I said I would create this thread. And, here it is. 
PacmanandMariofan : I said I would summon you to this thread.

I will use the Vizzed Bible verses, so they will all be here, and easy to find, if you want your Bible, now is a good time to get it! Know, buckle up and let's get started! 

First off, what is Theistic Evolution? It is the belief that God had the world made by Evolution, more of less, God used evolution to get the world started. In essence, it's the combination between the two main views of the origin of the universe, and everything in it. But, don't take my word for it, I'll post links on what it is:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Theistic_evolution#Definition

And, another website:
https://answersingenesis.org/theistic-evolution/

(Don't take any remarks that seem an attack on you in consideration... Sometimes people aren't good choosers of the words they enter.) 

Now that we have defined what it is, What is creation? Creation is the belief that God literally spoke the world into existence, in a seven day period, and, the Bible spells this out in Genesis 1:  

https://www.vizzed.com/bible/passage.php?book=1[url]  

You don't have to really read the entire chapter, and in the first verse it really condensed the entire chapter in one sentence. 

Why is Theistic Evolution not right? The biggest thing is, that first, the Bible says God created, not let the world come about. One is active, the other is passive. But, that's not the most important thing... The important thing is that it doesn't say what the Bible says, and if we don't believe what the Bible says, then what do we believe, and that creates a danger. But that's just what I say, how about another source If you want a scientific, Bible perspective, it's one of the best there is! (It's a good Bible believing Christian organization!) But, what's more important than the Bible. 

[url]https://answersingenesis.org/theistic-evolution/why-i-rejected-theistic-evolution/

Any questions? Rebuttals? Or anything I left out? Tell me!

That's right.  There's a lot of good resources out there, but one always has to be able to trace it back to the Bible.  If it contradicts the Bible, ignore it or throw it out.  There is nothing new out there.  We are only discovering the "old things" as we go along. If someone comes along and claim that they had this wonderful revelation about something, double check that it aligns with God's Word since God will never, ever contradict Himself.

As someone who doesn't believe in luck, I have a difficult time believing in Theistic Evolution. Luck means, in this case, something that God "lets be". Meaning He has no influence over it, and whatever happens is by complete chance. I believe that when we put an input into a computer for a coin flip, that there is no pure randomness there. Some algorithm guides it. We can only act or be acted upon. The line between these is 2D, or practically nonexistent. There is always something or someone controlling something, in my view. It may be God, it may be us, or it may be some animal or plant, but everything involving energy output is the result of something being acted upon by something/someone with the freedom to choose.

I don't claim to know to what degree plants or animals have the freedom to choose, though.

SoL@R :

If it contradicts the Bible, ignore it or throw it out.

I can't hate enough how many people blindly say this statement.


Please; Please don't ignore reality

If something is contradictory toward your perception of reality, find out where the issue lies, and then compare it to reality.

One should follow reality, not blindly follow some magical fairy tale that think will take you to a happy place when you die. It must be ground in truth, it must be ground in facts, and it must be ground in logic, without this you're just dreaming. Following something you clearly have no solid idea in what it is. People will ask you questions, and all you can say is "Jesus loves you" and can make reality any way he wants. They will just shake their heads and walk off, and you won't "save" anyone, if you can't first prove that you're sane. Pearls before swine.


Just a little nickpick I wanted to point out.




And darth, yes evolution exists; macro evolution, the other 5 forms of it doesn't and never will (Cosmic, Chemical, Stellar, Organic, and Macro-evolution)

To doubt micro evolution makes you the biggest idiot in history.

darthyoda :

which is exactly what I said in my first post.


Can you name something that faith woild be required in christianity?

If God really exsists, then it is A) proven and B) would remove any necessity for belief in fairy tales.

Sure some of the biblical accounts cannot be proven, but it doesn't really matter if it's true or not because we are just suppose to extract the lesson for our every-day lives.

