Poll concerning Creation(ism)

[Magnetic Poles]

PreachinJesus...you said much more eloquently than I, the points I was driving at. Thanks for the terrific post.

 

[ReformedBaptist]

Actually I'm going to respectfully disagree. They had the exact same mental and intellectual capacity as we do. Otherwise, why didn't they come up with neat things like shipping, transcontinental transportation, medicine, etc. until thousands of years later. The only people who could qualify as "closer to the perfect model" would be Adam and Eve, but their ability to connect with that model was irreversibly shattered at the Fall.




I'd have to ask for further explanation. I disagree with this statement at face value. The Bible, in its formulation completed in AD 390 at the Synod of Laodecia, even with the copies of the autographs they had, was far from perfection. The variants in the earliest copies we have are still pronounced and vary from early text to early text. Especially today we have a Bible that is perfect in inspiration and teaching while having some problems along the path of delivery.



Yeah, but the Bible isn't a science textbook. I don't go to the Scriptures to learn to be a better physician, how to do a heart transplant, how to understand botany, or even how to understand photosynthesis. The Scriptures are limited in their application to specific genres but replete in their application for life principles. We can't force the text of the Scriptures to say something that they, themselves, don't say or won't comment on.

We also must be very careful not to divinize the Bible. The only perfect Person is the Trinitarian Godhead...and they are uncreated. We cannot make the Bible a member of that Godhead, that is not its place.

Do you believe the Scriptures are the verbal and plenary inerrant Word of God? That is, what we have currently today?

 

[lbaker]

So, IOWS, God could have created the Universe less than 10,000 yrs ago, and set the light to arrive on earth from distant stars at different timelengths...

Just asking...

Yes, He could, but that would mean God is deliberately deceiving us, making it look like the universe is much older than it is by setting the speed of light at a certain value and then cooking the books so that measurements using that value are wrong.

Why would He do that?

If Creation really did happen 10,000 or less years ago, I would think the light from distant stars would reflect that.

 

[lbaker]

Do you believe the Scriptures are the verbal and plenary inerrant Word of God? That is, what we have currently today?

I've always wondered, what does "verbal and plenary" mean, anyway?

 

[Allan]

So if they were so smart, they would have known the Sun did not stand still in Joshua's day.. they would have know it was the Earth that did.. making the sun to apparently stand still.

Or do you believe the Bible literally and say the sun stood still?

Tiny now your bording on the absurd, what's up?

Seriously it seems you need ti get your head in gear. The Sun stood still in relation to it's normal obsreable movent in the sky. The sun rises and sets and if it stops midway it stands still based upon it's movements relating to the rising and setting. It has nothing to do with the specifics of each planetary revolutions or any other scientic notion. The Bible states the Sun stopped moving (or stood still) and nothing beyond that.

Yes, it is to be taken quite and specifically literal or at face value. It is not a myth nor a fairy-tale nor an amalomation of other religious writtings. - The Sun stood still on that day.

 

[Magnetic Poles]

The Sun stood still on that day.

IF that were true, the planet would have been destroyed by the forces acting upon it.

 

[Revmitchell]

IF that were true, the planet would have been destroyed by the forces acting upon it.

God has the power and ability to make what he wants to happen regardless of the laws of His creation.

 

[Allan]

Yes, He could, but that would mean God is deliberately deceiving us, making it look like the universe is much older than it is by setting the speed of light at a certain value and then cooking the books so that measurements using that value are wrong.

Wrong. You are assuming that God doing such is for the purpose of deception. Was God trying to decieve us when He made man and animals and plants fully formed? No. That was how He wanted it to be made. The same is true with the universe. God desires His creation to be fully formed to 'His' specifications and desire NOT ours and what our trendy new view is.

If Creation really did happen 10,000 or less years ago, I would think the light from distant stars would reflect that.

Not true. Scripture states that God stretched out the heavens in four different places regarding the creation event:

Isa 42:5 Thus saith God the LORD, he that created the heavens, and stretched them out; he that spread forth the earth, and that which cometh out of it; he that giveth breath unto the people upon it, and spirit to them that walk therein:

Isa 45:12 I have made the earth, and created man upon it: I, [even] my hands, have stretched out the heavens, and all their host have I commanded.

Isa 51:13 And forgettest the LORD thy maker, that hath stretched forth the heavens, and laid the foundations of the earth; and hast feared continually every day because of the fury of the oppressor, as if he were ready to destroy? and where [is] the fury of the oppressor?

