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Tuesday, October 27, 2009

Interesting Comment

I followed a link from Boar's Head Tavern to a blog post from First Things/Evangel about inerrancy. The post itself was standard fare and not particularly insightful, but one of the comments was interesting to me:
R. Hampton

We have two “works” authored by God – the Universe and the Bible. One is the result of many generations of Man collecting, editing, and translating several religious traditions into one official whole. The other has had no contribution from Man in its creation. So which one might be erroneous?

It’s important to remember that scientists did not invent atoms or gravity or geometric relationships – those things existed long before Man arrived. All that Science can does is study what God has made as honestly and objectively as humanly possible.

So when you dispute God’s Universe, you are being blasphemous. In effect you are rejecting God — it’s as if you judged his creation objectionable to your personal sensibilities. So disgusted are you by his method of construction (evolution being just one tool) that you have substituted his reality for a simpler, self-gratifying story.

I don’t know why God used evolution or friction or any other property found in this universe, nor do I presume to answer for him. But I do know that his Universe doesn’t lie. Evolution (science) is our best understanding of God’s physical reality.

I think it goes a bit too far, as far as the level of certainty expressed. However, I agree with the general sentiment I have highlighted.....with the caveat that the universe doesn't lie, but that doesn't mean we don't frequently misunderstand it.

As Christians, we don't get to quit trying to reconcile physical reality with our beliefs about God. If everything we believe has no correspondence to reality, no confirmation in the material world, no points of contact between the transcendent and the mundane, then we have created a collection of trite abstractions, well-meaning but empty.

This doesn't mean that we need "proof" for everything we believe. Belief certainly has its mysteries and puzzles, which is what makes it belief and not certainty.

What do you think?

3 comments:

MInTheGap said...

"We have two “works” authored by God – the Universe and the Bible. One is the result of many generations of Man collecting, editing, and translating several religious traditions into one official whole. The other has had no contribution from Man in its creation. So which one might be erroneous?"

I have one really big problem with this. Let's suppose, for a moment, that this is right. There are/were errors in the text about origins and Moses (wherever he got it from) got it wrong.

There was one man who, thousands of years after Moses, appeared on the scene. He followers believed He was both God and man at the same time. He stated that "before Abraham was, I am" in reference to this fact.

He also said that He came to fulfill the law, and until all was fulfilled, none of that would fail.

Wouldn't you think that if man had totally corrupted God's message to Earth that this Man would have done something to fix it?

The Word that was with God at the beginning of time, the Word that was said of Him-- "without Him was not anything made that was made" would certainly want to make sure the record was straight. Wouldn't you think?

As for the Universe-- I know that it is cursed with sin. I know that the "science" behind Evolutionism is guided by an anti-god worldview.

terri said...

"As for the Universe-- I know that it is cursed with sin. I know that the "science" behind Evolutionism is guided by an anti-god worldview."

Now, you're just sermonizing. You don't "know" any such thing. You believe those things.....and those things might be true...or they might be partly true.


But you can't stand back and declare that you "know" what every evolutionist or scientist is guided by. You certainly wouldn't put up with scientists declaring that they just "know" that YEC-ers are a bunch of liars who purposely distort science, would you?

Of course not.

If you want YEC-ers to be given the benefit of the doubt, there needs to be a two-way street. You can't go around declaring that all of science has an anti-God agenda and expect any sort of dialogue......because that's pretty much a discussion-ender.

Min....is there anything.....anything at all that would even slightly make you rethink your beliefs about YEC?

Randy Olds said...

I've read through your posts on YEC, as well as this one and see no fault in your reasoning.

I tend to think that it doesn't really matter. I applaud those who champion YEC and I also respect those who hold to the traditional view, especially those who have taken the time to fully research the subject.

I have a good Christian friend with an advanced degree in Geology who still holds to the traditional creation view. He's told me how inaccurate carbon dating really is and that in fact most of the work in the field of dating the earth's age is nothing more than educated guesswork. He's gone on to explain how many of the fossils that we have could quite possibly be antediluvian but not much older than that, again due to the problems that exist in the field of carbon dating.

I tend to think that accepting everything that we read from the "top scientists" is about the same as believing everything that we read from our "top theologians".

Could God have created everything in six days as in the Genesis account. Sure, after all He's God.

Could God have used evolution and guided His creation over millions of years. Again, He's God and could have done it in any way that He saw fit.

Could God have created the earth as is represented in the Genisis account but allowed Satan to mess with it a little by throwing some fossils and such just to throw us off in our faith. Sure, why not.

The bottom line is that God is God and I'm not. I think that any one of these explanations and several that I haven't mentioned are plausible.

Jesus didn't see the need as MintheGap suggested, to fix any problems that might have existed in the Genesis account. He came here to show us how to live and then to atone for our sins on the cross, not to explain the origin of the universe.


Keep up the good work, Terri. I've enjoyed reading your posts of the last few weeks.

Randy Olds