Posted on 06/17/2014 6:17:41 PM PDT by SeekAndFind
Whenever I engage in conversation with people I meet for the first time I try to avoid being asked the question, “What do you do for a living?” But if I am asked I say, “I am a minister.” Generally, the one who asks then inquires, “What denomination?” or “What kind of church?”
Here is where I always have to clarify, depending on the most recent news headline involving Christian leaders: “I am a Baptist minister, but I am not a science-denying Baptist minister who thinks that dinosaurs lived alongside humans a few thousand years ago.”
What a strange irony that a 30-foot-long fossil of an Allosaurus will be on display at the Creation Museum in Petersburg, Ky., where museum founder, Ken Ham, recently debated science educator Bill Nye. Ken Ham and his colleagues think it defends the book of Genesis and supplies evidence of Noah’s flood. Good grief.
Unfortunately, this is real life, not a Charlie Brown cartoon. According to a recent survey by the Associated Press, 77 percent of people who claim to be born again or evangelical say they have little or no confidence that the universe began 13.8 billion years ago with a big bang. And 76 percent of evangelicals doubt that life on Earth, including human beings, evolved through a process of natural selection.
Educated evangelicals know better. According to Newsweek 99 percent of America’s earth and life scientists hold to some form of evolution. Darrel Falk, a biology professor at evangelical Point Loma Nazarene University, told Cathy Grossman of the Religion News Service, that many biblical (evangelical) scholars do not see a conflict between religion and science. He noted: “The story of the cosmos and the Big Bang of creation is not inconsistent with the message of Genesis 1.”
I suspect that many (if not most) educated evangelical biblical scholars who subscribe to some form of biblical inerrancy (and sign faith statements testifying to that fact) believe what professor Falk believes.
They know there are different kinds (genres) of biblical literature which call for different approaches other than a literal interpretation of the text. They know that the creation stories are parabolic in nature and are not chronicles of history or reports conveying scientific data. They know that these stories are spiritual, metaphorical and theological stories and, while not factual, they certainly teach truth about God and God’s relationship to the world.
They know Ken Ham’s claim that “no apparent, perceived, or claimed evidence in any field, including history and chronology, can be valid if it contradicts the Scriptural record” is utter foolishness.
Harvard theologian Harvey Cox tells about the time the student leader of Harvard’s atheist group on campus took one of his theology classes. This otherwise bright student wrote a very weak paper in which he sought to discredit the God of the Christian and Jewish faiths by attacking and dismantling a literal interpretation of the Genesis flood story. He thought that by proving the story could not have happened the way the story says it happened, he would thus disprove the reality of God.
Dr. Cox said to the student, “Don’t you know a story when you read one?”
Educated evangelicals know that the creation stories were never intended to be history lessons or science reports, because the Bible is not a history or science book.
Educated evangelicals also know:
• That evangelical Christians need not fear or deny the enormous amount of scientific data supporting evolution.
• That the story of evolution and the biblical story are not mutually exclusive.
• That a healthy faith welcomes and is informed by science.
So why do so many evangelicals deny evolution and believe in a literal interpretation of the creation stories in Genesis?
Apparently what educated evangelical professors know and believe is not getting down to the people in the pew.
Why aren’t educated evangelical pastors teaching their churches these things? Are they afraid of being shunned or looked down upon by their peers? Are they afraid to rock the evangelical boat? Are they afraid of facing conflict in their churches or losing their jobs? Are the professors actually teaching what they believe and know to their students?
Whatever the reasons, it’s time for evangelicals who know the truth to come out and proclaim the truth. If the truth sets us free, as Jesus said, then many of our evangelical sisters and brothers need to hear a liberating word from their pastors.
OPINION: Views expressed in ABPnews/Herald columns and commentaries are solely those of the authors.
Chuck Queen is pastor of Immanuel Baptist Church in Frankfort, Ky., and author of Being a Progressive Christian (is not) for Dummies (nor for know-it-alls): An Evolution of Faith.
“Surely he wouldn’t be so dogmatic as to totally discount the side by side footprints at the Paluxy River, would he? What foolishness... I actually saw some of them when they were fresh.”
http://creation.com/arguments-we-think-creationists-should-not-use
about half-way into the article:
“Some prominent creationist promoters of these tracks have long since withdrawn their support. Some of the allegedly human tracks may be artefacts of erosion of dinosaur tracks obscuring the claw marks. There is a need for properly documented research on the tracks before we would use them to argue the coexistence of humans and dinosaurs.”
See also: http://www.icr.org/index.php?module=articles&action=view&ID=255
Ah yes. Liberal Baptists.
Evolution? OK.
Homosexuality? No problem.
Female ministers? Wonderful.
Abortions? Terrific.
Infant baptism? That’s a sin! :?
10,000 years is just 100 hundred-year lifespans end to end. Having a decent perspective on what a century is, methinks that’s not very long. Then I take my experiences with physics/geology/biology, look at the world as it is, and it’s pretty obvious it didn’t happen in 10,000 years or less, and that the delicate nuances and grand scale weren’t the result of terraforming in a matter of days.
And I read Genesis, and see no conflict of the above therewith.
And if you still insist everything was created less than 10,000 years ago, kindly explain why it all wasn’t done in the last 20 minutes.
