How many people believe in a literal Genesis, Literal Adam & Eve & Literal Flood

I am just interested to do a survey to wonder how many people hear believe in a literal adam and eve and not millions of year.

I believe in a young earth because of the science and because of the bible. Do we believe the bible to be a historical book from Genesis to Revelation.

I believe in an ancient earth/universe because of science and the Bible. No the Bible is not a history book (though it does chart the history of a certain people) and no it is not a science book. That said, it doesn't matter to me what you or anyone else believes on the matter. I grant that it is possible that I am wrong although I think it is unlikely.

I do believe in a literal Adam and Eve and garden of Eden and Flood (the extent of same is open to debate).

Where in the bible does it say that we have an ancient universe. The thing is our foundations, the bible is a book that covers science as famous people such as Issac Newton and others used the bible to determine that because God made morals laws he also made Physical Laws, it has been only been recently with the rise of Atheism in science.
Things such as DNA and Polystrata Fossils, The complexity of the cell and even Fossils themselves.

If the Bible is not a history book then what outside sources do we refer to. I know that say David is roughly 10th BC and Ezra around the 7th Century BC.

This thing is vital as to place the Bible in placed and in time and history.

The thing is Evolutionary ideas do not provide a preface to say the fact that the fall happened in Genesis or why there are so many different languages.

You cannot believe in an ancient earth and Charles Lyle and Darwinian Thought and believe in the Bible as they are opposed, you can believe in salvation.

Dominic- I do not believe you want a debate so I will not debate you.

But I must state that while I believe the universe is indeed billions of years old, I absolutely do not believe in Darwinian evolution, which is patently false.

But you cannot avoid the overwhelming evidence for a billions of years old universe because you are afraid it supports Darwinian evolution. That's kind of like saying you don't believe in germs because you are afraid of getting sick.

The bible is physically linked to time and space via the divine revelation set forth in scripture.
A literal Adam for a literal Eve, a literal rib taken for the creation of a literal woman. A literal creation of the stars and moon, all plants and animals and a literal rest on the 7th day. From this we have literal plants and animals, a literal day of rest and a literal sinful world from a sinful man and woman literally choosing their own way instead of God's.
God's word is reality, its is truth beyond speculation. You cannot debate truth you can only assert it or disbelieve it.
Evolution, and old earth theories are based upon scripture plug-ins to the latest scientific theories.
I realize there are plenty of PhD's who pretend to offer interpretations that attempt to unite scientific theory and divine revelation...and my opinion is they are deceived, their education and their peers combine to form an audience more important than what God has literally said about literal events in time and space quantified and sequenced according to divine revelation. Human history is God's sequence. Any other sequence or history is a lie, it is fabricated to send the Church down any street except the straight and narrow one.

Hi Id like to make a few points
1:Adam is counted as a literal man in the genealogies with a specific Age
2:It says in Genesis that "All the days of Adam were"
This is important because Adam was created on Day Six.So from Day Six to the end of his life were numbered in Genesis.
3:Jesus References Genesis as being literal.
4:If Sin and Death came into existance because of "Adam" then before "Adam" their could be no sin and death.Also if Sin and Death did not come in by Adam but were before Adam then their is no need for a saviour called Jesus, a second Adam.
5:For the most part but maybe not in this case "Billions of Years" are mentioned to leave room for evolution or to placate the modern world who call a young earth stupidity.Truth usually has nothing to do with it.
5:Taking God out of it for a moment :On the Issue of proof whether the earth is young or old?You cannot go out and measure it,so you have to rely on other evidences.For instance gravitational pull of the moon,it the moon were millions of years old then it would be right on top of the Earth as the moon moves I think an inch away every year.Or if you measure the silt at the mouth of rivers you can get an approximate time it takes to form that amount of silt and it is not millions but thousands of years etc
Just a few things on my mind ,Im sure others have good points that I didnt comment on,urs staff

"How many people believe in a literal Genesis, Literal Adam & Eve & Literal Flood?"

I DO! I DO! MY VOTE IS YEA!

Delta,

I got a good chuckle out of this thread. I disagree with TMK, but you are not being fair.

You said, "I am just interested to do a survey to wonder how many people hear believe in a literal adam and eve and not millions of year. "

You then proceeded to counter his response. Is this a survey or a discussion/debate?

I take the Bible literally where it does not say explicitly that it is symbolic. So I believe in a literal Adam and Eve and a literal 7 days.

Hi ,
One add-on to that is that Genesis takes Day Six and Day Seven as literal but that literal Day could be a year but no more than a year.Because "All of the days of Adam were" passage gives his age in Years.So I accept that Day Six and Day Seven could be a literal day or a literal year but no more than a year.So at its least the 7 days of Creation are 7 days and at its most the 7 days of Creation are 7 Years.Either way its a small period of time if you get my drift,
The bible sometimes has days as years and this is acceptable exegisis.The day in Creation week could not be a thousand years for instance because the age of Adam is qualified so we have the reference point sort to speak,urs Hugh

Dominic,

Really !
Do you really think it good to perhaps cast doubt on ,
The Word / Bible ?

What if we cast doubt in someone that comes to this forum, that is still a child in their walk,...have not yet grown strong in the faith,....

Should we be concerned?

I know ! ,...Who am I, ..that I should say such a thing !

It is not in me, to want to offend you, or anyone at all,....but what about offending The God of His Word ?

Concerned,
🙏
______
elizabeth

I identify with the Old Earth "viewpoint" of things and I believe in all three of them being literal. Adam and Eve were real people, Adam was a REAL person who actually brought sin into the world. The flood, from my POV was LITERAL, however the flood [that Noah had to do with] was a local flood. I do not hold to a global view of that event (from a biblical perspective).

by TMK on 2017/10/17 18:29:52

Dominic- I do not believe you want a debate so I will not debate you.

But I must state that while I believe the universe is indeed billions of years old, I absolutely do not believe in Darwinian evolution, which is patently false.

But you cannot avoid the overwhelming evidence for a billions of years old universe because you are afraid it supports Darwinian evolution. That's kind of like saying you don't believe in germs because you are afraid of getting sick.

I believe that Adam and Eve were real. I believe that the Flood during Noah's time was real. But I do not want to give a timeline to it. Bible itself does not give a timeline. Also Bible begins with God creating heaven and earth but Day 1 starts later. So there was a gap there, who knows what that gap was. Anything could have happened. An entire generation could have lived and destroyed before us.

Also do you believe that the earth is spinning at such a high velocity when you can stay still without feeling it? If this is possible to God, how can he not fool us with the age of the earth? I clearly believe God can fool scientists easily by making them believe the earth was millions of age old.

Hence I am indecisive about age of the universe. There is no way Science can prove the age of the earth. No one can prove anything that happened in the past. We can only come to some conclusion based on circumstantial evidences. Evidences can easily deceive. Science calls all these things theories, which means they are only possibilities, which may or may not be true. Even Evolution is just a theory, if Science finds a better fitting theory tomorrow, then they will switch to it. We will be easily deceived if we keep focusing on them.

What do you mean by "literal"? Do I think it happened as portrayed in scripture and only that? No, that is absolutely absurd. You think all that it takes to make the earth bear trees and fruit is found in the verse "Then God said, "Let the earth put forth vegetation: plants yielding seed, and fruit trees of every kind on earth that bear fruit with the seed in it.” And it was so. The earth brought forth vegetation: plants yielding seed of every kind, and trees of every kind bearing fruit with the seed in it."??

No. A LOT of things must have happened physically for this to occur. That is not just science, it's common sense. The creation accounts are very, very, very ancient traditions passed down thousands of years before they reached Moses (or whoever compiled them) and were committed into writing. How could a primitive man with this vision of creation (or even Adam if they were passed down from him) convey accurately and scientifically all that he was seeing? He simply was not smart enough for that. He had to put what he saw happen into terms and a broadness that he and the ones he related it to could understand. Are we smarter then man 5000 years ago? Heck yeah we are. There is nothing wrong with that. Put a mouse in a room with some simple contraptions and he'll go from knowing nothing about them to be able to use them.

For the record I think whoever began this oral tradition of creation with the vision God gave him (again, perhaps Adam) did a fantastic job considering his limitations. Truly remarkable.

As for the flood, no it did not cover the world. We know that now, a statement many of you find to be a doubt of God but I praise God for the advances we have now in knowledge. The person recording the flood stated it as such because the world was very small to him. (Probably no bigger then Mesopotamia). Where did you guys get the idea that whoever recorded these accounts were infallible super saints? They were used by God. THEY were used by God, meaning who they were. Great men, not God-like geniuses who had a sudden awareness of the entire span of the globe and a huge measuring stick to actually measure how far up the water came to Mount Everest, which by the way was nowhere near Noah and he could not have reached it in 40 days. Was the water fifteen cubits above Mount Everest? No. The author is making a point. Is it then wrong? Yeah, probably. Is the Spirit still the same? Of course!! The authors unfaithfulness (or in this case embellishment) does not annul the Truth of God contained in the words.

Men spoke as moved by the Spirit does not imply accurateness of everything physical, it implies complete infallibility of the things that are spiritual at that time. I have asked this before but to no avail, to those who have spoken in the Spirit did you find yourself with a complete knowledge of physics and biology or was the message of the Spirit transmitted through you according to your knowledge and all its fallibilities and errors? I have spoken things that were wrong while speaking the Word of God but the Spirit of God still broke forth because the power was the Spirit, not the exactness of what I was speaking. So it is with the bible.

In response to the original post, I think we must realize that the Bible stands or falls together. If we cannot accept its historicity, then we must call into doubt its veracity. Not only do I accept Adam and Eve, but the genealogies from them to Christ. We have record enough that we can, with a pretty fair degree of accuracy, calculate how many years it has been since creation. I believe that Jonah really did spend three days and nights in the belly of a great fish prepared by God for that purpose. And I think you can see where I stand.

I also believe in a young Earth and a young Universe, if you call 6 to 7 thousand years young. But I understand something of the nature of science, and the fact that it is a changeable as public opinion and personal conviction and experience. No man is an objective scientist. I have not seen one yet. A man's scientific interpretation of data, and the direction of his scientific quest all come from his core belief. We often find the evidence we are looking for in the first place. We see through glasses of our own design.

You see, if the universe is billions of years old, we must put that time somewhere in the Genesis 1 account, since it literally starts with the creation of the space we now know as the universe and the ball of matter upon which we live (heavens and earth). Since all of the celestial bodies were created on day four, then if the universe is billions of years old, those billions of years must rest between day 4 and day 5 of creation. I just cannot find this in a straight forward reading of scripture.

A cosmology is a mathematical and scientific view of the origins of the universe. I actually find some very good, peer reviewed, young universe cosmologies out there. One is by Dr. Russ Humphrey. There are others as well.