Please fix the first post in this thread so I can access all the links, and if you do, thank you

bombchu link : "To doubt micro evolution makes you the biggest idiot in history." Please don't be offensive when you're debating. I'm not saying that because I got offended. but it can make debate take a turn for the worse, even here in this thread in the Christian Conservatives forum. I'm sorry if I'm coming off as bossy, especially since I'm only a trusted member.

Anyway, I agree with everything I could read in this thread, and I realize it was a big mistake for me to believe that God would just let something happen in the world's creation. I was also kind of ignorant for that too (since I read the first chapter of Genesis) and not thinking enough.

I'm apologizing to God for that Also,

darthyoda : Sorry I didn't reply to this thread sooner, I was busy with family I only see once or twice a year and I was reading my Bible as well. Thank you so much for making this thread

Edit: Also sorry for summoning you to your own thread. Whoops.

PacmanandMariofan : I really have no idea why the two last links won't work... All the url tags are closed properly, so it doesn't make any sense. Thank you for reading it, and don't worry about late responses... 

bomchu link: A quick note on Micro-Evolution. That is best referred to as just mutations or kinds. Really nothing new "evolves" as we can mutate a grass leaf, but it remains grass... So with all of that, nothing new has been created, not even a species, it still remains grass, sometimes with a little difference to normal grass, but grass is grass.

PacmanandMariofan :

Who could I possibly offend, both Christians and evolutionists can see that dogs came from wolves. (that's micro-evolution, the changes in species of the same kind.)

I'm sorry if I'm coming off as bossy, especially since I'm only a trusted member.

That's another topic all on it's own, but tl:dr you have every right to judge me, and attempt to correct of my erroneous logic as long as you don't break any of the written rules in the process. After like 6 months on the site you should, (if you're reasonable) be in the same "tier" as most other members except a mod/staff member in his/her own playground.

If I refuse to accept when proven blatantly wrong then I am very clearly the fool.



darthyoda :

That's what I said (indirectly) in my first post? (and in this post when addressing Pac)

Something cannot come from nothing, the genes were always there.

   I think that makes no sense to be honest, because you basically are throwing everything to the wind. While a human might do that, remember, this is a God. He is supposedly all-knowing and all-powerful. 

SilverHyruler : Can you explain what you mean? Your post is vague, and if you're saying that I'm throwing the belief that evolution brought about everything into the wind, then yes. I am. I do not believe in chance. Everything has order, even a computerized "random" has order. 

God is all-knowing and all-powerful, therefore, he wouldn't use mistakes to make the world. He would only use perfection, as he is perfect.

bombchu link :  "One should follow reality, not blindly follow some magical fairy tale that think will take you to a happy place when you die."

A common misconception towards the Christian faith.  I'll get to that now, but first, you have also taken my comment, "If it contradicts the Bible, ignore it or throw it out." out of context or maybe it was my mistake for not elaborating enough on said comment.  Let's take the well known 10 commandments (God's moral law) as an example and list only three of the ten commandments.  Commandment 7 - You shall not commit adultery (or simply put, lust after a man or woman);  Commandment 8 - You shall not steal;  Commandment 9 - You shall not bear false witness against your neighbor (in other words, lie).  You might say, well, this was given to a specific nation (the Israelites) a thousand years ago and does not apply to me or us today.  This is where a lot people are deceived and get it wrong.  It still very much apply to EVERYONE today, Christian, Buddhist, Atheist, everyone.  You know it's wrong to steal right?  Just listen to your God given conscience to know this is true.  The effects of ignoring this command can be seen today.  Just visit your local jail.  You know it's wrong to lie, since one lie always builds on another lie until it gets to a point where all your lies blows up in your face.  Again, visit your local jail.  Extortioners will be able to tell you all about how far lying got them.  Last one, adultery.  Look how many broken marriages and families there are today because of guys and girls that can't keep their eyes to themselves.  It does not get more real than this.  This is no fairy tale and there's definitely nothing magical about this.  Try and contradict this and see how far you will get.  Just as a side note - God did not give us the 10 commandments to make our life difficult and to spoil our fun.  He gave it specifically to protect us.  See above again why.  This is only one example out of a hundred.  Many people today (and in the past) are subtly or blatantly distorting the Word of God to suit themselves and they have or are going to pay the price for doing so.

