“Kids don’t like being lied to.”

I got this missive from Charlie Richardson…child_martinak15

“Some fundamentalist churches equate doctrinal non-conformity with “not walking with Christ.”

So for a lot of folks your idea of “evolving your interpretation” of Scripture, based on science, is anathema and the liberal slippery slope to hell.

I know this from firsthand experience.

Extreme fundamentalism

of any sort is a big problem in general whether Christians do it, Muslims do it, or anyone else does it. A closed mind admits no light.

All Ken Ham has to do as you said, is to equate believing in evolution with all the ungodly things happening in the world, and losing faith/not walking with Christ, and he’s got ’em.

And you are absolutely correct about the backlash and damage that happens with young people when they begin to question what they are taught and compare an interlocking web of research and scientific exploration of our world.

Kids don’t like being lied to. The statistics for church attendance are showing the complete consequences of the abysmal strategy of Christians hiding their head in the sand about human origins, the age of the earth, and evolutionary theory.”

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113 Responses

  1. Paul Eilers says:

    “A half truth is much worse than a whole lie because it makes it even harder to tell the difference between the two.” – Gene Ruyle

    • Scott says:

      Believers are just that… believers. It just doesn’t matter. The Bible is no more relevant to science than Shakespeare. Keep on believing… reason within the bounds of religion.

    • Trevor says:

      For the time is coming when people will not endure sound teaching, but having itching ears they will accumulate for themselves teachers to suit their own passions. 2 Tim 4:3

  2. David Stirneman says:

    “Kids don’t like being lied to.” That’s implying that Christians know they are wrong but espouse their traditional beliefs anyway. That’s a careless accusation that is based on an unprovable assumption. It’s also one that should not be made against fellow believers.

    Equally offensive is the accusation that Christians are putting their heads in the sand and ignorantly hold to traditional beliefs in opposition to irrefutable proof of evolution and an old earth. You are very aware that innumerable Christians hold opposing views based on scientific reasoning.

    This article is an emotional ploy to win over support using fear of losing the souls of our youth. How is anything Ken Ham says worse than that?

    • If a star is 100 million light years away, how long ago did the light leave the star?

      • In which frame of reference?

      • David Stirneman says:

        Since God created all the stars at once then I would have to answer approximately 6,000 years ago. It seems absurd imo to think that God would create and name and give a different glory to each and every star but have to do so millions of years ago and have a waiting period for the light to finally reach us. Everything he created had an apparent age. All things were created as adults/mature.

        And there is no getting around the fact that God gave preeminence to the earth and created it 3 days prior to the Sun, Moon, and stars. I read your post on Genesis 1 and it does not sufficiently solve this obstacle.

        • Based on that approach, how would you know God didn’t just make us 5 minutes ago with our memories intact?

          • We have our own memories. We do NOT have memory or any independent witness of the alleged billions of years. But we do have God’s own word saying how and roughly when he created the world.

            If we cannot see how to reconcile that with atheist science, we should put the atheist science aside and trust God. In due course you may live to see a good reconciliation. Calling God a liar (sorry, but that is what it really is) is not a solution.

            Creation cosmologists have proposed possible solutions to the problem. For example, if the earth is near the centre of the universe, and God stretched out space over the creation week, there could well be millions or billions of years passing in the outer universe while only a few days passed here.

          • Bart Nielsen says:

            If He did, what difference would it make?

          • Gee says:

            I as a christian also kno this earth is billions of years old however flesh ppl have not bn on this earth for nearly this long check out pastor arthur murray at shepherds chapel in gravett arkansas teaches this very thing. He explains it all and takes ?s at the end of his lectures and explains it quite efficiantly

          • Brent Crouch says:

            Checkmate

          • Timothy Barker says:

            Well friend, he created Adam and Eve as adults. He also counted the stars and called them by name. Yet Genesis 2:4 says “These are the generations of the heavens and the earth when they were created, in the day that the LORD God made the earth and the heavens”. This verse reasonably suggests the time frame of creation was far beyond six 24 hour days. This is also confirmed in Isaiah 66:8 Who hath heard such a thing? Who hath seen such things? Shall the earth be made to bring forth in one day? Though God is able to do or create anything in an instant, he did not. But He has a wondrous plan ordained from before light or the first star was ever formed and His purpose is to fulfill that design to His own glory and infinite wisdom. In fact the temporal heavens and all creation only testify of the glory of the eternal Word of God as David wrote in Psalm 19, transitioning from the testimony to the testified truth of His voice in the written Law.

        • Michael says:

          The lights appeared, then the stars were made later, that is scriptual. You have actually studied the bible, you must be a “fundamentalist”!

        • Bob Helm says:

          The idea that God created the earth three days prior to the sun, moon, and stars is based on the shaky premise that the Hebrew verb “asah” should be translated “made” in Gen 1:16. Although that been the traditional translation, one should bear in mind that there are perhaps 60 meanings for “asah,” and there are other meanings for this verb that fit the context of Gen 1:16 very nicely.

          • Mike Tisdell says:

            There are two primary meanings for asah i.e. “to make” or “to do” all other meanings are derived from these two basic meanings, and even looking at derived meanings, 60 different definitions is quite a stretch! Additionally, many of the derived meanings require grammatical constructions that are not present in Gen. 1:16.

            Furthermore, I do not know of any Hebrew scholarship that suggest a meaning different from “make” in Genesis 1:16. While some scholars do argue for different tenses i.e. pluperfect instead of simple perfect, this is very different than suggesting a different meaning be employed because the context and grammar of Genesis 1:16 does not allow for a different meaning.

      • Big bangers have the exact same starlight problem as young earth creationists . Funny, the only ones really making any scientific progress on it that I have seen are the young earth creation scientists.

        • David says:

          If by “exact same” you mean explainable by looking at the evidence is the exact same thing as coming up with totally wacko ideas that ignore any reasonable interpretation of that evidence.

          • No, what I mean is in their search for evidence that would turn their conjecture into a scientific theory they keep finding physical evince that disproves their conjecture and actually raises even more questions.

      • Cale says:

        There have been numerous experiments showing that light travels at different speeds through different mediums. The theory of general relativity also states that actual time moves “faster” or “slower” depending on the objects mass.

        I haven’t made up my mind yet on whether the earth is old or young.

        • Physicists understand that 100% as any prism experiment shows. Nevertheless, in physics “c” is still a constant for a definite reason and none of these issues change that.

      • Dale says:

        It depends on how little we realy know about general relatively and our willingness to cast a moral judgment against God if he created light in transit from a distant object and call Him a liar.