As to some other comments. I would point to two scriptures that state very plainly that the flood was global. Gen. 6:7 and Gen. 7:9. If it is land, and if it is under the heavens, then it was covered with water.

If the flood was local, why did God not just tell Noah to move? Also, when the flood occurred, Mount Everest was not nearly as tall as it is now, tectonic plate movement during the flood caused most of the mountains we see now. And if the flood was local, were there any human survivors besides Noah, since they would have spread over most of the world at that time?

Nigel,

There's a very simple answer to the questions you ask.

And you, and all others who have not fallen for the deception know that answer.

Sree wrote: "I clearly believe God can fool scientists easily by making them believe the earth was millions of age old. "

Are you sure you meant to type this?

//were there any human survivors besides Noah, since they would have spread over most of the world at that time?//

I thought they did not spread all over until the episode of the Tower of Babel.

Duplicate post

After 1600 years, (or millions, if your believe evolution theory), human population would have spread far beyond a local Mesopotamian population, especially if you consider the longevity of people at that time. If some other people survived, Noah and the 7 other people on the ark would not be the sole progenitors of the human race after the flood, as the Bible indicates. The Babel narrative is a post flood record. To me, there is no reason to believe human population would not have spread beyond a local Mesopotamian population before the flood.

Also, as is my understanding, the Bible was written by God, not men. I don't believe an omnipotent God would allow human error in the sacred texts. I think it is erroneous to believe humans today are smarter than our ancestors from millennia ago. We merely have more accumulated knowledge.

I have to say, when you witness to someone, tell them about Jesus Christ and Him crucified, tell them what He has done for you, tell them Jesus loves them. Demonstrate the Holy Spirit's power. I personally don't want people to become creationists, I want them to know God. We have to be careful that we are not trying to just win arguments. If the best a person can do is give someone a bunch of scientific facts, I think this is deficient. If God leads you to talk about creation/ evolution, fine, but in my experience it just creates strife.

Then they said, "Come, let us build ourselves a city, with a tower that reaches to the heavens, so that we may make a name for ourselves; otherwise we will be scattered over the face of the whole earth.”.... So the Lord scattered them from there over all the earth, and they stopped building the city.

Once again, belief in an ancient earth does not mean one also believes in evolution, or that Adam was not real, or the flood was not literal, etc.

Hi Tod

What is your thoughts on Exodus 20:11?

11 Because the Lord made the heavens and the earth, the sea, and everything that is in them in six days, but rested on the seventh day.

Scree, you said " Bible itself does not give a timeline."
Don't you think it does so right here?

Gloryandgrace, amen to your posts.

Blessings

Moses wrote both genesis and exodus.

Dominic- I do not believe you want a debate so I will not debate you.

But I must state that while I believe the universe is indeed billions of years old, I absolutely do not believe in Darwinian evolution, which is patently false.

But you cannot avoid the overwhelming evidence for a billions of years old universe because you are afraid it supports Darwinian evolution. That's kind of like saying you don't believe in germs because you are afraid of getting sick.

I am personally up for debate, you cannot believe in millions of years, to me you have to believe in Darwinian evolution. If there is overwhelming evidence for billions of years I have studied science from things such as Big Bang cosmology which has problems because there is no evidence for things such as inflation or radioactive dating where you assume that the parent to daughter elements and that the fact that you have to have a uniform time period.

I have studied archaeology and can provide evidence say can provide evidence for the existence of David and Moses from archaeological evidence and other things.

I need to link the links as I am doing this on my iPad I will do it when I link it on my IMac

There's a lot in Genesis many Christians don't believe anymore. Science wants you to redo your thinking on the Word Of God. We listen to the god called scientism. We let it tell us what happened and how. We were once unmovable but now we zoom through space. They explain how the miracles really happened and how we got here. How we started as a grain of sand and began to heat up..... And looking at that round globe they have provided they remind us how impossible a world wide flood would be.

Yeah, that's right!

There's alot of things people don't believe anymore.

Billions of years ago when I lived on a planet which was triangular in shape, I used to believe some of these things.

But since coming to planet earth and participating in science class I've been enlightened.

Thanks be to the scientists!

I keep waiting for NASA to reveal the secret as why the vacuum of space doesn't suck away the earth's atmosphere.

I have wondered that since Noah and his family repopulated the Earth after the flood, where did Goliath descend from? Who are his ancestors? Did the Nephelim come back down to Earth and sire children again?

-Daniel

Dom wrote: "I am personally up for debate, you cannot believe in millions of years, to me you have to believe in Darwinian evolution."

Why in the world do you think that? Check out Hugh Ross's website- he believes in billions of years old universe but has countless resources that debunk Darwinian evolution.

I actually pretty shocked that so many folks think the earth is only 6000 or so years old. That's a hair away from flat-earthism.

ADD- I posted an article here a few days ago about colliding neutron stars, an exceedingly rare event. Neutron stars are the endgame of a supernova. The process takes billions of years.

Still scripture brother.

Hebrews 11:3
Through faith we understand that the worlds were framed by the word of God, so that things which are seen were not made of things which do appear.

Don't you hate it when you write stuff and its blown out?? well mine was.
I've read Hugh Ross and his ideas set forth in his books and in articles and those rebuttals as well. I've listened to him on YouTube in defense of his position.
Old Earth creationism is in effect a denial of the plain reading of scripture.
What must be done for Old Earth creationism to stick is to call Genesis 1 and 2 a poem, or a creation-myth formulated from pagan sources and from old fathers metaphor and analogy. The idea is to move Genesis 1 narrative away from reality into 'art' and thereby remove the necessity to put their faith into a God who created the world sun and moon, stars, plants, animals and mankind into 6 days. The evolutionist model anathematizes this because their model demands adherence to scientific instruments, theories, persons, ideologies, philosophies that form a very different world than a God-created and in their minds a "simpleton" world.
We are pitted against science, but when science actually falls short we find we were never pitted against science but against their ideologies, philosophies, god-suppressing emotional states, and the pride of education directed towards establishing a 'truth' outside of scripture truth.
When we debate the creation of the earth, old earth creationist must bring into the debate a denial of the literal events of Genesis 1 and 2 and work backwards filling in their theories with scripture nullifiers. In short, unbelief and belief in their own wisdom.

That does not answer how there are such things a neutron stars and supernovas, etc. If it only took 6000 years for stars to go nova there would be all novas and no stars.

To counter this the YEer must say that God created the universe with a deceptive "appearance of age" to trick us into believing lies.

Preposterous. God is in the truth business, not the deception business.

"Neutron stars are the endgame of a supernova. The process takes billions of years."

Some scientists might interpret this process to take billions of years, but, for example, the speed of light is not a constant, just an agreed upon convention. Light can speed up, slow down, and even stop in the right conditions. I think a careful examination of evidence without an evolutionary bias would produce viable theories that neutron stars do not take billions of years to form.

(As an aside, I was just at the Royal Tyrell Museum in Drumheller, Alberta today, and some thoroughly discredited "evidence" for evolution, such as "vestigial" organs, was on display. They said the coccyx (tailbone) in humans is vestigial. I made a remark to my uncle that I would personally pay someone foolish enough to have their coccyx removed if they think it is vestigial. This is the kind of malarkey still pushed on people to "prove" evolution.)

And Todd, God created Adam as a fully grown man, with the "appearance of age". That's not being deceptive.

Not the same thing. Did Adam have evidence of age when he was created, i.e. calluses, slightly worn teeth, etc? Besides, infants could not have fulfilled God's purpose for Adam and Eve in the garden.

And the formation of neutron stars has nothing to do with the speed of light. It is an actual physical and observable process. To suggest that two different stars in the last 6000 years (meaning their max age was 6000 years old) went supernova and then became neutron stars and were seen to collide very recently is quite frankly ridiculous.

I agree that the vestigial organ argument is a crock.

Once again my belief in an ages old universe does not mean I believe in macro evolution. I do not.

If one can believe God creates the great stars in the sky, believing he can bring the light from that star to our earth at just his word is no stretch of faith.
The same question can be asked about the creation of stars or anything that eliminate God from the creative process. Namely, God deceives when he tell us it took a day when our science has said it takes millions of years. Maybe, just maybe the deception does not lay with God, but with those who say "God didn't do it in 1 day". Our own DNA is enough to put stars, gases and light speed to shame and unworthy of mention...we don't need to question light-speed when we agree on the creation in 1 day of Man.

But all of this is just philosophical jousting...Its a matter of belief in the scriptures that ends philosophical postulating and posturing.

It's pretty condescending to say that someone who does not believe the earth is 6000 or so years old does not believe the scriptures.

Scripture says that God owns the cattle on a thousand hills. Who then owns the cattle on the 1001st hill? Or are there only 1000 hills on the earth, despite what "science" tells us? After all if you believe in scripture it must mean what it says, right?

A physical and observable process? Who was around billions of years ago to watch neutron stars form? How do we know the rates have always been the same? As for the speed of light, I know that the speed of light has nothing to do with the formation of neutron stars; however, light travel time might vary, so the fact that we observe some cosmological event that some people say takes millions of light years to get here might not.

And so far as I know, Adam did have the appearance of age, facial hair etc.

If the six creation days are allegorical, does that mean I can take a few million years off work? "Six long periods of time shalt thou work, and the seventh long period of time is the Sabbath; in it thou shalt do no work." 2nd Opinions 3:5
(I don't think my boss would go for that.)

We read where the angels were created. How the morning stars sang together at the creation of the earth.
Satan has a breastplate with 9 stones. Apparently at one time he was a priest of God. He caused a third of the angels to leave their estate. Sounds like this took place on earth before man. He was in the garden of Eden, perhaps one long before. The covering cherub..

Sounds like God wiped that creation out as we see in Genesis 1:2. Gen 1:1 everything was good as God doesn't create junk. Something happened to Satan's rein, his world. But the angels had to choose who they would serve, just like we do.

Then in Gen 1:2 we see God brooding or walking on the water. That's why Jesus walked on the water, he was showing them who he was. Why he took clay and created an eye, Why he stretched out a man's leg.

In Gen 1:2 it appears God decides on a different direction.
Earth is straightened up and man is created from dust. A disposable model.

The plateau of earth is huge but we are confined. We can't ascend to heaven. Evidently Lucifer could.

My point Nigel is that we see stars in varying stages. Of course no person can observe a stars life cycle from start to finish. We see the huge cosmic dust clouds from which stars form (look up "pillars of creation"). We see stars like our sun. We see red giants, white dwarfs, novas, neutron stars, black holes. The cycle from star birth to star death is a tad longer than 6000 years, I am sorry to tell you.

