Rinsen, I do not reject out of hand the geological time scale. I merely question it. There are instances where dating of certain rocks and layers has huge ranges, and where dating is revamped to suit the fossils contained in the layers. I am not a conspiracist, but I have seen the impact of group think.
You said, "we are faced with a God who assembles creatures "as if" they shared the same genetic script but actually, they don't. This is supposed to be an explanation? Just like the various fossil strata appear to be extremely old, and predictably laid down in layers going from more simple to more complex "
Actually creatures do share genetic building blocks, yes. I did not say that they do not share the same genetic script in various parts. They obviously have some similarities and some differences. If they did not have differences they would be the same species, or even identical twins, etc.. What I did say was that these similarities in dissimilar organisms by themselves do not prove inheritance of origin. They may demonstrate a similarity of planning and design.
It is also interesting when looking at genome size, that some fish and amoeba and some plants have a much larger genome than mammals (homosapiens). While other plants, bacteria, insects, and some fish have a smaller genome than homosapiens. For example one measured amoeba genome was 670Gb in size, one fish genome was 130Gb in size, two plant genomes were about 130Gb in size, and the human genome is 3.2 Gb in size. Some bacterium had a genome three times as large as the human genome, while others were much smaller or similar to human genome in size. From a genetic perspective, I'm not sure how that supports the simpler organism vs more complex organism theory.
The fact that some fossil layers are old.... but what is old? Is a thousand years old? Is ten thousand years old? Once a fossil layer is formed it does not visually look older. Neither do the fossils. So they are determined old because of fossils of strange animals we do not see anymore today, and because of radioactive dating.... but radio active dating is based on assumptions about parent rock materials. When carbon material is still discovered in rocks supposedly millions or hundreds of millions of years old, then the carbon dating method is deemed invalid for that rock layer, but.... the carbon 14 is still there in amounts much larger than it should be. When volcanic rocks less than ten years old are measured by Kr-AR methods to be millions of years old, then the method is deemed invalid, because the rocks are obviously too young to be measured.... but why does the method then not date them as young, instead of old? How can we prove the assumptions for radio-active dating are actually right, outside of the previous preconceptions about the age of the rocks.
It is interesting that fossils in the rock layers are generally also sequenced by size to some extent.
When we have fossils that transect layers of rock that are "dated" as millions of years difference between layers, then how do we justify or explain the existence or survival of these fossils (half exposed and half buried) during the layering process?
You also said, " The theory of evolution had NOTHING whatsoever to do with the findings of carban dating ..." Well, you are partly right. Without carbon dating, the theory of evolution was still orginally postulated. But the theory of evolution had difficulty with shorter time frames of time, since mathematically the probability of evolutionary processes based on what we see today, required ever increasing amounts of time. The radio-active dating methods began to give validity to these longer time periods. But, the radio-active dating methods were based on certain assumptions about uniformitarianism for earth processes. For example, one assumption is consistency in the rate of formation of C14 in the upper atmosphere over time.
You might find it oddly liberating if you were to really examine all the fundamental assertions of the E theory.
I assume you believe at least some of scripture. How do you decide when your perception of observable facts trumps scripture? How do you know that your interpretation of observable facts is correct? Would your observation of observable facts lead you to deny that Elijah, Elisha, Jesus and Peter raised someone from the dead? Would it lead you to deny that Elijah's prayer for three years drought was answered; was it going to happen anyway? Would it lead you to deny that Jesus made the lame walk, the blind to see, and deaf to hear?
Norm, I don’t think Magaret misrepresented anything about evolution. She has impaled herself on nothing. You seem to join with a common claim that evolution is misrepresented as if to say, “you don’t really understand it”, particularly when an anti-evolutionist makes a strong position. The fact is that for the present theory of evolution, random processes are foundational, along with natural selection and adaptations. It is by calculating apparently random processes that probabilities are derived and probable ages are attributed to various processes and to various turning points in the process. Furthermore, the idea of virtually unlimited time for these random processes to occur is also a foundational requirement for evolutionary theory to work. This is no misrepresentation at all. Whether Darwin was personally a nihilist or not is irrelevant to this. I note you did not state what in particular was misleading about it, nor did you summarize a contrary position.
If you think she is inaccurate, then do you think the processes are not random; that they are directed, and therefore the use of random probabilities are not appropriate? Do you think then that time is not an agent of creation, or a necessary requirement? Do you think nature does not point to random processes? And do you think that mainstream evolutionists would agree with you?
