’t think it was a good idea to challenge God’s trustworthiness (which is, in fact, what you’re doing in this thread, whether you accept it or not, Mike), perhaps it’s okay for us to follow Jesus’ lead and focus on how to heal our relationships with God, each other, and ourselves in the time given to us on Planet Earth. That’s a huge challenge for any of us to do well.
It’s also quite extraordinary, from a neuroscientific perspective, what happens to the brain’s wiring when we start from the bottom-up with the questions and solutions Jesus presented to us instead of worrying first about the top-down questions you’re asking on this thread.
Jesus (brilliant physician, healer, mystic, and humble person of faith that he was) understood and taught that if you want to be able to know God during your humble human lifetime, there are many big questions you can’t answer and will never be able to answer even if you have all the knowledge of all the human beings who have ever lived. One of these big questions involves the creation of the universe. Although we, as humans, are naturally curious about this creation (because we intuit a powerful backstory that tells us more about the amazing and wondrous Mother Father God who love us), it’s simply pure hubris for human beings to believe they have the right to know all the intricacies of this process, let alone the “right to be right” about our assumptions and conclusions about said process.
One thing Jesus was very clear about in his teachings was the need for us to have a thinking faith based on a blend of heart, mind, soul, and courage rather than a blind faith based only on the mind and the law.
It takes a lot of courage to let go of the idea that the human brain – any human brain, including the brains that wrote down the words we find today in the Bible – can or should be able to know everything in God’s book of historical facts. We can know some things – indeed, Jesus taught us to continually ask hard questions and let go of old answers when we realize that the old answers are getting in the way of our ability to build our relationships with God, each other, and ourselves – but we can’t know everything.
If you can manage, in your human lifetime, to fully understand and live by all the basic principles espoused in Jesus’ parables and Kingdom parables (which in no way reject or contradict the wonders of pure science), then, my friend, you will have lived a very full and meaningful life blessed with love, forgiveness, humbleness, joy, hope, and the peace that comes from knowing you are loved completely by God. No matter when God chose to create this poetic planet we live on.
Richard,
Thanks for the quote. Certainly God is stating that He created the heavens and the earth, but I might add that He does not stop with Genesis 1,1, but goes on to explain how He did it. So I am really suggesting that indeed God is using symbolism to that could be found to have meaning in modern science so as not to be lying, and symbolism had to be used because no one until the last two hundred years would have understood the scientific terms.
As such I literally get goose bumps when I read, “the earth was without form and void, and darkness was on the face of the deep, And the Holy Spirit hovered over the face of the waters.” A profound statement of quantum uncertainty waiting for God’s will to observe and create !
I know some may not find this “compelling”. But it seems to me to be the only “answer”. Do I need this answer? No. I have come to find Jesus and my personal relationship with God has proven to me His existence in a way that science never could.
Then why the discourse? Because I feel that those that hear that Christians believe that there were dinosaurs on the ark, will turn off God and Christianity, and I feel compelled to share another view that will bring them to Christ. As a Christian who is taking up his cross as a disciple, I must share this view. Perhaps at Bio Logos which is mostly Christian, I am preaching to the choir, but I do believe there are many who are curious about God that come to this web site, and maybe this view will help them see a path to Christ that they can accept.
In regard to the post about asking YEC’s to be silent so as not to do harm, I sometimes wonder if I should be silent when I talk to some of them myself. I have a friend in our small bible study growth group who is a woman of limited education, and she completely accepts the YEC view. Do I dispel this? I think of the prayer of Jabez, that I might not do harm. So why should I dispel her belief, even if she is being misled, as long as she holds Christ in her heart. I wrestle with this and hope I am being guided to share in an appropriate way.
All of Genesis 2 occurs on day 6, because Eve was created in Genesis 2, and also in Genesis 1 it says “male and female he created them.”
So why not rain yet on the surface of the earth?
My thoughts on this are still building so I offer up these views for critical feedback.
“No shrub on the earth and not plant of the field had yet sprouted”. God is describing the earth at the end of the last ice age in which all the moisture of the earth was captured on the polar ice fields and glaciers. From what I have read, most of the earth was a dessert, and some say only a few hundred homo sapiens survived it who lived in South Africa coast line. I am suggesting that perhaps none did. So God is describing the area in Mesopotamia where there was not moisture except that coming from rivers and deep springs. One issue with this theory is that the last ice age ended 10,000 years ago, and the lineage of the bible suggests this would be 6000 years ago. We are only 4,000 years off, and so one needs to address this issue for this theory to hold up.
