Comment on A Historical Review of the Creation Debate Among SDAs by BobRyan.
There is a huge problem here based on the BRI summary.
This is not unlike the Catholic church’s recent statementa about aliens on other planets and that the Christian world needs to adjust its views to aliens being real (for what reason? Maybe the Catholic church thinks they are going to show up).
Anyway – all very strange stuff.
BTW – Maranatha 210 says that “heathen deities.. will exhibit themselves before the cities of the world” (Whatever that means).
In the same way Pfandl’s statement (with names attached) appears to be preparing the Adventist church in general for a coming reality – that is most unnexpected.
1. The account he gives provides no instance where the Bible view actually wins out such that all of our scientists are creationist.
2. The history shows that things are only getting worse over time and that the people endorsing it are more and more coming from mainstream Adventism. The momentum over time indicates no hint of solving the problem, rather it shows a tendency towards “containing the problem less” as time goes by.
Here is something I recently put on Spectrum after having first sent a form of it to the Review months ago –
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The alpha of apostasy that was dealt with in early Adventism – was Kellogg’s pantheism.
Now let’s compare our current problems with evolutionism – to pantheism in Kellogg’s “Living Temple” at Battle Creek – what do you get?
1. Our schools today that do not tow the line in service to evolutionism – STILL have to teach evolution to the biology students at some modest level – just to inform them about the jargon, the mythology – they will meet when they graduate and seek jobs.
There was never any such thing as “teach the Living Temple basics to the students even though we don’t believe them – because the whole world is using that system as a frame of reference”. It simply was not there in the late 1800’s.
2. In the recent U.S Presidential election – we had all the presidential candidates of one of the political parties asked “do you believe in evolution” on national television during a debate – and the few that said “no” were then pummeled by the press over the next week or two with demands that they recant combined with insistence that nobody could be president that did not “believe” in evolutionism.
By comparison – there was no such “you must believe in Kellogg’s Living Temple or you cannot be elected to political office” nonsense in the 1800’s or early 1900’s.
3. In America – government grant funding is fully behind evolutionism as is the National Academy of Sciences. So anyone going into a field of research that might be remotely related to a field that evolutionists are interested in – will find a lot of jobs helping to promote an evolutionist agenda and none for Creation. Imagine for a moment that this were the case for Kellogg’s “living temple”.
Simply no comparison. Do we get out of science? I don’t think so. Well then where will this end up?
4. Acceptance of Evolution by the general public in Europe is reported to be well above 90% – and it has already destroyed Christian church attendance in Europe (it is down about 90% from what it was in the 1950’s in terms of % of population attending services) and will soon reach that point in Canada, and American acceptance of evolution is on the rise.
By comparison – there was no such world wide momentum behind Kellogg’s Living temple at the time the Adventists were dealing with it. Having all of society line up behind the mythology of evolutionism applies peer pressure at the grass roots level before students even get to college.
5. All indications are that if time continues long enough – almost all of our Universities will eventually fall, if our denominational response to this crisis is no more “insightful” than what we have seen over the last 12 years.
So while it is true that some “Worse thing” could always show up in the next few years – this one is plenty bad enough to be an “Omega of a most shocking nature”.
Table of Contents
BobRyan Also Commented
A Historical Review of the Creation Debate Among SDAs
Pfandl said –
2. The original Creation account. This view sees the six-day Creation week beginning in verse 1, not in verse 3. In other words, “heaven and earth†in verse 1 refers only to our planetary system or our Milky Way and not to the universe as a whole. The reason is that in Isaiah 65:17 and Revelation 21:1 “heaven and earth†do not refer to a re-creation of the universe but only to that part of the uni verse contaminated by sin.
This was J. N. Andrews’s view. He believed that the universe was created on day one. “If we could be placed back some 6,000 years in the past, and from that point survey the vast abyss of space now studded with the stars of heaven,what should we behold? Blank nothing. The host of heaven did not then exist. Our earth itself had not risen into being. The vast infinity of space was literally, as job expresses it, ‘the empty place,’ and that which filled it was ‘nothing’ Job 26:7. Utter and profound darkness rested upon the great void. Even the materials which subsequently formed the worlds had no existence.†4
Possibly J.N Andrews’ view is supposed to have a #3 by it because it does not look like the #2 that is listed above.
in Christ,
Bob
Recent Comments by BobRyan
Academic Freedom Strikes Again!
george:
By definition, I don’t believe in miracles or apocryphal, anthropomorphic stories about same.Why aren’t scientists observing them today if they occur?
Circular argument. If they were naturally occurring we would expect scientists to see that they are still occurring today. If they are singular events caused by an intelligent being – that being would be under no obligation to “keep causing world wide floods” as if “to do it once you must continually do it”. Armstrong went to the moon.. shall we argue that unless he keeps going to the moon so each new generation can see it … then it did not happen?