You make a comment about her bravado; I say she is entitled to her perspective, and it is really irrelevant to the validity of the theory. However, in what I have seen, it appears to be true that creationists often make undeniable and incontrovertible points and arguments about the science involved in “proving” or supporting this theory. Yes, often creationists do "win" the debates.
Todd Wood did not say that evidence for evolutionary theory have outstripped accumulations for creation science. What he said was that he felt there was a certain amount of evidence for evolutionary types of things happening, such as allele frequency changes, evidence of speciation, and universal common ancestry. But he felt there was another explanation for the evidence of common ancestry. So, evidence is just evidence. What is in dispute is what the evidence tells us, and how we understand the evidence. And Todd does not accept a universal common genetic ancestry.
Norman, Margaret is completely right that if all material is presented with only one particular view, then children will be influenced by it. Therefore her comment is completely valid that laymen and children need answers, and need them explained and described in such a way that they can counter the prevailing undesireable way. I don’t think evolutionists go out of their way to hide their publications, or to advocate that no one buy them, or publish them in shoddy inferior ways. There is no reason why creationist scientists need to apologize for promotion of their materials either.
Wendy, I think to a large degree, we have already acknowledged that we probably won't know for sure all the details until heaven. If God wants to tell us. But human curiousity doesn't stop. We may not know exactly what Moses was thinking when he crossed the Red Sea, or when he couldn't enter the promised land, or what the people of Israel did while wandering in the desert for forty years, or what Methusaleh said to Noah. But if information comes that helps us to understand, we seem to appreciate it....
Examining the possibilities of whether the universe has a center or not, or is expanding or has expanded, or whether real time can change in different locations, or the impacts of the "red shift", are very interesting to some people. For other people, it is not interesting at all. But if we look at the world and the universe as a revelation of who God is, then discovering how some of these things work is part of discovering how God works, and how we relate to God. For example, the fact that the solar system is not geo-centric says something about our place in the universe, that we must rely on something other than ourselves for our physical existence. God sends us those messages in various ways, including how he created everything.
It's a bit like studying Greek or Hebrew in order to study scripture better. Is it really necessary? Does it really make much of a difference? Isn't the english translation good enough to get by? Well yes, but.....
Problem is when someone proposes a genesis that excludes God and contradicts scripture, and wants christians to buy into it; perhaps we could regard that the same way we regard theft, or abuse, or atheism, or neglect, or pornography, or materialism, or marxism, or ..... Should we then just cover our eyes and ears and ignore it?
The commentator, Anthony Furley, stated that it was more important to find out what people believed, than what their faith said they were supposed to believe. I wonder if this would also apply to Christians, and in particular, members of our denomination.
Maybe John K, the reason the issue is not raised, is that there is no prohibition against caring for needy children. Maybe the issue is not raised because at least in Canada, health care is already available to all, including the children of single mothers. In addition, many pro-life people do not feel hindered in fostering, adopting, etc. In our small church of less than 100 souls, we have 14 adopted children, and support a mission project in Kenya which builds a school for orphans. Many pro-life people have set up homes or assistance for single mothers-to-be. Families usually support single teen moms within their family; while this sometimes sends mixed messages about appropriateness of "being" a single mother, it also confirms the value of unborn new life.
In the context you are indicating, I wonder if perhaps the biggest benefit of the confessions, is to use them as a way of teaching about scripture. In other words, the confessions are really about scripture; they do not exist unto themselves. Often we seem to go the other way around, to use scripture as a way of justifying or defending the confessions; many people would want to bypass this approach, since ultimately the confessions themselves are not the issue. They want to get directly to what scripture says about God, about Jesus, and about their relationship to God. The confessions help in this, but are not an end in themselves.
What does it mean to be prophetic in our current culture? I think of prophets like Nathan who spoke to King David, Elijah who spoke to Ahab, Jeremiah who spoke to Israel, John the Baptist who was beheaded. Maybe Stephen was also a prophet before he was stoned to death. Generally their messages were unpopular, although sometimes, like John the Baptist, they gathered large crowds before they were put in prison. But the essence of their prophecy was that they spoke the word of the Lord, and brought people to repentance, and back to God.
Do you remember the story of the prophet who was deceived by another prophet, and yet was held responsible for his disobedience, and died as a result? Prophecy does not guarantee perfection, and prophetic position does not guarantee purity or a prophetic word in all cases.
