TheSword

This morning I was watching Fox News when Mike Huckabee came on to discuss last night's debate and something caught my ear. In response to John Kasich's capitulation on gay marriage, Huckabee revealed himself as a Biblical Creationist by asserting a 6,000 year human history in support of traditional marriage. It was an incredibly short part of a larger answer but also incredibly telling. From that one little quote we know that he firmly believes the Bible and that he holds God's Word above man's word, even when it's likely to get him skewered in the public arena. I know he was a Baptist pastor for a while (of the SBC variety), but that's a stance even many of those won't say on TV. A politician who stands on the Bible regardless of the consequences? Whatever else he stand on politically, that is at least something I can get behind.

This morning I was watching Fox News when Mike Huckabee came on to discuss last night's debate and something caught my ear. In response to John Kasich's capitulation on gay marriage, Huckabee revealed himself as a Biblical Creationist by asserting a 6,000 year human history in support of traditional marriage. It was an incredibly short part of a larger answer but also incredibly telling. From that one little quote we know that he firmly believes the Bible and that he holds God's Word above man's word, even when it's likely to get him skewered in the public arena. I know he was a Baptist pastor for a while (of the SBC variety), but that's a stance even many of those won't say on TV. A politician who stands on the Bible regardless of the consequences? Whatever else he stand on politically, that is at least something I can get behind.

This morning I was watching Fox News when Mike Huckabee came on to discuss last night's debate and something caught my ear. In response to John Kasich's capitulation on gay marriage, Huckabee revealed himself as a Biblical Creationist by asserting a 6,000 year human history in support of traditional marriage. It was an incredibly short part of a larger answer but also incredibly telling. From that one little quote we know that he firmly believes the Bible and that he holds God's Word above man's word, even when it's likely to get him skewered in the public arena. I know he was a Baptist pastor for a while (of the SBC variety), but that's a stance even many of those won't say on TV. A politician who stands on the Bible regardless of the consequences? Whatever else he stand on politically, that is at least something I can get behind.

This morning I was watching Fox News when Mike Huckabee came on to discuss last night's debate and something caught my ear. In response to John Kasich's capitulation on gay marriage, Huckabee revealed himself as a Biblical Creationist by asserting a 6,000 year human history in support of traditional marriage. It was an incredibly short part of a larger answer but also incredibly telling. From that one little quote we know that he firmly believes the Bible and that he holds God's Word above man's word, even when it's likely to get him skewered in the public arena. I know he was a Baptist pastor for a while (of the SBC variety), but that's a stance even many of those won't say on TV. A politician who stands on the Bible regardless of the consequences? Whatever else he stand on politically, that is at least something I can get behind.

I've found Greek and Hebrew to be very helpful in illuminating the KJV word usage. English just isn't always great at expressing things coming from highly inflected languages like Greek and Hebrew (e.g. mood, case, tense, etc.) and so sometimes I just find it helpful to see what the underlying reasons for word usage or word order that may seem a little awkward at first in English. As a very simple and benign example...
Greek has no set word order and sentences are formed by inflecting words to show how they relate. More often than not, word order is used to show emphasis to make a point. In English, John 1:1 reads:
In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.
Pretty clear in English, no real need for a word study here. The Greek word order reads:
In beginning was the word and the word was with the God and God was the Word.
The only thing that's really different is the last phrase (the Word was God vs. God was the Word). The truth conveyed is the same but the Greek word order makes it the deity of Christ and His oneness with God so much more emphatic. It doesn't change anything. It's not earthshattering. It's just illuminating.
Another reason I like looking into original languages is the way words tend to have multiple meanings and what a possible meaning in an English word may be completely out of bounds for the Greek/Hebrew word it was translated from and vice versa. Another simple and benign example...
People like to argue over where exactly the nail was driven during crucifixion (hand vs. wrist vs. forearm). Some people read "hand" and dogmatically say it can only mean through the palm. Others go with the anatomical argument say it had to have been in the wrist or forearm because it would have ripped out of His hand. Well, the Greek word used for "hand" (see Luke 24:39 for an example) covers everything from the elbow to the fingertip, so it really doesn't matter where the nail was placed.
No truth was changed. No doctrine was challenged. All we did was clarify the intended meaning.
Another, more pertinent example. The English usage of "baptize" has taken on a variety of meanings that validates sprinkling and pouring and confines it to religious ritual. However, the Greek word can only be taken to mean full immersion, thus clarifying an important doctrinal position without having to examine and argue from every example of baptism found in the Bible to see exactly how they did it.
These examples are really simple and have no great impact and this type of word study makes up probably 80%-90% of valid word studies in the original languages. However, the rest can make big differences in the interpretation of things such as election/predestination that have enormous doctrinal impact. In every case, though, all it should do is make the intended meaning clear when the English rendering appears to leave more than one possibility on the table and people choose the one that suits them rather than the one that was intended.

