6,000 Years?

[bob121]

@Jipsah Blood Drinker – I once had the same questions you’re raising, so I’m grateful for the chance to talk them through.

1. “A day is like a thousand years” (Ps 90 & 2 Pet 3).
   Both passages are about God’s patience, not the length of the creation week.
   Peter’s point is: “The Lord is not slow in keeping His promise, as some understand slowness…”
   If we use this verse to tell Moses that “day” can mean “epoch,” we also have to let it tell Peter that “1 000 years” can mean “a day.” The text is highlighting the difference between Creator and creature, not re-defining the word “day.”
2. What kind of “day” does Genesis 1 itself give us?
   Evening + morning + a number = the same phrase Moses uses for the 24-hour Sabbath in Exodus 20:8-11. The fourth commandment grounds the Jewish week in God’s week: “For in six days the LORD made heaven and earth… and rested the seventh day.” Israelites weren’t told to work for six epochs and rest for one epoch.
3. The “pre-sun light” objection.
   Genesis says the light source (v.3) arrived three “days” before the light-holders (sun, moon, stars, v.14-19). That’s only a problem if we assume naturalism – i.e. that ordinary light must come from a burning ball of gas. A theist already believes in a God who can produce light ex nihilo. John’s Gospel calls Jesus “the light of men” before the sun existed; Revelation says the Lamb is the lamp of the New Jerusalem. Scripture is comfortable with a direct, unmediated glory of God functioning as light. So the chronological order in Genesis 1 is actually a polemic against the surrounding sun-worshipping cultures: the Creator is not dependent on the sun.
4. Appearance of age vs. maturity.
   Adam is created as a full-grown adult, trees already bearing fruit, grapes already fermenting, starlight already hitting Earth. That isn’t deception; it is functional maturity. A doctor who delivers a baby at 10 a.m. doesn’t expect the parents to wait 20 years before they can have a conversation with him. Likewise, God’s universe is ready-to-use from the first moment. The question is not “Does it look old?” but “Did God say He used long ages?” If He didn’t, then measuring secondary processes (radiometric decay, tree rings, ice layers, etc.) simply tells us how the universe would have developed had God used only those processes. It doesn’t tell us how long He actually took when He spoke it into being.
5. Science and Scripture.
   Christian science is not “science minus evidence”; it is science within a worldview that allows for miracle, providence and revelation. Uniformitarian geology and Darwinian biology are also worldview-laden; they simply start with the axiom “no miracles allowed.” The debate, then, is not evidence vs. faith but which axioms best account for all the evidence – including the text of Scripture.

So I’m not asking you to stop thinking scientifically. I’m inviting you to let God’s own eyewitness report (Genesis 1) set the boundary conditions for whatever secondary means we use to explore His work. If we start there, the rest of the data – including the anomalies that conventional models keep having to patch – starts to make a lot more sense.
Happy to keep talking if you’d like.

 

[Jipsah]

3 And God said, Let there be light: and there was light.

4 And God saw the light, that it was good: and God divided the light from the darkness.

5 And God called the light Day, and the darkness he called Night. And the evening and the morning were the first day.

Actually the one God invented in verse 3

No sun until the 4th day. What was the light source? Flashlight? Lightning? Pine torch?

It ain't literal, homey.

You won't admit you don't believe that "Take, eat, this is My Body" is literal, will you? The Genesis teaching story for preliterate people has to be literally true for your lot, but the Words of our Lord Christ Himself you just wave off as metaphorical. In both cases, your doctrine trumps the actual Word of God. Weird religion you have there.

 

[Jipsah]

Actually yes - the existence of light (single light source) and a rotating Earth.

And what light source was it that the Genesis account is silent about but that you know based on... the fact that your doctrine requires it? A fig for your doctrine!

 

[Jipsah]

“A day is like a thousand years” (Ps 90 & 2 Pet 3).
Both passages are about God’s patience, not the length of the creation week.

So it's Just Another Metaphor, and just means what your doctrine needs it to mean when it's necessary.

So much for Sola Scriptura. Just interpret away bit troublesome and literalize what helps your doctrinal position.

Rubbish.

“The Lord is not slow in keeping His promise, as some understand slowness…”
If we use this verse to tell Moses that “day” can mean “epoch,” we also have to let it tell Peter that “1 000 years” can mean “a day.” The text is highlighting the difference between Creator and creature, not re-defining the word “day.”

Ah, so "day" didn't really mean "day", there! Cool, so a day for God is precisely the same as a Dan for us, neither a second more or less.
Except when you need it to.
So God's bound in time just like we are. If you need Him to be to keep Him from spoiling favorite doctrines, huh?

