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But then again, I am just human, and God could be entirely different than what I imagine.
So, tell us, what kind of conversation are you looking for? If you don't want to talk about Genesis and stuff like that. Just curious.
I think you're onto something important in that last paragraph. I'm all for observing our universe and recording what we observe. I even trust that the people trained to do this are honest people. But every statement of faith should not get too far from the humility that we don't know anything for sure--whether we're making a traditionally religious statement or a scientific hypothesis that can then be tested.
And maybe think through the implications of what we believe.
Maybe this is just a big ol' jar of meal worm salsa like I ate at the New Orleans Insectarium. Mmmmm. Meal Worm Salsa.
Does it bother you that humans might have evolved from apes?
Separate the worldview of we are going to kill God and crush the Christians and puruse fully objective science in the whole thing and I have no problem. Same goes for Christians who say they will crush the evolutionists with the weight of the bible.
In the words of John Lennon "...cant we all just get along?" there are enough hills for Christians to charge and fight, this is not one of them.
I do feel sad (and a bit shocked) that you think it's possible. But it's not a deal breaker for me - I'll still associate with you. When you meet the Lord, he'll set you straight. ha ha
Monica, I'm sorry you're sad too! I guess it is just a sad issue. Why is that? At any rate, I'm sure the Lord will set me straight on a lot of points! And I look forward to it.
I almost believed in evolution once, then I decided I didn't really care HOW God made the earth and that I'd leave the question unanswered for now.
And, yet, it seems to me that both sides say they have "real" science completely on their side. (Reading books on the subject is fascinating, no matter who is talking.) To which I say... "Hmm... I think I'm going to go out and dig up fossils and find out what THEY say!" *sigh* If only we could all just find out for ourselves,... but most of us are left trusting people who may be carried away with their own ideas. And so... I lean toward six day creation because I know God CAN, and it seems more powerful to me that He could do it that way.
Agreeing with Monica's last sentence, I'm sure He'll set us ALL straight when we see Him face to face. It's pretty clear that how He made the world will be the least of our concerns, actually.
And I think it's great that you're reading what folks say about it all! Be sure to read Francis Collins' book The Language of God if you haven't already.
I also agree that how God made the world shouldn't be a concern. So why was I so scared to post this?
That's not the point of the creation story. The creation story emphasizes, over against other Ugaritic myths, that God is sovereign and that man, rather than being some accident, is pre-eminent in creation.
That being said, I don't believe in evolution, not because of my oh-so-knowledgeable scientific expertise, but because evolution means that death came before the fall, and I don't believe death to be natural. It's unnatural. It's part of the fall, and I believe Christ's victory in his resurrection (and our hope of our future resurrection) defeats the fall and death.
Now that being said, I do believe that creationists and evolutionists alike have a hard time being unbiased about the whole thing--and should we? Aren't we by nature biased toward something or other? Isn't it impossible to be purely objective about anything? Don't we come to everything with the presuppositions of our worldviews? As C.S. Lewis said, there's enough science in the world to prove anything (in The Discarded Image). I have many friends who are both, and I imagine it will always be that way until the day that it no longer matters.
So that's my two cents. I hope I didn't get too "Genesis-y" on you! ;) Will you still be my friend?
I think it's hard to consider having come down from such unattractive creatures. : ) Also, it does raise that whole sticky question about what was meant by Adam and Eve being personally created by God. (Sorry, I think you didn't particularly want to talk about Genesis. But that's where the story is. : )
And you were scared because you know there are Christians out there who would call you crazy for even suggesting evolution is truth. They might even say you weren't a Christian.
I think I've been riding the fence on this one for a while now. A few members of my family loved the Creation Museum and the movie, Expelled, but I feel so ignorant about any position that I hesitate to even ask what they liked about these.
I am, however, quite comfortable accepting whatever God did (unless I came from custard, which makes me gag). Six or six million, or maybe even something so radical that Moses couldn't bear to repeat, I trust that God could do it, and I'll revere Him all the same.
Perhaps it's deciding not to decide, but I like the idea of God as the Big Bang. Like The Big Bopper of Evolution. Really, though, wouldn't "someone/thing" have to set up the bang to begin with?
I'm always amused by the evolving from apes (there are days, especially after reading the news, if I don't wonder if it's the reverse). Nothing to do with its truth. I just wonder why there are still apes.
What I find most confusing is that when people refer to "evolution" theory and "creation" theory and whether they believe in it or not, I find that they are using the same words to talk about very different concepts, and usually it seems they are only referring to part of the overall concept. What would be most beneficial to me in these types of conversations is for people to explain what they really mean rather than just using the general terms that carry so much meaning and controversy inherently in themselves now.