To get back to the initial quoted statement.  See the thread, Faith vs. Reason, here.  Have a look at especially play4fun's replies and my explanation on the second page.  Hopefully it will clear up the "blind faith" misconception.

"Who could I possibly offend, both Christians and evolutionists can see that dogs came from wolves. (that's micro-evolution, the changes in species of the same kind.)"

You are 100% correct.  Micro-evolution are both accepted by Creationists and Evolutionists.  No quarrel here. The problem comes in when Evolutionists are trying to peddle macro-evolution as fact.  Here's a excerpt from the Ken Ham debates Bill Nye thread (mods, please ignore word count):

First of all, we need to make a distinction between micro-evolution and macro-evolution.  Creationists have no problem and totally agree with Evolutionists on the former, but it is more accurately described as adaptation.  The latter is the one that causes problems and I believe that Evolutionists use micro-evolution as a base to defend and justify macro-evolution when they are totally different. So micro-evolution, according to oxforddictionary.com is, ”evolutionary change within a species or small group of organisms, especially over a short period.”
Macro-evolution according to the same source is, ” major evolutionary change, especially with regard to the evolution of whole taxonomic groups over long periods of time.”  Atheism.about.com says, “Micro-evolution is used to refer to changes in the gene pool of a population over time which result in relatively small changes to the organisms in the population — changes which would not result in the newer organisms being considered as different species. Examples of such micro-evolutionary changes would include a change in a species’ coloring or size.  Macro-evolution, in contrast, is used to refer to changes in organisms which are significant enough that, over time, the newer organisms would be considered an entirely new species. In other words, the new organisms would be unable to mate with their ancestors, assuming we were able to bring them together.”  Biology online on micro and macro-evolution:  ” Macro-evolution involves major evolutionary changes at or above the level of a kind.  It is contrasted with micro-evolution, which is mainly concerned with the small scale patterns of evolution within a kind or population.  Example of micro-evolution:  Two long-haired dogs producing a short-haired puppy.
Example of macro-evolution:  An amphibian evolving into a reptile or a reptile evolving into a bird.  Macro-evolution is a very important concept because Darwinists / Evolutionists believe that it’s the mechanism for their idea that all life evolved from a common primordial ancestor.  Many Darwinists argue that because micro-evolution is a small scale biological change and macro-evolution is a large scale biological change, macro-evolution is simply the accumulation of micro-evolutionary changes over time.  Apparently this is a reasonable extrapolation of micro-evolution.  Evolutionists therefore often use evidence for micro-evolution as evidence for macro-evolution as I have already stated.  Macro-evolution requires new additional genetic information.  No amount of rearrangement, corruption or loss of existing genetic information will produce macro-evolution and this is really what micro-evolution is about.  So in other words, no amount of micro-evolution will produce macro-evolution.  Evolutionists draw a false correlation between the two.  When Creationists, like myself, say that we don’t believe in evolution, we are not talking about micro-evolution.  I am referring to macro-evolution.  Micro-evolution is a credible, observable scientific phenomenon.  Again, Creationists do not believe in Darwin’s macro-evolutionary extrapolation of micro-evolution which there is no true scientific evidence for.  So if you want to debate creation vs. evolution, it is thus very important to distinguish between micro and macro-evolution."

SoL@R : When speaking toward the evolutionist, we have to remember one thing.

Only proven facts exsist even though the bible hasn't contradicted itself yet doesn't mean it couldn't. (even with the current perfect track record.)


It's just the way you have to play the game because they don't hold weight to (y)our precious book

darthyoda : I don't believe in fate or destiny or anything like that. Life is full of metaphorical coin flips. However, yeah random number generators are bogus.

SilverHyruler : Explain what this has to do with Theistic Evolution? 