What kind of “day” does Genesis 1 itself give us?

Not a solar one. No sun.
I'm sure a day for Moses was a regular old solar day. One term of the earth. One sunrise, ine sunset
Except there ain't no sun.

Evening + morning + a number = the same phrase Moses uses for the 24-hour Sabbath

So? Moses had to write in terms his audience understood.

in Exodus 20:8-11. The fourth commandment grounds the Jewish week in God’s week: “For in six days the LORD made heaven and earth… and rested the seventh day.” Israelites weren’t told to work for six epochs and rest for one epoch.

God isn't bound by days even if the sun is there and in working order.

1. The “pre-sun light” objection.
   Genesis says the light source

No, it does not. You added "source".

1. (v.3) arrived three “days” before the light-holders (sun, moon, stars, v.14-19).

The sun being the relevant one.

1. That’s only a problem if we assume naturalism – i.e. that ordinary light must come from a burning ball of gas.

Straw man. Genesis mentions no pre-sun light source. Was there one? Maybe, maybe not. You say there hd to be one. Genesis doesn't. Naughty naughty.

1. A theist already believes in a God who can produce light ex nihilo.

Stipulated.

1. John’s Gospel calls Jesus “the light of men” before the sun existed;

Oh please.

1. Revelation says the Lamb is the lamp of the New Jerusalem.

Yep. Which has nothing to do with the question at hand. Sounds like a nice pious response though, doesn't it?

1. Scripture is comfortable with a direct, unmediated glory of God functioning as light.

Then the sun was entirely irrelevant. Except that the length of a day is wholly dependent on it.

1. So the chronological order in Genesis 1 is actually a polemic against the surrounding sun-worshipping cultures: the Creator is not dependent on the sun.

So it was just symbolic end to end. So the length of a "day" was completely arbitrary. That is creative!

1. Appearance of age vs. maturity. Adam is created as a full-grown adult,

Irrelevant to this discussion, except that a "day"being from God's perspective makes the "Adam was born old" tack unnecessary.

1. trees already bearing fruit, grapes already fermenting, starlight already hitting Earth. That isn’t deception; it is functional maturity.

1. A doctor who delivers a baby at 10 a.m. doesn’t expect the parents to wait 20 years before they can have a conversation with him. Likewise, God’s universe is ready-to-use from the first moment.

From God's perspective.

1. The question is not “Does it look old?” but “Did God say He used long ages?”

This is apparently leading to the "God made it all appear old" rubbish, which is an insult to any rational person.

1. If He didn’t, then measuring secondary processes (radiometric decay, tree rings, ice layers, etc.) simply tells us how the universe would have developed had God used only those processes.

I.E, He Made It Look Old. And I reiterate, rubbish. All that rotten sophistry to try to make a symbolic, metaphorical, poetic language "work" literally.

1. It doesn’t tell us how long He actually took when He spoke it into being.

So just declare it to be a 24 hour solar day. Sure, why not?

1. Science and Scripture.
   Christian science is not “science minus evidence”

If "Christian SCience" means having to make stuff up wholesale to make an ancient writing say what we'd like it to say, then it's neither Christian nor Science.

1. ; it is science within a worldview that allows for miracle

It doesn't give us leave to insert a "miracle" whenever we grossly misunderstand what's being said.

So I’m not asking you to stop thinking scientifically. I’m inviting you to let God’s own eyewitness report (Genesis 1) set the boundary conditions for whatever secondary means we use to explore His work.

And actual "eyewitness report" would have been utterly unintelligible to the target audience. Hence metaphorical language. It's an artistic, poetic, symbolic, metaphorical story of God's Creation of the universe. It isn't technically true, and wouldn't have served its purpose if it had been.

If we start there,

Then we've already missed the point altogether

The Creation account in John 1 says it best:

1 In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.
2 The same was in the beginning with God.
3 All things were made by him; and without him was not any thing made that was made.

Short and to the point, and no basis for add-on rubbish..

 

[bob121]

@Jipsah,
I’m going to step back from the quote-and-scorn cycle; it’s producing heat, not light.
Here’s the core issue I hear underneath your words: you’re convinced that anyone who reads Genesis 1 as anything other than stylised theological poetry is automatically “making stuff up wholesale.” Conversely, I’m convinced that anyone who insists the text MUST be pure symbolism is also deciding in advance what God could or couldn’t have meant. Both of us are bringing a hermeneutic—a set of lenses—to the page. The only honest question is: which lenses are prescribed by the text itself, and which are simply fashionable in our own century?