In general, the significance of prophecy was that it countered the prevailing notions of the day, and yet was found to be true. It was often unpopular because it stressed the supremacy of God at the expense of the popular opinions and current authorities. The prophets stressed that Israel and Judah would suffer severely and be decimated because of the actions of most of the Israelites and Judaites and their kings in worshipping false gods on the high places. John the Revelator prophecied first about several churches in terms of warnings and encouragements, as well as proclaiming the promised future of God's kingdom.
I have difficulty calling someone a prophet when they merely follow the conventional and popular wisdom of the day. A true prophet was a leader, not a follower. Except for being a follower of God, of Christ, of His Word.
What comes to mind is the difference between several prophets. Nathan convinces king David of his need to repent. Elijah prays for, or prophecies three years of drought, then prays for rain, after slaughtering 400 men (also called prophets, but false prophets). Jeremiah only prophecies doom and destruction, is cast into a well, imprisoned, but proven that his word is true. Jonah the reluctant prophet, needed to be taught as much as the people of Nineveh did.
Prophecy is not equivalent to earthly, nor even an institutional church type of authority. We did not hear often of priests (institutional church) being called prophets, other than possibly Ezra. Perhaps it is not an office conferred by men, nor even validated by men, but rather directly by God.
Following is the link to the article written by John Cotter. The article is actually found in several media outlets, particularly Vancouver Sun and other B.C. papers.
So what is a Christian's perspective on caring for creation? First, I would say that creation by its very name honors God as the creator. Second, Creation is not an accident, but has a purpose. Third, people were created to have a relationship with the rest of creation, in a very special way. It is a gift to us to be able to live in it, to enjoy it, to use it. As such, a gift given by God should be treated as a gift. This gift is also the means by which God provides us our daily life. Rejecting or mistreating creation is a way of rejecting the life God has given us on this globe. Fourth, we should not honor this creation for its own sake, nor worship it, nor assume that God gave us a weak, cheap, vulnerable world, or an inadequate world to live in. We can see that this world continues to provide amazing resources as our eyes continue to open when we live in it. We can see that we are pretty small compared to the amazing things that happen in this world, whether it is snow covered mountains, huge icebergs, giant rivers, tsunamis, volcanoes, hurricanes and tornadoes. But we can also see that we have some impact on water quality, air quality, species habitat, diseases, weeds, resource extraction, and innovative ingenuity. The invention of the lightbulb, extraction of oil and shale gas, invention of computers, GPS, steam engines, petri dishes, anti-biotics, and plasma tvs are only a few examples of things that people in the past did not have nor understand, and it is likely that we will continue to discover and utilize things that are presently barely imagined. The gift of creation that God gave us, seems to be getting bigger and better all the time, and such a gift is not yet limited by our imagination. But denying it is a gift, by mistreating it, will reduce its potential.
Beyond this basic understanding, we then begin to debate some of the details.
Bev, "is it more eagerly desired..." is a pretty general question. How would we know? Desired by CRC headquarters? By pastors and preachers? By elders? By everyone else? by ourselves? Is it only individuals who can speak prophetically, or can the anomalous institution also speak prophetically?
This morning I was reading the story of Jehosophat and Ahab who were considering a battle (Chronicles). Ahab had 400 prophets telling him to go because they would be successful. (sounds like a consensus). Jehosophat heard them, but asked for a real prophet of God. Ahab said, yes, there was one prophet, but he was irritating, always giving him bad news, and he didn't really want him. They got this one real prophet Micaiah anyway, and guess what? he agreed with the 400! But, Ahab sensed his sarcasm, and shouted at him to not lie, but tell him the real truth! Irony of ironies!! Then Micaiah gave the real prophecy and said that the battle would not go well, and that Ahab would die. Well, did it make a difference? Did Ahab and Jehosophat listen? hardly. partly. They put Micaiah in prison on bread and water. They changed uniforms, and Ahab was disguised as a soldier instead of a king. An enemy soldier shot an arrow at a random Israelite soldier, not realizing it was Ahab king of Israel, and it pierced his body armor and killed him.
Well, doesn't it make you laugh and cry a bit? We want prophecy, but only if we like it? We want prophets, but only if they agree with us? We know the truth, but don't want to hear it?
Perhaps we ought to more eagerly desire God's will, more eagerly spend time in His Word, more eagerly spend time in prayer, and then true prophecy will be a "natural" God-given result?
(400 prophets who were wrong.... makes you think, doesn't it?)
