Hello everyone! Since our other discussion thread was getting rather cumbersome (I estimate we would have to click through at least 15 "load more replies" buttons before finding the end) I wanted to start a new post. This topic is partly inspired by our previous discussion on slavery, and I think it is fundamental to any of our beliefs: what makes us, as humans, special and valuable? This could include discussions on any of the following, or other questions as they come up:
- It has been said that we are "star stuff", and the Bible says we are made in God's image. What do you believe we are made of?
- Why are we different than animals?
- What is "consciousness"?
- Where does our value as humans come from?
- How do our beliefs about these questions impact our lives?
I look forward to hearing your views!
There is something I think God has put on my heart to say. He loves you before you love Him. Wow, that's amazing.
Hello everyone, I hope you are keeping well. I have something I would like you to think over and maybe give you some perspective that will give hope without the baggage allotted by religion.
I have gone over it in the past and have explained that all life cannot see accurately. (This is scientifically proven). When we come up against something that we can't explain; religion votes for the supernatural and science tries to explain.
Not seeing accurately has taken man down many strange paths, leading to myths, magic and maybe religion, just to name three likely false innovations - we can never say for certain unless we have investigated properly and been able to demonstrate, which has never been done.
Let us take the demise of the dinosaur and how it allowed the most vulnerable and the more intelligent species to survive. It does not just concern dinosaurs, it is shown in other species that came after their demise. The crocodile, shark. bears, elephants and many more have succumbed to a more manageable size, allowing intelligence to be freed and gain the advantage. Which led eventually to us. The dinosaur's demise is put down to a meteor strike, but is that true? Looking at the evidence of life's other species scaling down makes me wonder - are we seeing accurately?
Is it designed to work this way?
Consciousness is often used in defence of the soul, but then again our consciousness comes from neuron activity in the brain which orders the trillions of synapses to tell the the eye to construct what it is seeing. It is during this construction where not seeing accurately brings forth a magnitude of false and true predictions - the dichotomy of mental equations that may be prescriptive or just descriptive. Not seeing accurately puts us in a no man's land of guessing which side we belong to. Once we have chosen which path to take, if it is the wrong path then everything we do afterwards will be wrong.
Does life have a purpose without religion? Perhaps. The subconscious works 24/7 and in the greater scheme of things it appears the most important. The consciousness feeds the subconscious and is the subconscious using this to guide a 'not seeing accurately' species down the right path, the path to more intelligence?
I have explained why I think that life is a one energy system and if this is so and I have evidence to back this up, then what is evolving could be our consciousness and all the rest is the cogs of evolution taking us to a journey of discovery that staggers the imagination and we have the privilege of being part of it.
Happy New Year
All the best windar12q, as I have already stated there is no point in continuing.
I wish you well from sunny Australia.
Burrawang
Hi windar12q, I am not interested in winning this or any other debate.
My main concern is that the truth be known, the falsities, deceptions and straight out lies perpetrated by vehement supporters of evolution need to be exposed for what they are.
I am not taking any easy way out as you suggest, the reason is that you are not debating in a verifiable, testable or falsifiable manner, nor are you applying sound logic to the rather rash and often accusatory statements that you continue to make. In short, having a cogent, rational debate with you by the application of sound logical arguments is just not possible.
There are multitudes of people who sincerely and honestly believe that evolution is a scientific fact. The mass media and educational propaganda machine keeps steamrolling on producing new deceptions to support the evolutionary paradigm whenever an opportunity arises as well as attacking anyone seen as a threat to the continuation of the evolutionary dogma paradigm, such as born again Christians whose eyes have been opened to this deception because they know the truth.
You state,
"The format of energy and its proportional function can explain in scientific fact how evolution can work. I can demonstrate the laws that that energy has to obey."
but as yet you have not done so.
If you claim this then please enlighten us and demonstrate it as you claim you are able.
I look forward with an open mind to what you will demonstrate.
