Creation Vs. Theistic Evolution

[theFijian]

Like looking at a 30 year old man who is really a minute old?

Sorry, but just where in scripture are you getting this '30 year old' from?

Andy

 

[ej]

http://www.christianforums.com/t684278

I've seen this link a handful of times, but i can't follow it anywhere

 

[jazzbird]

The creation-evolution debate is quite interesting and some devote their full time to this. I prefer to focus on other things, remembering what Paul's advice to Timothy was about "avoiding profane babblings". But still, since evolution is such a force in the Church today, there are those called to confront this challenge.

Do you understand that I do not believe in evolution? I've stated it a few times in this thread, but maybe you haven't read the entire thing. I know it's easy to gloss over some posts because it takes so long to read everything.

Some Christians, like Bulldog, do believe God used evolution. I do not. But I don't assume anything about theistic evolutionists' (or young earthers for that matter) relationship with the Lord based on their theory of creation.

So, for the record:

I do not believe in evolution simply because I believe in an old earth.​

 

[Donny_B]

Do you understand that I do not believe in evolution?

By the way, I noticed that the CF Forum in Theology that deals with this subject dropped the word "Theistic" from its title.

I understand that you are an old-age creationist (also called "progressive creationist") from the link you provided of the PCA Creation Study Committee's report. (The link you provided of the PCA Study is from Hugh Ross's Reasons To Believe web site...to repeat the link):

http://www.reasons.org/resources/apologetics/pca_creation_study_committee_report.shtml?main

I understand that Hugh Ross believes the universe is 16 billion years old and Noah's flood was only local. He also believes that "hominids" existed 2 to 4 million years ago. He is quoted as saying "Could it be that God’s purposes are somehow fulfilled through our experiencing the ‘random, wasteful, inefficiencies’ of the natural realm He created?’ "

In a parahrase of John 3:16, Hugh Ross perhaps tells us how all this has affected his theology: ‘Therefore it allows me to make an interesting paraphrase of John 3:16, if you’ll permit—For God so loved the human race that he went to the expense of building a hundred-billion trillion-stars and carefully shaped and crafted them for sixteen-billion years so that at this brief moment in time we could all have a nice place to live.’ (Dallas Theological Seminary Chapel Service, September 13, 1996).

http://www.answersingenesis.org/docs/4077.asp

Is this similar to what you believe, or do you believe differently?

 

[Eric_C]

Hello All!

This is my first post in this community (CF). Being a 5 pointer, I felt this congregation to be my home in this site.

I voted yes in the pole. I have a few things to say on this subject..., but its late and I'm tired, especially after reading this whole thread and several other long ones around the site, so I'll have to contribute my thoughts tomorrow.

By the way, what I've seen so far here in CF, I really like it.

 

[theFijian]

I've seen this link a handful of times, but i can't follow it anywhere

Same here

 

[jazzbird]

By the way, I noticed that the CF Forum in Theology that deals with this subject dropped the word "Theistic" from its title.

So, what are you saying - these people don't really believe in God if they believe in evolution?

I understand that Hugh Ross believes the universe is 16 billion years old and Noah's flood was only local.

Yes, he believes those things.

I haven't studied the flood in any extensive way, so I don't have a firm conclusion but I do not believe that a "local" flood contradicts the Bible. Let's look at the Scriptures:

Gen 6:12-13
So God looked upon the earth, and indeed it was corrupt; for all flesh had corrupted their way on the earth. And God said to Noah, "The end of all flesh has come before Me, for the earth is filled with violence through them; and behold, I will destroy them with the earth.

The reason for the flood: man's wickedness. God is grieved by man's sin and therefore He will kill them so that they don't continue to degenerate.

Gen 6:17
And behold, I Myself am bringing floodwaters on the earth, to destroy from under heaven all flesh in which is the breath of life; everything that is on the earth shall die.

It is so essential to look at the original Hebrew text when we are delving into the meaning of Scripture. It can lend so much insight, and help us avoid drawing wrong conclusions. A key word in the flood account is "the earth." The word used most frequently in the flood account for earth is "erets."

Erets (#776 in Strong's)
1) land, earth
a) earth
1) whole earth (as opposed to a part)
2) earth (as opposed to heaven)
3) earth (inhabitants)
b) land
1) country, territory
2) district, region
3) tribal territory
4) piece of ground
5) land of Canaan, Israel
6) inhabitants of land
7) Sheol, land without return, (under) world
8) city (-state)
c) ground, surface of the earth
1) ground
2) soil
d) (in phrases)
1) people of the land
2) space or distance of country (in measurements of distance)
3) level or plain country
4) land of the living
5) end(s) of the earth
e) (almost wholly late in usage)
1) lands, countries
a) often in contrast to Canaan

So, the Hebrew word that translated "earth" throughout the flood account does not require a world-wide meaning. This word is translated "country" (140 times) and "land" (1,476 times) in the Bible. Many of them are often of limited land areas.

There is another word which is also translated "earth" in these same passages... That word is : #127 'adamah (ad-aw-maw')

1) ground, land
a) ground (as general, tilled, yielding sustenance)
b) piece of ground, a specific plot of land
c) earth substance (for building or constructing)
d) ground as earth's visible surface
e) land, territory, country
f) whole inhabited earth
g) city in Naphtali

Adamah is related to Strong's #120 adam, and has the idea of "Adam's earth."

Here is a case where the two Hebrew words are used in the same passage.

Genesis 7:4, For yet seven days, and I will cause it to rain upon the earth (erets #776] forty days and forty nights; and every living substance that I have made will I destroy from off the face of the earth (Adam's earth #127].

Could we not say that the usage of #127 "adamah" interdispersed with #776 "erets" would qualify that word? Isn't it possible that land affected was "Adam's" land, field, ground etc? (Opposed to Cain's or other tribes or nation's ground)

There is a Hebrew word that always refers to the entire earth or the entire inhabited earth. The word is tebel (Strong's H8398)

1) world

It is found 37 times in the Old Testament. This word is never used to describe the flood, although it is used extensively to describe the creation of the earth and the judgment of the peoples of the earth.

From a theological perspective, the essential thing is that the flood was universal in it's effect. God's intention was to wipe out the wicked, and that is what He did.

Throughout the Old Testament, God’s judgment against sin is shown to be limited by the impact and extent of human wickedness.The extent of the Genesis flood would be limited to the extent of the defilement of man's sin.

Genesis 8 gives us the most significant evidence for a universal (with respect to man and his animals and lands), but not global, flood. The four different Hebrew verbs used in Genesis 8:1-8 to describe the receding of the flood waters indicate that these waters returned to their original sources. In other words, the waters of the flood are still to be found within the aquifers and troposphere and oceans of planet Earth. Since the total water content of the earth is only 22 percent of what would be needed for a global flood, it appears that the Genesis flood could not have been global.

What does the geological data tell us about massive floods in the earth's history? The evidence shows that the only place in the world where massive flooding has occurred since the advent of modem man is the region of Mesopotamia.

