Red Lake, MN shooting a result of evolutionary thinking?

"You can believe that more people would accept Christ if you made him easier to accept, but changing the nature of God to make him more acceptable isn't what God meant by the Great Commission."

I am not interested in changing the Gospel not of making anything more appealing. I am interested in getting rid of a false and destructive docrine that some feel the need to add to the Gospel.

 

UTEOTW, I'm glad to see the truth is beginning to dawn to you!

You're now saying what most of us have been trying to say for hundreds of posts; "Just accept what God said, as He said it! No more, no less"

 

UTEOTW, I'm glad to see the truth is beginning to dawn to you!

You're now saying what most of us have been trying to say for hundreds of posts; "Just accept what God said, as He said it! No more, no less" </font>[/QUOTE]Science is not a doctrine. It is a pursuit of the conscious mind to determine truth and reality.

 

Nothing to do with the "FAITH" argument.

The point is, when science directly or subtly, contridicts the Word of God, which are you going to believe? Now obviously, I hope, I'm speaking of ANY area that the Word does address; not some area where there are just differences of opinion!

As I've said many times, if I were not a Christian, the statements of God re: creation would mean zilch. However I am a Christian, so the Word of God has far more validity than mans feeble attempts to show his brilliance. (Which, incidentally, continues to change. Just a fer instance, how many foods have been changed from GOOD for you , to BAD for you; & vice-versa in the past half century?)

 

Science can't contradict Scripture. All it can do is gather, sort and make predictions based on evidence.

 

Science cannot comment on matters of faith. I take it on faith that I have a sin nature. I cannot measure or detect my sin nature in a materialistic sense. I take it on faith that I cannot reconcile the debt of my sin to God through my own efforts. Again, science has nothing to comment on this. I take it on faith that Christ paid the necessary debt for me, and that my FAITH in His life, death and ressurection has imputed righteousness to me.

You can look at theology and doctrine as a science (which it is) but I assume the understanding in this forum is that the kind of science discussed here is evidentiary, temporal, materialistic or natural.

 

What do you mean by "according to" Genesis? Do you take it on faith that a vapour canopy was created on day 2, as practically all young-earth creationists used to claim until science disproved it so clearly that even they were forced to take another look at Genesis? Why do you have so much faith in your interpretations, in spite of the fact that others have different interpretations that do not disagree so sharply with reality?

Do you also take it on faith that there was a global census in Luke 2:1?

Luke 2:1: And it came to pass in those days, that there went out a decree from Caesar Augustus that all the world should be taxed.

If you interpret "all the world" as something other than "all the world" in this passage, why do you take it on faith that you can't also do this elsewhere? Why do you have so much faith that your interpretations are infallible?

 

Context, my friend, context!

God did not say that "all the world---"; Caesar made that decree, and as far as I know he (Caesar) thought that his empire encompassed the whole world, so this may be just a colloquism OR he could have believed it literally, or it could have just been wishful thinking on his part.

Regardless, it was a fallible human that used the term "all the world", not God, so no reason to accept as literally true.

 

No, it wasn't. Luke says "all the world" in describing Augustus' decree. He doesn't quote Caeser Augustus or the decree. If it is an error, then it is Luke's error, not Augustus'. However, the much more reasonable explanation is that the phrase "all the world" does not always mean the entire globe.

Regardless, if you hold to your interpretation, then it also makes the apostle Paul to be just as incorrect as Augustus -- and even when he was writing Scripture:

Colossians 1:5-6: Of this you have heard before in the word of the truth, the gospel, which has come to you, as indeed in the whole world it is bearing fruit and growing -- as it also does among you, since the day you heard it and understood the grace of God in truth...

At the time Paul wrote this, the gospel had not yet been taken to the "whole world" in the modern sense of the term, so it could not yet bear fruit all over the world. Once again, a biblical writer used the word "world" to refer to something less than the entire globe.

 

Well it's a good thing for you and I that salvation is completely irrelevant to faith in such decrees!

 

Mercury

Add to your list the reference to the whole world in the Gospels.

Matthew 4:8
"Again, the devil taketh him up into an exceeding high mountain, and sheweth him all the kingdoms of the world, and the glory of them."

From even the tallest mountain of the region, there could be only a limited view. I did the calculation a couple of years ago and it was on the order of 100 miles or so.

 

Yes, that's another verse that shows how "world" can mean something less than the whole globe in Scripture. However, I know a lot of people claim that the devil used some sort of magic or vision to show these kingdoms to Jesus, and some even claim that the devil showed him kingdoms past, present and future, so that's why I didn't use that one. The parallel account in Luke 4:5 hints at this by saying the devil showed him the kingdoms "in a moment of time" or "in an instant".

However, the plain reading of the verse definitely says that it is the height of the mountain that allowed the devil and Jesus to see all the kingdoms. (If it were just a vision, it could happen just as easily in a valley or even indoors and there'd be no reason to spend time climbing a mountain.)

[ April 20, 2005, 01:55 PM: Message edited by: Mercury ]

 

I never had my question answered: Since science projects an end, as well as a beginning, of billions of years to the earth, then if the "young earth" concept is wrong, is it also wrong that it will end abruptly with a final judgment, or will the sun go red giant, engulfing the earth, in a few billion years?

 

Science predicts the sun will go red giant, engulfing the present orbit of the earth, in a few billion years. Science most definately does not promise the earth will last until that happens! Probably the most scientifically feasible natural demolition of the earth would be by collision with an asteroid. But of course we will take whatever fate God has in mind for us all.

 

It depends on how long God tarries. Until He finds the time right to return, the universe will continue to unfold according to His laws and His plans. I find it unlikely that He would tarry long enough for the sun to go into a red giant phase and consume the earth but no man knows the day of His return. If it were to be in the far distant future, then it is possible for the earth to be consumed by the sun. But I do not think any of us think that the delay will be that long. It which case the inhabitants of the earth will be judged well before the earth is consumed by the sun.

 

Yeah, I agree with what Paul and Ute said. God can end this world and usher in the new creation whenever he pleases.

 

Certainly God can end this world whenever and however he pleases. He also could have begun this world whenever and however he pleased. If you "think that the delay will not be that long," it appears you would qualify as a middle-age earther rather than on 'old earther,' or your concept of the cosmos is (&lt;--], while a "young earther"'s concept is [--&gt. Or perhaps the incident that ends life as we know it, as in the asteroid collision or a mega-volcano, and its darkening of the skies and destruction 'by fire' is all the reality there is to "outer darkness" or the fires of hell, while our believing in an eteranl Kingdom in our conscious thinking, which will also end abruptly, is the only reality that concept. All this fits if you accept divine authorship, yet only within the bounds of scientific theory, as you do in regard to creation.

 

When I choose to speculate about the end of the world first of all I recognize it is sheer speculation undertaken for the fun of it, because reality has a way of coming to be in totally unexpected fashion, but I speculate anyway.

So I speculate that the end of mankind will come in a nuclear holocast, and at that time we will have the second coming of Christ. It would also be an ideal time to have the "rapture" take place.

This will qualify as ending the world "by fire" as predicted in the Bible.

God is in control of history, and He is not going to allow men to destroy the world except as He ordains it to be time to happen.

In any case, we will take the ending as God provides it.