Life began in earnest roughly 550,000,000 years ago. Adam and Eve incarnate on a populated, fallen earth. They spent the first 6 days surveying their new garden home, on the 7th day they rested.
We, meaning the Christian community, spend a whole bunch of time debating this yet, by your own admission, it makes no difference to a persons salvation. So why do you spend so much time debating it?
Now, you don't. You were created in God's image with the ability to understand His creation. Yet each time you are confronted with facts that you do not agree with you stick your fingers in your ears, close your eye and shout at the top of your lungs.
The odd thing is is that we agree on the fundamental underlying truth. God created EVERYTHING. We quibble over how and how has no bearing on a persons salvation.
Each time you are confronted with facts that you do not agree with you stick your fingers in your ears, close your eye and shout at the top of your lungs.
That was the story, it was sufficient to bronze age sheep headers but not in 2016 for an educated age. Its because the young earth creation story is in the Bible that people are willing to suspend common sense, not because it sounds true.
Your god used a cruel process of death, disease, sufferting and extinctions.
The God of the Bible created all in six days and declared it to be very good. Death and sufferring was a penalty for sin. Our Creator humbled Himself... going to Calvary to defeat death...the final enemy. ... . Death and disease may be the creative god of evolutionism; not the God of Scripture.*
Your god used a cruel process of death, disease, sufferting and extinctions.
The God of the Bible created all in six days and declared it to be very good. Death and sufferring was a penalty for sin. Our Creator humbled Himself... going to Calvary to defeat death...the final enemy. ... . Death and disease may be the creative god of evolutionism; not the God of Scripture.*
The God of scripture is the creator of death and disease ans suffering. God created evil, by His own admission. God created death and disease and unleashed it upon His creation. Whether He let it evolve over time according to His plan or created it and loosed it on His creation, God created it.
I have skimmed this thread, and I'm sorry to interrupt. I just almost finished watching A&E's "Big History", which sucked me in at first, but the third disk was all about evolution.
Basically in one episode, they said that we "evolved" to lay eggs (aka, placentas). They also said that we "evolved" to stand up "over the weeds". But in the same show they specifically stated that "since we don't have claws and fangs", that we "evolved" to have broad shoulders so we could throw spears (to hunt for meat). So, if evolution is correct, why did we not "evolve" to have claws and fangs to capture our meat?
I just feel this particular case for evolution is invalid. If they claim that we evolved to lay eggs and stand up, why did we not develop claws and fangs?
Also, this is not a vegetarian issue. The show specifically stated that we "evolved" to have broad shoulders to throw spears for meat.
The odd thing is is that we agree on the fundamental underlying truth. God created EVERYTHING. We quibble over how and how has no bearing on a persons salvation.
A person can be a Christian and reject Genesis. But two problems result.
1. Many young people reject the Bible and Christianity over the evolution issue. PEW Research did a large study of college age 'kids' who grew up in Christian homes who no longer attended church. There of course was many reasons but what stood out was poor answers from parents and church over our origins. Many in this group thougt The Bible was Gods Word... but we needed to pick and choose what to believe. (For ex... perhaps Christs resurrection was not physical).*
2. All Christian doctrine is founded in Genesis. A rejection of Genesis can lead to rejection , and or * compromise on all doctrine. It can lead to a deist view of God and destroy the purpose of Christs physical death and resurrection.
CabinetMaker..... evolutionism destroys the gospel. The God of the Bible is not an inept creator using mutations, death, extinctions and sufferring as a "very good" creative process. Read Gen *1... God spoke...and it was.*
The God of scripture is the creator of death and disease ans suffering. God created evil, by His own admission. God created death and disease and unleashed it upon His creation.
While God ultimately is the Creator of everything, it would be heretical to suggest He created us in His image ' by unleashing *death and disease upon His creation. Scripture is clear that God 'unleashed death and disease upon His creation' as a result of man's sin.*
A person can be a Christian and reject Genesis. But two problems result.
