Creationism vs. Evolution

I'm hip about time - Captain America

 

The Bible is 100% morally literal.

Everything else doesn't matter which is why I gladly leave that for others here to quibble over. For me, the Bible is not a science textbook, nor is it a biology textbook, or an astronomy textbook, or a geology textbook, or a physics textbook.

It's a book about man's personal moral accountability to God.

Everyone here is perfectly free to choose either to accept that fact or to deny it. That's your own business and has absolutely nothing to do with me or my own choice.

 

I find that the new testament doesn't make it very clear what part of the old testament is the old law and no longer valid. We all know there are many parts of the old testament that are not considered valid, but much of what is considered valid isn't addressed.

Did jesus clear up the moral menstruation rules, and the moral butchering rules, and the moral slavery stuff, to name just a few.

You are 100% literal on this, what's the scoop in your literal interpretation?

 

You'll just have to find a way to resolve those issues for yourself because you're the only one who sets into motion the consequences of your own actions. That has absolutely nothing to do with me, for I have my own consequences to set into motion.

 

The only reason we are on that course is because of the failure to seperate Church and State, just open any history book(other than the bible for a change) and look at any of the failed civilizations of yesteryear. What is the common thread? The merge of church and state. "Not even Hitler killed as many men as have died in the name of Jesus." America The Book

 

Well... that clearly defines the contrast between our two views.

In my view there is nothing "cryptic" about my own personal moral accountability to God for the consequences I set into motion by my actions.

The Bible is clear on personal responsibility, but that doesn't make it so just because the Bible says it is so. The Bible merely affirms with words that pre existing moral reality which governs human behavior and its effect upon us and upon the world around us.

 

So it's not a history book either then in your opinion

 

Responsibility........consequences......motion.......moral......accountability

History no.

 

Simple. If you brought fool proof evidence of a deity to a real scientist he would say "oh, guess I was wrong". If you bring fool proof evidence to a theologian he just tries to discredit what you said and he says "well I have my beliefs and you can't change that. Before anyone comments, this example is assuming "fool proof" means 100% undeniable and true. I know, a big step... Some people aren't interested in discovering the truth, just validating what they already think. Anything else is a threat to them.

 

This was a serious question

Is there any Biblical passage that references whether animals are in Heaven ?

 

Not really. Both of your supposed examples pushed a belief system which they believed morally superior and was also very ritualistic. That is far more akin to a religion than the simple absence of a belief system. Common misconception of the unversed but in reality atheism is not a religion or belief system. Just as the famous guy said: "Atheism is a religion like NOT collecting stamps is a hobby" but alas, quoting someone doesn't make anything automatically valid....

Just like this... I don't play soccer/futbol. That doesn't mean that the position I play in soccer is "no position" it means that I don't play period. Absence of a belief is not a belief, but communist dictatorships are belief systems.

 

All dogs go to heaven, everyone knows that

 

Much like everyone's utopia is different, everyone's heaven should be different as well...so if you want your pets to be in your "heaven" then they may as well be there.

 

In 1910, in reaction to concerns about "Higher Criticism" and "Darwinism", a group of Presbyterian theologians proposed what they felt were five essential beliefs of Christianity:

1) the inerrancy of Scripture
2) the virgin birth of Christ
3) Christ's atonement for our sins on the cross
4) His bodily resurrection
5) the objective reality of His miracles

These became known as the "The Fundamentals". Widely distributed they formed the basis of what would come to be known as the Fundamentalist Movement within Protestant Christianity.

Many original Fundamentalists believed that the Holy Spirit of God dictated the Bible to its human authors word-for-word. To prove their point they reasoned that "inerrancy of Scripture" had to mean that everything in the Bible must be taken as absolutely, literally, scientifically and historically true. Anything less, according to this line of thought, would somehow be unworthy of God as they viewed Him.

According to this view, the Bible, in all its detail, is inerrant on matters not only of doctrine, but also of history as well as science. Any apparent conflict that arises between the Bible and science or history had to be resolved in favor of their literal interpretation of the Bible because of its supposed word-for-word origin. So went Fundamentalist claims.

Bible verses such as these were used to support this new literal view:

All scripture is given by inspiration of God, and is profitable for doctrine, for reproof, for correction, for instruction in righteousness: (KJV, 2nd Timothy 3:16)

But know this first of all, that no prophecy of Scripture is a matter of one's own interpretation, for no prophecy was ever made by an act of human will, but men moved by the Holy Spirit spoke from God. (NAS, 2nd Peter 1:20-21)

However, interpreting the entire Bible as literal in everything poses severe problems for serious Bible students. Besides the conflicts with science and history, the Bible itself tells us it is of both human and divine origin.

