The ultimate proof of Biblical creation and God

[rjp34652]

"Science investigates; religion interprets. Science gives man knowledge which is power; religion gives man wisdom which is control. Science deals mainly with facts; religion deals mainly with values.

The two are not rivals. They are complementary.

Science keeps religion from sinking into the valley of crippling irrationalism and paralyzing obscurantism. Religion prevents science from falling into the marsh of obsolete materialism and moral nihilism."

Rev. Martin Luther King, Jr.

just thought I'd share an idea from a great thinker of our time.....

but that's just me, hollering from the choir loft...

Edited September 15, 2012 by rjp34652

[bornagain2011]

"Science investigates; religion interprets. Science gives man knowledge which is power; religion gives man wisdom which is control. Science deals mainly with facts; religion deals mainly with values.

The two are not rivals. They are complementary.

Science keeps religion from sinking into the valley of crippling irrationalism and paralyzing obscurantism. Religion prevents science from falling into the marsh of obsolete materialism and moral nihilism."

Rev. Martin Luther King, Jr.

just thought I'd share an idea from a great thinker of our time.....

but that's just me, hollering from the choir loft...

Thank you for sharing! I believe science and christianity go hand in hand. People just draw different conclusions from the same evidence because of their worlviews. Some geologists will date the earth at about 10,000 years, and some at ...well....whatever it's gone up to now! 4 bill? I don't think God has "tricked" us, we just interpret differently. But if you think about it, God created everything to have the appearance of age, He created Adam and Eve to be old enough to procreate, He created trees already grown tall, He created the chicken before the egg, He created the stars with their light beams already attached so we could witness His glory. Do you know how long we would have to wait to see the stars if He didn't do that? We never would see them!

Why doesn't God just outright give us proof of Him? I think that answer is simple. He wants people to choose to love Him and choose to believe in Him, even with the world against us. I think He has given us enough evidence of Him through His Bible, and through the historical accounts of Jesus and the Israelites. The evidence, to me, is overwhelming and I could NEVER believe otherwise. And NOW I KNOW the living God and have a relationship with Him, so all that evidence comes second now!

I don't believe in religion, it confines people and keeps them trapped in ritual. I believe in christianity- a relationship with our Maker.

God bless

Natalie

[GlidingWings]

Born Again this was many pages of writing. I could only cover some of this so far. I guess sometimes things need to be broken up to discuss sections of a long presentation such as this one here. So I have not arrived at the Zenith of this article.

Once there was a mention of Evolution verses Creationism I had to stop there. Please know that there are more world views than Evolution or Creationist. We have cultural family ties and religious aspects of how the World began. When you are a witness you need to encounter the reality that there are lots of belief systems. You will need to prove to them about God who he is and how He made all things because Buddhists do not believe in a God. But I think they do believe in Reincarnation. As for Hinduism they have 3 powerful gods Vishnu, Shiva and I forget the other name. Do they believe in how the Bible created the World? So we must take in mind we are dealing with more people.

Please remember Paul traveled to many places to some of them as like Greece where they believe in Mythological gods. Paul had to break their belief from this to the one true God Greece wanted to know.

So actually Christians only defend the one God they believe in the Bible. How the Universe was made and how the Earth began. How life started on the Earth.

In that case the Bible must have importance even to back up Apologetics as to some of the evidence that has been presented.

It was said Creationism I believe was six thousand years old approximately. Where do they get these numbers? Genesis 1 says In the Beginning God created the Heavens and the Earth. But we learn later that Satan and the fallen Angels were caste down to the Earth. They were here before man because He came in the Garden of Eden as a Serpent in the very beginning. Genesis does not expound on Lucifer’s history but rather the History of Human kind. We need to go to Isaiah to learn how Satan fell on the Earth.

Therefore time elapsed. The first day was not considered until God “Created the First day on Earth before in that time for however long the Earth was of Darkness. There was no light. No 24 hour periods.

It was shown in verse 2 how God went to the waters and hovered above then. Saying let there by light. Then God saw the light and saw this was good God called the Light day and the darkness He called night so the evening and the morning were the first day.

When the Earth was first created it has not formed it was in darkness it has water on it but no light. No atmosphere. No plants no animals. Because at some point Satan must have been caste on the Earth after it was created in the beginning evidence being there in Genesis chapter three.

So how long was it between when God created to the time of casting Satan down to the time he made the first day of light and night time on Earth? .

