A speech about saving America and the church, in case you just don’t care enough actually watch the clip before you comment.

Anytime someone tells me the “Creation museum” is a museum I want to run this piece out. Ham’s organization owns this “museum.” It’s goal is to get the public in and discredit any science that doesn’t come to the conclusions of fundamentalists. You can get all four sessions of this “State of the Nation” speech in the Youtube sidebar. Don’t think that Creationism is a matter of agenda? Watch this talk and get back to me. Tell me that the kids being taken to this “museum” are learning “science.”

Ham believes that the reason young people leave the church is they aren’t taught AIG’s apologetics and views on science. That’s why young people leave the church: failure to teach creationism. (BTW, ask George Barna if his research shows young people want to be taught creationism to answer their questions.)

And what does the creationist dialog with contemporary science sound like? Like this:

All seven sessions can be found at the Youtube site. This is a lobbyist for a Conservative political group redefining science and declaring what the only acceptable attitude toward science can be. Listen to the discussion of “evidence.”

Now let’s be clear: I’m happy for creationists to take whatever approach they wish in their discussions, but I’m deeply concerned that this is being presented as the only true and Biblical “Christianity.” It’s not Christianity. It’s a kind of Christianity and it doesn’t speak for millions of us. I’m not precommitted to a view of science. My religious faith is the Apostles’ and Nicene Creed, not Ken Ham’s philosophy. Science disproves, advances, questions, disproves, advances and on and on. That’s a whole different business. If your science equals “the Bible is the only valid science and the only valid politics,” then say so and cut the “museum” act.

What you are listening to is the culture war. Politics. Not scientific inquiry of any kind, and I’m not sure what a person would have to be to actually miss that point.

I’ve been monitoring a discussion at a prominent Calvinistic blog regarding Richard Dawkin’s defense of evolution in his new book, The Greatest Show On Earth.

I do a unit on the New Atheists in my Advanced Bible class, so I get several hours of Dawkins vs John Lennox each fall. I’m always amazed at how naive Dawkins is regarding any kind of religion that isn’t the backwoods, book burning variety. He seems to think that those who aren’t creationists or fundamentalists aren’t cooperating sufficiently with his certainties of what religion is doing to the world. I could easily do six posts on goofy conclusions Dawkins draws about religion, i.e. there is a logical connection between religion and violence, but there is not a single case where he can see a logical connection between atheism and violence. Mmmmkay.

On Darwinianism, however, I find Dawkins to be a voice worth listening to. He does understand the significance of Darwin’s theories- something that Christians who reject evolution should still appreciate- and he represents well that shrinking minority of atheists who believe science necessarily leads to atheism.

I always find it interesting how Dawkins will, without knowing it, start talking about feelings of transcendence or universal moral sentiments, without realizing he’s echoing some of the finest Christian minds who look at the same questions he does. In the Birmingham debate with Lennox, he gives as fine a statement of C.S. Lewis’s evidence for a universal morality as Jack himself could muster. Dawkins simply credits it all to a Darwinian “lust to be good.” I’m sure you’ve all observed that on the Discovery Channel.

But Dawkins and his book aside- someone will have to buy it for me if I am going to read it- there’s a point to be made in the discussion regarding the message young Christians are hearing, and it will be better made and better discussed here than elsewhere.

One creationist contributed the following after a mention of a recent series of articles regarding a fossil discovery in Ethiopia:

That would be “Ardi” and it wasn’t that recent that “it” was discovered. It was over ten years ago and the remains were apparently such a mess (along with other remains) that they spent the last ten years trying to put “it” together. And wow… what do you know… they managed to figure it out on the 150th anniversary of Darwin’s “On the Origin of Species”… what luck!

The commenter is commenting on the publishing of research regarding “Ardi,” a sensational fossil find made in the early 1990s.

Take a moment and think with me. Imagine that you are a young person sitting in a college anthropology class. (My young friend who recently left the faith, Greg, was such a person.) You’ve been brought up in the conservative evangelical faith. You’ve had creationism in science classes straight through middle school and high school. You’ve been exposed to Answers in Genesis and Kent Hovind as proof positive that the Bible, not any scientist anywhere, is the only reliable guide to scientific truth.

What do you learn in this commenter?

1) Scientists are making bones say what they want them to say.

2) The fossil finds say nothing coherent. They are “a mess” and any conclusions from them are imposed.

3) Announcements of discoveries like this are orchestrated for media attention.

4) Taking time to evaluate evidence is actually proof that the evidence is being “cooked.”

5) Creationists know all about Ardi and other anthropological discoveries. Trust what they say.

Now, if you are this young person and you read the above comment with understanding, your entire attitude toward science is basically going to be at stake. What you are being told is that such discoveries are tantamount to conspiracies and frauds. If you imagined that you could enter into the study of anthropology or similar fields and simply study the evidence, you’re in for quite a surprise.

This is all about the presuppositions that both “sides” have before any evidence is discovered or discussed. (If you read the review I have taken the comment quoted above from, that’s the major point: presuppositions make any consideration of evidence useless.) Instead of being a discussion of the evidence raised by “Ardi,” this is a “war of the worldviews,” in which considering evidence is apparently simply a casualty or, at best, a waste of time.

And if that sounded completely postmodern to you, too, then I’m glad to not be the only one.

