In today's sermon the pastor taught concerning the beheading of John the Baptist by Herod Antipas.John's crime? Telling the truth. Herod and Herodias were in an adulterous, incestuous marriage and John had the audacity to say so. Herodias was the one who was most bothered by John's words and she waited for the opportune moment to get her revenge and to rid herself of her enemy. My favorite part of the sermon was the conclusion.
The pastor noted that even though they removed John's head from his body, they could never separate him from God. He took us to the following text, a great comfort to Christians...
Romans 8:35-39
"Who shall separate us from the love of Christ? Shall tribulation, or distress, or persecution, or famine, or nakedness, or peril,or sword? Just as it is written,'For Thy sake we are being put to death all day long; We were considered as sheep to be slaughtered.' But in all these things we overwhelmingly conquer through Him who loved us. For I am convinced that neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor principalities, nor things present, nor things to come, nor powers, nor height, nor depth, nor any other created thing, shall be able to separate us form the love of God, which is in Christ Jesus our Lord."
At the moment that his head was severed from his body, John was ushered to heaven, directly into the presence of his Lord. Even now he is there, in the presence of his Savior, Jesus Christ.
It is this hope that enables Christians to face all that comes in life. We are convinced of the truth of Scripture. It does not matter what the world says. It also does not matter what the latest science drums up. I know that God is sovereign and He can do whatever He wants, as long as it isn't contrary to His character and nature. He cannot lie. His scripture is inspired (God breathed) by the Holy Spirit and is trustworthy. Because of these truths, I can draw the following conclusions, by faith, not by blindness:
[Hebrews 11:1 defines faith as, the assurance of things hoped for, the conviction of things not seen.]
-The world was created in six literal days, no more than around 10,000 years ago.
-The stars were placed in the sky to shine light on the earth, and they were created on day four.
-Adam and Eve were adults at the time of their creation, as were all of the plants, and animals, which gave them an appearance of age.
-The world was created in six literal days, no more than around 10,000 years ago.
-The stars were placed in the sky to shine light on the earth, and they were created on day four.
-Adam and Eve were adults at the time of their creation, as were all of the plants, and animals, which gave them an appearance of age.
God created the earth and all that is in it. That means that, even if a fossil is found of a snake with legs, it will not shake my faith. If the fossil is genuine, then it just tells me that God created a snake with legs that has since become extinct. It is no proof for evolution, because evolution is a lie.
God has communicated with His creation through His word. It is our job to listen. Romans 1:18 and following gives the scenario of what takes place when we don't.
Ultimately the issue here is the fact that all of us are sinners. Facing up to that sin means facing up to our holy, righteous, jealous Creator. That can seem to be a frightening prospect, but in reality it is not. Because of Jesus' sacrificial death on the cross, we can be forgiven and, like John, have the amazing honor of spending eternity in the presence of God. Once we belong to Him, He - as our Judge - looks at us through Jesus-colored glasses, and He sees only His purity, not our sin. The question is do you want to continue to live your life separate from God, or do you want to give up your commitment to independence and get to know your Maker?
8 comments:
With apologies, Aunt Bee. "Appearance of age" = "falsified evidence" in my book. If we cannot trust the things that God made to have a truthful nature, how can we trust what God says in a book?
Form follows function. Adam and Eve would have had problems doing things like eating, had they been created as infants without parents.
Okay... so God wouldn't have acted as a parent to them? Why?
However, Aunt Bee is indicating the entire universe was created with the appearance of age. So we have light from stars that never existed (Supernova in 1987 was roughly 130,000 light years away), bones of creatures that never existed (there isn't room in the 6000 year timespan for all the fossils we've found). And a Christian site proclaiming that "appearance of age" is heresy.
God is sovereign; He created the universe, and He had every right to do so however He wanted. It served His purpose to create Adam and Eve "grown up" and it apparently served His purpose to have light shining on the earth. He spoke it all into existence. (A handy skill, I must say.) I wasn't there, neither were you, neither was the heresy guy. God was, He wrote the book, I'm going to take His word for it.
