Saturn has many thousands of rings in seven major ring divisions. They have been given letter names A–G in order of their discovery. The moon Enceladus produces the materials that compose the E ring.
Article image and caption.
Posted on 09/05/2019 10:45:07 AM PDT by fishtank
The planets are young: Saturn
by Russell Grigg
Published: 4 September 2019 (GMT+10)
We continue our response to the 2019 BBC-TV series The Planets, narrated by Professor Brian Cox. In this article we are considering the fourth episode, titled Life beyond the sun, Saturn. (for the others, see Related Articles, below).
Prof. Brian Cox begins this episode with something of a eulogy to Saturn:
“Beyond the warm worlds of the inner solar system, beyond the gas giant Jupiter, in the freezing regions far beyond the sun, lies Saturn, a planet made unique thanks to a nearly 300,000-kilometre-wide ring of frozen water. Here trillions of pieces of ice have been sculpted by gravitational forces into some of the solar system’s most stunning vistas. … It’s almost as if a god has taken snowflakes and sprinkled them over a gravitational field so we could see, it.”
Of course, he is not talking about the Creator God of the Bible.
(Excerpt) Read more at creation.com ...
"Of course, no amount of time will make the impossible possible. If physical and chemical laws dictate that something has zero chance of happening, time is irrelevant. Life is characterized by programmed information, and this is something that does not arise spontaneously from raw chemistry. This is the fundamental dilemma of the materialist, and is what caused Professor Antony Flew, formerly the world’s leading atheist philosopher, to change his mind and declare that the evidence indicated that there must be some sort of god, some sort of designing intelligence."
Saturn has many thousands of rings in seven major ring divisions. They have been given letter names A–G in order of their discovery. The moon Enceladus produces the materials that compose the E ring.
Article image and caption.
This is the fundamental dilemma of the materialist, and is what caused Professor Antony Flew, formerly the world’s leading atheist philosopher, to change his mind and declare that the evidence indicated that there must be some sort of god, some sort of designing intelligence.”
...
I like the participatory anthropic principle:
We had a nice discussion here on an earlier episode a few weeks ago...
https://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/3772034/posts
“If physical and chemical laws dictate that something has zero chance of happening,”
Which laws?
“We had a nice discussion here on an earlier episode a few weeks ago...”
Like this one?
Fishtank:creation::Kevmo:cold fusion
*pong*
3Know this first of all, that in the last days mockers will come with their mocking,
following after their own lusts,
4and saying, “Where is the promise of His coming?
For ever since the fathers fell asleep, all continues just as it was from the beginning of creation.”
5For when they maintain this, it escapes their notice that by the word of God the heavens existed long ago and the earth was formed out of water and by water,
6through which the world at that time was destroyed, being flooded with water.
7But by His word the present heavens and earth are being reserved for fire, kept for the day of judgment and destruction of ungodly men.
An how old is Uranus?
3 Knowing this first, that there shall come in the last days scoffers, walking after their own lusts,
4 And saying, Where is the promise of his coming? for since the fathers fell asleep, all things continue as they were from the beginning of the creation.
5 For this they willingly are ignorant of, that by the word of God the heavens were of old, and the earth standing out of the water and in the water:
6 Whereby the world that then was, being overflowed with water, perished:
7 But the heavens and the earth, which are now, by the same word are kept in store, reserved unto fire against the day of judgment and perdition of ungodly men.
8 But, beloved, be not ignorant of this one thing, that one day is with the Lord as a thousand years, and a thousand years as one day.
9 The Lord is not slack concerning his promise, as some men count slackness; but is longsuffering to us-ward, not willing that any should perish, but that all should come to repentance.
10 But the day of the Lord will come as a thief in the night; in the which the heavens shall pass away with a great noise, and the elements shall melt with fervent heat, the earth also and the works that are therein shall be burned up.
Truly amazing to ignore what Peter wrote, and, yet, use Peter's words as if it gives silly claims credibility. II Peter 3:5 is referencing Genesis 1:2 ... The first flood.
This is so been debunked before.
You are not advancing the cause of Christ by posting this failed nonsense. God is not a liar.
“...because if any rocks did begin growing in space, the gas through which they were travelling would act as a brake, slowing their speed and sending them into the sun”
Or into other rocks, although it’s not clear that the density of this primordial gas would be enough to cause small rocks to lose their orbital speed.