If “evening + morning + number” is obviously metaphor, why does every other biblical author who quotes the passage treat it as the ground for Israel’s seven-day week?

If the sun is required before the word “day” can be used, why do we still speak of a “three-day journey” when clouds hide the sun for a week?

If Genesis is only theological poetry, why does John 1 anchor the physical origin of “all things” to that same historical Word who “became flesh” in Roman-occupied Judea?

You call that “add-on rubbish”; I call it letting Scripture interpret Scripture—something the Reformation labelled Sola Scriptura, not Sola 21st-Century Scientia.

I’m happy to keep talking, but only if we can both admit our finitude: neither of us was there, and the text is older, wiser, and stranger than either of us. Humility isn’t a retreat from reason; it’s the prerequisite for it. When we stand under the Word instead of over it, we may discover that the God who made the cosmos in six literal days is equally able to sustain it for six billion years—and that His real concern is whether we will rest in the Seventh-Day Man, Jesus, who finished the work we could never clock in on.

P.S. When I wrote “Christian science” I meant believers who practise mainstream science—think Francis Collins (Human Genome Project), Jennifer Wiseman (NASA astrophysicist), or John Lennox (Oxford mathematician)—not Mary Baker Eddy’s “Christian Science” sect. My apologies for the confusion.

One-sentence position amid all the noise:
Genesis 1 is either a literal, chronological report or a theological one, but either way it claims to tell us what God did and that He did it by His powerful Word—so the humble question is not “How long?” but “Will we let that Word have the final say over our theories and timelines?”

 

[Platte]

And what light source was it that the Genesis account is silent about but that you know based on... the fact that your doctrine requires it? A fig for your doctrine!

The Light God saw that He called Day before the Sun.

 

[david p]

Does anybody have proof that the earth and the entire universe really is 6,000 - ish years old beyond the usual arguments that science has debunked over and over again? Arguments like the rocks in the Grand Canyon or some other such weak examples? I’m looking for reputable scientists who’ve written peer reviewed papers on the subject and gained the support of other reputable scientists?

AI Overview



After an extinction event, evolution "restarts" through a process called
adaptive radiation, where surviving species rapidly diversify into the vacant ecological niches left behind by the species that perished. While the mass die-off is a period of destruction, the aftermath is a burst of creative change that drives the evolution of new and innovative life forms.
A leveled playing field
Mass extinctions dramatically reduce the number of species, wiping out many dominant groups that had previously controlled ecosystems. This removal of intense competition creates a newly "leveled playing field" and provides a window of opportunity for previously suppressed organisms to flourish.
For example, for over 200 million years, mammals existed as small, rodent-like creatures in the shadow of dinosaurs. It was only after the dinosaurs' extinction 66 million years ago that mammals were able to rapidly diversify and fill the newly available niches, leading to the wide variety of mammalian species we see today.
Key steps in the evolutionary recovery process
The recovery after an extinction event is not immediate, but follows a distinct pattern over millions of years:

1. Ecological disturbance and collapse: The first phase is a period of ecological instability, where survivors are few and species diversity is low. The structure of the previous ecosystem is destroyed.
2. Survival of generalists: The species that survive the initial extinction pulse are often generalists, able to endure a wide range of conditions, while specialized species are more likely to perish.
3. Vacant niches: The extinction of dominant species leaves behind many empty ecological roles. For instance, after the dinosaurs were gone, niches for large terrestrial herbivores and carnivores were left open.
4. Adaptive radiation: Surviving species undergo a period of rapid speciation, or adaptive radiation, to fill those vacant niches. Through natural selection, advantageous mutations allow certain lineages to thrive in the new, less-competitive environment.
5. Evolutionary innovation: The absence of established, dominant species allows evolution to "experiment" with new forms and adaptations that would have previously been outcompeted or eaten. For instance, after the end-Devonian extinction, fish that could crawl on land didn't have to compete with established sea dwellers.
6. Ecosystem rebuilding: As new species evolve, they create new ecological relationships and more complex food webs. This rebuilds the ecosystem from the ground up, with species creating roles for still more species in a positive feedback loop.
7. Long recovery time: The full recovery of biodiversity and complex ecosystems is a slow process, often taking at least 10 million years, and sometimes up to 30 million years, to return to pre-extinction levels.

The end of one era is the beginning of another
Each mass extinction fundamentally changes the course and pace of life on Earth. It is a powerful form of "creative destruction" that reshapes the planet's biodiversity and can lead to the emergence of completely new groups of organisms. For example, the same event that enabled mammals to rise also ended the long reign of the non-avian dinosaurs.