You state, "You just keep saying it is God's doing, but you cannot demonstrate a God. This tells me that you prefer to believe in something that cannot be demonstrated instead of something that can. I ask you again, why?
If you cannot answer, is it because your God has not given you free will? Why did God give free will to everybody except the religious and the religious followers went on to commit the most horrendous crimes against humanity?"
As you appear unable to comprehend the implications of the evidence for brilliantly complex design that of necessity requires an absolutely brilliant designer, there is little more that I can say. Indeed, I strongly suspect that no matter what examples I provide, you will reject them out of hand without a second thought. As you have up to now, made absolutely zero attempt to provide any accepted peer reviewed papers or references to support your energy explains life's origin diatribe, I can only assume that you are unable for whatever reason to do so.
I have supported the claims that I have made with references, hyperlinks and direct quotations; it would be refreshing and more convincing if you would do the same.
As in my previous post, I wish you well windar12q and hope and pray that you will come to know the living God of the Bible by having a personal relationship with Jesus through the Holy Spirit.
Regards and best wishes,
Burrawang
.
Thanks for your reply windar12q. Unfortunately, it appears clear to me that we are wasting one an other's time continuing this as our worldviews are so evidently different that even communicating logically and rationally is obviously not possible.
windar12q, I encourage you to read the articles at the links below as they explain in some detail why species that have been put forward by evolutionists are not transitional forms such as Galapagos Cormorants and Mudskippers.
An interesting article titled “Natural selection ≠ evolution” by Mark Ambler can be found at https://creation.com/natural-selection-evolution
A short excerpt from this article is below that explains how loss of genetic information, (such as with Galapagos Cormorants) is most definitely NOT evolution: -
Patent law calls for a product to have an ‘inventive step’ in order for it to be patented. Mere changes in design of an existing product cannot be patented. Many legal battles over patent rights have been waged over this point. Evolution requires the same thing—an ‘inventive step’, a novel organ or body part, facilitated by new information in the DNA that wasn’t there before. Despite the huge resources thrown at evolution in universities and research institutions, natural selection has never been shown to bring about this type of ‘inventive step’.
Today’s Darwinists point to mutations as the mechanism which provides this novelty from which ‘Natural Selection’ selects. Evolutionists should then focus on mutations to defend their theory, instead of ‘Natural Selection’. When pressed for examples of novel genetic information or body organs created by mutation, they typically point to instances such as wingless beetles on islands, or the flightless cormorant on the Galapagos islands. The problem with these examples is obvious. While they may confer a benefit to the creatures in a specific, very unusual environment, nothing ‘new’ is added to the DNA or creatures’ body parts. They actually involve a loss or corruption of existing genetic information.
Evolution desperately needs ‘Natural Invention’, ‘Natural Novelty’ and ‘Natural Creation’. ‘Natural Selection’ just does not pass muster as exhibit A for evolution. Rather, it is a wonderful tribute to God’s design, and His providence for a fallen world. Natural Selection ≠ Evolution.
For more detail and the references check out the full article at the above hyperlink.
An interesting article titled “Mudskippers—marvels of the mud-flats!” by Philip Bell can be found at https://creation.com/mudskipper
Another interesting article titled “The evolutionary parade of ‘missing links’, The floats keep changing!” by Carl Wieland can be found at https://creation.com/missing-links-parade
Another interesting article titled “The Axolotl, The fish that walks?” by Jeffrey Dykes can be found at https://creation.com/the-axolotl-the-fish-that-walks
Another interesting article titled “Walking sharks: evolution in action?” by Shaun Doyle can be found at https://creation.com/walking-sharks-evolution-in-action
Another interesting article titled “It’s all talk, Tiktaalik can’t walk, A fishy story that has no legs” by Warren Nunn can be found at https://creation.com/tiktaalik-pelvis
Another interesting article titled “Rare Australian fish has fins like hands” by Kevin May can be found at https://creation.com/rare-australian-fish-has-fins-like-hands
An interesting article titled “The birds of the Galapagos” by Lita Cosner and Jonathan Sarfati can be found at https://creation.com/galapagos-birds
An interesting article titled “Darwin’s Eden, A huge evolutionary promotion aimed to put the Galápagos—and evolution—on the world map as never before” by Carl Wieland can be found at https://creation.com/charles-darwins-eden
I wish you well windar12q and hope and pray that you will come to know the living God of the Bible by having a personal relationship with Jesus through the Holy Spirit.
