Biblical Creation and Evangelism

I reckon the most common term to refer to those of us who believe that the Bible means what it says, and that the first eleven chapters of Genesis are presented as actual history, is young-earth creationists.  It is accurate to some extent, but it implies a skewed priority. We don't believe Earth is young and then plug into the Bible. Rather, we believe that Earth is young because the Bible teaches that. I'll allow that the abbreviation YEC is convenient, but I've learned that the more accurate term is  biblical creationists. Image credit: Freeimages /  Flavio Takemoto When professing Christians add "deep time" to the Bible, they immediately begin to use eisegesis instead of exegesis .  Scripture is not up for personal opinions or forcing in trends in atheistic science interpretations, old son. God said what he meant. When someone begins compromising to make the Bible more palatable to our science-loving culture, that person actually does violence to the tex

by Cowboy Bob Sorensen It's kind of sad that the manger scenes we have are wrong. Well, not exactly wrong, just...not exactly accurate. I had one of those barn things with figurines and three plastic wise men on camels. When I learned that the magi were not there to see the birth of Jesus and arrived much later (possibly even two years later), I put the figurines away from the manger scene and said, "They're on their way". Kind of difficult to include them in a Christmas celebration if you're going to be a stickler for historical accuracy, but that's just me. Adoration Of The Magi , Sandro Botticelli, 1500 We know the song about the "three kings of orient are", but who were they, really? There are a passel of traditions and opinions about them. The only reference we have to the magi (wise men) is in Matthew 2:1-12, but we can't justify the tradition of three  wise men on camels. Three gifts  are mentioned, but no camels (although that&

When someone has just given his or her life to Jesus Christ, one of the first things that the evangelist does is give them a New Testament with the recommendation of reading one of the Gospels. Then, keep going and get acquainted with other books in that volume. By all means, that's an excellent start. Image credit: Freeimages / John Harris Pe Unfortunately, some people stop there. Worse, some people are "Red-Letter Christians", who believe the red letter versions where the words of Jesus are in red, and only read those. The entire Bible is the written Word of God. To gain a fuller understanding of the work of Christ the Creator, we need the Old Testament, which points to him. It is common today for pastors/ministers to focus mainly on the New Testament in their preaching and ministry while hardly citing the Old Testament. Even worse are superficial slogans such as ‘This is a New Testament church’ or ‘Just preach Jesus’. Some of this can be due to either uneasi

When people hear the word unicorn, they typically think of the mythical magical horse with a horn on its head. I'll allow that it's a reasonable assumption, since we only hear about the beasties in fantasy stories. So why did the King James Version of the Bible use the word unicorn? Monoceros, Canis Minor, and Atelier Typographique  by Sidney Hall, 1825 Let's look at Numbers 23:22 KJV, one of several uses of unicorn. John Wycliffe and associates in the late 1300s rendered this verse, "The Lord God ledde hym out of Egipt, whos strengthe is lijk an vnicorn". The Coverdale Bible of 1535 rendered it, "God hath brought the out of Egipte, his stregth is as of an Vnicorne". In 1587, the Geneva Bible translated this verse as, "God brought them out of Egypt: their strength is as an vnicorne". Several Bibles before the KJV, including non-English translations such as Martin Luther's version, also used unicorn. Many modern versions translate We

Liberal theologians and theistic evolutionists attempt to say that Adam was not a literal person, but an archetype (or "protoplast"). The Bible does indeed use "type and shadow" imagery with real people (such as Joseph as a type of Christ ), but that does not excuse saying that Adam was not real. Adam and Eve expelled from Eden / Paul Gustave Doré, 1866 Saying that Adam was not real is essentially saying that Jesus, Peter, Paul, and many others in the Bible were wrong or even lying. The motive behind this is to reject the authority and inerrancy of Scripture, and elevates man's opinion above God's Word. Some people compromise with evolutionary ideas without thinking it through, but it leads to further serious compromises all the way through the Bible. There are some old Earth creationists as well as theistic evolutionists who falsely say that the Church Fathers rejected a literal Adam, or that the a ncients did not understand science, so they tol

