Sean, antagonistic remarks? I wrote Erv on March 10, 2009: I found …

Comment on Dr. Ervin Taylor: ‘A truly heroic crusade’ by Bob Pickle.

Sean, antagonistic remarks?

I wrote Erv on March 10, 2009:

I found your piece to be a little puzzling:

http://www.atoday.com/fundamentalist-creationist-gets-lukewarm-student-reception-la-sierra-university

If Sean Pitman was promoting the biblical Adventist belief that God created the world in 6 literal days, what is wrong with that? The way you wrote this piece, it comes across as if you do not believe that yourself.

Bob

He responded:

Bob:

My report/commentary was about student reactions to the speech not my opinions about the subject matter of the speech. My perception of the efforts of La Sierra University (LSU) faculty and administration is that they are seeking to educate students who “will not be mere reflectors of other men’s thoughts.” It seems to me that LSU is doing an excellent job of educating independent thinkers.

Thank you for expressing your thoughts on this piece.

ET

His response seemed less than forthright. I replied:

You wrote in your commentary:

As an institution functioning within the Christian tradition, as expected, most students approach their understanding of the contemporary world from a theistic perspective and thus hold the view that God is responsible for the ultimate origin of the natural world. In this sense, all Christians are “creationists” and thus, also in this sense, it would be expected that Adventist Christians would adhere to that view as well.

In popular contemporary discussions, the word “creationism” has acquired a connotation that has severely narrowed its meaning to describe a belief that the world and/or all of its life forms were created in the relatively recent past (less than 6000-10,000 years) in seven literal, 24-hour days and that there has been a even more recently, a world-wide Flood. This more restrictive understanding of creationism has been adopted by some fundamentalist-oriented Protestant denominations and the fundamentalist wings of others.

These paragraphs do not describe student reactions, but rather are written in a way that gives the impression that this is your view of things. But you did not mention that the Seventh-day Adventist Church is one of those “fundamentalist-oriented Protestant denominations.” And:

Although some highly conservative elements made a concerted attempt to add fundamentalist language to the official fundamental Adventist statement of belief, these efforts were not successful and the official summary of belief continues only to quote the Biblical expression used in Genesis to describe the origin of the world.

This statement gives the impression that you personally adamantly oppose the idea that God created the world in six days 6000-10,000 years ago, and that there was a worldwide flood since then. It says nothing about LSU students feeling this way.

The way the commentary is written it appears that LSU faculty are educating students to be mere reflectors of the thoughts of infidels. Both 1SP and 3SG have a chapter entitled “Disguised Infidelity” which identifies the idea that the days of creation aren’t literal as being that very thing. If it is true that LSU faculty are teaching such things, that is pretty serious, as well as false science.

Bob

Bob Pickle Also Commented

Dr. Ervin Taylor: ‘A truly heroic crusade’

While in Roosevelt, New York, August 3, 1861, different churches and families were presented before me. The different influences that have been exerted, and their discouraging results, were shown me. Satan has used as agents individuals professing to believe a part of present truth, while they were warring against a part. Such he can use more successfully than those who are at war with all our faith. His artful manner of bringing in error through partial believers in the truth, has deceived many, and distracted and scattered their faith. This is the cause of the divisions in northern Wisconsin. Some receive a part of the message, and reject another portion. Some accept the Sabbath and reject the third angel’s message; yet because they have received the Sabbath they claim the fellowship of those who believe all the present truth. Then they labor to bring others into the same dark position with themselves. They are not responsible to anyone. They have an independent faith of their own. Such are allowed to have influence, when no place should be given to them, notwithstanding their pretensions to honesty.

Erv has had decades to come into line. According to the above counsel from the Lord, “no place” should have been given him regardless of his pretensions. And it is far past time that place cease to be given him.


Dr. Ervin Taylor: ‘A truly heroic crusade’
I forgot to give the reference for the above quote. It was from 1T 326.


Recent Comments by Bob Pickle

The End of “Junk DNA”?
Thanks, Sean, for this informative article!


Avondale College Arguing in Favor of Darwinian Evolution?
@Sean Pitman: I have already cited DA 465 and Ed 14 where “stars” is limited to objects within our solar system. Therefore, I do not understand why you would base an argument on the “stars” of Day 4 without making some sort of effort to prove that “stars” on Day 4 cannot be limited to the “stars of our solar system.”

Showing that God formed woman from Adam’s rib does not address the point that Ellen White made: God formed our world and created the earth out of nothing. After He did that, then certainly He could have formed man and the animals from something. But thus far you have not given any reason for concluding that Ellen White was not referring to creation week when she said what she did in MH and 8T.

The available texts do not leave open the question of whether the sun and moon existed before Day 4. That is an idea that comes from outside the Bible. It isn’t in the text.

You assert that Gen. 1:1 can be interpreted to mean that the sun, moon, and Jupiter existed before creation week. How so? It uses the Hebrew word for heavens, but says nothing about the sun or moon or Jupiter. It is Day 4 that explicitly says that God created the sun and moon on that day. It is Gen. 2:1 that says that the heavens were finished after creation week. Gen. 1:1 says nothing about the heavens already being finished before creation week; the verse does not use the word “finished” at all.

Did the scholars you cite arrive at their views of Gen. 1:16 solely from reading the text? Or are they trying to get the text to accommodate the conclusions of scientists that believe differently than what the text states? Two sources tell me that “made” in vs. 16 is an imperfect, not a perfect. Why then does Grudem say that an imperfect should be taken as a perfect? Is his basis for thus amending the text solely the Bible, or is it something else?


Avondale College Arguing in Favor of Darwinian Evolution?
@Sean Pitman: The post’s date isn’t important to me. I was just trying to understand what happened.

I don’t think you answered my question: “Do you think it possible that Ellen White’s 1897 statements were a rebuttal of Wilcox’s sentiments as he expressed them the following year?” She obviously was addressing some sort of ideas that had come into Adventism. If these ideas weren’t what Wilcox expressed, what were they?


Avondale College Arguing in Favor of Darwinian Evolution?
@Sean Pitman: Please read MH 414 and 8T 258 again, and see if you think those particular quotes leave the question open.

We could come up with a long list of points that Ellen White, perhaps (since there might be an unpublished letter), never personally corrected this one or that one on, so we can only take that so far. For example, some held that an atonement was made at the cross, some held that no atonement was made until Christ ascended to heaven, and some held that no atonement was made until 1844. I do not recall Ellen White rebuking proponents of two of these three contradictory positions, even though she did support one of these positions in her writings.

Do MH 414 and 8T 258 really leave the question open?


Avondale College Arguing in Favor of Darwinian Evolution?
@Sean Pitman: In what ways are the He/Pb retention rate and Po halo evidence not solid?

Where does Ellen White allow for the existence of our earth and our solar system long before creation week?

“It could easily be that Moses was writing Genesis from an Earth-bound perspective and only wrote down what became visible to him from that limited perspective on a given day of the creation week.”

And from that perspective, Moses wrote that God “made” the sun and the moon on Day 4, and “set” them in the heavens. He also wrote in Ex. 20 that God made the heavens and all that in them during the first 6 days.

It just seems like a slippery slope. Why then couldn’t we conclude that God only made the “dry land appear” on Day 3, but that it really existed before that day? If the sun and moon can exist before God “made” them, why can’t animals exist before God “made” them too?

In what way is saying that God “made” the sun and moon on Day 4 an “interpretation”? Isn’t it just taking Gen. 1 and Ex. 20 as they read?