So, you have given God the name of “Energy” ? That’s a little odd… You do understand that many BioLogos supporters think God planned Evolution, yes?
Sorry but you finally got to me.this is rooted in Galileo, the famous saying what we all now agree is true. Sun,moon earth. Was fought fiercely by the inquisition, the church intelligencia for, say, 300 years. All that time people studying, thinking had to either reject the church teaching authority or stop studying. So what did we learn? The churches sided with ignorance for centuries, lost respect. I suggest consider how to accommodate evolution. It is written in stone, in plate tectonics. We have volcanoes and earthquakes that we no longer attribute to the wrath of god. Don’t fight the fact, find good and evil outside the apple story. Because we urgently need a moral revival
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Four paragraphs is a rhetorical nibble (relatively) around here. Carry on.
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Hi Lynn: You seem like a very nice person and gracious in your comment here in response to a relatively heated discussion between folks of various viewpoints of creation vs. evolution, yet greatfully remaining in a faith and life perspective called Christianity. I will tell you that in this time of year many call “Christmas” I have such a spirit of thankfulness towards who I know to be Creator and Designer of this universe who sent His Son to be born, live a life of modesty and servanthood and to ultimately die in our place.
I know of a person who came to know this God whom I serve who was raised in a very different system of thought. Upon choosing to serve the God of the Christian Bible which caused him to have to give up fellowship with almost his entire family who resided in a different country, as he packed his things before his mom and some aunts at this location, he turned to them and asked them very kindly, “Do you think that a worldview that has at its crux a perspective that if a man sacrifices himself on behalf of this particular god that in response he gets a herem of female virgins in heaven sound like it is from God or something that a man (with an appetite) made up.” He said in response to him, where it would be disrespectful and even dangerous for his mom and aunts to respond verbally with any type of affirmation, instead the culmination of difficulty in these women’s lives engrained in such a worldview combined with ideas of judgement and hate trumping love caused them to look into his face and offer to him a half smile that, to him, seemed to be their affirmation of his wisdom to go towards faith in God who does not call us to judge, hate or destroy, but to love, affirm and encourage people in life and towards closer association to the very God who loves us and describes Himself in His Word.
Many good hearted people who believe in this Great God of love and not hate desire to appeal to the conscious of those who are searching for meaning and for God and yet have been through much indoctrination from science teachers in high school and into college who suggest that it is absolutely unscientific to consider the idea of God. However sometimes this appeal is made by sort of agreeing to the secular terms of evolution that does its best to disallow God from almost the entire terms of development of complex life by simply re labeling these same evolutionary principles that have no grounding in the Christian text with Christian semantics. I respectfully don’t agree because if God is God, then the foundation upon which the entire body of thought which science tries to explain could be completely obliterated by how God chose to begin life on earth and this is impossible to determine with confidence in science as we know it. For this, we need to think long and hard about what we believe.
As a sophomore in college I was a chemistry major and took a biology elective that honed in on the structure of the human brain. It was one of the most fascinating classes that I have ever taken! The prof was a brilliant scientist who was even a consultant to NASA at the time (he bragged often about this) and for whatever reason chose to devote a lot of time towards literally demeaning the idea of God in the classroom all the while pronouncing the validity of evolution. As a naïve Christian student with half the smarts of this professor,I became disoriented as I would hear Dr. Parker proclaim how incredibly complex the human brain is on one hand, then belittling God on the other. I honestly began to see him as rather unprofessional and pitifully insecure with such bantering.
I will never forget this for as long as I live what happened next…Dr. Parker in one particular class was explaining the part of the brain that was in charge of protecting the body in the case that a person began to twist their ankle. He said that as one loses control and the ankle is bent into a contorted position, the brain immediately sends a signal to the thigh muscle to relax it in order to save the ankle from further injury which a stiff leg would inevitably do. It was like a human shock absorber of sorts. Then to my surprise, within a couple of days after this teaching while playing a pretty intense game of basketball, I did this exact thing where as I came down onto the ankle sideways and my leg immediately let loose which caused by body to embarrassingly fall onto the court floor in a heap. I was sparred from bad injury.
Within a week of this event, I hobbled on this swollen ankle to this same class and somehow mustered up enough courage to approach this professor Parker. I said something like, “Dr… Parker: Your class is awesome. I just experienced the brain sending a signal to my thigh muscle in order to ward off further injury to my ankle and the illumination about the complexity of the brain came to life in this experience. But Dr. Parker, I am really contorted by the fact that on one hand you relay pretty terrific detail on the brain yet at the same time vocalize to this class of young folks that God cannot exist and evolution must be the only explanation. I went on to tell him that I was a Christian and that I believed that the idea of God is the only rational explanation for complexity and for this, every time you put down the idea of God as Creator and Designer, you bring confusion and insult to some of those in your class.” Dr. Parker replied very nicely and needless to say, from that day on, our science class never regressed into indoctrination into the belief system called atheism that seems to be to be the foundation upon which naturalistic evolution is based upon.