I find that awesome. I mean, there is evidence in the earth that there was indeed a major flood in Mesopotamia - the exact area that Noah inhabited. Do you see how science actually supports the Bible, and how God reveals Himself through His creation? Scientists who are atheists and agnostics are so in large part because they believe that the Bible and science contradict each other, but when science actually proves the validity of the Bible, many of them, like Hugh Ross, discover that God is revealing Himself to them.

A huge problem with a global flood is speciation. If one believes the entire earth was flooded, then they must also believe that from the kinds of animals Noah had on board the ark, came millions of species in a short amount of time. In order to believe in a world wide flood, you must also believe that God used evolution after the flood to repopulate the world.

The young-earth model also assumes the animals on the ark were unique-they possessed special genetic coding that allowed them to quickly adapt to the post-Flood environment and produce new species. However, nowhere does Bible state the animals on the ark were different or endowed with special qualities. Nor is there a single example from field research that supports this claim. If modern species descended from common ancestors on the ark, we would expect to find evidence of intermediate forms. We would also expect to see thousands of new species arising today. However, nothing we observe suggests today's species descended from common ancestors on the ark.

The young-earth model assumes the animals on the ark were able to produce new species in a few hundred years. We know this is the maximum timeframe because historical records indicate some of the subtypes were in existence by then. However, animals, especially advanced animals, simply do not and cannot change at such rapid rates. If speciation really does operate this fast, why does any line exist at all that is stable enough and distinct enough to be called a species? Why is not the world filled with intermediate forms of every conceivable kind? Why have some species not changed from their ancestors in the fossil record?46 And why do we not witness thousands of animals species developing from others today

He also believes that "hominids" existed 2 to 4 million years ago. He is quoted as saying "Could it be that God’s purposes are somehow fulfilled through our experiencing the ‘random, wasteful, inefficiencies’ of the natural realm He created?’ "

He does not believe that man evolved from hominids. He believes that they were separate creatures.

RTB’s biblically based model for humanity’s origin regards Adam and Eve as real, historical people—the first human beings. Accordingly, the model maintains that all of humanity descended from Adam and Eve, who were created recently (within the last 70,000 years or less) in God’s image through divine fiat. As such, humanity stands markedly distinct from all other creatures made by God. (For more details see The Genesis Question.[3])

If humans are made in God’s image as a result of His special creative activity, then what is the biblical perspective on prehuman hominids? RTB’s model views these creatures as separate species, distinct from anatomically and behaviorally modern humans (Homo sapiens sapiens). These animals were created by God, and since that time they have gone extinct. Genesis 1 makes no specific allusion to the hominids, so it must be inferred that they were created along with other land mammals, most likely on Day 6.

The scientific data fit this view. Hominid fossils assigned to the genera Sahelanthropus, Orrion, Ardipitheus, Kenyanthropus, Australopithecus, and Paranthropus—all ape-like creatures—possessed limited intelligence, nonhuman bipedal capability, and may have used, in some limited cases, extremely crude tools. The hominids assigned to the genus Homo, such as Homo erectus and Homo neanderthalensis and “archaic” Homo sapiens walked upright, used crude and unsophisticated tools, possessed limited intelligence, and even displayed some emotional capacity. Yet they did not have a spiritual capacity and cannot be considered as humans made in God’s image. The distinction between Adam and Eve’s descendants (Homo sapiens sapiens, or anatomically and behaviorally “modern” humans) and the hominids in the fossil record is not just morphological, but also behavioral.

As for your quote about "random, wasteful inefficiencies," I have no idea the context of what he is saying. If you could provide a link so I can understand what is being addressed, I'd be happy to comment on it.

In a parahrase of John 3:16, Hugh Ross perhaps tells us how all this has affected his theology: ‘Therefore it allows me to make an interesting paraphrase of John 3:16, if you’ll permit—For God so loved the human race that he went to the expense of building a hundred-billion trillion-stars and carefully shaped and crafted them for sixteen-billion years so that at this brief moment in time we could all have a nice place to live.’ (Dallas Theological Seminary Chapel Service, September 13, 1996).

Again, there is no context in which to examine what Ross is saying. We can't just pull sound bites out of speeches and documents and try to make implications about people. The point he is making here is that God created this universe with care and love. Yes, we are created for His purposes and His delight, but He also created the world a beautiful place for us because He loves us.

This is what he and his organization believe with regard to Christ's atoning work on the cross:

We believe that Jesus Christ is both true God (the second Person of the Trinity) and true man (the Incarnate Son of God). We also believe in the great events surrounding Jesus Christ's life and ministry, including: His eternal preexistence, His virgin birth, His attesting miracles, His sinless life, His sacrificial death on the cross, His glorious bodily resurrection from the dead, His ascension into heaven, and His present work in heaven as High Priest and Advocate. He will return in glory to resurrect and judge all mankind.

We believe God has acted sovereignly to bridge the gap that separates people from Himself. He sent His Son, born of a virgin, attested by miracles and by a sinless life, to bear the full penalty for humanity's sin. Jesus Christ suffered and died in the place of sinners, thus satisfying the Father's just wrath against human sin, and effecting true reconciliation between God and mankind for those who believe. In the atoning death of Christ, both God's love and God's justice are fully manifested. The righteousness of Jesus Christ in perfectly fulfilling the law of God has been graciously credited to all believers. Redemption is solely a work of God's grace, received exclusively through faith in Jesus Christ, and never by works of human merit.

We believe justification is a judicial act of God's grace wherein He acquits a person of all sin and accepts that person as righteous in His sight because of the imputed righteousness of Christ. Justification is strictly a work of God's grace, apprehended through faith alone, and solely on the account of Christ.

References:
http://www.godandscience.org/apologetics/localflood.html
http://www.reasons.org/resources/apologetics/flood.shtml?main
http://www.reasons.org/resources/fff/2002issue10/index.shtml?main#noahs_flood

 

[Donny_B]

So, what are you saying - these people don't really believe in God if they believe in evolution?

You would have to ask the MOD's as to why they dropped the word "theistic". But they didn't put "atheistic" either. Just "evolution".

 

[Eric_C]

The first thing I want to address is some of the facts that I believe are being overlooked by the old earth camp.

God has given us time measurements in the form of years, months and days. All of them being a representation of an astronomical event, literally. Does it make any sense that God would break from this pattern and give us the literal seven day week to commemorate the week of creation, an astronomical event which supposedly took Him billions of years to complete? Would that not be a deception?

Concerning appearance of age. Obviously, it is universally accepted in Orthodox Christianity that Adam was created as an adult (the exception being an individual personal view) with the appearance of age being approximately 20 to 30 years, this being the contemporary definition of early adult. Now in hindsight, if we were to be able to view Adam freshly created, we have something that is young to compare him to, specifically, a child. Upon first glance, we would assume 20 to 30 years, but with close examination we would probably conclude that Adam was a person who had led a relaxed, work free and pampered life because of the lack of wrinkles or calluses.