----------------------------



AI Overview



Since the Cambrian period, approximately 540 million years ago, Earth has experienced five major mass extinction events, often called "The Big Five"
. A sixth is currently underway due to human activity.
These events represent sharp, dramatic increases in the rate of extinction, wiping out between 70% and 95% of species in a geologically short time, and standing out from the "background rate" of extinction that occurs naturally.
The five major mass extinctions

• End-Ordovician Mass Extinction (~444 million years ago): Occurring in two main pulses, this event wiped out about 85% of marine species. It is associated with periods of intense global cooling, glaciation, and subsequent rapid warming, which caused drastic sea-level fluctuations and oxygen depletion in the oceans.
• Late Devonian Mass Extinction (~375–360 million years ago): A prolonged event consisting of several pulses that primarily affected marine life, especially in shallow, warm waters. Hypotheses for its cause include volcanic activity, climate change, and widespread ocean anoxia (lack of oxygen), possibly triggered by the expansion of land plants.
• Permian-Triassic Mass Extinction (~252 million years ago): Known as "The Great Dying," this is the most severe mass extinction in Earth's history, eliminating about 96% of all marine species and 70% of terrestrial vertebrate species. The primary cause is widely believed to be massive volcanic eruptions in Siberia that led to catastrophic global warming, ocean acidification, and anoxia.
• Triassic-Jurassic Mass Extinction (~201 million years ago): This event saw the extinction of about 80% of land and marine species, which allowed dinosaurs to thrive and dominate during the Jurassic period. Evidence points to intense volcanic activity associated with the breakup of the supercontinent Pangea, which released greenhouse gases and caused severe climate change.
• Cretaceous-Paleogene Mass Extinction (~66 million years ago): The most famous of the "Big Five" because it led to the extinction of all non-avian dinosaurs. This event was caused by a large asteroid impact in the Yucatán Peninsula of Mexico, which created tsunamis, firestorms, and an "impact winter" that blocked sunlight. Volcanic activity may have also been a contributing factor.

The ongoing sixth mass extinction
Many scientists agree that we are currently in the midst of a sixth mass extinction, driven by human activity such as habitat destruction, pollution, and climate change. Some studies show that current extinction rates are hundreds or even a thousand times higher than the natural, pre-human background rate.


------------------------------------------



A recent World Wildlife Fund (WWF) Living Planet Report states that global wildlife populations have plunged by an average of 73% since 1970, reflecting a drastic decline in monitored vertebrate species. This alarming trend, which also shows significant losses in freshwater species and specific regions like Latin America, underscores the urgent need for global action to address biodiversity loss and restore nature.

Key Findings:

• Major Decline:
  From 1970 to 2020, the average population size of vertebrate wildlife decreased by 73%.

----------------------------------------------------


Nature decline is now nearing dangerous tipping points, WWF warns

 

[david p]

Matthew 11:25-26, Jesus breaks into prayer, saying, “I praise You, Father, Lord of heaven and earth, because You have hidden these things from the wise and learned,

and revealed them to little children.”

Luke 7:35
"But wisdom is justified of all her children."


What does it mean?

If those who were 'wise' enough to have wisdom weren't understanding, how is wisdom justified?

 

[bob121]

The Light God saw that He called Day before the Sun.

Hello Platte, I hope you are doing well. Here are my thoughts on the 'Glory of God'.
If we look at Revelation 21:23, what do we read? "The city has no need of the sun or of the moon to shine on it, for the glory of God gives it light, and the Lamb is its lamp."

This passage tells us that there will come a time when the created light sources—the sun and moon—are no longer necessary because God Himself will be the light.

When we consider this in light of Genesis 1, we see a parallel. On the first day of creation, God said, "Let there be light," and there was light (Genesis 1:3). The sun, moon, and stars were not created until the fourth day (Genesis 1:14-19). The Bible is not silent here; it is the chronological order of events that reveals the truth. The first light was not from a created object, but from God's own glory, just as it will be in the New Jerusalem.

Therefore, this is not a doctrine I hold to simply because it is required; it is a theological inference drawn directly from scripture's own testimony about God being the source of all light, both at the beginning and at the end.

I hope that helps explain my perspective. It's a topic I'm passionate about (all topics about God's glory that is), and I'm glad we could discuss it here.

Have a wonderful day/night.

 

[Aaron112]

Luke 7:35
"But wisdom is justified of all her children."
What does it mean?
If those who were 'wise' enough to have wisdom weren't understanding, how is wisdom justified?

