>What sets apart The Bible apart from other books are the claims
>it makes and the ongoing proofs it provides every day throughout
>the world. If Jesus said 'I am the way the truth and the life,
>no one comes to the Father except through me' and that makes Him
>a relativist. So be it. I'll be one with Him. He made some
>pretty clear statements regarding Scriptures and their
>reliablity. His Apostles claimed to have a view that the
>truths depended on the message they were conveing. If that
>makes them adherents to relativism. So be it. I'm one with
>them.
>
>The difference between this type of Christian thought and the
>one from other religions, is that a true Christian has the
>ability to be a vessel of supernatural power to bless other
>humans; and they do daily worldwide. Like Peter, while he
>believed he walked on water, the moment he doubted he sank. But
>his Master was next to him to pull him up to safety. Later on,
>he learned to keep his faith and was able to bless multitudes
>and he did.
>The moment a man or woman thinks that 'I'm going to evangelize
>this person' he/she must resort to human reasoning and logic.
>This approach doesn't work and is anti-Scriptural. Furthermore,
>one will never accomplish a thing by walking up to somebody and
>declaring his faith as wrong or bad.
>Spirit led evangelism doen't need a human intellect to get in
>the middle. If I can convince somebody of this today, somebody
>else can convince otherwise tomorow.
So why does Peter say:
>
>Paul wrote regarding this 20 centuries ago:
>
>"...to preach the gospel, not with wisdom of words, lest the
>cross of Christ should be made of no effect. For the message of
>the cross is foolishness to those who are perishing, but to us
>who are being saved it is the power of God. For it is written:
>"I will destroy the wisdom of the wise, and bring to nothing the
>understanding of the prudent." Where is the wise? Where is the
>scribe? Where is the disputer of this age? Has not God made
>foolish the wisdom of this world? For since, in the wisdom of
>God, the world through wisdom did not know God, it pleased God
>through the foolishness of the message preached to save those
>who believe. For Jews request a sign, and Greeks seek after
>wisdom; but we preach Christ crucified, to the Jews a stumbling
>block and to the Greeks foolishness, but to those who are
>called, both Jews and Greeks, Christ the power of God and the
>wisdom of God."
>
>The power lies in the gospel not the ability to 'reason' the
>whole thing. After all in Christianity one must give to receive,
>become the lowest to be the highest, be the last to become the
>first, give it all up to receive it all and lastly die to live.
>
As Josh McDowell, says, the heart can not rejoice in what the
mind thinks is false.
>Again, we have estimates and assumptions at work. The reality
>is that as time goes by humans take over and reproduce rather
>quickly. The only thing that stops human growth are wars,
>epidemics or catastrophes.
>
>However, I do find it interesting that 80% of the Chinese
>population today, belong to 5 main families only. Imagine that
>800,000,000 from five couples in 5000 years.
>
I don't know where you got this but it is wrong. I have spent
time in China; I speak Mandarin and I did not find this to be the
case in all the people I met over there. So I called my Chinese
tutor who is from Wuhan, China and read him your statement. He
said that was not correct. His family name is the largest in the
world with 100 million people with that surname. His name is
Zhang. Considering that there are 1.3 billion Chinese 80% comes
to a little over a billion. If Zhang is the largest family name
with 100 million, at most the top five families could probably
represent 400 million people. And remember that most likely not
all of the Zhang's are related. All of the Smith's are not
related. Each town had one. Same with the Miller's etc.
>What does this have to do with proving a global flood? I don't
think the
>local flood was in Mesopotamia. I think a mesopotamian flood is
as
>observationally unsound as is a global flood.
> snip...
>All this provides is SUPPORT for an anthropologically universal
flood. It
>does not prove a global flood and does not even prove an
anthropologically
>universal flood.
>
Lets discard the Utnapishtim, Noah and the other 700 or so flood
accounts worldwide. Because after all, first hand account does
not count since they don't match the current model.
Wait a minute. Please try to understand what I am saying rather
than what you think I am saying or what you want to think I am
saying. The current model of the flood will not account for
anything in geology. If the current, young-earth, global flood
model is true, then geology has nothing to say about the flood.
