RE: [asa] Who's to blame for the lost ones?

David,
 
This is the most edifying email I have ever read on the ASA list and God
bless you for your compassion and concern.
 
Bernie, I think we all share your struggles but regardless of where your
intellectual pursuit takes you, you obviously have gotten something wrong if
it leads you to deny the spiritual revelation of Christ. It is just not
logical to me that that His spiritual presence that we have experienced
could ever be contradicted, regardless of the results of your studying or
reasoning. And maybe in a time like this you should take a break from your
studying and just enjoy some fellowship with Him and some of His people that
you trust and respect. God is a spirit and exists outside of just your
intellect and that is how He wants you to know Him.
 
I made the decision a while back that I would go back to believing in a
young earth if I had to and if it was the only way I could hold on to my
faith. And in fact, after seeing the potentially devastating impact the
theological extensions of TE can have on some believers I have since ceased
making an issue of it, even though I share your concern and regard for truth
and knowledge and was bitter as you were for not being told the truth
sooner. But not all things are profitable.
 
I think this pursuit may be close to Adam's desire for the fruit of the tree
of knowledge of good and evil and we have to be duly cautious with it.
Possibly we weren't meant to have these answers so focusing on it too much
to where it becomes a stumbling block to us isn't wise. Maybe Gould was onto
something with his NOMA concept. I don't have the answers you seek, but I
encourage you to press in and let the seed of His word take root in the good
soil of your deepest inner man.
 
My prayers are with you.
 
Thanks
 
John
 
God is a Spirit: and they that worship him must worship him in spirit and in
truth. John 4:24 (King James Version)

 
 
 
 -----Original Message-----
From: asa-owner@lists.calvin.edu [mailto:asa-owner@lists.calvin.edu] On
Behalf Of David Opderbeck
Sent: Thursday, June 05, 2008 3:47 PM
To: Dehler, Bernie
Cc: asa@calvin.edu
Subject: Re: [asa] Who's to blame for the lost ones?

Bernie, I understand all too well how you feel -- all too well, believe me.
Let me offer a few thoughts that have been helping me; maybe they'll help
you or maybe not.
 
First -- I don't see that it's necessary to "drop a literal first human
named Adam." What might be necessary is to allow more room for different
possibilities concerning what it might have meant to be the "literal first
human." Does "human" mean only biology?
 
Second -- Christian faith springs from a personal relationship with the
risen Christ, not from how we understand the literary genre of Biblical
geneology. If the Biblical geneologies reference some mythic-heroic
characters, does that mean Christ is not raised? Or if "first" in the genre
of Biblical geneology doesn't mean the same thing as "first" in terms of
genetics or some other scientific category, does that mean Christ is not
raised?
 
Third -- "I am determined to follow the truth wherever it leads." Yes, I
understand that determination well. But what is the final arbiter of
"truth?" What if the limitations we all face as finite, situated human
beings mean that every human search for "truth" based only on human
knowledge and reason ultimately must remain unresolved -- stuck in
paradoxes; pitted with missing data; mired in hindsight bias, confirmation
bias, and other cognitive limitations; and subject to the inevitable changes
of intellectual history? Has any person in all of human history ever
actually "followed the truth wherever it leads" and ended up with
dispationate, comprehensive and accurate understanding of reality? Why
should you expect to be the first? Or could your encounter with the risen
Christ be a reference or lens through which you evaluate and ground truth
claims?
 
A few maybe helpful books that have helped me at times: Esther Meeks,
"Longing to Know" (http://longingtoknow.com/); Roy Clouser, "Knowing with
the Heart"; Michael Polanyi, "Personal Knowledge"; Leslie Newbiggin, "Proper
Confidence"; Alister McGrath, "Doubting"; John Stackhouse, "Humble
Apologetics".

On Thu, Jun 5, 2008 at 3:11 PM, Dehler, Bernie <bernie.dehler@intel.com>
wrote:

David said:
"Did the person who found his YECism shattered and gave up on Christianity
altogether really trust in and encounter the person of Christ? Or was his
faith only in a set of propositions?"

It is like my struggle. I know Christ as well as any born-again Christian.
Yet, I also pretty much accepted that there was a first human named Adam.
Since accepting evolution, I think it makes sense to drop a literal first
human named Adam. The problem is, the Bible treats this Adam guy really
seriously, even putting him into geneologies. I almost fell-away, but at
times am still teetering on the edge. I'm still studying. I'm considering
it may be impossible to reconcile evolution with Christianity, esp. after
reading the latest ASA Perspectives article called "Optimistic
Evolutionists: The Progressive Science and religion of Joseph LeConte, Henry
Ward Beecher, and Lyman Abbott."

It is like what I learned in my seminary class- Darwinism is a universal
acid that eats away at everything (philosophical and theological).

If I fall away, it would be because Christianity, and the Bible, don't make
sense in light of evolution. It sounds scary to say, but I am determined to
follow the truth wherever it leads. I have faith in Christ, but my theology
is very liquid at this point.

.Bernie

  _____

From: David Opderbeck [mailto:dopderbeck@gmail.com]
Sent: Thursday, June 05, 2008 11:41 AM
To: Bill Hamilton
Cc: j burg; Dehler, Bernie; asa@calvin.edu

Subject: Re: [asa] Who's to blame for the lost ones?

Bill, you make what I think is a very helpful point here, one which many
folks often make: our faith is centrally about Christ. I wonder if the
"blame" isn't so much on any particular view of origins as it is on a highly
rationalist version of the faith elevates certain propositions, including
but not least about scripture, above the person of Christ. Did the person
who found his YECism shattered and gave up on Christianity altogether really
trust in and encounter the person of Christ? Or was his faith only in a set
of propositions?

On Thu, Jun 5, 2008 at 2:33 PM, Bill Hamilton <williamehamiltonjr@yahoo.com>
wrote:

Burgy wrote

> Glenn Morton has made the claim many times that it is the YECs who are
> to blame, along with those in the church who swallow their stuff. He
> has at least strong anecdotal evidence to back his claim.

I certainly agree with Glenn that YECism can be a factor in an individual
departing from the faith. (As a former Arminian I cannot agree with the
Calvinist accusation that Arminians believe one can _lose_ his faith. In the
Wesleyan church I came to know the Lord in we believed that an individual
could willfully depart from the faith. But _lose_ it? Never)

But my own experience might serve as a counterexample. I encountered YECism
shortly after I became a Christian. I decided to investigate it and believed
it for a time. But I soon discovered a number of flaws in it. At that point
I had to make a decision, and I decided that no matter what I believed about
creationism, I believed in Jesus Christ, my savior.

William E. (Bill) Hamilton, Ph.D. Member ASA
248.821.8156 (mobile)
"...If God is for us, who is against us?" Rom 8:31
http://www.bricolagia.blogspot.com/
Want to help a child?:
http://www.compassion.com/sponsor/index.asp?referer=85198

----- Original Message ----
> From: j burg <hossradbourne@gmail.com>
> To: "Dehler, Bernie" <bernie.dehler@intel.com>
> Cc: asa@calvin.edu
> Sent: Thursday, June 5, 2008 11:31:47 AM
> Subject: Re: [asa] Who's to blame for the lost ones?
>

> On 6/4/08, Dehler, Bernie wrote: (in part)
>
> > Imagine this, you hear a report at church that 10 kids accepted Christ
> > in the 3rd grade Sunday School. Everyone claps.>
> > Fast forward 10 years, and you hear that the kid who entered college
> > just left the faith because they now believe in evolution.>
> > Who's to blame, the evolutionist who is teaching the lie of evolution,
> > or the church who says that evolution is a lie?
> >>
> Glenn Morton has made the claim many times that it is the YECs who are
> to blame, along with those in the church who swallow their stuff. He
> has at least strong anecdotal evidence to back his claim.
>
> I have but one example -- a high school close friend who was a
> witnessing Christian whem I was not -- who lost his faith in college
> when he found out the YEC stuff he believed was wrong. Dick went on to
> a career as an executive with Pitney Bowles (sp?) and is now retired,
> living in Florida, a confirmed atheist.
>
> I think (and pray) for him on occasion. Sad.
>
> > I'm thinking more about this because I'm offering to teach a class at
> > church, and am anticipating the push-back... I think there is a faction
> > that wants to keep everyone in slumber.
> >
> I hope you are successful. I have taught such a class several times
> (see my web site for material). On the last occasion the regular
> teacher was (and probably is) a YEC. But she was willing to at least
> give me equal time (three weeks).
>

> Burgy
>
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-- 
David W. Opderbeck
Associate Professor of Law
Seton Hall University Law School
Gibbons Institute of Law, Science & Technology 
-- 
David W. Opderbeck
Associate Professor of Law
Seton Hall University Law School
Gibbons Institute of Law, Science & Technology 
To unsubscribe, send a message to majordomo@calvin.edu with
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