It is not at all as people think in chruches or forums or most anywhere. It is practicallly impossible to discuss online because of the vast opposition.

 

[bob121]

Luke 7:35
"But wisdom is justified of all her children."


What does it mean?

If those who were 'wise' enough to have wisdom weren't understanding, how is wisdom justified?

Hello David, I hope this helps. The key to understanding Luke 7:35 is to see wisdom not as an abstract idea, but as God's divine plan for humanity.

David, here is how almost every reputable commentary (and the Greek itself) reads the line:

The proverb is Jesus’ closing verdict on the whole paragraph (7:31-35). He has just set two groups side-by-side:

• John the Baptist came fasting, and the critics said, “He’s demon-possessed.”
• The Son of Man came eating and drinking, and they said, “He’s a glutton and a drunkard.”

The Pharisees and lawyers rejected both messengers, no matter what they did.

So in verse 35, Jesus’ reply is this: “In the end, the real proof of God’s wisdom will be the people it produces.”

• Wisdom is God’s wise plan that is already at work in the world.
• Her children are the people who embrace that plan and let it change their lives.

For example, the tax-collectors and sinners who repented at John’s preaching and who are now welcoming Jesus are the "children" wisdom has raised. Their changed lives—their faith, repentance, and good fruit—publicly prove that God’s strategy is right. The critics, by refusing both John and Jesus, prove that they are not wisdom's children at all.

This means “wisdom is justified by all her children” simply means: “Time will show who was truly on God’s side, because the people who align with God’s plan will be the living evidence that the plan was right.”

There is no hidden code or mystical meaning. The ultimate test of true wisdom is the fruit it bears. The tax-collectors' repentance and the disciples' joy are the visible proof that God’s way works, while the critics’ empty accusations are the proof that theirs does not.

Have a great day/night

 

[Jipsah]

Here’s the core issue I hear underneath your words: you’re convinced that anyone who reads Genesis 1 as anything other than stylised theological poetry is automatically “making stuff up wholesale.”

Not "automatically", just when they're stuck for an answer, and then they'll make stuff up that Scriptureri doesn't say at all. TYpicall it involves "light sources" or "suns" that SCripture doesn't mention in any way. It's patently dishonest, but needs must when you doctrine is in the ditch, right?

Conversely, I’m convinced that anyone who insists the text MUST be pure symbolism is also deciding in advance what God could or couldn’t have meant.

I assume that God didn't literally mean anything that doesn't make sense, like evening and mornings without a sun to produce them. And apparently Genesis literalists often agree with me, given the frequency with which they find it necessary to make up stuff from whole cloth to "support" the idea that every word in Genesis must be literally true. The whole "light source" nonsense is the prime example.

Both of us are bringing a hermeneutic—a set of lenses—to the page.

That is true. I believe that the testimony of God's Creation itself is the best source of information for Creation itself. Genesis, not so much. Genesis was composed to convey the essence of the Creation to people who had no understanding of the nature of the cosmos at all. They reckoned time in evenings and mornings, moons, and seasons. Twenry four "hour" days? What's an hour? "Oh, it's a 24th of a day." "....oh... OK".

So how long did it take for God to make everything? Oh, six epochs. "What's an epoch. ? 150 zillion years" "what's a year? " "two seasons". "How many seasons in an epoch""? Three hundred zillion. "Is that more than 100? Yeah, by a fair bit. "

OK, lets think of it this way. God made everything in Six days, one evening and one morning eash". Oh, then why didn'tyou say that in the first place!"

That's rhe principle. You have to meet your students where they are, even today. And you don't go looking for the principles of particle physics in a 6th grade science book. And that wasn't what Genesis was about in the first place. It was about "God made the universe", and the details were scarce, to no one's surprise.

That'd the summary of my position.

The only honest question is: which lenses are prescribed by the text itself, and which are simply fashionable in our own century?

Bother fashion. Either such data as that is there is there is factual or it it isn't. In short, almost none of it is. THe best you can wring out of it is "God made everything", which is what it says in John 1 in concise form.

If “evening + morning + number” is obviously metaphor, why does every other biblical author who quotes the passage treat it as the ground for Israel’s seven-day week?

Because from a religious/ceremonial standpoint the six day week plus Sabbath is representative of God's Creation. Inaccurate? Sure, but it isn't about empirical data. It's about God and His Creation.

If the sun is required before the word “day” can be used, why do we still speak of a “three-day journey” when clouds hide the sun for a week?

