Cliff wrote

Joe, that’s a very optimistic outlook. I hope you’re right. But I have found a high level of intransigence among conservative Christians which suggests to me a bloody culture war looming on the horizon. Many Christians have too much invested in their folk science to simply role over in the face of something so inconsequential as evidence!. Entire movements are founded upon special creationism, and young earth theories, against which the evidence has been lopsided for decades.

From my perspective — an atheist in a small community that’s having a serious brouhaha over the teaching of creationism in science classes — we’re in a culture war now. People are demonstrating on the public square (literally), crowding BOE meetings and heckling speakers, and, sadly, threatening other people on occasion. Middle school kids who are themselves Christians but not vocal enough to suit the mob were physically shoved against lockers and called atheists. It’s ugly and mean-spirited and it has the potential to rip the community apart.

Now, many Christians feel, that if the biblical flood story can’t be used as a scientific model to help 21st century scientists explain Earth’s geologic history, that this somehow undermines the authority of God’s Word. But that’s really only true if the Scriptures were intended to provide that level of technical detail in the first place. Certainly this wasn’t the case for questions of ancient geography (remember the antipodes controversy) or for questions of medieval cosmology (remember the Galileo controversy). So we must ask ourselves this: was answering questions of Earth’s geologic history something that would have concerned Moses or the ancient Hebrews? Is that why God gave us the flood account? Or could it be that we modern Christians are making the same mistake that medieval Christians made by failing to understand the nature of biblical inspiration and scope of biblical authority?

We’ll discuss this more in Lesson 15, but just think about this for a moment: when 21st century western Christians set aside the original ancient near-eastern concerns of the biblical authors and their immediate audiences, and replace them with our modern scientific concerns, we actually make ourselves the channel of biblical authority. In other words, we interpret Scripture based on what we think is important and what kinds of information we are interested in. But if God’s authority is communicated to us through human vessels who wrote to a particular people at a particular point in history, what right do we have to ask questions of the Scriptures that would have been of no concern those who originally received God’s Word? Is it possible that WE actually undermine the authority of God’s Word by placing demands on it that were of no concern to the original authors or their original audiences?

Now what about this idea that universe and the earth are really young, but God just created them to look old. In our next lesson, we’ll look at this in more detail.

The final Lesson (15) will be my take on inspiration and the ANE cosmological context of the “science” found within the pages of Scripture. That should wrap of the series quite nicely.

Ok, just so folks know, I’m commenting as a female who is currently living in the Bible belt. I’m surrounded by YEC and I’m pretty new these discussions. That said, I will go ahead boldly suggest that you ditch the ZERO and NONE buzzers. Your message is difficult for those who may be hearing it for the first time. The arguments speak for themselves, I see no need to affront a listener who may be carefully chewing on your message trying to unpack each word. It’s too jarring and feels out of place. I am reminded of Proverbs 15:1, use gentle words (and tactics) whenever possible.

One more thing to keep in mind, perhaps for the end of the series if its not already there. Many folks that are new to all of this will be left with strong emotions as they watch these videos. They may become defensive or incredulous or feel betrayed or confused or depressed. Your message can leave someone in the same crisis of faith that Morton faced. This is not a place to leave someone. Just an affirmation that this is hard stuff for those who have been in the YEC camp and some grounding back to the gospel would go a long way.

I though the end of is video finished strong, but when I read Stephen’s comments I had to agree that your final word on the flood is important. Here is an important place for solid theology- bring folks back to the sovereignty of God.

By the way, I am currently reading the book and enjoying your humor.

The background is spot on.

The buzzers were a bit harsh.

I agree with Stephen that you have to somehow not say that flood-belief is ridiculous. In which case, you have to get at the theology of Genesis and explain the meaning of these stories first, followed by the criticism of literal interpretations for anybody to really hear you. Unfortunately, that seems well beyond the scope of this series.

I actually like being able to read a wide variety of stuff, from astrophysics to molecular genetics, and repackage it for others in the context of a Christian worldview. That’s really all I do — plus dreaming up wacky analogies to drive the points home. As for making a living doing this… well, we’ll see about that.

And someday I do plan to go back and earn a PhD. People like Brian May and Tom are an inspiration to me in that regard. It’s never too late!

I have also marveled over Gordon’s grasp of these issues in light of the fact that his training is in engineering, and he mispronounces certain words (leading to the conclusion that he is very well read, but lacking in the formal academic training of the lecture hall. Gordon, I am in agreement with Stephen. I hope that with the help and input you are receiving here, you can keep honing your presentations and, at some point, find a much larger audience!

Joe,

Again, let me say, I hope you are right. But do you really think that good Calvary Chapel folk will reject YEC so long as Chuck Smith unequivocally endorses it as a major cornerstone of the whole movement?