1. Many young people reject the Bible and Christianity over the evolution issue. PEW Research did a large study of college age 'kids' who grew up in Christian homes who no longer attended church. There of course was many reasons but what stood out was poor answers from parents and church over our origins. Many in this group thougt The Bible was Gods Word... but we needed to pick and choose what to believe. (For ex... perhaps Christs resurrection was not physical).*
2. All Christian doctrine is founded in Genesis. A rejection of Genesis can lead to rejection , and or * compromise on all doctrine. It can lead to a deist view of God and destroy the purpose of Christs physical death and resurrection.
CabinetMaker..... evolutionism destroys the gospel. The God of the Bible is not an inept creator using mutations, death, extinctions and sufferring as a "very good" creative process. Read Gen *1... God spoke...and it was.*
Evolutionism destroys the gospel. Even atheists understand that if physical death is not the result of sin by Adam, then the physical death and resurrection of Christ become meaningless.
Here is a atheist website explaining how your compromise defeats the purpose of God taking on human flesh.
ATHEIST "Christianity tells us that we are all sinners and doomed to Hell, unless we accept Jesus as our Savior. The reason we are doomed is that we are all sinners. The Apostle Paul says in Rom 5:12:
"Wherefore, as by one man sin entered into the world, and death by sin; and so death passed upon all men, for that all have sinned:
"The reason that we are all sinners is that we “inherit” the “Original Sin” of Adam.* As sinners we deserve death. Only Jesus’ death could atone for Original Sin.
"Right?
"That puts Christians in an awkward position.
"Christians have to hold that there really was an Adam and Eve and a talking Serpent in the Garden of Eden. They have to accept the creation story of Genesis. Most Christians have abandoned this position in favor of concepts like “divinely guided evolution”. A few Christians still argue in favor of creation a la Genesis but the arguments have been exposed over and over as baseless dogma and have rapidly lost traction among all but the most fundamentalist of Christians.
"Or, Christians can accept evolution, even if they qualify it as divinely guided evolution. Then there was no Adam in a garden with Trees of Life and Knowledge. If there is no Adam, there is no Original Sin. There is only our nature (is it sinful?). And our nature is the product of evolution (is it divinely guided?). If there is no Original Sin, then why did Jesus die?"
CabinetMaker said:
And I do not agree that all Christian doctrine is founded in Genesis.
It's amazing to watch people who don't know the first thing about a field of science (in this case geochronology) nevertheless anoint themselves sufficiently qualified to declare that entire field of science invalid.
The thing is Jose, that the program seriously dumbed down the audience. By contrast, go watch the episode 'White Feather' in the FOYLE'S WAR series. Do you know there are people who just can't get what is going on? It is way over their head. The very opposite of the PBS doc on this field of bones and ACRES of shells out in the wide open, picked at by birds, hail, high winds, snowdrifts, whatever. The first questions most people would have is simply buried by the omniscience of the PBS guy who is wondering whether it is closer to 90M or 100M (the only two 'sensible' choices).
Evolutionism destroys the gospel. Even atheists understand that if physical death is not the result of sin by Adam, then the physical death and resurrection of Christ become meaningless.
Here is a atheist website explaining how your compromise defeats the purpose of God taking on human flesh.
ATHEIST "Christianity tells us that we are all sinners and doomed to Hell, unless we accept Jesus as our Savior. The reason we are doomed is that we are all sinners. The Apostle Paul says in Rom 5:12:
"Wherefore, as by one man sin entered into the world, and death by sin; and so death passed upon all men, for that all have sinned:
"The reason that we are all sinners is that we “inherit” the “Original Sin” of Adam.* As sinners we deserve death. Only Jesus’ death could atone for Original Sin.
"Right?
"That puts Christians in an awkward position.
"Christians have to hold that there really was an Adam and Eve and a talking Serpent in the Garden of Eden. They have to accept the creation story of Genesis. Most Christians have abandoned this position in favor of concepts like “divinely guided evolution”. A few Christians still argue in favor of creation a la Genesis but the arguments have been exposed over and over as baseless dogma and have rapidly lost traction among all but the most fundamentalist of Christians.