Of course, those 400 prophets did not worship God. They were from Israel, not from Judah. They likely worshipped Baal and other gods. So maybe this doesn't apply to us? But even Jehosophat, a good king, worshipper of the one true God, didn't listen to Micaiah that day.
"1 When Jehoshaphat king of Judah returned safely to his palace in Jerusalem, 2 Jehu the seer, the son of Hanani, went out to meet him and said to the king, “Should you help the wicked and love those who hate the Lord? Because of this, the wrath of the Lord is upon you. 3 There is, however, some good in you, for you have rid the land of the Asherah poles and have set your heart on seeking God. " II Chronicles 19.
Steve, I appreciate the attempt by Christians to apply Christian principles to all of life, to all activities we engage in. Good motives.
But as Christians, we are as susceptible as anyone to simply following non-Christian agendas and cloaking it with Christian icing on the cake. That is where we need to be discerning.
In this case, you mentioned “ecology, climate, economic expansion and resource development, solidarity with Indigenous peoples, appropriate democratic and environmental review process” and kind of lumped them together as justification for churches being involved. Then you suggest that speaking on these issues relative to the pipeline does not make you an expert. You suggest that the church is merely applying theology to the real world. And that if this does not inpsire action, then you suggest there is no value to faith in God, especially to a reformed faith.
You have raised a lot of issues, and so I will respond only in brief to some of them. First, the importance and value of our faith in God is much larger than our response to a pipeline. Further, how do you distinguish the christian response, from the Sierra Club response? Does the Sierra Club or greenpeace response thereby automatically make them Christians too?
I have conversations with some aboriginals occasionally, and in the case of the pipelines it seems that there is a divergence of views with aboriginals. In many cases, they get manipulated by extreme environmentalists, and have an eye on the possibility of compensation (we won’t call it bribes), as well as possible work. Yes ecology is important to aboriginals as it is to all of us, but their primary concern is usually housing and food, and potential economic benefits.
Aboriginals on reserves presently don’t pay income tax nor property tax while on the reserves, unless they work off the reserves. They have a multitude of national and provincial benefits at no cost. They feel they have a right to it, but it also takes them out of their ecology; this support from Canada means that they do not depend on the ecology for their living. Nor do most aboriginals interact with their ecology as they did four hundred years ago, not even as two hundred years ago. Most simply do not have the knowledge to survive in that environment. For that reason, they also depend on industry, modern machines and modern processing and retail, and on government dollars, for their living.
What makes Kairos or the united church or the crc church an expert on an appropriate environmental review process, as distinguished from unnecessary and costly duplication of regulations and inspections? How can a review process be democratic; doesn’t that remove the science and objectivity from it?
What does Kairos know about the quality of pipelines being built today, compared to pipelines built fifty years ago? Does Kairos know there is already an oil pipeline to Vancouver, B.C.? Does Kairos know there are already pipelines to the West Coast for natural gas?
It seems to me that this issue is a political one, used as a pin-prick towards the larger issue of whether we should use fossil fuels at all for our daily life. That larger issue will not be solved by fighting a pipeline or making a pipeline more costly.
When Christians become overly involved in these issues under the banner of christianity and church, they run the risk of being manipulated by the opponents in the larger discussion. They might be manipulated by the environmentalists who have the agenda of raising funds to fight the big corporations. They might be manipulated or “used” by the environmentalists who are being used by certain oil refinery companies to delay or hinder the export of oil to China, and thus retain a captive supply and lower price for Canadian oil in the USA. And christians also run the risk of having their main gospel neglected, both because of lack of focus, and because of the likelihood that they are wrong, or on the wrong side of an issue.
I agree the economy is not the only important thing to us. The environment, and the social aspect are also very important. But is finding the balance between environment, economy, and social goals, in the expertise of the institutional church? What happens when a church “speaks” for its members, and many members do not agree? Is that democratic? What if the church misleads its members due to its lack of balance and perspective and lack of expertise?
Posted in: Creation vs Evolution: Impact on Witness and Faith
Rinsen, I do not reject out of hand the geological time scale. I merely question it. There are instances where dating of certain rocks and layers has huge ranges, and where dating is revamped to suit the fossils contained in the layers. I am not a conspiracist, but I have seen the impact of group think.
