Walking Away from Creation Science?

by Cowboy Bob Sorensen

A few people may be thinking, “Oh, there he goes again, getting ready to quit.” Not quite quit, but I did get a kind of warning that causes me to reexamine my attitudes and motives.

There have been several occasions upon which I considered walking away. It had nothing to do with loss of faith or lack of evidence. Indeed, this is a great time to be a biblical creationist! Apathetic responses to posts (whether mine or featured from others) from people who claim to support creation have been a big part of it, and I was doubting if I was called to do this after all.

However, the content is science and theology as well as creation science, and those are small niches. There are also what I call CiNOs — