On Tue, 12 Sep 1995 17:27:16 GMT you wrote:
[...]
DT>From a BIBLICAL PERSPECTIVE, two considerations stand out
>in my mind....
DT>(a) The Scriptures consistently refer to creation as a finished,
>completed act of God. (The TE position MUST eventually blur the
>distinction between creation and providence - but these are not
>blurred in the Scriptures).
Agreed. I have made this point and have received no satisfactory
answer. Gn 2:1-3 could not be more emphatic:
"Thus the heavens and the earth were FINISHED, and all the host of
them. And on the seventh day God ENDED HIS WORK which he had
made; and he RESTED on the seventh day from all his work which he had
made. And God blessed the seventh day, and sanctified it:
because that in it he had RESTED from ALL HIS WORK which God created
and made."
DT>(b) The proposed processes of evolutionary change (involving
>mutations and natural selection) invoke features which belong to
>the world subject to "bondage to decay". To associate such
>mechanisms with God's creative activity is to darken his
>character. It is effectively to say that God created a world
>which carries the consequences of Adam's sin - and even
>unbelievers find this thought unpalatable.
The "bondage to decay" of Rom 8:20, should not be overstated. It is
stated clearly in Gn 3:16-19 what this involved:
"To the woman he said, "I will greatly increase your pains in
childbearing; with pain you will give birth to children. Your desire
will be for your husband, and he will rule over you." To Adam he
said, "Because you listened to your wife and ate from the tree about
which I commanded you, 'You must not eat of it,' "Cursed is the ground
because of you; through painful toil you will eat of it all the days
of your life. It will produce thorns and thistles for you, and you
will eat the plants of the field. By the sweat of your brow you will
eat your food until you return to the ground, since from it you were
taken; for dust you are and to dust you will return."
The above seems to be summed up by a partial withdrawal of grace. It
could be seen as letting nature take its normal course, ie. as outside
the Garden. It implies that Eve would have experienced some pain in
childbirth, but now it would be "greatly increase(d)". There
already were "thorns and thistles" (otherwise Adam wouldn't have known
what they were), but now they would be not restrained. Adam would have
to "subdue" the earth (Gn 1:28), but without the fullness of God's
grace.
I see nothing in this that rules out "mutations and natural selection"
nor can I see how these would "darken his (God's) character" if He
used these natural mechanisms. They have unquestionably, through
micro-evolution, enhanced the beauty and variety of this fallen world.
God bless.
Stephen