You said, "we are faced with a God who assembles creatures "as if" they shared the same genetic script but actually, they don't. This is supposed to be an explanation? Just like the various fossil strata appear to be extremely old, and predictably laid down in layers going from more simple to more complex "
Actually creatures do share genetic building blocks, yes. I did not say that they do not share the same genetic script in various parts. They obviously have some similarities and some differences. If they did not have differences they would be the same species, or even identical twins, etc.. What I did say was that these similarities in dissimilar organisms by themselves do not prove inheritance of origin. They may demonstrate a similarity of planning and design.
It is also interesting when looking at genome size, that some fish and amoeba and some plants have a much larger genome than mammals (homosapiens). While other plants, bacteria, insects, and some fish have a smaller genome than homosapiens. For example one measured amoeba genome was 670Gb in size, one fish genome was 130Gb in size, two plant genomes were about 130Gb in size, and the human genome is 3.2 Gb in size. Some bacterium had a genome three times as large as the human genome, while others were much smaller or similar to human genome in size. From a genetic perspective, I'm not sure how that supports the simpler organism vs more complex organism theory.
The fact that some fossil layers are old.... but what is old? Is a thousand years old? Is ten thousand years old? Once a fossil layer is formed it does not visually look older. Neither do the fossils. So they are determined old because of fossils of strange animals we do not see anymore today, and because of radioactive dating.... but radio active dating is based on assumptions about parent rock materials. When carbon material is still discovered in rocks supposedly millions or hundreds of millions of years old, then the carbon dating method is deemed invalid for that rock layer, but.... the carbon 14 is still there in amounts much larger than it should be. When volcanic rocks less than ten years old are measured by Kr-AR methods to be millions of years old, then the method is deemed invalid, because the rocks are obviously too young to be measured.... but why does the method then not date them as young, instead of old? How can we prove the assumptions for radio-active dating are actually right, outside of the previous preconceptions about the age of the rocks.
It is interesting that fossils in the rock layers are generally also sequenced by size to some extent.
When we have fossils that transect layers of rock that are "dated" as millions of years difference between layers, then how do we justify or explain the existence or survival of these fossils (half exposed and half buried) during the layering process?
You also said, " The theory of evolution had NOTHING whatsoever to do with the findings of carban dating ..." Well, you are partly right. Without carbon dating, the theory of evolution was still orginally postulated. But the theory of evolution had difficulty with shorter time frames of time, since mathematically the probability of evolutionary processes based on what we see today, required ever increasing amounts of time. The radio-active dating methods began to give validity to these longer time periods. But, the radio-active dating methods were based on certain assumptions about uniformitarianism for earth processes. For example, one assumption is consistency in the rate of formation of C14 in the upper atmosphere over time.
You might find it oddly liberating if you were to really examine all the fundamental assertions of the E theory.
I assume you believe at least some of scripture. How do you decide when your perception of observable facts trumps scripture? How do you know that your interpretation of observable facts is correct? Would your observation of observable facts lead you to deny that Elijah, Elisha, Jesus and Peter raised someone from the dead? Would it lead you to deny that Elijah's prayer for three years drought was answered; was it going to happen anyway? Would it lead you to deny that Jesus made the lame walk, the blind to see, and deaf to hear?
Posted in: Creation vs Evolution: Impact on Witness and Faith
Norm, I don’t think Magaret misrepresented anything about evolution. She has impaled herself on nothing. You seem to join with a common claim that evolution is misrepresented as if to say, “you don’t really understand it”, particularly when an anti-evolutionist makes a strong position. The fact is that for the present theory of evolution, random processes are foundational, along with natural selection and adaptations. It is by calculating apparently random processes that probabilities are derived and probable ages are attributed to various processes and to various turning points in the process. Furthermore, the idea of virtually unlimited time for these random processes to occur is also a foundational requirement for evolutionary theory to work. This is no misrepresentation at all. Whether Darwin was personally a nihilist or not is irrelevant to this. I note you did not state what in particular was misleading about it, nor did you summarize a contrary position.
If you think she is inaccurate, then do you think the processes are not random; that they are directed, and therefore the use of random probabilities are not appropriate? Do you think then that time is not an agent of creation, or a necessary requirement? Do you think nature does not point to random processes? And do you think that mainstream evolutionists would agree with you?
You make a comment about her bravado; I say she is entitled to her perspective, and it is really irrelevant to the validity of the theory. However, in what I have seen, it appears to be true that creationists often make undeniable and incontrovertible points and arguments about the science involved in “proving” or supporting this theory. Yes, often creationists do "win" the debates.