I usually consult the BDAG (ISBN: 978-0-2260-3933-6) or ALGNT (ISBN: 978-1-4120-5654-0). Thayer's is ok, but not my favorite.

What I said was you cannot use music that physically distresses the body to exhort. That is, physical distress is not a means of exhortation.
I disagree that God did not establish a clear musical standard. He did.
Yes Christians have been debating the issue for years, yes "Conservative Baptist" rejected the new worldly style of music Moody used (although to say that that exact style is common in Baptist churches today is somewhat of an assumption [furthermore, I don't generally concern myself with the opinions of Moody, as he was a Methodist]), this is because there has always been those who have an agenda to push and there have always been those who don't understand anything about music, yet try to proclaim what is right or wrong with it based off their opinion.
I care little for what other Christians, Baptist, Musicians, etc. etc. think, I care only for what God thinks. God laid down the purpose of music very plainly in his Word, and to say that He did not tell us in His Word what sort of music to listen to, or to say that music is amoral, or to say that the musical structure has no effect on people, or any other of the excuses that I have heard and have spewed out myself, is to totally ignore the real problem. The problem people have with music is that they want to do what they want to do, and THEY DON"T CARE WHAT GOD THINKS, they will make Him conform to their wants and desires.

Another big problem Christians have with music, is that so many are ignorant about it-it comes down to what feels good to them, not what is holy and sanctified, which is what God demands.

No, never heard of such a thing. It doesn't seem to agree with the description of the Temple in Scripture.
Also, if the Temple was indeed at the location of the Dome of the Rock, that area doesn't seem to agree with the idea of arches either.

Well, the Tabernacle was built on the ground, and every altar of stones was built on the ground (and with the ground). The temple was razed - what, 3 times? - which one of those incarnations was suggested to have been built on arches? After the first destruction of Jerusalem it probably was not re-built at original ground level anyways.

Wow, that is an excellent and astute question and one I don't think I've ever gotten before. It's not often someone makes me stop and think on an academic level, so thanks for that. The answer is actually kind of simple. What we've left out of this conversation so far is that there is a possibility in addition to an allele persisting or being lost, and this is an allele being damaged. A great example is human blood types which has three possible allele's (A, B, and O) that produce four different blood types (A, B, AB, O). The intriguing thing is that the O allele is, functionally, a damaged A allele that will not allow production of A traits on the outside of cells.
This might sound a little bit odd, but denying evolution via a gain of genetic information through mutation does not necessarily mean we should deny that mutation never happens. Indeed, it happens all of the time, but it is deleterious or damaging. If a damaged allele is copied and propagated, it results in a different gene expressions, but that does not make it a new allele and it certainly does not add information to the genome.

In short, you're correct. This is a very simplistic example of how loss of information leads to a certain expression of traits. In reality, there would be several letters with various levels of dominance. Human eye color, for example, has three different alleles (B - brown, G - green, b - blue). It's chart would look something like this:

As you can see, even adding 1 allele variation gets a little cumbersome to look at which is why I used such a simplistic chart for the beaks. What should be immediately clear, though, is that blue eyes can only result from a complete absence of both B and G allele because they are dominant. This brings me to the answer for your first statement. Variation does not only come through a loss of information, but also through allele combination. This will sound a little backward, but in truth lack of variation is what comes from a loss of information. Take, for example two parents, one with blue eyes and one with brown:
 BbBBBBbbBbbbThey will be capable of producing both brown- and blue-eyed children and you will see variation within the population. Since both brown and blue alleles are present, there is variation. However, if you have two blue-eyed parents, the only possible outcome is blue because there is only one allele at play:
 bbbbbbbbbbbbIf you extrapolate this to a larger population, you'll see that a group of people that only have blue eyes, you know that there has been a complete loss of both the brown and green alleles. This is the same process that is at play in Darwin's finches that started this line of discussion. There likely existed the capability of variation at one point, but as the populations were isolated, the variation within each population was truncated and resulted in static speciation even though they are all of the same created kind. The point is, that the speciation did not occur through random mutations (which is what both micro- and macro-evolution assert). Organisms don't adapt and change through a gain of information, they simply lose the ability create varied offspring and so only one possible trait becomes expressed.
 

