Can the universe be accounted for without a creator?

[Gigajak]

God cannot be through creating. Rev 21:1 And I saw a new heaven and a new earth: for the first heaven and the first earth were passed away; and there was no more sea.
Rev 21:2 And I John saw the holy city, new Jerusalem, coming down from God out of heaven, prepared as a bride adorned for her husband.
Also, what happened to believing as a child, without question. Mat 18:3 And said, Verily I say unto you, Except ye be converted, and become as little children, ye shall not enter into the kingdom of heaven.
Mat 18:4 Whosoever therefore shall humble himself as this little child, the same is greatest in the kingdom of heaven. I liken it to trying to figure out how a magic trick was preformed.
After all, the Bible says it and that settles it. It doesn't matter if we believe it or not.

 

[Magnetic Poles]

Whether it can or cannot be accounted for without a creator is really of no consequence. If one believes that God is the creator, then it doesn't matter. Also, doesn't matter what processes he used.

 

[David Ekstrom]

yeshua makes the error of putting all types of "evolution" into one bucket. The term in itself simply means, "change." Many, many Bible believing Christians believe that God created ex nihilo certain species long ago and put into creation the Creation Mandate: "Be fruitful and multiply and replenish the earth." As environmental conditions change, creatures adapt to the changes. But there's a limit as to how far adaptation can occur. It's ludicrous to say that fish turned into mammals and monkeys turned into people. But it's not so ludicrous to imagine that, over time, the beak of a bird might adapt to its environment. As Timothy Johnson has said, Natural Selection seems an obvious fact. But what Natural Selection can accomplish is much in doubt. Some distinguish between "micro-evolution" and "macro-evolution." Self-styled "Creation Scientists" seem oblivious to this distinction as well as they are oblivious to how many Bible-believing Christians hold this view.

 

[David Ekstrom]

Many years ago I stood with my associate pastor on the shores of Lake Michigan at Illinois Beach. The shore consisted of small, round stones. I asked Bob, "How did these stones get here?" They were right before our eyes. "Duh! God put them there." "Yes, but by what means?"
Geologists believe that the Great Lakes were formed at the last Ice Age. The moving glaciers churned up these rocks, called "Glacial Till." They are smooth and round because they were ground by the movement of the glacier. The point is that right before your eyes is something that is there. Do you close your eyes to truth? Do you call that faith? Bob saw the stones but didn't even see them. I saw the stones because I look around at God's creation and praise Him. I praise God almost every day without fail as I walk from my church's beautiful wooded campus across the street to the parsonage. The fact that those trees probably adapted over time does not in any way detract from God's glory. He is the One who created them, who commanded them to survive, and who enabled them to do so. And I believe that He is active in the process. No sparrow falls to the ground apart from Our Heavenly Father.

 

[Paul33]

Originally posted by Marcia:
</font><blockquote>quote:</font><hr />Originally posted by Paul33:

Jonathan Edwards believed that God was perpetually creating every moment of the universe by his will. Without God willing it into existence second by second, the universe wouldn't exist.

This is a very interesting statment and it made me think. I am not sure what to think of it.

For one thing, doesn't it negate the fact that God finished creating on the 6th day? Everything was created and put in place, and then God "rested," which indicates He finished creating.

I am not saying He is not interacting with us anymore or that He does not act in the world, but I think he finished creating according to Genesis.

What does anyone think of this? </font>[/QUOTE]Could God finish creating the universe in "time" but still hold it together by his "will?"

Col. 1:16ff.

Also, "In him we live and move and have our being."

Just thinking out loud, Marcia!

 

[Marcia]

Posted by Paul33
Could God finish creating the universe in "time" but still hold it together by his "will?"

Col. 1:16ff.

Also, "In him we live and move and have our being."

Just thinking out loud, Marcia!

Yes, I almost said this myself!

I do see this scripturally, but not that God is still creating.

As far as the new heaven and new earth go, that is a future event, so that is different than saying God is creating at every moment which means the universe was not complete on Day 6, as I believe.

 

[Travelsong]

"Can the universe be accounted for without a creator?"

Sure. The creator could also be a magnificent benevolent pink unicorn. Anything is possible.