I see no reason to assume that Adam had no belly button. God can create him fully grown but is unable to fashion him with a belly button? I would say that, the fact that we have them and that we are created in the image of God as he was and that we came from his loins, the conclusion is that he most certainly had one. Why should the fact that it was never connected to an umbilical cord be of any significance?

Back to the appearance of age. When it comes to The Earth and the rest of the universe, do we have something to compare it with? Like another earth that we know for sure is young, that we can see the difference between the two and affirm that this one that we have is old? No, we don't have anything like that to compare to. The only experience that we do have with planets is the six thousand years or so of recorded HIStory. We don't have any, confirmed conclusively beyond any doubt, new matter, that we can see that the matter that makes up this earth is billions of years old. All that we have is this universe as we find it. The main point her is, what does a 13 to 16 billion year old universe look like? What does a six thousand year old universe look like? Has anyone ever seen both?

The old universe camp says look at all of the scientific evidence. But I say what scientific evidence? Radio dating? That is not real science. The rate of decay being constant in the past cannot be falsified nor proved to be true. It is a presumption about the past and real science does not include treating presumption as fact.

A (long) side note concerning rate of decay.
The Earths magnetic field is decaying at a certain rate that when extrapolated back to the past it gives an upper limit for the age of the earth of 10 thousand years. Of course, the evidence of the decay rate of the earths magnetic field being constant in the past is rejected because it does not fit with the model of billions of years old.
Secular scientist have attempted to construct a theory to explain this evidence away, using the mid ocean rifts and magnetic orientation of new igneous rocks as they are formed. They claim that magnetic orientation of the rocks alternating horizontally outward from the rifts, which is caused by see floor spreading over a long period of time, is evidence of magnetic pole shifts in the past. But they don't have an explanation for why the magnetic orientation also shifts vertically in the same rocks. Thus, their theory is blown completely out of the water. (pun intended) Their explanation of the earths magnetic field decay being part of some sort of cyclical event, well, there is no real evidence for it.

So what do we have with the evidence of these two decay rates, one is treated as fact, the other is rejected, the only criterion being the presumption of old earth. Does anyone see the problem with this?

When we stand back and take a look at big picture of the last 200 years or so, we see that the presumption of old earth/theory of evolution was present before any supposed scientific evidence. Just like a heretic will search the Scriptures for proof texts to support a preconceived heresy, we have secular scientist over the last 200 years or so searching the earth for, out of the context of real science, evidence for their presumption of old earth. What is it that has driven them to do this? Primarily, they oppose the gospel.

One more thing to consider.
I believe that Christians will often fall into a heretical view simply because they forget to remember what God has said about Himself, His attributes.
He is eternal, He is immeasurable, He is infinite, His ways are beyond finding out. And what He says about His created universe, it has a beginning and an end, it is measurable, it is finite. God created something(which is measurable) out of no-thing, which is not measurable--(please don't get caught up in a fallacy of equivocation here, God is not nothing)--if nonexistence can be measured, I would like to see that measuring stick. Where I'm going with this is, God is infinite, time is finite. Is it so difficult to comprehend that God has infinite access to every millisecond of time, infinitely? And that God has an infinite ability to multi-task? Is it necessary to understand the mechanics of the miracle of creation week (six literal 24 hour periods of time as the context clearly indicates) in order to accept it by faith?
--Hebrews 11:3
Through faith we understand that the worlds were framed by the word of God, so that things which are seen were not made of things which do appear.--
It is a very poor Biblical hermeneutic to metaphor-ize the context when the context does not call for it, and in the face of other later Biblical accounts that understand it to be literal.

OK, I guess that is just a little bit more then the "One more thing to consider" so I'm going to stop for now. This is getting to be a long post.

​

 

[rmwilliamsll]

take a look at:
http://www.opc.org/OS/html/V9/1c.html

Conclusion

The framework interpretation agrees with the 24-hour view that at the literal level Gen. 1 speaks of ordinary solar days. In fact it is even more consistently literal since it insists on this meaning even for the first three days. What sets the framework interpretation apart is its claim that the total picture of the creation week is figurative. The creation history is figuratively presented as an ordinary week in which the divine craftsman goes about His creative toil for six days and finally rests from and in His completed work on the seventh. To insist on taking this picture literally is to miss the profound theological point—that the creation is not an end in itself but was created with the built-in eschatological goal of entering the eternal Sabbath rest of God Himself in incorruptible glory.

or look at Kline's Kingdom Prologue at:
http://www.twoagepress.org/Kingdom.pdf

 

[jazzbird]

Hi Eric, welcome to the conversation.

God has given us time measurements in the form of years, months and days. All of them being a representation of an astronomical event, literally. Does it make any sense that God would break from this pattern and give us the literal seven day week to commemorate the week of creation, an astronomical event which supposedly took Him billions of years to complete? Would that not be a deception?

Well, if we want to examine the creation week carefully, we will see that there is no closure on the seventh day. Every other day ends with evening and morning, except the seventh day, which would lead us to believe that it is still the seventh day if we read Genesis as a literal week.

Also, if you will note verse 14, we are told that the rhythm of time in the form of days, months, years was not established until day four.

Could you clarify what you mean about time measurements representing an astronomical event and God breaking from a pattern to give us a literal week? I'm not sure I'm understanding what you are driving at.

Now in hindsight, if we were to be able to view Adam freshly created, we have something that is young to compare him to, specifically, a child. Upon first glance, we would assume 20 to 30 years, but with close examination we would probably conclude that Adam was a person who had led a relaxed, work free and pampered life because of the lack of wrinkles or calluses.

I see no reason to assume that Adam had no belly button. God can create him fully grown but is unable to fashion him with a belly button? I would say that, the fact that we have them and that we are created in the image of God as he was and that we came from his loins, the conclusion is that he most certainly had one. Why should the fact that it was never connected to an umbilical cord be of any significance?

I don't think it really matters whether or not Adam had a bellybutton. What does matter however, is that Adam's body would show absolutely no sign of aging if we were to examine him at creation. If he was given a physical, the doctor would not merely conclude that he lived a pampered life, but that he had not yet lived any life at all. There are many signs in our body that signal age that Adam would have lacked.

Perhaps we should be talking about the appearance of history and not the appearance of age. After all, what do our bodily scars, wrinkles, etc. tell about us? They are not merely signs of age, but more accurately, signs of our history. They often tell what has happened to us. Now, Adam had none of these things, right? He had no absolutely no appearance of history.

So, how can we draw an analogy between Adam's body and the earth? The earth does not merely have the appearance of age, but the appearance of history. Something that Adam lacked. And where does this idea come from that we can draw up such an analogy in the first place? The Bible draws no analogy between Adam and the earth. This is being imposed by man. There is evidence in Genesis that not everything was created with maturity. Adam is the only creation that we are told is created this way, and for practical reasons. How can we assume that anything else was created with the appearance of age? These are merely suppositions. We can observe many past events that took place on our earth and in our universe, that imply the world's history reaches back farther than 6,000 years.

I don't understand how we can believe in the appearance of age and still believe that the heavens declare the glory and truth of the Lord. If the universe is not as it appears, then God's glory is not declared in reality, but merely in appearance.

