Posted on 04/04/2009 1:47:03 AM PDT by gondramB
I'd like to ask. I promise I don't mean this in an unkind way. I would really like to know.
Suppose the Freepers who believe that humans were created in their current form by God (whether 6,000 years ago or much longer)....
Suppose you became convinced that instead man had developed from lower organisms over billions of years.
Would that have to change any other core beliefs - that God directed man, The God came to Abraham and chose his children; that God sent us His son, that we are to follow the teachings of Jesus - particularly that we are to love the lord and love each other and ask forgiveness in his Son's name when we do wrong?
>>Scripture is much more clear about animal’s and man’s beginning than about the heliocentric view of the solar system, if it even teaches that. They do not fall in the same category at all.<<
Those are good points but I would also like to think before responding.
This argument about the literalness of the creation account usually gets nowhere because we don't have enough detail about what happened to make definitive statements. There's also the difference between *literal* and *true*.
The creation account is written as a step by step account using declarative statements. They state things like *God created*, *God said*, *God formed*. They make statements of fact. There's no reason to read that account as allegory. Nowhere does it say that it's a parable, it doesn't use words such as *like* or *as*.
I see no reason to doubt that God formed man as a separate act of creation because everything in an obvious, clear reading of the passage indicates it. It says that "the LORD God formed the man from the dust of the ground and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life, and the man became a living being." When God created Eve, it specifically says that God took one of Adam's ribs and formed woman from it. When He used a different method for creating woman, He goes out of His way to say so.
If He is so careful to be that distinct, then there's no reason to read more into it and presume that God used animals to give rise to humans when it says He used the dust of the earth.
That is what is a cause of so much contention. If you choose to interpret something that's written in such a concise, clear way that can be interpreted as fact as it stands, then why go looking for other means of interpretation?
Basing your interpretation of the creation account on your interpretation of the fossil record demands that you ignore the plain reading of the account as it stands. You either have to say that it's a lie, or make it out to be an allegory to make it fit with the currently accepted theory of how life arose on this planet.
Now, if you're going to based your interpretation of Scripture based on man's reasoning in one area, then what's to stop you from doing it in another, and how do you determine when to do that and when to not do that with other passages which are written in a similar factual account style using declarative sentences?
I'm still having trouble wrapping my mind around that one. I would need to be able to be convinced that science could prove that beyond a reasonable doubt and I just don't see that happening.
Right now, it's mostly forensic evidence. Nobody has been able to go back in time and see what happened. Short of actually observing the process in an unbroken step-by-step sequence, there will always be some doubt that science *proved* it because what happened in the places we didn't see will always be open to speculation.
It will always leave open the possibility that man's interpretation of the fossil record and other forensic evidence is incorrect.
God told us how He did it in His inspired Scripture. I'd rather believe that God, who did it and told us, is right, over man's speculation, which has a high probability of being wrong.
Just for kicks, Why is it that evolutionists consider it limiting God when creationists insist that He did it the way He said He did in Scripture, but when evos insist that God used evolution instead of special creation, it isn't considered limiting God? They're limiting Him to using evolution and being bound by the physical laws He created, are they not?
There's a lot in the Bible that's not *literally true*. There's parables, songs, psalms, metaphor, simile, poetry, etc. I don't know anyone who doesn't recognize those literary styles. It's when people try to force one literary style into another where problems occur.
OK, now for nighty-night.....
It sounds like your saying doctrine does not matter. And on that we'll just have to agree to disagree.
When you write: >>My question is “what if new evidence showed man developed rather than was created intact.” Could creationists keep their core faith?<<, you are stating a "what-if" rather than a "what-is". Science always deals with what can be proved repeatedly in the laboratory, not what consensus is.
Evolution is a comfortable way of believing in a system that would elevate man and nature up from its fallen or simpler state, which there is no proof in it. A belief in UFO's does make it so, irrespective of the fact that there is no physical proof to the contrary.
A similar way of stating your question would be to say that "if" there was new evidence to the contrary to bible teaching about the fallen nature of man and his need for a savior, would a christian need to rethink his/her belief system?
Proving that the world was round and not the center of the universe does not change the gospel. If we were visited by UFO's offering an end to world hunger, war and want, would this change the same gospel? Even Satin can appear as an angel of light, but his message is always the same; I'm okay and your okay. We are not okay, we are all sinners.
Is it possible to understand that what we currently do everyday as being injurious to another human being? Of course, and we should then change our actions. Is it possible that we need to change our lifestyles and how and when we view the creation of life? Absolutely.
But we can never vary our belief system of the need for being redeemed. Will man ever evolve past the need for being saved? Never. Will there come a time when there is no more war, want and need? When Christ comes back and ends all of it, it will all be changed, but, we and the earth will not evolve to that that state on our own.
To say that there is evolution for man is to say that there is evolution of God, and He changes not. Science can never offer a solution or answer for a condition of the soul.
Some would say that it is a sin for the USA to have 5% of the world's population and uses 95% of the world's natural resources. America produces and gives away the majority of the aid and technology to third-world and developing nations. Should the USA resort back to pre-industrial revolution standards of living so as to allow the rest of the world to catch up to us? Take a look at Africa after decolonialism, it has sunk back to the ways of petty banana-republic status.
The world hates us for two reasons; we are successful and we believe in spreading freedom and the gospel. The covet our success, while at the same time rejects our notion of freedom and the good news of the gospel.
