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A Soul’s Salvation Could Hinge On the Earth’s Age


Guest shiloh357

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Let me as you (and the others) this. Suppose someone came to you, said he was contemplating the gospel and becoming a Christian, but  just couldn't get his mind around YEC and couldn't accept it. Would you say "well that's too bad, you can't be a believer unless you embrace YEC"? Or would you suggest that if he believes that God exists, that he is sinful in need of a savior, and that he believes Jesus died and was resurrected for his sins he ought to act on that?

 

I have led people  to the Lord who didn't believe that sex before marriage was a sin. I have led people to the Lord who held to all kinds of erroneous nonsense.   We don't have to change to come to the Lord.  We come to Him just as we are, but He doesn't leave us just as we were.  I never said that belief in YEC is necessary for salvation, no matter how bad you would LOVE to be able to pin that on me and apparently are trying to do so now.

 

Sure. When I converted I was of that mindset also, though I have since changed my mind thanks to the Spirit. I still struggle over many questions. This one, about the age of the earth and evolution, is one that profoundly affects my life. That is why I'm engaging in this discussion.

 

I am not trying to trap you, or trick you, or even win debate points here. We're exchanging words on a subforum in a Christian forum. If I am mistaken about a view that you  hold, you could just tell me that. If we could move beyond the assumption of ill intent for the purposes of meaningful discussion it would be nice honestly. If that is not possible, I would like to know so that I know not to engage you in this format.

 

 

Alright, suppose that is true. Why restate this more than once? or at all really. It doesn't seem like a discussion point exactly as it could only really provoke me.

 

My point is that if your view stems from a lack of theological knowledge, it would explain why you are unable to see why you are unable to see the theological problems in your cliams.   Instead of relying on what your imagination says is possible, look at what the Bible actually says, and work from that point.  

 

 

Okay. I will outright admit that this isn't about what I think the best or easiest reading of the Bible is, though that isn't unimportant to me either. This is about what actually seems true to me. It is not the case that me thinking that the best reading of the Bible would lead to the conclusion that x, that I will then believe x.  I admit this to you realizing how this sounds here, but I might as well put it on the line. If it's between the Bible vs science, I don't see it as a choice that way. It's merely, what really seems to be true about the world given all the facts available to me, and then how can I fit it all together in a reasonable manner?

 

What it comes down to that way is this. I don't think this is something that I can choose to believe one way or another. I believe what actually seems true to me. You could have an awesome argument that the Bible says the sky is red, but it isn't in my power to decide to believe that. Here, it seems as obvious a fact that the sky is blue as it does that the earth is billions of years old. It's not something I can just decide to ignore. But, at the same time, I take the Bible seriously as an authority, so I am left  making perhaps uncomfortable models.

 

My desire here isn't even to convince you that I have the best models or the best way of doing things, it's merely to communicate with others how I view things and why. I think it's especially important in this thread because I don't think I'm the only one who is this way about the age of the earth, or about evolution. I don't see how forcing a dilemma on me, or others, helps anything, when it isn't really possible to willfully decide to believe differently about things. It's not in my power to think the earth is 10k years old. I really think it would take an act of God to change my mind if that is the way it really is (or the available facts drastically change!).

 

I am certainly not against people arguing forcibly for what they think is true or engaging in these debates, but I don't think it's helpful to make these sorts of links to salvation.

 

I became a Christian because I believed that Jesus was risen from the dead, and I said my first sincere prayer in the wake of that realization. I didn't become a Christian because I came to believe the Bible is the inspired Word of God completely without error. My views of the Bible have changed immensely over time since I became a believer, but are still being worked out as you can see.

 

 

 

Alright, suppose I wake up and find myself in a deep pit. I'm fuzzy on the details about how I got in there, but I do know I'm stuck in the pit and I need help out. Me knowing precisely how I got there doesn't change either my need for help or my knowledge of needing help. That's the rather essential bit here isn't it? That the pit exists, that we are stuck in it, and cannot get out by ourselves?

But that is not the situation we are in.   We are not fuzzy about the details at all.  God has gone to great lengths to tell us exactly why we are sinners, how we got in that condition, what sin is and what the remedy for sin is.   So your analogy doesn't really apply here.    The only "fuzziness" you might have about sin is deliberately self-inflicted. 

 

 

It is fuzzy to me. I'm not fuzzy about my need to get out of the pit and my need for help, however.