Regards and best wishes,
Burrawang
Gee whiz windar12q, you do make many unsubstantiated grandiose statements, let’s take a look at your reply.
Your statement, “Wow burrawanga, you have given me a lot to digest. let's start with the sun. I can see the sun so I know that it is there - I can't see your God. You ask how do I know the sun will rise the next day; the reason I know, is because if it didn't, that would mean the collapse of our solar system. I wouldn't be here to witness the absence of the sun, I would have perished long before that happened. I see no logic to this question, it's nonsensical´
You have again missed the clear and logical point that is simply no one on this planet can claim to know with absolute certainty that the sun will rise in the morning. Of course it is extremely improbable that it won’t rise and yes if the reason it did not rise was because the solar system had collapsed, then there is a fairly high chance that we would all be dead, but that doesn’t change the fact that believing that it will rise tomorrow is an act of faith. It is the same as driving a car through a blind intersection with a green light, you are acting on faith that the other drivers on the crossing road will stop at their red light, the principle is the same. Anyway, as I said, we will have to agree to disagree. Your reasoning is what is nonsensical because you have not addressed the critical point in question.
Your statement, “I would like to add at this point that your idiosyncrasies are showing in your assumptions of me. I am not a slave to the fundamental criteria of science, I am my own man and I only decide after weighing up the facts - unlike you with your religion, you accept without concern of whether it's right or wrong.´
It is not I but it is yourself that is showing your assumptions of me. How can you possibly say that I, “accept without concern of whether it's right or wrong.” It does indeed appear that you are accusing me of having your own faults.
Your statement, “I don't believe Darwin got it 100% right and neither did Einstein, I think his equation needs adding to.´
OK, this will be interesting, please advise exactly what needs to added to Einstein’s famous equation and why it needs to be added?
Your statement, “The genome with it chemical mysteries - if you take life as one energy, then the genome is serving that one energy and not just that one individual. An example of this is when a mutation happens to a species, it is not just to save THAT species, but to save all species. It's what we call the balance in nature, if that balance is not kept then a mutation would eventually emerge that would destroy evolution.´
“if you take life as one energy” is a good example of an unclear statement that needs explaining in depth.
Mutations are occurring in every individual in every generation, such that the entropy in the genome is increasing all the time. This will ultimately lead to extinction if left to run the full course of time at some point in the future, the fact is that nearly all geneticists acknowledge that beneficial mutations are demonstrably very rare compared to deleterious mutations. It is an inescapable fact. You should read an excellent paper by Robert W. Carter, titled “More evidence for the reality of genetic entropy” at https://creation.com/evidence-for-genetic-entropy
Your statement, “I find it hard to believe an intelligent mind can dismiss an attempt at trying to explain a complex problem as googly - gook. All that answer shows me, is your lack of wanting to the truth, for which I blame your religion and not yourself. The reason we don't see life suddenly appearing is because life is governed by a one energy system - it is proportional to its function. I don't know why you won't accept this basic fact about energy; if you dismiss what is fact, it is the equivalent of dismissing your own existence and this goes for all your questions that can be answered using scientific fact.”
You claim that the above is scientific fact. I challenge that. I expect that you will be unable to provide references to accepted peer reviewed research that supports your claims. Your statement, “The reason we don't see life suddenly appearing is because life is governed by a one energy system - it is proportional to its function.” is indeed gobbeldy gook unless you can support it with accepted peer reviewed research!
