Evolution has blurred the lines between what is science and what is not. They will say "to disbelieve in evolution is to disbelieve in all of science including gravity, atoms, chemistry, biology, astronomy, etc". Two fallacies here: Fallacy of equivocation and fallacy of hurling elephants. Evolution is NOT science. Science is NOT evolution...

Fencer I applaud you! When people make statements like that it drives me nuts Evolution is a theory... and as such scientists believe about it may change and already has changed in the past... Just cuz someone disagrees with the current theory doesn't mean they disagree with every science in the universe.... Things happen and ideas change... we now know the sun doesn't rotate around the earth, or that not all food chains are based on photosynthesis... What's to say that in the future we won't find some sort of anti-gravity, or a temperature below 0K, or something that changes or ideas about evolution. Basically science is supposed to malleable, people can have different theories just as long as they have evidence to support* them. (*Note I did not say prove! There is no proving in science!)

Also I've seen secular groups use the term outreach... It doesn't have to be involved in ministry... I've always interpreted it as Ithy does... although ministry tends to take it a step further, but I wouldn't call being wittiness and outreach the exact same thing- though I see how being a wittiness could be a form of outreach. That's more of a technicality though

Be careful with using the word "theory". It's changed since I was in school (11 years ago was HS graduation). I know "theory" to be unprovable, untestable, and just ideas on paper. They are now citing "theory" to be the 2nd strongest statement in science next to a law. They are now called what we used to call theory "hypothesis". I call it playing word games. It's the same thing as "Atheist" now no longer means "I do believe God does not exist" but "I lack belief in God". It's just a word game. "I lack belief" is one of two things: a cop-out for "I believe God does not exist, but I cannot prove it, so this is how I am going to keep out from the burden of proof" OR it is the same thing as "I don't know" (which is agnostic). The latter is important. If you don't know, you cannot make any claims for or against on the issue. And if you don't know you also cannot make any claims against someone else's arguments (which they will do frequently). Most of the time their way of thinking fits with "I don't know the answer myself, and because I don't know, neither can you. I don't have the answer, but I do know you are wrong." Be watching for this strategy. I see it often.

Very good point... I can try my best to elaborate a little... but I'll probably fail miserably at it.

Evolution is technically considered a scientific theory (this is different than how we'd use theory in the vernacular which is more like a hypothesis- an untested guess about what would occur or has occurred in a certain situation) meaning it has some evidence to back it up, but it has not undergone enough testing or has enough evidence to make it a law. A law would be something that is well supported, and has been around relatively unchanged for a long period of time. Fencer is right in correcting me about this because by a scientific point of view it is harder to disprove a theory than a hypothesis, but it is also harder to disprove a law than a theory. This is something I think lots of people who aren't familiar with science would get confused about. My point was however that even though it is a theory, there is still room for change... I know the discovery of chemosythesis (using chemicals to make energy... kind of like photosynthesis, but without light) has altered the way most scientists think evolution progressed, though I forget the exact details... (I believe this is part of the reason why why the classification systems have been changing a lot as of late...) Although it wouldn't be as easy as with an untested hypothesis I would say it's not far from impossible. Scientific laws aren't really considered 100% proven, they're just assumed to be true because we've had no evidence to say otherwise, but we can never prove them 100%

Hopefully that made sense and was relevant.

As far as I know I'm the only Christian here who is open to evolution. Now, seeing as that would normally put me on the defence, I'm going to turn my my canons outward and ask the literalists (hopefully that's the correct term) here some questions (note: I don't "believe" in evolution, I'm just not against it. I'm not scientifically inclined, so I leave it to the experts and have faith that they're not trying to intentionally mislead me. I think YECs are projecting their cultural prejudices into Genesis 1 and think they are missing the point by viewing it as literal history. Oh, and I still accept the Bible as God's word, though not every book in the same way.):

1.Why do you believe the Bible is scientifically and historically infallible. What is this belief based on?

2. Would your faith collapse if you knew beyond the shadow of a doubt that the earth is 4.6 billion years old or that man and chimpanzees have a common ancestor?

3. What do you make of the "firmament" described in Genesis 1:6-8? This acurately describes an ancient planetary model that has been since disproven. In this image you can see the firmament between the sky and the "waters above the firmament":

4. What exactly do you mean by "inspired Scriptures"? Do you mean God essentially whispering into the authors ears and them dictating the whispers word for word?