Because a "day" our vernacular is 24 hours, one revolution of the earth. Both of those were concepts unknown and unknowable to those to whom Genesis was recited (recitation being the way stories were shared in those days, after all). So an evening and a morning was a day, because it is. No hours, minutes, seconds, microseconds, nanoseconds, ad infinitum. And if you're dealing with a figurative day, it's an evening and a morning. Even if there's no sun. Or fictitious sun-substitute. (BTW why do you reckon God stuck in a temporary sun on Day 1 instead of just installing the permanent sun right off the bat? That's what I'd have done, but then I never designed a universe.)

If Genesis is only theological poetry, why does John 1 anchor the physical origin of “all things” to that same historical Word who “became flesh” in Roman-occupied Judea?

Lost me there, mate.

You call that “add-on rubbish”; I call it letting Scripture interpret Scripture

I don't see any evidence that you've done any such thing. Instead you've pencil -whipped and "interpreted" into submission any Scripture that didn't fit your presuppositions Better described as "doctrine interpreting Scripture.)

—something the Reformation labelled Sola Scriptura, not Sola 21st-Century Scientia.

'Splain to me how SS it is to run in new "suns" into a the Creation account where there is not even even a vague hint of such a thing having happened. "Sola doctrinal necessity " would be more accurate.

we may discover that the God who made the cosmos in six literal days is equally able to sustain it for six billion years.

Nice try, but you're still pointedly ignoring both Moses' St. Peter's teaching about God's reckoning of time, which renders the entire "Six Solar Day Creation" doctrine utterly ridiculous. And no, "but that doesn't count!" doesn't do you any good. Either the old Prophet and the old Saint just got it wrong, or y'all did. I'm putting my money on them getting it right.

—and that His real concern is whether we will rest in the Seventh-Day Man, Jesus, who finished the work we could never clock in on.

Nice religious jargon there. I'm sure it's translatable to English, but I'm not the man for the job.

the humble question is not “How long?” but “Will we let that Word have the final say over our theories and timelines?”

My question is how long will yourDid ou lot drive reasonable people away from the Christian Faith by peddling baseless Fundy dogmas as essential confessions of faith? Did any of the disciples go to unbelievers and "preach unto them Genesis"?
Do the Creeds we confess mention belief in a 6 Day Creation? Did the Council of Jerusalem require the Gentile converts to profess belief in the literal truth of Genesis 1? Did our Lord say "he that believeth in Me, and who believes in a literal Six Day Creation, though he were dead, yet shall he live"? No, none of the above.

No, a belief in the literal truth of the Genesis account of the Creation has never been a requirement of the Church. If you folks require to qualify as a member of your sect that is entirely your business. But it is not a requirement of the Church of Christ, and never has been. You're free to believe it, and we're free not to believe it. If you'd rather not consider us Christians on that basis that's entirely your own affair.

 

[Jipsah]

The Light God saw that He called Day before the Sun.

Trying too hard, mate.

 

[Jipsah]

It is not at all as people think in chruches or forums or most anywhere. It is practicallly impossible to discuss online because of the vast opposition.

Hey, if you want to believe it, suit yourself. It's isn't a salvation issue.

 

[bob121]

Not "automatically", just when they're stuck for an answer, and then they'll make stuff up that Scriptureri doesn't say at all. TYpicall it involves "light sources" or "suns" that SCripture doesn't mention in any way. It's patently dishonest, but needs must when you doctrine is in the ditch, right?

I assume that God didn't literally mean anything that doesn't make sense, like evening and mornings without a sun to produce them. And apparently Genesis literalists often agree with me, given the frequency with which they find it necessary to make up stuff from whole cloth to "support" the idea that every word in Genesis must be literally true. The whole "light source" nonsense is the prime example.

That is true. I believe that the testimony of God's Creation itself is the best source of information for Creation itself. Genesis, not so much. Genesis was composed to convey the essence of the Creation to people who had no understanding of the nature of the cosmos at all. They reckoned time in evenings and mornings, moons, and seasons. Twenry four "hour" days? What's an hour? "Oh, it's a 24th of a day." "....oh... OK".

So how long did it take for God to make everything? Oh, six epochs. "What's an epoch. ? 150 zillion years" "what's a year? " "two seasons". "How many seasons in an epoch""? Three hundred zillion. "Is that more than 100? Yeah, by a fair bit. "

OK, lets think of it this way. God made everything in Six days, one evening and one morning eash". Oh, then why didn'tyou say that in the first place!"