      • Ty says:

        Well if God is… Well… God and if He may have known that the creation ( man) would actually enjoy the creation more if he could actually see the light from the star now instead of having to wait 100 million years then maybe He in his omnipotence was able to somehow create the star with the light having already reached planet earth. Surely you don’t mean to tell me that you think God incapable of this. This is not even a small problem.

        • It is a problem if God designs into the universe 13 billion years of apparent history that never actually happened. Are we supposed to tell non-Christians that all that detailed geology is fake history created by God?

          • Bart Nielsen says:

            No. All that detailed geology is the result of the Creation process, followed by the Flood, followed by the Ice Age.

            • Bart,

              I respect that you desire to be faithful to scripture; that the Bible is the inspired word of God; that it is of utmost importance to trust God rather than men.

              That said, responsible scholarship and use of science indicates that the flood geology theory doesn’t stand up to close scrutiny.

              I recommend the book “The Grand Canyon, Monument to an Ancient Earth: Can Noah’s Flood Explain the Grand Canyon?”

              https://smile.amazon.com/Grand-Canyon-Monument-Ancient-Earth/dp/0825444217/ref=sr_1_1

              It is written by Christians who are extremely conscientious about both Bible and science. The “flood geology” that others have taught is not buttressed by strong evidence. It has a number of significant problems. I invite you to carefully study this book, it has extremely detailed geology on every page and it makes its case very well. It is written people who respect you as a Christian and they have some valuable things to say.

              Respectfully,

              Perry

      • David Moorman says:

        It could have been instantaneous. He’s God. He works outside of time, space, and matter. Plus there’s a little something that without it, it’s impossible to please God: Faith.

        • So 99.9% of the universe’s apparent history is an illusion then?

          • David C. Moorman says:

            I didn’t say that. Why the inference? Are you without faith?

            • If God made the universe instantaneously 6000 years ago, as you suggested in your previous comment, then it has 13.7999999 billion years of history that appears to have happened but never actually happened. And that’s a far worse problem than any hermeneutical issue of ‘yom’ not being 24 hours.

              What do you say to a person who points to stars exploding in the sky 100 million light years away, which according to all common sense appear to have happened 100 million years ago?

              David I am asking you to fully embrace this question because if you don’t I’m not sure it’s possible to appreciate the problems that YEC creates by insisting on a young earth.

          • Bruce says:

            Not an illusion, we just don’t understand it yet. If I can’t trust the Bible on this, than I can’t trust the Bible on anything. And on that I hang my faith. Weall, including scientists, look through a glass darkly. We think we understand a lot more than we really understand. Just look at our food. Coffee is bad, jo coffee is good. Chocolate is bad, coconut oil is bad, etc.etc., but now they are all good. There are lots of theories that may be backed up by good science, but still not correct. You can spout all sorts of scientific facts, but they still aren’t verifiable. Carbon dating is wildly inaccurate, and yet it is the gold standard in the scientific community. As for my house, we will serve the Lord!

      • Jonathan Vlietstra says:

        “If a star is 100 million light years away, how long ago did the light leave the star?”
        At the time that we see it, 100 million years, modified by the movement between earth and said star. 🙂

      • Anthony Smith says:

        If the speed of creation (even Big Bang if you insist) is greater than the speed of light the universe could be much younger that it appears.

      • Peter Browne says:

        Perry,stop playing with the fact deniers minds please

      • Bob Stenson says:

        This ad ignoraniam question is actually a claim that the Almighty God could not possibly have gotten distant starlight to earth in 6,000 years by any means natural or supernatural. There are very workable cosmologies that allow for distant starlight by natural means. We also know very little about the cosmos, which makes dogmatic views about the age of the earth irrational. There’s no physical evidence nor anything in Scripture that indicates that the earth is over 6,000 years old. God has revealed 6,000 years. Just as God hasn’t revealed that He made no flying spaghetti monsters, He has not revealed that He hasn’t hidden billions of years somewhere. In fact, Humphreys’ White Hole/Time Dilation Cosmology allows for billions of years passing in space while little or no time passed on earth.

      • RA says:

        that depends on the speed of light which is theoretical….in other words it is not a constant necessarily.

      • Joe says:

        What’s your story about Adam and Eve. Were they created old, do their names represent certain elements of the cosmos, or were they the first “homosapiens” that stood straight and were thus allowed to walk with God in the Garden? Please give me a picture of what you believe it was like. A link to an article expressing your viewpoint would suffice.

      • Buck says:

        It might depend on when God created it. If Genesis 1:1 was 6000 years ago, then that’s when the light left the star. That particular creation light won’t be here for nearly 100 million years. (Less 6000, ????)

      • Stan Weidler says:

        No one can say with certainty. Only God knows.

      • W.Schulting says:

        What if light is an instantaneous Phenomenon?

      • G. Post says:

        The only problem with that presupposition is that it assumes everything created by God, during the creation, is that everything appears “new.”

        Your supposition doesn’t give way to the possibility of the created thing having the appearance of age. e.g. a California Redwood may have JUST been created but may have the appearance of already being hundreds of years old. A star system having just been created, might have the appearance of already being hundreds of thousands of years old.

        • Well that’s fine. So then why do YECs continue to put down non-Christians for saying the earth appears 4.5 billion years old and the universe appears to be 13.8 billion years old?

    • Thank you, David, for your well-reasoned comment. It saved me the effort of applying Jude 3 to the “missive from Charles Richardson.” That missive misses the truth.

      The referenced “evolving interpretation of scripture” sounds a lot like eisegetical hermeneutics. Trying to shoehorn evolution into the scriptural account of creation seems like an effort, not in getting to the truth, but in trying to earn attention from the popular kids. It’s rather curious there is this effort to reconcile Scripture and evolution at a time when the silly theory is beginning to fall into disfavor (especially among astronomers and cosmologists, but even among biologists).

      • David Stirneman says:

        Chris, you’re welcome. And I agree. In so many theological areas well intentioned Christians either fail to study Church history or just too easily dismiss it. God did not allow his bride to be deceived for the last 2,000 years just waiting for modern textual critics to come along and show everyone the error of their ways.

        • Michael Healy says:

          But one could just as well say, “In so many theological areas well-intentioned Christians either fail to study Church history or just too easily dismiss it. God did not allow his bride to be deceived for [1,500] years just waiting for [Martin Luther] to come along and show everyone the error of their ways.” Fundamentalism contradicts itself.

