I have been opposed to evolution since the first time I heard about it as a child. But I was only the Y in YEC through my high school days, after attending a YEC conference. Before that I believed in a literal Adam and Eve and the garden and the fall 6k years ago, but also believed the dinasaurs roamed the earth 65 million years ago, and I guess they were eating each other and dying; but I never seemed to notice this inconsistency in my thinking.
I was also strongly opposed to the BIG Bang, since the Big Bang taught that there was no God and everything in the universe just happened to be, or so I thought.
In college I was exposed to nuclear physics, radiometric dating, etc, and basically glided peacefully back to my old earth position. God must have had seperate creation events through time. Actually, I glided to a "I don't care" position. I was much more interested in girls, especially the ones alive today, and not so much where they came from
The age of the earth was one thing, but I was still strongly opposed to evolution. I understood natural selection and didn't have a problem with that, but I thought the Bible was authoratative on this matter and that was that.
Between college and last year I hadn't given it a whole lot of thought, except to be made uncomfterable every time the issue came up regarding public schools, since I had two children with the most fantastic woman God saw fit to put on this earth. But I did have an ever growing interest in science, especially physics. I purchased used textbooks on a variety of subjects, physics, meterology, pschology, chemistry, geology ect, and read a good deal of them. And something started to bother me. How could these scientists be so right about one subject, such as general relativity, and so utterly wrong about something that is so much less subtle, like evolution. Yet still, I persisted.
Until finnally last summer when a YEC speaker came to our church. He did a 12 part series of which I only attended 2 of them. In one, a summary, he bashed the old earth position, and I could tell he didn't understand radiometric dating. But it had been a long time for me as well, so I decided to go restudy the issue to see what I would find.
But even as I began, I knew their was a big elephant in the room, a big huge E shaped elephent, named evolution. I knew even before I began that if I began to study the issue I would have to confront the theory of evolution. It only took several days to reconvince myself on the age of the earth, but as I started to look at evolution, I resisted with all my years of resistence. I began reading several books, one of which was Erst Myers "What evolution is". Myers does not try to defend evolution in that book, but he made a startling claim that really finnally put the whole question into a new light. He said, "scientists are not trying to debate whether evolution took place. They are debating HOW it took place, not WHETHER. THAT it took place is readily evident in nature". Okay, that was a total paraphrase and I probably slaughtered it. But it focused the question. Forget the probability, the odds, the philophical objections. What was the evidence that it took place at all, why would anybody think it did in the first place. Veterans would readily reconginze this as the fact of evolution vs theory of evolution dichtomy. But I began exploring and landed on this essay.
http://www.freethoughtdebater.com/FEvolutionCase.htm
It is a very clear explanation of what the evidence for evolution taking place really is, introducing the nested heirchy and how it is colloborating through morphology, genetics, fossils, biogeophaphy, etc. I remember exactly where I was sitting when I read this and finnally got it. I was at the top of my stairs. I was overwelmed. I was both excited and very scared. I remember that moment when it hit me, that evolution was indeed a reality.
My in-laws were in town, and if they had found out they would have retroactivly dissolved my marriage with their daughter, so I kept things quiet. I kept them quiet for several months until my pastor commented about some of my evolution books on my shelf (which I hadn't cracked btw, but I continue), and though I gave a somewhat misleading response at the time, it encouraged me to restudy it again. More and more evidence seem to pour in, starting with the 29+ evidences for macroevolution on talk.origins, and then after that, it just seemed to be everywhere.
Because I was in a position of authority in my church, I thought it right to tell my pastor. He has taken it pretty well, but it is still up in the air. Issues regarding our statement of faith (which I hadn't even signed yet and would need to shortly), and several other issues have weigh'ed heavily on me. To sum up this portion, my church is completly YEC (or at least OEC), and for the most part no body has studied it or really cares. But it still weighs on me and I stay in the closet for the most part.
As for myself, I have began to struggle with my view of the Bible, I can comment on that in another thread. I will just sum up how this all weighs on me in a few short hits
1) I have no philosphical objections to evolution. I am still in the image of God if that it was He declared. God can work through natural and supernatural means, and they would often be indistiguishable.
2) I am in a position of authority in my church, for one, leading a Bible study with people who if they found out would probably leave. This concerns me.
3) I probably would be asked to be an elder in my church in five years or so, but that won't happen if I have this position. I am not terribly concerned with this, except to highlight that I am really not fully accepted within this community.
4) What do I tell my children about Adam and Eve.
5) My in-laws finding out. My brothers finding out (I have told my sisters, they are much more open to this kind of thing and don't really care).
6) What other parts of the OT are myth, metaphorical, allegory, etc? Noah? Babel? Abraham?
Well, I won't bore you any longer. The list is probably endless.
