Comment on Supreme Court Decision on Church Employment Case by BobRyan.
ken: Hi Bob
Does that mean that you think that the Good Samaritan would go to heaven for good works irrespective of his religious beliefs?
The Romans 2:13-16 text tells us that gentiles with no access to the Bible at all will be in heaven if they show the works of the law written on their heart (a result of the New Covenant work of the Holy Spirit according to the end of Romans 2).
The “level of information” that they have does not matter.
What matters is that they chose to follow “The Spirit of Truth” mentioned in John 16. It is the Holy Spirit that causes the New Birth.
And as Christ said in Matt 7 – that New Birth (bad tree becomes good tree) surely results in “good fruit”.
Does that mean you think the thief would end up in heaven based on faith alone, without good works?
1. As we have already stated – all of the lost are justified – are saved “by grace through faith and that without works”. It is how all the lost (bad trees) become one of the saints (good trees of Matt 7).
2. It is not true however that Christ’s rule in Matt 7 got suspended in the case of the thief on the cross. Even in that case the thief confesses Christ while the other thief merely continues to attack and reject Christ. The “good fruit” was seen even in that case.
Does that mean to you think secular folks who embrace the light of goodness to humanity are on a plane like the Good Samaritan?
Christ is the light that coming into the world “enlightens EVERY one of mankind” John 1 – – not just Christians.
The world “loves darkness rather than light” and so most people choose to reject that light. But Christs “Draws all mankind to himself” John 12:32 anyway.
Those who choose to accept and respond to the light of Christ are transformed by it. Those who choose to doubt, question, delay and dismiss it – are choosing darkness even in the arena of the little light that they have.
Each person makes his own choice.
It is not the amount of light that you have that counts – it is what you do with it.
in Christ,
Bob
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BobRyan Also Commented
Supreme Court Decision on Church Employment Case
Mack Ramsy:: : but the one thing we know for certain is that it was designed to change. There are so many back up and redundancies designed to make whatever changes that DNA faces to be profitable for the organism, or if their deleterious to ensure they don’t damage the subsequent generation (yes there are very complex methods for doing this) The immune system in fact does it intentionally.
BobRyan:
Obviously the references above to “designed” and “intention” could not be overlooked by the objective unbiased reader applying a bit of critical thinking to the topic. And so my response below merely states the obvious point of agreement on a part of that post.No wonder the application of a bit of critical thinking just then – demands that we conclude from your remarks above – that you are an example of an evolutionist that is strongly in favor of Intelligent Design. I too favor I.D.
Mack Ramsy:
Obviously the references abovI don’t believe in ID as it’s traditionally defined. I believe that God created a system designed to evolve.
BobRyan:
Obviously the references abov
In your earlier statement you claimed that system was designed with “redundancy and backup” features. That is not something rocks, gas and water could ever do – hence the term “Intelligent Design”.But perhaps you have access to more highly advanced rocks, gas and water?
Also you mention “intention” as if the immune system was deliberately designed with an end goal in view.
As it turns out – it is those “intention” and “Intelligent Design” aspects (so key to your response above) that are at the very heart of I.D. enabled science were we have the freedom to “follow the data where it leads” even if it leads to a conclusion in favor of design that does not fit atheist dogma about there “being no god”.
how odd then that you seem to later back pedal on your prior observation.
Thus you seem to be in somewhat of a self-conflicted position at the moment.
At least given the content of your statements about “intent” and “backup systems” and “redundancy” designed into the systems themselves (even to the point of “error correction” as we see in the case of nucleic polypeptide amino acid chains and their chiral orientation).
Of course all that just gets us back here
http://www.thebranch.org/videos/Creation_Calls.movMack Ramsy: My language in this forum is not formal. Try not to get caught up in semantic issues.
Out of curiosity is that statement supposed to provide a solution to just how it is that something “not designed” is able to exhibit unique design characteristics such as “back up systems” – “redundancy” – error correcting mechanism and an “immune system with intention” regarding a specific outcome or goal?
No doubt the study of biology most definitely shows us that such things are present “in nature” based on “observations in nature” – and so you are right to state it as you did.
So if you are then going to double back and reject what you just affirmed – what do you have by way of “explanation” for such a self-conflicted course?
Reaching for a solution of the form – “Pay no attention to my actual words if they do not serve to deny I.D.” does not provide as satisfactory resolution to the problem as you may have at first supposed.
in Christ,
Bob
Supreme Court Decision on Church Employment Case
Mack Ramsy: @BobRyan Being familiar with Dawkins I’ve never known him for a loss for words.
I agree – so let’s let the reader/viewer decide if Dawkins’ answer to this softball evolution101 question is “instructive” for the objective unbiased observer:
Even more “instructive” is Dawkins’ later “explanation” that he in fact does not allow himself to be asked evolution101 by anyone but a devotee to evolutionism’s ardent cheerleader club.
It just does not get any easier than this for the objective unbiased observer!
in Christ,
Bob
Supreme Court Decision on Church Employment Case
Mack Ramsy: I think there is some confusion about the role of science here. Science is very explicit about “proof” and “certainty” in that there isn’t any.
1. Science is all about observation and experiment. Something that the amoeba-to-horse, hyrax-to-horse, and prokaryote-to-eukaryote storytelling is lacking. Hence Pattern’s lament.
2. Science is being coopted – indeed hijacked by evolutionist-well-wishers in a thinly disguised effort to cover bad religion with a garb of “science terms” all the while destroying science.