When “God formed every beast”, the past tense is meant to mean the animals were created man. Out of the ground God formed every beast and man, in essence we are all of the dirt or elements of the universe with water added in, so this is a true statement.
Same answer for birds of the sky order, they were already created in the order in Genesis 1, and Genesis 2 refers to past tense, meaning they were created before man and now brought before him to name them. The fact that fist are not mentioned, the bible will often not say everything that was done, but that does not mean it was not done.
Hi, Neal. You can even correct the original post instead of having to reprint the corrected portions in a later post. Just find the pencil that shows underneath only your own posts (since you are only allowed to edit your own!) and click on that. I know I was delighted when somebody first showed me that, and I’ve used it shamelessly ever since.
Added edit: If content has changed in some way more significant than mere grammar corrections or word omissions, you can always add a note to the end that you’ve now edited it. I sometimes change content that I later think better of. Honesty may compel an acknowledgment of this, especially if people have already “liked” your post in its original state.
Mike Gantt: What a silly question. Go outside, dig a hole and sniff the soil. Drive to a wild land area and walk a mile. Investigate. Ask a question. Propose a test and measurements. Do the test and then conclude. This isn’t rocket surgery. Everywhere will be evidence of natural processes that need no supernatural directive. Sun, soil, decay - it is a non spiritual extraordinarily complex set of evidence. You do a great disservice to your own intellect (which is quite evident in these posts) to force the supernatural nonsense of christianity on to the complexities of natural processes.
I thought BioLogos existed for the express purpose of applying Christianity to the complexities of natural processes. Here’s their stated mission:
BioLogos invites the church and the world to see the harmony between science and biblical faith as we present an evolutionary understanding of God’s creation.
Is BioLogos thereby doing “a great disservice” to the intellects of its supporters? And are you collaborating with them in that disservice?
Casper Hesp and Mike Gantt: I’m not associated with BioLogos except as a participant in the thorny but always fascinating topic of the intersection of religion and science. I am an atheist.
I am an atheist as well, but I don’t see this site as a place to challenge Christianity itself, although I may meander into that territory on occasion. This site is much more about the reconciliation between religion and science.
Just to be clear, I am not telling you what you should or shouldn’t say, challenge or not challenge, but I think you may get more out of Biologos if you focus on what Christians and atheists have in common than on where they differ.
T_aquaticus: Thanks for the advice and I suppose you’re right about the purpose of this forum. From my perspective though, discussing YEC or the specific sequence of Genesis or any other biblical claim is irrelevant if there is no evidence. If evidence is not required to believe in christian claims, then christians have the trump card: God did it. Can’t win if the other player has a handful of wild cards.
There is faith and there is the scientific method. I see no way for them both to coexist.
I use them both daily, Gunter. There are limitations to methodological naturalism, and I believe it is erroneous to assume that nothing can exist outside of our ability to directly observe.
Gould tried to reconcile science and faith through his concept of “Non-overlapping magisteria”.
“The net of science covers the empirical universe: what is it made of (fact) and why does it work this way (theory). The net of religion extends over questions of moral meaning and value. These two magisteria do not overlap, nor do they encompass all inquiry (consider, for starters, the magisterium of art and the meaning of beauty). To cite the arch cliches, we get the age of rocks, and religion retains the rock of ages; we study how the heavens go, and they determine how to go to heaven.” http://www.blc.arizona.edu/courses/schaffer/449/Gould%20Nonoverlapping%20Magisteria.htm
NOMA has the usual mix of those who praise it and those who detest it, but it seems like a reasonable place to start when one talks about the intersection of faith and science.[quote=“loraxx, post:268, topic:36232”]
From my perspective though, discussing YEC or the specific sequence of Genesis or any other biblical claim is irrelevant if there is no evidence. If evidence is not required to believe in christian claims, then christians have the trump card: God did it. Can’t win if the other player has a handful of wild cards.
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While we atheists may not accept faith based assertions and beliefs, many of our fellow citizens do. The politics of science are an important part of our society and our future, so I think it is worth understanding where people are coming from and where we are coming from, both scientists and lay people. After all, you can’t do the science without money to fund it, and that money comes from a wide swath of people across the religious spectrum. If you are an atheist and you believe that scientific research should be funded and supported, then theistic evolutionists (or evolutionary creationists as people tend to say on this website) are our best friends.