Your statement, “There are many transitional fossils if you take a trip to the museum, but you don't even have to do that; in the Galapagos islands, the cormorants are in the transitional period of changing from feather to down, because their ability to fly is not needed for their survival. The Mud Skipper is another in the same process of changing from gills to lungs. Each can be substantiated from fossil evidence by checking their lineage. The missing link which you will never find is because your religion has stopped you from thinking - the missing link is the one energy system that governs evolution and also explains most of what we think is supernatural. (We don't see accurately!)”
To state that Cormorants and Mud Skippers are transitional forms is utter nonsense!!!
Cormorants have always been Cormorants and Mud Skippers have always been Mud Skippers!
Your statement, “You are right when you say that matter and energy are interchangeable, but that does not alter the fact that matter is energy to begin with and the changes you mention are without doubt of the most importance.”
How can you possibly say that matter was energy to begin with? Were you there? Did you see it happen? It would appear that you are talking about the Big Bang Theory that theorises that matter may have been energy to start with in a singularity, but you cannot make statements like that without qualification.
Your statement, “Because both matter and energy are one of the same thing, is another reason for the theory of a one energy system governing evolution and not a God "
What references do you cite to support this unscientific statement? To me this kind of blanket statement is meaningless unless you can describe the mechanisms, the connections, the processes etc that explain exactly what you mean. It is utter pseudo-science nonsense to make blanket statements like this.
Your statement, “You mention heat and the effect it could have on life evolving from the very beginning, please check the virus - it is indestructible and will survive in extreme heat and extreme cold; it will also survive in a vacuum. If life did succumb to some disaster, there would still be the virus to start the process of evolution once more.”
Are you seriously suggesting that a virus can survive being exposed to several thousand degrees Kelvin in a particle accelerator? You either take the contributors on this website to be fools or you do not have a very clear or accurate understanding of what conditions viruses can and can’t survive in.
Your statement, “The 'special creation' attributed D.M.S. Watson is correct, but it is where this 'special creation ' comes from that he has got wrong. I think I have explained this when writing about the genome.”
I am amazed that you even seem to have misunderstood the quote by Emeritus Professor D.M.S. Watson that he admitted years ago, so I have put it below again so that you may read it again more carefully this time.
“evolution [is] a theory universally accepted not because it can be proven by logically coherent evidence to be true, but because the only alternative, special creation, is clearly incredible” (Nature 124:233, 1929).
By the way my site name is Burrawang not Burrawanga and not a good look windar12q!
windar12q - We will have to agree to disagree windar12q.
Let us take a much closer look at your claims!
You have stated, "Mentioning faith in the sun rising is not quite the same as faith in a God - I can see the sun and can measure its strength, you can't do this with a God."
Well I absolutely disagree with this irrational claim
and the proof you supply of measuring the suns strength is totally irrelevant to the point. No one on this planet can claim to know with absolute certainty that the sun will rise in the morning. Who knows, something unforeseen may occur that somehow prevents this occurring. The odds are far more likely that the sun will remain in its appointed position and the earth will most likely continue to revolve resulting in the sun rising in the morning but it is in fact a faith position whether you like it or not!
You have stated, "Describing the wonders of nature as the work of God, is not relevant unless you can demonstrate it in the same way as you can the sun."
Just because you say the wonders of nature are not relevant doesn't make it so!
The amazing complexity and brilliant design of all of creation all around us. for everyone to see, yells out extremely loudly to those who have not been blinded (by intensively indoctrinated fairy stories such as Darwinian evolution and Big Bang origin tales), that it was all designed by a master designer far beyond the intellect of human understanding. The fact that you appear unable to grasp this simple, yet profound truth is unfortunate and sad, but the good news is that you can open your heart and mind to the truth at anytime. Jesus is our Saviour, that is for ALL of us including you.
You state that, "Freewill is the mainstay of our intelligence, without it, there would be no intelligent life. It is this intelligence that will eventually bring some peace on Earth, but first we have to understand a problem before we can solve it."
