RE: have we forgotten who the enemy is?

Feb 17,2005

> -----Original Message-----
> From: asa-owner@lists.calvin.edu
> [mailto:asa-owner@lists.calvin.edu] On Behalf Of Lawrence Johnston
> Sent: Thursday, February 17, 2005 8:52 AM
> To: asa@calvin.edu; jack syme
> Subject: Re: have we forgotten who the enemy is?
>
>
> Hi, fellow Citizens of the Kingdom of God (and seekers!)
>
> I really appreciate Jack's starting this thread, in a very
> revealing way.
>
>
> Jack Syme wrote:
>
> I am not sure why the discussion on this list is always so negative
against
> both ID and YEC. IMO in the big picture, this battle is a minor one.
The
> most important belief that we all have, and share with our
creationist
> brothers, is the Gospel. Most evangelical Christians dont really
care that
> much about the creation/evolution issue, knowing Christ is much more
> important.
>
> It seems to me that we are losing sight of the real enemy, which is
> philosophical materialism, atheistic naturalism. We should be
reaching out
> to scientist non believers, and showing them that the Bible, and
science are
> compatible. This issue is more about apologetics than polemics.

I will tell both of you why this issue is important. If you ever go on a
field trip with geologists (real ones, not the ICR pseudo-rock docs) and
listen to the geologist's comments about the creationists and what they
teach, you will quickly find that it is almost impossible to share the
gospel with these people because of the idiocy of the young-earth
position. I have seen this type of situation. One geologist will say,
"look at all those burrows, they were deposited as they are in one
single year!" and everyone hoots and hollers, laughing. Some one will
then chime in, "Halleluyah, right on brother!" More laughter. When a
radio preacher comes on the radio saying false and slanderous things
about geologist and biologists and how one can't be a christian and
believe in evolution, the derision starts. "Hey can you believe how dumb
you have to be to be a christian?" "Yeah, they are born with only a
brainstem," "Yep, that is the religious part of the brain!" Such
things make it very very difficult to share the gospel. Who wants to
be as stupid as these YEC guys? Y'all live in your nice non-geological
world and such things are mere abstractions to you. They are the
reality I see.

To you it is a minor thing. In my profession, YEC and even ID with some
of their nonsense, are huge blocks to the gospel.
Received on Thu Feb 17 19:36:34 2005