"Or, Christians can accept evolution, even if they qualify it as divinely guided evolution. Then there was no Adam in a garden with Trees of Life and Knowledge. If there is no Adam, there is no Original Sin. There is only our nature (is it sinful?). And our nature is the product of evolution (is it divinely guided?). If there is no Original Sin, then why did Jesus die?"
Ok..... You might be correct. Which doctrine is not foundational on Genesis?
I do not believe that the death referred to in Genesis is physical death. I have always believed that it is is spiritual death. We were created in God's image and I understand that to mean, in part, our soul, not so much our physical form. Evolution does not threaten the gospel unles your faith in God is week.
The God of scripture is the creator of death and disease ans suffering. God created evil, by His own admission. God created death and disease and unleashed it upon His creation. Whether He let it evolve over time according to His plan or created it and loosed it on His creation, God created it.
Evil is not something sitting in the corner smoldering as in some substance or spiritual essence. Evil has no substantial, ontological existence.
Matthew Henry is helpful here:
Spoiler
But, It had two extraordinary trees peculiar to itself; on earth there were not their like.
[1.] There was the tree of life in the midst of the garden, which was not so much a memorandum to him of the fountain and author of his life, nor perhaps any natural means to preserve or prolong life; but it was chiefly intended to be a sign and seal to Adam, assuring him of the continuance of life and happiness, even to immortality and everlasting bliss, through the grace and favour of his Maker, upon condition of his perseverance in this state of innocency and obedience. Of this he might eat and live. Christ is now to us the tree of life (Rev. 2:7; 22:2), and the bread of life, John 6:48, 53.
[2.] There was the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, so called, not because it had any virtue in it to beget or increase useful knowledge (surely then it would not have been forbidden), but, First, Because there was an express positive revelation of the will of God concerning this tree, so that by it he might know moral good and evil. What is good? It is good not to eat of this tree. What is evil? It is evil to eat of this tree.
The distinction between all other moral good and evil was written in the heart of man by nature; but this, which resulted from a positive law, was written upon this tree. Secondly, Because, in the event, it proved to give Adam an experimental knowledge of good by the loss of it and of evil by the sense of it. As the covenant of grace has in it, not only Believe and be saved, but also, Believe not and be damned (Mk. 16:16), so the covenant of innocency had in it, not only "Do this and live,’’ which was sealed and confirmed by the tree of life, but, "Fail and die,’’ which Adam was assured of by this other tree: "Touch it at your peril;’’ so that, in these two trees, God set before him good and evil, the blessing and the curse, Deuteronomy 30:19. These two trees were as two sacraments.
The tree was not evil, nor good. It was a tree with no special properties apart from being set apart by God for holy use. The partaking of it by Adam and Eve gave them knowledge of their sinful act, and the evil consequences therein. The tree can be no more evil or good than a can of gasoline. It is the use made of the thing by moral agents that comes good or evil consequences.
The knowledge of good and evil, has a distinct meaning in the Old Testament. It refers to the ability to determine for one's self what is good and evil, what is helpful and harmful. In 1 Kings 3:9 Solomon prays for it so he can rule well. In Deuteronomy 1:39 little children don't have it yet. In 2 Samuel 19:35 senile people have lost it (Note: it is translated "discern between good and evil," but when we look at the Hebrew word behind "discern", it is the very same word as used in Gen 3:5 to mean "knowing" [good and evil]. So, there is no difference between the two.)
In fact, both Trees were sacramental in nature; but as with later sacraments, the two sacraments functioned differently. Concerning Gen.2:15-17, Keil & Delitzsch brilliantly summarize as respects the Tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil (on Gen.2:15-17):
The tree of knowledge was to lead man to the knowledge of good and evil; and, according to the divine intention, this was to be attained through his not eating of its fruit. This end was to be accomplished, not only by his discerning in the limit imposed by the prohibition the difference between that which accorded with the will of God and that which opposed it, but also by his coming eventually, through obedience to the prohibition, to recognise the fact that all that is opposed to the will of God is an evil to be avoided, and, through voluntary resistance to such evil, to the full development of the freedom of choice originally imparted to him into the actual freedom of a deliberate and self-conscious choice of good.