5. How could there be light in Day 1 of creation if the light-giving sun and moon weren't created until Day 4? (note: there's a neat scholarly explanation, but it assumes a non-literalist viewpoint)

6. What is wrong with man having an animal ancestry? Were not man and beasts created on the same day? Is not man made of dust? Does not man have an animal nature as well as a spiritual nature (eg. sins of the flesh and sins of the spirit)?

Let's see if I have enough time to answer them all in one post.

1. AND 4. (Since I cannot answer 1 without addressing 4). If the Bible is the word of God is must be correct in every aspect it touches. Otherwise it is not of God. Where the Bible touches on history, it must be accurate or it makes God a liar. Where the Bible touches on science, it must be accurate or it makes God a liar. While the Bible was written by fallible men, these men were simply scribes writing down what God told them to write. 2 Timothy 3:16 says "ALL SCRIPTURE is God-breathed..." Inspired and God-breathed are the same thing. It pretty much says everything that is in the Bible, while physically written by men, are as though God wrote it himself in the same way an order written by a king's scribe would carry the authority if written by the king himself. If the Bible is the word of God, we must accept ALL of it including the account of creation. The OEC, TE issue is that it doesn't stop in Genesis. OEC and TE cannot accept a Global Flood of Genesis 6-9 and they cannot accept the dispersion of the Tower of Babel. Yet there are over 300 NT references to these passages alone and a large portion of Christian doctrine is rooted in Genesis 1-11. Just a small portion of the list: the 7-day week, marriage, sin, death as punishment of sin, clothing, work vs toil, the promise of a Savior, and more.

2. This is loaded question with more weight than you think. First, "if I knew beyond of shadow of a doubt", tells me "if there was undeniable scientific proof". Many in the scientific community are already claiming this yet no such proof exists. Science cannot "prove" anything. There is only one way to "prove" the earth is millions of years old and that is to time travel and watch it happen. My approach to this issue is Romans 3:4. "Yea, let God be the truth and every man a liar." I won't take someone's word for it unless it is backed up by the word of God. Martin Luther said this in regards to issues about creation. "But, if you cannot understand how this could have been done in six days, then grant the Holy Spirit the honor of being more learned than you are.". It takes eating some humble pie to acknowledge that God knows what happened in his own creation that we know with what feeble methods we have. Now I have a great respect for science. But I do not have respect for what is not science claiming the guise of science and boasting to to disagree with them is to disagree with all science. Here is reality. NOBODY knows from science how old the earth is. And nobody ever will. Historical science is NOT the same thing as observational science. All historical science requires interpretation and that depends on the worldview of the person. All "old earth" evidence requires a worldview that the earth is old.

Now, let me be also clear. Belief is OEC/YEC is NOT a salvation issue. That is merely dependent on our faith in Jesus Christ. But it is a significant doctrine issue. If you carry the OEC/TE position logically to it's conclusion, you will find that it greatly hinders and impacts the power of Jesus' death and resurrection. One of the biggest issues is both OEC and TE require death before sin because that is the mechanism of how the creatures would come into being. And if death was before sin, it cannot pay the penalty of sin. What is more, is that Jesus' death and resurrection redeems us to what originally was. If death, disease, thorns, etc were part of God's "very good" creation, we don't have much to look forward to in heaven.

So to answer the question of would my faith collapse if I knew the earth was billions of years old? Yes it would. Because it means Jesus' death was for nothing and if his death was for nothing then we have no hope. And that is the reason why Darwin and Huxley presented evolution. Because if evolution is true, then sin is not and neither is our need for a savior. I do believe one can be saved and believe OEC/TE, but there must be a logical break somewhere between Genesis and the Gospels for that to work. I have no fear of 'finding out' that the earth is billions of years old because I know enough about Science and about my God that I know it is not only not true, it will never be able to be demonstrated to be true beyond a shadow of a doubt. We know about 1% of there is no know and we know that the more we know, the more we realize we don't know. So I take consolation in the Holy Spirit is more learned than I am and I take God as his word.

3. There are lots of theories about the firmaments. Do I know which one is true? No. Can anyone? No. At least one of those firmaments is gone due to Noah's Flood and we cannot scientifically demonstrate what happened prior to Noah's Flood because it messed up any methodology we would have.