Your argument is of the form “all eye witness evidence to some event in the past is no evidence at all unless that event keeps repeating itself so we too can witness it”. Seems less than compelling.
“Could it be that science is better able to detect hoaxes and false claims?” As a rule for dismissing every eye witness account in the past – it is less than compelling. (even when that event cannot be repeated)
Evolutionists “claim” that dust, rocks and gas (in sufficient quantity and over sufficient time and a lot of luck) self organized into rabbits via prokaryote-then-eukaryote-then-more-complexity. But such self-organization cannot be “observed” today.
(What is worse – such a sequence cannot even be intelligently manipulated to occur in the lab)
By your own argument then you should not believe in evolution.
Academic Freedom Strikes Again!
@Sean Pitman:
Suppose you were at a crime scene … there is a tree limb on the ground and a bullet hole in the victim — “all natural causes”? or is one ‘not natural’? Those who say that nothing can be detected as “not naturally occurring in nature” – because all results, all observations make it appear that every result “naturally occurred without intelligent design” seem to be missing a very big part of “the obvious”.
Academic Freedom Strikes Again!
george:
Gentlemen,What just God would allow an innocent child to be born guilty for the sins of a distant ancestor? …What if there was only One Commandment? Do Good. ‘Kant’ see a problem with that.
An atheist point of view is not often found here – but this is interesting.
1. God does not punish babies for what someone else did – but I suppose that is a reductionist option that is not so uncommon among atheists. The “details” of the subject you are commenting on – yet according to you “not reading” – is that humans are born with sinful natures. A “bent” toward evil. That is the first gap right out of the gate between atheism and God’s Word..
2. But still God supernaturally enables “free will” even in that bent scenario, the one that mankind lives in – ever since the free-will choice of the first humans on planet earth – was to cast their lot in with Satan and rebellion..(apparently they wanted to see what a wonderful result that poor choice would create). John 16 “the Holy Spirit convicts the world of sin and righteousness and judgment”. And of course “I will draw ALL mankind unto Me” John 12:32. (not “just Christians”). Thus supernatural agency promotes free will in a world that would otherwise be unrestrained in its bent to evil.
3.God says “The wages of sin is death” — so then your “complaint” is essentially “that you exist”. A just and loving God created planet Earth – no death or disease or suffering – a perfect paradise where mankind could live forever … and only one tiny restriction… yet Adam and Eve allowed themselves to be duped by Satan… tossing it all away. The “Just God” scenario could easily just have let them suffer the death sentence they chose. He did not do that… hence “you exist” – to then “complain about it”.
4. Of course you might also complain that Satan exists – and Satan might complain that “you exist”. There is no shortage on planet earth of avenues for complaint. But God steps in – offers salvation to mankind at infinite cost to himself – – and the “Few” of Matthew 7 eventually end up accepting that offer of eternal life. The rest seem to prefer the lake of fire option… sort of like Adam and Eve choosing disease and death over eternal life (without fully appreciating the massive fail in that short-sighted choice).
In any case – this thread is about the logic/reason that should be taken into account when a Christian owned and operated institution chooses to stay faithful to its Christian mission — rather then getting blown about by every wind of doctrine. Why let the alchemy of “wild guessing” be the ‘source of truth’ when we have the Bible?? We really have no excuse for that. As for science – we can be thankful that it has come as far along as it has – but no matter how far back you rewind the clock of our science history – we should always have chosen the Bible over wild guessing.
Newly Discovered Human Footprints Undermine Evolutionary Assumptions
Ervin Taylor:
Perhaps Dr. Pitman would enlighten his readers what on earth “the neo-Darwinian story of origins” might be. Darwin did not address origins.
Origins of what?? the first eukaryote??
Or “origins of mankind”??
Darwin himself claimed that his own false doctrine on origins was totally incompatible with Genesis and that because of this – Genesis must be tossed under a bus.
hint: Genesis is an account of “Origins” as we all know — even though “bacteria” and “amoeba” are terms that don’t show up in the text.
The point remains – Darwin was promoting his own religion on origins totally counter to the Bible doctrine on origins. He himself addresses this point of the two views.
Newly Discovered Human Footprints Undermine Evolutionary Assumptions
Ervin Taylor:
Here we go again.If the footprints upon close examination, are determined not to be from a hominim/hominid, I wonder if Educate Truth (sic) will announce that determination.Or if the date of the surface is determined to be much younger, will there be a notice placed on fundamentalist web-sites.If you believe the answer to these questions are yes, I have a big bridge that I would like to sell you for pennies on the dollar.
Here we go again … hope piled upon hope…no matter the “observations in nature” that disconfirm the classic evolutionary hypothesis
Reminds me of “What we still don’t know” by Martin Reese and Leonard Suskind