By obedience to the divine will he would have attained to a godlike knowledge of good and evil, i.e., to one in accordance with his own likeness to God. He would have detected the evil in the approaching tempter; but instead of yielding to it, he would have resisted it, and thus have made good his own property acquired with consciousness and of his own free-will, and in this way by proper self-determination would gradually have advanced to the possession of the truest liberty. But as he failed to keep this divinely appointed way, and ate the forbidden fruit in opposition to the command of God, the power imparted by God to the fruit was manifested in a different way. He learned the difference between good and evil from his own guilty experience, and by receiving the evil into his own soul, fell a victim to the threatened death. Thus through his own fault the tree, which should have helped him to attain true freedom, brought nothing but the sham liberty of sin, and with it death, and that without any demoniacal power of destruction being conjured into the tree itself, or any fatal poison being hidden in its fruit.
Within Scripture, evil and sin are never considered as "things" or "not things." They are considered to be actions and consequences. Per the full counsel of Scripture evil is relational, not material.
Evil is a broader category than sin. Sin creates and leads to evil. Cancer is a great evil that is the result of sin generally (not anyone's sin in particular save Adam's, e.g., John 9) but is not sin. All sin is evil, but not all evil is sin.
Sin is the action (lawlessness, e.g., 1 John 3:4) and evil is its consequence.
Satan denied the goodness of God in his rebellion. Said denial of the good is evil. Evil is an ethical state of said denial, thus, the privation of the good. The temptation of Satan brought Adam into this evil state. When Adam partook of the fruit he engaged in an ethical act of rebellion. Hence, the fall of Adam and all his progeny is not some ontological event, but an ethical event. Adam embraced no substantial thing called "evil". Instead when Adam turned from God and the good, he denied the good. In that denial of the good lies the ethical act which was evil—a want of conformity unto, or transgression of, the law of God.
From Scripture we see God on display as such a great and good God that evil acts do not defeat Him (Gen. 50:20; Romans 8:28), rather God uses evil to bring about the greatest good, as especially in the death of Our Lord, wherein lies the death of death for God's people. God's supreme wisdom is such that in both the use and defeat of evil He brings about more in Christ Our Lord than we ever lost in Adam.
We believe that this good God, after he created all things, did not abandon them to chance or fortune but leads and governs them according to his holy will, in such a way that nothing happens in this world without his orderly arrangement.
Yet God is not the author of, nor can he be charged with, the sin that occurs. For his power and goodness are so great and incomprehensible that he arranges and does his work very well and justly even when the devils and wicked men act unjustly.
We do not wish to inquire with undue curiosity into what he does that surpasses human understanding and is beyond our ability to comprehend. But in all humility and reverence we adore the just judgments of God, which are hidden from us, being content to be Christ's disciples, so as to learn only what he shows us in his Word, without going beyond those limits.
This doctrine gives us unspeakable comfort since it teaches us that nothing can happen to us by chance but only by the arrangement of our gracious heavenly Father. He watches over us with fatherly care, keeping all creatures under his control, so that not one of the hairs on our heads (for they are all numbered) nor even a little bird can fall to the ground without the will of our Father.
In this thought we rest, knowing that he holds in check the devils and all our enemies, who cannot hurt us without his permission and will.
For that reason we reject the damnable error of the Epicureans, who say that God involves himself in nothing and leaves everything to chance.
Whatever we do, let's not try to "rescue" God from the problem of evil via false theodicies, as do the open theists and others. Every time we try to make God's actions completely "reasonable" (to our finite minds) we run roughshod over the Book of Job and the cross.