I have a huge problem with it, not only because it questions the very nature of God, but also because it denies our ability to rely on our senses. If one holds to the appearance of age theory, they must either deny the reliability of creation or the reliability of our senses. Neither of these things are biblical. The Bible tells us that our senses are reliable and that we are to test things. Are we not to believe what we see in the heavens? God says that the heavens reveal knowledge that we can trust, yet if we follow a young earth view, this knowledge is merely fictitious illusions.

 

[jazzbird]

The old universe camp says look at all of the scientific evidence. But I say what scientific evidence? Radio dating? That is not real science. The rate of decay being constant in the past cannot be falsified nor proved to be true. It is a presumption about the past and real science does not include treating presumption as fact.

How is radiometric dating a presumption? If you mean that the dating system is based on fossils with dates that had been assigned to them before radiometric dating was discovered, that is a misconception. It is based on the half-lives of radioactive isotopes measured over the last forty to eighty years.

I'm not a scientist, but from what I understand, radioactive decay rates are known to be constant under all relevant physical conditions. Sure, it's not perfect, however, there is a huge amount of overall agreement among radiometric ages, that give strong circumstantial evidence for it's reliability.

The constancy of radioactive decay rates follows from quantum mechanics, which has also passed every test physicists can create. In short, everything we know in chemistry and in physics points to radiometric dating as being a viable and valuable method of calculating the ages of igneous and metamorphosed igneous rocks. To question it seems to be beyond the bounds of reason.

To charge thousands of chemists all over the world with mass incompetence also seems to be beyond the bounds of reason. Radiometric dating has been used ever more widely for the past forty years. The dates produced have gotten steadily more precise as lab techniques and instrumentation has been improved. There is simply no logical reason to throw this entire field of science out the window. There is no reason to believe the theory is faulty, or to believe that thousands of different chemists could be so consistently wrong in the face of every conceivable test.

Further, radiometric dates can be checked by other dating techniques. When they are, the dates almost always agree within the range of expected error. In cases where the dates don’t agree, it’s always been found that some natural factor was present which selectively affected one or the other dating method being used.

Here are just a few reasons why we can trust the accuracy of this type of dating:

1. Radiometric dates agree with astronomical timescales. In astronomy, decay rate constancy can be tested easily by studying stars at varying distances. Since these distances represent different light travel times (hence different astronomical eras), astronomers can observe whether or not decay rates were slower or faster at different eras. Their research reveals constancy, and constancy confirms established radiometric dates.

2. Most rocks are, for practical purposes, closed systems. Some doubters have tried to dismiss geologic dating by saying that no rocks are completely closed systems (i.e., rocks are not isolated from their surroundings and as a result have lost or gained some isotopes used for dating). From an extremely technical perspective this point may be true—perhaps one atom out of a trillion has leaked out of nearly all rocks—but such a change makes an unmeasurably small change in the result. Many books written over the past forty years detail the precise conditions under which dating mechanisms work.

3. If decay rates were poorly known, dates could be inaccurate. However, most decay rates used for dating rocks are known to within about 2 percent accuracy. Uncertainties are only slightly higher on rhenium (5%), lutetium (3%), and beryllium (3%). Such small uncertainties provide no reason to dismiss radiometric dating. Whether a rock is 100 million years old or 102 million years old makes little difference.

The Earths magnetic field is decaying at a certain rate that when extrapolated back to the past it gives an upper limit for the age of the earth of 10 thousand years. Of course, the evidence of the decay rate of the earths magnetic field being constant in the past is rejected because it does not fit with the model of billions of years old.

Secular scientist have attempted to construct a theory to explain this evidence away, using the mid ocean rifts and magnetic orientation of new igneous rocks as they are formed. They claim that magnetic orientation of the rocks alternating horizontally outward from the rifts, which is caused by see floor spreading over a long period of time, is evidence of magnetic pole shifts in the past. But they don't have an explanation for why the magnetic orientation also shifts vertically in the same rocks. Thus, their theory is blown completely out of the water. (pun intended) Their explanation of the earths magnetic field decay being part of some sort of cyclical event, well, there is no real evidence for it.

Where is the evidence that shows that there is no fluctuation in the magnetic fields? And why is it the scientists (not all of whom are secular, BTW) who are rejecting the truth in this regard to fit their model? Couldn't the same be just as easily said about the young earthers?

The magnetic fields do indeed fluctuate over time.

At the heart of our planet lies a solid iron ball, about as hot as the surface of the sun. Researchers call it "the inner core." It's really a world within a world. The inner core is 70% as wide as the moon. It spins at its own rate, as much as 0.2° of longitude per year faster than the Earth above it, and it has its own ocean: a very deep layer of liquid iron known as "the outer core."

Earth's magnetic field comes from this ocean of iron, which is an electrically conducting fluid in constant motion. Sitting atop the hot inner core, the liquid outer core seethes and roils like water in a pan on a hot stove. The outer core also has "hurricanes"--whirlpools powered by the Coriolis forces of Earth's rotation. These complex motions generate our planet's magnetism through a process called the dynamo effect.

Using the equations of magnetohydrodynamics, a branch of physics dealing with conducting fluids and magnetic fields, Glatzmaier and colleague Paul Roberts have created a supercomputer model of Earth's interior. Their software heats the inner core, stirs the metallic ocean above it, then calculates the resulting magnetic field. They run their code for hundreds of thousands of simulated years and watch what happens.

What they see mimics the real Earth: The magnetic field waxes and wanes, poles drift and, occasionally, flip. Change is normal, they've learned. And no wonder. The source of the field, the outer core, is itself seething, swirling, turbulent. "It's chaotic down there," notes Glatzmaier. The changes we detect on our planet's surface are a sign of that inner chaos.

Also:

Ovens used by ancient civilizations and the igneous rocks making up the ocean floor are two of the more obvious examples. Both record the direction and strength of the magnetic field as it was at the time they were last heated, and both prove conclusively that the hypothetical exponential decay of Earth's magnetic field has not occurred.

When we stand back and take a look at big picture of the last 200 years or so, we see that the presumption of old earth/theory of evolution was present before any supposed scientific evidence. Just like a heretic will search the Scriptures for proof texts to support a preconceived heresy, we have secular scientist over the last 200 years or so searching the earth for, out of the context of real science, evidence for their presumption of old earth. What is it that has driven them to do this? Primarily, they oppose the gospel.

So, you don't believe, for example, that the fact that we see starlight and heavenly events that are millions of light years away is evidence, or at least cause for consideration, of an old earth?

Many scientists have been led to the Gospel through their study of our natural world.

I believe that Christians will often fall into a heretical view simply because they forget to remember what God has said about Himself, His attributes.
He is eternal, He is immeasurable, He is infinite, His ways are beyond finding out. And what He says about His created universe, it has a beginning and an end, it is measurable, it is finite.

OEC is not a heretical view. It is a legitimate and Biblical theory of creation.

What does God say about Himself and how we can know Him and his creation? Is He a trickster? Does He mislead us through His creation? No. He tells us many things about Himself through Scripture. He tells us that He reveals Himself through His creation, and that we can discover truth through the natural world.