Jer 10:12 He hath made the earth by his power, he hath established the world by his wisdom, and hath stretched out the heavens by his discretion.

If God created the universe (stars, planets, sun, et..) and therefore the light is already there - and then - He stretched them apart; would you still be able to tell how old the universe is by using such a model?

EXAMPLE-
If you take the sun and the earth at present being fully formed (say they just came into existance) and suddenly stretched the Sun away from the earth 200 million light years. How old is the universe based on speed of light in relation to the distance of the Sun to the Earth?

Answer: You wont get a true estimate using light as guide. The only key to truly knowing is being at the event to know all variables. Thus we have the witness and testimony of the only one who was there - God. Man apart from Gods truth is like the old saying of four blind men asked to feel four different parts of an Elephant and came to four completely different opiniions about what it was but all were wrong.

 

[Allan]

God has the power and ability to make what he wants to happen regardless of the laws of His creation.

Amen.

My God can also bring the dead back to life again, He can hold back the rain for 3 years, He can create from nothing - everything, and even cause the Sun to remain in place for whatever duration He so desires - without adversely affecting anything else in creation by doing just that.

 

[preachinjesus]

Do you believe the Scriptures are the verbal and plenary inerrant Word of God? That is, what we have currently today?

Hi loaded question!

I affirm the Chicago Statement on Biblical Inerrancy.
http://www.bible-researcher.com/chicago1.html
I (every year) affirm the inerrancy statment of the Evangelical Theological Society.
http://www.etsjets.org/?q=about/constitution

I do not believe in the dictation theory of inspiration. In the great mystery that is inspiration (we can't know precisely how the inspiration of Scriptures occured scientifically) we do know that God, through the manifestation of the Holy Spirit, led men (and possibly women) of God to author distinct texts that are influenced by God's guidance, spiritual insight, personal experience, personal grammatical choice, prophetic insight, and cultural markers.

I believe the Scriptures (the closed canon of 66 books) are inerrant in their original autographs. Furthermore I believe that the translations we have today inspired and contain the words of God (lest we forget that Jesus is the Word of God according to John) for all of mankind. The text of the Scriptures (recreated through textual critical study of thousands of manuscripts) is illuminated to Christians by the power of the Holy Spirit. These translations are coherent and without error in teaching.

That's a WHOLE lot of words to get to a reasonable answer...but honestly you've asked a really difficult question to provide and answer for without getting bogged down in rhetoric and loaded language.

Well, here come the rocks...

 

[preachinjesus]

God has the power and ability to make what he wants to happen regardless of the laws of His creation.

Just for what it's worth...I agree with this statement. Particularly about the Joshua incident.

Now I had a couple of questions for you...

 

[Thinkingstuff]

I've always wondered, what does "verbal and plenary" mean, anyway?

spoken and full.
like:

Sanctus Sanctus Sanctus
Dominus Deus Sabaoth
Pleny sunt caeli et tera in gloria tua
Hosana in excelsis
Benedictus qui venit in nomine domine
Hosana in excelsis Amen.

Holy holy holy
Lord God Almighty
Heaven and earth are filled with your glory
Hosana in excelsis
Blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord
Hosana in excelsis Amen.

 

[Magnetic Poles]

If God created the universe (stars, planets, sun, et..) and therefore the light is already there - and then - He stretched them apart; would you still be able to tell how old the universe is by using such a model?

The only stretching going on here is the stretching of logic to ridiculous lengths to retrofit evidence into a literary tale meant to describe meaning, not process.

 

[Thinkingstuff]

Amen.

My God can also bring the dead back to life again, He can hold back the rain for 3 years, He can create from nothing - everything, and even cause the Sun to remain in place for whatever duration He so desires - without adversely affecting anything else in creation by doing just that.

The "my dad is bigger than your dad argument?" Well that is exactly what Genesis is. God is greater than any other god. He makes that point again with each of the plagues of Egypt. Showing his control over the supposed gods of the Egyptians.