But life isn't full of any type of coin flip, because, even mathematically there are ways to predict and figure out why a decision is reached... Everything has order. Life, and all. What you eat isn't just a whatever thing, even that "spur of the moment" decision was made with some deliberation.

darthyoda :

Txgangsta : Firstly, let me address a common misconception, God did create things on two occasions, but the second was the garden of Eden. That was a special part of it. 

Also, genetics. God created everything needed in the "lines of code." So God had given the way for different breeds of dogs and everything else.

darthyoda :

"God created everything needed in the "lines of code." So God had given the way for different breeds of dogs and everything else."

The evolutionist Christian claims exactly this, but in an orderly manner. God created life, and within this first life there were "lines of code" which God gave way for different breeds of bacteria, dogs, plants, fish, birds, and everything else. Your choice demonstrates a disordered God.

If God created the means to create new species from current ones, then there is nothing restricting God from creating evolutionary except your interpretation of 3 chapters of scripture. In fact, my interpretation of those chapters complements God's gift of creating new species from current ones. Your understanding of God is fractured between evolution and the divine *poof*. My God is not disordered, and through his omniscience and omnipotence, he established nature to reflect his divine presence.

Aha, one of my favorite topics!  I'm a biologist by trade, and one of the few Christians who roamed the Biology department halls back in college.  While I had a few Christian professors, most were avowed atheists.  Some started class with brief lectures on why we should abandon our religions. One of my atheist professors really shocked me once, though, and it was all about "lines of code" mentioned in the preceding two posts.

In 2009, I was in Biochemistry, and I lucked out study under a professor who had worked with Fred Sanger during the 1970s.  Fred Sanger is one of a few individuals who has multiple Nobel Prizes- one for discovering the structure of Insulin and the methods for sequencing proteins, and one for the method for sequencing entire genomes- particularly Phi X 174, a bacteriophage.  My professor was the one member of the team who performed the last step in a sequence that finally unlocked the first entire genome.  They were ecstatic. What a better way to play "God" than to know how life works.  They decided to look for certain sets of patterns to try to find if they could unlock some logic in how life is built on the genetic level.  After several attempts, they placed the code to music, where Adenines are the note A, Cytosines the note C, Guanines the note G, and Thymine's the note E. What better way to try to find a pattern than listening to music?  Well, after months of trying, they came up dry.  They couldn't unlock the power of creation.

My professor, after telling us this story got quiet and looked out across our 150 person lecture hall and said "At that point, we knew we were listening to the first words of God- the words of creation."  He was very respectful to his students of faith- I think he wanted to believe, but wouldn't let himself for some reason.

And that's where I see the lines of code.  If there was some humanly understood order, we could become creators.  But we don't understand that code.  We might have a great library of genes and what they do (we have sequenced thousands and thousands of genes), we have amazing combinatorial DNA libraries, but we don't know how to create.  There is but one agent of creation, the One Who knows the order in that code- and I really like my professors classification of that code as "God's words".

That taken into consideration, I definitely am an old world creationist- There is no reason why God could not have set creation into motion, thereby allowing himself to rest on the seventh day.  In fact, considering the two creations in Genesis, I'd say it is logical to assume God needed to set forth some sort of system that would continue his creation.  This is not far off from the neo-Platonic ideas put forth by Saint Augustine in his works on creation. Augustine basically says God spoke and creation happened- creation was an instantaneous event and the initial products of creation were similar to what Plato would have called perfect "universals," after which the more rudimentary creation was then made. This explains the first creation in Genesis as the perfect creation, and the second creation as our imperfect world's rudimentary creation from God perfect design.  The distance between these secondary and tertiary reflections of the initial perfect creations later theologians would term "sin" (my hero, theologian Karl Barth comes to mind as one of those theologians). This requires that God would have coded his creation to keep creation in motion- or what modern Biologists call evolution.   

It's made sense to me for years.

-Andrew

Dfsg :

While I agree with nearly everything said, I actually think that we will, one day, understand the code well enough to create. And I don't think this infringes upon God's sovereignty. God made us in his image and likeness, so that if God is Creator, I would have no problem understanding humans as creators like God.