Todd Wood did not say that evidence for evolutionary theory have outstripped accumulations for creation science. What he said was that he felt there was a certain amount of evidence for evolutionary types of things happening, such as allele frequency changes, evidence of speciation, and universal common ancestry. But he felt there was another explanation for the evidence of common ancestry. So, evidence is just evidence. What is in dispute is what the evidence tells us, and how we understand the evidence. And Todd does not accept a universal common genetic ancestry.
Norman, Margaret is completely right that if all material is presented with only one particular view, then children will be influenced by it. Therefore her comment is completely valid that laymen and children need answers, and need them explained and described in such a way that they can counter the prevailing undesireable way. I don’t think evolutionists go out of their way to hide their publications, or to advocate that no one buy them, or publish them in shoddy inferior ways. There is no reason why creationist scientists need to apologize for promotion of their materials either.
John z
Posted in: Creation vs Evolution: Impact on Witness and Faith
Wendy, I think to a large degree, we have already acknowledged that we probably won't know for sure all the details until heaven. If God wants to tell us. But human curiousity doesn't stop. We may not know exactly what Moses was thinking when he crossed the Red Sea, or when he couldn't enter the promised land, or what the people of Israel did while wandering in the desert for forty years, or what Methusaleh said to Noah. But if information comes that helps us to understand, we seem to appreciate it....
Examining the possibilities of whether the universe has a center or not, or is expanding or has expanded, or whether real time can change in different locations, or the impacts of the "red shift", are very interesting to some people. For other people, it is not interesting at all. But if we look at the world and the universe as a revelation of who God is, then discovering how some of these things work is part of discovering how God works, and how we relate to God. For example, the fact that the solar system is not geo-centric says something about our place in the universe, that we must rely on something other than ourselves for our physical existence. God sends us those messages in various ways, including how he created everything.
It's a bit like studying Greek or Hebrew in order to study scripture better. Is it really necessary? Does it really make much of a difference? Isn't the english translation good enough to get by? Well yes, but.....
Problem is when someone proposes a genesis that excludes God and contradicts scripture, and wants christians to buy into it; perhaps we could regard that the same way we regard theft, or abuse, or atheism, or neglect, or pornography, or materialism, or marxism, or ..... Should we then just cover our eyes and ears and ignore it?
Posted in: What Is the Real Impact of Muslim Relations?
The commentator, Anthony Furley, stated that it was more important to find out what people believed, than what their faith said they were supposed to believe. I wonder if this would also apply to Christians, and in particular, members of our denomination.
Posted in: The Church's Response to Abortion
Maybe John K, the reason the issue is not raised, is that there is no prohibition against caring for needy children. Maybe the issue is not raised because at least in Canada, health care is already available to all, including the children of single mothers. In addition, many pro-life people do not feel hindered in fostering, adopting, etc. In our small church of less than 100 souls, we have 14 adopted children, and support a mission project in Kenya which builds a school for orphans. Many pro-life people have set up homes or assistance for single mothers-to-be. Families usually support single teen moms within their family; while this sometimes sends mixed messages about appropriateness of "being" a single mother, it also confirms the value of unborn new life.
Posted in: Young, Restless, Reformed, and ... Disgruntled?
In the context you are indicating, I wonder if perhaps the biggest benefit of the confessions, is to use them as a way of teaching about scripture. In other words, the confessions are really about scripture; they do not exist unto themselves. Often we seem to go the other way around, to use scripture as a way of justifying or defending the confessions; many people would want to bypass this approach, since ultimately the confessions themselves are not the issue. They want to get directly to what scripture says about God, about Jesus, and about their relationship to God. The confessions help in this, but are not an end in themselves.
Posted in: So What Is "Prophetic"?
What does it mean to be prophetic in our current culture? I think of prophets like Nathan who spoke to King David, Elijah who spoke to Ahab, Jeremiah who spoke to Israel, John the Baptist who was beheaded. Maybe Stephen was also a prophet before he was stoned to death. Generally their messages were unpopular, although sometimes, like John the Baptist, they gathered large crowds before they were put in prison. But the essence of their prophecy was that they spoke the word of the Lord, and brought people to repentance, and back to God.
Do you remember the story of the prophet who was deceived by another prophet, and yet was held responsible for his disobedience, and died as a result? Prophecy does not guarantee perfection, and prophetic position does not guarantee purity or a prophetic word in all cases.