Your statement that freewill is the mainstay of our intelligence; may be true to some degree but I rather think that our intelligence is more a product of our amazingly designed brains that have been described numerous times as the most complex things in the known universe. Free will is a gift of God that we are truly able to exercise through the use of our amazingly complex brains for truth or delusion, it is our own individual choice how we exercise our free will.
You state that, "If you take a mix of atheists, agnostics and all the tens of thousands of religions; you have the illusion of segregation; I say illusion because they are really acting as one - in the same way as we are doing, regarding this debate. These different levels of intellect are needed to give purpose to an intelligent mind and an intelligent species. There will never be only one religion and that diversity spreads to the atheist and agnostics too. It applies to any field of intellect that you can think of - it is needed by nature to allow us to evolve - the only other way is to stagnate into extinction. Nature is responsible in a way, for the faults you blame on man, but nature is not misguiding us intentionally. All life cannot see accurately; this is nature's way of making us construct what we see and in doing so our intelligence is growing."
A large part of the above is wholly unscientific gobbeldy gook, but of particular note I must take exception to your assertion that, "There will never be only one religion and that diversity spreads to the atheist and agnostics too. It applies to any field of intellect that you can think of - it is needed by nature to allow us to evolve - the only other way is to stagnate into extinction." because you are firstly making the huge assumption that evolution is correct which in fact it demonstrably isn't. It was a sad day when solid scientific institutions around the world compromised into giving evolutionary theory a little credibility which has since grown into full blown acceptance, dissemination and general public belief that evolution is an established fact. It is a fact though that biological evolution does not in any way progress through rigorous use of the scientific method to the point nowadays where it is effectively NOT falsifiable!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! This is because the theory has become that malleable that just about anything discovered can be accommodated into the theory and evolutionary models. It is a fact that evolution is based on numerous unproveable assumptions that fly in the face of the facts!
I would be very interested to hear your explanation as to why we do not find any of the trillions upon trillions of intermediate forms of creatures that span the supposed time from the imagined first cell to the present day human such as you and me. It is utter rubbish to suggest that evolution has any real credibility, it is in fact an alternative religion for its devout followers, that is, those who of their own free will choose to reject God or at the very least choose to accommodate belief in evolution as a compromise on the truth of Creation as revealed to us in the historical narratives in the Bible. It is a very sad thing that evolution is still given credibility and scientific respectability by most universities on this planet, though the tide is slowly turning as more and more people become aware of the truth about the underlying deceptions upon which evolution is built, it is a house of cards and perhaps the greatest hoax ever perpetuated on modern man!!!
Contrary to popular opinion, it is a fact that when research is conducted with rigorous application of the scientific method and objective analysis of the results are interpreted without unproveable Darwinian assumptions and preconceived unproven evolutionary dogma, the results strongly support creation NOT evolution. For example I would love to hear a cogent explanation from you as to where you believe the information comes from that is brilliantly written on the deoxyribonucleic acid sugar ribose strands with nucleotide letters that code complex specified information for every aspect of life's synthesis, maintenance/repair, growth and reproduction such as in the human genome? Are you aware that DNA can hold more information in one cm3—about 1/5 of a teaspoon—than could be stored on a trillion CD's. Our computer storage systems pale into insignificance in comparison to information storage density of this magnitude. I look forward to your cogent explanation.
Think about this also, if the supposedly fairly hostile primordial soup somehow? gave rise to life then why don't we see life spontaneously generating all the time in say a sardine tin where all the necessary homochiral compounds are already present. The answer is simple, the primordial soup fairy tale is nothing more than that, a fairy tale designed to give those who choose of their own free will to reject God something to believe in, inadequate as it is, millions, possibly billions have unfortunately swallowed it, hook, line and sinker!
You state that, "I have mentioned before that the energy of a system, including its kinetic energy; is proportional to its function. If you consider all life as a one energy system, with all its kinetic energy (life) then that would explain the diversity of life. If all life reached the same level of intelligence, it would destroy purpose and it would also destroy us - without purpose (constructive purpose) intelligent life could not exist."