Covered that. Beastiality.
Goats, sheep - other farm animals.
I suspect that many (if not most) educated evangelical biblical scholars who subscribe to some form of biblical inerrancy (and sign faith statements testifying to that fact) believe what professor Falk believes. They know there are different kinds (genres) of biblical literature which call for different approaches other than a literal interpretation of the text. They know that the creation stories are parabolic in nature and are not chronicles of history or reports conveying scientific data. They know that these stories are spiritual, metaphorical and theological stories and, while not factual, they certainly teach truth about God and God’s relationship to the world. They know Ken Ham’s claim that “no apparent, perceived, or claimed evidence in any field, including history and chronology, can be valid if it contradicts the Scriptural record” is utter foolishness.
PFL
You don’t have to believe in the big bang to not believe in evolution.
In fact, since they are both about science, you only have to accept what can be proven. Evolution hasn’t got a single stitch of prove to back it up.
The issue the ‘big bang’ has is all the stuff that came from it. Matter can’t be created or destroyed, just converted, so going from nothing to all this stuff is a problem.
These aren’t religious questions at all.
“They know Ken Ham’s claim that “no apparent, perceived, or claimed evidence in any field, including history and chronology, can be valid if it contradicts the Scriptural record” is utter foolishness.”
So far, the Bible’s track record on this is pretty good. It’s evolution that gets dodgier by the decade as a theory with any foundation at all.
Oh, I don't know... very little of what we 'know' is much older than 300 years. There is fair provable history back about 1500 years, but even then, it's getting pretty sketchy. Most of the sciences have taken a quantum leap in the last 100 years or so, relying largely upon extrapolation. I think we have grown comfortable with those extrapolations, and assume science to be fact. That is not necessarily the case. In fact, historically, 'settled science' has time and again been turned over on it's head. Why do you suppose it is any different now?
It is the hubris of Man. The same hubris that accepts our knowledge and society today to be oh, so sophisticated, and attributing near retardation to our direct ancestors (at least by comparison). It isn't so.
Then I take my experiences with physics/geology/biology, look at the world as it is, and it’s pretty obvious it didn’t happen in 10,000 years or less, and that the delicate nuances and grand scale weren’t the result of terraforming in a matter of days.
That presupposes quite a bit. In fact, the Flood is the best and most reasonable explanation of our current biodiversity by the means of micro-evolution. The very thing that Darwin got wrong explains it perfectly - Life (a species) does not change because it MUST. When it MUST, it dies out. A species changes because it CAN. And it happens relatively rapidly.
And I read Genesis, and see no conflict of the above therewith.
Then you aren't understanding Genesis. The only chance you have is gap theory, because after that the patriarchy from Adam onward sets the time frame exclusively. And even with that, an understanding of the Jubilees will probably change your mind.
And if you still insist everything was created less than 10,000 years ago, kindly explain why it all wasn’t done in the last 20 minutes.
Because of the plan. I am not an hard core 6k guy, but I cannot go much farther than 13k without calling YHWH a liar... And without losing sight of the plan.
Oh puke.......
NO
http://www.sci-news.com/astronomy/science-universe-not-expanding-01940.html
When my wife calls me a knuckle dragging neandrathal, at least she’ll be accurate.
...well, close to accurate...a tiny change of diction would suffice, to wit, Neanderthal...
...ah, excellent...wonderful reading to start my day...kudos to you, sr (or madam)...
Good one. Should be obvious but what I meant was tracks in this type of sediment degrade quite rapidly once they are uncovered.
Hey... anyone who watches politics has witnessed the attempt to discredit all kinds of things that should be obvious and the tactics can even extend to pretending to be 'on the other side of the argument'. This is no different. I've been there and to argue that what is in Paluxy is anything other than dinos and humans coexisting is to argue against the obvious.
Good one. Should be obvious but what I meant was tracks in this type of sediment degrade quite rapidly once they are uncovered.
And I read Genesis, and see no conflict of the above therewith.
It is too bad that people who are literalists are not literalists on things that are easy to understand but on the things that seem impossible.
2 peter 3
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.
Why don`t they take this scripture literal?
It'll never happen in this house. Christianity and evolution contradict each other.
Evolution teaches gradual development of living things until man finally arrives on the scene. So, there have been eons of suffering, bloodshed, and death preceding mankind. But the Bible says man was created at the beginning, and that there was no death until sin brought it into the world.
If you go with evolution, you have to dispense with original sin. If there was no original sin, why did Jesus have to die on the Cross?
Jesus said that God made male and female at the beginning. That single statement from the Lord puts to rest the idea that man is a relatively recent arrival.
So why do so many evangelicals deny evolution and believe in a literal interpretation of the creation stories in Genesis?
Gen 2
4 These are the generations of the heavens and of the earth when they were created, in the day that the Lord God made the earth and the heavens
2 Peter 3
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.
The missing evolution link? there is no link because Adam was not created at the same time God created man on the sixth day he was created thousands of years later.
The sons of god were Adams off spring, they married unto the daughters of men, for that reason the men who the evolutionists say roamed the earth many thousand of years ago were changed into what we now have.
Bingo. And they keep overlooking the text asserting that for the first few “days” there was nothing constituting a “day”.
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