“Then Cox makes this statement: “Saturn was now so big it could contain nearly 5,000 Earth-sized worlds. But this vast, wild proto-planet was totally unlike the Saturn we see today.”
This is a surprising statement for two reasons.
All the evidence for life is consistent with the belief that God created life here on Earth some 6,000 years ago.
Because today only 764 Earths would fit in Saturn, which means Saturn has somehow lost 84.7% of its former bulk (according to Cox), and
Cox doesn’t tell us in the rest of this episode how this shrinkage of Saturn occurred.”
Umm... Gravity?
“II Peter 3:5 is referencing Genesis 1:2 ... The first flood.”
Nope.
Genesis 2:3-7 (NKJV)
Then God blessed the seventh day and sanctified it, because in it He rested from all His work which God had created and made. This is the history of the heavens and the earth when they were created, in the day that the Lord God made the earth and the heavens, before any plant of the field was in the earth and before any herb of the field had grown. For the Lord God had not caused it to rain on the earth, and there was no man to till the ground; but a mist went up from the earth and watered the whole face of the ground. And the Lord God formed man of the dust of the ground, and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life; and man became a living being.
The passage clearly states that it did NOT rain before God created man. Further, Peter’s description of that rain says it caused the world of that time to perish.
Genesis 1:5
God called the light Day, and the darkness He called Night. So the evening and the morning were the first day.
No flood could have happened between verse 1 and 2 because this would require calling the day in verse 5 something other that “first” and it would contradict Christ calling this first week, “the beginning”.
Peter described the antediluvian era “the earth standing out of water and in the water.” See 2 Peter 3:5. This precisely matches the description of how water was both above and below the “firmament” i.e. atmosphere prior to Noah’s flood in which the “windows of heaven [i.e. firmament] were opened.”
There were no seasons until after Noah’s flood. See Genesis 8:22. This cataclysmic event resulted in the earth’s axis being tilted. And this allowed for the flood waters to recede and be stored in the polar ice caps. Prior to this, massive amounts of water were above the atmosphere, probably forming something like the rings of Saturn.
Jeremiah describes the first flood.
When did the Heavenly Father create all souls? The breath of life, which means soul/spirit intellect is what we are told that made the man Adam living.
“Genesis 1:2 clearly states this earth became flooded.”
You must have an entirely different Bible, because the Hebrew word for “flood” (mabbul) is not used until Genesis 6, referring to Noah’s flood.
Genesis 1:2 describes nothing like a flood. As I already pointed out, the Bible said it had not rained on the earth until Noah’s flood. Genesis 1:2 describes “the deep” which is not a flood but a body of water. God created the space of the second heaven and the watery void which He formed into the first generation (i.e. prior to Noah’s flood) Earth.
Jeremiah 4 alludes to this verse as a way of describing the coming judgment that Jeremiah was prophesying about. It is simply saying that the destruction that was coming would turn the “land” from “fruitful” to “desolate”. Those are the exact words Jeremiah uses. I’m not twisting it to try to make it mean something other than what it actually says.
“Perhaps you might look into what the words ‘before the foundation of the world’, actually mean.”
Paul refers to things that are outside of time which are “eternal”.
2 Corinthians 4:18 (NKJV)
While we do not look at the things which are seen, but at the things which are not seen. For the things which are seen are temporary, but the things which are not seen are eternal.
Hebrews 11:3 (NKJV)
By faith we understand that the worlds were framed by the word of God, so that the things which are seen were not made of things which are visible.
“Paul says that is when the ‘elect’ (chosen), saints were set aside.”
The elect were chosen based on God’s foreknowledge. This means God chose before time began, and God’s predetermined plan was established before creation, but we all came into existence in our own time and place in history. God chose us before we existed in space and time. Numerous scriptures support this.
Acts 17:26 (NKJV)
And He has made from one blood every nation of men to dwell on all the face of the earth, and has determined their preappointed times and the boundaries of their dwellings.
1 Peter 1:2 (NKJV)
Elect according to the foreknowledge of God the Father, in sanctification of the Spirit, for obedience and sprinkling of the blood of Jesus Christ: Grace to you and peace be multiplied.