      • To use modern kids terminology. In the eyes of teens I’ve never had any problem wiping the floor with the dead bodies of evolutionists and big bang speculators by using reason and science

      • Jonathan Vlietstra says:

        You mean the silly theory of creationism?
        Because evolution is not in disfavor except from apologists. 99% of biologists still say its the only plausible explanation from the evidence. And religious brainwashing is that other 1%.

    • Mark says:

      Thank you!!! It depends on your world view!!! If your looking thru the lens of the Bible or humanism…..I see the world thru GOD GLORIOUS CREATION!!!

    • Bill Stiefel says:

      Spot on David!

    • Mike Tisdell says:

      David Stirneman,

      While I don’t think this site is the bastion of truth. They are correct about the damage that is done when people find out that they have been lied to, and yes sadly sometimes the lies are deliberate. While it is true that secular scientists have also been caught in some very significant lies, I have a lot more contempt for Christian who uses lies to prop up their version of the truth because those who are true followers of Christ should hold themselves to a higher standard than those who reject him.
      If you want a good example of a deliberately misleading paper, check this one out:
      https://answersingenesis.org/bible-timeline/genealogy/gaps-in-the-genesis-genealogies

      Like many of AiG’s articles almost everything in this one is untrue. I will point out one example. They make the claim numerous times in this article that the root YLD (the Hebrew root for ‘begat’) is only used in biblical Hebrew to refer to the birth of a direct decedent; however, no Biblical Hebrew (or Semitic) scholar would substantiate such a false claim. It is the same root used in Aramaic (and in Hebrew) to translate the Greek word ‘gennao’ in Mt. 1:8 in Aramaic and Hebrew translations of Mt. 1:8; and just like the related Greek ‘genesis’ (which means generations), the Hebrew root YLD is also used to form the word ‘toldot’ (generations). To see how broadly this word can actually be used, one only needs to look at Ru. 4:17 where it is says that a son has been born (YLD) to Naomi (in reference to Ruth’s direct biological son Obed). Not only was a generation skipped in this verse, but there wasn’t even a direct biological link i.e. Boaz was a relative of Naomi’s and not a son, and Ruth not biologically related.
      What makes me mad about this kind of deceit, is that regardless of whether one subscribes to a young earth or an old earth, it is an undeniable fact that genealogical gaps exist in the biblical chronologies. There is absolutely no question about whether they exist, the only questions are about how many gaps exist and in which genealogies are gaps present. These gaps were not mistakes but simply a reflection of how genealogies were transmitted in ALL of the Ancient Near Eastern cultures; genealogical gaps are not unique to the biblical literature but quite common in all of the literature of the Ancient Near East. In this article AiG has presented a lie to prove a point that is never made in Scripture, and one that even biblical Hebrew scholars who prefer a YEC interpretation would reject. Additionally, AiG’s position does raise some interesting problems i.e. if accepted, Noah becomes a contemporary of Abraham, and Shem out lives him. It is hard to imagine why Noah and his sons were not mentioned during the Patriarchal period of Scripture if they were still living at that time.

      • It is certain that gaps occur in Matthew’s genealogy of Jesus, since we can compare it to other parts of the bible. But the genealogies of Genesis are given in terms that eliminate the possibility of gaps, since the age of the father at the birth of the next in line is given.

        As to the coincidence of Noah and Shem with Abraham, you fail to consider the very limited possibility of communication in a society where the only means of getting anywhere was walking. If Noah and Shem were several hundred miles away from Abraham, they would never meet and so there would be nothing to say about them once the narrative had moved on to Abraham. They played no further part in the story of God’s dealings with mankind.

        Finally, your accusation of lying is hysterical. I looked through the occurrences of yalad in Young’s Concordance and almost all of them are indeed single generation; that is evidently the normal usage of the word. The authors may be mistaken in saying that every single one is; you have no right to say any more than that. Furthermore you say that they make that claim about the root YLD, but in fact they claim it only for the one word, yalad.

        You say “They make the claim numerous times in this article that the root YLD (the Hebrew root for ‘begat’) is only used in biblical Hebrew to refer to the birth of a direct decedent[sic]”

        In fact they make the claim just once, and in two other places support their argument in the face of invalid arguments to the contrary. Therefore your statement that they make the claim “numerous times” is a further example of your hysterical reaction.

        The one example you actually give is from Ruth 4:17 where the verb yulad is passive. It does not say that Naomi bore Obed, but that a son has been born [by Ruth] to Naomi. The same usage occurs in Isaiah: “Unto us a child is born…”, but in [almost?] every other case it refers to the actual parent. So you have actually picked a very rare usage as if to give the impression that it is common. I find that has at least the appearance of dishonesty.

        I would recommend anyone reading your comment to read AiG’s article for himself.

        • Mike Tisdell says:

          Oliver Elphick,clearly you have no knowledge of the Hebrew language. YaLaD is the root; biblical Hebrew has no written vowels, those were added by the Massorites many centuries later. And for the record, the “word” as it is conjugated in Genesis 5 with the vowels is NOT “yalad” it is “holido”; AiG was either referring to the root or, if you as you contend, they were referring to a specific conjugation of the root then they were wrong yet again.

        • Mike Tisdell says:

          Oliver Elphick,

          You note that “It is certain that gaps occur in Matthew’s genealogy of Jesus.” Do you realize that every Hebrew and Aramaic (sister language of Hebrew) uses the same root YLD in its translation of the genealogy of Mathew. Despite the certainty of the gaps in this genealogy, no translator (ancient or modern) has felt the need to search for any other word to translate this genealogy into Hebrew or Aramaic.

        • If you’re going to take the chronology given in Genesis as factual and historical, then you need to consider this: what is far more unbelievable to me than their unusually long life-spans is how old each patriarch is said to be when they have their first son. For the first ten generations, many of the fathers are well over one hundred years old before siring the next generation; the youngest ages given are for Mahalel and Enoch, both of whom are said to be sixty five years old before this milestone event in their lives. During the next ten generations, the patriarchs are said to all be in their third decade before fathering their first sons. Today, any sexually-active couple not using some form of birth control finds themselves pregnant within a year or two of enjoying intimacy. During the time referred to in the first eleven chapters of Genesis, on the other hand, God had given them the command to “be fruitful and multiply,” it is said that “the daughters of men were beautiful,” there were no laws against any kinds of sexual activity (those laws would not have been written until two thousand years later), and there was no form of contraception available other than the rhythm-method (assuming they would even try to control their birth rate, given God’s direct command to them to be fruitful and multiply). We have no other historical example of human populations living under conditions like that and being able to avoid pregnancy for even a few years, let alone till they reach a hundred years of age. We’re just too prone to that primordial urge to reproduce and too capable of doing so successfully. Don’t answer with anything implying that these men were able to exert an unbelievable amount of self control when it comes to sex, because, again, they were *commanded* to be fruitful and to multiply, and there were at that time no Mosaic laws against any form of sex (those laws would come thousands of years later, and we have absolutely no evidence, scriptural or archaeological or traditional, that they had any other set of laws prior to Moses).