Then please go to Genesis Chapter five Noah lived 930 years and Seth lived 912 years. Enosh 905 years Canain 910 years. Mahalajal 895 years Jared 962 years. Enoch 365years. Methuselah 969 years. Lamech 777 years and Noah lived 950 years so the generations between Adam and Noah are already several thousands of years. So then when you add the generations and families of Noah to Jesus and then of today we are talking over ten thousand years and yet not sure how much older than that.

The Bible does not tell us what day or year God created. Or when he began the first day or when Satan was caste onto the earth. But I do believe with chapter five shows us the earth is at least ten thousand years old in all history. How much more older is uncertain except to God who created the Universe and the world in His own plan and timing on things.

Concerning Evolutionists however I do consider that being their religion. They are a religion without God. I call them a religion because they do believe that what they teach is true to the school and to other people alike. They don’t want to be proved wrong why they say that truth can be different allows them to change their mind of things. They will look at something and say that is the truth. Later facts changes now they say now this is the truth instead. Evolutionists are continuing changing theories. Truth will change as time goes along and whatever evidence they think they have uncovered.

So in that is the case why they don’t accept God. If they did God would finalize His answer. They don’t want a final answer. They still think there is an answer but later there will even be a better answer and even later than that there will also be a better answer than all of these.

So Evolution also worked in Theory. That theory also makes Evolutions of changes when they feel they want to make those changes. . They see all that is made but they do not either do we see who made these things. Since God is not visible their evidence proclaims God does not exist. Unless God show Himself we will then believe.

But the Bible says That God reveals his invisibility by those very things He has made. God’s creations are proof of His existence. At least it is proof enough for me to believe so. I can’t say it all just happened. It all just happened because of some changes. Because then to me that is nothing but chaos. There is no logic to me in that the creations we see are the reflection and the Glory of God. Psalms 8 verse 3 I consider the Heavens the work of your Fingers the moon and the Stars you have ordained. I see patterns I see work. I see things being made. But who made them. Man can make things but not a star not a whole planet. God is the only logical answer that comes to my mind but this alone I believe. No one needs to take me to the science academics to uncover the most detailed forms of complicated science to make me believe there is God behind the work. The creation I see around me of water, mountains, trees the clouds are all the evidence to convince myself. Evolutionists are their own God. They want to have all the answers for life and their life. They don’t want any God telling them what to do. They are full of pride to tell them God made these things because He loves Man Kind. It will never satisfy their Heart. They will retort. You are wrong and I am going to prove you so. If not now one day I will show how wrong you are. Evolutionists believe some day they will uncover answers. Christians will no longer be able to claim there is a God. One day they want to laugh at us saying see we showed you and there is no God. Indeed they will keep doing so until one day the truth is revealed. When will this day be? A day we don’t know of yet. But the day will arrive that neither of us will expect that day. But it will happen. And the truth will speak with His mouth. And they will then believe.

[Tyler John]

To the message board in general...

What utter, unadulterated nonsense!

What on earth (or for that matter in heaven) does Bornagain think she is doing by basing her arguments on inaccurate definitions and suppositions of what "evolutionists" "believe". Of course, there may be some people who argue in the terms she suggests, but, speaking as a scientist, I have to say that I know very few. It is always dangerous to assume that one knows or understands other people's arguments, especially when one's opinions are based on self-selected texts, many of which are far from being primary sources. With my science hat on, I can assure Bornagain that her assumptions cannot be taken as generalisations and do not reflect the evidence-based opinions (not "beliefs") of the vast majority of scientists.

As a committed follower of Jesus I have to say that this type of argument is both unproductive and distracting. It produces no helpful insights into the rights or wrongs of evolutionary science, and distracts people from what truly matters, which is not evolution versus creation (a wasteful and pointless argument if ever there was one) but the love of Jesus.

To Bornagain personally...

I am perfectly willing to accept, Bornagain, that you have the right to believe whatever you want, the right to express your own beliefs, and the right to dispute with individuals about their views. However, you should be sticking to what you believe, not falsely defining what others think, and especially not generalising about other people. As ambassadors and children of the living God we have a duty to represent him wisely, and he has given us the Holy Spirit to enable us to do so.

[ByFaithAlone]

Question to my Evolutionary and scientific oriented Theists friends: what is more likely, that God, with us in mind, created the universe with initial conditions so that those two stones would collide at the right moment, with right energy and angle (creating also a lot of discomfort to many innocent creatures), or that we are here just because of pure chance?