Let me be simple: if we can’t discuss evidence, but are simply playing gorilla warfare with worldview weapons, then our young people aren’t coming to conclusions. They are simply deciding whether to stay on our team and play the game.

You are going to lose hundreds of thousands of bright evangelicals with that approach. You better homeschool them till they are 40 and keep the television firmly under parental control if you are going to pull this off. You’ll need lots of propaganda and manipulative tactics to keep your kids motivated against those evil scientists and their distortions.

The transcript of the following lecture was secured through means that cannot be revealed, but as C.S. Lewis said, are readily available to those who learn a few basic techniques. The general conclusion is that the following lecture is part of an advanced demonic curriculum specializing in leading Christians to abandon their faith.

Transcript of Class Discussion. Advanced Tactics for Apostasy Seminar. Professor Vilesidious presiding.

If you would please turn to page 853 in the teal binder. We’re looking at the outline and readings regarding “Advanced Techniques for Apostasy.”

***noise, pages turning, conversation***

It would be important at the outset to continue emphasizing the focus of this seminar: moving professed and generally assumed Christians to the point of abandoning the faith. Those of you selected for this seminar should be completely aware that much of what you learned in the basic curriculum is of questionable value at this level. A survey of case studies, such as Ehrman 32 for example, will reveal that failure in the basics of preventing a profession of loyalty to the enemy is of often the preparation for greater success in abandoning a very public and influential Christian influence. For that reason, apostasy is far preferable for our Father’s overall goals for the human race. Those of you who are able to assimilate this material and put it into practice will find your advancement in the lowerarchy to be substantially accelerated.

My own experience in advanced apostasy is available to you in the syllabus. I would not want to leave the impression that the considerable accomplishments you will observe there were simply the result of academic study. Far from it. I have made apostasy a passion and I cannot imagine any more satisfying contribution to the Kingdom of Darkness than to accomplish the discouragement of hundreds, even millions on the basis of one person’s renouncing of faith in the enemy.

Now, today’s topic is playing the counter to current apologetic efforts and the basic theme of your readings can be stated as the following:

The dominant themes of Christian apologetics provide the outline of a general approach to apostasy by way of creating subversive resources outside of the realms of those “answers.”

We are discussing a response to the proliferation of Christian apologetics that is proving devastating on the battlefield. In the past 10 years, literally millions who have been exposed to supposed high levels of apologetics answers have despaired of God and abandoned faith into the waiting arms of the agents of darkness. Millions more can be expected. A coming evangelical collapse is not too much to hope for.

The enemy himself has never given high levels of confidence to the apologetic task within Christianity, but Christians themselves have followed a general path of emphasizing the intellectual over the actual, the relational and the existential. The enemy’s use of a written scripture as a key component in his program has led to the inevitable and happy exploitation of the academic nature of faith at the expense of true experience. With moderate amounts of work on our part, the impression has been created that “the Bible has all the answers” and all matters of concern, all problems, all difficulties are addressed within scripture in a sort of “encyclopedic manner.”

So the vast majority of apologetic efforts are actually a collection of answers, generally put forward with a ridiculously arrogant amount of confidence. Look at the absurd claims regarding “proving” the existence of God or “answering all objections” to the resurrection. I have see quite intelligent Christians say that all objections to the resurrection have been answered and no other position exists except to accept it as a fact.

All the while, everyone in the audience knows that all dead people stay dead. Their “gut” is commited to the notion there is no resurrection. It’s a laughable strategy, but the apologists and their publishers and promoters are endlessly trumpeting it. Only the vile and unfair tampering and cheating of the enemy can get past the obviousness of such reality.

Now it would do all of you well to stop and watch a video available in the library this week of one Ravi Zacharias answering questions at a state university somewhere, with the accompanying commentary by Bilgewilber and Wretchitorious. They make it plain that the kind of question and answer demonstrated by Zacharias is not of the variety I referred to earlier, but is characterized more by an overall seriousness in considering all questions without pretending that a few scripture verses or bullet points can be produced to end the dilemma. This can be problematic, even devastating. Zacharias is actually humble, which is difficult to watch. I much prefer listening to the internet webcast by ***garbled*** for a better demonstration of the confidence of the NBA ball player and the resulting set up for blowing away the childish structure of answers.

Question?

Calvinists? Yes, but not exclusively, and especially the “presuppositionalists.” Quite an amusing bunch they are. But someone like Josh Macdowell is not part of the reformed movement and millions of Christians seem to think he has answered all possible question somewhere in his “Evidence” books. So don’t be over specific to the type of apologist. Apologists generally operate at a sub-denominational level for the most part. Some notable exceptions. Labels will do you little good. Look for the flaw in the method.

So the basic agenda is to work in the vast- and I mean truly vast- spaces left between the answers and in the whole realms not addressed by the apologetic techniques.

Look at the conversation I monitored just yesterday. “What was the reason _____ left the faith?” Now what is the questioner looking for?

(Student answer) “A single reason. Probably a reason that can be answered by a standard apologetic answer in some answer book or seminar.”

Correct. The questioner is looking for some single issue- like the problem of suffering- to which an answer will be supplied and the problem remedied. It’s quite ridiculous.

In case study 74097 you’ll see a young man with exceptional Christian background who falls in love with a non-Christian girl. In six months, all traces of faith are in full retreat and apostasy is likely. No “issue” is at stake. This is the actual ground of human experience and addressing it intellectually will only work with an increasing minority of humans. All that was needed was a real life choice between what was empty cardboard and what seems like the meaning of life. Too easy. (Of course, the enemy knows this trick as well and has used it for years.)