It is interesting that even atheist evolutionists like Patterson will admit to this basic point about “doing harm to systematics” via evolutionism.
I presented you with a half dozen articles in a few minutes of searching.
There are a great many articles on a great many topics – that was not the challenge.
That said you’re right the sense that evolutionists may not have a perfect picture of how the world works,
More to the point – atheist evolutionists such as Colin Patterson are in fact correct when they lament the “revealed truth” religious nature of the argument for evolutionism.
Where time after time the evolutionist merely assumes the salient point of his argument rather than actually proving it.
Mack Ramsy: That claim is
reserved by solely by creationists.If you want an bit more of an objective view of that – you apparently cannot go to SDA evolutionists – you have to go to an atheist evolutionist like Colin Patterson who compares the creationist argument for certainty with the evolutionist argument that uses the same religious “certainty as to the fact all the while pleading ignorance as to the means”.
This is an objective up front comparison of the two groups given to us by an atheist evolutionist!
How sad that we have some SDA evolutionists that do not wish to step to that level.
Oh well – I suppose it was to be expected.
Perhaps the bar that Patterson sets for SDA evolutionists – is just too high for them.The only “evidence” that could possibly be convincing is a notarized statement by god saying this is the way it is , which of course you believe you already have.
Indeed – the proclivity of the evolutionist to grasp the Bible by the throat in an effort to set it aside so they can make their case with more freedom – is not totally unknown to us.
in Christ,
Bob
Recent Comments by BobRyan
Strumming the Attached Strings
@David Read:Erv Taylor is not “afraid” to post here – but he is “Afraid” to have well thought out views posted on AToday that do not flatter his agenda.
That was not news right?
in Christ,
Bob
Michigan Conference vs. LSU – Right Wing Politics or Truth in Advertising?
@John J.:John J.: The fact remains, any decision direction or policy made by a church, conference, union or GCEC can be reversed or changed by those they serve.
Agreed and the fact that the constituency are not voting to reverse it – is a sign that this is not merely the views of the Administration in Michigan.
As for hierarchy – there is no doctrinal authority in the administrators.
And as for administrative hierarchy – the GC leadership has no authority to dismiss rogue teachers which is one of the reasons that this particular meltdown at LSU seems to go on and on and on. It slows at times and it speeds up at other times – but the fire is not simply put out.
in Christ,
Bob
ken:: Let’s continue shall we. You posit that Adam and Eve were producing telomerase as adults as a result of eating fruit from the tree of life. Would you agree that the production of adult telomerase was a direct result of the environment or did the gene(s) affecting production of the a enzyme as adults mutate in their progeny?
1. I never stated whether the fruit from the Tree of Life provided the telemerase enzyme or simply provided a trigger enzyme/protein that caused Adam and Eve to produce Telemerase. Either way the end result was the same.
2. The salient point is that we have a known mechanism that affects the aging of cells starting with new borns.
This is simply “observation in nature” given in response to your question about an observed mechanism in humans for the 900 year life span the Bible mentions.
BobRyan:
It is hard to “do the study” without having them under observation.1. But it is not hard to see the gradual decline in ages over time.
2. It is not hard to see the Bible declare that access to the Tree of Life was the determining factor.
3. It is not hard to see that even in humans today – the ability remains for us to produce telemerase – but we quickly lose that ability.
4. It is not hard to see what effect that has on the telomeres of infants.
The list of knowns for this mechanism are far more impressive than the “I imagine a mechanism whereby static genomes acquire new coding genes not already present and functioning in nature and that this happens for billions of years”.
Ken: Hi BobWe are making good progress!Thanks for your admitting thaf we do not have Adam and Eve or their progeny under observation to do the study.
My pleasure.
Let’s look at the empirical results of your observation. There is no physical evidence that the progeny or descendants lived to 900 years, right? Thus there is no physical evidence that the tree of life provided longevity through the increased production or activation of telermerase right?
There is evidence that a mechanism does exist whereby access to an enzyme would in fact affect the aging process of human cells.
That mechanism is observed in nature to be related to the enzyme Telemerase.
There is a ton of evidence that food contains enzymes and proteins and that the human body can produce enzymes in response to the presence of trigger proteins and enzymes.
It is irrefutably true that humans still today produce telemerase in the case of infants just before birth. Impossible to deny it – though you seem to want to go down that dead end road.
You asked about the “mechanism” that can be observed today that would account for long ages of life recorded in the Bible.
You now seem to be pulling the classic “bait and switch” asking for the video of the people living for long ages before the flood.
Nice try —
As I said before – your method is along the lines of grasping at straws in a true “any ol’ exuse will do” fashion.
in Christ,
Bob
SDA Darwinians compromise key church doctrines
Rev 21 does not say the planet has no light – it says the City has no NEED of light from the Sun.The inconvenient deatils point to the fact that the New Earth will have a Sun and Moon but the New Jerusalem will have eternal day due to the light of God’s presence.
This is not the hard part.
in Christ,
Bob
Changing the Wording of Adventist Fundamental Belief #6 on Creation
@Professor Kent:I think Ellen White was inspired and was a tremendous asset to the Church. However, I believe God allowed her to insert personal opinion in much of her writings, and to err.
Is that your view of the gift of prophecy mentioned in 1Cor 12? Is that how Moses, Peter, John and Paul wrote in your thinking?
Which parts were just their own mistaken ideas and which parts are the actual Word of God in your view?
in Christ,
Bob