Perhaps not those two particular stones or particular stones in general. However, the idea that God created the initial conditions such that atoms themselves could arise seems more plausible to me. Pure chance on two asteroids colliding in general near a planet that could contain life (assuming the that it is within our universe) is possible. Pure chance on the issue of the fine tuned constants (power of strong force, weak force, etc.) is statistically much less possible unless you start appealing to a multiverse. In that case, I begin to wonder why we do not see cosmic "bruises" where inflationary universes have split off from our own or where neighboring universes have touched ours. We also still have to deal with the idea that the inflationary universe or multiverse if it exists would still be past finite but that gets into other matters where we would probably end up debating contingent states of affairs.

Nice dodge, but you are not getting away with this

We are not talking of the fine tuning of the universe, big unification or inflationary multiverses. We are talking about the circumstances that favored human evolution on earth. And these circumstances are pretty down-to-earth (pun intended).

So, again, what is more likely, that God promoted our evolution by "finely tuned" colliding stones together with a big evolutionary and life waste, or that all this is just a Newtonian and biological accident?

Sorry for the delay and I honestly wasn't trying to intentionally dodge the question but rather phrase it in the best way possible. I would not say that the stones themselves would be finely tuned (although they could be for all I know) as I have no evidence of such fine tuning. They could be just due to chance perhaps. However, I would contend that the universe itself appears finely tuned as to allow for basic chemistry so in that sense it does allow for our existence. Hope that clarifies my position.

Honestly, I have more respect for the creationist stance, even the Adam and Eve theory, which, at least, makes the intentions of God and the associated theodicy (death and pain as a result of original sin) more clear cut. I think it is also absurd, but less absurd than the hypothesys of an infinite wisdom who goes through the pain of blind evolution, suffering, colliding stones, big cataclisms, etc. just for us. To believe this is equivalent to believing in a inefficient, indifferent or cruel God or, more likely, it is just a huge exercise of self-centered anthropocentrism.

Just to be clear, are you asking why natural calamities occur in a creation with an all-loving God? Secondly, are you claiming that an all-loving God and such disasters/problems are mutually exclusive ideas? Just trying to clear this up so I don't go off on a wild goose chase in the wrong direction without answering your actual question

[bornagain2011]

Okay, Like I said before, I didn't write that article in the OP. I have been studying it as a new way to prove creationism and thought it was a strong arguement. I don't know very much about philosophy and stuff like that. I go to community college for heavens sake! I wanted to see what the response on here would be before I used it with friends and family. I still think the arguement is very strong for reasons I already posted.

Thank you viole for your last response above, I agree 100%! Evolution and the Bible to not mesh! You have to believe one or the other for it to make sense.

[ByFaithAlone]

Hi BFA,

I know your position about the fine tuning of the universe. What I really do not believe is a God that fine tunes the universe so that those two stones collide at the right moment and with the right dynamics (the alternative being unguided chance).

I would tend to agree with this assessment. I do not believe that this is fine tuning either but rather random chance that these two rocks collided.

Answering the second part of your post: yes, I think that the Christian idea of God is irreconciliable with evolution by natural selection, for the simple reason that evolution and other cataclisms nullify the only valid theodicy Chrisians have, that is, that death and suffering are the results of our sins. Without fall there is no need of redemption, is there?

From the perspective of a theistic evolution, physical death occurred before the Fall which is considered to be man's spiritual death (his loss of communion with God).

So, I think you should decide what to accept and work it out for yourself what is more plausible: that disasters, colliding meteorites, merciless evolution, parasitic wasps, etc. are just part of an uncounscious and morally neutral world, or that they are mechanisms set in place by God to favor the ascent of a particularly "clever" mammal on an anonymous speck of an anonymous galaxy.

Ciao

- viole

Ok so the rest of your post largely deals with something known as the logical problem of evil or at least that is what I think you are going for. If I am understanding your argument, it goes as follows:

P1: Evolution is the most likely explanation for why life exists in its present form on Earth

P2: Pain and suffering exist in the process of evolution

P3: An omnibenevolent and omnipotent God (such as the one in Christian theology) would not allow such death and pain to exist.

C: An omnibenevolent and omnipotent God can therefore not exist.

The problem I think I would have is with premise 3. I would contend that a God could allow pain and death and still remain logically consistent with his nature. There are a few reasons why pain and death could exist.