Sorry too for the length here yet again in this post… Christmas is a time of year of celebration. It is full of life, lights, trees, family, wrapping paper. For some not so much and sometimes bitterness. Whatever the case may be experientially should never dispose of what should make the front page news of our minds. It is the dogma that the God who created and designed the universe, in response to mankind turning their back on Him still chose to love us by sending His Son to die in our place. If the truth that God LITERALLY exists, that He created, that He designed, that He loves us enough to die in our place does not take ones breath away with awe and thankfulness that necessarily drowns the noise of the lights, trees, wrapping paper or the pain and lonliness for some the same, I encourage you to simply get on your knees and by faith thank Him for the true gift found in His Son! That is Christianity. He is real and He loves me and He loves YOU! I mean this statement not just in a frivolous greeting type of way like we say “God bless you” after a sneeze type of thing. No, God Himself who exists and designed us really loves the world. All nations, all people. He loves you! When we hear “Merry Christmas” at the next Christmas party, may we remember the literal God who made those stars and all those galaxies in heaven by a snap of His fingers is the God who cares for us in the details of our very lives. in this light, His Christmas blessings to you Lynn and everyone in earshot of this message. Greg
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In reading through this series of blogs and others in this forum, we seem to always get hung up on two issues:
- The time it took to create the world we live in.
- The means of creating species and us as man.
Under item 1, lets be clear that the bible and science declares it took time for creation - it did NOT happen instantly. The bible says 6 days, and science says 14.5 Billion Years. How can both be true? Answer: Time is relative per Einstein’s theory of relativity and also in the bible, “To God a 1000 years is like a day and a day is like a thousand years.” The 6 days is God’s time and since we only existed in the mind of God prior to Adam, it is our time as well. To Adam had existing on the earth (that didn’t exist either) it would have been observed as 14.5 Billion years.
For Item 2, I would like to use a simple comparison to man made buildings. If one were to look at a series of buildings made by the same builder, and one was a single story, another a two story, and perhaps a third was a multi-story building all made of similar materials but different in their height, an evolutionist might theorize than this is an example of evolutionary processes and theorize that highest structure evolved from the lower one. Of course this is ridiculous. But perhaps so is evolutionary theory in that it assumes since one species has one genetic structure, and another seems similar but more complex than the other that the more complex evolved from it. Indeed all genetic theory is based on this principle. I would think God is smiling and saying that to create a mouse you need one genetic code, and to create an ape another. How ridiculous it is to assume that one came from the other.
In summary, the Bible and science do fit together and God wants us to think. We just need to start with the bible first, and seek an answer for scientific observation that is consistent with the bible. Then we can find the truth as God and indeed God wants us to do so as it builds faith in him for all people.
Correcting typo in last sentence:
Then we can find the truth and indeed God wants us to do so as it builds faith in him for all people.
I agree Mr. Burke: Jesus sermon on the mount discusses the very real tie of worry about one’s financial well being and the tendency to fake religiousity on the part of the religious leaders that thereby affect their followers. Jesus teaching here is absolutely brilliant! Religion and religiousity comes in many forms…all the major world religion players but includes atheism, agnosticism and naturalistic science as these are indeed belief systems the same whether they might like it or not. Atheism by the way takes the most faith.
And to be brutally frank-there are a lot of organizations out there who start with good intentions and base themselves on an idea and get a following, money flow, employees that find any competing ideas as a threat to their personal well being. Just human nature. I run a business. I know a thing about this very type of thing in myself. This is exactly why Jesus teaching about worry in this sermon on the mount so fitting while He at the same time discusses acting religious for an audience and paycheck in the case of the pharisees.
For all of this, I choose to remain outside of getting a paycheck from any Christian para church organization as this can cause for tainting truth. (churches with good accountability from godly elders is best) I appreciate Christian organizations but there needs to be caution and for this I want to explore God’s Word without pressure to conform to an organizations view just for the sake of livelihood in the form of a paycheck from that organization. If I were a betting man, I would place my bet that the differences of viewpoints on the topic at hand have more to do with blame on this side issue of how organizations are formed around issues than the disagreements over the issues themselves. I could never prove this, but a hunch. Think about it…secular universities have a theory, research dollars flow, then feel obligated to stick to their guns. Same with AIG. Same with Biologos. (sorry) The argument gets heated because the idea that I could be wrong can affect my livelihood and what those leaders think and feel translates into their following. ugh. I cannot wait for heaven God!
