The Full Spectrum of Christian Belief on Origins - where are you?

We also must look at how God works in our everyday lives. Does He micromanage things for us now? Does photosynthesis work on its own, or does God purposefully step in and "push" each event in the direction He wants it to go? The answer, to my mind is yes and no. Yes, He is intimately involved in the process in that He developed the process (or allowed it to develop according to His plan) and, I think we can view God as IN every process. But, no, I don't believe that God makes a conscious, purposeful intervention in every aspect of the workings of life. A part of it is our desire to anthropomorphize God's nature a bit.

And even in the "course of human events". How much does God just "let happen" and how much does He control? Did He just guide that dog to run across my yard? Was that plane crash part of God's specific plan, or was it just life "playing itself out" according to the rules he established? While I believe that God can, and does, intervene in human affairs all the time, is it ALL directly guided, or do some things just happen in the course of natural events? These are more difficult questions, not limited to origins.

We do know that God had a particular and special plan for Man as compared to the rest of His creation. How He implemented the "specialness" of this plan is, and probably will remain, a mystery.

As for science, I think we gain a degree of objectivity by the structural elements of science itself. It is set up to minimize subjectivity by making all proposals subject to peer review and objective standards. So far, it has worked very well to come up with how things actually work. Remember, even the most ardent YEC would have to agree that they fully accept 99.999999% of the conclusions reached by the scientific processes about our natural world. One reason for this success is that contrary ideas which prove to be sound are actually praised and rewarded.

Can you imagine the fame, prestige and even wealth that would come with being the scientist that falsified the theory of evolution or developed a scientifically sound alternative theory that explained the evidence even better? After 150 years this has not happened. What has happened is that many scientists have been praised and rewarded for finding out exactly how the details of the theory play out, even if contrary to earlier concepts of the mechanisms. Change and challenge is welcome in science.

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In matters that are obscure and far beyond our vision, even in such as we may find treated in Holy Scripture, different Interpretations are sometimes possible without prejudice to the faith we have received. - St. Augustine, in his analysis of Genesis.

Thank you all for your thoughtful answers. I'm running a little short on time right now and since I'd like to ponder your ideas a bit, I'll get back to you in a day or so.

Thanks again!
=) Mandy

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"Our highest assurance of Providence seems to me to rest in the flowers. All other things, our powers, our desires, our food, are all really necessary for our existance in the first instance. But this rose is an extra. Its smell and its colour are an embellishment of life, not a condition of it. It is only goodness which gives extras, and so I say again that we have much to hope from the flowers."
-Sherlock Holmes, The Naval Treaty
Sir Arthur Conan Doyle

I would have to put myself under #3.

I guess I'm a mix of Progressive Creationists and kind of Theistic Evolutionists. I believe that science says the earth is 4 billion years old, but since the Bible talks a lot about a day/year time, I'm sure it has something to do with that. I'm not sure exaclty where I stand with it, but I do believe that God created everything and made Man special and unique from all of the rest of his creation. Whatever I question today, I'll find out at a later time from God! So I don't feel the need to debate it or worry about it now.

I am a very happy YEC. I can't get enough of it. It excites me to no end.
It's great knowing that God fit everything into his perfect plan.
The stars haven't burnt out yet,and nature still does the same things every
day and every night. I like reliability. It's a good thing!

I'm a dangerous number 8

While I lean towards progressive creationism, I'm becomming more of a origins-theology-is-not-a salvation-issue-IST every day.

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Definitely a young-earth-creationist here. But it occurs to me -- I once heard a physics professor say that if you rotate a pencil, you can look at that either as a pencil rotating, or the rest of the universe rotating around the pencil. The math works out the same either way. So, couldn't geocentrists always argue that everything in fact revolves around the Earth? It isn't a good inertial reference frame to do math in, but I suppose there isn't anything illegal about doing that.

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nm

Agree. Let scientists get on with their job and prove to us. We can then go back to the Bible and try to understand the scriptures. Won't that be more fun than trying to second guess how the universe and the living things are formed, based on the scriptures? There are many schools but at most only can be correct. Perhaps none will get it right in all aspects.