Re: [asa] The apostle warns of evolution

If one wants to try to clarify scripture with scripture, and believes that the epistle of Jude was written after 2 Peter, then the "scoffers" are identified in Jude as those "godless men", "following mere natural instincts", and who "do not have the Spirit" And that they have already "slipped in among" ... "those who have been called, who are loved by God the Father and kept by Jesus Christ."

In other words, the "scoffers" referred to by Peter, were present in 68AD give or take a year or two.
  ----- Original Message -----
  From: David Opderbeck
  To: burgytwo@juno.com
  Cc: asa@calvin.edu
  Sent: Sunday, September 03, 2006 2:30 PM
  Subject: Re: [asa] The apostle warns of evolution

  Incredible. The really pernicious thing about this is that it contains a grain of truth. Peter does refer here to philosophies that make God (or the gods) aloof or unable / unwilling to intervene in the creation and particularly in the affairs of humans. These "scoffers" derided the Christian community's hope that Christ would return, judge unbelief, and establish his kingdom. I wonder if Peter is responding here to Hellenists or secular Romans who understood Roman society and government to be something that would forever endure? Peter contrasts this with the God who intervened at the Noahic Flood and who will again intervene decisively at the second coming of Christ.

  Materialist philosophy says something similar, although the laws of nature are substituted for Roman rule, and the teleology is universal heat death or something along those lines. But the underlying lie is the same: the universe will continue on as they always have, so don't expect (or fear) that God ever will or could intervene.

  That's the grain of truth. The horrid thing AIG does with this is to tie these false teleologies -- the triumph of Roman rule, or the grim march of materialism -- to the historic Christian understanding of natural laws. Christians historically have held that natural laws are regular and discernible because they reflect God's unchanging rational nature. When we see change in nature, that change occurs according to regular natural laws. Obviously, Peter isn't rebuking anyone who believes God is a rational and orderly being or that the universe God created reflects God's rational and orderly character.

  So this "exegesis" of 2 Peter not only misses the point of the passage (and really the point of the whole letter), it also leads to a pagan understanding of God and the cosmos -- an arbitrary god who is unable to establish consistent rules for creation and a cosmos that is utterly beyond rational comprehension, rather than a sovereign creator whose works reflect his orderly nature but who remains free to act decisively in history.
   
  On 9/3/06, burgytwo@juno.com <burgytwo@juno.com> wrote:
    From that paragon of rational thinking, AIG, come this admonition
    this week:

    Q: Did the Apostle Peter warn about evolution?

    A: Most of us think that evolution was an idea started by Darwin
    around 150 years ago. So how could Peter have warned us about
    evolution nearly 2,000 years ago?

    Well, first of all, Darwin didn't come up with the idea of evolution—
    he just popularized a particular version of it.

    In 2 Peter 3, Peter warns us that in the last days, "scoffers" will
    come, saying that all things continue as they did from the beginning
    of creation. Evolutionists teach this when they say that the
    processes of nature have virtually been the same from the supposed
    beginning billions of years ago.

    An excellent example to illustrate this can be found when you visit
    the Grand Canyon. The park rangers will tell you that the layers of
    rock in the Canyon are the result of slow processes that have been
    going on for millions of years.

    But the evidence from the rock layers fits with what the Bible tells
    us concerning the judgment of the Flood. It is obvious these layers
    were laid down catastrophically, not slowly. But evolutionists
    deliberately choose to ignore the obvious—why? They have been blinded
    by the god of this world and don't want to submit to the God of the
    Bible!

    Burgy

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Received on Sun Sep 3 20:25:50 2006