Romans 1:20 For since the creation of the world His invisible attributes are clearly seen, being understood by the things that are made, even His eternal power and Godhead, so that they are without excuse.

Psa 19:1 -2 THE heavens declare the glory of God;And the firmament shows His handiwork. Day unto day utters speech, And night unto night reveals knowledge

1Th 5:21 Test all things; hold fast what is good.

It is a very poor Biblical hermeneutic to metaphor-ize the context when the context does not call for it, and in the face of other later Biblical accounts that understand it to be literal.

What are you implying is being metaphor-ized?

References:
http://www.asa3.org/ASA/resources/Wiens.html#page 23
http://my.erinet.com/~jwoolf/rad_dat.html
http://www.reasons.org/resources/fff/2001issue07/index.shtml?main#dynamics_of_dating
http://science.nasa.gov/headlines/y2003/29dec_magneticfield.htm
http://www.godandscience.org/youngearth/yeclaims.html#magfield

 

[Eric_C]

Hello Jazzbird and thank you for welcoming me to the discussion.

I don't care much for these quote windows so I'm going to stick with my own style of quoting, that is if no one minds.

I will be quoting your comments/questions in italic.

My comments/answers/questions/Scriptures will be in bold.



(part one)

___________________________________________________

"Well, if we want to examine the creation week carefully, we will see that there is no closure on the seventh day. Every other day ends with evening and morning, except the seventh day, which would lead us to believe that it is still the seventh day if we read Genesis as a literal week."

I have several problems with this interpretation. The first is, we have evenings and mornings going on since the beginning. If the sun hasn't set on the seventh day yet, why do we have evenings and mornings every day?

The second is, the absence of something is not evidence against it. The fact that it is not mentioned does not mean that it didn't occur, to the contrary, take a look at what the verse says:

Gen 2:3

|--"And God blessed the seventh day, and sanctified it: because that in it he had rested from all his work which God created and made."--|

The short phrase "in it he had rested" means that it occurred and at a time in the past. For it to be referred to as a day in the past tense, it would have had to have an evening and a morning and, it would have had to have come to a close. Now I know that those words that emphasis the past tense aren't in the Hebrew, but sense neither of us are experts in dead Semitic languages, and those who are have placed them in every translation that I know of, I believe it is safe to assume they belong there. If they didn't, I'm sure God would have done something about it a long "day" ago.

The third is, if this is still the seventh day of creation (figuratively) then God has broken His own decree by working in it.

Isa 44:24

|--"Thus saith the LORD, thy redeemer, and he that formed thee from the womb, I [am] the LORD that maketh all [things]"--|

The forth is, each day was bounded by an evening and morning, not ended by them. That would be the same as saying each day ended with a day, and that wouldn't make any sense. Look at the verse:

Gen 1:5

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

It does not say ended the first day, it says "were" the first day, also could be translated "be" the first day.


"Also, if you will note verse 14, we are told that the rhythm of time in the form of days, months, years was not established until day four."

No, thats not completely true. The earth was created on the first day, verses 1-2, and we have the first time measurement of evening and morning, verse 5, the earth rotating on its axis. The first day time period was established in the first day. Months and years are inconsequential because only three days had gone by at verse 14.


"Could you clarify what you mean about time measurements representing an astronomical event and God breaking from a pattern to give us a literal week? I'm not sure I'm understanding what you are driving at."

Certainly,
Year = one approximate orbit by the earth around the sun.

Month = one approximate orbit by the moon around the earth.

Day = one approximate rotation of the earth on its axis.

All of these are literal time indicators that God gave us.

My point is that God gave us the time measurement, of a week, as 7 literal days of approximately 24 hours each, along with the other 3 literal time measurements.

Now if creation week (which is supposed to be what our week represents) is not a literal 7 days of approximately 24 hours each, then He has broken from the pattern of literal for literal and, He has been deceiving mankind from the beginning by not telling us that it was billions of years that our week represents.

Exo 20:11

|--"For [in] six days the LORD made heaven and earth, the sea, and all that in them [is], and rested the seventh day: wherefore the LORD blessed the sabbath day, and hallowed it."--|

This is God speaking here and referring back to creation week in the past tense as a literal week.


"I don't think it really matters whether or not Adam had a bellybutton. What does matter however, is that Adam's body would show absolutely no sign of aging if we were to examine him at creation. If he was given a physical, the doctor would not merely conclude that he lived a pampered life, but that he had not yet lived any life at all. There are many signs in our body that signal age that Adam would have lacked."

This is based on what evidence? How do you know what condition the body was in that God gave him? Would it be "good" for Adam to go through the blistering of his feet, for the first two or three weeks after he was created? Or the blistering of the baby fresh skin, of his hands working in the garden? God said everything was good. Would that be good? I'm inclined to believe that God made Adam fully functional at the moment He created him. I would speculate that God gave him a body that was ready to withstand walking around in the garden, in the mid day sun, naked. I would further speculate that his body was created as if it had grown the same number years that it appeared to be. It makes no sense to me that God would do it any other way. Adams first month of existence, blistered, sun burned and scratch marks from bushes all over his body?


"Perhaps we should be talking about the appearance of history and not the appearance of age. After all, what do our bodily scars, wrinkles, etc. tell about us? They are not merely signs of age, but more accurately, signs of our history. They often tell what has happened to us. Now, Adam had none of these things, right? He had no absolutely no appearance of history."

Again, I believe this to be speculation on your part. I like my speculation better. I think it would be very good to discuss history, especially Jewish and Christian Church history. And how the doctrine of old earth, that is, billions of years old earth, is not present in either until the later half of the 19 century, it is absent from the church history before then. The mainstream doctrine down through years has always been a literal 7 day creation week. This is the single most significant reason why I reject the old earth doctrine.

I'm still trying to understand how you could look at a full grown man (the evidence that we do have) and claim that, that, is not an appearance of history or age? Full grown is the appearance of age and the only evidence that we have. Speculations about what condition the body was in, is not evidence.


"So, how can we draw an analogy between Adam's body and the earth? The earth does not merely have the appearance of age, but the appearance of history. Something that Adam lacked. And where does this idea come from that we can draw up such an analogy in the first place? The Bible draws no analogy between Adam and the earth. This is being imposed by man. There is evidence in Genesis that not everything was created with maturity. Adam is the only creation that we are told is created this way, and for practical reasons. How can we assume that anything else was created with the appearance of age? These are merely suppositions. We can observe many past events that took place on our earth and in our universe, that imply the world's history reaches back farther than 6,000 years."

My purpose for drawing an analogy between Adam and the earth, or universe is to show that we have something to compare him to, a child or a baby. We don't have anything to compare the universe to.
For the purpose of my point, consider this. Lets say that you are not part of mankind and you have no experience with, or knowledge of mankind. Now, being absolutely clueless as to the determining factors of age in mankind, you find yourself in the presents of Adam minutes after he was created, but not aware of how he came to be. You begin to examine this strange and wonderful being with all of its systems and subsystems. Would you be able to determine his age not knowing the factors that would determine his age?

