We've Missed Out on Some Great Pauline Thoughts
Reading some passages like Phil. 4:1, Col. 2:1-5, and 1 Thess. 2, I wonder how I've missed passages like these before. In reading Paul, we (at least I) always skim through these in order to get to the "meat" - doctrines about things like justification, spiritual gifts, the Christian's experience with sin, the antichrist; as well as some pastoral advice on how to deal with certain situations, requirements for church leaders, etc.
But God (and Paul) don't separate these doctrines from the relationships that Paul had with his fellow workers and the people in the churches. The above passages are also Scripture.
Selective reading strikes again!!!
Creation & Evolution
Thanks to Kirk for teaching us about the young-earth view of creationism. I had known about it for some time but he really led us in a great class the past 3 weeks (I've only made 2).
Check out
www.icr.org. 6-day creationists are not stupid, they are not uneducated, and they are indeed scientists.
I'm no scientist, but I have a huge philosophical problem with evolution (actually I have many problems with it but this is the one I've been considering). I was thinking about the idea of natural selection. Of course, this is the process in nature by which the weaker animals die in some way, leaving the stronger animals to survive. A corollary term is "survival of the fittest." High school biology, right? The phrase "natural selection" states that this process is "natural" - that is, that it's what we normally find in nature. There is also an unspoken assumption that since it is a "natural" process, it is good, right, and normal. That somehow things will work out in the end, as long as the "natural" process is able to continue.
My wife's parents live on a pond. OK, it's a pond on a golf course. Anyway, the pond has ducks and the area around the golf course has coyotes. The coyotes sometimes eat the ducks. My mother in law gets sad about the eaten ducks. My father in law says "Oh, come on. That's just nature's way. They need to get eaten." In my father in law's attitude we find the above assumption, that since this is a "natural" process, it is good, right and normal. The weaker ducks get eaten.
No, I am not saying that we should be interfering in food chains everywhere in order to right the world. We can't do that anyway - we don't have the wisdom or power.
Yet, we find in the Scriptures that God tells His people to remember, regard, and care for the weak. "Blessed is he who has regard for the weak; the LORD delivers him in times of trouble" (Ps. 41:1); "We who are strong ought to bear with the failings of the weak and not to please ourselves" (Romans 15:1); "Defend the cause of the weak and fatherless; maintain the rights of the poor and oppressed. Rescue the weak and needy..." (Psalm 82:3-4a).
These and many other passages (orphans and widows passages, for example, in the Old & New Testaments) show quite plainly that God is not into natural selection, at least as far as human beings are concerned. It is not "natural" to Him at all.
We human beings know this. It is in our consciences (unless we have ignored them for so long that we can't hear them anymore). Why else would we nurse a sick animal back to health? Why fix a bird's broken wing? Why save a freezing, abandoned pet? Why do we, watching the Discovery channel, have pity for the one antelope who, because of a hurt leg, will be the lion's dinner tonight? Deep in our souls we know that natural selection, survival of the fittest, is a perversion of what
should be. It is a misrepresentation of God's nature, the God who loves every creature and did not form this world's creatures simply to watch them kill each other. My mother-in-law feels this love in her heart and knows that there is a true sadness involved with the death of the weak ducks. My father-in-law, I think, knows it but has forgotten it.
The environmentalists know this as well. Many don't believe in a God or in the Christian view of creation. Many would strongly uphold evolutionary theory as an origin for mankind. Then why do they work so hard to save creatures from extinction? In a truly natural-selection type of world, where mankind has risen to the top because of his intelligence and ability to create technology (abilities which arose by random mutations over a long period of time, according to evolution), then man should be able to do whatever he wants with other creatures. They are weaker. They cannot defend themselves against us. Yet that means that we are strong, we "deserve" to survive. We "deserve" to impose our (stronger) will on animals which are weaker than we are.
This is madness and the evolutionists know it. But this leaves them with a serious conundrum. If we are truly in a closed system, and evolution alone has produced mankind, then the logical result would be humanity's unchecked "right" to do what he wants to do with the rest of the (weaker) species. But the evolutionists intuitively know that there is a higher Law, a Law outside of this natural-selection world, a Law which tells us that we should not treat animals in this way. It is this Law that they want us to follow, and stop destroying other species. But where did this Law come from? Certainly not from the process itself. Oops.
Philosophically, then, natural selection stinks. It doesn't hold up logically. Of course, C.S. Lewis knew and wrote about this in his book
Miracles. You should read it sometime.
Radical New Blog
Just discovered a new blog that I really like.
www.sethbarnes.com. Check it out. He is a radically on-fire missions guy who has written a book on listening prayer. I'm sure I'll buy it and read it some time. Read his article titled: "Sports Are More Important Than Jesus." Of course he's being sarcastic. But so many parents make this mistake.
Great short interview
Here is a great interview with Eugene Peterson about various topics. It's short, but poignant.
Click
here for it.
He really has some insight into some of the American church's problems!