Another case……62223. This is a fellow who was walking around for at least three years horrified by the notion that God would eternally punish a creature he created in his own image and at one time loved. We took the fellow’s sense of justice and tortured him with it until he was willing really to do anything to get away from religion. He only needed to read a new atheist for 15 minutes and he had permission to dump a God who presided over a lake of fire.

By the way, it’s exceptionally ironic that the creator has endowed his creatures with the capacity to be completely overwhelmed by the implications of love and justice. Apart from Jesus ***mumbling*** – excuse the use of the name- these attributes of God will drive humans to despair. Take almost any of them, but especially sovereignty, justice or love. It’s like being forced to look at the sun. (Something those of us in the spiritual world know all too well.) But Jesus makes the deity tolerable without resolving all questions. To that end, may we all be encouraged by the disappearance of teaching and preaching about Jesus. Another 50 years of what we see with Osteen, and victory is at hand.

So the entire point is to find areas far, far from the chess board of apologetic answers. Despair comes to those who believe there is no relief. Apostasy is sweet relief to those who are empty, tired of hypocrisy, weary of the church, stuffed full of Christian junk thinking and forced to swallow unsatisfying answers. The sign on the bus is brilliant: There is no God. Just enjoy your life. It’s not great logic. It doesn’t answer the quest for truth. It is no foundation for life. It’s utterly inadequate….but to the human in the vise grip of religion, it looks like an open door to relief, even paradise.

They do not need answers. They need community. Relationships. Satisfaction. All those disgusting aspects of Trinitarian creation. We push the view that they are brains in a jar. They know they are children looking for a Father. Your job is to make the search itself a torment so that the abandonment of the search is a pleasure.

Question?

***something about the new atheists***

There is a division on the use of the answer of those bright boys. I’m of the opinion that they are a bit too cartoonish for long term value. But I realize there are millions who find the discovery of a loud and obnoxious atheist to be reassuring. I don’t understand why anyone is cheering Richard Dawkins like a rock star, but I’m old school. His logic makes me shudder, but our program is nothing if not admiring of pragmatism. It works. Use it. But I’d caution against filling despairing, weary souls with large amounts of Hitchens or Harris. The final result may be to swear off atheism as just as intolerable as fundamentalism. No real progress there.

In the end, we are looking to make the feeling of being alone the dominant desire. Leave me alone. Stop thinking for me. Stop promising what isn’t true. Stop preaching. Stop talking. Just leave me alone. Religion these day can produce some wonderful monastic style apostates. They won’t need much reassurance. They just need to be reassured they never have to take on anyone’s version of the Christian God.

One more question?

The Creation “Museum.” Oh I love it. I surely do.

The last time I saw Greg (Not his real name), he looked like he was walking away from it all.

I had a premonition at the time that Greg was troubled. He looked unsettled. I’d heard he was thinking of leaving college. His talk of an art history degree last year in my AP English IV class was just the kind of parrot talk that bright kids learn to repeat. They usually don’t know what they are talking about, and Greg was just humoring irrelevant adults like myself.

What really captured him was the outdoors, exploring, and a new girlfriend who kept him on the road on weekends. School wasn’t putting any light in his eyes, but the fire was gone elsewhere as well.

The last time I saw Greg, the fire of his faith was burning low. I should have known where things were going. It’s all quite familiar now.

He wanted some books on philosophy. I gave him Somerset Maugham’s novel of a man who follows his own path, The Razor’s Edge.

I don’t know if he read it, but he found the path. Today I learned that Greg has left the faith in which he was raised.

I understand completely and I am devastated. My heart is broken.

I understand because I’ve watched him grow up in an environment where fundamentalist Christianity was the constant assumption. He not only traveled the road of Christian family and Baptist church, but also the path of Christian school, Christian academics, Christian sports and on and on. It was the water. He was the fish.

I remember his music. It was a place to mark out your own path, to not conform to the pressure of breathing Christian air. Classic rock. The sound of authenticity. He was tenacious in his love for it.

In class- I had him twice- he was bright, but unmotivated. Assignments came along late, always bearing the marks of last minute preparation. The bored, bright kid in the Christian school, where true individuality and creativity is measured out in manageable doses. What is important is that no one’s questions or struggles knock down the elaborate production we’re staging; that no one’s questions or struggles reveal just how shallow are the foundations of our heralded “grand” world view. So the student cooperates and all is presentable.

He meandered through my intro to Bible class, not the more challenging Advanced Bible. He could have taught the class.

He happened to be with us at the apex of our science department’s devotion to Answers in Genesis style creationism. He got the full treatment. What must it be like to be taken into this world where the teaching of science itself becomes an exercise in the deconstruction of science? God have mercy on the intellectually hungry, thirsty and curious.

He sat under my preaching for 6 years. Hundreds and hundreds of messages. Most of them, honest efforts to do the best I could. I want to think that I am speaking to the young people like Greg, the bright, curious ones looking for some sign of diversity in the clonish experience of evangelical fundamentalism. Instead, I must admit that I did not go deep enough to find Greg and his true heart. I stopped short.

I’m despondent feeling that I have failed. I may have done my best and my best is simply not good enough this time.