          • You might find this interesting as far as the age issue and children. By the way. the Masoretic text was written by some men who were very embarrassed like you at the age the Bible says these people started having children. So embarrassed that they simply removed a hundred years of their lives in the text. The Septuagint not messed with by them leaves that extra hundred years on. (Christians of the day were complaining that a group of men were altering the scripture.) Low and behold the paleo Hebrew of the dead sea scrolls agrees with the Septuagint. So it’s now even more embarrassing to you. Anyway, here is some theory on why they took so much longer to mature to have children.
            https://answersingenesis.org/human-evolution/neanderthal/those-enigmatic-neanderthals/

            • Mike Tisdell says:

              I am curious about the source of your information. When I look through the Dead Sea Scrolls, I can only find one small fragment of Gen. 5 i.e. Ge. 5:13 and it has the same ages as are recorded in the MT. And this is one of the many verses where it is the LXX that is missing 100 years. When I look at the evidence from the Dead Sea Scrolls, your argument appears to be completely wrong on both accounts. As far as the link to Answers in Genesis is concerned, I don’t place much trust in them. Here is why: http://hamilim.netronix.com/2016/07/20/please-dont-create-unnecessary-division-among-believers-over-gods-creation/

                • Mike Tisdell says:

                  Daniel Martinovich,

                  I noted several significant errors in the reference you provided, and I will note those below; however, the claim you made about the genealogical data of Ge. 5 and 11 being found in the scrolls from the DSS is not a claim I see made in the source you cited. What is claimed is that the DSS scrolls show that the LXX was THE original Hebrew text, and that is a claim that is not supported by the evidence of the found in the scrolls from the Dead Sea.

                  Let’s look at a few of the claims that are made in the source you cited:

                  Claim1:
                  “The Dead Sea Scrolls show that Paleo-Hebrew was often used for Scriptural work up until 70 AD”

                  The Dead Sea Scrolls do not show that Paleo-Hebrew was used for Scriptural work until 70 A.D, but rather quite the opposite. Most of the scrolls are not Paleo-Hebraic, and the very few that are Paleo-Hebraic are the very oldest scrolls in the collection i.e. 2nd century B.C., later scrolls are composed entirely in an Aramaic Script (i.e. very close to modern Hebrew) with the exception of the name YHWH which is written in older scrolls in the original Paleo-Hebraic (a reflection of the Jews not wanting to change the name YHWH). Because the script is so drastically different, even those who cannot read Hebrew can easily spot God’s name in these scrolls. The latest scrolls i.e. those approaching 70 A.D. are entirely written in the Aramaic script.

                  Claim 2:
                  “Modern scholarship on the DSS therefore supports the contention that the ancient LXX text is in accord with the original Hebrew Old Testament as it existed in the 1st and 2nd centuries BC and the early 1st century AD.”

                  This claim is simply untrue. Three separate textual traditions were found in the Dead Sea Scroll collection, the largest collection composing the proto-MT scrolls; the proto-LXX scrolls represent a minority of the scrolls found. They do provide evidence that the LXX was far more accurately translated than scholars had assumed before the discovery of the DSS. Because it is now known that there was an existing Hebrew text that contained many of the same variants that are found in the LXX, much greater respect is given to the translation work of the LXX translators. But this was not the majority text found at the Dead Sea, and the claim that the LXX is in accord with THE ORIGINAL HEBREW OLD TESTAMENT TEXT is unfounded. It is only one of three different textual traditions found among the DSS, and it is not the majority text found there.

                  Claim 3:
                  “Another striking example occurs in Hebrews 1:6. There we read, “And again, when God brings his first begotten into the world He says: ‘Let all the angels of God worship him’. ” This is referenced as a quote from Deuteronomy 32:43 in both the ancient Septuagint and the Dead Sea Scrolls as well as in the footnotes of a number of modern translations. However, when you try to look it up in our modern translations (all of which are from the Masoretic), it does not exist in Deuteronomy 32. Our modern translations only read “Rejoice, O Gentiles with His people; for He will avenge the blood of His servants … ” It is in the ancient versions we find the words: “Rejoice you heavens with him, and let all the angels of God worship him; rejoice you Gentiles with his people, and let all the sons of God strengthen themselves in him; for he will avenge the blood of his sons…” Thus the Masoretic text from Rabbi Akiba deletes a key passage pointing to the deity of Christ, a passage which the Apostles used in their presentation of the Gospel and which was part of their Old Testament.”

                  Unlike the claim you made about the genealogies in Ge. 5 and 11, there is a variant of this verse that is reflected in a single scroll from the Dead Sea i.e. 4QDeutq G, but the translations offered here are a bit suspect. Below is the first phrase found in this verse with the variants found in 4QDeutq G and in the LXX. Note, there are significant differences between the text of the DSS and the LXX. In this case the LXX seems to reflect a harmonization of the MT text and the 4QDeutq G text.

                  הַרְנִ֤‌֯ינוּ גוֹיִם֙ עַמּ֔וֹ
                  MT: “Nations rejoice with him.” (Note: Unpointed ‘his people’ and ‘with him’ are identical i.e. ‘עמו’; the MT text is pointed as ‘his people’ and many translate this as ‘with his people’ but is awkward because then the preposition is missing. Versions that have adopted the MT pointing frequently italicize the preposition to note its absence in the Hebrew text).

                  ‎ וְהִשְׁתַּחֲווּ לוֹ כָּל־אֱלֹהִים‎ הַרְנִ֤‌֯ינוּ שָׁמַיִם עִמּוֹ
                  4QDeutq G: “Heavens rejoice with him and all gods bow down to him.” (Note: The pointings are provided by the BHQ editors, the have pointed the preposition עם as I have understood in the MT.