You would find literally no decay rate within his body because sin had not yet occurred, a half life of forever. You would probably conclude that Adam had been in existence forever.

The difference with the earth and mankind is, that God has told mankind just how old the earth is, there is no guess work. As a Christian, I can accept the possibility of Gods curse on the earth (because of mans sin in Genesis 3:17) to be the cause of rapid decay rates and or fluctuations in them and later restored to normal when the curse was removed in Genesis 8:21.

As to your claim of Adam being the only thing that was created by God, a fully functional adult with the appearance of age. How can animal kinds and sea creatures be fruitful and multiply if they were not created as fully functional adults with the appearance of age? The account in Genesis says that God created the trees with their seed in their fruit and all the other vegetation with their seed in them, or in their fruit. It does not say that God created seeds only. It says that God formed man, breathed into him the breath of life, then planted a garden and put him in it to work it. Now if that garden was planted from seed, what did Adam eat while he was working it? It takes 3 to 4 months, at least, to get vegetables to come up, fruit trees, it takes them 8 to 12 years when grown from seed to produce fruit. So what did Adam eat sense he didn't have any "super" abilities?

Observing past events on the earth and in our universe? Don't you have to be there in the past in order to observe it? It is presumptuous to look at the universe and the world around us and then use what we find with our limited minds to interpret the perfect word of God.

Proverbs 30:2-5

|--"Surely I [am] more brutish than [any] man, and have not the understanding of a man. I neither learned wisdom, nor have the knowledge of the holy. Who hath ascended up into heaven, or descended? who hath gathered the wind in his fists? who hath bound the waters in a garment? who hath established all the ends of the earth? what [is] his name, and what [is] his son's name, if thou canst tell? Every word of God [is] pure: he [is] a shield unto them that put their trust in him."--|

(End part one)

 

[Eric_C]

(Part two)

Jazzbird quoted in italic, my response in bold

_____________________________________

"I don't understand how we can believe in the appearance of age and still believe that the heavens declare the glory and truth of the Lord. If the universe is not as it appears, then God's glory is not declared in reality, but merely in appearance."

It is not that the universe isn't what it appears to be, it is mans inability to perceive the universe as it truly is.
Job 9:7-10

|--"Which commandeth the sun, and it riseth not; and sealeth up the stars. Which alone spreadeth out the heavens, and treadeth upon the waves of the sea. Which maketh Arcturus, Orion, and Pleiades, and the chambers of the south. Which doeth great things past finding out; yea, and wonders without number."--|


"I have a huge problem with it, not only because it questions the very nature of God, but also because it denies our ability to rely on our senses. If one holds to the appearance of age theory, they must either deny the reliability of creation or the reliability of our senses. Neither of these things are biblical. The Bible tells us that our senses are reliable and that we are to test things. Are we not to believe what we see in the heavens? God says that the heavens reveal knowledge that we can trust, yet if we follow a young earth view, this knowledge is merely fictitious illusions."

Our senses are reliable??? I could fill an entire post with Scriptures alone that say they're not. Look at the passage I just gave above, it says "Which doeth great things past finding out" directly connected to God creating the celestial bodies in the heavens and the heavens them self. Not only do the Scriptures teach that mankind is in darkness and deceiving himself, it literally says that what God has done in creating the universe is PAST FINDING OUT! I find your last sentence to be spurious.
________________________________________________________________

(From post #132)

Jazzbird quoted in italic, my response in bold

__________________________________________

"How is radiometric dating a presumption?"

I'll answer you with your own words "it's not perfect]---[circumstantial evidence for it's reliability"

"If you mean that the dating system is based on fossils with dates that had been assigned to them before radiometric dating was discovered, that is a misconception. It is based on the half-lives of radioactive isotopes measured over the last forty to eighty years.

I'm not a scientist, but from what I understand, radioactive decay rates are known to be constant under all relevant physical conditions. Sure, it's not perfect, however, there is a huge amount of overall agreement among radiometric ages, that give strong circumstantial evidence for it's reliability."

Aren't curses and judgments from God relevant physical conditions?


"Where is the evidence that shows that there is no fluctuation in the magnetic fields?"

That wasn't my point. And I don't believe I made any claim that they don't fluctuate.


"And why is it the scientists (not all of whom are secular, BTW) who are rejecting the truth in this regard to fit their model? Couldn't the same be just as easily said about the young earthers?"

.......No. The Christian young earth scientist are not the ones attempting to accommodate the fruit of the theory of evolution, which is old earth.


"The magnetic fields do indeed fluctuate over time."

I never claimed that they didn't. And by the way, where is the evidence to support that the rate of decay in radioisotopes hasn't changed or fluctuated in the past? There is a huge astronomical difference between the circumstantial of 40 to 80 years and the "guessed" at billions of years.


"So, you don't believe, for example, that the fact that we see starlight and heavenly events that are millions of light years away is evidence, or at least cause for consideration, of an old earth?"
.......No.

"Many scientists have been led to the Gospel through their study of our natural world."

No disagreement here, though it certainly isn't because of the heavens teaching that slow and natural processes are Gods way of creating things.


"OEC is not a heretical view. It is a legitimate and Biblical theory of creation."

While it may be accepted by some part of orthodoxy today, the doctrine is historically nonexistent within orthodoxy. Whether or not it is legitimate depends on an individuals view.


"What does God say about Himself and how we can know Him and his creation? Is He a trickster? Does He mislead us through His creation? No. He tells us many things about Himself through Scripture. He tells us that He reveals Himself through His creation, and that we can discover truth through the natural world."

Eze 14:9
|--"And if the prophet be deceived when he hath spoken a thing, I the LORD have deceived that prophet, and I will stretch out my hand upon him, and will destroy him from the midst of my people Israel."--|


"Romans 1:20 For since the creation of the world His invisible attributes are clearly seen, being understood by the things that are made, even His eternal power and Godhead, so that they are without excuse.
Psa 19:1 -2 THE heavens declare the glory of God;And the firmament shows His handiwork. Day unto day utters speech, And night unto night reveals knowledge"

Absolutely, but the things that are discovered in the heavens and the natural world do not contradict what is written in the Scriptures. If they do, then they are not the truth.


"1Th 5:21 Test all things; hold fast what is good."

Well..., old earth theory stands on things that can't be tested and that is not good.


"What are you implying is being metaphor-ized?"

Making the Scriptures speak what they do not say.
(end part two)

___________________________________________________________

Jazzbird

I hope that you don't take my boldness and convictions personally. I know that your convictions are just as passionate to you, as mine are to me. So if there is anything that I've said in my posts that are offensive to you, I apologize in advance. It is not my goal to cause anyones feelings to be hurt. If you knew me better, you'd probably take what I say with this grain of salt, I'm stubborn...lol



Peace in Christ Jesus,

Eric.

 

[theFijian]

"And why is it the scientists (not all of whom are secular, BTW) who are rejecting the truth in this regard to fit their model? Couldn't the same be just as easily said about the young earthers?"

