Posted on 05/16/2014 12:34:41 AM PDT by 2ndDivisionVet
Young earth creationist Ken Ham lashed out at televangelist Pat Robertson over his claim earlier this week that someone has to be “deaf, dumb and blind” to believe that the Earth is only 6,000 years old, accusing Robertson of compromising “the Word of God.”
“Pat Robertson illustrates one of the biggest problems we have today in the church — people like Robertson compromise the Word of God with the pagan ideas of fallible men!,” Ham wrote on his Facebook page. “Pat Robertson is not upholding the Word of God with his ridiculous statements — he is undermining the authority of the Word. And any attack on the WORD is an attack on the person of Jesus Christ, who IS THE WORD!”
Ham, who runs Answers in Genesis, a Christian ministry that takes the Bible’s Genesis account of creation literally, broke down the comments Robertson made on CBN’s “The 700 Club” earlier this week in a point-by-point analysis.
In addition to accusing Roberson of expressing “his utter ignorance of science,” Ham wrote that the televangelist “makes Christianity look silly.”
But Ham took particular exception to Robertson’s claim that there is no way that the Earth could have possibly come to fruition in such a short time span.
“Really Pat Robertson? You mean there is no way God, the infinite Creator, could not have created the universe in six days just six thousand years ago?,” Ham rhetorically asked. “God could have created everything in six seconds if He wanted [to]! And it’s not a matter of what you think anyway — it’s a matter of what God has clearly told us in His infallible WORD!”
As TheBlaze previously reported, Robertson unleashed his critiques on young earth creationists Tuesday, saying that they are mistaken in their views about the age of the planet.
“The truth is, you have to be deaf, dumb and blind to think that this Earth that we live in only has 6,000 years of existence, it just doesn’t, I’m sorry,” Robertson said.
He added, “I think what we’re looking at is that there was a point of time after the Earth was created, after these things were done, after the universe was formed, after the asteroid hit the Earth and wiped out the dinosaurs — after that, there was a point of time that there was a particular human being that God touched — and that was the human that started the race that we are now part of.”
Watch Robertson’s comments below:
(VIDEO-AT-LINK)
When did I mention oil? Been talking about rocks. Were those made in a lab?
Im sorry, I read too fast, my mistake
FYI, it is a *huge* leap to assume that scientist=avowed atheist. If you want to accuse people of something, provide evidence. You will not find anywhere in my posting history where I have "avowed" atheism.
The evidence that the universe is several billion years old, that the earth is a few billion years old, and that life has been evolving for the last 2 or 3 billion years is strong and ubiquitous. I accept that evidence for what it is. I do *not* believe that God is a liar who planted that evidence, and I am *not* okay with the concept of God as a liar and deceiver.
The prince of lies is the one who stands against God, aka Satan—God is not a liar.
The Bible is meant to guide morality. It is not a scientific document, and should not be used like one.
Yes, exactly.
If you interpret the stories of Genesis as rough outlines of the history of the universe prior to man, told for the benefit of people who had not developed scientific methodology yet, then there really is no conflict.
Gen. 1:3— “And God said, “Let there be light,” and there was light.” Which took place as the big bang, several billion years ago.
As you point out, a literal interpretation of the Genesis stories is problematic. The discrepancy between the measured age of the earth and the Biblical 6,000 year old earth is only one of those problems—there are many more. For instance, when Cain was cast out of the garden and was afraid that someone would kill him, who, exactly, was he afraid of? And when he ended up in the land of Nod—where did that come from, since at this point, Cain is the only living child of the first pair of humans? And so on. The only way Genesis makes sense is as a moral lesson.
Have you tried looking in the New Testament?
Trying to get the world to buy off on one view over the other will not save one lost soul. Our energy is wasted trying to win this battle. Our call is to preach Jesus.
Amen.
