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YEC Limits God?


Guest shiloh357

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You have yourself conceded to so called micro evolution. The mechanism is there.

There's a big difference, though, between tiny adaptations to do something that would change a population of a Species to be categorized as a different Species (under the same Genus) and that of the many adaptations it would take for a population of a particular Family to eventually change into a population of something that would have to be categorized as an entirely different Family from the parent population.

 

I dare say the young earth notion is a stumbling block to scientists. Be it truth, there is no better way of putting these people off. As I posted above, concentrate on the gospel and let the other doctrine follow.

I agree that this is a huge stumbling block. But I do wonder how many of them would actually come to the faith would this stumbling block be removed?

 

That said, I wish there was more teaching on the theology of Genesis 1 rather than the scientific interpretation of Genesis 1. Sigh.

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Blessings Shiloh...

     I appreciate your OP & I think it was beautifully written,,,,not just because it is what I believe but because it is what God says .I was once a science major and a very rebellious young lady ,the more God tugged at my heart the harder I tried to refute His Word.....if I could just find one part of His Word that was something concocted by mere men then I would not have to bow down to this Sovereign God....I wanted so badly to be my own God,,,

     I found carbon dating to be inaccurate,radiometric dating a farce,the theory of evolution a joke....one thing after another just crumbled but His Word withstood every test I could come up with.................historically,scientifically,geologically...you name it!

      I am so happy & grateful that my loving Father was so patient with me & gave me enough rope to hang myself ,& He never stopped loving me for one moment ....thanks Shiloh for being so confident & bold,that is what we should be because we are the children of the Most High & His Timeless Truth is never changing.....Praise & Glory to God!!!!

                                                                                                                                       With love,in Christ-Kwik

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You have yourself conceded to so called micro evolution. The mechanism is there.

I dare say the young earth notion is a stumbling block to scientists. Be it truth, there is no better way of putting these people off. As I posted above, concentrate on the gospel and let the other doctrine follow.

 

"You have yourself conceded to so called micro evolution. The mechanism is there."

 

Conceded to what??...does evolution take credit for the Air we breathe also?  Just because the phrase has evolution in it doesn't make it darwinian evolution LOL. Another Ad Hoc Observation passed off as a Prediction.  Note the PRE-fix in PRE-diction..... it means "Before".  This is just like all the rest, Clumsy POST-dictions added to "evolutions" coffers then they take credit for some omniscient capability of the predictive powers of evolution.  R Ya Kidding Me  :huh:

 

The mechanism:

 

Natural Selection + Genetic Variation = "Micro" evolution....This is (Humans: Tall/Short, Green Eyes/Blue Eyes, Dark Skin/Light Skin, Puerto Rican/ Greenland Eskimo ... Dogs: Big/Small, Short hair/Long hair, Boxer/Collie) THEY'RE STILL DOGS and HUMANS!!

 

And, So......?  Hasn't this been going on for 6,000 years or so ;)

 

Did "evolution PRE-dict this?? :24: :24:

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Guest shiloh357

You have yourself conceded to so called micro evolution. The mechanism is there.

 

 

Everyone understand that animals adapt to new environments and conditions.  That is not really "evolution" proper.  The changes that take place within a given species are engineered by wise and loving Creator.

 

That is not a mechanism for evolution proper.  There are observed adaptive changes within species, but there are NO changes from one species to a completely new species, again like the claim that some lizards evolved into birds.  That is completely absurd, it is not emprically proven, nor can it be intuitively observed.

 

I dare say the young earth notion is a stumbling block to scientists. Be it truth, there is no better way of putting these people off. As I posted above, concentrate on the gospel and let the other doctrine follow.

 

That suggestion implies there is way to disconnect the Gospel from the rest of the Bible.   The Gospel includes Genesis because Genesis explains the need for the Gospel in the first place.   A scientist who is an evolutionist who doesn't believe that mankind started with only two human ancestors is going to have a hard time swallowing the fall of Adam in the Garden.   The Bible's definition of sin begins in the Garden of Eden.  Paul links salvation to Adam's sin in the Garden, which points back to Genesis 1.  The Bible is a interlocking system of progressive revelation.  It builds on itself begining at Genesis 1.   You can't simply unplug the Gospel from Genesis.   It doesn't work that way.