by Cowboy Bob Sorensen Pastor Chris " Fighting for the Faith " Rosebrough presented a lecture that I used as a springboard for this article. First, some background on the spiritual condition. Western society has never had morality that we can be proud of, since it has been in a decline for quite a spell. And it's getting worse. Increasing violence, sexual immorality, atheism and other false religions, mental illness, abortion, defamation, lying, corruption at many levels, and so much more. How did we get in such a state? Image credit: David Castillo Dominici / FreeDigitalPhotos.net The simple answer is sin, which began in Eden. It escalated (Gen. 6:5) and God judged the world with the Great Flood (Gen 7:23). It didn't take long for man's sinful nature to rear it's ugly head afterward, but God promised never to flood the entire world again (Gen. 9:14-15). Don't think we're getting out of this easily, because the next Judgement will be by

by Cowboy Bob Sorensen We need something new. That Bible on the shelf (or wherever it is, I can't find mine) is tired and old. Fortunately, we have apostles that are busy anointing other apostles, and they are proclaiming direct revelations from God! I can be blessed , especially if I make seed offerings to their ministries. Praise the Lord! It's all about  me,  God  needs  me to fulfill my dreams, the Holy Spirit can't  function  without me , God  wants  me to meet all my material needs and desires, and maybe I, too, will be told by an angel to preach "Kingdom Power" . I'm so special, I don't know how he made it so long without me. Well, isn't that the kind of thing people are saying? Christians have turned into a bunch of biblically illiterate selfish owlhoots . We have enough problems of alleged "former Christians" who have rejected God and claimed he doesn't even exist (or God is evil) because he's not a magic wish-granti

by Cowboy Bob Sorensen This is a follow-up of sorts to my previous article, " Challenges for Christians ". It follows the same trail and then branches off onto a slightly new one. There are Christians who complain that their spiritual lives are not what they should be. Worse, when attacked by atheists and evolutionists with various "Gotcha!" challenges, they don't know what to say. Well, don't blame God, Pilgrim. What are you putting in your mind? Image credit: Pixabay / johnhain When looking at "Likes", posts, "Tweets" and so forth from friends and followers, I see a mixed bag. Sometimes I wonder if they consider themselves Christians and creationists because they like certain Pages and sites, have watched a couple of Bible-oriented movies, share a funny captioned picture (take that, evolutionists, I really showed you, ha ha ha), read the blasphemous book The Shack  and the admittedly fake Heaven is for Real, the discredited

by Cowboy Bob Sorensen One of the most significant problems that Christians and creationists encounter from atheists is that they seem to want us to accept their evolutionary materialistic naturalistic presuppositions, but they do not want to let us have our own presuppositions. Because we reject their views and believe God's Word and in miracles, we are often labeled "science deniers" or "reality deniers". The problem here is that they are denying logic itself by imperiously setting the definitions of "science" and "reality" in their favor. From there, they feel entitled to ridicule and misrepresent us. I don't rightly recollect anybody appointing atheists to be in charge of definitions. Image credit: Wikimedia Commons / Larch Although village atheists claim to believe in "reason" and "science", they frequently display little knowledge of or skill in either one. (For example, there is a narcissistic atheopath

by Cowboy Bob Sorensen People get mighty fond of their learning and intelligence, and usually detest being called ignorant or stupid. Humanistic philosophies elevate "science" (which is a philosophy in and of itself) to supreme authority and importance in matters of truth. Mankind as a whole looks down on God and considers his wisdom as foolishness. Quote miners may find the phrase "the foolishness of God" and use it to their own advantage. Inquisitive honest people may want to read the source, 1 Corinthians 1:25, and see that it means something completely different. Image credit: Morguefile / Plume Those who are wise in the eyes of the world arrogantly require God to do things their way, and fallaciously claim that if they cannot understand God's methods, he does not exist. What happens is that they become idolators, creating a false god that they can reference but has nothing to do with the true Creator God as revealed in the Bible. The wisdom of

