Re: [asa] E.O. Wilson "Baptist No More"

There is a time, place, and manner for confronting these questions within
the evangelical community. I think of Mark Noll's book "The Scandal of the
Evangelical Mind"; and of many other well-reasoned and irenic books,
articles, etc. As a Christian scholar, I identify with Noll's *cri de coeur
*.

The problem is that sometimes we have a tendency to make this into a
personal crusade, to the detriment of other priorities, our own spiritual
lives, the local body, and our public witness. Maybe I'm just projecting my
own foibles here, but there are times when I feel that my spiritual life is
becoming consumed by this stuff. If I have limited personal resources, at
some point I face a choice: do I argue with the YECs in my church, most of
whom are good Christian people even if I think they are misguided about
creation, or do I become involved together with them in works of justice and
mercy among the poor, marginalized, and unchurched in my community? Did
Jesus spend most of his time on earth correcting doctrine or meeting needs?
I have to confess that my personal record here is very poor, and needs to
get better.

On Nov 27, 2007 4:30 PM, John Walley <john_walley@yahoo.com> wrote:

> This issue and this same discussion comes up in my RTB Chapter all the
> time. People like to wave off the YEC issue as unneccessary division and a
> distraction and worth our time to debate it. But the point is truth matters.
>
>
> And this is not just an internal debate like some people claim. Infant
> baptism and once saved always saved and speaking in tongues are better
> examples of internal debates that people outside of the church are unaware
> of and unconcerned with. This is at the very intersection of faith and
> culture and winds up splashed all over the media all over the world and in
> prominent court cases like Dover. And it has serious consequences for people
> seeking the truth like Wilson.
>
> I am glad that YEC's don't absolutely require YECism for salvation but
> that concession doesn't even count since the words out of the other side of
> their mouth say exactly the opposite. The only hope for the church reaching
> the world with the gospel is to repudiate YECism first.
>
> John
>
> ----- Original Message ----
> From: David Opderbeck <dopderbeck@gmail.com>
> To: Jon Tandy <tandyland@earthlink.net>
> Cc: asa@calvin.edu
> Sent: Tuesday, November 27, 2007 3:50:31 PM
> Subject: Re: [asa] E.O. Wilson "Baptist No More"
>
> Please -- I'm not defending YEC views, and I'm well aware of how they tie
> them to the doctrine of the atonement. Dig a little further on Ham's site,
> though, and you'll find that they explicity say that YEC views are not
> essential to an *individual's* salvation, even though (in their minds)
> such views are foundational to the theology of the atonement.
>
> Nor do I doubt that in some churches YEC views are so fundamentally
> important that no deviation is tolerated. Even in the more "tolerant"
> northeast, while no one questioned my salvation when I dissented from YEC, I
> was called divisive.
>
> But I don't like this "blame" game. I don't like the implication that
> evangelicalism must embrace evolution uncritically to avoid producing
> legions of EO Wilsons. For lots of people -- problably most people -- this
> isn't an issue at all. For those relatively few of us who care about it, if
> our response is to earnestly seek after God's truth, there are lots of
> resources (ASA being one) and other churches out there. And, even within
> evangelicalism, there are currents moving, particularly in the academy.
> There are many more people working on this stuff in positive ways in
> evangelical schools than we might otherwise think.
>
> On Nov 27, 2007 2:47 PM, Jon Tandy <tandyland@earthlink.net> wrote:
>
> > These are just a few quotes I have in my notes:
> >
> >
> > Ken Ham: "As soon as Christians allow for death, suffering,
> > and disease before sin, then the whole foundations of the message of the
> > Cross and the Atonement have been destroyed. ... The whole message of the
> > Gospel falls apart if one allows millions of years for the creation of the
> > world." http://www.answersingenesis.org/docs/1316.asp
> >
> > Henry Morris: "When one decides to reject the concept of
> > real [young-earth] Creation, there is no scientific stopping-point short of
> > what amounts to atheism. ... It [any old-earth view proposing that God
> > created a universe that really is the age it appears to be, without apparent
> > age] is essentially an affirmation of atheism, a denial of the possibility
> > of a real [young-earth] Creation." (The Genesis Flood, pages 237-238,
> > by Whitcomb & Morris in 1961; similar views are on page 307 of What is
> > Creation Science? by Morris & Parker in 1987)
> >
> > John Morris: "Any form of evolution and old-earth thinking
> > is incompatible with the work of Christ. ... If a Christian can distort
> > Scripture to teach such beliefs as evolution, progressive creation, an old
> > earth, or a local flood, can that Christian be trusted with other doctrines?
> > ... Creationism should be a requirement for Christian leadership! No
> > church should sanction a pastor, Sunday school teacher, deacon, elder, or
> > Bible-study leader who knowledgeably and purposefully errs on this crucial
> > doctrine."
> > http://www.icr.org/index.php?module=articles&action=view&ID=1108
> >
> > Though Ken Ham in this quote didn't call non-YEC "atheism" like Henry
> > Morris, I'll bet it wouldn't take too much digging (which I haven't done) to
> > find similar quotes from him. Isn't destroying the foundation of the
> > Atonement akin to atheism, and thus damnation?
> >
> > In fact, I decided to do a couple minutes of digging and found at least
> > one further quotation from Ken Ham:
> >
> > *"The god of an old earth cannot therefore be the God of the Bible who
> > is able to save us from sin and death*....There's no doubt — the god of
> > an old earth destroys the Gospel."
> > http://www.answersingenesis.org/creation/v21/i4/oldearth.asp
> >
> >
> > Jon Tandy
> >
> >
> > -----Original Message-----
> > *From:* asa-owner@lists.calvin.edu [mailto: asa-owner@lists.calvin.edu]
> > *On Behalf Of *David Opderbeck
> > *Sent:* Tuesday, November 27, 2007 1:24 PM
> > *To:* D. F. Siemens, Jr.
> > *Cc:* john_walley@yahoo.com; asa@calvin.edu
> > *Subject:* Re: [asa] E.O. Wilson "Baptist No More"
> >
> > I went to a very conservative "independent" baptist-type church for
> > many years where the leaders were YEC. Never was it suggested that there
> > was a choice between YEC and "damnation." Even AIG doesn't say this. Maybe
> > that is the case in some churches, but let's not overstate it.
> >
> >
>
>

To unsubscribe, send a message to majordomo@calvin.edu with
"unsubscribe asa" (no quotes) as the body of the message.
Received on Tue Nov 27 17:37:00 2007