Quoting from my grown son's earlier words he spoke to his high-school classmates about this same subject. They may have evolved from a monkey in central Africa, but his ancestors descended from humans that were created in the Middle East.
If evolution for the rest of the world could be traced back to a common ancestor of a lesser man-species, then that would mean that they were predestined to never being able to be saved; beasts of the field, and never needing to "hear" the gospel according to Romans. But because Paul commands us to preach to those that can and will be saved, then they can never evolve to the point of understanding, that is a condition of the heart.
Old Patriot
When talking about creationism versus evolution in a physics and thermodynamics class that I teach to adults, I am asked which is true. I answer that after the Big-Bang, everything can be explained in science about energy and how matter reacts, except for life.
I present that for there to be a Big-Bang, then there had to be a singular point in time, no matter how infinitesimally small in length, that all matter and energy of the universe existed in a single point. That would mean that this creation well held every single atomic and sub-atomic particle in the universe including every single electron.
My classes start to visualize such a point in time and agree that this was how the universe was, void and without form. I then ask them that if all matter and energy existed at one point in space, then if it all existed together for even a fraction of a second then it was in a state of equilibrium and would never have exploded into what we now call the universe.
But according to thermodynamics, the only thing that could have upset this previously closed system that was in a state of equilibrium was an exterior energy force greater than this closed system's ability to absorb and to then equalize with this new energy source. The question is where did this new energy source come from if all of the energy in the universe already was in a state of equilibrium?
Some of my students get angry and say that I am preaching about God. I tell them that if there is a God, He can come here and present His own case on creation, I only teach science. This then brings all of the students to ask what then was this external energy source.
As I tell all of them that we cannot explain such an event as it does not fit into any physics of thermodynamics model that exists now, we cannot explain what happened there. Then that takes a position of faith on what they belief happened, and that had no place in the classroom.
The exact same situation comes up when there are questions about where the end of the universe is and whether or not the universe is expanding or contracting. I explain that for there to be some place so far out in space that the edge of the universe was just reaching it with light from the time of this above stated creation or Big-Bang, then everything around that point in space was utterly dark and extremely cold. This first ray of light would appear as a single point of light that would continue to grow over time until the entire area around this point in space was full of stars.
Almost all of my students then dismiss this idea as being a fable as they cannot comprehend a place in the universe where a single electron of matter has never occupied or passed through. Such a place would be a complete vacuum which is in itself by definition cannot exist.
Science cannot explain the creation of life, and faith reads no contradiction in anything that science discovers about man or the universe. Man needs faith in something for him/her to believe in. Faith in God requires believing that He is, and is a rewarder of those who seek Him. Faith in anything else makes man the center of the universe and needs no God other than himself.
Keep the faith.
Old Patriot
Well, that’s at least 2 of us!
Good job. Keep up the good work.
Thank you. I couldn’t quite figure out what was giving me trouble with the question that made it so difficult to answer. You nailed it.
Actually, the evidence for the development of life is pretty spotty. The fossil record is by no means complete enough to make the conclusions that evolutionists make without some jumps and assumptions.
Granted DNA evidence helps fill in some of that, but still does not make it complete. The DNA evidence can point to common design. It kind of depends on which presumptions one starts with.
>> A similar way of stating your question would be to say that “if” there was new evidence to the contrary to bible teaching about the fallen nature of man and his need for a savior, would a christian need to rethink his/her belief system?
<<
Yes I’m asking if creationists would consider evidence that man had developed as being the equivalent that there is no God or that He does not love us or that he did not send His Son.
I personally don’t feel it means any of those things - I a certain of God and God’s love. But I wanted to ask about how creationists view this.
The reason for my curiosity is that I don’t understand the vehemence with which many creationists insist that man was created as is. It it meant their entire faith would collapse then I can understand why they would be so opposed to entertaining any evidence.
My view of God is that He is large enough to have worked over a very long time and because I know he exists then the age of the earth or the development of man cannot threaten him.
>>Actually, the evidence for the development of life is pretty spotty. The fossil record is by no means complete enough to make the conclusions that evolutionists make without some jumps and assumptions.
Granted DNA evidence helps fill in some of that, but still does not make it complete. The DNA evidence can point to common design. It kind of depends on which presumptions one starts with. <<
Yeah, I shouldn’t have posted that in this thread - rather than arguing about the evidence as-is I wanted to ask about the hypothetical - “what if evidence were found that convinced you?”
Ah, now we're getting somewhere.
I'd say *No*. However the issue then becomes the veracity of Scripture and that is what I think people are reacting most to.
I seriously doubt that any further evidence would convince me. The evidence we have is enough to convince anyone who wants to believe it. For those who choose to believe Scripture over man, there will never be enough evidence, because as far as it seems now, the evidence will never be complete enough.
I think that there is enough doubt about the fossil record that I'm going to choose to go with the clear obvious reading of Scripture.
It is not out of the realm of possibility that God violated the physical laws of the universe and instantaneously created full grown creatures capable of reproducing. A God who can change water into wine, heal the sick, and raise the dead, is certainly powerful enough to create in an instant instead of taking billions of years to do it.
It's not that I don't think God couldn't have used evolution if He chose, I just think He didn't because of a no frills added reading of the creation account in Genesis.
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