On micro-evolution, not exactly. The variation is never due to added genetic information. What you see with finches is more of a sorting and subsequent loss of genetic information. When a species becomes isolated in a particular environment, the genes most effective for survival are the ones that end up becoming expressed. Rather than gaining a mutation to survive in a particular environment, less effective genes are essentially bred out. Consider the attached graphic of finch beak alleles where "T" (large/thick beak) is the dominant trait and "t" is recessive. If the available food supply cannot be collected or eaten with a small beak, the "t" will ultimately die out and "T" will eventually be the only available trait to be expressed. This is an example of how the loss of genetic information is what produces variation and not the addition of it. Speciation occurs when enough genetic material is lost from a population so as to be distinct from another previously identical population. You don't need a compromise with evolutionary theory to explain the variation in kinds or the diversity of species.

In addition to UM's excellent points, here's a fantastic article on a Noah's Ark feasibility study that should answer most questions you have on that one: http://creation.com/how-did-all-the-animals-fit-on-noahs-ark
Additionally, I would caution against the use of micro-evolution because it still implies evolution is a real phenomenon. Evolution (be it micro or macro) assert a gaining of genetic information through mutation. Rather, what we see with speciation within the created kinds is a loss of genetic information that differentiates between species we know of today.

Sadly, my wife and I were completely oblivious to this when we first got married. We were still spiritually immature and had never heard any of this from either the church or anyone in the health sector. It literally never crossed our minds. Unfortunately, she got pregnant during our first year of marriage while she was on the pill and we ended up losing the baby sometime between week 7 and 11. That inhospitable environment doesn't just go away when the fertilized egg implants. Her placenta simply tore away because the effects of the birth control were still at work. It was probably one of the most difficult times in our marriage. Since then we've done our research (initially just to figure out what happened) and have come to these same conclusions. It's something everyone under our spiritual care (especially teens and young adults) need to be taught and understand because the outside world certainly isn't going to make them aware. It happened to us out of innocence, but the loss of life is no less tragic and devastating. Know what I know now, birth-control pills should be considered no different than abortion pills because they effectively cause the same effect.

In short, you're correct. This is a very simplistic example of how loss of information leads to a certain expression of traits. In reality, there would be several letters with various levels of dominance. Human eye color, for example, has three different alleles (B - brown, G - green, b - blue). It's chart would look something like this:

As you can see, even adding 1 allele variation gets a little cumbersome to look at which is why I used such a simplistic chart for the beaks. What should be immediately clear, though, is that blue eyes can only result from a complete absence of both B and G allele because they are dominant. This brings me to the answer for your first statement. Variation does not only come through a loss of information, but also through allele combination. This will sound a little backward, but in truth lack of variation is what comes from a loss of information. Take, for example two parents, one with blue eyes and one with brown:
 BbBBBBbbBbbbThey will be capable of producing both brown- and blue-eyed children and you will see variation within the population. Since both brown and blue alleles are present, there is variation. However, if you have two blue-eyed parents, the only possible outcome is blue because there is only one allele at play:
 bbbbbbbbbbbbIf you extrapolate this to a larger population, you'll see that a group of people that only have blue eyes, you know that there has been a complete loss of both the brown and green alleles. This is the same process that is at play in Darwin's finches that started this line of discussion. There likely existed the capability of variation at one point, but as the populations were isolated, the variation within each population was truncated and resulted in static speciation even though they are all of the same created kind. The point is, that the speciation did not occur through random mutations (which is what both micro- and macro-evolution assert). Organisms don't adapt and change through a gain of information, they simply lose the ability create varied offspring and so only one possible trait becomes expressed.
 

If death came before sin, Wretched, then it does negate the work of Christ. That's why the Gap Theory is a problem. Also, while I agree that we don't have full understanding on everything (maybe not much!), there is more to the Christian life than just reproducing. We are also to disciple, and grow up to the 'full stature' of believers, to become those that eat meat and not just milk. Believers that do not grow in such a manner are easily swayed by false and harmful doctrines - so it is important to discuss things like this and come to a level of understanding.

Which is also why I've always rejected Scofield and his Bible.
It's amazing even among Fundamentalists how many believe in some form of a gap theory and how many promote those who believe such (even if they themselves don't believe it). Talk about a little leaven!

Salyan is entirely correct.
All of the different Gap Theories are totally doctrnally incorrect. The twisting of 2 Peter 3:3-7 to fit the Gap theory is a blot, a shame, and a reproach on fundamentalism. 2 Peter 3:3-7 is a direct reference to the flood of Noah's day and not to anything else.
To say that Genesis 1:1 is a reference to the, Original  creation is very close to heretical. Please forgive me for saying this, but, your interpretation of Genesis 1:14-17 and Job 22 are not correct.
I have known about James Knox for some time and due to the Gap Theory I have not gotten involved with his ministry nor do I apporve of it. He is a good man in almost all other respects, but the Gap theory, and the false interpretation of Genesis 1:1, 2 Peter 3;3-7, Job 22, etc... by these Gap theorists is heretical.