 

That doesn't mean that you have to be YEC to be saved, but what it does mean is that Genesis 1 is forever connected theologically to the Gospel of Jesus Christ.

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Limiting God

 

By Shiloh357

 

For millennia, the standard Christian understanding of the text of Genesis 1 was that God created the earth and the universe in six days.  Much of modern science owes its existence to scientists who were Christians.  They were, by modern standards, young earth creationists.   The argument in response to that reality is that when many of these scientists were alive there were no competing, or alternative views existed.  This claim is false ithat there were those who proposed evolution and thus an older earth well before Charles Darwin came on the scene.

 

The old earth view pre-dates modern science and has its origin in philosophy.  Many ignore the philosophical origins of the old earth view and that view is advanced as if it were scientific, proven fact.    Science has been desperately trying to prove that philosophical assumption for decades, to no avail.  All of the dating methods used so far work from the assumption of an old earth and begin with assumptions that skew how evidence is gathered and interpreted.  The dating methods used by scientists provide erroneous results, dating recently created rock formations to be millions of years older than they are known to be.

 

One of the most astonishing claims by those believers who hold to an old earth model is that we, who hold to the young earth model, are limiting God.   God we are told, is not bound by time, so limiting creation to six days is limiting God who could have created the universe in billions of years.  Since God is outside of time, there is no reason, we are told, to limit God to a mere six days.   But is it really the case that we are limiting God?

 

The issue is not whether or not God is bound or limited by time.  God is eternal, and of course is outside of time and is not bound by linear time as we know it.   So that point is not in dispute.  It is not about whether or God is limited by time.  The issue is, what has God revealed to us in His word?    What does God say He did?   We can sit around all day dreaming up scenarios where God could have done this or that, but those are meaningless speculations and do not provide substantive or intelligent reasons to discard a literal interpretation of Genesis 1.  God could have done it any way He wanted in any amount of time, but the issue for us is not what God could have done, or in how long He could have done it.  The question for us centers around what God said He did.

 

God said He created the earth is six days.   In Exodus 20:11 God told the Israelites that their Sabbath observance was rooted in the fact that God created in six days and rested on the seventh day.   How would those Israelite slaves have understood what God said?   Would these former slaves standing there still dressed in the rags they wore as slaves, understood six days to mean billions of years?  It is unlikely.  Another place where God makes the same claim of a six day creation is in Exodus 31:15-17:

 

Six days may work be done; but in the seventh is the Sabbath of rest, holy to the LORD: whosoever doeth any work in the Sabbath day, he shall surely be put to death. Wherefore the children of Israel shall keep the Sabbath, to observe the Sabbath throughout their generations, for a perpetual covenant. It is a sign between me and the children of Israel forever: for in six days the LORD made heaven and earth, and on the seventh day he rested, and was refreshed.  (Exo 31:15-17)

 

You will note not only the repeated claim that the heavens and earth were made in six days, but note also the emphatic nature of the commandment.  They were to observe the Sabbath throughout their generations (Heb. l’dorot), as a perpetual (l’olam) covenant and as a sign between the Lord and the children of Israel forever (l’olam).  So if God wanted to communicate to these people that the creation of the earth and heavens were longer than six days, He had the perfect opportunity to make that clear.  God is perfectly able to communicate clearly with us and doesn’t play word games with us.

 

One argument is that God was simply speaking in terms that ancient people could conceive of, that they had no concept of long epoch periods of time.   But the Bible speaks to ancient people in terms of longer periods of time.  The word “olam” is used to refer to long indeterminate time periods where eternity and the dateless past and dateless future is concerned.  It doesn’t mean endless continuous time, but refers to long indeterminate, successive periods of time.   God speaks to ancient people in terms of other long periods of time (Gen. 1:14, II Pet. 3:8).  He could have used the Hebrew word “dor” which also means long periods of time. It is a word that refers to posterity and is often used to communicate perpetual ongoing generations in the Hebrew text (l'dorot).

 

But unfortunately for us today, for many Christians, the evolutionary dating assumptions have become the father of biblical interpretation.  The assumptions made by the scientific community are the filter through which the Bible must be sifted and word of God is believed only inasmuch, as it can be modeled around the theories and assumptions of sinful men.   The evolutionary claims of science regarding the age of the earth have become the standard measure of truth to which the Bible must conform as an obedient slave.  Thus the limits being placed upon the Bible and by exension, on God, comes from those who reject a literal interpretation of God's word.