“exactly when did Lucifer rebel as described in Isaiah and Ezekiel”
Jesus said “from the beginning”:
John 8:44 (NKJV)
You are of your father the devil, and the desires of your father you want to do. He was a murderer from the beginning, and does not stand in the truth, because there is no truth in him. When he speaks a lie, he speaks from his own resources, for he is a liar and the father of it.
This is the same phrase the Lord used to describe the institution of marriage. So, I infer that Satan’s rebellion occurred immediately after (or during) the first week of time in which God created the universe and made everything. Satan is a finite, created being who, unlike God, has not existed in eternity past. While it is certainly possible that God enabled beings of the angelic type to not be bound by the laws of physics, such as time and space, I do not necessarily see this specified other than Satan being able to do things which humans do not have the ability to do. As a finite being, I stipulate that Satan must have been created / made during the 6-day creation / beginning.
Like Jeremiah, Job also alludes to the creation:
Job 38:7 (NKJV)
When the morning stars sang together,
And all the sons of God shouted for joy?
This passage is the only actual evidence in the Bible that angels sing. But when did this particular event happen? It was on the fourth day of creation, when God made the stars. Throughout scriptures the “hosts of heaven” are both stars (and other celestial objects) and angels. When Peter and Jude discuss the extra-biblical writings of Enoch’s prophecy, they address the angel who sinned in the days of Noah and left their abode or previous estate. This appears to be the stars. As man was made of the dust of the earth, so angels appear to have something like bodies which were formed of the material of stars. (Obviously, this is somewhat conjecture on my part, but I think it is consistent with scripture and other extra-biblical sources that are in harmony with the Bible.)
“When did the Heavenly Father create all souls?”
I think, technically speaking, God created the Heaven and Earth—the matter and space from which He made or formed all things—before the end of the first day of creation. He formed or made everything else from the properties of space, time, matter, and energy, or perhaps out of the eternal things that cannot be seen with direct observation. So, our bodies, souls, and spirits all originate from the first man and woman. Man was formed from the dust of the ground but was imparted with a spirit that was breathed into him by God. That is the point at which the first human life began. Subsequently, the descendants of Adam and Eve become unique individuals from the moment of conception. The breath of life is provided in the womb through the mother until a baby is born. Remember that Adam did not become a living soul when he breathed on his own but when God breathed into him. But, more specifically, all humans, as finite creatures have a starting point. In a certain sense we were all part of Adam when he sinned, but we had no conscious awareness or volitional input in his sin because we did not exist as individual persons at that time. It is more like the way his left hand received punishment even if he only used his right hand to eat the forbidden fruit.
“The breath of life, which means soul/spirit intellect is what we are told that made the man Adam living.”
The soul and spirit are not the same thing.
Hebrews 4:12 (NKJV)
For the word of God is living and powerful, and sharper than any two-edged sword, piercing even to the division of soul and spirit, and of joints and marrow, and is a discerner of the thoughts and intents of the heart.
Our soul is our identity. Our bodies are just containers through which our souls interact with the physical realm. Our spirits are that part of us that interacts with the spiritual realm. When Adam’s body (formed from clay) received a human spirit he then became a living soul. James says the body is dead whenever the spirit departs. So, we can see a distinction and a correlation in how individual human lives begin and end.
Since the first week of God creating / making everything is called the beginning, it is not reasonable to believe that billions or even millions of years elapsed prior to this week because then it would not be “the beginning” but merely a continuation of something prior.
Science can only take a person so far in his or her quest for the truth. Biblical faith is a reasonable faith, but at a certain point it requires the humility of admitting that scientific inquiry and knowledge is insufficient for our needs and we must accept that truth must be imparted through revelation by God. Biblical faith is not “blind faith”. It is based on evidence. It is based on God’s trustworthiness. God does not reject skeptics like Thomas, but He does reject cynics. God requires faith in order to please Him. Those who refuse to believe are insulting God’s character of being trustworthy and true.
Genesis 1:2 “And the earth (became) was without form, and void; and darkness was upon the face of the deep. And the Spirit of God moved upon the face of the waters.”
Isaiah 45: 18 For thus saith the Lord that created the heavens; God himself that formed the earth and made it; he hath established it, he created it not in vain, he formed it to be inhabited: I am the Lord; and there is none else.
