Of Races and Dinosaurs
There are people who do have real doubt about the source of races if Adam and Eve were the only created people. And there are those who wonder how dinosaurs come into the picture of Creation in the garden of Eden. Now, seriously, these questions in themselves are probably not so significant. The significance lies more in the implications that the answers to these questions may have on the a foundation of Christianity. I am referring to the reliability of the Bible. If there is NO reasonable explanation for the presence of Races if there were only 2 people at first, then it makes sense to say that this picture of creation is wrong, or at the very least, meant to be metaphorical (Of course I am far from saying that there is no reasonable explanation, especially after Cyrus had given us one fairly reasonable one just today).
These are of course just sample questions. There are thousands of other questions in the world. And many of them use science as their backing. A very simple example would be the concept of creation challenged by the concept of evolution / spontaneous origins of life. Haven't we all heard of this? The scientists say that evolution happens and that is the origin of life. Not creation.
Are you all troubled by these things? It is fine not to have all the answers. We know that Jesus Christ is came to earth and die for our sins, and rose on the third day, and will return to judge the living and the dead. That is the foundation of our belief. I am more concerned for the people out there. There are those who use these questions as a shield against the teachings of Christ (Ie: You Bible is wrong, haven't you heard that evolution is how men came about?). Then there are those who are genuinely in doubt about it. For both cases, this may prove to be a real stumbling block
Now, in the such cases, what is our role as evangelists? How can these people still come to know the Lord? In those cases, I believe that our role is to remove as many of these roadblocks as possible. Here lies the significance of these questions - they may obstruct another to the Faith. These questions are not important in themselves, but they may be important in relation to the faith of another.
Now, there are many types of questions, but I will just deal with those to do with science. By itself, science should neither support nor challenge Religion. How can it? Science has the basic assumption of "all things being equal" (Ie: in the event of all things being equal, the result will be the same). In that case, how can it examine anything supernatural? It will see a miracle and can only say that this does not happen naturally. It cannot say that this cannot happen, because in a miracle, there is supernatural interference.
In that case, why then is there so many challenges from science? I believe that it is because people had taken science out of its original intention, added in a naturalist assumption, and used it to challenge religion. When people say that evolution disproves creationism, an interesting question to ask would be "in what way"? How is evolution a challenge to creationism? Evolution tries to deal with how species came about. Even if it turns out to be proven true without doubt (which I highly doubt so, it remains a theory), how is that mutually incompatible with the idea of a God who directs the changes (not that I believe this to be what takes place personally). As for the other question, how life came about, there is no scientific way to show that life came about spontaneously, without external interference. If God wants to create, He can do so by arranging for nature to do so.
The previous paragraph was very messy, please bear with me. All I am trying to say is that science does not challenge the Christian belief. Most of those who say that the Bible is full of error have never read the Bible, or they had read it out of its original intention. What tries to challenge Christianity is more often the naturalist ideas (this basically means that nature is all there is).
Unfortunately, many of our friends will probably be unable to make the distinction. Perhaps it is our role to show it.
Pardon me for this lengthy post. In reality, I suspect that this will not be relevant for most people. But for those it is.. hope it somehow helps ;)
These are of course just sample questions. There are thousands of other questions in the world. And many of them use science as their backing. A very simple example would be the concept of creation challenged by the concept of evolution / spontaneous origins of life. Haven't we all heard of this? The scientists say that evolution happens and that is the origin of life. Not creation.
Are you all troubled by these things? It is fine not to have all the answers. We know that Jesus Christ is came to earth and die for our sins, and rose on the third day, and will return to judge the living and the dead. That is the foundation of our belief. I am more concerned for the people out there. There are those who use these questions as a shield against the teachings of Christ (Ie: You Bible is wrong, haven't you heard that evolution is how men came about?). Then there are those who are genuinely in doubt about it. For both cases, this may prove to be a real stumbling block
Now, in the such cases, what is our role as evangelists? How can these people still come to know the Lord? In those cases, I believe that our role is to remove as many of these roadblocks as possible. Here lies the significance of these questions - they may obstruct another to the Faith. These questions are not important in themselves, but they may be important in relation to the faith of another.
Now, there are many types of questions, but I will just deal with those to do with science. By itself, science should neither support nor challenge Religion. How can it? Science has the basic assumption of "all things being equal" (Ie: in the event of all things being equal, the result will be the same). In that case, how can it examine anything supernatural? It will see a miracle and can only say that this does not happen naturally. It cannot say that this cannot happen, because in a miracle, there is supernatural interference.
In that case, why then is there so many challenges from science? I believe that it is because people had taken science out of its original intention, added in a naturalist assumption, and used it to challenge religion. When people say that evolution disproves creationism, an interesting question to ask would be "in what way"? How is evolution a challenge to creationism? Evolution tries to deal with how species came about. Even if it turns out to be proven true without doubt (which I highly doubt so, it remains a theory), how is that mutually incompatible with the idea of a God who directs the changes (not that I believe this to be what takes place personally). As for the other question, how life came about, there is no scientific way to show that life came about spontaneously, without external interference. If God wants to create, He can do so by arranging for nature to do so.
The previous paragraph was very messy, please bear with me. All I am trying to say is that science does not challenge the Christian belief. Most of those who say that the Bible is full of error have never read the Bible, or they had read it out of its original intention. What tries to challenge Christianity is more often the naturalist ideas (this basically means that nature is all there is).
Unfortunately, many of our friends will probably be unable to make the distinction. Perhaps it is our role to show it.
Pardon me for this lengthy post. In reality, I suspect that this will not be relevant for most people. But for those it is.. hope it somehow helps ;)
posted by P{ZM} at 7:01 PM
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