 

What disussion were you hoping to generate by this?  This is a forum, remember?  Was there a question hanging somewhere in there?

 

clb

 

 

The Point, as I see it is....

 

"But unfortunately for us today, for many Christians, the evolutionary dating assumptions have become the father of biblical interpretation."

 

It's Juxtaposing, Biblical Authority vs "science" or mans authority and highlighting the concept of filtering ones hermeneutics through science rather than the WORD.

 

It places the reader in that all to familiar position of................................ MAKING A CHOICE!!

 

 

It's a Poignant and very Illuminating Piece, IMHO. :thumbsup:

 

I suppose I must be resolved to never tire of saying this:  NO!!! It is juxtaposing man's interpretation of Biblical authority with man's interpretation of nature.  It is the exegesis of one of God's books compared with the exegesis of the other of God's books.  Two books.....both by God....in discussion with each other.  Augustine.

 

clb

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Why subject a seeker to this?  Why not rather emphasize Christ and let God take care of the details and convictions later?  

 

 If I had written an article about OEC  or Theistic Evolution and why I thought either one was biblically sound, I doubt you would be questioning the need to write such an article.  These are not nonessential details.  One's worldview is shaped by how you view the origin of man and humanity.  

 

YEC I think is for the firm Christian.

 

It is for everyone regardless of what stage they are at in their walk. 

 

 

If you predicate acceptance of the Gospel with acceptance of YEC, you are going to lose people.

 

History has shown that Evolution has a far greater potential of shipwrecking people's faith than YEC.   No one rejects God on an intellectual basis, but on a spiritual one.  

 

I am not predicating acceptance of the Gospel with acceptance of YEC.  That is a common false accusation that gets thrown around here in the absence of intelligent rebuttals.   I am not saying that you have believe in the YEC model to be saved.   I have never said or even implied it.  Perhaps you could actually read what I have said instead misrepresenting my comments and framing them to mean something I never intended.   Or am I asking too much of you?

 

I would not accuse you of that.....but only because I give you the benefit of the doubt.  Your zeal for YEC almost rivals my own insistence that Christ is the only way to salvation.

 

So then, I ask, if it is not essential to salvation, why is it so important that seekers (or anybody) read this article or care about the debate between OE and YE?

 

clb

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Why subject a seeker to this?  Why not rather emphasize Christ and let God take care of the details and convictions later?  

 

 If I had written an article about OEC  or Theistic Evolution and why I thought either one was biblically sound, I doubt you would be questioning the need to write such an article.  These are not nonessential details.  One's worldview is shaped by how you view the origin of man and humanity.  

 

YEC I think is for the firm Christian.

 

It is for everyone regardless of what stage they are at in their walk. 

 

 

If you predicate acceptance of the Gospel with acceptance of YEC, you are going to lose people.

 

History has shown that Evolution has a far greater potential of shipwrecking people's faith than YEC.   No one rejects God on an intellectual basis, but on a spiritual one.  

 

I am not predicating acceptance of the Gospel with acceptance of YEC.  That is a common false accusation that gets thrown around here in the absence of intelligent rebuttals.   I am not saying that you have believe in the YEC model to be saved.   I have never said or even implied it.  Perhaps you could actually read what I have said instead misrepresenting my comments and framing them to mean something I never intended.   Or am I asking too much of you?

 

"History has shown that Evolution has a far greater potential of shipwrecking people's faith than YEC"

 

I absolutely believe this: people who have grown up as Christians under the assumption that Genesis MUST BE READ LITERALLY and then discovering that perhaps the universe is older than what they've been taught will no doubt get shaken up a bit.  I blame this on their upbringing: it is such upbringing that creates people like Bart Eerman (a staunch antiChristian). They are raised not only to believe that Scripture is inspired,  but force fed a definition of what it means to be inspired--i.e. either creation happened in 6 days or Scripture is not inspired.

 

Very well....