                  εὐφράνθητε οὐρανοί ἅμα αὐτῷ καὶ προσκυνησάτωσαν αὐτῷ πάντες υἱοὶ θεοῦ εὐφράνθητε ἔθνη μετὰ τοῦ λαοῦ αὐτοῦ (Deut. 32:43)

                  Rejoice heavens with him, and let all the sons of God do obeisance to him. Be glad, O nations, with his people, and let all the angels of God prevail for him. Rejoice nations, with his people, and let all the sons of God prevail for him

          • Only the ancestors in the Abrahmic line are mentioned. Jewish tradition says that Adam had 56 children in total, but only Cain, Abel and Seth are mentioned. No other descendants of Adam are mentioned unless something significant is related concerning them.

            • Joe A says:

              GEN 5:4 clearly states that Adam had other sons and daughters, beyond Seth. The descendants of Adam are mentioned are mentioned in the Bible.

          • Mike Tisdell says:

            One of the things that is very clear in the early genealogies is that there are sons and daughters that were not mentioned, and we have no idea how many were born. We do know that they existed because Scripture make that point very clear. The following is from the first four generations listed in Genesis 5, and it reflects a pattern that continues to the end.

            Adam fathered other sons and daughters. (Gen. 5:4)

            Seth fathered other sons and daughters. (Gen. 5:7)

            Enosh fathered other sons and daughters. (Gen. 5:10)

            Kenan he fathered other sons and daughters.(Gen. 5:13)

    • Jonathan Vlietstra says:

      “That’s implying that Christians know they are wrong but espouse their traditional beliefs anyway.”
      They may not know they are wrong, but they are, and today’s younger generations are more aware of what is and what isn’t.
      So when Christianity denies evolution, they are putting their heads in the sand and the younger generations know it and thus in catching that lie cannot trust the other claims.

    • Michael Bartlett says:

      Those who go against Ken Ham’s young earth and 7-day creation need to prove him wrong because it is really Biblical but those who go against it are showing their lack of Christian faith. The reality of hell escapes them. I make no apologies for saying this because it cannot be refuted Biblically nor can it be refuted scientifically.

    • Gordon Gresch says:

      Another thing to consider is the creation of Adam and Eve. Were they created as babies, or as adults with the appearance of age? If they were created with the appearance of age, is it not possible that God created the universe with the appearance of age? After all, God is not confined by the limitations of scientific laws such as gravity or the speed of light. If he is, how did Christ walk on water? Was that just a parlor trick that can be explained by science? How did Christ heal the leper? With some form of medicine that only he knew about? Or by the power of God? Why do people need to hold God to the standards of man’s limited mind? Is God accountable to us, or are we accountable to God? What does God have to say about the “wisdom of man”? I would agree that each denomination has its own doctrine. That is why I will never be a Lutheran, a Baptist, a Methodist, a Presbyterian, a Catholic or belong to any other denomination. I am a Christian. I follow the Scriptures based on the original Greek, Hebrew and Aramaic texts. I do this because, according to the Scriptures, I am the spiritual leader of my family. I take my job seriously. I do not however, take this conversation seriously. Perry Marshall, apparently you have put science above God. You have decided that God is only true if you can explain his creation and his methods through the lens of science. I believe that you have somehow lost the meaning of the word faith. And you are telling people to be careful about what they read in Scripture if it doesn’t go hand in hand with man made science. That is indeed a “slippery slope”.

      • I have not put science above God. Rather I have decided that science needs to be seriously considered as we interpret our Bibles. As you will quickly see if you look around this website on the subject of the speed of light, if God made a universe 6000 years ago with the appearance of 13 billion years of exquisitely detailed cosmological apparent history that is not real, then therefore that invokes a boatload of horrible epistemology problems. I wish to respectfully suggest that I don’t think you’ve really thought as hard about this as you ought.

        • Joe says:

          Then how do you explain the resurrection of Christ to someone without encountering epistemological problems?

          • Epistemology is on your side with the resurrection, because it is such a well documented event. Even things like nail scars in Jesus’ hands indicate that God cares very much about accurate physical history. In fact I’d say the resurrection + gospels + extrabiblical recorded history are a more stable foundation for an apologetic argument than Genesis + science.

            • Joe says:

              The historical evidence of the fact of Christ’s resurrection can be studied and verified but the method of His resurrection cannot. If I have to limit myself to what I am scientifically able to prove regarding the method of His resurrection, I’m in trouble. What exact process did God use to resurrect Jesus? What energy source was used? What were the specific chemical and physical reactions that took place and how long was that process? Did it take God three days to “work” that miracle using methods that science can prove? Or was accomplished in a split second?

              I don’t think we can know or understand that at this time. That’s why it’s called a miracle. Same as the Creation. As believers, we are going to have a difficult time explaining each and every miracle. I’m not giving up on logic and reason, I just don’t want to put God in a box and make Him fit.

              I do, very much, appreciate your responding to my post. I consider you a faithful apologist.

              • Joe,

                How can you be sure that the events in Genesis 1 are the same kind of miracles as the resurrection?

                Why assume that animals just “appeared”?

                What do the scriptures actually say?

                And God said, “Let the earth sprout vegetation…. And God said, “Let the waters swarm with swarms of living creatures, and let birds… And God said, “Let the earth bring forth living creatures according to their kinds…”

                The earth sprouted and the waters swarmed. How could you even begin to be sure this wasn’t a physical process that can be understood?

                Are you sure you’re not already putting God in a box with a view that someone probably gave to you, which you received without perhaps questioning it, when the text may mean any number of other things?

                Why drive any more wedges between science and faith than absolutely necessary?

                • Joe says:

                  I’m not sure, that’s why I keep reading and studying. To be honest, I’m not sure if anyone “can be sure.” I do believe we can be confident.

                  My concern with a theistic evolutionary worldview is its effect on Biblical theology. If Adam and Eve were a chosen couple from a group of Homo sapiens, was the serpent real and was the tree of the knowledge of good and evil legit in this scenario? Or are we spiritualizing all of this?

                  • Joe,

                    You might find value in this:

                    http://evo2.org/evolution-biblical/

                    I don’t see any reason why the serpent couldn’t be real. But I’m also not sure the text is at all clear about what the serpent actually is. Sure, in Sunday School books it’s a snake but how do you know that’s what it really is?

                    I see no problem with a literal tree of life, but if you think about it, the tree of life being present also implies that Adam and Eve weren’t created immortal in the first place.

                    Actually I think we have to re-think a lot of this stuff to make it wholly compatible with scripture. I do not think the most common views are compatible with scripture and they’re also in tension with science.

                    Don’t be afraid of finding out. You have much to gain by searching.