God is not morally liable for evil, but we cannot say exactly what His relations are—it is beyond our capacity. Nevertheless, there is much we can say from James, causality, etc., but we can't give an exhaustive answer. How this all works we leave to the mind of God which is, as WCF 2.1 and elsewhere says,"incomprehensible."
At this point, we trust in God's goodness. Let's remind ourselves that we can know that what God has done is right and good, because God did it. The thought that we would have done things differently shouldn't function as an indictment of God, but as a grateful reminder that God is the judge of all the earth, that God is goodness itself, that (in a word) He is God, and we are not. And so where we cannot explain or where we do not understand, we can still rest and resist our itching ears for things contrary to Holy Writ. God has given significant help to the weakness of our faith in this regard by making clear that He is not the author nor the approver of sin.
I do not believe that the death referred to in Genesis is physical death. I have always believed that it is is spiritual death. We were created in God's image and I understand that to mean, in part, our soul, not so much our physical form. Evolution does not threaten the gospel unles your faith in God is week.
Your explanations trying to fit millions of years into the Bible..... and trying to fit death into scripture before sin, end up destroying the Gospel. If physical death already existed before sin... then why did Christ need to physically die and be resurrected? If the curse in Genesis 2 was only a spiritual death to Adam, then Christ only need to rise, or defeat, spiritual death. Clearly, in 1 Cor. 15:26, physical death was part of the curse which Christ conquers.
The Bible attributes physical death to sin...specifically referring to Adam. And here is the Gospel....
1Cor. 15: 21 "For since death came through a man, the resurrection of the dead comes also through a man. For as in Adam all die, so in Christ all will be made alive"Also see Rom. 5:12-19
CabinetMaker....To imagine that Genesis 2:17 is not referring to physical death, (as you claim) is refuted in Genesis 3:19 "In the sweat of thy face shalt thou eat bread, till thou return unto the ground; for out of it wast thou taken: for dust thou art, and unto dust shalt thou return."
Physical death ...returning to dust, IS part of the curse. It is something that Christ has defeated and we can join Him in the resurrection. "He will wipe every tear from their eyes. There will be no more death' or mourning or crying or pain, for the old order of things has passed away." Rev. 21:4
Your god used a cruel process of death, disease, sufferting and extinctions.
The God of the Bible created all in six days and declared it to be very good. Death and sufferring was a penalty for sin. Our Creator humbled Himself... going to Calvary to defeat death...the final enemy. ... . Death and disease may be the creative god of evolutionism; not the God of Scripture.*
Therein lay the answer to your dilemma, you have your own preconceived notions about how God was to have created life, that everything is supposed to be rainbows and unicorns, no one ever falls and skins their knee. The Bible presents temporary evolution. The fact is that, all that has happened would have been foreseen by the eternal God. There are no unforeseen accidents in the cosmos. You cant get beyond the erroneous philosophy of your own speculation.
* The speculative theory that death entered the world through Adam ruins the batch from the start. In my religion Adam and Eve were incarnate celestials who came from another world for a purpose under the authority of The Son of God, the creator of this world. They were to lead the world in the teaching about the universal Father in heaven (Adams religion).They were warned ("did God really say") beforehand about what to expect on our fallen world. Their human bodies were sustained by "the tree of life", but after their sin they were confined to the mortal death and ascension plan that man is already a part of.
* Jesus didn't end death, man still dies, it's normal. The death penalty for Adams sin is erroneous speculation on the part of mans very limited understanding of Gods cosmic plan.
* However, the failure of Adam and Eves ministry did have enormous consequences going forward for the world, for the environment we inherit due to, not one, but two catastrophic failures of celestial leadership. The fall and rebellion of Lucifer was deliberate, he never repented. Adam and Eve were outflanked, tricked, but still Eve and then Adam did try to assert their own plan fostered by the beast, into world saving, but they did repent. They had become impatient, the beast exploited that.
* Jesus didn't end sin, man still sins.
* People assume so much that Jesus frankly did not say. His original gospel was contaminated by these same kind of preconceived notions after Jesus left.
* All of this prevents sincere believers from acknowledging the facts of evolution.