.......No. The Christian young earth scientist are not the ones attempting to accommodate the fruit of the theory of evolution, which is old earth.

I'm afraid this is incorrect. Geologosts such as the christian Hugh Miller were formulating theories of an old earth 50 years before Darwin.

Andy

 

[Eric_C]

I'm afraid this is incorrect. Geologosts such as the christian Hugh Miller were formulating theories of an old earth 50 years before Darwin.

Andy

OK, so I should have said Naturalism, which has been around much longer then Darwian theories. They are both part of the same tree.

Edit--[[font=Verdana, Geneva, Arial, Sans-serif]50 years before???[/font]
[font=Verdana, Geneva, Arial, Sans-serif]That is not correct. Hugh Miller (1802-56) and Charles Darwin (1809-82) lived at the same time and published works during the same time period. One of Darwin's works, published in 1840 "Zoology of the Beagle", which is based on an expedition (1831-36) to the southern islands, coast of South America and Australia. In that work he says that his observations of the "organic beings", as he calls them, and the geological relations of the present to the past inhabitants of South America, that they seem to shed some light(?) on the origin of the species, which he calls "that mystery of mysteries". [/font]

[font=Verdana, Geneva, Arial, Sans-serif]Miller said that he couldn't accept a symbolic interpretation of the Genesis creation account.--(Testimony of the Rocks pub. 1857) Miller was not an old earth creation Christian.[/font]

[font=Verdana, Geneva, Arial, Sans-serif]This disproves your claim that Miller was working on old earth ideas 50 years before Darwin. [/font]

[font=Verdana, Geneva, Arial, Sans-serif]I don't know why you would attempt to misrepresent the facts of history? Did you think I wouldn't check out what you say?[/font]

[font=Verdana, Geneva, Arial, Sans-serif]I would give links, but I don't have the minimum required (15) posts. I offer instead, copy and paste the two names into the search engine of your choice and read what you find for yourself.]--Edit[/font]

[font=Verdana, Geneva, Arial, Sans-serif]Eric.[/font]

 

[theFijian]

OK, so I should have said Naturalism, which has been around much longer then Darwian theories. They are both part of the same tree.

Edit--[[font=Verdana, Geneva, Arial, Sans-serif]50 years before???[/font]
[font=Verdana, Geneva, Arial, Sans-serif]That is not correct. Hugh Miller (1802-56) and Charles Darwin (1809-82) lived at the same time and published works during the same time period. One of Darwin's works, published in 1840 "Zoology of the Beagle", which is based on an expedition (1831-36) to the southern islands, coast of South America and Australia. In that work he says that his observations of the "organic beings", as he calls them, and the geological relations of the present to the past inhabitants of South America, that they seem to shed some light(?) on the origin of the species, which he calls "that mystery of mysteries". [/font]

[font=Verdana, Geneva, Arial, Sans-serif]Miller said that he couldn't accept a symbolic interpretation of the Genesis creation account.--(Testimony of the Rocks pub. 1857) Miller was not an old earth creation Christian.[/font]

[font=Verdana, Geneva, Arial, Sans-serif]This disproves your claim that Miller was working on old earth ideas 50 years before Darwin. [/font]

[font=Verdana, Geneva, Arial, Sans-serif]I don't know why you would attempt to misrepresent the facts of history? Did you think I wouldn't check out what you say?[/font]

[font=Verdana, Geneva, Arial, Sans-serif]I would give links, but I don't have the minimum required (15) posts. I offer instead, copy and paste the two names into the search engine of your choice and read what you find for yourself.]--Edit[/font]

[font=Verdana, Geneva, Arial, Sans-serif]Eric.[/font]

I must concede I got my dates wrong, must learn to count one of these days. However, Miller's The Testimony of the Rocks was published before Origin of the Species (1st edition).

And there's no need to be so suspicious you know. This is a christians only area, we're all family here.

 

[Eric_C]

I must concede I got my dates wrong, must learn to count one of these days. However, Miller's The Testimony of the Rocks was published before Origin of the Species (1st edition).

And there's no need to be so suspicious you know. This is a christians only area, we're all family here.

Amen..., it is good, to be of like minds...

It was more, an expression of confusion than a question of suspicion.

I must confess, I don't do very well sometimes at expressing inflections.


Eric.

 

[jazzbird]

My point is that God gave us the time measurement, of a week, as 7 literal days of approximately 24 hours each, along with the other 3 literal time measurements.

Now if creation week (which is supposed to be what our week represents) is not a literal 7 days of approximately 24 hours each, then He has broken from the pattern of literal for literal and, He has been deceiving mankind from the beginning by not telling us that it was billions of years that our week represents.

Exo 20:11

--"For [in] six days the LORD made heaven and earth, the sea, and all that in them [is], and rested the seventh day: wherefore the LORD blessed the sabbath day, and hallowed it."--

This is God speaking here and referring back to creation week in the past tense as a literal week.

I see. The thing is - and you said it yourself - the creation week is a representation of our week. We are to model our work and rest after the example God gives us in Genesis. A representation is not the thing itself. It is a symbol. We see God’s example of working 6 and resting 1 in other places that do not refer to days. For example, the people of Israel are told to farm the land for six years and to rest on the seventh:

Exd 23:10-11 And six years thou shalt sow thy land, and shalt gather in the fruits thereof:
But the seventh year thou shalt let it rest and lie still; that the poor of thy people may eat: and what they leave the beasts of the field shall eat. In like manner thou shalt deal with thy vineyard, and with thy oliveyard.

Lev 25:2-5 Speak unto the children of Israel, and say unto them, When ye come into the land which I give you, then shall the land keep a sabbath unto the LORD. Six years thou shalt sow thy field, and six years thou shalt prune thy vineyard, and gather in the fruit thereof; But in the seventh year shall be a sabbath of rest unto the land, a sabbath for the LORD: thou shalt neither sow thy field, nor prune thy vineyard. That which groweth of its own accord of thy harvest thou shalt not reap, neither gather the grapes of thy vine undressed: for it is a year of rest unto the land.

Again, I believe this to be speculation on your part. I like my speculation better. I think it would be very good to discuss history, especially Jewish and Christian Church history. And how the doctrine of old earth, that is, billions of years old earth, is not present in either until the later half of the 19 century, it is absent from the church history before then. The mainstream doctrine down through years has always been a literal 7 day creation week. This is the single most significant reason why I reject the old earth doctrine.

I’m glad we can agree that both views are equally speculative on this matter. The fact is we cannot know. What is most important about Adam is that he was created an adult, and God created him this way in order to protect him. There was a purpose for Adam to be created mature. Perhaps he had calluses to protect his hands and feet as he worked, perhaps he did not, but any such signs would have been designed for his ability to survive.

Yes, we can look at church history - though we’ve got a lot on our plate right now. Let’s finish up some of this stuff before throwing another aspect onto the table.

I'm still trying to understand how you could look at a full grown man (the evidence that we do have) and claim that, that, is not an appearance of history or age? Full grown is the appearance of age and the only evidence that we have. Speculations about what condition the body was in, is not evidence.