Genesis 1:2 is not how God created this earth.. it describes the katabolé ... overthrow - casting down of Lucifer. ‘Supernatural ejection’ and this earth show the evidence of that katabole. And yes this earth was flooded.
Jeremiah 4:
22 For my people is foolish, they have not known me; they are sottish children, and they have none understanding: they are wise to do evil, but to do good they have no knowledge.
23 I beheld the earth, and, lo, it was without form, and void; and the heavens, and they had no light.
24 I beheld the mountains, and, lo, they trembled, and all the hills moved lightly.
25 I beheld, and, lo, there was no man, and all the birds of the heavens were fled.
26 I beheld, and, lo, the fruitful place was a wilderness, and all the cities thereof were broken down at the presence of the LORD, and by his fierce anger.
27 For thus hath the LORD said, The whole land shall be desolate; yet will I not make a full end.
Isaiah 14: 12 How art thou fallen from heaven, O Lucifer, son of the morning! how art thou cut down to the ground, which didst weaken the nations!.............
Ezekiel 28:
12 Son of man, take up a lamentation upon the king of Tyrus, and say unto him, Thus saith the Lord GOD; Thou sealest up the sum, full of wisdom, and perfect in beauty.
13 Thou hast been in Eden the garden of God; every precious stone was thy covering, the sardius, topaz, and the diamond, the beryl, the onyx, and the jasper, the sapphire, the emerald, and the carbuncle, and gold: the workmanship of thy tabrets and of thy pipes was prepared in thee in the day that thou wast created.
14 Thou art the anointed cherub that covereth; and I have set thee so: thou wast upon the holy mountain of God; thou hast walked up and down in the midst of the stones of fire.
15 Thou wast perfect in thy ways from the day that thou wast created, till iniquity was found in thee.
16 By the multitude of thy merchandise they have filled the midst of thee with violence, and thou hast sinned: therefore I will cast thee as profane out of the mountain of God: and I will destroy thee, O covering cherub, from the midst of the stones of fire.
17 Thine heart was lifted up because of thy beauty, thou hast corrupted thy wisdom by reason of thy brightness: I will cast thee to the ground, I will lay thee before kings, that they may behold thee.
18 Thou hast defiled thy sanctuaries by the multitude of thine iniquities, by the iniquity of thy traffick; therefore will I bring forth a fire from the midst of thee, it shall devour thee, and I will bring thee to ashes upon the earth in the sight of all them that behold thee.
19 All they that know thee among the people shall be astonished at .....
These scriptures are NOT about Noah's flood, firmament or whatever else the quick time creationists attempt to claim. Peter declares there are three heaven/earth ages. We are presently in the ‘second’ heaven/earth age nearing the end.
5 For this they willingly are ignorant of, that by the word of God the heavens were of old, and the earth standing out of the water and in the water:
6 Whereby the world that then was, being overflowed with water, perished:
7 But the heavens and the earth, which are now, by the same word are kept in store, reserved unto fire against the day of judgment and perdition of ungodly men.
8 But, beloved, be not ignorant of this one thing, that one day is with the Lord as a thousand years, and a thousand years as one day.
9 The Lord is not slack concerning his promise, as some men count slackness; but is longsuffering to us-ward, not willing that any should perish, but that all should come to repentance.
10 But the day of the Lord will come as a thief in the night; in the which the heavens shall pass away with a great noise, and the elements shall melt with fervent heat, the earth also and the works that are therein shall be burned up.
Hebrews 2: 14 Forasmuch then as the children are partakers of flesh and blood, he also himself likewise took part of the same; that through death he might destroy him that had the power of death, that is, the devil;
15 And deliver them who through fear of death were all their lifetime subject to bondage.
“Do a search in the Hebrew for that word ‘deep’ in Genesis 1:2.”
https://biblehub.com/hebrew/tehom_8415.htm
https://biblehub.com/hebrew/8415.htm
Strong’s has
tehom: deep, sea, abyss
The Septuagint has abyssos, which is the Abyss.
In context of Genesis 1 and 7, “the Deep” appears to be referring to the unfathomable depths of water God formed on Day 1 of creation out of which He later formed the land, sea, and sky (including the atmosphere and water above the atmosphere). During Noah’s flood, the “fountains of the deep” came to the surface and were as much a part of the flood perhaps as the rain and the collapse of the body of water that then existed above the atmosphere.