1. From a theological perspective, death is nothing to the Christian but a gateway. It does not mean that physical death in itself is evil. To the Christian, spiritual separation (spiritual death) is the problem.

2. Pain serves to protect ourselves from greater danger. In that way, pain allows us to adjust and to learn (adapt if you will). For instance, burning yourself on a hot stove will cause you to not touch the stove when it is on in the future to protect ourselves from greater pain or even death. From a Christian perspective, God does not promise us a comfortable life within the natural world.

3. God gave his creatures free will. That is, a human can choose to kill another human in cold blood (murder) which is considered to be evil. However, at that point, he is not God but is acting as his own moral agent to choose as he sees fit. The evil that he enacts should not reflect on God.

In philosophical terms:

P1: There exists a possible world in which an all-loving God exists

P2: In this possible world, it is also possible that God grants his creatures free will

P3: With free will the creatures can choose to do good or evil

C: There exist a possible world in which an all-loving God exists and evil exists

So I can see really no logical contradiction between God and the existence of pain, death or evil for that matter. This was a bit rushed so it might not be as in depth as you wanted it to be so please ask questions.

[ByFaithAlone]

Which means, we are here by chance. I doubt we would have evolved without that asteroid.

The asteroid may be chance but that does not necessarily mean that we are here by chance. That only means that one event is possibly due to chance.

When you say "before the Fall", what do you mean? Is there a well defined point in our past that we can identify as "the Fall", evolution style?

The Fall is a theological term that relates to the spiritual separation of humanity from God due to the sin of the first humans. I do not know for sure which event in evolution we would point to as the Fall. Probably soon after the first homo sapiens but I doubt it could be measured biologically.

yes, even thought I do not recognize a Platonic morality, that is a morality that is decoupled from the organisms which need to deploy it in order to survive. I can, for instance, imagine a possible alien world in which killing 50% of someone's offsprings is consired moral, if progeny is huge and resources are scarse. We might not consider it moral because we do not make so many children. So, on this aspect, morality is subject to gene survival and can depend on biology.

My critique is based on human morality which is reflected, like many other things, onto all athropomorfic products of human's imagination.

Just to make things clear... So you are a moral relativist and believe that it is merely biological adaptation? So your critique against the morality of a creative God is based on the human perception that God would be evil to allow the painful process of evolution?

Well, I wonder what all those moral patients (dinosaurs) thought about this gateway theory when the asteroid hit the earth. Theproblem is not what happens to Christians, but what happens to all the ones who suffered and died before Christianity existed. Unless you believe that dinos and Cro-Magnons were also Christians who goes through this misterious gateway.

There is no Christian theological position that deals with what happens to animals after death so all I can answer from the Christian perspective is that we don't truly know. Additionally, the argument I pose really doesn't need to include the idea of a spiritual afterlife. The only part of the argument that truly matters is that death is not inherently evil.

Right. But all this pain is not very useful if you are being eaten by a T-Rex. But this brings about a more serious question: is this the only possible world that God could create, given that He is omnibenevolent? Please note that we are talking of a world in which the weak and young is eaten and parasitic larvae use other organisms to live and eat their hosts inside out.

He probably could have created another universe. However, that is irrelevant. All I need to prove is a possible world in which God and evil can co-exist and then the logical problem of evil fails.

3. God gave his creatures free will. That is, a human can choose to kill another human in cold blood (murder) which is considered to be evil. However, at that point, he is not God but is acting as his own moral agent to choose as he sees fit. The evil that he enacts should not reflect on God.

Free will...mmh. Free from what? You make it sound like you are much better off with free will, whatever that is. I am not sure. Firts of all, we are not free to do whatever we want to do. For instance, I cannot read other people mind. Second, do you think that it would have been possible for God to create a world with free will but without the evil associated?

You are abusing the philosophical definition of free will. Free will merely means that a person is able to choose between the options available to him or her. It does not mean that one is able to do anything they dream of at the particular moment that they are making the choice. Doing anything logically possible would be the definition of omnipotence, not free will. I don’t know if it would be possible for God to create a world with free will but without evil associated. Whenever one is given free will they have a choice whether or not to obey God. If everyone obeyed the precepts God sets before us (to love God with our heart, soul and mind and to love others as ourselves) then it would be possible for free will to exist in conjunction with a lack of evil.