 

My point is, you can be sure you are in the pit and need of help without being sure how you got there. That you think the fuzziness is completely  unnecessary isn't relevant to the point I'm trying to make.

 

 

 

We've run up against this wall before and I think we have a semantic difference. I am not arguing for unguided evolution and have not in our discussions. I have regularly argued for divinely guided evolutionary processes. Furthermore, evolution being an explanation for our *physical bodies* doesn't negate our having a soul. That you think evolution in any form negates that is just not the case.

 

I understand that, but you don't get to define evolution to fit what you are willing to accept.  Evolution cannot be arbitrarily assigned whatever values we want it to have anymore than we can do that with the Bible.   Evolution is a "theory" that rests upon the view that requires NO intelligent causality.   That is why it is so valuable to atheists and why any intellgent cauality or intelligent design to the unvierse is so hotly contested and rejected by mainstream evolution proponents.   Why do you think Evolution is viewed by so many as the #1 alternative to the Genesis narrative?   It removes the "unscientific" assumption that God or a "god" created the unvierse.   Evolution is unplanned and unguided and most of all it is impersonal.    You cannot have either the Bible or Evolution on your terms. 

 

I can define what I mean by 'evolution' all day. What I am talking about is what I mean by the term. If you need to change the term to 'alpha's version' that is fine.I realize there are atheists out there who love to find ways to allow for nature in all its order and complexity to arise spontaneously, and many see evolution as a key piece in that puzzle. But really, I don't' care about that. They could say the same about General Relativity (aha, a way to model gravity that doesn't involve God!) and it would not matter to me either. I believe God originated it. I believe God sustains it. I believe God could destroy it on a whim.

 

 

 

 

There's  nothing about evolution per se that necessitates that people deny that we are sinful, or ought  not to sin. Honestly I don't even see the connection in my own  mind at all.

 

In Evolution man is not special.  Man is not created in the image of God from an evolutionary mindset because man is actually nothing but a higher primate that evolved from ape like ancestors that we share with modern chimps/apes.   If that is the case, then there was no fall of man.  The Bible teaches that Adam and Eve were created separate from the rest of the animal kingdom.   Man was a special creation directlly from the dirt and we were created in God's image.  The Bible teaches that all of mankind stems from a single couple which flies in the face of the claims made by Evolutionists that man evolved from some unknown creature.  

 

"Sin" is a theological term, not a scientific term and you can't see sin under a microscope, but if man is really just an evolutionary creature, then sin has no meaning from that vantage point. 

 

 

 

Even as an atheist I would not have agreed with you. Evolution does not entail materialism or physicalism. You can be an atheist and have a philosophy of mind that is dualist (property or substance). You can be an atheist and be a moral realist. These things are possible and moreover, there are atheist philosophers who defend these positions with rigor.

 

 

 

 

I don't find this compelling. If God exists (as I think He does), that God intended to create us (as I think He did), and gave us a soul (as I think He did), along with commandments as to how to live, they are just as binding on me with evolution as without evolution.

 

Not to a mainstream evolutionist though.  Again, you are trying run with what you can imagine as possibe and not with how things really are.  You are operating from a customized version of the Evolutionary theory that you apparently think you can edit and tweek on the fly.     If man is just the product of evolution, then the entire biblical platform for the origin of sin collapses.  The entirety of biblical authority is meaningless and irrelevant because the story of Adam would never have happened.   The Bible's ability to define sin is also irrelevant  because it would simply have been written by men whose ideas of right and wrong would carry no more weight than anyone else's.

 

 

 

 

I don't really care what a 'mainstream evolutionist' thinks. The theory itself is a theory about common descent. It is about descent with modification. It is not about  how the rules of physics arose, whether or not God exists, or whether or not we have a soul.

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Who Is This Man From Galilee

 

Behold, a virgin shall be with child, and shall bring forth a son, and they shall call his name Emmanuel, which being interpreted is, God with us. Matthew 1:23

 

Who Spoke The Raging Storm To Calm

 

And there arose a great storm of wind, and the waves beat into the ship, so that it was now full. And he was in the hinder part of the ship, asleep on a pillow: and they awake him, and say unto him, Master, carest thou not that we perish?