“Genesis 1:2 And the earth (became) was without form, and void; and darkness was upon the face of the deep. And the Spirit of God moved upon the face of the waters.”
You are in the minority when it comes to translating the passage as an indication that the earth “became” void. While technically it could be translated either way, I know of no major translations that choose the one you are putting forward. While this does not disprove the accuracy of your proposal, it demonstrates that you are going way out on a limb. The issue is WHY force the text to contain some secret information about a prior world that existed before day 1 or 2 or the biblical creation narrative?
If God wanted us to know of some former world that was destroyed apart from the world of Noah, He would have made it much more clear rather than hiding it between the lines of a small number of passages of scriptures. Such small clues might be useful in resolving something like the approximate value of Pi given in scripture, but even in such cases it is an aside and not something essential to understanding the Bible.
Handling the scriptures this way is reminiscent of the Gnostics’ idea of secret or hidden knowledge. It is also how cults typically operate when interpreting the Bible.
I don’t think anyone would naturally make such inferences from the passages (and the mountains of commentary on these passages, as well as traditional teachings, bears me out).
So, it seems to me, it is merely an attempt to try to reconcile the historicity of the Bible with modern scientific theories in the interpretation of archeological and similar data.
Isaiah 45:18...
Yes, and God DID make the first world to be inhabited by man. Adam was the first man, and Christ was the second original man. There was no earlier race of men before Adam, and none after Christ. There is no contradiction to Genesis 1 describing the earth as being void and formless because God was not finished. He says He makes all things new and that His children are a new creation, but is His new creation complete? No. There is a process involved, and it will be complete in the time God appointed.
Jeremiah 4
As I’ve already pointed out, Jeremiah alludes to the creation for an analogy. Turning this into some secret, hidden insight into what took place at creation does not fit with the point and purpose of the passage. The passage is a warning of coming judgment. The pending doom is compared to a reversal of what happened at creation. God brought light from darkness and order from chaos. In judgment there is destruction so that darkness swallows up light and order is turned into chaos. Jeremiah did not give the slightest hint of some secret war or flood of judgment that took place during or prior to day 1 of creation.
On day 1 we have several new things: water, the physical material of the earth, light, and time. From these components God makes or forms everything else, with the possible exception of the Heavenly hosts on day 4. Day 1 is the first day of time itself. As I pointed out in earlier posts, Paul describes creation as emerging from the eternal. God is eternal. He planned all of these things before time began. The Son was with the Father before time began:
2 Timothy 1:9 (NKJV)
Who has saved us and called us with a holy calling, not according to our works, but according to His own purpose and grace which was given to us in Christ Jesus before time began.
This is one of the points of John 1:1. Before the “beginning” the Word (Jesus) already was.
Isaiah 14 & Ezekiel 28
Assumedly you are inferring a connection between Satan being cast out of Heaven and the destruction of a supposed former earth before the one Adam lived in. Let me point out that the passages of Satan / Lucifer’s being cast out of Heaven are all prophetic. This event has not happened yet. It is correct to say that Satan fell, just as Adam fell. But his being cast out of Heaven and down to earth is a future event that will occur precisely in the middle of Daniel’s seventieth week. See Revelation 12.
However, there was a group of angels who departed from their natural abodes (assumedly among the stars) and had sexual relations with women in the days of Noah. These angels have been banished from Heaven and are presently chained in the Tartarus, waiting to be briefly released during the Day of the Lord to torment the inhabitants of the earth. These are mentioned in the extra-biblical book of Enoch, and are referenced by Peter in 2 Peter 2, and in Jude 6.
“These scriptures are NOT about Noah’s flood, firmament or whatever else the quick time creationists attempt to claim. Peter declares there are three heaven/earth ages. We are presently in the ‘second’ heaven/earth age nearing the end.”
Compare Psalm 104 which is a similar passage to these in reference to both the creation and the flood. It is clearly talking about Noah’s flood.
Peter’s three ages are the antediluvian world, the post-flood world we now live in, and the world to come after God destroys this one by fire in the same manner He destroyed the first one by water.