This is predominantly unscientific gobbeldy gook again, and not worthy of an intelligent response.
You have stated, "Your religion, by going the way of a God is not constructive; it is going against all that nature is telling us and that is why it is wrong; it is time to change all that.”
Again, just because you make a negative statement doesn't make it in any way true. The truth is that God does exist, He is very real and because you must be telling yourself that He does not exist, it does appear that you feel you have the right to publicly disregard Him. Nature is nothing more than the combined ecosystems of life that were created and are presently sustained by God whom you deny exists.
You have stated, “Physicist Richard Feynman tried to explain this connection of all life with his one electron theory, it failed because the balance of positrons and electrons didn't match. However we know now with the advent of quantum entanglement that this connection could be possible."
I do not know anything about quantum entanglement, but I do know a little about quantum mechanics!
Matter can be produced from energy in the laboratory. Einstein’s idea that energy and matter are interchangeable (E=mc²) is now well established experimentally. When particles of matter are created in the laboratory they always appear in matter/antimatter pairs. If we get an electron, we also get an anti-electron (called a positron). If we get a proton, we also get an antiproton. If we get a neutrino, we also get an antineutrino, and so on. Just as energy can produce matter by this quantum pair production method, so when matter and antimatter particles come together again they annihilate one another and revert back to pure energy.
Worth noting here and the thing that you have unfortunately omitted to mention when you appealed to quantum physics as a reason to exclude God from your explanation of how life came to be as it is, is that in order for energy to produce matter, the temperature has to be exceedingly high.
The experimental evidence for energy/matter transformation has come from particle accelerators that move sub-atomic particles at unimaginably high velocities. To infer that somehow the laws and properties of energy/matter conversion has any compatibility with organic life is seriously questionable in my opinion. Any life form subject to the laws of quantum physics is of necessity exposed to extremely high energies, many thousands of degrees C that would instantly destroy all Carbon based life forms that exist!
The failure of evolutionary theory has been so consistent that it should have been abandoned, but the only alternative is unthinkable to the secular (God-less) mind.
A quote from an eminent scientist for you to ponder published in the science journal – Nature.
Emeritus Professor D.M.S. Watson admitted years ago:
“evolution [is] a theory universally accepted not because it can be proven by logically coherent evidence to be true, but because the only alternative, special creation, is clearly incredible” (Nature 124:233, 1929).
You state that, "You can still go on believing in God, but please not this one. You can do better."
I suggest with sincere respect that perhaps it is not I who can do better!
It sounds lovely and cold where you are, a little snow would go down really well here. Might even put out a few fires around the place. I am not looking forward to the rest of summer that won't officially end until the end of February. Cold weather is nice!
All the best,
Burrawang
Hi windar12q, you long for summer and I long for winter, I find that it's easier to get warm than it is to keep cool, though we do have mild winters only getting down to -2 or -3 degrees at night, only then it warms up to a beautiful day that is well above zero and most often above 10 degrees.
The rationale that you are using is flawed. To infer that simply because God is omnipotent and omniscient He somehow is therefore the cause of all that happens is incorrect and far too simplistic a statement.
God's enormous love for all of us is demonstrated in the creation. The fact that we have a fantastically habitable planet with so much beauty even now demonstrates this. The fact that water exists, air exists, just the right amount of solar radiation, plants with their fruits for us to consume demonstrate this.
It is man's choice to quarrel, fight, kill, covet and steal others possessions and disobey God's laws.
It is man's own choice to do those things.
We all have a choice to do right or wrong in our lives. It is the freewill that God gave us that allows us to make those choices.
The fact that their is pain, sorrow and suffering throughout the world is a direct consequence of man's actions not God's.
I believe that in order for us (mankind) to have 100% freewill, the fact that man has fallen short of God's laws was always an inevitable result of our freewill. The fact that God has paid the penalty Himself for ALL of mankind's sins demanded by His own holiness demonstrates the enormous love that He has for us all.