 

And he arose, and rebuked the wind, and said unto the sea, Peace, be still. And the wind ceased, and there was a great calm. And he said unto them, Why are ye so fearful? how is it that ye have no faith?

 

And they feared exceedingly, and said one to another, What manner of man is this, that even the wind and the sea obey him? Mark 4:37-41

 

Who Used His Finger Play

 

When I consider thy heavens, the work of thy fingers, the moon and the stars, which thou hast ordained; Psalms 8:3

 

To Create The Cosmos

 

Canst thou bind the sweet influences of Pleiades, or loose the bands of Orion? Canst thou bring forth Mazzaroth in his season? or canst thou guide Arcturus with his sons? Job 38:31-32

 

Who Loved Us Before Creation

 

Forasmuch as ye know that ye were not redeemed with corruptible things, as silver and gold, from your vain conversation received by tradition from your fathers; But with the precious blood of Christ, as of a lamb without blemish and without spot: Who verily was foreordained before the foundation of the world, but was manifest in these last times for you, 1 Peter 1:18-20

 

Who Washes Us Clean

 

And from Jesus Christ, who is the faithful witness, and the first begotten of the dead, and the prince of the kings of the earth. Unto him that loved us, and washed us from our sins in his own blood, Revelation 1:5

 

Who Welcomes Us Home

 

Now unto him that is able to keep you from falling, and to present you faultless before the presence of his glory with exceeding joy, To the only wise God our Saviour, be glory and majesty, dominion and power, both now and ever. Amen. Jude 1:24-25

 

Who Is This Jesus

 

The Spirit of the Lord is upon me, because he hath anointed me to preach the gospel to the poor; he hath sent me to heal the brokenhearted, to preach deliverance to the captives, and recovering of sight to the blind, to set at liberty them that are bruised, Luke 4:18

 

Who Is

 

For by him were all things created, that are in heaven, and that are in earth, visible and invisible, whether they be thrones, or dominions, or principalities, or powers: all things were created by him, and for him: And he is before all things, and by him all things consist. Colossians 1:16-17

 

LORD

 

For unto us a child is born, unto us a son is given: and the government shall be upon his shoulder: and his name shall be called Wonderful, Counseller, The mighty God, The everlasting Father, The Prince of Peace. Isaiah 9:6

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I became a Christian because I believed that Jesus was risen from the dead, and I said my first sincere prayer in the wake of that realization. I didn't become a Christian because I came to believe the Bible is the inspired Word of God completely without error. My views of the Bible have changed immensely over time since I became a believer, but are still being worked out as you can see.

 

 

 

And this has been a highlight of my time at worthy. 

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I became a Christian because I believed that Jesus was risen from the dead, and I said my first sincere prayer in the wake of that realization. I didn't become a Christian because I came to believe the Bible is the inspired Word of God completely without error. My views of the Bible have changed immensely over time since I became a believer, but are still being worked out as you can see.

 

And this has been a highlight of my time at worthy.

 

:emot-heartbeat:

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If evolution is really the only truth out there, why is it necessary to maintain a stranglehold on it?  If anything at least let creationism be an elective course.

 

The fact is, evolutionists believe that my child doesn't belong to me, and that my sole responsibility is to keep it alive until it's old enough to take care of itself. 

 

That has to be true, right, since they won't allow the schools to teach my child what I want her to be taught.  My child isn't the only one in her school that has Christian parents, you know.

 

Evolution cannot stand on it's own merit.  So, the evolutionists have to resort to brute force indoctrination of our children while their minds are still gullible (naive).  It's the most corrupt thing I've ever seen.

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Thanks ayin! It's not a secret, nor do I intend for it to be, that I have struggled with faith a lot. But, thankfully God seems to be merciful and patient with me so against all my personal expectations I'm still around to harass you guys.

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It's not a secret, nor do I intend for it to be, that I have struggled with faith a lot.

 

If it is any consolation, we all struggle with faith in some manner, shape, or form. It is a part of what makes us grow, and grow closer to Him in the end.

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Thanks ayin! It's not a secret, nor do I intend for it to be, that I have struggled with faith a lot. But, thankfully God seems to be merciful and patient with me so against all my personal expectations I'm still around to harass you guys.

You are definitely not alone brother in your struggle. I see our short stay on earth as merely a faith test. Hebrews 11 is meaningful to me in this regards.

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Thanks nebula and spock. I've found my engagement here with you guys very encouraging.

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