  3. Charlie Richardson says:

    Wow. Perry, I do appreciate your re-posting one of my responses to the Ken Ham article as a new topic, but I am not sure this is a good thing or not in some ways. I have purchased and read Evolution 2.0 and have just spent the last approximately 10 years attending an ultra-conservative Church of Christ congregation with my family.

    I have experienced a complete YEC presentation with well-rehearsed, charismatic, persuasive speakers, and all the audio-visual eye candy on the projection screen, at the church building, a few years ago. Now my kids are 12 and 13, respectively, and are questioning the inerrancy they have been exposed to. I went to great pains to not interpose my own viewpoint, doubts and all, during this time, and they finally came to me with their doubts. I did not discuss anything different from the teaching they were receiving in Bible class taught by members of the church, and in many cases, men who have spent a large part of their lives studying the Bible. Yes, they attended the YEC presentation, too.

    I am telling you this to emphasize that I have some serious skin in the game right now, and also to bring up the point that this scenario that Perry is talking about isn’t just something that happens when kids get college age, move away from home, and get “corrupted” by the “wicked, liberal, godless” teachers at college. In fact, my daughter revealed to me that she had asked questions in Sunday class , and the answers she received didn’t make logical sense. She was about 8 or 9 when this occurred.

    Do you ever wonder why the ultra-conservative denominations (I am only familiar with the CoC, but am sure others are in the same boat) are shrinking and aging? The figure I was quoted by a CoC preacher is that 75% of young people raised in the church, leave the church. Has anyone you know of actually asked why young people are increasingly not interested in the church any more? Is that possibly because that these kids from ultra-conservative denominations have had a major disconnect between what they have been taught, and the organized, interlocking, confirmed by study, experiment and observation, but imperfect and evolving, body of facts and theory , whose successful results they are exposed to every day ?

    I did not intend to say that kids were lied to with malice in my response on the other thread and I apologize if that impression was created with my brevity. What I wanted to say in depth was fundamentally agreeing with Perry that IMHO we have a duty to teach our children about the world and how it works. We also feel the need to train our children “in the way they should go” spiritually. If we teach our children things that are just plain wrong about the world, contrary to hundreds of years of human observation, experiment, and developed theory in an effort to understand more about the world, and say things in a faith context that are not borne out by our human experience and knowledge of the world, there is a huge risk that they will throw out the baby with the bath water, and completely reject or at least doubt, all they have been taught in their religious upbringing. This is completely borne out as a real thing both by statistics and by my own experiences.

    In my comments I wanted to point out that this is particularly an issue with fundamentalist Protestants who believe in the doctrine of biblical inerrancy. This is not an issue with both large numbers of Protestant groups. Inerrancy, or a certain group of people’s interpretation of it (thanks for that point, Perry), is 100% the position of YEC advocates. In fact, this exact issue is one of the reasons many fundamentalist Christians home-school their children. A great many Protestant denominations do not in fact teach or emphasize the idea of the plenary inspiration and inerrancy of the Bible as a requirement for their members’ faith and Christian fellowship.

    Perhaps my statement should have been, “Kids don’t like feeling that they’ve been lied to,” whether that was intentional or a byproduct of a set of memes repeated to them by others. And in fact, this is a very, very real thing, it’s upon me now, and I don’t get the luxury of waiting until they are older, more mature, and out of the house to deal with it.

    • Absolutely correct. This plays out 1,000 times a day everywhere.

    • If you don’t believe biblical inerrancy, you cut away the branch you are sitting on. Why believe anything in the bible? Jesus’ miracles? His resurrection? Obviously legendary, in the world’s eyes.

      The problem is that believers do not know how to back up their faith with rational argument. Our faith is very reasonable, given the view that God is creator and Lord and his word is true. If you adopt an atheist world view instead, you will not be able to rationally justify your belief. So people need to have the mind of Christ (who completely endorsed all the OT scripture) and adjust their world views to God’s rather than the atheist world’s.

      As to the choice of church, the rigid, hyperliteralist ones may be lacking in the actual experience of the Holy Spirit. If its a spiritually dead environment, children are not likely to find life there. (I can’t say whether that is your own experience, of course.)

  4. Charlie Richardson says:

    “The problem is that believers do not know how to back up their faith with rational argument.”

    Unfortunately, from what I have seen, it’s all too common in people – not just believers – to not be able to back up anything with rational argument.

    It’s impossible at a certain point to back up faith with rational argument, because faith itself is defined as believing things for which you have no objective proof. In short, this is also the way the writer of Hebrews defines it as well. Ultimately, in an examined system of faith, you arrive at the basic propositions or key beliefs which you accept with no proof, and build your personal structure of faith on those.

    If your personally chosen assumptions come under logical questioning or repeatedly validated evidence that those assumptions may be wrong, that in fact should be a good thing, in that you have to work logically to justify or at least not contradict, and possibly modify, your own structure of faith. But lots of people don’t take that view; instead, they ignore or don’t think about the new information, they demonize the source ( e.g. thousands of scientists over 500 years have been influenced by Satan, or godless atheists, etc.), or just don’t think about it and just follow what their preacher said about it in a sermon or ten.

    There are millions of Christians who have a structure of faith which is identifiably Christian but does not include the belief in biblical inerrancy.

    Would you say that they are not Christian since they do not share your views on inerrancy? How much of the Bible do you have to believe to be a Christian? Can you rationally back up the answer, “All of it , because every word is true, and God isn’t a liar” ?

    • “It’s impossible at a certain point to back up faith with rational argument, because faith itself is defined as believing things for which you have no objective proof. In short, this is also the way the writer of Hebrews defines it as well. “

      Hebrews 11:1 Now faith is the assurance of things hoped for, the conviction of things not seen.

      The objective proof is that God has said it. Atheists deny the existence of God and compromisers deny that he speaks to us in his word. To go along with them is to concede atheist presuppositions and is the sin of unbelief.

      We are convinced about things unseen because God says that they are so. He is utterly reliable, and therefore faith is rational and it is certainly objective, because nothing can be more real than God!

      • Charles Richardson says:

        Oliver,

        I do understand where you are coming from in the position that you are expressing above. However, I would respectfully point out that there are at least a couple of problems with your statement, ” The objective proof is that God has said it.” This is in fact a statement of faith, not a factual statement that can be tested, and encapsulates or includes several “points of faith” that not all Christians would completely agree with. If indeed it could be shown to independent observers that do not share that belief, that God did indeed say the things either directly by quote, or indirectly by inspiration, to any or all of the writers in the OT or NT, then the statement would be true. But objective proof outside the Bible is a bit difficult to come by. In fact, proof of this sort in the real world, would in fact be defined as a miracle. The atheist case would completely collapse if a miracle occurred with objective proof and watertight documentation, in today’s age.