5. So the sun and stars are the only sources of light possible? That rules out light bulbs, fire, your computer screen, your TV, lightning, etc. Revelation talks about how in Heaven there will be no sun because there will be light continuously from the glory of God. What was the source of light for Days 1-3? Don't know. It doesn't say. It's not important. All it takes to make a day is one earth rotation and a light source. Is that light source God? Possibly. We just know that on Day 1 God created light. We can't assume a source that is not stated. We know it was not the sun because it was not made until Day 4. Other than that, one can only speculate.

6. Animals do not have a spirit. Animals have a soul, but not a spirit. Animals were not made in the image of God. If man came from animals, then an animal could pay the price of sin. The OT sacrificial system demonstrates that not to be true. Only a man could pay the price of sin. That is why Christ's 100% manhood is such a critical part of Christian doctrine. Everything Jesus did on the earth he did not do as God. He was God but he did not do it as God. He did it as a man. If he did it as God, then his death meant nothing for us. Because it was a man who sinned, it had to be a man who paid the price (Romans 5). Man is given dominion over all the animals. Another critical part of Genesis 1 doctrine. If we came from animals, that would be a different matter. If we came from animals, why do we wear clothes and no one else? Sin plays a huge part in it. No animal sinned, but all animals are impacted by the curse of sin.

That should do for now. Gotta go.

Yes, if we weren't made in the Image of God, than we wouldn't be unique or any different from animals.
As for everything else, Fencer seems to have covered your questions with great detail (and I wouldn't have said anything different to him).

What it really boils down to is Biblical authority. Age of the earth does not matter. What does matter are these questions: Is the Bible the word of God? If so, do we believe that in every aspect the Bible touches? If we do not believe that in every aspect, do we really believe it is the word of God? If the Bible is the word of God, it is the authority on every issue it touches. Not a authority. THE authority. In any dispute Scripture is the trump card. And regardless of the interpretation of "yom" I have still yet to see a single old earth model that actually get the order of creation correct. Every one presented so far has had something out of order and is forced to play theological gymnastics to try to get it in. It just does not work.

Dr. Michael Brown after a radio interview with William Lane Craig answered a question that is quite telling. "If there were no other books other than the Bible, I probably would believe the earth is several thousand years old." And there lies the problem. Too many people, including great Christians spend too much time reading and believing what other people say instead of reading and believing what God says. I stand with what God says.

Great post, Fencer. You make some really great points in favor of YEC.

However, your post raised a couple points/questions for me that I wanted to ask you about; not concerning the YEC vs. OEC debate, but rather concerning animals not having a spirit. Now, I don't believe that humans evolved from apes. And I definitely believe that humans are separate from animals, because we were made in the image of God and animals were not. However, everything I've read in the Bible has led me to believe that animals do indeed have a spirit.

I also said to myself, “As for humans, God tests them so that they may see that they are like the animals. Surely the fate of human beings is like that of the animals; the same fate awaits them both: As one dies, so dies the other. All have the same breath; humans have no advantage over animals. Everything is meaningless. All go to the same place; all come from dust, and to dust all return. Who knows if the human spirit rises upward and if the spirit of the animal goes down into the earth?”

Now, I know what this scripture is saying is that both men and animals die in the end and return to the ground. And I know that when it says, "All go to the same place", it's not referring to the afterlife, but to the dust of the earth. That isn't the point I'm trying to make. The point I'm trying to make is the actual wording in the scripture. It uses the term "human spirit" and then uses the term "animal spirit". Why would it say "animal spirit" if animals had no spirit? Also, according to the notes in my Bible, when this scripture says, "All have the same breath", the word "breath" translates as "spirit". So, if "all" ("all" here meaning both humans and animals) have the same spirit, that would mean that animals have a spirit just like humans do.

Another thing I've seen people use to try to prove that humans have spirits and animals do not is they say God breathed into Adam the breath of life, but didn't do so with the animals. The scripture they use for that is:

Then the Lord God formed a man from the dust of the ground and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life, and the man became a living being.

But it also mentions animals having the breath of life:

And to all the beasts of the earth and all the birds in the sky and all the creatures that move along the ground—everything that has the breath of life in it—I give every green plant for food.” And it was so.

Now, I've given some scriptures that indicate that animals do have spirits, but is there anything in the Bible that says that animals don't have spirits? A claim should be backed up Biblically before it is considered; and as they say, the burden of proof is on the person who presents the idea, not on those who disbelieve the idea. And although I've met many people who believed in the theory that animals have no spirit, and could give logical explanations for why they believe it, man's logic is still man's logic, and the Bible is the only authority that counts. So I guess the best question is, is there anything in the Bible that says animals don't have spirits?