Luke for example attributed the Gospel he wrote to his own research:

Many have undertaken to draw up an account of the things that have been fulfilled among us, just as they were handed down to us by those who from the first were eyewitnesses and servants of the word. Therefore, since I myself have carefully investigated everything from the beginning, it seemed good also to me to write an orderly account for you, most excellent Theophilus, so that you may know the certainty of the things you have been taught. (NIV, Luke 1:1-4)

Paul's letters (Romans, 1 & 2 Corinthians, Galatians, etc.) were written to the churches he founded, not as Scripture. They dealt not only with revelation, but also with mundane matters like disputes among church factions.

Paul often stated his own personal opinions in his letters:

To the rest I say this (I, not the Lord): If any brother has a wife who is not a believer and she is willing to live with him, he must not divorce her. (NIV, 1 Corinthians 7:12)

It's evident that great portions of the Bible were originally intended to be interpreted figuratively rather than literally (John 16:25, Galatians 4:24, Revelation 1:20, 17:18, etc., etc.).

Nevertheless staunch Fundamentalists continued to insist that the Bible must be interpreted literally in everything. In spite of this minority view, a majority of Christians today believe that God inspired the Bible's human authors to deliver His message to the world, and ensured that they delivered it faithfully. However they believe God left it up to these authors to express that message in their own words, using literary styles current at the time.

God did not give the Bible's authors any supernatural knowledge of future scientific discoveries, nor did He lean over their shoulders whispering in their ears as they wrote. In this majority view there is no conflict between the Bible and science. The Bible is a book of spiritual and moral guidance, and most Christians today know that God never intended it to be a book of hard science or a literal fact based account of the ways and means God used to create the world.

Most Christians accept scientific truth along with the scholarly study of the Bible as completely legitimate. To suggest otherwise does a great disservice to Christianity as a whole. Christianity is after all a faith based way of life built on the concept of understanding and adopting truth in our lives (John 8:32, Romans 1:18, James 1:17-18).

Whatever we learn about the Bible adds to our ability to understand the truth of the Bible as it was originally intended. Restricting ourselves to a narrow ideological view, such as the strict literalism that Fundamentalists insist on, blocks our God given ability to more fully understand the message the Bible has for us.

Christians today for the most part recognize that spiritual truths are set forward in Scripture through common literary mechanisms such as allegory, parable, simile, metaphor, hyperbole, and irony. They understand stories like these were never intended to be taken literally. They were mechanisms by which spiritual truth was revealed. To insist on the concept of literalism in everything, as is common in western thought today, is entirely foreign to the spirit and the message of the Bible as it was originally intended, and does serious disservice to the truths the Bible has for us.

Such truth delivery mechanisms as those used in the Bible serve to "paint a mental picture" of ideas not easily expressed in words. The Bible reveals timeless spiritual truths about God, love, salvation, faith, morals and ethics; truths that transcend the realms of science and history. We appreciate the beauty of a sunrise whether or not the sun literally "rises" above the earth. In the same way, we understand and appreciate the lessons the Bible teaches whether or not its stories are all based on verifiable historic truth.

 

The wolf also shall dwell with the lamb, and the leopard shall lie down with the kid; and the calf and the young lion and the fatling together; and a little child shall lead them.

Isaiah 11:6 (KJV)

 

That refers to them in heaven ?

That's encouraging

 

Anyone else think of the lion king?

 

Doesn't that make it crystal clear to you too?

 

I believe you may find most of the Bible encouraging.

Give it a try OZ. I know by your posts and the work with your hands you are a smart and articulate man. I guarantee you will find something in it that touches your heart.

Like I posted before...try the New Testament. Read James...his words will make you think. James pulls no punches.

Listen to Paul's letters to the Corinthians, the Ephesians, the Philippians, the Colossians. And especially Paul's letters to Timothy (1 & 2).

The word of God can capture your heart and change your life, in ways one could never dream of.

 

That the Bible was written thousands of years ago makes it an historically relevant document, and even though it contains a lot of history it is not primarily a book about history. It is a book about morality.

It's a common practice for secularists (not necessarily you) to believe that if they can invalidate the Bible on (for example) evolution, that it will automatically invalidate it on a moral basis. As long as that practice offers them comfort they are perfectly free to indulge themselves and to experience the consequences set into motion by their own choice.