 

.....But then we are not talking about people whose faith is shipwrecked.  We're talking about people who have no faith to begin with, and then are asked to pit one interpretation of Scripture (yours) against claims made by scientists; no surprise that they reject Christianity because they've been forced to make a choice that (as I and others believe) was never required of them by Scripture.  If you have stats showing that evolution or OE has actually prevented people from coming to faith in Christ, even though they have been introduced to interpretations that allow for both these claims, I'd like to see them.  In my experience, most unbelievers think Christians are naive or obstinately stupid because they insist that the world is only 6,000 years old; of course, we do not alter our convictions to accommodate unbelievers: many cannot come to faith because they disbelieve in the miraculous, which excludes Christianity.  But I and others with me do not think Genesis was intended by God to be read as read by YE.

 

I think you and I will both agree that it is better for a man to come to faith in Christ under the assumption that evolution or whatever is compatible with Scripture, then to reject Chrstianity because he is told he must make a choice between one interpretation of Genesis and science.

 

clb

Edited by ConnorLiamBrown
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Oh....I could not find it above, but it was claimed that Evolution could not be reconciled with the central themes of Genesis.  Here is an excerpt from C.S. Lewis.  Problem of Pain

 

For long centuries God perfected the animal form which was to
become the vehicle of humanity and the image of Himself. He gave it
hands whose thumb could be applied to each. of the fingers, and
jaws and teeth and throat capable of articulation, and a brain
sufficiently complex to execute all the material motions whereby
rational thought is incarnated. The creature may have existed for
ages in this state before it became man: it may even have been
clever enough to make things which a modern archaeologist would
accept as proof of its humanity. But it was only an animal because
all its physical and psychical processes were directed to purely
material and natural ends. Then, in the fullness of time, God
caused to descend upon this organism, both on its psychology and
physiology, a new kind of consciousness which could say "I" and"me", which could look upon itself as an object, which knew God,
which could make judgements of truth, beauty, and goodness, and
which was so far above time that it could perceive time flowing past.
This new consciousness ruled and illuminated the whole organism,
flooding every part of it with light, and was not, like ours, limited to
a selection of the movements going on in one part of the organism;
namely the brain. Man was then all consciousness. The modern
Yogi claims - whether falsely or truly - to have under control those
functions which to us are almost part of the external world, such as
digestion and circulation. This power the first man had in
eminence. His organic processes obeyed the law of his own will, not
the law of nature. His organs sent up appetites to the judgement
seat of will not because they had to, but because he chose. Sleep
meant to him not the stupor which we undergo, but willed and
conscious repose - he remained awake to enjoy the pleasure and
duty of sleep. Since the processes of decay and repair in his tissues
were similarly conscious and obedient, it may not be fanciful to
suppose that the length of his life was largely at his own discretion.
Wholly commanding himself, he commanded all lower lives with
which he came into contact. Even now we meet rare individuals
who have a mysterious power of taming beasts. This power the
Paradisal man enjoyed in eminence. The old picture of the brutes
sporting before Adam and fawning upon him may not be wholly
symbolical. Even now more animals than you might expect are
ready to adore man if they are given a reasonable opportunity: for
man was made to be the priest and even, in one sense, the Christ,
of the animals - the mediator through whom they apprehend so
much of the Divine splendour as their irrational nature allows. And
God was to such a man no slippery, inclined plane. The new
consciousness had been made to repose on its Creator, and repose
it did. However rich and varied man's experience of his fellows (or
fellow) in charity and friendship and sexual love, or of the beasts, or
of the surrounding world then first recognised as beautiful and
awful, God came first in his love and in his thought, and that
without painful effort. In perfect cyclic movement, being, power and
joy descended from God to man in the form of gift and returned
from man to God in the form of obedient love and ecstatic
adoration: and in this sense, though not in all, man was then truly
the son of God, the prototype of Christ, perfectly enacting in joy and
ease of all the faculties and all the senses that filial self surrender
which Our Lord enacted in the agonies of the crucifixion.
Judged by his artefacts, or perhaps even by his language, this
blessed creature was, no doubt, a savage. All that experience andpractice can teach he had still to learn: if he chipped flints, he
doubtless chipped them clumsily enough. He may have been utterly
incapable of expressing in conceptual form his paradisal experience.
All that is quite irrelevant. From our own childhood we remember
that before our elders thought us capable of "understanding"
anything, we already had spiritual experiences as pure and as
momentous as any we have undergone since, though not, of course,
as rich in factual context. From Christianity itself we learn that
there is a level - in the long run the only level of importance - on
which the learned and the adult have no advantage at all over the
simple and the child. I do not doubt that if the Paradisal man could
now appear among us, we should regard him as an utter savage, a
creature to be exploited or, at best, patronised. Only one or two,
and those the holiest among us, would glance a second time at the
naked, shaggy-bearded, slow-spoken creature: but they, after a few
minutes, would fall at his feet.
We do not know how many of these creatures God made, nor
how long they continued in the Paradisal state. But sooner or later
they fell. Someone or something whispered that they could become
as gods - that they could cease directing their lives to their Creator
and taking all their delights as uncovenanted mercies, as
"accidents" (in the logical sense) which arose in the course of a life
directed not to those delights but to the adoration of God. As a
young man wants a regular allowance from his father which he can
count on as his own, within which he makes his own plans (and
rightly, for his father is after all a fellow creature) so they desired to
be on their own, to take care for their own future, to plan for
pleasure and for security, to have a meum from which, no doubt,
they would pay some reasonable tribute to God in the way of time,
attention, and love, but which nevertheless, was theirs not His.
They wanted, as we say, to "call their souls their own". But that
means to live a lie, for our souls are not, in fact, our own. They
wanted some corner in the universe of which they could say to God,
"This is our business, not yours.” But there is no such corner. They
wanted to be nouns, but they were, and eternally must be, mere
adjectives. We have no idea in what particular act, or series of acts,
the self contradictory, impossible wish found expression. For all I
can see, it might have concerned the literal eating of a fruit, but the
question is of no consequence.