I take some cold comfort in this news.

Perhaps an inauthentic and empty posture toward God has been replaced with something genuine. I much prefer genuine unbelief to the pretense of faith. It is more healthy on the human level and more useful in God’s economy.

No one outruns the hound of heaven.

I can pray. And weep.

I can renounce this wretched cowardice that fears speaking up boldly on behalf of the spiritually starving and desperate who exist in the midst of any gathering of God’s people. I am paralyzed for fear that some creationist pastor will demand my head on a plate because I believe in God the Father, creator or heaven and earth, but I do not believe I am confessionally obligated to accept or reject any conclusion of science.

I’m afraid to describe the evangelical fundamentalism that I know, but instead choose to flatter the entire business so I won’t rouse the Pharisees.

I treat my classroom as a place to shadow box rather than as a place to speak plainly. I run like a frightened girl at one irritated fundamentalist, and look away from students I know will soon turn away altogether because people like myself keep our answers to ourselves.

It is too late for Greg. He is on to another place in his journey and I am not part of it. I have lessons to learn.

I have more students. More opportunities.

I have a place to repent and a place to risk telling the truth another day.

Dr. Dennis Alexander on Evolution & the Church from Bill Kinnon on Vimeo.

The Roots of My Problem

I have been reading creationist materials since high school. I bought The Genesis Flood when I was a very young Christian. I was converted in a fundamentalist church that contained very few college educated members, but they were aware of the challenge posed by the teaching of evolution. Darwin’s theories were skewered and preached against, in traditional fundamentalist fashion, by preachers who had never read Darwin or sat through a college biology course.

Evolution held a particular fear in my family and church. My parents were uneducated, but they warned me about the dangers I would face if I went to a school that taught evolution. When I took my college science classes, the professors were aware that many of us came from such backgrounds, and at least my teachers, took great care in separating their teaching of science from any critique of religion. My college biology professor was very cautious not to stir up controversy. In retrospect, I wish he had been more straightforward.

My views on the relationship of scripture and science were more affected by my college Bible classes than my science classes. I learned that scripture must be rightly interpreted. It must be understood within its world, and interpreted rightly in mine. If I came away with any suspicions that the young earth creationists might be wrong, it came from my developing an appreciation for Biblical interpretation, not from the Biology lab. Secular science didn’t turn my head. I learned that the people waving the Bible around weren’t necessarily treating it with the respect it deserved.

In seminary I continued my study of Biblical interpretation. I had been warned that liberal professors would teach me evolution and deny the historicity of miracles in the Bible. There were some professors out there that fit the stereotype, but they weren’t in the Bible department of my school. My Bible instructors taught me to respect the Biblical text by not imposing my interpretations and favorite hobby horses on the scriptures. What became clearer to me over my seminary career was that many of my evangelical and fundamentalist brethren were not willing to let the scriptures be what they were or to let them speak their own language.

Among the most valuable lessons I learned at seminary was to ask questions about the literary genre of the Biblical text. Literary criticism is among the most recent and helpful approaches to the Bible, and I don’t claim to be an expert. But I did come to appreciate that identifying a text as history, poetry, song, drama, parable or epistle was essential in allowing that text to “play by its own rules.” This had tremendous influence on my approach to the issues of young earth creationism, and continues to be the primary reason that I cannot accept their reading of Genesis.

The Ham Hermeneutic

One of the most well known creationist communicators is Ken Ham, an Australian school teacher whose humor and communication skills have served the cause of creationism well. His ministry “Answers in Genesis” is heard around the world. I’ve heard a lot of Ham’s stuff on tape and videos. I’ve read several of his books. In fact, I show my students an overview of Genesis 1 by Ham to demonstrate how creationists approach the Biblical text. Without being disrespectful, I have to say that I am always left uneasy by Ham’s approach to the Bible.

Ham loves the Bible and believes it is utterly truthful. He is unswervingly committed to the Bible as the Word of God and as divinely inspired. He is, however, primarily a scientist and an educator. Not a Biblical scholar. I do not believe he knows the Biblical languages. He shows little interest in Genesis as a literary text. His teaching is on Genesis as a scientific text.

One of Ham’s favorite laugh lines is suggesting students wait until a professor makes some claim about evolution or “millions of years” (a favorite Ham line) and then ask the killer question. “Sir, were you there?” (Add Aussie accent.) After the professor says “No, but….” then the follow up is something like this: “Then why do you believe the words of men, who weren’t there and don’t know everything, instead of believing the Word of God, who was there and does know everything?”

I don’t want to disparage Ham’s question or his belief that the Bible reveals to us unique information we could not know otherwise. But Ham has completely run past the really important questions about how we read and understand Genesis 1. He is asserting that Genesis 1 is to be believed because God inspired it. I don’t know of any real contention about that subject among those of us who are not young earth creationists. But Ham assumes that anyone who doesn’t interpret Genesis exactly as he does is rejecting the Bible as truthful.

And how does Ham interpret Genesis? He believes it is a scientific description of creation; a detailed scientific description that answers specific scientific questions and rules out any theories that cannot be based upon statements in Genesis. I am perfectly at ease with Ham making this presupposition, but I disagree with it. I do not believe Genesis is written as scientific description, but as a theological (and prescientific) one.

