AnomalousSilence said:
- If we were created to worship God, then why would God delay u for billions of years? Even if time is meaningless to God or is quick to God, 4 billion > a few hundred thousand by a long shot.
I don't know. Maybe God's not on an ego trip?
Seriously, though I think it has to do with whether or not God created a real world (not a holodeck world) and whether God has respect for what he created. More on that in the next response.
- God could poof things into existence if He pleased - why wouldn't He?
Maybe because he didn't want us to think of creation as some sort of magic show. Maybe because he wanted us to take creation seriously, so he took creation seriously.
What do I mean by that? Ever hear of the Anthropic Priniciple? It's the idea that the universe was "fine-tuned" to support life, to be a place where we can live. It comes from the discoveries of physics about the fundamental particles/forces of the universe. If gravity had been a little stronger or a little weaker, the universe as we know it could not exist. If the electromagnetic force was a little stronger or weaker atoms would not hold together or interact as they do, and the universe as we know it could not exist. If an electron weighed a smidgeon more or less than it does, the same applies. Some other sort of universe might exist, but it would not be one we could live in. Only a universe in which electrons have the precise weight they do, where atoms can form, and gravity has the precise strength that it does is one we can live in.
Now these qualities of electrons and protons and gravity and light and so on came into existence with the initial formation of the universe. If God planned it that way, God made the universe liveable with us in mind right from the beginning, long before there was a solar system or a planet earth or anything living on it.
And if he then starts zonking the universe by poofing things into existence, he then undoes all this fine-tuning with each poof and renders the universe uninhabitable. And he has to set up the fine tuning all over again.
That doesn't make sense. It makes God look like a child who carefully builds a tower of blocks and then kicks it down.
I believe God shows respect for his own creation. He doesn't knock it in the teeth to add something new. Rather from the beginning he makes it in such a way that it will produce what he intends it to produce by using its fundamental particles and forces to make them.
Take atoms for example. The universe all on its own can only make the simplest of atoms: hydrogen and helium. But because God set gravity the way he did, hydrogen and helium can coalesce into stars. And stars, using hydrogen and helium as fuel for fission produce more complex atoms: like carbon, oxygen and iron. But it takes about 10 billion years to do this. Since these elements are necessary to life, you need a universe that is at least 10 billion years old for life to be possible.
You also need at least some of those stars to go supernova and produce really heavy elements like nickle and uranium. And you need a solar system with a second-generation sun that incorporates these heavier elements in its star and in its planets.
Why doesn't God poof things into existence? To show us he is not a whimsical child playing at creating. He is a wise God who plans for the future, who doesn't undo what he worked to create in the first place, who nurtures his creation rather than forcing it, and lets it unfold in its own time. Just as he lets trees grow at their own pace and blossoms take their own time to become fruit.
Because God nurtures creation instead of forcing it, we can also trust that he will nurture us. Because he made a universe that operates in predictable, reliable ways, we can trust that God is also reliable and worthy of our faith in him.
- How are the 7 days interepreted? The fruit? The geneaolgy?
Long before science was developed, people needed to explain the world to themselves and the way they did it was to tell stories about the world and how it came to be. God himself is a story teller and he gave his chosen people a set of stories through which he taught them things they needed to know about himself. These stories (including the geneologies) were never intended to be scientific or historical records. They do, however, give us fundamental theological truth in a simple, easy-to-remember, easy-to-tell story form. The theological truth of the seven days, for example, is the importance of making sabbath a part of our life. It has nothing to do with the chronology of creation.
- Any good websites I could go to?
You might start here.
http://www.christianforums.com/t1133651-what-is-theistic-evolution-an-explanation.html
And then explore these.
http://www.theistic-evolution.com/
http://www.ualberta.ca/~dlamoure/
http://www.iscast.org.au/
http://www.cis.org.uk/
http://www.asa3.org/ASA/topics/Evolution/index.html
And if you would like a good book on the topic pick up a copy of "Finding Darwin's God" by Kenneth Miller.
Theistic Evolution simply doesn't make any sense to me in regards to the Bible - and how evolution is a theory.
Do you know what the word "theory" means to a scientist?
Evolution makes scientific sense, but you need to take time to study the science to see that.
A theology that accepts evolution also makes sense unless one is adamant that the creation accounts must be scientifically and historically factual. Nothing requires us to interpret the bible in that way. But again, it requires an open mind and some serious study to see that.