This is clearly demonstrated by the fact that even the heavenly beings in the presence of God (Angels) who likewise also have freewill made choices, some to remain in obedience to God and others to rebel against God. Again it was not God that brought the pain and suffering to the fallen angels, it was their own choice that was enabled by absolute freewill.
It could never have been any other way, the pain and sorrow in the world around us is a direct result of the moral weakness displayed by us all. No-one is exempt from this weakness, only God is holy and righteous.
If it were any other way then we would be automatons without real free will; there simply is no other way, to create humanity with absolute freewill as God has done.
The original creation was perfect with no pain or sorrow, all was in accord with God's holiness and man and God walked in the garden together. It was only when man (Adam) rebelled against God by disobeying His direct warning that the pain and sorrow started in this created universe that is even at this very moment still being held in existence by God's will, though I believe it is likely to a lesser degree than it was prior to man's rebellion in the garden of Eden. Hence we have all of creation slowly degrading, deteriorating resulting in floods, famines, fires and pestilence; it is all out of whack so to speak.
Faith is important too. I think that we all have faith that the sun will come up tomorrow morning, and the faith that Christians have in Jesus is exactly the same. Faith is not some airy fairy thing that is without reality or supporting evidence, it is the result of our reason, that is enabled by our amazing brains and our spirit that have been given to us by God to use for this very purpose.
It is each persons free choice as to whether or not they acknowledge God in their heart and accept His free gift of salvation or rail against Him as a petulant child does who refuses to obey his mother/father because it doesn't suit him.
The bible tells us that Faith, Hope and Love remain, these three, and the greatest of these is Love.
Hope the weather warms up for you soon.
Cheers,
Burrawang.
Thanks windar12q, much appreciated!
Thanks windar12q, much appreciated! I guess in my last post I should have added at the end, that we are saved by believing that Jesus died on the cross for our own personal transgressions against God's holy laws that He provided to us in the Ten Commandments. We are saved by the grace of God and accepting His free gift of salvation. All the very best to you in the UK. It is about 40 degrees C here at present. Lots of bushfires about. Very hot summer already, we are hoping for some rain.
Happy New Year to all.
Yes, Jonathan I believe that you are absolutely correct, we are all born into the family of Adam and Eve as sinners, i.e. the entire human population from creation to the present time. But it should also be remembered that babies and young children are innocent and blameless as they have no conscious understanding of sin when very young, see Matthew 19:14
But as Jesus said, "Let the little children come to Me, and do not hinder them! For the kingdom of heaven belongs to such as these."
I have always thought that at some point in every child's life we become accountable to God, however I do not know when that point in each person's life is reached but God sure does!
It is also a relevant time to reflect on what God's Word tells us of the significance of creation and the result of rejecting God as Creator in Romans 1:18-25
18 The wrath of God is being revealed from heaven against all the godlessness and wickedness of people, who suppress the truth by their wickedness,
19 since what may be known about God is plain to them, because God has made it plain to them. 20 For since the creation of the world God’s invisible qualities—his eternal power and divine nature—have been clearly seen, being understood from what has been made, so that people are without excuse.
21 For although they knew God, they neither glorified him as God nor gave thanks to him, but their thinking became futile and their foolish hearts were darkened.
22 Although they claimed to be wise, they became fools
23 and exchanged the glory of the immortal God for images made to look like a mortal human being and birds and animals and reptiles.
24 Therefore God gave them over in the sinful desires of their hearts to sexual impurity for the degrading of their bodies with one another.
25 They exchanged the truth about God for a lie, and worshiped and served created things rather than the Creator—who is forever praised. Amen.
Harsh as it may sound this applies now just as much as it did when the apostle Paul wrote these words nearly 2,000 years ago.
The homage paid to evolution, big bang theory and astrology are current western culture examples of futile thinking.
Believers are all saved by the grace of God, there is absolutely nothing that we can do to earn the free gift of forgiveness from God for our sin.