That's rhe principle. You have to meet your students where they are, even today. And you don't go looking for the principles of particle physics in a 6th grade science book. And that wasn't what Genesis was about in the first place. It was about "God made the universe", and the details were scarce, to no one's surprise.

That'd the summary of my position.


Bother fashion. Either such data as that is there is there is factual or it it isn't. In short, almost none of it is. THe best you can wring out of it is "God made everything", which is what it says in John 1 in concise form.

Because from a religious/ceremonial standpoint the six day week plus Sabbath is representative of God's Creation. Inaccurate? Sure, but it isn't about empirical data. It's about God and His Creation.

Because a "day" our vernacular is 24 hours, one revolution of the earth. Both of those were concepts unknown and unknowable to those to whom Genesis was recited (recitation being the way stories were shared in those days, after all). So an evening and a morning was a day, because it is. No hours, minutes, seconds, microseconds, nanoseconds, ad infinitum. And if you're dealing with a figurative day, it's an evening and a morning. Even if there's no sun. Or fictitious sun-substitute. (BTW why do you reckon God stuck in a temporary sun on Day 1 instead of just installing the permanent sun right off the bat? That's what I'd have done, but then I never designed a universe.)


Lost me there, mate.

I don't see any evidence that you've done any such thing. Instead you've pencil -whipped and "interpreted" into submission any Scripture that didn't fit your presuppositions Better described as "doctrine interpreting Scripture.)

'Splain to me how SS it is to run in new "suns" into a the Creation account where there is not even even a vague hint of such a thing having happened. "Sola doctrinal necessity " would be more accurate.

Nice try, but you're still pointedly ignoring both Moses' St. Peter's teaching about God's reckoning of time, which renders the entire "Six Solar Day Creation" doctrine utterly ridiculous. And no, "but that doesn't count!" doesn't do you any good. Either the old Prophet and the old Saint just got it wrong, or y'all did. I'm putting my money on them getting it right.

Nice religious jargon there. I'm sure it's translatable to English, but I'm not the man for the job.

My question is how long will yourDid ou lot drive reasonable people away from the Christian Faith by peddling baseless Fundy dogmas as essential confessions of faith? Did any of the disciples go to unbelievers and "preach unto them Genesis"?
Do the Creeds we confess mention belief in a 6 Day Creation? Did the Council of Jerusalem require the Gentile converts to profess belief in the literal truth of Genesis 1? Did our Lord say "he that believeth in Me, and who believes in a literal Six Day Creation, though he were dead, yet shall he live"? No, none of the above.

No, a belief in the literal truth of the Genesis account of the Creation has never been a requirement of the Church. If you folks require to qualify as a member of your sect that is entirely your business. But it is not a requirement of the Church of Christ, and never has been. You're free to believe it, and we're free not to believe it. If you'd rather not consider us Christians on that basis that's entirely your own affair.

I too reject any view that makes God dishonourable; that’s exactly why I take Him at His written word rather than imputing to Him billions of years of death-filled ‘creation’ before Adam sinned. MacDonald’s warning cuts both ways. I’d also ask, Jipsah: why fire a quote that brands me dishonourable when you know nothing of my life, and the love that compelled me to offer light in the first place? Tossing moral grenades over a text-debate may feel clever, but it only shows the size of the chip on your own shoulder. I bear no malice toward you; please extend the same courtesy—and leave the character-judgements to the One who actually sees the heart. For such an unsupported insult I’ll step back and leave you to wrestle with these things yourself. Time and maturity have a way of softening what argument can’t. Grace, Jipsah. Have a wonderful day/night.

Not "automatically", just when they're stuck for an answer, and then they'll make stuff up that Scriptureri doesn't say at all. TYpicall it involves "light sources" or "suns" that SCripture doesn't mention in any way. It's patently dishonest, but needs must when you doctrine is in the ditch, right?

I assume that God didn't literally mean anything that doesn't make sense, like evening and mornings without a sun to produce them. And apparently Genesis literalists often agree with me, given the frequency with which they find it necessary to make up stuff from whole cloth to "support" the idea that every word in Genesis must be literally true. The whole "light source" nonsense is the prime example.

That is true. I believe that the testimony of God's Creation itself is the best source of information for Creation itself. Genesis, not so much. Genesis was composed to convey the essence of the Creation to people who had no understanding of the nature of the cosmos at all. They reckoned time in evenings and mornings, moons, and seasons. Twenry four "hour" days? What's an hour? "Oh, it's a 24th of a day." "....oh... OK".