Layer after vertical layer has footprints, plant roots, burrows
(filled in by the sediment from above which means that
sedimentation had to be interrupted long enough for the burrower
to make his burrow). If the current model is correct, then all
the animals should be down at the bottom of the geologic column.
Rates of sedimentation would require that they be buried there.
They aren't.
[snip]
>Please help me so I get this straight. The Biblical narrative
>is only of events that they could see. So if it there was a
>flood was only local.
One can certainly take that view of the flood account and not
violate the inspiration of it.
>>You can only hold this if you decide apriori that EARTH means
>>planeat earth not land. If we are going to hold this type of
>>view of Biblical words, then why do you not believe that the
>>entire UNIVERSE was filled with water? 2
>>Pet. 2:5 says the entire KOSMOS was destroyed. Why would you
>>not include Mars, Jupiter, Alpha Centauri and the Andromeda
>>galaxy in the destruction of the Flood? After all that is what
>>the Bible says.
>
The burden is on you to prove that twenty centuries ago when
'kosmos' was used it meant the entire universe. If we are going
to use ancient Greek and Aramaic in our exchange of ideas, at
least lets be honest and use the meaning of the word as it was
then, not now, to support a given point of view. The word meant
then, an orderly arrangement which implied the world.
Which is what the compilers of Greek linguistic texts do. They
look for the meaning of the word 20 centuries ago and put it in
their book. The experts are the ones who did this not me. I am
merely looking to see what they say. Thayer said that from
classical times on down the primary use of Kosmos was
universe/world order. If you want to argue this point at least
go look in a Greek Dictionary like I did.
> 'And spared not the old world <kosmos>, but saved Noah...'
>2Pet.2:5a
>
>>>The last point has to do with rain.According to Scripture,rain
>>>as we know it today didn't happen until after the flood. In
>>>Gen. 2:5 'for The Lord God had not sent rain on the earth and
>>>there was no man >to work the ground' Not until Noah do we
>>>find rain again Gen. 7:4. But the water that poured from
>>>heaven was no common storm. The Biblical description in
>>>Gen.7:11 'all the springs of the great deep burst forth, and
>>>the floodgates of heaven were open. And rain fell on the
>>>earth forty days and forty nights'.
>>>
>>This may not be what that verse says.
>
>I don't have any doubt you could come up with a whole different
>spin.
The idea of no rain is tied up with the vapor canopy which would
produce temperatures on earth's surface in excess of 700 degrees
fahrenheit. Let me ask you something. Are you aware that ICR is
knows that the vapor canopy would produce surface temperatures of
the earth that are too hot for life and yet they continue to
teach this?
"Morton(1979) was apparently the first to conclude that the
canopy would have made the earth's surface too hot for human
habitation (Kofahl did not calculate surface temperatures).
Morton made a number of assumptions that greatly simplified the
problem, and his surface temperatures are much higher than ours,
but the general conclusion is the same: Life as we know it would
not have been possible under a conopy of 1013 mb (1 atm), nor
even with a canopy of only 50 mb. When other features such as
clouds are added to the model, this conclusion could be modified
greatly, however. Preliminary explorations with cloud layers at
the top of the 50 mb canopy have shown significant radiation
effects which lower the surface temperature drastically.
Unfortunately, while the surface temperature decreases when
clouds are added, so does the temperature of the canopy, reducing
its stability."~David E. Rush and Larry Vardiman, "Pre-Flood
Vapor Canopy Radiative Temperature Profiles," in Robert E. Walsh,
and Christopher L. Brooks, Proceedings of the Second
International Conference on Creationism, (Pittsburgh: Creation
Science Fellowship, 1990), p. 238
[snip]
>Mr. Morton:
>
>I was trying to withold judgement in one thing, but not anymore.
>
>Gen. 2:6 reads 'but a mist went up from the earth and watered
>the whole face of the ground'.
>
>I will be a great benefit to learn to read more than a verse a
>time. Believe me.
How does the mist come up out of the ground? What is the physics
behind it? Do you care about the physics of this problem?
>>Lastly, we find that clouds aren't mentioned in the Bible until
after this
>>deluge takes place. And the clouds are associated with the
rainbow. The
>>symbol by which God establishes the Noahic covenant and
promises never to
>>use a flood to destroy all life on the planet.