Have you ever seen Rob Bell's Everything is Spiritual video? In it he talks about 2-Dimensional world (which he called Flatland) and how the people who live in 2-Dimensional world can only see things in 2 dimensions, and so their entire world view - even vocabulary - is set within the context of the limit of their universe - two dimensions. He held up a marker and said if I show someone in Flatland the marker this way (showing the marker to the audience from the side), what would they see? A rectangle. If I showed it to them this way (showing the marker from the end) what do they see? A circle. And to the people in Flatland, they cannot describe it otherwise and they cannot see it otherwise. But in reality, the marker is both . . . even more. So if we live in our world (how many dimensions have we discovered now?) and God lives outside our world in a place with dimensions we don't even understand, can't we then assume that some things are beyond the limit of our language, our understanding?
I sort of feel that way about the way science and religion like to explain the way the world began and how it works.
I think it's troublesome that so many people of faith find it difficult, if not impossible to reconcile the observable universe with scripture. As one of little faith myself, I guess I don't really identify with the mindset that opts to ignore evidence that runs counter to orthodoxy. I understand the impulse if one ascribes to a particularly stark fundamentalist interpretation of scripture, but despite being one of little faith, it has major flaws in my eyes.
It takes away the power of the myth of the creation story. The story of the Garden of Eden, Adam, Eve, temptation, etc are all more powerful to me as metaphor describing the limits of humanity, that what separates us from god is wanting. Holding firm to the belief that it is a journalistic, observed account of the beginning of life is at once juvenile and simplistic as it is debasing, and robs a potentially profound story of its message.
In a way, creationism pigeonholes god into something that it's not, which is limited -- to a tidy, easy-to-digest temporal narrative in which the world is created in a single week. Nothing about life, god, or humanity is illuminated in this story. All it says is "God is magic!" which, you know, is just so damn spiritually unfulfilling and a large part of the reason why I left the church and joined those crazy Unitarians.
Anyway I'm fine with creationists so long as they stick to releasing ridiculous children's literature that I can appreciate on ironic levels (nota bene: I was given such a book as a gift which provided 32-illustrated pages of giggles). They're on the losing end of history and it's just a matter of time before they're cast in with the flat-earthers of centuries past.
Good post and interesting thread.
I think evolutionists would say we didn't come strictly speaking from apes, but that apes and us came from the same ancestor.
I agree with the basics of what you say, though I am not sure I embrace it for myself, nor do I care much. I think it's a tragedy that young people lose their faith at the university, when they're taught a view which shatters what they were taught about creation from Genesis. As if the Bible stands or falls on such a view. Completely absurd I'm sad to say, I think!
I don't care how God created all things. I believe the Bible is true, and what we can learn from science is true as well. I say go ahead and put some weight on science, but let's remember too, that science itself is ever evolving as to its theories from its continued endeavor.
Just my two cents on this, where I'm at now.
LL, about the apes. I've been thinking about it, and I wonder if our vision of the Imago Dei isn't troubled by the thought of us being genetically connected to apes.
Monica, I'm middle born too! Yea! Go us. You are absolutely right about my fear. I hope you don't think I'm crazy. I'm not. But neither are you.
Sam Van Eman, you make me laugh. I wasn't thinking of this as an entrance, but I guess it was. You raise an important issue (as did Tina) in thinking about Moses' role (or a similar person) in the authorship of Genesis. Given what others were saying at the time, Genesis was ground breaking in its picture of God and creation. So why do we get stuck on 6 days?
Christa, technically evolution isn't about us evolving from apes at all, I think. At best, humans and primates have a common ancestor. Still I was very surprised to see the discussion go there so quickly.
spaghettipie, the word theory is tricky. What scientists mean by theory is quite different than what the word means in common usage. It has to do with peer review and something worthy of building a hypothesis on.
I'm with you 100% on the dimensions argument. I highly recommend people try to read Brian Greene's Fabric of the Cosmos. Or else watch the PBS video series on The Elegant Universe. (Or read it.)
Creation theory is a funny phrase. For me, its like we're taking apples from one basket of knowing and oranges from another basket of knowing and arguing over whether all fruit is apples or oranges. Maybe that makes no sense.
mch3snut, it's always good to hear from you here. You're as spunky as ever! I think you're onto something when you reduce the problem to this: We're in danger of robbing a potentially profound story of its message.
Of course, that's been the problem for awhile. We can't agree on the details of that message--and we assume our disagreements are incompatible. Some are, naturally. But others maybe not.
Ted, thanks for making that point. I should have discussed that earlier, but I hadn't gotten around to it until this comment. I wanted to see where it led. Again, I was very surprised to hear that come up.
And I like what you say that science itself is ever evolving. That's what peer review is all about.
B. Currant, thanks!
Everyone, feel free to keep commenting. I'll pop in and out, without addressing each commenter from this point on.
Saying that doesn't mean that I take the Genesis account to be intended as scientific. I believe it's intended as the beginning of the story, as great myths and stories and legends, etc. And, like any good story, the end recapitulates the beginning in some way. In the last chapters of Revelation, we see re-creation and even a forward progress from Genesis, although based on Genesis, if that makes any sense. So, yes, I believe theology and literary-ness to be intertwined here. God's the master story teller. But I don't believe death, any type including physical, to be a part of his plan. In fact, it really irritates me when people call death a natural part of life. No, actually, it's not. It was never meant to be. It came as an effect of sin. All creation groans from this death-ness and destruction.