        So until something like that happens, it really still boils down to faith that some things are true, even if there is no objective evidence, or with contradictory or hearsay evidence.

        That’s back to the points that I was trying to make, that (a) an adult decides his or her points or foundations of faith, and (b) for many people, their foundations of Christian faith do not include the belief in the verbal plenary inspiration of the Bible.

        Also, in my opinion, maturation as a Christian should in fact have elements of not only growing knowledge and interpretation of the Bible, but also growing knowledge of the real world, and of other human beings. Interacting with others who do not share your beliefs, I believe, can be a great tool for honing and refining your own beliefs.

        Nothing was said at all here about generally not believing that God did communicate to individuals and perform miracles, the results of those encounters being written down by men and handed down in the Bible, and that the key points of Christian faith aren’t true.

        If you are passing judgment on those who profess to be Christian and do not share your beliefs (“compromisers deny that he speaks to us in his word”, “the sin of unbelief”, to quote you) , then you have removed yourself from the arena of faith where logical discourse, exploration, and a resulting maturation of faith can occur, and entered the camp of dogmatism, where only one interpretive view of the Bible and one hermeneutic is correct and all those who do not support this view or core belief are not “real” Christians, and/or will be doomed to eternal torture.

        It can be very comforting to believe in the absolute truth of the Bible. But please realize that there are a large number of other Christians who do not believe as you do, and it is at least possible to learn something from them, and it may also be possible that a lot of them end up in the same eternal home to which you are wanting to go.

        • Bart Nielsen says:

          Charlie, Jesus disagrees with your assessment that the atheist case would collapse with a sufficiently documented and current miracle. He says they would not believe even if someone were to return from the dead.

          • Charles Richardson says:

            Bart,

            Thanks for your comment , and I do think that there are some hard materialist atheists who are so dogmatic that they would reject proof, no matter what it was.

            As far as Jesus saying that, actually, Father Abraham said that in the Lazarus and the Rich man passage, Luke 16:31, which Jesus recounted. But your point was made.

    • David Stirneman says:

      Charlie,

      I agree with your last comment. I don’t believe that you or anyone is required by God to believe in Biblical inerrancy in order to be saved. We just disagree on the topic. I happen to think it is vitally important to a Christian’s sanctification. It is Satan who is the author of lies. He always casts doubt on the word of God. First it was God’s oral word. He said to Eve, ‘Yea, hath God said…?’ Now he does it with God’s written word.

      In my own journey I have never found a contradiction in scripture that someone has not already explained satisfactorily. The only one that I am still searching presently is the one supposed copyist error between a duplicate account in Kings and Chronicles.

      And, in my experience, the one that seeks a solution to a supposed contradiction works very hard while the one who accepts a contradiction as fact does very little work, if any, by contrast.

      This seems to be true with most presuppositions. It is just far easier by our nature to accept what we already agree with. Truth seeking is the road less traveled.

  5. Bart Nielsen says:

    In my observations of your website,there are three main areas of discussion: science, hermeneutics and personalities.

    This post and the one that spawned it go on at nauseating lengths about personalities, most especially Ken Ham’s.

    I would like to suggest that you really weaken your credibility with other believers when you slander a brother in Christ with hearsay. You mentioned an unnamed president of an unnamed organization who says KH is a bully. Mr. No-name should confront Mr. Ham privately and seek reconciliation and if that fails and he needs to call him out publicly, then do it publicly. Whispering behind his back and hiding in a cloak of anonymity is conduct unbecoming a Christian.

    Do you know Ken Ham personally? I do, and I will say that he is a sincere, godly man who I have always known to choose his words carefully. When you go off on him as one who is manipulative or lying or mishandling science, I simply do not recognize the straw man you are pummeling because I know this man. So who do I believe, you or my lying eyes?

    And of course Ken Ham does not singlehandedly produce all the material from Answers in Genesis. Would you care to go toe to toe with Dr. Menton about histology and its implications for your ideas?

    I suggest that you go to the Creation Museum and sit in on a few lectures by the PhD scientists they have on staff. After the lectures they always leave time for questions and discussion, so you could interact with them in real time. If you don’t care to give them any money,I would gladly pay your admission fee.

    • I would be happy to debate Mr. Ham if you can help arrange it.

      • Bart Nielsen says:

        I live 500 miles from Cincinnati and have no connection with Answers in Genesis beyond having been to the Creation Museum quite a few times. So unfortunately it will not be me who arranges the Marshall/Ham debate. However, having attended a number of lectures at the Museum as well as a few in other venues, I have noticed that the speakers almost always leave time at the end of their presentations for questions and discussion. I would respectfully suggest that you interact personally with some of these men and women. I believe that you will find that they do not reject science and that you would find much to agree with in their conclusions, just as you say you have found with Werner Gitt.

        I have noticed that the size of the universe with its attendant millions of light years of distance is an impediment for you. Perhaps if you were discuss this with Dr. Faulkner you might gain some new insights into the problem. Indeed any cosmology out there currently appears to have major points of discontinuity that indicate that we have not yet come up with all the answers. But rejecting the work that creationist astronomers and astrophysicists have done out of hand is shutting out what may in the end be the path that will resolve many cosmology issues.

        Meanwhile, the geologists, biologists and earth scientists at AIG have done excellent work in many fields to support the proposition that the plain reading of the Genesis text is verified in the natural sciences. I would urge you to interact with them personally.

  6. Bart Nielsen says:

    And now a fine new question for Charlie and Perry: you both have attributed declining church attendance to YEC being taught in conservative churches. Are you claiming that church attendance/affiliation is rising for mainline churches? If not, are you claiming that the existence of YEC teachings in conservative churches is so poisoning the well of Christianity that young people can’t see the difference between, say the Southern Baptist Convention and the United Methodist Church and therefore abandon all denominations because some of them hold to YEC?

    • I’m not claiming anything about mainline churches.

      I’m saying that Ken Ham’s insistence that an extreme literal interpretation is the only way to go, forces people to choose between Bible and science when in fact extreme literal is questionable even on purely hermeneutic grounds, which is to say nothing of the science problems with YEC. I know this is true – I’ve lived it. It’s my brother Bryan’s story.

      • Bart Nielsen says:

        Are you familiar with the ARG research which was commissioned by AIG?