The problem with all these type of arguments. God is outside time and space. He is not governed by the laws he set in place. I can speculate that the elements He used to create the universe were for a time outside space time. Humans are pretty linear because we are governed by those laws. If God wanted to make the world in 6 days he could. No one argues that. The argument comes with how he decided to record the event. It's deffinately not a blue print. It does show his dominance over all things in the "module" of his creation. What is God trying to get accross? His lordship or making an imperical statement? Unfortunately, thats not how the ancient world works. The ancients used numbers symbolically more so than imperically. Now they knew their math as we can see with the Parthenon. But you see numeric symbolism all over the place.
Anyone work out the prophesy of Daniel to the day? Just curious. Or was there some give and take? How many years or days was he off?
God inspired men to write his word. God is constantly doing his work through men. He speaks to them in the situation and knowledge they find themselves in. He doesn't err but he may not be saying exactly what you believe him to say. What's important to him is what he will communicate to us. Jesus told many parables. Does he mean for us to quible over exactly what happened. Could you imagine. Did the prodical son eat two or three bites of pig slop? I don't have a problem with someone believing in 6 days of creation. That's there perogative. But I believe God's message was greater than whether than " I did it in 6 days" These arguments lead us to argue whether Jesus ever got a splinter or was all his works done perfectly. Those kind of arguments were popular in the middle ages.

 

[Allan]

The only stretching going on here is the stretching of logic to ridiculous lengths to retrofit evidence into a literary tale meant to describe meaning, not process.

That is flawed assumption because you believe man over God. That is your choice.
So lets try this.

Do you deny that science states the universe is expanding?

Just when did this happen, and at what rate?

When does it slow down or speed up (since it does both according to science).

Your trying to tell me God stretching out the universe is a fairy-tale when science itself says the universe is doing just that. :laugh: Talk about speaking from both sides of ones mouth.

 

[Magnetic Poles]

That is flawed assumption because you believe man over God. That is your choice.

No, I trust observation of reality over fundamentalists' narrow view. Not buying the fundy view is not the same as not trusting God.

So lets try this.

Do you deny that science states the universe is expanding?

Nope, never said I did.

Just when did this happen, and at what rate?

It appears to be the remaining momentum from the Big Bang.

When does it slow down or speed up (since it does both according to science).

Not sure what you are asking.

Your trying to tell me God stretching out the universe is a fairy-tale when science itself says the universe is doing just that. :laugh: Talk about speaking from both sides of ones mouth.

No, you said that God stretched out the light, and that the Universe is 6k years old, did you not? That has nothing to do with the expansion of the visible universe as observed. Again, you try to fit evidence to a predetermined outcome.

 

[Revmitchell]

Truth is always narrow. Praise God!:jesus:

 

[JustChristian]

That is flawed assumption because you believe man over God. That is your choice.
So lets try this.

Do you deny that science states the universe is expanding?

Just when did this happen, and at what rate?

When does it slow down or speed up (since it does both according to science).

Your trying to tell me God stretching out the universe is a fairy-tale when science itself says the universe is doing just that. :laugh: Talk about speaking from both sides of ones mouth.

But you're arguing that this belief about (stretching out) is true due to scientific evidence while rejecting significant scientific evidence that the universe is much older than than 3,000 years. I don't see this as consistent.

 

[Allan]

No, I trust observation of reality over fundamentalists' narrow view. Not buying the fundy view is not the same as not trusting God.

Nothing fundy about it. God said this is what He did and it is so, period.

Nope, never said I did.

I didn't ask if you did, I asked do you deny.. IOW - do you agree?

It appears to be the remaining momentum from the Big Bang.

Then I take it your answer is - yes.

No, you said that God stretched out the light, and that the Universe is 6k years old, did you not? That has nothing to do with the expansion of the visible universe as observed. Again, you try to fit evidence to a predetermined outcome.

No, I did not say "God stretched out the light" I said God stretched out the heavens/universe after the light (sun, stars, and planets) were already in existance.

No, I'm not trying to fit anything. I am just showing that science can and does validates the scriptural account of creation if looked at from the right perspective.

 

[Allan]

But you're arguing that this belief about (stretching out) is true due to scientific evidence while rejecting significant scientific evidence that the universe is much older than than 3,000 years. I don't see this as consistent.

Apparently you didn't understand the argument.

The evidence shows the universe is moving in an outward direction albeit slowly. MP stated it was (in essence) a ridiculous notion that God stretched out the heavens. I was merely showing that even science affirms that the universe is not only stretched but continuing in the same manner. He even states "It appears to be the remaining momentum from the Big Bang", thus making my point. He believes that God didn't do it but at the same time acknowledges it is a continuation of some specific event it actaully happened

However, there is no valid data scientifically that states the earth is millions of years old especially when you take into account the literal and more specificially biblical world wide flood (which includes not only the deluge of water from above AND beneath but also the cataclysmic destruction and movement upon the earths surface) . It is one of the factors that is denied because it puts a huge wrinkle in their theories.