Todd: this is why sometimes venues like this are tough to work with. First...I consider you a sound an spiritual believer, your posts ( which is what I am basing my statement upon) are sound, reasoned and mature. That last thing I want to do is come off as though I am the high water mark for truth.
I do think there is a disconnect between faith and the necessity to adhere to scientific theory that by necessity draws Genesis into question. So, I state that disconnect as an "unbelief". But so what? My judgment of the matter is what I can offer, some will agree some will not, what I am intending is to offer my own reasons and scripture trust in a young earth=young stars=young moon= etc.
I am always being pitted against "what about rock dating?" or what about "red-shift?" or "what about cosmic expansion?"
All of these necessitates an expanse of time beyond Genesis narrative I realize this. But what I don't necessitate in my own life is a full scientific explanation to validate Genesis 1 and 2. Why? Because I am un-scientific? No, because I have no legitimate reason to question the divine revelation of sequence and quantity revealed in Genesis 1.
There are just as many questions arising from humanity that wants to put God's word in check...let alone old-earth theories. I count all of them as unbelief, and no, I don't think I am so foolish as to think there are only 1000 hills. Because I take Genesis literally does not mean I have a necessity to take all things literally...otherwise I would be blind, footless and handless.

God could have created stars etc. in various stages of life (I believe He did).

Drifter you say: God could have created stars etc. in various stages of life (I believe He did).

Why would God do that? Everything else we have seen come into being started from infancy to mature. Why would God decide to suspend this natural order of the world, the order that he created for it?

It seems the only reason God would do this is to trick us. He obviously knew one day we would have technology and telescopes.

Besides, we have actually seen supernovas occur- or at least the light produced by same. The actual nova occurred eons ago. But it does counter the argument that God created exploded stars. That is like saying God created burned out forests or the the moon full of craters despite no meteors having actual hit it.

As I've already said, the speed of light is variable. This is scientifically proven. So the supernovas we see now might not have occurred millions of years ago.

http://abcnews.go.com/Technology/story?id=120095&page=1

And when God created the world, I'm sure He created fully grown birds, reptiles, mammals etc.

Drifter, God did not "create" the animals in the sense he did with man. The bible says the earth brought them forth.

"And let the earth bring forth all kinds of living creatures: cattle, crawling creatures, and wild animals."

What makes you "sure" they were created fully grown? Thats not according to the order that God established this world in.

Because God said to Adam, "Of every tree of the garden thou mayest freely eat" Genesis 2:16. I'm sure He did not say to Adam, "sorry Adam, you'll have to wait for these trees to grow before you can eat anything. Hope you like fasting". The trees etc. were fully grown.

"What makes you "sure" they were created fully grown? Thats not according to the order that God established this world in."

Yes it is. Adam was mature when he was created. There is no reason to believe the animals were not as well.

God made the trees first, they were obviouly grown by the time Adam was there

You see, baby mammals and reptiles were created in the beginning. But they went extinct because they couldn't survive without their mother to nurse them to maturity.

And then plan B was executed because the experiment of plan A failed. And so there was success this time.

You see, you must read the lost books of antiquity to get your history of origins right.

You see, you must fill in the gaps when you read Genesis.

I hope this clears things up!

Or they evolved from simple organisms, doesnt contradict Gods word one bit. In fact it shows forth the incredible order of creation that is found in Christ.

For the record I do not believe in the evolution of man the way Darwin presents it. I believe man is unique among the creations of God.

The problem with the evolutionary process is the aspect of genetic mutations.

The overwhelmingly deleterious nature of mutations can be seen by the incredible scarcity of clear cases of information-creating mutations.

Sanford, John. Genetic Entropy (Kindle Location 345). FMS Publications. Kindle Edition.

Current Neo Darwinism deals with the fact that you need added genetic information. You also account for the fact that our DNA is information that information needs a designer and creator.

To me there are no mechinisms for evolution such as genetic drift or natural selection are not explanations for cell to human evolution.

In this Lecture Dr Georgie Purdom deals with the fact of the Wonder of DNA.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=B1_pOc1tYlc

One of the most common thing is that one mutation causes one feature that is simply not true according to the actual science.
DNA is more complex that computer code.

Dr Werner Gitt in his book in the
beginning was Information

Figure 34: The ant and the microchip. Microchips are the storage elements of present-day computers. Their details are practically invisible, since structure widths are about one millionth of a meter. What a 30-ton computer of the University of Pennsylvania (USA) could do in 1946 can now be accomplished by a chip less than 6 square mm in size. Only a few years ago, chips which could store the text of four typed pages were regarded as revolutionary. Today, all the telephone numbers of a city like Canberra, Australia, can be stored on one chip, and their speed of operation is so fast that the Bible could be read 200 times in one second,

Gitt, Werner. In the Beginning Was Information (Kindle Locations 2649-2653). Master Books. Kindle Edition.

I have read Evolutionist such as Jerry Coyne is his book

It’s clear that this resistance stems largely from religion. You can find religions without creationism, but you never find creationism without religion. Many religions not only deem humans as special, but deny evolution by asserting that we, like other species, were objects of an instantaneous creation by a deity. While many religious people have found a way to accommodate evolution with their spiritual beliefs, no such reconciliation is possible if one adheres to the literal truth of a special creation. That is why opposition to evolution is so strong in the United States and Turkey, where fundamentalist beliefs are pervasive.

Coyne, Jerry A.. Why Evolution is True (Kindle Locations 202-206). Oxford University Press. Kindle Edition.

"Scripture says that God owns the cattle on a thousand hills. Who then owns the cattle on the 1001st hill? Or are there only 1000 hills on the earth, despite what "science" tells us? After all if you believe in scripture it must mean what it says, right? "

Why is it not 1000 million hills if you use the same Hermanuetic for Genesis or that Joshua walked around Jericho in 6 Billion Years.

This deals with some of the genetic problems that you have with evolution from a genetic perspective

Lets deal with Big Bang Cosmology. My problem with Big Bang cosmology is the fact of inflation.

With Light Travel time problem, the Horizon problem is what you have to deal with if you believe in the Big Bang Model as it is also a light time travel problem.

The Big Bang model is not an explosion it is like inflating up a balloon. The idea of Big Bang comes from Hubble when he discovered Microwave Background Radiation.

In early models such as the Lamaitres Idea of the Big Bang it comes from a point infinitely small which has not mass, density or other problems.

This infinity hot small singularity expands into the universe through particles reacting and galaxies form through swirling gas clouds and stars form.

I wish I could show you all the different models of Big Bang Cosmology as there are many
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lambda-CDM_model

I was trying to find the quote in Tysons book where he states that the four laws of physic just happen to come into existence at the beggining.

With the aspect of things such as with Big Bang Cosmology complex particles such as electrons, neutrons and protons have to simply happen through random chance then even fundemental particles like quarks and other particles like photons.

To understand the behavior of space, time, matter, and energy from the big bang to present day is one of the greatest triumphs of human thought. If you seek a complete explanation for the events of the earliest moments, when the universe was smaller and hotter than ever thereafter, you must find a way to enable the four known forces of nature””gravity, electromagnetism, the strong and the weak nuclear forces””to talk to one another, to unify and become a single meta-force. You must also find a way to reconcile two currently incompatible branches of physics: quantum mechanics (the science of the small) and general relativity (the science of the large).

Tyson, Neil deGrasse. Origins: Fourteen Billion Years of Cosmic Evolution (Kindle Locations 270-275). W. W. Norton & Company. Kindle Edition.

What are the problems with Big Bang Cosmology.
Inflation
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Inflation_(cosmology)

There is no evidence for it in the Universe. With inflation the universe has to move faster than the speed of light.

According to the theory of inflation, the Universe grew by a factor of 10 to the sixtieth power in less than 10 to the negative thirty seconds, so the "edges" of the Universe were expanding away from each other faster than the speed of light; however, as long as those edges can't see each other (which is what we always assume), there is no physical law that forbids it.
http://curious.astro.cornell.edu/physics/109-the-universe/cosmology-and-the-big-bang/inflation/664-how-can-the-universe-expand-faster-than-the-speed-of-light-during-inflation-advanced

Inflation solves 2 problems

Horizon problem: The CMBR is essentially the same temperature in all directions.

Flatness problem: The universe appears to have a flat geometry.

Jason Lisle in his video

Big Problems with the Big Bang Cosmology
https://archive.org/details/BigProblemsForTheBigBangTheory-JasonLisle

Origins - Big Bang or Big God? with Dr. Danny Faulkner
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DxCwfkkJeII

I do not believe that God created the Universe using Big Bang Cosmology!

Other problems with Big Bang Cosmology are things such as Structured Galaxies on the scale of billions of light years across which do not fit into any big bang cosmology such as the Fredrick-La Maitre Model or Stephen Hawkins Model or the many other models of the big bang cosmology. If you know this sucject in any depth you know that current people like Lawrence Krauss and Stephen Hawkins are trying to get rid of a beginning.

Other problems such as Blue Stars or the fact that there are no Population 3 Stars which are the first stars according to the Big Bang model made up of Helium and Hydrogen, there also should be no Blue Stars because blue stars are stars that do not have a very long life period they should not be around if the universe is billions of years, things like comets should not be around either.

There is the Horizon Problem and the Flatness Problem and I think the Dipole Problems.

There are many things that are in are universe that should not be around if our universe is billions of Years old.

The Milky way should have no spirals, the moon should be alot closer to the earth.

I am tired from work and should detail all so called errors in different models of Big Bang cosmology.

"Is Heaven "literally" exist?"

"Is Hell "literally" also exist?"

Well...let me tell ya!

I "literally" just got back home from being out with my wife. So she's a witness as well. We "literally" just had a conversation with a man who told us he died and came back when he was 18 years old. He said they "literally" exist.

And I am "literally" not kidding.

Thank you very much!

Therefore it is essential that the two witnesses come. We live in the land of confusion.

When we debate the creation of the earth, old earth creationist must bring into the debate a denial of the literal events of Genesis 1 and 2 and work backwards filling in their theories with scripture nullifiers. In short, unbelief and belief in their own wisdom.

Careful here! This is a logical fallacy. It’s a "Black-or-white” argument, which is a false argument because it fails to consider alternate possibilities.

In the Genesis narrative, the earth already existed before the opening of the story. Scripture does not tell us how long it existed… or the solar system, or other stars…

You don’t want to divide God’s people according to your own presuppositions. It would be wiser to simply praise God for his mighty power in the miracle of creation ”“ without throwing your brother into the dungeon along with the evolutionists. We can’t forget that the Pharisees were experts at taking everything literally ”“ every jot and tittle ”“ but they were dead wrong in their understanding ”“ of God, of His purposes, and of themselves.

Just wondering: What is the intended purpose of this "survey”?