Let Us Do Your Speaking For You

Young earth creationists have not only not won me over with their approach to the Biblical text, and they have impressed me less with their attitude towards those interpretations that differ with them. Young earth creationists win the award for factionalism, and some of their achievements have to be noted.

For example, any approach that rejects a less than 10,000 year old earth or the flood as the explanation for all visible topography and geology is not on the team. So advocates of intelligent design, who have written and spoken powerfully on the evidence for God in microbiology and astrophysics, are written off because they tend to accept the current scientific dating of the universe and the earth. Phillip Johnson and Michael Behe, significant voices in the intelligent design movement, are no better than Stephen Jay Gould or Carl Sagan to the young earthers. In fact, the entire Intelligent Design movement is ignored by the creationists. This is foolish. There is much common ground between these groups.

Some of the contentions of the young earthers seem, to a layman like me, somewhat far-fetched, like denying the existence of black holes or questioning the constancy of the speed of light, and the evidence cited for these positions is, to say the least, fringe or below the fringe. Yet young earthers feel that because these views must be accepted to keep the age of the earth less than 10,000 years,anyone who does not embrace these strange and unproven theories is rejecting the truthfulness of the Bible, even though such ideas are in no way related to any text in Genesis. I find their rejection of the speed of light and the measurability of the universe to be particularly troubling.

I have noted on several occasions the open hostility towards Hugh Ross, the Canadian astronomer who has written a number of books on Genesis and Science for Navpress and has an apologetics ministry based on answering scientific questions. Ross interprets Genesis differently than the young earthers, and basically affirms the standard picture of big-bang and an old, expanding universe. Ross is somewhat unique in his interpretations, and takes the text very literally, but to the young earthers, he is out of the ball park, because he does not assume/conclude the earth/universe is young.

This is a method of Biblical interpretation where a few questions will quickly determine where one stands. How old is the earth? Was there death before Adam? Do you believe in a world wide flood? Were there dinosaurs on the ark? Any number of these questions draw lines in the sand for the young earthers. I am sorry to say that I cannot think of any division in Christianity- Calvinist/Arminan, Catholic/Protestant, Pentecostal/Cessationist, Seeker/Traditional- where one side is more completely unlikely to appreciate the other position than this one.

Two issues particularly have bothered me. One is the young earth contention that there cannot be such a thing as theistic evolution. For the young earth movement, the teams seems to be young earthers versus atheistic evolutionists. But this is too simplistic. There are many theistic evolutionists in the diverse traditions of Christianity. We may disagree deeply on the evidence for macroevolution, particularly as it applies to human beings, or on various claim about the nature of the Bible, but to say that there is no such possible Christian position as theistic evolution is criminally inaccurate. (For example, the controversial life and work of Pierre Teilhard de Chardin should be noted as a significant advocate of such a position. I did extensive research on the life of Charles Darwin during seminary, and Darwin himself was not an atheist, but a Deistic evolutionist.) Theistic evolution may have its problems, but in the opinion of serious confessional theologians, it does not deny anything essential to the Christian faith.

The other issue is the rejection of the astronomical evidence for the “Big Bang.” Christians like Fred Hereen and Hugh Ross have taken the evidence of the “Big Bang” and produced powerful arguments for the existence of God. I personally find the evidence compelling and exciting, and very helpful to students in understanding why faith in a creator God is not irrational. Yet the young earthers, fully committed to rejecting any evidence that might challenge their age of the earth, routinely equate the “Big Bang” with atheism. When I refer to the “Big Bang” and what we know about it from the Hubble telescope, I can count on at least one student asking me how I can believe in the “Big Bang” since that is what atheists believe? (Even my own children had to be reeducated on this point.)

Good men, like R.C. Sproul and J. Gresham Machen, are outside of the young earther’s definition of orthodoxy on this issue. The Presbyterian Church in America has been painfully divided over this issue, an issue that no creed or confession in classical orthodox Christendom has ever taken sides on. Even if I were impressed with the Biblical or scientific claims of the young earth position, I would hesitate to identify with a movement this uncharitable towards other Christians.

Literally Missing the Point

The young earth creationists believe that Genesis 1 is “literally” a description of creation. I do not. It is this simple disagreement that is the cornerstone of my objection. I believe that Genesis 1 is a prescientific description of Creation intended to accent how Yahweh’s relationship with the world stands in stark contrast to the Gods of other cultures, most likely those of Babylon. Textual and linguistic evidence convinces me that this chapter was written to be used in a liturgical (worship) setting, with poetic rhythms and responses understood as part of the text. It tells who made the universe in a poetic and prescientific way. It is beautiful, inspired and true as God’s Word.

Does it match up with scientific evidence? Who cares? Here I differ with Hugh Ross and the CRI writers. I do not believe science, history or archaeology of any kind establishes the truthfulness of the scripture in any way. Scripture is true by virtue of God speaking it. If God spoke poetry, or parable, or fiction or a prescientific description of creation, it is true without any verification by any human measurement whatsoever. The freedom of God in inspiration is not restricted to texts that can be interpreted “literally” by historical or scientific judges of other ages and cultures beyond the time the scriptures were written.

In my view, both the scientific establishment’s claims to debunk Genesis and the creationists claims to have established Genesis by way of relating the text to science are worthless. Utterly and completely worthless and I will freely admit to being bored the more I hear about it. I react to this much the same I react to people who run in with the Bible and the newspaper showing me how 666 is really the bar code on my credit card. (A theory which, by the way, creationist and KJV-only advocate Kent Hovind gives considerable credibility to.)