Ever since God gave the Ten Commandments (Exodus 20:1-17), people have been a mite cranky about them. The Israelites broke them, and everyone else has been happy to oblige in breaking them as well (which is one reason taking people through the Ten Commandments is a powerful witnessing tool ). They've been around for a few thousand years, and have been making people mighty uncomfortable. Ten Commandments Monument in Austin, Texas image credit: J. Williams Some folks have tried to rewrite them, including Clinton Richard Dawkins (who does not even keep number eight ). It's not like there's anything wrong with them — except to misotheists and liberal culture revisionists who mock the authority of God's Word. We're in a pagan evolutionary culture, and the Commandments make for a hostile environment. Some yahoos at Seeker dot com decided to replace the Ten Commandments with their own rules for the "good person" (defining "good" by their own s

A common occurrence for Christians and creationists is to have a smug atheist issue the demand, "Prove to me that God exists using science". These people who claim to believe in science and "reason" are arguing from their naturalistic presuppositions, but demonstrate not only their ignorance of the nature of God, but are also committing the formal logical fallacy known as the category error . That is, it's impossible to use man-made science philosophies and methods to "prove" the existence of God, who exists outside the confines of time, space, and matter. Then the owlhoots claim victory over the stupid Christian and proclaim that God does not exist, then try to prove evolution. However, there is abundant evidence for the existence of God, beginning from inside the questioner (Romans 1:18-23, Psalm 53:1 ESV). Image of God by Michelangelo di Lodovico Buonarroti Simoni, painted in the 1500s, modified by a graphic from Clker clipart Similarly, a

In matters of sharing our faith in accordance with Jesus' command (Matt. 28:18-20, Acts 1:8), we need to take a thoughtful approach. First of all, we must remember that we are not the ones who are doing the saving with our own brilliant arguments, that's the work of the Holy Spirit (1 Cor. 2:1-5). That's why people come to Christ through simple one-on-one evangelism from an excited new convert who is unskilled in theology and philosophy. Modified from an image on Pixabay by geralt People have pointed to Peter's sermon in Acts 2:14-41 as a model for evangelism, but that message was given to monotheistic Jews. For people who have different religions such as paganism, atheism, evolutionism, Mohammedanism, Hinduism, cults that claim to be Christian, and others, a different approach is needed. A good working knowledge of their worldview is very important to establish communication. People who engage in serious debates take the time to learn where the other is coming

We are seeing 2 Peter 3:3-4 happening right before our eyes . Worse than that, Christianity is being eaten away from the inside. People will proclaim themselves as modern prophets and apostles with "new revelations" from God. Christians should be saying, "Hang on a minute. Where did you get that from the Bible? Oh, you heard from God personally? You know, like Joseph Smith? The canon of Scripture is closed,  as are the offices of apostle and prophet. Let me check your presumptuous pronouncements against the written Word of God". Instead, too many are staring in wide-eyed wonder, being gullible, and being whipped into a frenzy by the false teachers. Image credit: Morguefile / clarita (modified) Many false teachers with throw some Scripture into the mix, but it's a bait 'n' switch tactic, the Heresy Two-Step. Be discerning and watchful. Notice that they are not fond of reading verses in context, often reading a bit and then telling you what

The way some people cling to their "deep time" beliefs, sometimes including evolution, while claiming to believe the Bible is mighty disconcerting to me. They are elevating man-made science philosophies to the magisterial position and are telling God that he is wrong. Scriptural teaching begins to unravel — and that's why unbelievers attack the foundations of the Christian faith, the book of Genesis. Image credit: Pixabay / bluemorphos Now, don't get all het up, I'm not saying that every professing Christian who goes in for long ages is deliberately sabotaging the Bible or is unsaved. (If you study on it a spell, you might begin to wonder why some people attack biblical creationists and have a fervent desire to believe Earth is ancient.) What I am  saying is that many people really don't know what the Bible teaches, and the implications of forcing millions of years into the text. Especially when Jesus, Peter, Paul, and many others in Scripture believed