When you relegate Genesis 1 and 2 to poetry ( which you must do in order to turn days in to millennia or days into epochs or days into years) you open the door to the use of a hermeneutic that is foreign to general Christian usage.
Those who take the bible as an inerrant locus normally subscribe to a historical grammatical hermeneutic.
Yom as is used in Hebrew to denote a normal 24 hour day is encased by the repeated Evening and Morning were the 1st day until the 6th day. 6 times we are told the length of that day...evening and morning.
So, Adam and Eve, the ancient men, the Israelites down to Jesus would not have needed Neil Degrasse or any technology, nor would they have needed various cosmological theories to know Moses narration was dealing with 6 24 hr periods.
What we are being told now, those men didn't know how long those days were because we have an interpretive grid known as Philosophical Materialism. Within that grid we interpret all occurrences in accordance with natural events as any good humanist/atheist/skeptic/naturalist/agnostic would have to offer.
The Church-elite now fully immersed in philosophical materialism thinks nothing of telling its congregants that for the last 6000 years those ignorant and superstition bible-thumpers they were in the dark, we now know better and for one very important reason. What reason?
We have developed technology specifically designed to help us maintain our philosophical materialism with technology based observations that when combined demand those observances and their philosophical conclusions be adhered to...or else you are in the stone age and back when men were using spears and sticks to get food.

So here I am, I am faced with a hermeneutic that forces the usage of humanist philosophical views into my interpretive grid. My simplistic historical grammatical hermeneutic is all passe'. I am also confronted with a very clear conclusion I must make regarding the old prophets, believers etc. They didn't know what they were talking about, now that we have Dawkins, and Hawking, and Degrasse and the like we are privileged to have the bible correctly interpreted for us. Then additionally I have Christian after Christian vouching for the veracity of their claims because technology has provided the evidence we need to dismiss almost 6000 years of interpretation.

Yes, this is a philosophical argument, but what is being offered to me from some of you is also a philosophical argument. There is no reason to demand Genesis 1 and 2 be turned into a poem...so that we can unhinge the door to let any theory or philosophical perspective gain ground in the Church.

As I said from the outset, if you call Genesis 1 and 2 poetry and remove the literal reading from the text, you have plenty of room to poetically get rid of original sin, Adam and Eve, A garden of God, Angelic removal of them from the garden...all is up for grabs.
Some might pretend that their interpretations do no open the door to a myriad of falsehoods but they would be wrong...and the Church for the last century has suffered for it under the teachings of various liberal theologians all redefining and reinterpreting Genesis.
If God didn't literally make them male and female, just what argument will you use against homosexuality, lesbianism or bestiality? Surely anyone can promote anything once you have believed the lie that "Has God said"?

To counter this the YEer must say that God created the universe with a deceptive "appearance of age" to trick us into believing lies.

This is a true statement, IF the sum total of our current knowledge is the sum total of all knowledge about the origins of the universe. But, if our current knowledge is incomplete, or wrong, then this could very well be a false assumption.

What we must realize is that almost all of our knowledge about the universe is mathematical theory. And our ideas about how all of this came to be is also mathematical theory. There are some very good young universe, creationist, cosmologies that would explain these phenomena. They rely upon Einstein's theories of relativity, which have been demonstrated to be true time and again.

The assumption that a supernova is so many billion years old is based upon our frame of reference that is fixed. Yet time is not a constant. Time dilation due to motion is a well established reality both in mathematics and in experiment. It might be worth looking into.

I always work from this basic assumption. The word of God is accurate in every respect. Therefore, if my science does not agree with the plain reading of scripture, It must be that my science is incomplete and that my understanding has not yet caught up with the truth of the Word of God.

However, if I ever try to bend the word of God in order to make it agree with what my science seems to say.......................................

The logical fallacy is supposing God didn't mean 24 hr periods...then we come along and develop justifying theories to fit the only other alternative to divine revelation, mans wisdom and mans inventions.

If any brother is in a dungeon, I didn't place him there, I have been writing so as to give men a reason to believe the simple narrative as it stands. The alternatives are born of godless ideologies I refuse.

I was surprised I didn't get hit for the slippery slope fallacy or some other...but regardless when you open the door to elitism whereby the common man cannot interpret the scriptures unless he has the latest technology and doctors of science to support him, he must confess he does not know what God's word is saying. This sort of thing stinks of human pride. Sorry if it comes off as divisive. But what can I do, I have chosen scripture to interpret scripture not atheist scholars.

Roadsign:

In the Genesis narrative, the earth already existed before the opening of the story. Scripture does not tell us how long it existed… or the solar system, or other stars…

This is an absolutely true statement. However, we are not dealing with the Genesis narrative alone. We are dealing with the rest of scripture as well.

Exodus 20:11 tells us that God created the heavens, the earth, and all that is in them in six days. So Exodus fills in the gap that seems to exist in Gen. 1.

I might also add something at this point in the discussion that I think is important to keep in mind.

I have many brothers and sisters in Christ with whom I disagree on some points of Biblical interpretation. Yet these brothers and sisters are solid believers whose judgment I would trust in spiritual matters.

We also have the problem of the divergent accounts of Gen 1 &2. A plain reading indicates they are not consistent.

Gen 1 says plants were created on Day 3. Gen 2 says that plants had not yet sprung up because God had not sent rain (thought it never rained until the flood per most YEers) and also because no man was around to till the ground. But Gen 1 says plants were around 3 days before man was created and doesn't say a word about the plants needing rain.

"I have many brothers and sisters in Christ with whom I disagree on some points of Biblical interpretation. Yet these brothers and sisters are solid believers whose judgment I would trust in spiritual matters."

I agree completely.

Todd: Perhaps, unless chapter 1 is chronology, and chapter 2 are details not placed in any particular order. I notice that man was created on day 6. Chapter 1 brings day 6 to a definite close. Then chapter 2 gives a much more detailed account of what God did. Notice the shift in verse 4. It seems to me that these are some very specific things done on day 6 that have to do specifically with man.

Millions and millions of years ago I saw this movie;

https://genesismovie.com

You gotta check it out!

Because it won't be playing again for millions and millions of years.

//Then chapter 2 gives a much more detailed account of what God did.//

An awful lot happened on day 6 per Gen 2-- let me tell you!

Add- I guess my point is there is already a question about the consistency of Gen 1 and 2, yet we are ready to blindly accept that a few verses in Gen 1 ( which does read like a poem) explains all cosmology and secrets of the universe.

I’ve been following this topic over the last couple of days.

I would like to approach this question from a slightly different perspective. The question seems to be asked in an "either/or" manner (i.e., "... and not millions of years").

My approach would be to ask the following: What if BOTH are true?

Atheists often approach such things as an "us versus them" or "science versus faith" manner. Many believers approach it the same way albeit from an opposite position (i.e., "faith versus science").

It is as if people approach the point in which atheists see faith as the enemy of science and Christians often view science as the enemy of faith.

To be clear: I have known people who are afraid to send their children to college out of fear that their children will depart from their faith after being exposed to "science" lectures from professors. Moreover, I've known scientists who were fearful of allowing their children to go to church out of fear of losing their children to "religion."

Yet, there are those who can complete their undergraduate and post-graduate courses at secular universities and leave stronger in their faith in Christ than they were going in.

Science is not a religion -- even if it sometimes seems that way. Science is about repeated observation through research and experiment.

Secondhand (or "novice") science (which is the version most people are actually supposed to) is simply accepting the word of scientists who have had their findings "verified" through peer-review. This is like going to a class in Physics, Chemistry or Astronomy and simply taking the textbook and lecture as "fact" because they are deemed to be "experts."

True scientists and engineers realize that there is much debate on certain intrinsic topics in scientific fields. During college, I lived in the dorms. My roommate was a graduate teaching assistant who taught most of the Physics and Astronomy labs. He's now a professor at a major university.

He was a very nice guy who got along with most people. We spent many hours discussing issues of science and faith. He had access to the university's observatory, so we would often go late at night and use it to view planets, galaxies and other celestial objects. One night, we even burned the motor for the telescope and dome (because the telescope must move to follow items as the Earth rotates). It was a lot of fun.

My roommate was very calm, gentle and friendly. The only time that I ever saw my roommate raise his voice was once during a discussion over theoretical physics with some post-graduate students. That was my first realization that there is much debate among physicists over certain topics. It was almost like seeing a debate over Calvinism on SermonIndex! So, while much of the science is considered established and even "proven" through repeated experimentation and observation, there is still debate over other issues.

I have a unique perspective in that I passed from being quite agnostic as a youth to believing in Christ. My mother became a believer when I was young; however, I had major obstacles to believing in Christ. One of those obstacles was the size and age of the universe.

The observable universe (the spherical limits to what can be seen from the vantage point of earth) are now estimated to be about 13.8 Billion light years. The universe itself is said to be considerably larger. There are many books and science websites to explain the basis for those measurements.

One of the obstacles to believing in the Biblical account was that the Bible estimates the age of the Earth since Adam to be roughly 6000 years (using the timetable of Genesis and Matthew). My issue was the fact that we can see light from stars that are significantly farther away in space -- millions and even billions of light years away. A "light year," of course, is the distance that light can travel in a single year.

As a youth, I reasoned that it would be impossible to see light that was more than 6000 light years away since a literal Genesis account points to a young universe. Yet, most stars and galaxies are measured to be much, much further away. This means that it took much longer than 6000 years for light to travel from that star to the Earth.

Even though I was forced to go to church as a child, this was something that I couldn't actually rationalize. Any time that I heard preachers or Sunday school teachers talk about the creation of the world, this was always an obstacle to accepting it as truth.

Now, I eventually came to faith in Christ Jesus. My story is not very different from any believer that comes to Christ in that there was a moment in which I passed from darkness to light and from "old" to "new." I was truly "born again." In fact, if there is any truth that I know to be real with every fiber of my existence, it is in that that God exists and that of Christ who made it possible for God to be known by his creation.

After coming to Christ Jesus, I have seen some amazing and truly miraculous things. I wouldn't be comfortable sharing many of those things because it would seem self-serving or even boastful. Let's suffice to say that I've seen and experienced things that defy nature. Sharing those things would certainly invite skepticism from other believers not to mention atheists.

Eventually, I began to approach science again. I was in high school and concurrently enrolled in college science courses. It never occurred to me to try and rationalize or bridge a "gap" between science and faith -- because I knew (without doubt) of the existence of God and belief in his Word. However, I did hear believers approaching the issue with an attempt to explain science by faith or faith by science. I do think that there is a danger in this as voiced in I Timothy 6:20-21.

Still, my faith in Christ Jesus is immovable. I am not intimidated by science or scientists. I took many courses in Chemistry, Math and Physics while in college while studying engineering. I also worked for NASA at Langley Research Center throughout college and into graduate school. Even at NASA, I knew some very sincere believers -- experts in their fields -- who weren't ashamed of their faith.