        It shows a strong correlation between rejecting the normal reading of the early chapters of Genesis and young people leaving the faith.

        If you have a refutation of the methodology or the research I would be interested to see it.

        I share your sadness at seeing your brother leave the faith, but in refuting Beemer’s research,remember that the plural of anecdote is not data.

    • Charles Richardson says:

      Bart,

      In general church attendance is declining as measured by a number of polls that have been widely done in several countries, as you are probably aware. I don’t think that the issue we are mentioning is across all Christian denominations as I pointed out. The only ongoing study I am aware of which tries to ask the question “why” is by Bob Altemeyer, which he mentions in his book The Authoritarians. http://home.cc.umanitoba.ca/~altemey/ . He polls his students every year and asks them that question.

      The resulting number one reason young people stop attending is “doctrine”, and he speculates on the causes in the free book available at that link.

      I can only comment from my own experience and would not generalize to the overall trend of society to become more secular. I think both Perry and I are talking about a specific issue and a specific problem or hazard when young people are exposed to the current state of accepted and interlocking knowledge of our world and that knowledge doesn’t “jibe” with their religious teachings when growing up.

      The “75% of young people raised in the church leave the church” figure isn’t scientific in any way but I think represents a consensus or at least partial common knowledge among CoC preachers.

      I’m not claiming that the well is poisoned in all cases but I do have specific knowledge of young people leaving the conservative fundamentalist churches and rejecting “everything” because they were taught the belief system associated with YEC. I have no way to know whether they ended up in more liberal churches, left Christianity, or anything else, so couldn’t speculate. What I think I was pointing out was a danger, not a foregone conclusion. Both Perry and I have specific examples in our personal experience from which we are speaking.

      • My experience, with my own children, is that they swallowed the evolution story and therefore rejected faith as obviously incompatible with it (which is a correct assessment – they just chose the wrong side). CMI, for example, has many instances of people, including their own staff, who came to faith when they realised that the evolution story was false and Genesis could be reconciled with proper science.

        For example:

        once I realised that Creation could have happened—thereby removing my evolutionary foundation and replacing it with the Creation foundation, I then found it easy to accept the entire Gospel message. This did not happen overnight as I was thoroughly indoctrinated with evolutionary ideology and had already rejected the Bible.from this testimony

      • Bart Nielsen says:

        Charlie, if Robert Altemeyer is your idea of an objective, disinterested observer, or if you consider what he does to be in any way scientific, then I think there will be little common ground for us to meet on to discuss the issue.

  7. Daniel Everett says:

    I wonder why we spend so much time debating this. At least we are confronting the issue I guess, unlike most Churches who don’t admit that there is a spiritual battle going on for the hearts and minds of young people in the Church.

    We are called to be in the world, but not of the world. And some of the things we believe are considered strange. It is our job to try and convince as many people as possible of the Truth, not to be though of as “normal” people. If some of our policies are not right in the world’s eyes, we do not change these. So I think that if some Churches want to promote literal Biblical creation, they do not have to worry about what the world thinks, or whether they should change tack. We do not have to find acceptance here on earth, but in heaven.

    P.S. have you heard of dc Talk’s Jesus Freak? If you have, think about the chorus, and apply it from a creationist point of view. That’s how the Church should stand on any Biblical issue it truly believes in, without pressure from the world or other churches/theologians.

  8. Maximilian Somerset says:

    With regarding young earth and old earth, the problem is quite easily rectified once we understand the fact that space time has stretched a million million fold since the moment of creation. T=0 point. Time is Like dots on a balloon. The more you blow up the balloon the further apart the dots become. One 24 hour period going forward is just by virtue of the stretch, a million million 24 hour periods looking back. It’s a simple product of the stretching of space time. Now do a simple calculation, 6 days looking forward is 6 million million looking back.

    From our space time coordinates approx 15 thousand million. 15 Bn divide by a million million is 0.015 X by 365 = 5.475.

    This of course is an oversimplification as there will be exponential factors in the stretch and various other things however the principle holds true. Check out MIT scientist Gerald Schroeder for a more accurate understanding of the math.

    In answer to the question is it literally 13.8 Bn years or 6 days? Answer= yes

    • That’s one scientific conjecture out of a quite a few. There are creation scientists who are also investigating it. You need physical evidence though for it to become a scientific theory. Not against it as a conjecture at all. That’s how it is done. You came up with a conjecture based on your field of expertise then look for evidence that would give it scientific theory status. I’m only bringing this up because of the tabloid science media out there continually stating the latest conjecture someone came up with is a proven scientific fact. Scientifically decoding the mysteries of the universe is in its infancy. No one has proven squat yet. Every time a scientific conjecture, some of which are really good and reasonable is brought to the table it has been getting disproven. The physical evidence searched for to give weight to the conjecture is not only found to disprove it but brings up even more questions without answers.

  9. I was just telling an atheist in a debate with him that i don’t believe in the straw men created by man either and that it is unfortunate that the churches constructed them. Everyone wants easy rote doctrine to memorize. What happened to doing the hard and continual work of renewing the mind? It is so much easier to write off perceived enemies and threats as deceived of the devil. Even if true, that won’t save them. This is why God reserved the harshest words for the religious leaders. They do the most damage to truth because like the first quote given in this thread said, “…it makes it even harder to tell the difference between the two.”

    As Jesus said, the blind are not guilty of sin. It is those of us who claim to see that had better do our homework.

  10. Aaron Frampton says:

    Big problem with the assertion that fundamentalism causes youth to leave the church. That problem being the VAST majority of churches do not address origins and instead stress that the gospel is what really matters. Youth leave the church for a myriad of reasons, but the Bible CAN be effectively defended for those youth that understand a watered down, constantly compromised Word is no Word at all. Once man’s word becomes the standard, then it’s no better than any other messages from the media, Hollywood, or other

    • Mike Tisdell says:

      I absolutely agree with you, we should not let man’s word become the standard. Being unable to reconcile God’s word with the teaching of men from ministries like AiG and CRI is one of the reasons I so staunchly reject their teaching.

  11. tony says:

    Nothing takes God by surprise.

    The Holy Spirit through the pen of the writer says that these folks in the latter days would depart from the faith by giving heed to seducing spirits and DOCTRINES OF DEMONS! 2 tim 3 and 1Tim 4. Its ok to have questions that should cause you to search and study. God loves that because in doing that we get to spend time in His word. We get to know Him. However, when you cant understand something dont go the way of the goat, meaning you get reckless in your conclusion.

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