2 Peter 3:7 (NKJV)
But the heavens and the earth which are now preserved by the same word, are reserved for fire until the day of judgment and perdition of ungodly men.
The passage under discussion is also part of the contiguous message of 2 Peter in which he had already referenced Noah and the flood in chapter 2.
The present world / age (the second) is a time in which the destruction of the earth cannot happen by any other means than what God has appointed because the current earth is being protected and preserved by God’s word. Which word? When was it spoken?
It cannot be His word at creation because the first world was destroyed. This is clearly a reference to God’s promise to preserve the post-flood world which He gave Noah in Genesis 8 and is reiterated in 9. Psalm 104 also mentions it.
I think the arguments you have given are very weak, and this is more troubling because you have been very dismissive of those who do not share your view and believe in Biblical creationism. We are not talking about people who are advocating burning people at the stake for saying the earth revolves around the sun. I think you and they will agree that God’s preserving word: “The earth cannot be moved” can be reasonably reconciled with our scientific knowledge that the earth moves in several ways. Likewise, science may presently describe theories in which the earth and universe are billions of years old, while the biblical description presents a timeframe of a few thousand years.
While scientists are not bound to stipulate the truth and veracity of the Bible, they are also not limited from doing so. A person can accept scientific reason and also accept the Bible as the ultimate authority of what is true. In some cases it may be difficult to reconcile the two, but the difference is that scientific theories are always subject to change, and God’s word is immutable.
Did you miss Genesis 1:1 ... In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth. PERIOD!!!! verse 2 begins with ‘and’... And what ... this earth became uninhabitable ... There is no place in the whole of the WORD describing, how long ago or the date of Genesis 1:1 ... However, this earth contains evidence that it is millions upon millions of years old. Even Peter call the heavens of OLD.
What we are told is this earth ‘became’ uninhabitable in Genesis 1:2 ... The Heavenly Father had Isaiah pen, HE did not create this earth ‘void and without form’. Check out the Hebrew for those specific words.
Why do you suppose the Heavenly Father had Jeremiah pen His children were sottish? Check out what that word means. God called his children ‘stupid’, why? because they ignored Him/His WORD.
IF you think a minority status of searching the WORD is suppose to be an enticement to join the crowd, might want to revisit the story of Gideon. God culled out the crowd, so as the many would not take claim for the victory.
It is a joke for ‘young earth’ creationist to claim they ‘literally’ are following the WORD of God.
You remind me of Amos 8: 11 Behold, the days come, saith the Lord God, that I will send a famine in the land, not a famine of bread, nor a thirst for water, but of hearing the words of the Lord..
This world is up to its eyeballs in this famine.
“In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth. PERIOD!!!! verse 2 begins with ‘and’ ... And what ... this earth became uninhabitable”
There is nothing wrong with translating it as the “earth was void and without form”. The rationale for your insisting upon reading it as the “earth became void” is loose inference from other passages and a desire to reconcile the scripture with scientific observations and the popular theories used to explain these observations. However, more plain scriptures on the subject are why the passage is not ordinarily translated the way you insist it should be. And scientific theories are constantly changing. Today, we can directly observe that the earth “moves” around the sun. This is not a theory but an observation. But millions or billions of years of time are not directly observable, obviously.
Moses uses a writing style in which some passages begin or end with summaries of what is about to be or has been stated. For example:
Genesis 2:4 & 7
This is the history of the heavens and the earth when they were created, in the day that the Lord God made the earth and the heavens... And the Lord God formed man of the dust of the ground, and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life; and man became a living being.
Did the Lord make man here in chapter two? Didn’t He already make man in chapter 1? Also, the creation and making of the heavens and earth are summed up here, but this includes the whole first week (if counting the final day of rest). So, in this sense, God created the heavens and the earth in 6 days, and His self-evaluation is that what He made was “very good”. And this means that it was not void, formless, etc. when He was DONE.
This is another way of understanding what Jeremiah was alluding to. And other scriptures support this. First, there is only one correct answer to when the first day occurred. It was after God created light, day, and night in verses 3-5. Yet you are insisting that millions of years took place between verses 1 and 2, BEFORE there was even light, day, or night. That makes no sense.