Sorry. There I go again.
It's not as though I haven't come to my own answers in regards to this. As I said, I lean toward six days, myself... even as I admit I really can't define what God did or how He did it. I don't know enough. It seems to me that we're worse off physically, spiritually, and mentally than we were in this perfect beginning of humanity. In any case, these are questions we have to process, at least a little, because they affect how we see God, and what we think He calls good.
To believe in anything but Creation, is to tell God that he's just not able, and maybe, as J.B. Phillips put it, "Your God is too small."
If you don't believe in creation, then just for a minute, think about this: "Where does space end" and then "When did time begin and when does it end." If you're honest, those three questions will short-circuit your brain, unless God enters the conversation. Then it becomes totally rational.
I never want to limit what God can do based on my logic, my intelligence or my research. that's the power of the unchained life!
David
www.redletterbelievers.blogspot.com
I'm with you here depite the risk where I worship.
I put it this way to describe the relationship.
What if God is the painter? Evolution God's paintbrush and all God's creation his painting?
-Sam
The fall of Adam brought death, not just to man, but to all of creation. Romans 8 says that Creation groans and "eagerly awaits the revelation of God's children."
Before the fall, Adam and Eve would have lived forever. They were vegetarians! That's why Christ, as Heather states, came. He came to take us away from the penalty, from the stench of death. Thats why in eternity, there will be no more death -- it will be Eden again.
Morphing evolution with creationism is tough to do -- not just explaining away Genesis -- but figuring out what do with Jesus' sacrifice. Without the resurrection...and our resurrection into new life, it would have been in vain. And if it was in vain, then what in the world are we doing with this crazy faith?
http://www.christianitytoday.com/tcw/2008/julau...
To my credit I really like fruits, vegetables, grains, and dairy products too.
Basically, I just like food. Food that moos as well as food that makes amber waves across our Great American plains.
I do want to reiterate, though, that I don't believe the Genesis account is concerned as much with the how as with the fact that God is Creator (and Sustainer) of all Life, and because of that He's sovereign over it, and that man is pre-eminent in creation (which also gives us the responsibility of caring for creation).
A couple of things that strike me about evolutionists and creationists:
--Evolution arose because of questions in the Modern period (I believe that the philosophy of a culture precedes the science of it--c.f. C.S. Lewis' The Discarded Image)
--Creationists claim that God created the world and that man was placed here by God, yet we're often at fault for irresponsibility of earth's resources. Evolutionists claim that we evolved through survival of the fittest--which I'd then assume gives us the right to use the resources as we feel like because, after all, we fought to get here, we're the fittest and we're surviving--yet they're often the "liberals" (notice my use of quotes, please) that fight for the environment.
Of course, nothings that simple, and I say that a bit tongue-in-cheek using sweeping generalizations.
By the same token, I'll use your words here, "If God is who he says He is (powerful, creative, in control), then why..." can't he allow things to evolve and be the Agent of that change. You have to allow for that, no?
Just checking.
For clarification on one point: we humans are in fact primates, and under reasonable biological schemes, we're apes.
It's fascinating to consider the point where the humans species became self-aware, for there is a true miracle. That is a point where I see the divine. And it would likely be a very few, maybe brothers and sisters in a bright family, that cooked up speech and story-telling and songs.
There is Adam - surrounded by those who are not quite aware yet, who will carry the species forward with his slightly less capable cousins, and bring it to the full light of humanity. Ready to eat from the tree of knowledge, with fruit both good and evil.
Put them to sleep, draw on their forehead with a marker, then show them a mirror and they will try to rub the mark from their head. They know the chimp in the mirror as themselves. Self-awareness.
Dolphins have it too, I've heard. I'm guessing there are levels of self-awareness, but still. We're hardly the only species that has it.
All of this should end with the caveat that I'm no scientist.
And another caveat for L.L. When I say I love sausage, I really mean it. I've been known to drive two hours for good sausage.
On self-awareness - perhaps that was the wrong term, and I'm sure you're right Marcus that it is not an "on-off" phenomenon. But still I think there must have been a qualitative shift sometime.
What's often not said is that evolution offers NO explanation of how life began. None. And while some evolutionists claim the process is random, that's really not important either. The truth is, natural selection, while brutal, seems to be God's way. As such, speaking against it is like speaking against a mountain. It just is. And because it is, it is true. And if it is true and we believe in God, then it is God's truth.
And if natural selection is happening (and it is) then evolution is simply a larger version of that happening on a grand scale. I think it is beautiful in a hard way, like the way galaxies are born and the way stars die. All things have their time. All things are born in His love but also born to struggle in this life. It all seems to make sense to me.