In general, the significance of prophecy was that it countered the prevailing notions of the day, and yet was found to be true. It was often unpopular because it stressed the supremacy of God at the expense of the popular opinions and current authorities. The prophets stressed that Israel and Judah would suffer severely and be decimated because of the actions of most of the Israelites and Judaites and their kings in worshipping false gods on the high places. John the Revelator prophecied first about several churches in terms of warnings and encouragements, as well as proclaiming the promised future of God's kingdom.
I have difficulty calling someone a prophet when they merely follow the conventional and popular wisdom of the day. A true prophet was a leader, not a follower. Except for being a follower of God, of Christ, of His Word.
Posted in: So What Is "Prophetic"?
What comes to mind is the difference between several prophets. Nathan convinces king David of his need to repent. Elijah prays for, or prophecies three years of drought, then prays for rain, after slaughtering 400 men (also called prophets, but false prophets). Jeremiah only prophecies doom and destruction, is cast into a well, imprisoned, but proven that his word is true. Jonah the reluctant prophet, needed to be taught as much as the people of Nineveh did.
Prophecy is not equivalent to earthly, nor even an institutional church type of authority. We did not hear often of priests (institutional church) being called prophets, other than possibly Ezra. Perhaps it is not an office conferred by men, nor even validated by men, but rather directly by God.
Posted in: When Churches Start Becoming Experts on Pipelines, Does That Mean Oil Companies Can Become Experts on Theology?
Following is the link to the article written by John Cotter. The article is actually found in several media outlets, particularly Vancouver Sun and other B.C. papers.
http://www.globaltvcalgary.com/money/pulpits+and+the+pipeline+more+churches+speaking+out+on+northern+gateway+project/6442692223/story.html
Posted in: A Christian’s Perspective on Caring for Creation?
So what is a Christian's perspective on caring for creation? First, I would say that creation by its very name honors God as the creator. Second, Creation is not an accident, but has a purpose. Third, people were created to have a relationship with the rest of creation, in a very special way. It is a gift to us to be able to live in it, to enjoy it, to use it. As such, a gift given by God should be treated as a gift. This gift is also the means by which God provides us our daily life. Rejecting or mistreating creation is a way of rejecting the life God has given us on this globe. Fourth, we should not honor this creation for its own sake, nor worship it, nor assume that God gave us a weak, cheap, vulnerable world, or an inadequate world to live in. We can see that this world continues to provide amazing resources as our eyes continue to open when we live in it. We can see that we are pretty small compared to the amazing things that happen in this world, whether it is snow covered mountains, huge icebergs, giant rivers, tsunamis, volcanoes, hurricanes and tornadoes. But we can also see that we have some impact on water quality, air quality, species habitat, diseases, weeds, resource extraction, and innovative ingenuity. The invention of the lightbulb, extraction of oil and shale gas, invention of computers, GPS, steam engines, petri dishes, anti-biotics, and plasma tvs are only a few examples of things that people in the past did not have nor understand, and it is likely that we will continue to discover and utilize things that are presently barely imagined. The gift of creation that God gave us, seems to be getting bigger and better all the time, and such a gift is not yet limited by our imagination. But denying it is a gift, by mistreating it, will reduce its potential.
Beyond this basic understanding, we then begin to debate some of the details.
Posted in: So What Is "Prophetic"?
Bev, "is it more eagerly desired..." is a pretty general question. How would we know? Desired by CRC headquarters? By pastors and preachers? By elders? By everyone else? by ourselves? Is it only individuals who can speak prophetically, or can the anomalous institution also speak prophetically?
This morning I was reading the story of Jehosophat and Ahab who were considering a battle (Chronicles). Ahab had 400 prophets telling him to go because they would be successful. (sounds like a consensus). Jehosophat heard them, but asked for a real prophet of God. Ahab said, yes, there was one prophet, but he was irritating, always giving him bad news, and he didn't really want him. They got this one real prophet Micaiah anyway, and guess what? he agreed with the 400! But, Ahab sensed his sarcasm, and shouted at him to not lie, but tell him the real truth! Irony of ironies!! Then Micaiah gave the real prophecy and said that the battle would not go well, and that Ahab would die. Well, did it make a difference? Did Ahab and Jehosophat listen? hardly. partly. They put Micaiah in prison on bread and water. They changed uniforms, and Ahab was disguised as a soldier instead of a king. An enemy soldier shot an arrow at a random Israelite soldier, not realizing it was Ahab king of Israel, and it pierced his body armor and killed him.