In regards to the question:

I feel that people can approach the question from various possible perspectives:

1.) The Biblical account of creation is not true, scientific principles are true and the Christian faith is little more than ancient storytelling.
2.) A young Earth/universe coinciding with a wide-spread conspiracy involving science used to deceive the masses away from the truth of God's Word.
3.) Neither science nor the Biblical account are true.
4.) The Biblical account cannot be taken literally in certain areas for which scientific observations and established principles seemingly contradict such account (e.g., age of Earth, size of universe, etc.).
5.) Both are true and the appearance of contradictions is based upon misunderstanding of both Biblical record and scientific reasoning.

To this end, my firm conclusions include:

- I am absolutely certain of God’s existence and the Gospel of Jesus Christ.
- I have engaged in enough personal observation and research to dismiss any great conspiracy theories (including the flat-Earth ideas).
- Many scientific principles are exemplified in everything from the computers that you’re typing upon to the cell phones that you use to the triangulation in navigation and flight.
- The Gospel of Jesus Christ is true and there is much historic evidence of histories and events of the Old Testament. Jesus and the apostles cited events, prophecies and individuals from the Old Testament as fact.

This rules out #1, #2 and #3; and, it leaves #4 and #5 for further consideration.

I’ve spoken with atheists who point to the apparent "contradictions” in the Genesis account of creation as something that can be used to dismiss the faith altogether. For instance, they point to the account that God created light and "divided” it so that there was day and night ”“ but this was before the creation of the Sun and Moon (on the fourth day of creation). They dismiss the literal account that the Moon is a "lesser light” since it produces no light whatsoever and only reflects the light from the Sun.

Now, it is entirely possible that God created the entire universe in the exact manner written in Genesis. After all, God is not confined to the laws of nature or this universe. He can make the night light up as if the Sun were shining if he truly wanted to.

Someone already pointed out to the possibility that God created a universe in which it appears (from our vantage point) older than it really is. The universe can indeed by billions of light years across but light "appeared” across the entire stretch of the space of the universe (even without stars yet created) because God commanded it to do so. This would be confusing because there is no basis for the observation necessary for science. So, scientists ”“ motivated by observation ”“ would cling to any other explanation.

Now, I would postulate a different option. This would be the "both are true” option. Now, as a disclaimer, I am not saying that the conclusions by scientists are simultaneously true or meet the Biblical standard of truth. Rather, I am saying that much of the observation and data can be true even as the Biblical account is entirely true.

This is where it can get somewhat confusing, so please bear with me. It must take into account the notion postulated by scientists and another assumption:

- Time is relative.

- God is not confined to our universe or time.

I’ll explain my thoughts on this in a post tomorrow.

"I might also add something at this point in the discussion that I think is important to keep in mind.

I have many brothers and sisters in Christ with whom I disagree on some points of Biblical interpretation. Yet these brothers and sisters are solid believers whose judgment I would trust in spiritual matters."

Well said Travis, I agree.

Christopher,

Please spare us from part 2.

I don't have millions and millions of years so I didn't have time to read your whole post.

You lost me here;

"What if BOTH are true?"

And ya'll will tell me you prayed before posting this trash.

Hi Savannah,

Yes, I did pray. I pray always over everything. I'm sad that you felt assured enough to dismiss it as "trash" without having even read it.

Christopher: Well said post.

But you are proving my point very well, the common man 4000 years ago could not have a creation in 6 days because he didn't have the technology or the advanced studies to give him permission to "believe" what is true about our world and universe. In short only the elite get the truth and the rest are ignorant dolts.

What you are proposing in essence is the ancient man was merely ignorant and superstitious about the creation of God, and since we subscribe to materialist philosophies now all is explainable...and the bible narrative is relegated to antiquity.

I realized you stumbled over light getting to the earth from stars so far away, but why would you think that God didn't bring the light from his created stars in an instant...since he created the stars from nothing the light from those stars was delivered to validate their existence and their subsequent usage for times and seasons.
For me there is no disconnect between the creation of the star and the light from that star being delivered over a vast amount of distance...my faith apprehends both and I don't have to do any scripture nullifying to do it.

Do you see? This generation of science-minded Christians has said "those ancients knew nothing true", But we know because our science has given us permission to believe.

I do not pit faith against science, I never have, there is no true science that is going to find the scriptures at fault. God validates truth and whatever man finds in God's world belongs to God. Science today has the overlay of centuries humanism, agnosticism, atheism, skepticism...and our experts are proud of it. They cannot be trusted, they cannot be interpreters of truth and they cannot be given the reigns to dictate to the Church what parts of the bible are true and what are not.
I understand you compartmentalize salvation away from creation. I do not.

The idea of two extremely dissimilar things being true at the same time is not unprecedented- like perhaps one of the most sacred tenets of Christianity- namely that Jesus was both God and man.

Todd,

Not wise at all to make comparisons between the created and the Creator.

He is not on equal par with created things to use the example you have.

He is unfathomable these things are not. By doing as you have you show that you have a very low view of God.

The scribes and pharisees even knew better, and would not so much as pen His Name.

But then I shouldn't be surprised, knowing where you've been schooled.

Question. Was the writer of Ecclesiastes correct when he said in 1:5 "The sun also ariseth, and the sun goeth down, and hasteth to his place where he arose.?"

It's too bad that you're sad. But do not be sad for me, be sad for the university and her children.

I would only wonder what university you learned this from.

I am sure you have not learned this seated at the feet of the Living Christ Who is both God and man.

But there are plenty more who have ears to hear what you are saying, than there are who are hearing what I am saying.

May God correct us both where correction needs to be applied.

wooooo...lets be gracious, anyone reading my posts know where I stand, but even in disagreement, I stand with Todd, Christopher and anyone else that is my brother in the faith. Lets give each other room to express themselves...otherwise this discussion room is being misused.

1john 5:1 Everyone who believes that Jesus is the Christ has been born of God, and everyone who loves the Father loves whoever has been born of him. ESV

Ecclesiastes 1:5 is not some trite figure of speech like, "What goes up, must come down."

Don't make it out to be that way!

Todd:
I would not say it explains it. It describes it, and accurately. Genesis is not a book of poetry. It is a book of history. If I give an account of what happened, I might summarize for the sake of chronology, and then I might give a more detailed explanation of parts of my summary. Yet, if I am Moses, a writer of the Bible, and if I am inspired by God to write, then both accounts will be accurate.

I agree, a lot happened on day 6, but not so much that it is impossible for God nor for Adam. I am sort of a math nerd, so consider this. Lets take naming the animals for instance. There are only about 3500 created kinds of land animals and birds, including dinosaurs that are now extinct. (Not species within a kind, but kinds as the Bible says God created them.) If Adam were to be presented with a new animal every 10 seconds, which seems plenty of time for a perfect man with a totally perfect brain, arguably the most intelligent person ever to live since at this point he was not touched by the corruption of sin, to give a name, then this process itself would only have taken 9 hours and some change. And if God did this at a faster pace, say 7 seconds on average, which still seems plenty of time, then we could cut that time down considerably to something like 6 and a half hours. What God Himself did is easily conceivable in the other 15 hours that are left. No worries.

The appearance of niceness has gotten us where we are today.

Doubting the very Word of God. In this thread Genesis. Entertainment driven churches. Christian psychology. Loose living. Accepting fornication in the churches. Accepting sodomites in the churches. The list goes on.

Almost anything goes, except of course, a sharp rebuke. Because that's just not nice.

We've entertained all these ideas so long, that now if it's not entertaining we lose interest. Sort of like that thread started last week that got very little notice. It was about certain doctrines getting alot of attention, but when self denial is talked about everyone gets quiet.

Carry on...

Savannah, the verse clearly states the authors belief that the sun rises and sets. Was he right or wrong?

The inspired Writings are not to be questioned as to whether they're right or wrong. Our understanding of them is to be questioned.

I do not stand in judgment of God's Word.

Wow. Willful ignorance. Is that what God called us to? He certainly didn't call us to believe the bible is literally true, that commandment came by men NOT by God therefore know that you stand firm in the traditions of men and not in what is actually true.

Savannah,

I think that you misunderstand my intent or the gist behind my post. It may be due to your not having read it or that I just didn't word it well.

To be clear: I believe in a young Earth. I believe in a young universe. However, I also believe that time is relative -- which is why it can be 6000 years old yet measured as much older.

I will explain my rationale in my post tomorrow.

Hi Savannah: I do not want to appear nice, I want to be nice. My brothers who disagree with me warrant no rebuke from me, though I word my posts strongly at times I would rather be wrong and be corrected than be right and have a wrong heart towards them.

All those things you speak of that corrupt the house of God and the people of God need to be removed that is certain. Yet while I am here, I am a guest by permission given opportunity to speak by permission and I have the privilege to address men like Todd and Christopher and other godly men and women. It is I that needs to be reminded of humble discourse as Diane exhorted me to do.

I know you are strong in the faith, I am what I am by the grace of God.

Genesis 1King James Version (KJV)

1 In the beginning God created the heaven and the earth.

2 And the earth 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.

3 And God said, Let there be light: and there was light.

4 And God saw the light, that it was good: and God divided the light from the darkness.

5 And God called the light Day, and the darkness he called Night. And the evening and the morning were the first day.

6 And God said, Let there be a firmament in the midst of the waters, and let it divide the waters from the waters.

7 And God made the firmament, and divided the waters which were under the firmament from the waters which were above the firmament: and it was so.

8 And God called the firmament Heaven. And the evening and the morning were the second day.

9 And God said, Let the waters under the heaven be gathered together unto one place, and let the dry land appear: and it was so.

10 And God called the dry land Earth; and the gathering together of the waters called he Seas: and God saw that it was good.

11 And God said, Let the earth bring forth grass, the herb yielding seed, and the fruit tree yielding fruit after his kind, whose seed is in itself, upon the earth: and it was so.

12 And the earth brought forth grass, and herb yielding seed after his kind, and the tree yielding fruit, whose seed was in itself, after his kind: and God saw that it was good.

13 And the evening and the morning were the third day.

14 And God said, Let there be lights in the firmament of the heaven to divide the day from the night; and let them be for signs, and for seasons, and for days, and years:

15 And let them be for lights in the firmament of the heaven to give light upon the earth: and it was so.

16 And God made two great lights; the greater light to rule the day, and the lesser light to rule the night: he made the stars also.

17 And God set them in the firmament of the heaven to give light upon the earth,

18 And to rule over the day and over the night, and to divide the light from the darkness: and God saw that it was good.

19 And the evening and the morning were the fourth day.

20 And God said, Let the waters bring forth abundantly the moving creature that hath life, and fowl that may fly above the earth in the open firmament of heaven.

21 And God created great whales, and every living creature that moveth, which the waters brought forth abundantly, after their kind, and every winged fowl after his kind: and God saw that it was good.

22 And God blessed them, saying, Be fruitful, and multiply, and fill the waters in the seas, and let fowl multiply in the earth.

23 And the evening and the morning were the fifth day.

24 And God said, Let the earth bring forth the living creature after his kind, cattle, and creeping thing, and beast of the earth after his kind: and it was so.