Does the Bible need to be authorized by scientists or current events to be true? What view of inspiration is it that puts the Bible on trial before the current scientific and historical models? Has anyone noticed what this obsession with literality does to the Bible itself?

The compliment that is paid to the Bible by those who say it is “literally” and scientifically true comes at the expense of an authentic and accurate understanding of the text. A simple illustration will show what I mean.

ESV Revelation 6:12 When he opened the sixth seal, I looked, and behold, there was a great earthquake, and the sun became black as sackcloth, the full moon became like blood, 13 and the stars of the sky fell to the earth as the fig tree sheds its winter fruit when shaken by a gale.

I do not believe the stars will fall to the earth. I don’t. I don’t believe stars are in the sky. I don’t believe the writer understood what stars are or how they operate or the distances involved. I think this is prescientific language, and it is meant to tell us truth in its own way. A simple illustration, but it clearly shows that literary purpose must come before “literal” interpretation.

Now if I insist on a literal interpretation of this verse as a way of saying it is true and inspired, I am not treating the text with reverence and respect. I may be well motivated, but I am damaging the text. My point gets across, but at the expense of the real meaning of the text as it was written and inspired.

In the same way, Genesis describes creation prescientifically, in the language and idioms of the time, with a theological purpose in mind. It speaks clearly and powerfully. Making this into a literal and “scientific” description as a condition of inspiration is wrong.

Am I treating Genesis as a special case? Are Ham and others correct that this is straightforward description and there is no reason for putting a literary “spin” on how I read the text? My objection is to saying what a “straightforward description” means in a text several thousand years old; a text from a specific culture with a particular purpose. I am not claiming any special insight into Genesis. I am simply saying that, in my opinion, Genesis was not written with reference to the questions or methods of modern science, and making its truthfulness depend on that is a misuse of the text.

Many other examples could be brought forth. (Ask what a literal interpretation of the vision of Jesus in Revelation 1 turns into?) The literary nature of a text can’t be overlooked or taken for granted. In my opinion, this is typical of the creationist approach to the Bible. It becomes a piece of evidence in a scientific discussion, and the text of scripture- particularly its literary distinctiveness- is largely ignored.

Her name is Niki. (Not her real name.) She’s a Japanese student who lived with an American family for a year and attended a Christian school. She took a year of Bible. She attended worship and heard lots of preaching. The Gospel was explained to her many times. She was well liked and sociable.

A very smart girl. A great student, much advanced over the average American student. She made A’s in everything, including Bible.

She left America after graduation and went back to Japan.

She came to America an atheist and she returned to Japan an atheist, and very aware that she had rejected Christianity.

Before she left, she talked with one of her teachers.

“I am an atheist because I believe in evolution. When people here explained to me what they must believe as Christians, I always ask them about evolution, and they say “You cannot be a Christian and believe in evolution.” So I cannot be a Christian, because I believe that evolution is true.”

No doubt, Niki has met many Christians who told her that she could not be a Christian and “believe” in evolution. No doubt, few, if any, of those Christians took the time to explain what they meant by evolution. Most probably meant that the Bible teaches that the earth is 10,000 years young, that no biological death of any kind happened before sin and the major Creationist ministries such as AIG have all the answers to the hard questions of physics, astronomy and science. (”Were you there?”)

No doubt, Niki was told that science is mostly an arrogant attempt to explain questions without reference to the Bible and should be approached with great caution. Christians, she was probably told, are quick to refuse to believe the phony “evidence” science is so good at making up.

No doubt, Niki was told that the same Bible that tells us Jesus is the one who saves a broken world and sinful people is also the Bible that tells us a completely scientific picture of the origin of the universe, the earth and human beings; a view that depends, ironically, on rejecting most of what science says about those origins. No doubt, Niki was told that since both these things- the Gospel and real scientific answers- are from the same Bible, we cannot reject one without rejecting the other.

So she heard it: you cannot be a Christian and “believe in” evolution.

Niki heard, as a matter of routine, that the phrase “big bang” means “there is no God and the universe is an accident. (I’ve been listening to that reaction to the term Bib Bang for almost 20 years, despite being able to recite the names of 25 evangelical Christians who accept the old universe and the Big Bang.)

Was Niki ever told about the the thousands of Christians in the sciences who believe the “Big Bang” is evidence for creation by God? No, she wasn’t. Was she told of the many conversions to Christianity among scientists who have been moved by the evidence for God as creator now available in astrophysics? No, because that would complicate the views of Creationism she was told were non-negotiable.

Was Niki ever told that the vast majority of Christians on planet earth don’t believe now and haven’t ever believed science and Christianity answer the same questions in the same way? No, she wasn’t.

Was Niki told that millions of Christians believe in some form of evolution? (For Catholics, it’s in the Catechism!) Some form of an old earth? That millions of Christians do not accept the claims of the Creationist ministries as representing the Bible accurately or correctly? No, she wasn’t.

Was Niki told that even atheists are largely agreed that evolution does not equal atheism, and atheists like Dawkins are wrong to claim that is the case?

So Niki, who heard the Gospel message of God’s love, life and forgiveness in Jesus, also heard that non-Christian science mostly can’t be believed, most scientists are atheistic conspirators in a plot to eliminate God from our culture and real Christians renounce any belief in the conclusions of secular scientists and embrace Creationism.