For groups like AIG I applaud them for their high view of Scripture as I do. However God is more complex than what a billion Bibles say. Yes the ark a bit a crazy. Their donors wanted the ark and would never have put $ towards research. Must take our hats off for them going against the grain for so long. I know a number of staff members and really really solid Christians who are in line with my thinking about holiness and humbleness before a mighty God who saves us despite us and at great cost. So I offer AIG and groups similar my respect.
For the theistic evolution groups. I respect Tim Keller. I have given a number of his books to friends. When it comes to theistic evolution, if they are to appeal to naturalistic evolutionist models by adopting most principles and just plastering some new semantics upon those, then consider going all the way with the basic premise of this camp too and not just suggest that God has intermingled Himself in the paradigm prescribed …might consider a different direction all together that does indeed incorporate Bible with science.
The rocks just do not show definitive proof that God absolutely did not place kinds of plants and animals on this earth specifically fashioned and designed to evolve and adjust in order to survive. God playing these into nature where He chooses to let nature have its course and where He might interject here and there seems to me the most reasonable.
When it comes to these discussions about evolution and creationism, I really wonder if we took away the monetary pressures that inevitably exist in all of the camps if we’d find an easier pathway for unity upon the truth of the matter. We might find it easier to really sit down to discuss all elements of the ideas and pray and process with sincerity and perhaps find more unity on a more common ground.
I have seen God do some pretty amazing things. And I am not selling anything and say this without blushing or for profit like many do on the church channel (I do love you guys but your marketing materials in the guise of making disciples makes Christianity look bad) I believe that He did introduce the world with life that was of fully functioning plants and animals that had the ability to adjust and evolve. And there just has been enough confusing evidence out there in our dating processes to warrant a closer look on how we are coming up with billions of years. etc. human skull fossils dating old, old fossils with blood cells and soft tissue, known young ages of rocks dating millions of years old etc. We should take a closer look. I bet that long term we are going to see results that have a closer resemblance to plain principles out of early Genesis than some may believe today.
And now we have BioLogos with its instructional materials so that Christians who are scientists or professors can help understand how Religion and Science can co-exist … even if they are not lucky enough to have you in their classes!
I wish I could agree with you here, brother. Unfortunately we have a little picture of what that looks like right here. See, your paycheck doesn’t depend on your YEC view nor mine on my EC view, and with the exception of our fearless moderator Brad and a handful of practicing biologists, nobody else’s here does, either, and yet even for all of our lack of financial interests and earnest desire to treat each other as brothers and sisters in Christ worthy of respect, we can’t even seem to agree on the baseline rule of civility that we should stop misrepresenting evolutionary creationists as fawning over Ivy League professors.
I dunno, maybe as we continue prayerfully through the discussion, maybe even here in this conversation, you could prove yourself right here.
I’m happy you’re so filled with joy about God. I love learning about the intricacies of the natural world and all the amazing things we are even now still discovering about the universe.
I do also marvel a little at how long your reply was, yet it never actually addressed any of the topics I did. There are all kinds of wonders in the world. 
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So you are suggesting that the scientific community, with participants all over the world, in such diverse fields as geology, biology, cosmology, chemistry and so forth … are being driven by money and ego to prove the earth is billions of years old… when in fact, you think it is obvious the earth is less than 10,000 years old?
This is not just mildly insulting … it is grotesquely so. Very Christian Geologists of the Victorian era were the first ones to say that God’s creation is looking way more complex than a simplistic interpretation of Genesis allows. These men of science did not die millionaires… and neither did the subsequent waves of scientists who confirmed the work of the first.
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Besides which, it is demonstrably false. As I keep saying, most of the evidence for an ancient earth comes from oil exploration. The financial pressures on petroleum geologists are to report ages that are accurate and reliable, not ages that are ideologically convenient.
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What do you suppose the YEC explanation is for oil? Do they think oil can be made from 3000 year old dead algae?
Answers in Genesis has a very long and detailed article giving their theories on the origin of oil. I’ve only skimmed through it, and I haven’t read it in detail, but it appears that they’re proposing a combination of a “mature creation” argument and Flood geology.
The problem is that their model only attempts to provide an alternative explanation for oil deposits that are already known. As far as I can tell, it It doesn’t even attempt to predict where new oil deposits might be found. Therein lies the problem, because that’s the only question that oil executives are interested in.