Numbers 23:19 "God is not a man, that He should lie, nor a son of man, that He should repent; has He said, and will He not do it? Or has He spoken, and will He not make it good?"
I'm not sure about the starlight myself; however I will disagree with the fossil record.
The amount of fossils definately can figure into a young earth model. One popular explanation (which I believe has much merit) is that most of the fossils were laid down during the flood. When water suddenly covered the entire planet every animal not on the ark died and many could have been fossilized soon after.
Don't forget too, creationists only rule out "macro evolution," i.e. from one species to another via the gaining of genetic information. I wouldn't argue that every kind of dog was housed on the ark. There was probably only a pair of wolves or something similar. After the ark these animals differentiated (though the loss of genetic information) into the many different canines seen today.
I'm not saying that God would be incapable. I'm saying that if God plants falsehoods in Creation, then nothing that God does or says may be trusted as being true. And light from stars that never existed counts as a falsehood to me.
As for fossils and the flood (from talk-origins and found many other places):
Where were all the fossilized animals when they were alive? Schadewald [1982] writes:
"Scientific creationists interpret the fossils found in the earth's rocks as the remains of animals that perished in the Noachian Deluge. Ironically, they often cite the sheer number of fossils in 'fossil graveyards' as evidence for the Flood. In particular, creationists seem enamored by the Karroo Formation in Africa, which is estimated to contain the remains of 800 billion vertebrate animals...
...the animals fossilized there (Karroo) range from the size of a small lizard to the size of a cow, with the average animal perhaps the size of a fox. A minute's work with a calculator shows that, if the 800 billion animals in the Karoo formation could be resurrected, there would be twenty-one of them for every acre of land on earth. Suppose we assume (conservatively, I think) that the Karroo Formation contains 1 percent of the vertebrate [land] fossils on earth. Then when the Flood began, there must have been at least 2100 living animals per acre, ranging from tiny shrews to immense dinosaurs."
An acre is roughly four football fields, btw. And this is ONE major fossil deposit.
Well I'd not heard of that before, so I did a quick search on AIG's website. Here is one article in PDF format The author first tracks down the source of the 800 billion claim and reveals that it is a general estimate only. It assumes that averages consistantly hold across the entire area as you go deeper and deeper.
Secondly he says that the concentrations are not impossible. He isn't more detailed and I'm not a reptilian biologist so I don't know how the proof stacks up for either side.
Something else to consider is that the pre-Deluvian climate was likely quite different and land areas might have been bigger before the "fountains of the deep opened" to cover the earth.
And I'm saying that for God to have created the stars without beams reaching the earth, it would have been inefficient and pointless since they were created specifically to shine on the earth.
It seems to me that you are working very hard to figure out the details in all of this, and I know that, because God has given you a very logical and scientific mind, you want it all to make sense to you.
If you insist on having all of the details worked out in your mind about what happened at Creation, you will never be content. The only way that could ever happen would be for you to be a follower of Christ, and after you died and were in His presence, He chose to reveal them to you. Otherwise, no one can know. I am uncertain if God will reveal all of the details of Creation in eternity, as far as I can recall Scripture doesn't say.
On the other hand, Scripture is very clear about many things, including the reality that we are all sinners in need of a Savior. I know that you say you are content in your current situation, but I believe that deep down you have doubts. I recommend that instead of questioning people, that you turn your attentions to God and ask Him for clarity. He is not watching us from a distance, He is very near and His door is always open. He also has a huge Book that He wrote that is full of the answers you need.
When I was first saved, I remember how amazed I was that He made sure my questions were answered. I would be wondering about something, and though I hadn't said anything about it to anyone else, the next thing I knew, He would answer the specific question - maybe through a speaker on a Christian radio program, maybe through a sermon from my pastor, maybe through overhearing some conversation, and often from His Word.
He still works in my life, but when I was a baby in Christ it was all so new and unfamiliar and awe inspiring. It is amazing to me how involved He is with my life, and how much He cares about the details. It is a great comfort to know that He is working out all of those details, no matter how ugly they might be at times, for my best good. I love having Him watching over me.
I am praying that you will find real peace and contentment, Qalmlea.
Post a Comment