25 And God made the beast of the earth after his kind, and cattle after their kind, and every thing that creepeth upon the earth after his kind: and God saw that it was good.

26 And God said, Let us make man in our image, after our likeness: and let them have dominion over the fish of the sea, and over the fowl of the air, and over the cattle, and over all the earth, and over every creeping thing that creepeth upon the earth.

27 So God created man in his own image, in the image of God created he him; male and female created he them.

28 And God blessed them, and God said unto them, Be fruitful, and multiply, and replenish the earth, and subdue it: and have dominion over the fish of the sea, and over the fowl of the air, and over every living thing that moveth upon the earth.

29 And God said, Behold, I have given you every herb bearing seed, which is upon the face of all the earth, and every tree, in the which is the fruit of a tree yielding seed; to you it shall be for meat.

30 And to every beast of the earth, and to every fowl of the air, and to every thing that creepeth upon the earth, wherein there is life, I have given every green herb for meat: and it was so.

31 And God saw every thing that he had made, and, behold, it was very good. And the evening and the morning were the sixth day.

Genesis 2 King James Version (KJV)

2 Thus the heavens and the earth were finished, and all the host of them.

2 And on the seventh day God ended his work which he had made; and he rested on the seventh day from all his work which he had made.

3 And God blessed the seventh day, and sanctified it: because that in it he had rested from all his work which God created and made.

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,

5 And every plant of the field before it was in the earth, and every herb of the field before it grew: for the Lord God had not caused it to rain upon the earth, and there was not a man to till the ground.

6 But there went up a mist from the earth, and watered the whole face of the ground.

7 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 soul.

8 And the Lord God planted a garden eastward in Eden; and there he put the man whom he had formed.

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.

10 And a river went out of Eden to water the garden; and from thence it was parted, and became into four heads.

11 The name of the first is Pison: that is it which compasseth the whole land of Havilah, where there is gold;

12 And the gold of that land is good: there is bdellium and the onyx stone.

13 And the name of the second river is Gihon: the same is it that compasseth the whole land of Ethiopia.

14 And the name of the third river is Hiddekel: that is it which goeth toward the east of Assyria. And the fourth river is Euphrates.

15 And the Lord God took the man, and put him into the garden of Eden to dress it and to keep it.

16 And the Lord God commanded the man, saying, Of every tree of the garden thou mayest freely eat:

17 But of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, thou shalt not eat of it: for in the day that thou eatest thereof thou shalt surely die.

18 And the Lord God said, It is not good that the man should be alone; I will make him an help meet for him.

19 And out of the ground the Lord God formed every beast of the field, and every fowl of the air; and brought them unto Adam to see what he would call them: and whatsoever Adam called every living creature, that was the name thereof.

20 And Adam gave names to all cattle, and to the fowl of the air, and to every beast of the field; but for Adam there was not found an help meet for him.

21 And the Lord God caused a deep sleep to fall upon Adam, and he slept: and he took one of his ribs, and closed up the flesh instead thereof;

22 And the rib, which the Lord God had taken from man, made he a woman, and brought her unto the man.

23 And Adam said, This is now bone of my bones, and flesh of my flesh: she shall be called Woman, because she was taken out of Man.

24 Therefore shall a man leave his father and his mother, and shall cleave unto his wife: and they shall be one flesh.

25 And they were both naked, the man and his wife, and were not ashamed.

To me there does not seem to be contradictions between the accounts, As if you do any depth or research this is only a contradiction in scholars minds.

Do Genesis 1 and 2 Contradict Each Other?
https://answersingenesis.org/contradictions-in-the-bible/do-genesis-1-and-2-contradict-each-other/

Gen 1 says plants were created on Day 3. Gen 2 says that plants had not yet sprung up because God had not sent rain (thought it never rained until the flood per most YEers)

also because no man was around to till the ground. But Gen 1 says plants were around 3 days before man was created and doesn't say a word about the plants needing rain.

Genesis 2

5 And every plant of the field before it was in the earth, and every herb of the field before it grew: for the Lord God had not caused it to rain upon the earth, and there was not a man to till the ground.

6 But there went up a mist from the earth, and watered the whole face of the ground.

Genesis 1

11 And God said, Let the earth bring forth grass, the herb yielding seed, and the fruit tree yielding fruit after his kind, whose seed is in itself, upon the earth: and it was so.

12 And the earth brought forth grass, and herb yielding seed after his kind, and the tree yielding fruit, whose seed was in itself, after his kind: and God saw that it was good.

13 And the evening and the morning were the third day.

Why do you struggle with the fact that God watered the plants through a mist (Gen 2 v6), In Genesis 2 it basically says that God looked after the plant life.

I do not see your contradiction here, God did things extremely differently before the flood than after it, Genesis 2 is also not a creation account, other than Genesis 1 (v1-3)

We need to look at the bigger picture. Did physical material exist before Genesis? Doesn't God live in a non physical world. The things made around the temple were like the things above.. Jesus isn't returning on a physical horse..

The physical appears to have been created for a temporary purpose and in an enclosed environment. It has no access to the things of God. That's closed off. We never existed before. We were brought into existence in a temporary fashion for God's purpose. He is going to roll it all up one day like a scroll and it will be like it never was. remembrance of former things will be gone.

God is bigger than we are. His plans deeper than ours.

As to science, we are earthbound, we only believe what others say. Others say we went to the moon. Others say Mars looks like this. Many say the earth is round or flat. I can't prove it. I see pictures supposedly of earth but It's funny how the continents change size every year and the clouds seem to repeat over and over as though they were doctored. I haven't been to the south pole and you can't either. It's blocked from any access by the military. Why? I see science as moving us away from belief. isn't that Satan's goal?

We really should give God credit. If so much of the book is untrue why do we believe it all? We need to take our pen knives and start whittling it away. That was done long ago and God had it rewritten.

I see the Bible written in coded language. It was recently discovered that Gen 1:1 had a message in it when looking at the meaning of each letter. I don't care what the world says, I'm sticking with his word.

RogerB His Word is Christ who is Truth, both inside and outside the bible. The bible is not the final authority, it is subject to the Word

Dom-

Because Gen 2 says plants did not spring up yet BECAUSE God had not sent rain yet and BECAUSE there was no man yet to till the ground. Gen 1 says plants were created on day 3, w/o rain or w/o a man around.

In other words, a plain reading of Gen 2 implies that man was needed for plants to spring up.

My main point is that in the first 2 chapters of the Bible we have inconsistency.

Also, I would prefer that we not link to outside sources or cut and paste from outside sources because I have likely read what Ken Ham has to say on the matter and I could post counters to what ken ham says. I'd prefer we just discuss it among ourselves.

In regards to Ecclesiastes it is obvious that verse was not intended to explain astronomical truths- the writer just said what we observed and we use the same lingo today. The second someone says that because scripture says the sun rises that we must therefore blindly accept false ideas, they are making a huge mistake.

I personally have no problem with the idea of the sun standing still for Joshua- it was simply a miracle.

From a plain reading of Genesis we see two seperate traditiins about the creation of the earth and the authors attempt to tie them together. I am not questioning the truth of either of them but that is what it seems.

As for the Eclessiastes quote my point is we reject the literal accuracy of this quote because now we know that is not true. The author, though speaking in the Spirit and therefore speaking spiritual truths, was in error concerning the science and physics of what he was saying. Therefore I submit that it is silly to stick to a literal interpretation of what Genesis 1 and 2 says and instead we should seek to understand what they were trying to say when they had the vision of what they could not put into words with their limited vocabulary, which if you do you will be blown away by the accuracy and detail of the vision of creation.

Folks, what's happening here?! I am baffled by the number of responses to this thread - don't have even the time to read it all but just a few remarks:

The Bible is not a scientific or historical book but contains both truths that somewhat concern both. When Solomon says "The sun riseth...", you say "It is not right from a scientific point of view!" But who told you that he was actually making a statement about physical law?! Don't we use the same language today (as Todd mentioned). We DO say "sunrise" and "sunset", although we know that from a scientific point of view the sun does not move!

There are many things we do not understand about Genesis 1 and 2. And remember there are parts of the universe God created without telling us :) So I believe, that it is perfectly well and sufficient to believe everything that is written in the Bible about creation. Oh yes, I am sure that behind the "Let there be light" hides something very powerful and majestic, perhaps some physical processes of which we are not aware - but IT WAS NOT A COINCIDENCE! I think one of the greatest mistakes of science is thinking that when you admit that GOD is in the equation - you'll never get to truthful statement.

"As for God, his way is perfect" - Psalm 18

TakeUptheCross...Folks, what's happening here?! I am baffled by the number of responses to this thread - don't have even the time to read it all but just a few remarks.

It would be interesting to know the percentage of folks minds/opinions, that have been changed during these long debates. Maybe we should have a thread and call it, "My Mind/Opinion Was Changed" and have a brief testimony from that person, on how and why their mind/opinion was changed. That would not only be a powerful thread, it would also be a very humbling thread, to help folks understand it's ok to not know everything. Scripture teaches that we can have a true and personal knowledge of God, but this does not mean we will ever understand him exhaustively. The Bible is clear that God is ultimately incomprehensible to us; that is, we can never fully comprehend his whole being. The following passages show this:

Great is the Lord, and greatly to be praised, and his greatness is unsearchable. (Ps. 145:3)

Behold, these are but the outskirts of his ways, and how small a whisper do we hear of him! But the thunder of his power who can understand? (Job 26:14)

For my thoughts are not your thoughts, neither are your ways my ways, declares the Lord. For as the heavens are higher than the earth, so are my ways higher than your ways and my thoughts than your thoughts. (Isa. 55:8”“9)

Oh, the depth of the riches and wisdom and knowledge of God! How unsearchable are his judgments and how inscrutable his ways! "For who has known the mind of the Lord, or who has been his counselor?" (Rom. 11:33”“34; cf. Job 42:1”“6; Ps. 139:6, 17”“18; 147:5; Isa. 57:15; 1 Cor. 2:10”“11; 1 Tim. 6:13”“16)

These verses teach that not only is God’s whole being incomprehensible but each of his attributes his greatness, power, thoughts, ways, wisdom, and judgments are well beyond human ability to fathom fully. Not only can we never know everything there is to know about God, we can never know everything there is to know about even one aspect of God’s character or work.

The reason I brought this subject up in the first place was the bible has to be a literal, historical, scientific account.

When I read the scriptures I think when I went to the Death of Darwinism Conference by Yacov Prasch with the different authors such as John Mackay his evidence of things like Polystrata fossils. If you look at current science it has a Christian foundation.

Also the fact is with things like fossils, how long would it take to cover a toe of a dinosaur by current evolutionary calculations, it is like 10,000 years just to cover a toe of a dinosaur.

Then there are fossils of fish eating fish, soft bodied creatures that should not be alive due to millions of years of decay.

