Calvary Chapels YEC ?

[Canuckster1127]

Just a quick remark on this topic around putting science before the Bible. I know that is a stock accusation, I get that myself all the time even though I refuse to be bound by any position on creation right now.

Here is what I ask in response. Do you believe that the earth is rotating on its axis, and is in an orbit around the sun, while our solar system is also moving through space, as is our galaxy?

I've not had someone say they don't believe that. But then how do you know that, I ask? Well, it's something we learn from *gasp* science.

But how does that then reconcile with this: "Psa 104:5 He set the earth on its foundations, so that it should never be moved." Does a literal interpretation not require that we deny everything we agreed to above? And that *gasp* science has influenced how we interpret that verse?

Therefore, everyone accepts some kind of admissible scientific evidence when it comes to Biblical interpretation. The age of the earth question has just become a sore issue because the militant atheists has used it as a stick to hit Christianity with, and now we self-flagellate because of it. A consistent Christian worldview requires that we view science as a way to know more about creation, not bury our heads in the sand when it provides us with more insight to its wonders.

That's exactly what Galileo was challenged with among other things when he was challenged for his "Heresy" in this regard.

Know what came of it in some ways? In order to reconcile the scripture verses, a new hermeneutic was introduced, that of taking into account the positional perspective of the person speaking.

It's also possible you know, that a piece of Scriptural Poetry was not intended to be understood in the most painfully literal sense but really is a metaphore or a poetic device speaking to something else. The problem with trying to assume the simplest most literal sense of every passage is that the formula is consistent but the types of literature in the Bible are not. Better to seek to understand what the original author intended (inspired of course, but still understanding that they were not blind emotionaless robots but that God moved through them and their personal vocabulary and experiences) and also the understanding of the original audience. Sometimes that even takes some (gasp) hard work.

[August]

Of course I agree, we need to carefully examine the context, the literary circumstances and the purpose of the message before we can draw any conclusions.

So for me the question here is whether anyone at that time would have understood this to mean anything else but that the earth does not move? Regardless of the literary context, whether an analogy or poetic appeal to the power of God, set against the immovability of the earth (The rest of the Psalm seems to be a pretty straightforward description of the majesty of creation with an interplay of physical observation and God's role in creation). The conclusion which we now have to interpret in a somewhat different way, depending on the change in hermeneutic, which, in our case, now includes some more knowledge about the physical characteristics of the earth, and therefore put us in a position to see the contextual purpose of the Psalm different (better)? Or actually, it may seem to be different but ultimately it still communicates what the writer intended...a timeless tribute to the creative power of God.

But does a Christian wordlview not posit that we take into consideration all aspects of creation, including science, since it is all subject to God anyway? The fact that the foaming-at-the-mouth crowd of atheists have injected some of their own metaphysical assumptions into the discussion should not change that. I refuse to let them dictate terms to me for my hermeneutic, just as we should all refuse to let them intimidate Christians into accepting their assumptions.

Unfortunately many YEC's fall into this trap, they let secularism dictate terms which find their way into a hermeneutic which then demands a reading of the text which ignores large parts of our God-given common grace existence in a multi-faceted cultural environment.