Animals do not have a spirit. Animals have a soul, but not a spirit.

Also, can you tell me which part of the Bible says that a "soul" is different from a "spirit"? Again, this is another theory where people have given me logical explanations as to why they believe it; but so far, no one has been able to prove it to me Biblically.

Animals were not made in the image of God. If man came from animals, then an animal could pay the price of sin. The OT sacrificial system demonstrates that not to be true. Only a man could pay the price of sin.

See, this is why I've always believed that Christ had to die for us rather than animals. Not because animals are different from us in soul/spirit, but rather because they are not made in God's image as we are. And even more importantly, because Christ was also God at the same time as He was a man, was unaffected by the Fall (unlike animals, who don't sin but were still impacted by it), and could therefore serve as a more perfect, Holy sacrifice than anyone/thing else on earth.

And here's one final question from me. The sacrifice of animals was not enough to pay the price for everyone once and for all. But it was enough to pay the price for individual sins at the time. Why do you think it was enough to do that?

~Riella

And here's one final question from me. The sacrifice of animals was not enough to pay the price for everyone once and for all. But it was enough to pay the price for individual sins at the time. Why do you think it was enough to do that?

I don't think it ever was enough; it was simply the action God had people take to demonstrate their faith in Him.

Salvation has always been by grace through faith. I don't know why God had people sacrifice animals - maybe as a reminder of the severity of sin, maybe as a metaphor for the sacrifice He would make Himself, maybe as a sign of obedience. But it seems pretty clear to me that blood of animals never took away people's sins.

Arwenel is right on the money. Also, Jewish people understood the seriousness of sin and the holiness of God better than we do today.

I've heard that animals were sacrificed because God had decided that sin was to be paid for in that manner according to the Israelites' law system. I think I agree with Arwenel here. I don't think that the animals actually took the sin away, but I think it signified how Christ's blood would pay for us, except His sacrifice put an end to our slavery under the sinful nature.

The body contains the functions of the five senses. The soul contains the functions of mind, will, and emotion. The spirit contains the functions of intuition, conscious, and communion. We know animals have emotion, but can they communicate with God? Do they know the difference between right and wrong? (training is different than instinctively) Another difference between man and animals is that animals came about by the voice of God and man was actually formed by God.

As for the sacrificial system. Animal blood could only cover the sin. It was temporary and a picture of what was to come. It took Christ's blood to remove sin (Heb 9:22).

Yes, animals are body and soul, while humans are body and soul/spirit.

The soul contains the functions of mind, will, and emotion. The spirit contains the functions of intuition, conscious, and communion.

But where is this distinction made in the Bible? The Bible is the only authoritative source we have on what a soul or spirit really is. No matter how much sense an argument makes, it doesn't matter unless it comes from scripture.

We know animals have emotion, but can they communicate with God?

I wouldn't automatically assume this means an animal has no spirit (and I still am unconvinced from a Biblical point of view that a spirit is different than a soul). This could just be the result of a difference in intelligence.

I don't think it ever was enough; it was simply the action God had people take to demonstrate their faith in Him. Salvation has always been by grace through faith. I don't know why God had people sacrifice animals - maybe as a reminder of the severity of sin, maybe as a metaphor for the sacrifice He would make Himself, maybe as a sign of obedience. But it seems pretty clear to me that blood of animals never took away people's sins.

As for the sacrificial system. Animal blood could only cover the sin. It was temporary and a picture of what was to come. It took Christ's blood to remove sin (Heb 9:22).

It sounds like you two are disagreeing here. So, one of you is saying that the sacrifices was an action of faith or a reminder -- but did nothing to cover the sin itself. And the other is saying it did cover the sin. Correct? And if so, what are the reasons each of you believes this? I was always of the understanding that the punishment for sin was death; and so, back then, an animal was killed to pay the price for each individual sin to be forgiven.

~Riella

Hebrews 10: 1 The law is only a shadow of the good things that are coming—not the realities themselves. For this reason it can never, by the same sacrifices repeated endlessly year after year, make perfect those who draw near to worship. 2 Otherwise, would they not have stopped being offered? For the worshipers would have been cleansed once for all, and would no longer have felt guilty for their sins. 3 But those sacrifices are an annual reminder of sins. 4 It is impossible for the blood of bulls and goats to take away sins.