Niki, who heard about Jesus for weeks and weeks in her Bible class, could not bring herself to believe in creationism, so she cannot be a Christian.

Did Niki meet anyone who believes the Bible is true, but didn’t believe that science is a vast conspiracy? That the answers aren’t all to be found in the Creationist movement? That you are not forced into the “either/or” choices between Jesus and science that so many Christians insist on? No one knows, but if she did, they were few.

Did Niki receive any encouragement from someone who had managed to answer these questions and still survive as a scientist in the evangelical community? Did she meet anyone in the sciences who still believed in Jesus and the Gospel? Did she meet anyone who was a professing Christian and also a person who worked in mainstream scientific fields of research or academics?

So Niki has gone back to Japan as an atheist. The seeds were sown and perhaps they will take root and bear fruit. Perhaps one day Niki will write and say that she has placed her faith in Jesus and has abandoned her confidence in the usual scientific models of the origin of the earth and human beings. Perhaps Niki will tell us she found a church and has given up her beliefs in science so she could embrace believing in Jesus.

If Niki goes to MIT, or works for NASA or cures cancer or AIDS, will she remember her journey among evangelical Christians as an encouragement to be a great scientist?

Or perhaps Niki will go on being an atheist.

For many Christians, that will continue to be an acceptable outcome.

UPDATE: Why the LCMS choose the ESV. I doubt that it was the Piper endorsement.

I have this nagging feeling that the English Standard Version isn’t as good a translation as I’ve previously thought.

My experience with the NLT has me in major regrets that I’ve got my students using the ESV, that there isn’t a cheap textbook version of the NLT, etc.

I’m using the NLT in preaching most of the time, but when I read the ESV for personal study, sermon preps, classes, etc…..something just isn’t right. I’m wondering if I’ve been “marketed.” That is, I’ve bought the impressive ESV marketing version of itself, but the translation isn’t living up to its own press.

Is it really clunky….and awkward? Do people really have problems reading it? Is it stylistically difficult? Does it do all of the things it accuses other translations of NOT doing? Is it just not up to its own press clippings?

Scott Mcknight recently came right out and said it: We do translations by tribes:

“NRSV for liberals and Shane Claiborne lovers;
ESV for Reformed complementarian Baptists;
HCSB for LifeWay store buying Southern Baptists;
NIV for complementarian evangelicals;
TNIV for egalitarians;
NASB for those who want straight Bible, forget the English;
NLT for generic brand evangelicals;
Amplified for folks who have no idea what translation is but know that if you try enough words one of them will hit pay dirt;
NKJV and KJV for Byzantine manuscript-tree huggers;
The Message for evangelicals looking for a breath of fresh air and seeker sensitive, never-read-a-commentary evangelists who find Peterson’s prose so catchy.”

By that list, I’m an NLT guy. (I’ll complain about the NLT some other day. Basically- we need MORE EDITIONS GUYS. Way too few choices.) I don’t want to just play this game. I am honestly wondering if the ESV is more C+/B- than I’ve suspected.

So, this ISN’T a ” tell your favorite translation” discussion. Please, please don’t give your “translation testimony.” This is a “What’s your experience using the ESV?” discussion, with a special invite to the long unheard from critics- who have used it.

What’s your experience with the ESV?

The command to “not be afraid” was common in Mark. The disciples are constantly choosing between faith and fear as they journey with Jesus. It is fear, not unbelief, that cripples the community of Jesus-followers.

I don’t believe Christianity is a mind-game where we force ourselves to think happy thoughts. Far from it, I believe Christianity allows- even insists on- a full embrace of the difficulties, obstacles and deadly realities of life.

What does concern me, however, is the response of disciples to the media universe we live in, a media universe that uses fear in ways that are crippling to the mission of Jesus and detrimental to the work of the Holy Spirit.

1. I am concerned that many Christians do not understand the media’s financial stake in creating an atmosphere of crisis about as many stories as possible. They will do anything to keep you watching and reading.

2. I am concerned that many Christians do not understand the manipulation that a diet of fear-mongering makes possible. The media seeks influence and audience. A constant crisis creates that atmosphere.

3. Without in any way taking a skeptical attitude toward science, I have to wonder how many Christians realize media science reporting on many of the popular television and internet venues is exaggerated and quite “unscientific?” Loch Ness this hour, asteroids the next, swine flu at 6, followed by a special on alien DNA.

4. I am concerned that the multiplication of “fear factors” has powerful impact on some Christians, to the point of challenging fundamental aspects of how we as Christians face the painful, unpredictable and evil aspects of existence.

Am I alone in this? Is anyone else feeling that the thermostat of corporate fear is being turned up by media and its echo chamber for all the usual reasons- profit, influence, audience addiction, government empowerment- and many Christians are becoming the victims of an atmosphere not unlike what we saw at Y2K?

Anyone else see Christians becoming easy fodder for this, and failing to relate what they hear to the sovereignty of God, a moderate skepticism of media and the truths of the faith we live by in scripture?

When I heard a guy making motions about the Mayan calendar and 2012 at this year’s SBC, I thought….we’re over a line here. Now I’m seeing many more evidences of the same thing and its getting worse. Those of us who don’t have televisions are at risk for being “unbelievers.”

