In a message dated 4/6/99 you wrote:
<<One of the questions at issue is whether God, as the Creator (the giver of
being to the creation) achieved his intentions by: 1) giving being to a
creation gifted with all of the formational capabilities needed to actualize
the desired array of life forms in time, or 2) giving being to a creation not
equipped in that manner so that the actualization of at least a few desired
forms required occasional episodes of form-imposing action by God in the
course of the creation's formational history.
>>
I am gratified that you have softened your statement in 2) from what you have
previously written. Yet I continue to press you that it is not a question of
"a creation not equipped". Rather it is a question of how God reveals his
mode of operation with respect to creation. I illustrate my point with the
use of scriptural concept that you are familiar with, viz., "the fulness of
time", taken from Eph. 1:10. I, of course, am taking this phrase out of its
immediate context and applying it to the action of God with respect to
creational history. I suggest that God acted "in the fulness of time", that
is, when certain previous conditions had been fulfilled, to give being and
material embodiment to new advances and entities in creation that were not
present before.
For example, when the effects of the fine-tuning of the universe, and the
completion of the fitness of earth for the "form imposing action by God", the
fulness of time came for God to actualize the first forms of _life_. While
the preparation of the universe and earth for life on planet earth occurred
according to physical and chemical laws, something more is needed for the
emergence of life. Therein lies God's creative actualization.
A similar scenario can be described for the new level of organization,
complexity, and diversity that is found in the metazoan biota that appeared
in the Cambrian explosion. And once again in the fulness of time, the human
lineage appeared on earth, especially actualized in the persons of Adam and
Eve as head of corporate humanity.
Finally, in the fulness of time Christ came, as described in Eph. 1:9-10.
"For he has made known to us in all wisdom and insight the mystery of his
will, according to the purpose which he set forth in Christ, as a plan for
the fulness of time, to unite all things in him, things in heaven and things
on earth."
As I view cosmic history culminating in the person of Christ, it is a series
of accelerating episodes of God's creative actualizations, each occurring in
the fulness of time.
Respectfully,
Bob