JOhn Mackay also talked about the amount of humans that the Natural History museum keeps hidden because they were around the same time period of the dinosaurs.

When looking at science, I have done Chemistry and Physics.
The difference is the things in school you are just taught and you accept them until you actually look into what is the evidence for things such as evolution or say long periods of time as there is a big difference between real life and what is actually in the real world.

I have read the evolutionist books and the evidence such as Lawrence Krauss book the Universe from Nothing or Stephen Hawkins book The Grand Design and I can quote from them.

When looking at the bible it is sad to me that most people in sermons do not take the bible literally as when looking at the book of Ephesians, the archaeology is tremendous, we are dealing with a real life place and people or someone like the Hittites you can read there Akkadian Literature.

It saddens my heart as Christian tend not to know Science or the Bible that well and tend to quote other people and not go back to original sources, when I first started looking at revival history I would always find people who actually had a proper revival not a fake one.

When we are look at the New and Old Testament text. To verify the actual archaology and to dig into the depths. So when we look up a book or a place in a biblical passage we can go on Google Maps and look up the thing.

My problem is also with Science when I did Physics you went through these numerous scientist from kepler to Newton to others and did not realise that the foundation for there worldview was Christianity as any other world view does not provide a basis for what we believe as Hinduism, atheism and New Age beliefs do not adequately describe the World that we live in.

If we believe in the bible does that mean the same God got everything from science to history wrong and that would make God not God! This really upsets me with things like Liberal Theology saying Moses did not write the Torah.

To me it lessens the power of God to say that he can create the universe but not the way mentioned in scripture. Newton wrote more Bible Commentaries than he did things on Science.

If we cannot believe the Bible on Science and History why should we believe him about Salvation or the Gospel?

To me there are so many lines of evidence and I have read all the other so called Creation Myths including things such as the code Of Hammarabi.

If you cannot belive the Bible on Science and History why should you believe him on anything else

With the numerous evidences from Science and Archaeology and Space Exploration

2 Peter 3
Knowing this first, that there shall come in the last days scoffers, walking after their own lusts, 4And 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. 5For 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: 6Whereby the world that then was, being overflowed with water, perished: 7But 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.

The bible did predict one thing that people would deny a flood and that they would deny creation.

2 Peter 3
10But 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.

11Seeing then that all these things shall be dissolved, what manner of persons ought ye to be in all holy conversation and godliness, 12Looking for and hasting unto the coming of the day of God, wherein the heavens being on fire shall be dissolved, and the elements shall melt with fervent heat? 13Nevertheless we, according to his promise, look for new heavens and a new earth, wherein dwelleth righteousness.

Whether you like it not you are meeting that God one day and you will meet Adam and you are going to say to him you did not create the world in six days.

I want to go through the numerous dating methods from a chemistry method as noone hear actually looks at the science.

Do you really want to say to God when you meet him the Bible is not scientific and historically true ?

If you disagree the bible is not a historic book or scientific book actually provide examples please and do not quote hearsay!

The importance of this thread...It helps us all to see that those who say they believe scripture...believe it as long as it conforms to current scientific pronouncements.

So Ecclesiastes says the sun rises...and yet from the scientific view it is merely a rotation of the earth. So what? when you say the sun comes up, were you wrong? Did you need Hubble to tell you the sun was rising or falling? did you need science to reveal seasons from planetary tilt? No, science came along and told us what we already knew and we didn't need a college degree in physics to understand it.
Don't any of you see this? All of this scientific jargon has not given the ancient men anything they didn't already know. In fact, they knew more about the times and seasons, growing and planting than we do.

All of this is to move the believing man away from the necessity of belief that a God...Oh, the depth of the riches and wisdom and knowledge of God! How unsearchable are his judgments and how inscrutable his ways! "For who has known the mind of the Lord, or who has been his counselor?" (Rom. 11:33”“34; cf. Job 42:1”“6; Ps. 139:6, 17”“18; 147:5; Isa. 57:15; 1 Cor. 2:10”“11; 1 Tim. 6:13”“16)
MrBillpro...
who posted the above says God has all this...but cant actually tell a common man how long he made the sun, moon, stars, and man himself with any accuracy. The way you get out of it is to say "God is really big and we don't understand him" but the issue was not understanding the person of God, it was understanding his creative acts were done in a sequence and in a time frame...that many of you will not believe.

When will we give up on expecting the world to give you the truth? They cannot because they do not have the Spirit of truth.
I'm no conspiracy nut, but it takes no imagination to know that pharmaceuticals lie to us, governments lie to us, politicians lie to us, preachers lie to us, teachers lie to us, professors and deans all lie to us, propaganda is rampant in every devious form poured out through media we are addicted to.
Then after all that...my faith in a God who cannot lie, who cannot be false or misleading me didn't actually tell me the truth about the sun rising or how the earth was made is nothing more than "a blind faith not based on current evidence or scientific data".

I'll take my foolish and ignorant faith you can have your faith+caveat beliefs.

If it didn't work for the Christian in 33 AD it won't work for me either. If it worked for the Christian in 33 AD with all his ignorance, pagan background, still imperfect mind and heart...It will work for me in the absence of all these useless theories.

I utterly refuse a Christianity that must be supplemented by godless theories that were unnecessary in 33AD yet they lived in faith. We, of course, need a by-your-leave from the physics department at the local college.

Gloryandgrace.....MrBillpro...
who posted the above says God has all this...but cant actually tell a common man how long he made the sun, moon, stars, and man himself with any accuracy. The way you get out of it is to say "God is really big and we don't understand him" but the issue was not understanding the person of God.

MrBillPro you dont have to know henry ford to know how a ford works. You can figure it out by looking at the order of it. Same with God, nature is a testimony to his order and it can be perceived without being saved

Marvin-

To be fair, there were no Hubble telescopes etc in 33 AD.

You seem to think that scientific discovery is in and of itself evil and not to be trusted because most (but not all) scientists are non-Christians. I, on the other hand, feel that the very fact that we have a Hubble telescope requires that we trust science to some degree.

Newton was a smart guy but he was a prisoner of his time. Surely if he had lived into the 20th century he would not have rejected all scientific progress?

I have said it before and I will say it again: I understand how scientists might be wrong about the exact age of the universe, but how is it possible that they can be THAT wrong?

Someday I suspect there will irrefutable evidence of the age of the universe and I wonder what YE believers are going to say when that happens.

It's time to end this thread.Satan must be laughing his head off.

Sorry Tyler, I never should have even posted in this thread, it’s way to deep for me, as with the majority of threads these days. I guess just simplicity in the word, has become a thing of the past at SI. My guess is some of the newer members here, might think some of us here are quite nutty. :-)

It’s def worth taking into consideration....

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=Ub80TfY7tsI

//It's time to end this thread.Satan must be laughing his head off.//

Whys that? Just having a discussion.

Thanks for posting that link Fletcher. I recommended it to to the SI-ites months ago.

The other one (which I have posted a link to in this thread) coming out next month is excellent as well.

Todd: They will say...Praise the Lord, God told us the truth and we were faithful to trust him all along, Thank you, Lord.

Todd: No, Brother I love science and I enjoy it a great deal. What I will not do is chose the latest theory over the revealed word of God no matter how it appears the bible "might be wrong"
We were told of the gay-gene about 30 years ago, found out that was total bunk
We were told about evolution and are still being sold tickets to that Titanic even today. Total bunk
We were told about ape to man and the closeness of DNA...
That was bunk
We were told a 1000 other things all contradictory and in supposed debunking the scriptures...and they all fall.
I don't need a hundred more theories all attacking the veracity of scripture to realize...it isn't a conspiracy of some elite group of men, it is princes and powers of the air that are conspiring and they do it through the ideologies, science, philosophies, and religions of the day.

Overly simplistic? Not for me, I recognize error when I see it, even when its packaged in technological advancement praises, break-through scientific discoveries, worldwide acceptance of scientific theories which at the heart are nothing more than materialist explanations in order to remove the necessity of faith and trust in God.

You see my friend Satan is smart enough to try and flank us...he doesn't just rush straight at salvation by grace through faith in Christ...no, he will rush creation, he will rush and teardown the virgin birth, he will attack the origin of sin in man and relegate all findings to materialistic answers.
This is a flanking move and I see the enemy...and I will shoot him down. That means those who hold to contrary opinions...though they may be my brothers and sisters in the faith will be shot at too. It is not my intent to harm my brothers and sisters in Christ, but it is my intent to resist and repel this admixture of belief in the Genesis account with scripture-nullifying scientific theory that must and does sacrifice the Isaac of scripture for the sake of an Ishmael compromise.

Hi I think that to say that Genesis is not literal or the flood is really like saying David,Moses,Elijah,Joshua,Rehab etc are not literal,no difference.The foundation is the foundation how can you build something literal on the unliteral,urs staff

QUOTE:
1.how many people hear believe in a literal Adam and Eve and not millions of year.

Ans. I do

2.Do we believe the bible to be a historical book from Genesis to Revelation?

Ans. Yes.

I am learning about the physical benefits that are in-bedded in obeying the the WORD - most of it unknown to many. Just because I do not understand something does not mean it is not true. God rarely justifies or explains himself. Take his word for it and in time you will experience those "ah - hah" moments. Love it.

Sandra

//That means those who hold to contrary opinions...though they may be my brothers and sisters in the faith will be shot at too.//

Then you would be shooting at the likes of C. S. Lewis, Billy Graham, Dietrich Bonhoeffer, Charles Spurgeon, and William Lane Craig. Further, many major defenders of biblical inerrancy (such as B. B. Warfield and Gleason Archer) and strong opponents of liberalism (such as J. Gresham Machen) affirm Genesis as history-- but also affirm an ancient universe.

Hi Todd: Yea it does mean that there are some pastors and leaders who share opposing views, Wow, that's a shocker...

Some of these were just being introduced to the new science of the day and the philosophical foundation of that science had not reared its viperous head...but it has now.

Many of those men you listed are awesome in so many ways. I've read all of them, and some I have many books from them.

Apologist Craig is one of my faves, yet I dislike his Molinism and old earth views. But I don't toss the baby with the bath water.

I could care less what anyone believes on this topic. They can believe few thousand year old universe or a 16 billion year old universe, or that we actually live in a gigantic snow globe.

What I detest is the implication that those we disagree with on the issue are spiritual cretins. I don’t ever see this attitude flowing from old earthers to young earthers”” only the other way around- often to the extent of claiming and old earth proponent cannot be saved. Why is that?

The only reason I posted that list of names is that they can hardly be called deceived spiritual oafs. Legitimate respected believers, past and present, question the YE position for exceedingly good reason. I don’t see why YEers freak out over it.

Hi Todd: Those men would no doubt look at me and say the exact same thing about me for one reason or another, that I am deceived...and in some cases maybe a spiritual cretin. When I was in CAA Christian Apologetics Association for a while the old earthers were very contemptuous toward YE and didn't mince words about it. But that is my experience.