 

 

 

 

clb

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Guest shiloh357

 

I would not accuse you of that.....but only because I give you the benefit of the doubt.  Your zeal for YEC almost rivals my own insistence that Christ is the only way to salvation.

 

 

I don't need the benefit of the doubt because I have never said that YEC is essential for salvation. Here's what you and others can do.  You can respond to the arguments I have actually made instead of creating strawman arguments just you can have something to knock down.

 

 

So then, I ask, if it is not essential to salvation, why is it so important that seekers (or anybody) read this article or care about the debate between OE and YE?

 

Why does something have to be essential for salvation in order for me or someone else to be passionate about it?    Just because something isn't essential for salvation doesn't mean it isn't essential.   Truth is worth defending and promoting on its own merit against the wave of lies, history revisionism and false doctrines that are leading people astray in our world today.  The fact is that YEC is rooted in a belief in the inerrancy, authority and immutability of the Word of God.  That is worth defending and promoting in my estimation.

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"History has shown that Evolution has a far greater potential of shipwrecking people's faith than YEC"

 

I absolutely believe this: people who have grown up as Christians under the assumption that Genesis MUST BE READ LITERALLY and then discovering that perhaps the universe is older than what they've been taught will no doubt get shaken up a bit.  I blame this on their upbringing: it is such upbringing that creates people like Bart Eerman (a staunch antiChristian). They are raised not only to believe that Scripture is inspired,  but force fed a definition of what it means to be inspired--i.e. either creation happened in 6 days or Scripture is not inspired.

 

But that  assumes that the only factor involved was being taught that the earth is older than Genesis seems to indicate.  If you were dig a little deeper into the life of Bart Ehrman you would discover that there were some other things in play in his life that led him down the wrong path.  No one turns from being a Christian into somone like Bart Ehrman overnight.  There is a downward moral spiral that is in play as well.

 

Raising a child to love and trust the Bible has never, on its own, EVER led a person to reject the Lord and shipwreck their faith.  Even the Bible tells us to raise a child up in the way they should go, and when they are hold they will not depart from it.   It is never a belief in the faithfulness and trustworthiness of the Bible that causes a person walk away from the Lord.

 

The root of the problem lies in the fact that many Christians are not taught critical thinking skills. This is especially true of younger, impressionable minds of youth who have just gradated highschool and have entered college.   They are not taught how to respond to the challenges leveled at their faith by atheistic professors.  They are not equipped with why they should believe the Bible is inspired.  They were simply given a set of propositional claims to believe without the apologetic foundation needed to defend the claims of Scripture to be wholly inspired.

 

It's the saem reason that Christians can get sucked into the Mormons, Jehovah's Witnesses, Sevent Day Adventists or other cults.  They are not grounded in the truth of Scripture and are not prepared to answer the charges and false claims made against the Bible or the Christian faith.