So how long did it take for God to make everything? Oh, six epochs. "What's an epoch. ? 150 zillion years" "what's a year? " "two seasons". "How many seasons in an epoch""? Three hundred zillion. "Is that more than 100? Yeah, by a fair bit. "

OK, lets think of it this way. God made everything in Six days, one evening and one morning eash". Oh, then why didn'tyou say that in the first place!"

That's rhe principle. You have to meet your students where they are, even today. And you don't go looking for the principles of particle physics in a 6th grade science book. And that wasn't what Genesis was about in the first place. It was about "God made the universe", and the details were scarce, to no one's surprise.

That'd the summary of my position.


Bother fashion. Either such data as that is there is there is factual or it it isn't. In short, almost none of it is. THe best you can wring out of it is "God made everything", which is what it says in John 1 in concise form.

Because from a religious/ceremonial standpoint the six day week plus Sabbath is representative of God's Creation. Inaccurate? Sure, but it isn't about empirical data. It's about God and His Creation.

Because a "day" our vernacular is 24 hours, one revolution of the earth. Both of those were concepts unknown and unknowable to those to whom Genesis was recited (recitation being the way stories were shared in those days, after all). So an evening and a morning was a day, because it is. No hours, minutes, seconds, microseconds, nanoseconds, ad infinitum. And if you're dealing with a figurative day, it's an evening and a morning. Even if there's no sun. Or fictitious sun-substitute. (BTW why do you reckon God stuck in a temporary sun on Day 1 instead of just installing the permanent sun right off the bat? That's what I'd have done, but then I never designed a universe.)


Lost me there, mate.

I don't see any evidence that you've done any such thing. Instead you've pencil -whipped and "interpreted" into submission any Scripture that didn't fit your presuppositions Better described as "doctrine interpreting Scripture.)

'Splain to me how SS it is to run in new "suns" into a the Creation account where there is not even even a vague hint of such a thing having happened. "Sola doctrinal necessity " would be more accurate.

Nice try, but you're still pointedly ignoring both Moses' St. Peter's teaching about God's reckoning of time, which renders the entire "Six Solar Day Creation" doctrine utterly ridiculous. And no, "but that doesn't count!" doesn't do you any good. Either the old Prophet and the old Saint just got it wrong, or y'all did. I'm putting my money on them getting it right.

Nice religious jargon there. I'm sure it's translatable to English, but I'm not the man for the job.

My question is how long will yourDid ou lot drive reasonable people away from the Christian Faith by peddling baseless Fundy dogmas as essential confessions of faith? Did any of the disciples go to unbelievers and "preach unto them Genesis"?
Do the Creeds we confess mention belief in a 6 Day Creation? Did the Council of Jerusalem require the Gentile converts to profess belief in the literal truth of Genesis 1? Did our Lord say "he that believeth in Me, and who believes in a literal Six Day Creation, though he were dead, yet shall he live"? No, none of the above.

No, a belief in the literal truth of the Genesis account of the Creation has never been a requirement of the Church. If you folks require to qualify as a member of your sect that is entirely your business. But it is not a requirement of the Church of Christ, and never has been. You're free to believe it, and we're free not to believe it. If you'd rather not consider us Christians on that basis that's entirely your own affair.

I too reject any view that makes God dishonourable; that’s exactly why I take Him at His written word rather than imputing to Him billions of years of death-filled ‘creation’ before Adam sinned. MacDonald’s warning cuts both ways. I’d also ask, Jipsah: why fire a quote that brands me dishonourable when you know nothing of my life, and the love that compelled me to offer light in the first place? Tossing moral grenades over a text-debate may feel clever, but it only shows the size of the chip on your own shoulder. I bear no malice toward you; please extend the same courtesy—and leave the character-judgements to the One who actually sees the heart. For such an unsupported insult I’ll step back and leave you to wrestle with these things yourself. Time and maturity have a way of softening what argument can’t. Leave you too it. Grace, Jipsah ' blood drinker' Have a wonderful day/night.

 

[Aaron112]

Their changed lives—their faith, repentance, and good fruit—publicly prove that God’s strategy is right.

Who has ears to hear any more today ?
"Drove past 3 smoke shops, 4 liquor stores, and 8 fast food joints on my way to pick up illegal raw milk because the government really cares about our health"

 

[The Barbarian]

I too reject any view that makes God dishonourable; that’s exactly why I take Him at His written word rather than imputing to Him billions of years of death-filled ‘creation’ before Adam sinned.

It's always important tor remember that our interpretation of God's word is not necessarily God's word. You have to remember that death is not the enemy for Christians. Nor is physical death the sort of death that Adam brought into the world, as God makes clear in Genesis.