No, speculation is not evidence, and I don’t think it’s important to dwell on the condition of his body.

I will try to better explain my view on Adam and age: If something only appears to be old, it is not really old. Adam was created an adult. He was not created with the appearance of being an adult. He was an adult, yet he had not begun to age. Though we can speculate that perhaps he was created with calluses, I think it would be a mighty big stretch to say that he was created with worn joints and wrinkles as well. God created Adam so that he could function properly, not so he could appear old. Despite the fact that at his creation he was only minutes old, he was also an adult. That is what he was.

The whole appearance of age argument, reminds me of the argument atheists use when they say the world only appears to be designed with purpose. (I don’t mean that as a dig). They are trying to force what we know about our world to fit their mold and their preconceived notions and prejudices.

The difference with the earth and mankind is, that God has told mankind just how old the earth is, there is no guess work. As a Christian, I can accept the possibility of Gods curse on the earth (because of mans sin in Genesis 3:17) to be the cause of rapid decay rates and or fluctuations in them and later restored to normal when the curse was removed in Genesis 8:21.

No, he has not told us how old the earth is. Please support this assertion. If we knew, we would not have this big controversy on our hands.

As to your claim of Adam being the only thing that was created by God, a fully functional adult with the appearance of age. How can animal kinds and sea creatures be fruitful and multiply if they were not created as fully functional adults with the appearance of age?

I didn’t say that Adam was without a doubt the only thing that God created with full maturity. What I said is that we know from the Genesis account that not all things were created this way, and other than Adam, it does not tell us what things, if any, were created with maturity. Perhaps the animals were also created with maturity. If that was necessary to their safety and survival, then I’m sure they were created in that manner. That has nothing to do with being fruitful though. If an infant animal can get along without a mother and grow to maturity, it will be able to reproduce in a short period of time.

The account in Genesis says that God created the trees with their seed in their fruit and all the other vegetation with their seed in them, or in their fruit. It does not say that God created seeds only.

It doesn’t say that the fruit had their seeds in them at the time of creation. The text is giving us a description of what kind of plant it is - that being the kind that bears seeds.

Genesis says that the plants grew - they were not planted fully grown. I’ve posted this before in this thread, but no one seems to want to address it.

Gen 1:11-12 Then God said, "Let the earth sprout vegetation, plants yielding seed, and fruit trees on the earth bearing fruit after their kind with seed in them"; and it was so. The earth brought forth vegetation, plants yielding seed after their kind, and trees bearing fruit with seed in them, after their kind; and God saw that it was good.

The earth sprouted vegetations. The earth brought forth vegetation. This is not a description of mature plants and trees.

It says that God formed man, breathed into him the breath of life, then planted a garden and put him in it to work it. Now if that garden was planted from seed, what did Adam eat while he was working it? It takes 3 to 4 months, at least, to get vegetables to come up, fruit trees, it takes them 8 to 12 years when grown from seed to produce fruit. So what did Adam eat sense he didn't have any "super" abilities?

Hold on now….vegetation was created on day three and Adam was created on day 6. You are making an assumption that the garden was void of vegetation until after the creation of Adam. The verb “planted” is past tense. There is nothing to indicate God planting the garden after Adam’s creation. The text is merely giving us the information that God created a garden, and that is where he placed Adam. Why wouldn’t God have prepared the garden for Adam when he created the rest of the plants? The Bible does not say that on day 3 God created plants and then on day 6 he created some more plants.

 

[jazzbird]

It is not that the universe isn't what it appears to be, it is mans inability to perceive the universe as it truly is.

Job 9:7-10

--"Which commandeth the sun, and it riseth not; and sealeth up the stars. Which alone spreadeth out the heavens, and treadeth upon the waves of the sea. Which maketh Arcturus, Orion, and Pleiades, and the chambers of the south. Which doeth great things past finding out; yea, and wonders without number."--

This scripture is speaking of the awesomeness of God. Yes, He is beyond our comprehension. He has power unimaginable. Job understands that he cannot comprehend the ways of God - that is true.

I don’t think however, that your statement that we cannot perceive the universe as it truly is, is accurate. Of course there are many things we do not know. There are mysteries. But God does not tell us that we are to be ignorant of all the workings of the world. The scripture from Job refers to our inability to understand God. It is not telling us that we can understand nothing of our natural world.

Our senses are reliable??? I could fill an entire post with Scriptures alone that say they're not. Look at the passage I just gave above, it says "Which doeth great things past finding out" directly connected to God creating the celestial bodies in the heavens and the heavens them self. Not only do the Scriptures teach that mankind is in darkness and deceiving himself, it literally says that what God has done in creating the universe is PAST FINDING OUT! I find your last sentence to be spurious.

Yes, our senses are reliable. If I see a table, I know before I touch it that it will be hard. If I see a dog, I know it will bark and not purr. I am not saying that we are to rely on our own wisdom and intuition instead of on God - perhaps you think I say “sense” as in “reason.” I am saying that the Bible tells us that if we use our five senses they tell us things about our world. We use our senses to collect information and evidence. I could fill an entire post with Scriptures that tell us this - but I will limit it to a few verses:

1John 1:1-3
That which was from the beginning, which we have heard, which we have seen with our eyes, which we have looked upon, and our hands have handled, concerning the Word of the life was manifested, and we have seen, and bear witness, and declare to you that eternal life which was with the Father and was manifested to us that which we have seen and heard we declare to you, that you also may have fellowship with us; and truly our fellowship is with the Father and with His Son Jesus Christ.

Deut 4:9
"Only take heed to yourself, and diligently keep yourself, lest you forget the things your eyes have seen, and lest they depart from your heart all the days of your life. And teach them to your children and your grandchildren…

1Cr 15:4-7
….and that He was buried, and that He rose again the third day according to the Scriptures, and that He was seen by Cephas, then by the twelve. After that He was seen by over five hundred brethren at once, of whom the greater part remain to the present, but some have fallen asleep. After that He was seen by James, then by all the apostles.

Evidence is important. It is necessary to support verbal testimony. Events carry more weight than words. Deut 18.22 says "When the prophet speaks in the name of the Lord, if the thing does not come about or come true, that is the thing which the Lord has not spoken. The prophet has spoken it presumptuously; you shall not be afraid of him."

Jesus tells His disciples: "And now I have told you before it comes to pass, that when it comes to pass, you may believe." (John 14:29) Jesus acknowledges the importance of evidence and implies that if His words don't line up with the events, then He doesn't expect them to believe. It is the consistency of His words with the events of reality that prove He is who He says He is. He is telling us that we can believe what we experience to be true.

The Bible tells us so many times that we can trust events. God says we can believe our eyes. Some people will argue that after Jesus’ death the disciples saw merely an apparition, and not Jesus himself. What does Paul say? He says that they saw Jesus in His earthly body and that this is proof of the Truth of Christianity.

So God tells us we can believe what we see, yet you say that the astronomers cannot believe what they see in the sky. Are the events in the sky real or falsified?