In philosophical terms:

P1: There exists a possible world in which an all-loving God exists

P2: In this possible world, it is also possible that God grants his creatures free will

P3: With free will the creatures can choose to do good or evil

C: There exist a possible world in which an all-loving God exists and evil exists

So I can see really no logical contradiction between God and the existence of pain, death or evil for that matter. This was a bit rushed so it might not be as in depth as you wanted it to be so please ask questions.

There is no logical necessity of God being good (human good). The reason is simple. I could postulate an omni-evil (human evil) God and rebuke all attempts to deny him based on the existence of good in the world, by inverting your logic:

P1: There exists a possible world in which an all-evil God exists

P2: In this possible world, it is also possible that God grants his creatures free will

P3: With free will the creatures can choose to do good or evil

C: There exist a possible world in which an all-evil God exists and good exists

I would agree that there is philosophically a possible world in which this could be true. However, that does nothing to help your argument on the logical problem of evil. The logical problem of evil relies on the idea that in all possible worlds, it is impossible for an all-loving God and evil to exist. If I can prove one possible world in which evil and God can co-exist, then God and evil co-existing in a world is not mutually exclusive.

[ByFaithAlone]

viole, I'm not sure why the assumption has to be that only humans, and specifically humans after Jesus lived, are objects of God's consideration. You've brought that up several times now and I am left wondering why you keep asserting that is the case on something like a bare Christian position. There is nothing specifically about Christianity that entails such a conclusion.

Bary said this very well. Christians do not have a specific spelled out theological position on what exactly happens to these creatures but that does not mean that God does not care for them. Christian just simply must admit to not knowing on this issue.

[ByFaithAlone]

Don't have a lot of time to reply right now so my answers will be brief.

[well, this is one of the main problems of evolution. There is not such a thing as the first homo sapiens, and the idea of a first sin is, in my opinion, meaningless in the context of evolution. Do you really believe there was a discontinuous transition between amoral and moral agents? Or between organisms without an immortal soul and organisms with one? Without this discontinuity, which is not contemplated by evolution, it is impossible to identify an original sin. On a side note, even if there was such a discontinuity, I doubt we can call it a separation from God. Which God, the one of the australopitecus?

First let me note that I see the Genesis creation account as an allegory/poetic book obviously and that is why it does not spell out the exact method of creation. It is not intended as a science book. secondly, according to evolutionary theory, there could be a temporally first group of homo sapiens based somewhere in Africa or Mesopotamia so it is possible. Is it possible to measure when it occurred? probably not and I admit that.

So, I am as relativist as a different sort of plant that found different ways to optimize its sunlight intake. In this context, the definition of relativism is not only defused, but it is meaningless.

ok just wanted to clear that up. I would just like to pose a question to you on this. Why would morals appear evolutionary? Wouldn't the best path be ammoral utilitarianism?

Well, I agree. There is nothinhg inhently evil or inhently good.

That was taking my words out of context. I said there was nothing good or evil about death.

My universe is eminently morally neutral. As I said, my critique is based on the concept of good and evil that Christians (and most of humans) have, and I consider these concepts self-defeating in the context of theism. Either you accept my view, and God becomes superflous, or you insist on the objective and universal existence of moral teachings, and then you have a problem, in my opinion. I believe my view might sound too clinical and cold, but it has the advantage of simplifying things a lot, and we all love simplicity, don't we?

How exactly is it self-defeating?

I think this self-defeating. If God cannot create a world with free will and without evil, then either this is impossible, or He is not omnibenevolent or omnipotent. If it is impossible, then things like Heaven cannot exist, unless there is evil in heaven or you will not have free will in it.

If you note, what I said is that it is possible for free will and infinite good and no evil to exist if everyone were to follow the precepts of God (love God and love your neighbor). This is what I would say heaven would be like although there is a lot of theologically debate over if there is free will in heaven.

OK. Maybe it does not help me in finding a contradiction, but that does not help you to infer that God is all good. If both worlds are possible, what necessity is there to prefer one or the other? If there is no necessity on the moral qualities of God, then they are contingent, and this will open a whole new can of worms.

Philosophically I suppose this may be a tenable position that our universe is actually created by an omni-evil being. However, since we are debating the Christian concept of God as a possibility and whether or not that Christian God can exist in a possible world then I was assuming a omnibenevolent being. I will have to look into your theory a bit more and we would need another thread to debate it.