Hello windar12q. In order to understand God's judgments, such as His plagues in Egypt, we must first understand that there is no such thing as an "innocent" person. The holiness of God does not tolerate even the slightest violation of His laws.
8 If we say we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us. 9 If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness. 10 If we say we have not sinned, we make him a liar, and his word is not in us. - 1 John 1:8-10
But why did God even let Adam and Eve sin in the first place? (That seems to be your question, which is also something many Christians wonder about. A true relationship with God has room for questions). One possible reason I have heard much about recently is this: so that God could demonstrate His traits that would not have been obvious to us otherwise; such as mercy and forgiveness. God is glorified and that is good. One passage we discussed in my theology class is Revelation 4-5. The first section of it describes the creatures and saints in heaven worshiping God the Father for His wonderful power of creation. They worship day and night singing:
11 “Worthy are you, our Lord and God, to receive glory and honor and power, for you created all things, and by your will they existed and were created.” - Revelation 4:11
What can possibly shift their attention? Only when Jesus enters the throne room does their song change. Jesus' redemption of the world through His death and resurrection is the ultimate work of heroism and brings God incredible glory.
9 And they sang a new song, saying,
“Worthy are you to take the scroll and to open its seals, for you were slain, and by your blood you ransomed people for God from every tribe and language and people and nation, 10 and you have made them a kingdom and priests to our God, and they shall reign on the earth.”
12 saying with a loud voice,
“Worthy is the Lamb who was slain, to receive power and wealth and wisdom and might and honor and glory and blessing!” - Revelation 5:9-10, 12
Hello windar12q. I think I should describe a little more of what I believe about free will. I noticed you had several questions about it. First of all, the Tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil was not forbidden by God because He didn't want Adam and Eve to know things. He forbade it because in order for them to have free will, they had to be able to make a choice that had consequences. They could choose good (obey God), or they could choose evil (disobey God). Since they were created without a sinful nature, they had complete freedom to choose either one. However, the "free will" that we experience is tainted by our sinful nature; we make choices but we will be unable to choose to follow God if left to our own devices. Sin does not expand freedom, it restricts it. Adam and Eve had more freedom in paradise than we experience today.
I noticed your point that God should start over. That's what He promises to do in scripture.
Then I saw a new heaven and a new earth, for the first heaven and the first earth had passed away, and the sea was no more. 2 And I saw the holy city, new Jerusalem, coming down out of heaven from God, prepared as a bride adorned for her husband. 3 And I heard a loud voice from the throne saying, “Behold, the dwelling place[a] of God is with man. He will dwell with them, and they will be his people,[b] and God himself will be with them as their God.[c] 4 He will wipe away every tear from their eyes, and death shall be no more, neither shall there be mourning, nor crying, nor pain anymore, for the former things have passed away.”
5 And he who was seated on the throne said, “Behold, I am making all things new.” Also he said, “Write this down, for these words are trustworthy and true.” 6 And he said to me, “It is done! I am the Alpha and the Omega, the beginning and the end. To the thirsty I will give from the spring of the water of life without payment. 7 The one who conquers will have this heritage, and I will be his God and he will be my son. 8 But as for the cowardly, the faithless, the detestable, as for murderers, the sexually immoral, sorcerers, idolaters, and all liars, their portion will be in the lake that burns with fire and sulfur, which is the second death.” - Revelation 21:1-8
Romans 5:8 "but God DEMONSTRATES His own love for us in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us." It seems to me that in our whole discussion, YOU are the only one who keeps exhibiting hate, not God. God's primary directive isn't "Believe in Me or go to Hell" but "Trust in Me and rejoice in Me because I love you and suffered Hell in your place." Unfortunately, you won't understand any of this until you stand at the foot of the cross and look up into the face of the One who loves you so much that He would suffer and die just for you. Windar, if you were the only sinner on the face of this earth, Jesus would still have come and died just for you. He loves you that much. I will continue to pray for your deliverance.