 

[David Ekstrom]

I guess it gets down to semantics. But I think we are guilty of explaining away rather than explaining when we deny that God is creating even now. All of us, I think, believe God is providentially caring for all of us. All of us, I think, believe that life on earth adapts to its environment. Some don't want to call that creating. I think they are forced to that position because of a hyper-literal interpretation of Gen 1. The Six Days is a metaphor for God's creative activity. Everything was created by God with order, purpose, design for God's glory and man's blessing. The Six Days are neither 24-hour periods or long ages. Rather, the account is an ahistorical rendering of an historical event. It is only because of our fear of Darwinism that we back ourselves into a literalistic interpretation of Gen. 1. Before Darwin, many Christians recognized Gen. 1 as metaphorical.

 

[TexasSky]

John V, you asked When did we start adopting the false notion that natural explanations are devoid of God or His handiwork? Last time I checked, God created nature.

I think the answer is that when evidence began to come out that some of the miracles of the bible could be explained certain authorities said, "Well, that means it wasn't a miracle of God, it was just nature." Putting the two sides on opposite sides.

I take a lot of pot shots at Science's arrogance for that reason, but I do respect science despite who I sound on these boards. I just don't respect the view that if you can explain it scientifically it means there isn't a God, and if you can't explain it scientficially, it didn't happen.

When I was growing up the big thing was "Big Bang" or "Creation." "Gaseous cloud" or "Intelligent Being."

The non-Christians loved to say, "Where did your God come from?!" Then Christians started saying, "Where did your gaseous cloud come from?" They didn't like dealing with that.

To me, planned order from intelligence made a lot more sense than total order from disorder.

Still does. Doesn't mean that the world doesn't follow the rules of physics most of the time. Afterall, that same intelligence created those rules.

But if anyone comes to me with more faith in science than in God, I will challenge them.

 

[Johnv]

Originally posted by TexasSky:
John V, you asked When did we start adopting the false notion that natural explanations are devoid of God or His handiwork? Last time I checked, God created nature.

I think the answer is that when evidence began to come out that some of the miracles of the bible could be explained certain authorities said, "Well, that means it wasn't a miracle of God, it was just nature." Putting the two sides on opposite sides.

I couldn't disagree more with that idea. If there were a scientific explanation for every scriptural miracle, they would still be miracles of God nonetheless. We need to abandon the notion that miracles must violate the laws of nature or physics. Not only is that notion ridiculous and man-centerd, it's not scriptural. Jesus the Great Physycian, not the Great Magician.

I had an agnostic frind of mine once say that if he could go back in time and witness every on of Jesus' miracles, he'd be able to come up with a scientific explanation for them. I replied, just because they're explainable doesn't mean they cease to be miracles. BTW, that friend of mine is now an avid churchgoer.

Doesn't mean that the world doesn't follow the rules of physics most of the time. Afterall, that same intelligence created those rules.

I agree with you there.

But if anyone comes to me with more faith in science than in God, I will challenge them.

That presumes that science requires a lack of religious faith, or that adherence to religious faith requires an abandonment of an understanding of science. I don't think that any such compromise is necessary or called for.

 

[Mercury]

Originally posted by David Ekstrom:
I guess it gets down to semantics. But I think we are guilty of explaining away rather than explaining when we deny that God is creating even now. All of us, I think, believe God is providentially caring for all of us. All of us, I think, believe that life on earth adapts to its environment. Some don't want to call that creating. I think they are forced to that position because of a hyper-literal interpretation of Gen 1. The Six Days is a metaphor for God's creative activity. Everything was created by God with order, purpose, design for God's glory and man's blessing. The Six Days are neither 24-hour periods or long ages. Rather, the account is an ahistorical rendering of an historical event. It is only because of our fear of Darwinism that we back ourselves into a literalistic interpretation of Gen. 1. Before Darwin, many Christians recognized Gen. 1 as metaphorical.

David E,

While I have a different opinion about the plausibility of some aspects of science, I fully agree with your theology regarding creation, as expressed above. Well said.

 

[Marcia]

Originally posted by David Ekstrom:
I guess it gets down to semantics. But I think we are guilty of explaining away rather than explaining when we deny that God is creating even now. All of us, I think, believe God is providentially caring for all of us. All of us, I think, believe that life on earth adapts to its environment. Some don't want to call that creating. I think they are forced to that position because of a hyper-literal interpretation of Gen 1.

I don't call adaptation creation because it isn't. This isn't a case of semantics. When I say creating, I mean creating out of nothing, something only God can do, and He did it when he created the universe. Adaptation is NOT creation.

It is only because of our fear of Darwinism that we back ourselves into a literalistic interpretation of Gen. 1. Before Darwin, many Christians recognized Gen. 1 as metaphorical.

I have no fear of Darwinism. This is an ad hominem that keeps cropping up on the BB towards any who believe in a 6 day creation or literal Genesis.