For the record, those men and no doubt many others on this website are better more faithful Christians than myself and yet hold opposing views. I must do as I believe my conscience and my understanding of spiritual truth directs me. As to judging my brothers to whether they are spiritual cretins I leave that for the goofy name callers. I for one do attack what I believe is false...and that falseness is connected to other things so it can appear I am making a large broad-brushing cut towards godly and faithful men. I believe in the sacredness of my brothers' faith and their relationship with God that I am not to judge or to imply that I have by resisting what I consider an error that they are any less a believer or consecrated to the Lord Jesus than I am. This sounds contradictory, but be that as it may, I stand with my brothers though I resist this conclusion they have made about Genesis.

The concept of day was introduced in gen1:3, but before that could it be possible that the heavens and earth already existed long ago in darkness, but then how would we explain the concept of light years though somebody already offered a way around about this in earlier post.

Thanks Marvin-- I know you weren't name calling and that it's nothing personal.

This is one of those topics that I like to discuss because I find it interesting but unfortunately it is a topic where folks get excited. I don't think it's a hill to die on but some do. I understand why they do- just don't agree.

Someday I suspect we will all be surprised when we learn the actual truth of the matter.

Then you would be shooting at the likes of C. S. Lewis, Billy Graham, Dietrich Bonhoeffer, Charles Spurgeon, and William Lane Craig. Further, many major defenders of biblical inerrancy (such as B. B. Warfield and Gleason Archer) and strong opponents of liberalism (such as J. Gresham Machen) affirm Genesis as history-- but also affirm an ancient universe.

I would agree that most of these people are not decieved, I think that C H spurgeon believed in Young Earth Creationist as Darwinism had not spread.

The Genesis Flood written by John Whitcomb and henry Morris was the first person to bring it up since then in the 1960,s

There has been a recent split over Biblical Innerancy with Mike Licona on the subject of Biblical Innerancy with Norman Geisler taking the view for Biblical Innerancy among the ETS with norman geisler forming his own society.

Norman geisler had to split from the Evangelical Theological Society over Biblical Innerancy.

http://normangeisler.com/tag/evangelical-theological-society/
http://normangeisler.com/tag/ets/

and had to set up the

International Society of Christian Apologetics
http://www.isca-apologetics.org/

Over the subject of Innerancy!

The reason I struggled with this recently I was talking with a well known professor online about sin and because he did not believe that Genesis 3 was a literal event and it provides a foundation for sin in the bible, there is no other ancient literature that is even close it has so much embellishment in it.

The Ancient Near East: An Anthology of Texts and Pictures
https://www.amazon.co.uk/Ancient-Near-East-Anthology-Pictures/dp/0691147264/ref=sr_1_13?ie=UTF8&qid=1508713640&sr=8-13&keywords=near+eastern+ancient

I used to listen to William Lane Craig alot and have listened to his entire defenders class and things like that, it is interesting listening to James White as he states in one podcast that he thinks that Catholicism is simply just another denomination and that he holds to the views of Andy Stanley who completely denies the bible with the old temple model and the new temple model.

To me a literal Genesis is vital as it destroys the foundation for the Gospel, if Adam is not a real person then he cannot sin, he is not simply an evolved ape which people like William Lane Craig and others say if you have to deal with people like Hugh Ross and others.

I do not believe this issue is a soterialogical issue to do with salvation but it destroys the foundation for the gospel and creation saying that God created through natural processes rather than through supernatural means and leads to Atheism in the cases of people like Charles Templeton and other famous atheists state it Evolution that lead them to Atheism.

It also destroys the fact say if Adam is not a real person or not the first created human we have problem.

The Uniqueness of Man - Professor Stuart Burgess
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2MvJbwA9SZQ

My problem is that I was conviced on the science before I was conviced on the actual theological side.

People like Dr John Mackay
https://www.youtube.com/channel/UClPlCdC6YD0kRpOERrSgpSA

I am tired and it is late and I have not posted all links to what I have stated

God Bless

DOm

What a lively discussion! It looks like everyone here believes that the universe was created within the scope of time and space and is not divine in itself; it is distinct from the Creator. That’s what matters.... surely!

" Was the writer of Ecclesiastes correct when he said in 1:5 "The sun also ariseth, and the sun goeth down, and hasteth to his place where he arose.?"

By the way: Surely no one here takes the bible entirely literally!!! The bible is replete with imagery, metaphors, hyperbole, etc, and "literal” renderings can be seriously incorrect. One day a crowd misunderstood Jesus when he spoke of bread. They thought he was talking about food - literally. He was talking about himself ”“ literally! Jesus accused them of unbelief!
Who is not above the propensity to forge "nearsighted” interpretations in our minds?

To me a literal Genesis is vital as it destroys the foundation for the Gospel, if Adam is not a real person then he cannot sin, he is not simply an evolved ape…

So, if one doesn't believe in "literal" 24-our days, then that person also believes Adam wasn't real and is an evolutionist? Can you prove this two-part view to be consistently true. If not, it is merely an assumption.

Consider Gen. 3:15 "He will crush your head, and you will strike his heel.” So… If I don’t believe that Jesus literally stomped on a literal serpent, does that mean I believe Adam evolved from an ape?? See the problem with insisting on literalism? We can miss the point ”“ badly!

Dom-

Hugh Ross believes Adam was a special creation. He does not believe Adam evolved from apes. He believes in a literal fall.

For about the 10 th time, I do not believe in macro evolution. Natural selection among species, yes (it is observed and obvious) but not macroevolution.

Roadsign, we are in agreement. He was scientifically wrong but spiritually correct. It is possible the Genesis account is the same, and more possible when you consider the fact that someone that lived thousands of years ago is trying to describe a vision he saw of the creation of the universe!!

He was scientifically wrong but spiritually correct.

But why don’t we get into a quagmire over Day 3? The lights (sun, moon and stars) were placed into the "vault", that is, the space between the separated waters. Surely I do not need to believe that literally, since we now know that these "lights" exist far outside the earth’s "waters above” ”“ in outer space.

Wow okay yeah everyones technically wrong. Same goes for your interpretation of scripture because of all the biases you have from your culture, knowledge ,speech, comprehension and understanding that influence the way you read and see it. Do you really want to go down that route?

Oh brother...

"…biases … influence the way you read and see it. Do you really want to go down that route?

Regarding the current thread, here’s my personal take-away ”“ my summary so to speak:

The creation account is framed for us in a simple concise seven-day portrait. This is the framework for the Old Covenant Law and the Sabbath traditions. Centuries later, Hebrews presents all that as a "shadow” for the glorious redemptive promise: entering His Sabbath rest - salvation.

The Genesis creation account is a splendid backdrop for God’s glorious covenant promise. God, who by his Spirit breathed the ENTIRE universe into existence, also, by that same Spirit sustains our temporal home (a mere dot in the universe), and by the same Spirit breathes eternal life into his called ones ”“ along with an eternal dwelling with Him.

It’s just too overwhelming to fathom!

I’d love to hear testimonies from other folk ”“ of your "take-aways” from this long thread.

Hugh Ross believes Adam was a special creation. He does not believe Adam evolved from apes. He believes in a literal fall.

if you listen to William Lane Craig Defenders Class, When I was listening to it, he quotes Hugh Ross and states that God created Soulless beings in which God put human life.

I cant find the exact defenders class but hue ross believes in a local flood, to me both his science and his view of the bible is in question with people like hugh ross.

http://www.reasons.org/explore/blogs/todays-new-reason-to-believe/read/tnrtb/2011/08/26/bioinformatics-and-a-literal-adam-and-eve

http://www.reasons.org/explore/publications/rtb-101/age-of-adam
Age of Adam

When did Adam and Eve live? The Bible gives some parameters but leaves the question open. Three different lines of scientific evidence (albeit imprecise) help provide an answer. First, the oldest archeological evidence of humanity (tools, religious artifacts, etc.) dates back around 80,000 years ago. Second scientists have found fossilized human remains with ages in the 100,000-year range. Third, genetic dating using molecular clock analysis of mitochondrial Eve and Y-chromosome Adam yield dates between 100,000 and 200,000 years ago. The consistency of these three independent lines of evidence instills some confidence that Adam and Eve lived somewhere between 50,000 and 150,000 years ago. This date fits within the Biblical framework and strongly argues for a recent origin of humanity.

http://www.reasons.org/explore/blogs/todays-new-reason-to-believe/read/tnrtb/2001/09/30/the-leap-to-two-feet-the-sudden-appearance-of-bipedalism

Hugh Ross Q & A Session Sat 26 04 14
https://youtu.be/Fc9KqMXChqA?t=14m6s

The question starts at 12:07

One thing that Hugh Ross believes in is a local flood and not a worldwide flood, what you have to understand is that natural selection is not macro evolution.

Natural Selection there is loss of genetic information and with Evolution you have a gain in Genetic Information.
Evoultion can no way happen because it has not been observed, even thou some genetist use methods such as Genetic Drift and other things.

If you listen to Dr Georgie Purdom or even Nathan Jensen, there is not the actual mechanisms for Evolution to actually happen.

My problem is that I was conviced on the science before I was conviced on the actual theological side.

Deltadom, I’m a tad confused, being unsure of your objective with this thread. Why not respond directly to my last couple of posts, and explain how they relate to the sources you’ve cited. (That might convince me to check them out).

Also, I’m not sure of your "theological side”. How does it compare to mine, as I described earlier … with this addition:

The theme of completion is central to the Genesis creation account. God FINISHED it ”“ and then rested. This foreshadows the ultimate completion of God’s redemptive purposes, uttered in Jesus’s own words on the cross: "IT IS FINISHED”. The theory of evolution, on the other hand, leaves no sense of completion, or of divine order and purpose reflecting God’s covenant promise to humanity. That’s the problem with it!

Is this theological reflection faithful to scripture? If so, what would be the vital points of consideration in this thread topic?

I believe in six day creation I am classed as a young earth creationist , I was just stating what Hugh Ross believes which I am against .

The reason is I was debating with a professor over the subject over whether the fact that genesis 3 happened . I believe that Moses wrote the Torah And I have been meaning to do a post on the archaology of the bible

To me it makes a difference as viewing the bible as history makes a complete difference when doing bible study because I have studied different world views I know the views from a different perspective

Dom- Hugh Ross does not believe in evolution. Why do you keep saying that he does? And he believes in a literal Adam and Eve and a literal fall. The pile of dust from which God created Adam was soulless until God breathed into it.

He believes in a local flood-- so? Lots of Christians do. Why did God need to flood Alaska if no one lived there.

It is obvious he believes in a much older earth than you do, as do I, as do millions of other Bible believing Christians.

As Bill previously pointed out- there ain't gonna be no mind-changin in these here parts.