 

.....But then we are not talking about people whose faith is shipwrecked.  We're talking about people who have no faith to begin with, and then are asked to pit one interpretation of Scripture (yours) against claims made by scientists; no surprise that they reject Christianity because they've been forced to make a choice that (as I and others believe) was never required of them by Scripture. 

 

 That is absurd.  Who is talking about going out and converting people on the basis of believing in YEC??   I don't go up to unbelievers and unload on them about YEC or whatever.  That has absolutely nothing to do with leading someone to the Lord.  If asked, I will tell the truth about what I believe, but my opening salvo in evangelism is not YEC. 

 

When I am witnessing to someone I take them straight to the resurrection of Jesus and why it is important to them.  I avoid, in witnessing opportunities, attempts to be led off into other arguments because I place the focus squarely on the resurrection of Jesus.  I have discovered that it is an amazing means of keeping the focus Jesus because the resurrection is the lynch pin of the Christian faith.   Everything stands and falls on the resurrection.   The ressurection of Jesus is the source of our hope and faith in our own future resurrection.  

 

I am not running around and calling on people to believe in the YEC model or burn in hell.   Again, I realize that in the absence of being able to mount a serious intellectually credible argument you have to erect a strawman that paints me as claiming that YEC is necessary for salvation just so you can have something to knock down.  It's easier to do that than to take the time to frame my arguments correctly and then provide a response that is intellectually credible, substantive, meaningful or important.

 

 

If you have stats showing that evolution or OE has actually prevented people from coming to faith in Christ, even though they have been introduced to interpretations that allow for both these claims, I'd like to see them. 

 

I have never made that claim.  I have noted that the potential is there.  I have also noted that 75% of churched young people leave the Christian faith within two years of high school graduation.   Three out of four Christian youth statistically will leave their faith and one of the main reasons is that they lose their faith while attending universities in the United States and are taught by atheistic professors that the Bible they were raised on is not trustworthy.  http://www.gotquestions.org/falling-away.html

 

Most of the time, these kids go into college with only rudimentary knowledge of the Bible.  They were never really that spiritually mature to start with.  They were heavily involved in church activities, parties and even went on mission trips but they were never taught the Bible to any significant degree.  

 

In essence, they were raised in Church, but they were never raised in Christ.  They were never given the survival skills they needed to navigate a world that is hostile to the Christian faith.

 

 

In my experience, most unbelievers think Christians are naive or obstinately stupid because they insist that the world is only 6,000 years old; of course, we do not alter our convictions to accommodate unbelievers: many cannot come to faith because they disbelieve in the miraculous, which excludes Christianity.  But I and others with me do not think Genesis was intended by God to be read as read by YE.

 

The problem is that we alter our beliefs to accomodate nonbelievers all of the time.  That is the problem.   We are willing to discard parts of the Bible, to sacrifice its integrity any time we feel the need to, espcially when it comes to avoiding ridicule.   Many Christians go along with the world in many areas:  Christians are shacking up together outside of marriage, Christian youth seen nothing wrong with pre-marital sex, they watch the same movies, listen to the same music, they look, smell, talk and walk like world, live hand-in-hand with the world, and then we wonder why they fall away from the faith.  

 

Christians in our day, have given up so much ground to the world's system in order to be respected in the misguided thinking that if we accomodate their beliefs, they will view Christianity has more reasonable and attractive and it simply isn't the case. 

 

God intended Genesis to be interpreted literally, just as much as you expect me to read and interpret your own words literally.  What is the point of writing something down, what is the point of expressing yourself in words if you didn't expect people to understand you as you intended.  To interpret the Bible literally, is to read it with an understanding of the object the author has in view.  NonChristians are far more honest about the text of Genesis 1 than Christians are, it seems.  But then nonChristians do not have a need to re-write the Bible to suit an agenda.  The irony is that it is Christians who are workting the hardest at  trying to erode the integrity of God's word.

 

 

I think you and I will both agree that it is better for a man to come to faith in Christ under the assumption that evolution or whatever is compatible with Scripture, then to reject Chrstianity because he is told he must make a choice between one interpretation of Genesis and science.

 

When I am witnessing to someone I am not preaching to them about their view of creationism.  Honestly, you have a very skewed way approaching this issue and you are making a lot of unwarranted assumptions about me that have no basis in reality or any post I have made, but again, when you don't have intelligent argument, i guess that is the kind  of low-browed tactics you are forced to resort to.

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