Well, doesn't it make you laugh and cry a bit? We want prophecy, but only if we like it? We want prophets, but only if they agree with us? We know the truth, but don't want to hear it?
Perhaps we ought to more eagerly desire God's will, more eagerly spend time in His Word, more eagerly spend time in prayer, and then true prophecy will be a "natural" God-given result?
(400 prophets who were wrong.... makes you think, doesn't it?)
Of course, those 400 prophets did not worship God. They were from Israel, not from Judah. They likely worshipped Baal and other gods. So maybe this doesn't apply to us? But even Jehosophat, a good king, worshipper of the one true God, didn't listen to Micaiah that day.
"1 When Jehoshaphat king of Judah returned safely to his palace in Jerusalem, 2 Jehu the seer, the son of Hanani, went out to meet him and said to the king, “Should you help the wicked and love those who hate the Lord? Because of this, the wrath of the Lord is upon you. 3 There is, however, some good in you, for you have rid the land of the Asherah poles and have set your heart on seeking God. " II Chronicles 19.
Posted in: When Churches Start Becoming Experts on Pipelines, Does That Mean Oil Companies Can Become Experts on Theology?
Steve, I appreciate the attempt by Christians to apply Christian principles to all of life, to all activities we engage in. Good motives.
But as Christians, we are as susceptible as anyone to simply following non-Christian agendas and cloaking it with Christian icing on the cake. That is where we need to be discerning.
In this case, you mentioned “ecology, climate, economic expansion and resource development, solidarity with Indigenous peoples, appropriate democratic and environmental review process” and kind of lumped them together as justification for churches being involved. Then you suggest that speaking on these issues relative to the pipeline does not make you an expert. You suggest that the church is merely applying theology to the real world. And that if this does not inpsire action, then you suggest there is no value to faith in God, especially to a reformed faith.
You have raised a lot of issues, and so I will respond only in brief to some of them. First, the importance and value of our faith in God is much larger than our response to a pipeline. Further, how do you distinguish the christian response, from the Sierra Club response? Does the Sierra Club or greenpeace response thereby automatically make them Christians too?
I have conversations with some aboriginals occasionally, and in the case of the pipelines it seems that there is a divergence of views with aboriginals. In many cases, they get manipulated by extreme environmentalists, and have an eye on the possibility of compensation (we won’t call it bribes), as well as possible work. Yes ecology is important to aboriginals as it is to all of us, but their primary concern is usually housing and food, and potential economic benefits.
Aboriginals on reserves presently don’t pay income tax nor property tax while on the reserves, unless they work off the reserves. They have a multitude of national and provincial benefits at no cost. They feel they have a right to it, but it also takes them out of their ecology; this support from Canada means that they do not depend on the ecology for their living. Nor do most aboriginals interact with their ecology as they did four hundred years ago, not even as two hundred years ago. Most simply do not have the knowledge to survive in that environment. For that reason, they also depend on industry, modern machines and modern processing and retail, and on government dollars, for their living.
What makes Kairos or the united church or the crc church an expert on an appropriate environmental review process, as distinguished from unnecessary and costly duplication of regulations and inspections? How can a review process be democratic; doesn’t that remove the science and objectivity from it?
What does Kairos know about the quality of pipelines being built today, compared to pipelines built fifty years ago? Does Kairos know there is already an oil pipeline to Vancouver, B.C.? Does Kairos know there are already pipelines to the West Coast for natural gas?
It seems to me that this issue is a political one, used as a pin-prick towards the larger issue of whether we should use fossil fuels at all for our daily life. That larger issue will not be solved by fighting a pipeline or making a pipeline more costly.
When Christians become overly involved in these issues under the banner of christianity and church, they run the risk of being manipulated by the opponents in the larger discussion. They might be manipulated by the environmentalists who have the agenda of raising funds to fight the big corporations. They might be manipulated or “used” by the environmentalists who are being used by certain oil refinery companies to delay or hinder the export of oil to China, and thus retain a captive supply and lower price for Canadian oil in the USA. And christians also run the risk of having their main gospel neglected, both because of lack of focus, and because of the likelihood that they are wrong, or on the wrong side of an issue.
I agree the economy is not the only important thing to us. The environment, and the social aspect are also very important. But is finding the balance between environment, economy, and social goals, in the expertise of the institutional church? What happens when a church “speaks” for its members, and many members do not agree? Is that democratic? What if the church misleads its members due to its lack of balance and perspective and lack of expertise?