I think the scientists themselves cannot agree. If I want to believe in it, which scientist should I agree with? They are constantly disagreeing with each other and coming up with new theories all the time. They changed the cro-magnon man from what I was taught in school, for example.

BTW, I am not an anti-science. I think science is man's way of explaining what God created. Because it's man's attempt, it's flawed, but what it is attempting to explain is objective data.

The last sentence that before Darwin, "many Christians recognized" Gen. 1 as metaphorical means little. Who were these people and why should we go along with them? Does this mean they were right?

And saying they "recognized" it as metaphor is a subtle way to say that it is metaphorical. Actually, the statement should be that some Christians believed it was metaphorical.

 

[Johnv]

Marcia, I just wanted to clarify:

Darwinism doesn't claim that life evolved from nothing. Darwinism claims that current life forms developed from a common ancestor or ancestors.

 

[Paul33]

I think the creation account is historical and not metaphorical. However, as you all know by now, I don't think YEC are interpreting it correctly. BTW, I don't thinkg OEC are interpreting it correctly, either.

If only everyone would listen to me, then we would all know the right way to interpret it.

Did I actually type that?

 

[Paul33]

Originally posted by Johnv:
Marcia, I just wanted to clarify:

Darwinism doesn't claim that life evolved from nothing. Darwinism claims that current life forms developed from a common ancestor or ancestors.

Please, how demeaning, as if Marcia didn't know that.

But today's definition of science rules out a creator and claims that life did in fact spring from nothing without the help of a supernatural God. And since this can't be proved and is rediculous, some postulate space aliens from another galaxy.

Also, the implications of Darwin's theory was understood by his contemporaries to mean "atheism."

 

[Marcia]

Originally posted by Johnv:
Marcia, I just wanted to clarify:

Darwinism doesn't claim that life evolved from nothing. Darwinism claims that current life forms developed from a common ancestor or ancestors.

Yeah, I know. I had nothing but Darwinism stuffed into every nook and crevice of my brain from early youth. I was never taught creation as far as I can recall. Even though I went to a baptist church in high school (and I was not a christian then, either), I don't remember it coming up as an issue there at all.

My father was an agnostic who thought the Bible had some great literature in it, and my mother, a nominal Baptist, did not believe most of the bible. I was raised in a household with high regard for science (especially from my father) and education and nary the tiniest scrap of creationism crept in.

 

[Mercury]

Originally posted by Marcia:
I don't call adaptation creation because it isn't. This isn't a case of semantics. When I say creating, I mean creating out of nothing, something only God can do, and He did it when he created the universe. Adaptation is NOT creation.

By that standard, the creation of Adam wasn't creation, since according to a literal reading of Genesis 2 Adam was formed from dust, not nothing. The vegetation and animals also weren't creation, since the land was commanded to produce them rather than them springing from nothing.

Basically, such an approach limits God's creation to an initial event, while Genesis 1 portrays everything on the six days as also being God's creation, even if they weren't created from nothing. Other parts of the Bible also give God credit for creating what is presently around us (or at least, what was around the authors at the time they wrote). There is also no Hebrew word that means "create from nothing". Even bara, which always speaks of something God creates, is used both to describe things created from existing materials (such as creating Israel from Abram and Sarai), and creation with no existing materials specified.

To limit creation to ex nihilo is to limit God's creation further than the Bible does. God's creation includes what was made ex nihilo along with everything that God has made since. You are a creation of God and so am I. The existence of our parents in no way invalidates that.

I was raised in a household with high regard for science (especially from my father) and education and nary the tiniest scrap of creationism crept in.

Well, there's two ways to incorporate the truth of creation. Suppose that from your youth you had also learned a lot about gravity, with narry a mention about God's hand in it. Once you realize that God claims to be the one to hold the universe together, you could either reject gravity as an atheistic theory, or accept that gravity merely describes a bit about how God does some of what he does. The same choice is available when it comes to biology.

 

[Johnv]

Originally posted by Paul33:
Please, how demeaning, as if Marcia didn't know that.

Whoa, lighten up there, Paul. I have nothing against Marcia. I was clarifying a point, which I thought was worthy of clarifying. I wasn't demeaning Marcia or anyone else. Heck, I wasn't even arguing Darwinism. I was making a simple clarification. Please do not accuse me of something that doesn't exist.

 

[Paul33]

Sorry, John,

I didn't mean to come on so strong. Marcia obviously knows what Darwinism is.

 

[Johnv]

No harm done.