>
>We don't find elephants mentioned either. Were there no
elephants before
>the Flood?
>
>And neither after the flood. In fact they are totally absent
>from The Bible along with the admiration for scientific
>findings.
>
>If one day you decide to take up some serious Bible study, maybe
>you could find the meaning of the first mention principle in
>Biblical hermeneutics.
If science is so repugnant to you why did you cite scientific
evidence in favor of your flood view? Why are you on a listserv
which discusses the relation of science with the scripture.
Would you advocate that we cease talking about science
altogether?
>>
>>I would disagree with you here. I believe in a historically
>>correct Biblical account of the Flood and I believe that the 6
>>days were 24 hour periods,
>
>I will love to read your explanation of 24 hours periods when
>the moon, the sun and the stars weren't created until the fourth
>day. But then again, maybe Genesis is wrong in this sequence
>too.
I told you how you could do it. It is on my web page at
http://www.isource.net/~grmorton/dmd.htm
or more directly try
http://www.isource.net/~grmorton/synop.htm
If you would really love to read my account, I would have thought
you would have availed of the opportunity.
>>I believe that the details of the Flood account were
>>correct.Noah
>>was on an ark for a year, only 8 humans survived. The entire
>>LAND was
>>flooded. What is it that I don't beleive? I don't believe your
>>>interpretation of 'eretz" as planet earth is the correct one.
>>While I may disagree with you, I do not disagree with the
>>Bible.
>
>How does 'all living things which were on the face of the
>ground; both men and cattle, creeping thing and bird of the air.
>They were destroyed from the earth.' rimes with only a local
>flood. How can the papagayos in central America died from a
>flood far away ?
They were destroyed by from the land not the earth. I would put
the flood way, way back in time... But then I am an evolutionist
an you won't like my explanation.
>I fail to see why the Bible, a book inspired by God, must force
>me to believe that what I see with my eyes in nature, is
>illusion. Surely God knew what was buried in the rocks prior to
>telling Moses what to write. If He didn't know, then He isn't
>God.
>
>
>Funny thing. I seen nature up close too (last time I lived in
>the Amazon was for 18 months back in the early 70s) and enjoy
>tremendously reading and taking advantage of the advances in
>science.
>
>I saw the Amazon river flood every year. And every year the
>river went down to its prior level without any large deposits of
>dirt left on top of the ground. There were no 6 feet or 6 mm of
>mud on top, nothing.
>
>Moreover, many homes are so close to the river that the first
>floor gets flooded every year. The owners always come back,
>sweep the floors with any broom to clear the wood and coat it
>with diesel fuel (to keep insects away) and back to normal.
If there was no mud, what were they sweeping away. Remember that
not everyplace along a river has to be covered to the same depth
etc. Not ever river carries the same sediment load. When I was
on the banks of the Yellow River in China, the suspended sediment
is so thick that the river is actually yellow. This river dumps
so much sediment around it that it has built up its own levies so
that it now rides 15-20 feet above the surrounding plain. When it
gets out of its banks the sediment covers everything.
As to the Amazon, there is one very interesting thing. The thick
jungles around it do not allow the water to move quicly. Thus
the velocity of the water will slow to a crawl and sediment drop
out near the river. The thick jungle carpet will also prevent
much erosion which is where the sediment comes from in the first
place. So I am not surprised by your observations of the Amazon.
>Have never been in a situation where I have to explain away
>Biblical accounts by deeming the Scriptural record somewhat less
>of what it is, or begin some word guessing to accomodate the
>'scientific' thought of the day.
Maybe you should take a geology course and go on a real field
trip with one of these devil geologists and see what they are
talking about. I would not recommend ICR's one because they
totally ignore lots of stuff.
>Many items in The Scriptures aren't clear and The Bible isn't a
>scientific manual. As it stands, I believe what it says and
>have no doubt of events as described.
That is fine. But I would suggest that you should never again
cite a single fact to support your view of Scripture. It is not
right to cite science only when it agrees with your position and
rule it out if it disagrees. You know what the Scripture means
and the observational data doesn't matter.
glenn
Foundation, Fall and Flood
http://www.isource.net/~grmorton/dmd.htm