Is it just me?

An event has an application, and God has a Word, but making the various aspects of weather in a particular place a clear word from God is raising a human pastoral application up to the level where all the problems we’ve discussed become real problems for many people. Such connections will cause many to stumble in their faith as they wonder “what was God’s Word to me in taking my child? Why did he have to speak that way instead of another way?” Piper clearly, WILL answer that question for suffering people out of his high views of God ordering all that comes to pass. Many other Christians will not. It’s the difference between a pastor saying, “in the tornado, I see a lesson” and saying “in the tornado, God is saying to you.” There’s a significance difference between these two expressions. I, and many others, frequently call to mind the lessons of providence, but they are the connections we see, not the connections God has made absolute. “The tornado caused me to think about God” and “God sent the tornado to Minneapolis so I would think about God” are simply two pastorally different statements. I’d suggest that what I can say about my house fire (or Piper can say about his cancer) and what I can say about Minneapolis’s tornado are two very different things on the level of using my interpretation of events as God’s Word.

In my conception of pastoral care, there are things you can think and believe, and then there are things you say at particular times. In the neo-natal ICU, when a child is about to die, people are making these connections: God is punishing them, God isn’t there, God is wanting something from them, etc. I believe pastoral care doesn’t tell people why that tornado is in the ICU. It humbly clarifies what we know about God from Jesus and the Gospel. I’m not going to say “this happened for the glory of God” THEN. I’m going to lament THEN. I’m going to take the time to see death for the enemy that it is, not say this is God. I’m going to Romans 8:28, etc LATER. If your first word to those parents is God’s sovereign ordering of all things so they will repent, I don’t think you’ve spoken a false word, but in the context, you’ve spoken a word that makes it more difficult to trust God. Jesus wept even when he’d said Lazurus’s death was for the glory of God. Some believe the highest expression of God’s sovereignty in the midst of tornadoes is the best pastoral and evangelistic word at that moment. It’s a legitimate disagreement, and no one should be embarrassed for having it.

1. Christians all generally believe that God is sovereign. I realize there’s a rather large bar fight about the footnotes, but it’s a reasonable attribute of anyone who calls himself the sort of things God does in scripture.

The game, however, becomes something like this: “My sovereignty can beat up your sovereignty.” “Oh yeah?” “Yeah. Watch this. I say that tornado was a warning from God to the liberals in the ECLA.” “Well….well…..OK…OK….I say that Kyle Lake’s electrocution during a baptism was because God wanted to warn the emerging church.” “Oh yeah….well….”

If you want to play this game, you can generally find people willing to play, but I have one thing to say before you do: If you tell me that I don’t believe in the sovereignty of God because I won’t play your “one up” game, I’m going to punch you in the nose (if you are a man over 18 and not blind) and then you can figure out what that means. (That’s a joke.)

2. Evangelical Christians are amazing for wanting it both ways. They want to be able to say when a tornado is warning liberal Lutherans, but they don’t want to say the light fixture that fell and killed a baby in some church is a sign of anything. They will probably sue the electrician. They want to say that God sends signs of repentance in the tornado that just skirted their town, and then want to say God is teaching us to depend on him when the tornado destroys the building the church meets in. They want to say that God is always communicating through his “megaphone of pain,” (not Lewis’s finest moment) but they don’t want God communicating by putting the face of Jesus on toast. They want to call John Piper a prophet and Kim Clement a kook.

3. It’s an evangelical specialty to jump in and out of the scientific world view as needed. It really irks me. One moment we sound like people who have no idea what storms and earthquakes are all about meteorologically and geologically then the next minute we’re off to the doctor to get more of the benefits of medical science with no reference to God’s decision about whether we should get well or not. I know these understandings of reality aren’t exclusive, but who is your audience when you talk about a storm in language not too far off from animism and then next minute you’re looking down your nose at someone who says that grandma’s blindness is caused by demonic attack, not macular degeneration?

We’re just fine telling kids that God sends X and causes Y, but if our children are scared of that God and don’t want to cross the bridge or go to sleep during a storm we tell them that everything is OK. How does that work? If you say that storms are the result of the way the atmosphere operates as a system and that bridges hold up if the engineers build and maintain them right are we confusing the kid, contradicting ourselves or just operating in two entirely different universes.

If we are going to start saying that comets and eclipses and asteroid strikes are messages from God, then I think we owe it to someone to explain how that interacts with the fact that we also understand these things scientifically.

4. The Bible says that God sent plagues upon Egypt and that God told Moses- told him- what was happening. Was there a difference in that and Moses next inclination to believe that an unusually strong wind was warning the rebellious Israelites to obey? It seems to me there’s a huge difference here, and it’s a difference that has everything to do with our view of scripture as authoritative and everything to do with why we don’t believe that every pastor who tells his church the reason God caused an infant to die is a prophet.

I fully believe that general revelation preaches to those who are listening, but when I start cherry-picking what events and occurrences I want to use to make my point, I’m being inconsistent. I never read that general revelation requires commentary from selected preachers.

5. If you haven’t read it, read this mess from Paul Proctor and tell me that it’s not a monstrous and vile abuse of the theology of God’s sovereignty for Proctor’s own purposes. This is an extreme and vicious example, but it obviously raises the question: how does this guy know that?

This sort of thing has been going on for centuries. We should be taking notes and learning a few things along the way.