Further, Christ refers back to the “beginning”—His words—to describe Adam and Eve’s marriage. This would not be the beginning if millions of years took place first. Also, John 1 describes Christ as already existing in this same time called the “beginning”. The point of this is that He is eternally pre-existent. But your position would merely place Him in the era before the modern era rather than before time began. Time began on the first day.
“IF you think a minority status of searching the WORD is suppose to be an enticement to join the crowd, might want to revisit the story of Gideon. God culled out the crowd, so as the many would not take claim for the victory.”
Sure, but before you go getting a martyr’s complex you might want to double-check that being found among the minority is not the result of your own misinterpretation. I think the Israelites had this problem due to wanting to assimilate the practices and teachings of the pagan nations around them rather than relying on what God revealed. Accommodating the millions and billions of years of earth history proposed by secular scholars who generally reject the Bible might be more akin to the errors of the nation of Israel.
“It is a joke for ‘young earth’ creationist to claim they ‘literally’ are following the WORD of God.”
A literal reading of the Bible provides a timeline of a few thousand years for the human race. There is plenty of room for discussion, inquiry, and friendly debate over why there appears to be millions or billions of years having elapsed on the earth or at least in the universe.
“You remind me of Amos 8: 11 Behold, the days come, saith the Lord God, that I will send a famine in the land, not a famine of bread, nor a thirst for water, but of hearing the words of the Lord... This world is up to its eyeballs in this famine.”
You present a valid point concerning “rightly dividing the word of truth.” There is a very real danger for a person who knows the Bible to still be blinded to its meaning. We see that with religious leaders during Christ’s ministry who questioned His authority, His identity, and His doctrine. We see this in the corporate blindness of Israel, though God always preserved a faithful remnant from among His earthly people. But if it was possible for those who directly received the scriptures and knew them well to be deceived, we must take heed to not fall into the same delusion. Yet if God turns a person over to delusion, what remedy can he take unless it comes from God Himself? So, I take this as a reminder to go to God and ask Him to spare me from such a judgment as this. And I think this is what all who desire to study the Bible must do.
There are endless debates among professing followers of Christ regarding the meaning of various passages. There really shouldn’t be so much disagreement. For example, some groups practice water baptism by immersion, while others do sprinkling. And a person might argue that New Testament baptism is obviously by immersion (and I agree). But I could likewise point out that there are at least 3 examples of baptism in which those who were baptized didn’t even get wet.
I am more concerned about your elevating a personal opinion to the level of the Bible itself. I am open to being corrected, but there are some things in scripture that are plainly taught and, more importantly, essential to the faith. And there are others which are subject to personal opinion. For example, whether a follower of Christ should drink wine is subject to many different opinions. Here, believers would do well to follow their conscience rather than seeking to impose rules upon other believers which are not explicitly commanded by God. On the other hand, if anyone denies the deity of Christ, which can be easily proven from scripture to be true, and which is a doctrine essential to salvation, then such a person has gone beyond mere opinion, and into the realm of heresy or apostasy.
To have Genesis 1:2 say, And, the earth ‘became’, tells about the ‘foundation of the world’, in which Paul states the ‘elect’, chosen, saints were ‘chosen’. The Heavenly Father leaves nothing to chance, and as Christ declared in Mark 13:23 But take ye heed: behold, I have foretold you all things.
IF you note it is not until Genesis 2:
9 And out of the ground made the LORD God to grow every tree that is pleasant to the sight, and good for food; the tree of life also in the midst of the garden, and the tree of knowledge of good and evil.
We are specifically instructed in ‘good and evil’ existing, in the form of a symbolic tree...
In Revelation 20:2 we are told of the many names attributed to the devil .. Ezekiel 28 says he was in the Garden of God ... Eden... Moses does not give any detail of the creation of Lucifer, nor of when all the souls/spirit intellect were created. We do know they existed, as it was the breath of life, which means soul/spirit intellect that was breathed into the freshly formed ‘the Adam’ that made him a living being.
But Ezekiel pens in chapter 4 Behold, all souls are mine; as the soul of the father, so also the soul of the son is mine: the soul that sinneth, it shall die.
What got translated was not what Moses penned... Genesis 1:2 is the first of many places, where men used ‘fig’ leaves to hide what the Heavenly Father instructed.
Just like the reason Christ taught in parables, is akin to why Paul penned about that spirit of slumber... Some people just cannot handle the history.
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