Replies

Your imagined God seems strange. He obviously, lovingly creates an absolutely marvelous, infinitely interesting universe and than doesn't seem interested or just barely and steps back almost entirely uninvolved.

The God of our universe, and the miracle of almost unbelievable varieties of intricate and exciting living things, shows forth Himself as one who is passionately involved and interested in what He poured Himself so lovingly into. The thought and creativity He invested into creation is way beyond anything we can possibly imagine or fathom. Why would He do this just to be dispassionate and standoffish?

I have no problems with intelligent design and I also have no problems with total evolution as presented by secular scientists.

As any engineer/architect would tell you, the greater feat of design would have been to create all laws of the universe from which everything followed at the moment of creation ie "big bang"... the instant something emerged from nothing. Perhaps God periodically intervened to guide his creation in the form of intelligent design. This need not diminish the greatness of his creation. Perhaps he had to intervene because some other being kept interfering with his creation. Who knows? We can only speculate because the bible doesn't say.

My point is that scripture is too vague concerning matters of creation to form hard and fast opinions. The user manual for my leaf blower is larger than the entire creation account. God gave a simple explanation suitable for a primitive people to understand he created all things. He didn't say how, just that he took credit for it.

God gave a simple explanation suitable for a primitive people to understand he created all things.

Ha ha ha ha ha ha. For a start, read Miracles by C.S. Lewis to get an idea of how primitive your idea of "a primitive people" is. Just because a culture, like ours, can make a lot of nifty things doesn't mean it's more "advanced" or that its people have a more accurate view of life and the world than people living 2000 or 3000 years ago. In the same vein as your comment is the one that describes "primitive people" as believing in miracles because they don't know anything about natural law. Here's Lewis's take on this:

“All records of miracles teach the same thing. In such stories the miracles excite fear and wonder (that is what the very word miracle implies) among the spectators, and are taken as evidence of supernatural power. If they were not known to be contrary to the laws of nature how could they suggest the presence of the supernatural? How could they be surprising unless they were seen to be exceptions to the rules? And how can anything be seen to be an exception till the rules are known? If there ever were men who did not know the laws of nature at all, they would have no idea of a miracle and feel no particular interest in one if it were performed before them. Nothing can seem extraordinary until you have discovered what is ordinary.”
by C. S. Lewis Miracles (New York: McMillan, 1952), p. 47.