On the flip side, a god that would have gone to great effort 6,000 years ago to make a universe that shows consistent and ubiquitous evidence of great age regardless of how one observes (whether as a physicist, geologist, geneticist, paleontologist, etc.) is a liar. A lying god is not worthy of worship.
In my world, God is not a liar. The great age of the universe and the evolutionary processes that shape all of creation are real. The story of Genesis is meant to teach morality.
There are many arguments for accommodationists, but the Creation/Evolution argument fundamentally points to the object of one’s faith.
The evolutionist attempts to justify age in terms of billions of years by using relative metrics, all assuming constants only measurable in our local space and time. Hs argument has no gauge to justify his leap of faith identifying relative deduction as absolute value.
Even radiocarbon dating techniques sloppily hinge upon huge exponential relationships, which easily may be swayed by millions to billions of years depending upon how they are framed.
Provided the dating techniques are consistent, they have local relative value to indicate relative differences in age. i.e. this rock is older than that rock in its present chemistry and structure. They might relatively quantify those differences. e.g. this rock is 1.8887 times as old as that rock.
Identifying the rock as 1.2 billion years old, or any age beyond human history of about 6000 years is prone to error.
2) If God is not capable of doing the events noted in Genesis 1, then He is not capable of doing anything else in the Bible. This would also require the nullification of Cross. 3) The last part is the real goal of people who deny God the ability to create ex nihilo.
Indeed, God can take however long He desires to create the universe and all that is in it. The evidence is that God created the universe several billion years ago with the big bang, and that the physical laws He set into motion at that time then caused stars and planets to form, and later, life to evolve on at least one planet. I take that evidence at face value, since I do not believe that God is a liar who faked all that evidence--for what reason, to test our faith?
If you keep in mind that 6,000 or so years ago, when God revealed Himself to Adam and Eve, people were very primitive and the scientific method was rudimentary, at best. Adam and Eve would not have understood the big bang, the process of gravitationally driven coalescence of cosmic dust into stars and planets, etc. So God gave them the Cliff notes version and left the details for us to discover as our civilization developed. All I can say is that life is certainly a lot more interesting with new things waiting to be discovered. I thank God that He did not tell us everything about the universe up front, and left it for us to discover!
You are right, He didn't fill the universe with evidence of great age.
Haha!
I would go even further and say that they worship the creation above the Creator. They spend too much time and energy trying to pigeonhole the earth into something it is not for me to think otherwise.
None of the creationist attempts to misrepresent the scientific observations are at all Biblical, either. You won't find "microevolution"--the creationists' invention to counter evolution--mentioned anywhere in the Bible.
This thread makes freepers look crazy.
Creation still happens today. I suspect in most instances people ignore the evidence, as it is more convenient for them to attribute their perceptions as previously unrecognized preexistant objects.
We scar our thinking by accepting academics, instead of sanctifying our education through faith in His Provision.
Since the big bang happened in a vacuum, it made no sound.
Actually, that is an interesting concept to ponder... did the big bang make sound?
Radioactive decay happens at a constant rate, which we can measure. Given a specific radioactive compound, we can precisely measure the quantity of its decay products and calculate from that how long the decay has been taking place. As long as there is still radioactive starting material, that length of time calculated is the age of the object being dated.
We express exponential relationships in terms of logarithms, all of which have a linear phase, which closely approximates the linear slope equation, y = ax + b. Within that linear portion of a logarithmic curve, radiometric dating methods are extremely accurate. The large errors only appear outside of the linear portion of the curve.
I find it more direct to associate the sons of God as being angelic creatures who left their first domain. This also happens to be the perspective of many extrabiblical books such as the Book of Enoch.
Charles Clough has some good study material in his Framework series. (about 250hrs of mp3 studies)
He begins discussing he differences in Creationism and Evolution, as well as many arguments used by accommodationists.
I find it more direct to associate the sons of God as being angelic creatures who left their first domain.
I would go even further and say that they worship the creation above the Creator
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