There’s a discussion of YEC hypotheses on the origin of oil on the Age of Rocks blog here.
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“And to be brutally frank-there are a lot of organizations out there who start with good intentions and base themselves on an idea and get a following, money flow, employees that find any competing ideas as a threat to their personal well being. Just human nature.”
I really do not find this statement insulting, in fact I feel it is an accurate description of how things work. When you have big bucks sunk in a big boat theme park or a manufacturing process, or a publishing company, or research project, you are very unlikely to turn around and say, never mind, I had it wrong, I think I’ll just declare bankruptcy and start over. It doesn’t make you evil, but is a result of our sinful natures. It is very hard to separate self interest from our actions.
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Part of Christian confession necessary for salvation is admittance that God is God and we are not…Sin is not just doing bad, but in God’s sight, the performance of even good things made ultimate above God. This is not because He is needed, but the Christian God is a God who just IS.
If the vastness of the universe or the absurdity that the order and complexity of life comes from nothing does not strike a bit of humility in a person such that they are willing to lean in a direction of such admittance and humility, then I have pity. Even Einstein admitted that the more he knew, the more he realized the probability of the unknowable. The nature of naturalistic science today, unfortunately so stiff arms the idea of God that somehow it deifies self and humankind.
God is real. Where for some who get brainwashed into a worldview over night, I have spent 30 years reading, studying and analyzing and I have never experienced just a simple acceptance of the terms, but instead found myself wrestling even more. One of the conclusions is that where naturalists claim less bias and better ability to make conclusions about the universe than a theist, I am 100 percent convinced that this is nothing more than an alternative from a belief system that says God just IS and we cannot earn His favor to another belief system that takes more faith to believe that suggests that we are alone and capable to figure out our own path.
To suggest that this latter understanding is best for finding truths about the universe is absolutely bologna.
For this, Christmas time is a special time for myself and my family and I proclaim this without blushing.
His blessings
First, a clarification: the quote you introduce your post with is, as you know, not mine. It is Grog’s quote. Just wanted to make sure the other readers coming in later are sure of this.
Second, what makes it insulting is that @Grog uses financial motivation as the chief reason there are still people who teach Evolution.
It’s utter nonsense.
Certainly, I agree with you in that that is not why most teach evolution. I suspect that somewhere, somebody does, but the usual scenario is more commonly that many in fundamentalist/conservative institutions evolution is denied even though believed, as their jobs and livelihoods are at stake. It would be interesting to know how many “closet evolutionists” there are out there.
So I agree with your statement, Grog, even though probably not with it’s intended application.
Basically, put it this way. Greg’s statement is correct in general, but it can not account for the evidence for an ancient earth or evolution in particular.
More specifically, it can not account for the evidence accumulated through oil exploration, medical research, or any other areas where the financial and economic pressures on evolutionary models are to deliver results that are accurate rather than ideologically convenient.
Greg, what you’re talking about here is not science, but scientism – the belief that everything that exists is within the scope of scientific inquiry, and conversely, that anything that isn’t within the scope of scientific inquiry doesn’t exist. Basically it’s Ken Ham’s “were you there?” argument, but for atheists. Science itself, on the other hand, is simply a systematic evidence-based framework for formulating and refining hypotheses and models about how the universe works through testable predictions.
Clearly there are some things that do exist that aren’t accessible to scientific inquiry, such as what caused the Big Bang. The multiverse is a popular hypothesis among cosmologists at the moment, but it’s ultimately untestable. As Christians, on the other hand, we acknowledge that what caused the Big Bang was, ultimately, God.
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I understand. When human beings are talking about things that occurred thousands, millions and billions of years ago, there needs to be a lot more humility. The language I heard from mainstream science today that organizations like biologos has largely bought into reveals a unjustified confidence about billions of years. When I learn from the creationist camp investigations about rocks of a known age getting old dates and many other evidences that would suggest a much younger planet, they get written off “because they put too much trust in the literalitic view of Scripture” Well, I am not one to suggest that I know all the answers, but I sure see some sour fruit from various worldviews that choose to ignore evidences of other sorts or explain these away.
And I just don’t buy that Romans 1:19 and beyond is about how God makes plain the understanding about the formation of this earth/solar system and galaxy. I believe that all men who have the opportunity to make it face to face with our Creator one day become crushed in humility before Him in the things that we assumed to be true and used to try to entice the world in the direction of these assumptions. Roman 1 is about how man has a plain understanding that God exists because it is so obvious from the fact that there is creation with complexity, planets floating in space in ordered systems etc.
I have seen the research that attempts to validate evolution as well as billions w wand I just don’t buy it.