John81,
You are correct. Scofield's note on Genesis 1:1 and 2,  (note 2 and 3), and his private, heretical, senseless, interpretation is a blot on his otherwise, for the most part, good references. If you read the notes carefully he brings out the Gap Theory  by his own private interpretation of Jeremiah 4:23-26 and Isaiah 24:1 and 45. It is a sad day in fundamentalism when otherwise good men bring out heretical doctrine.
Alan
Brethren,
I am not going to continue debating the merits of Pastor Knox and the Gap Theory. The Gap Theory has already been hashed out pretty good in previous threads on OnLine Baptist and I do not have the inclination to continue.
I have a very good personal friend (a couple) at Bro. Knox's Church (Bible Baptist Church, Deland, Florida), and, except for his Gap theory teachings, I respect Pastor Knox and his ministry. The only reason I even responded, briefly, to this thread is because of the Gap Theory issue. To me it is a doctrinal issue.

The problem is that the Gap theory is not just a misunderstanding of creation history. It places death before sin, and by doing so contradicts God's statement of history (i.e. calls God a liar) and completely distorts redemption. Christ is our Kinsman-Redeemer. He was born a man so, being man, He could take our place. Why? Because by man came sin (and death). The Gap theory states that death existed before sin. If death existed before sin, then death is not the punishment for sin. If there is no punishment for sin, there is no need for a Redeemer. It just completely messes up everything that God says is so. Let God be true, and every man a liar.

1 Corinthians 15:21-22 -  For since by man came death, by man came also the resurrection of the dead. For as in Adam all die, even so in Christ shall all be made alive.
Romans 15:12-19 - Wherefore, as by one man sin entered into the world, and death by sin; and so death passed upon all men, for that all have sinned: (For until the law sin was in the world: but sin is not imputed when there is no law. Nevertheless death reigned from Adam to Moses, even over them that had not sinned after the similitude of Adam's transgression, who is the figure of him that was to come. But not as the offence, so also is the free gift. For if through the offence of one many be dead, much more the grace of God, and the gift by grace, which is by one man, Jesus Christ, hath abounded unto many. And not as it was by one that sinned, so is the gift: for the judgment was by one to condemnation, but the free gift is of many offences unto justification. For if by one man's offence death reigned by one; much more they which receive abundance of grace and of the gift of righteousness shall reign in life by one, Jesus Christ.) Therefore as by the offence of one judgment came upon all men to condemnation; even so by the righteousness of one the free gift came upon all men unto justification of life. For as by one man's disobedience many were made sinners, so by the obedience of one shall many be made righteous.

I'm with you on this one because it reveals an enormous amount about what they believe about the Bible in general and what takes authoritative precedence. After a proper understanding of the Gospel/Salvation/Jesus, Genesis is my next big test issue when examining a pastor and/or church. If they compromise there, it shows that they allow something other than Scripture to be the final authority and it undermines their ability to uphold the full force of the Gospel message. because it all goes back to Gen 1-11.

I'm with you on this one because it reveals an enormous amount about what they believe about the Bible in general and what takes authoritative precedence. After a proper understanding of the Gospel/Salvation/Jesus, Genesis is my next big test issue when examining a pastor and/or church. If they compromise there, it shows that they allow something other than Scripture to be the final authority and it undermines their ability to uphold the full force of the Gospel message. because it all goes back to Gen 1-11.

I know it's not right but I just can't. For me there are just deal breakers and genesis is one of them. Sent from my Passport using Tapatalk

I suppose you would have an issue with Paul, Priscilla and Aquila taking important time out of the work to waste their time making foolish tents. Tents are pretty worldly.   And Jesus, well, how dare He waste the entire first thirty years of his life in such a worldly wicked job as a carpenter!
There is nothing in the Bible that tells us that the life of a believer must have absolutely nothing else in it. We have not been called out of the world, just not to be a part of the world. That means we should have some sort of ability to talk to them in a way they understand. Jesus, when He spoke to the lost, used stories and examples of worldly things of society. He even said to make unto yourselves friends of mammon. The idea we must reject every aspect of the world we live in is unbiblical and unrealistic, and honestly, I can't think of one story of anyone falling into sin and debauchery...or crossdressing, for that matter, from watching Bugs Bunny. 
As for my goats, actually, I have learned a lot about being a pastor from raising sheep and goats-the Bible speaks a lot about them, but I never fully understood it and was able to apply it until I raised them. So don't disrespect the sheep and the goats, for of such are you, my dear fellow-sheep.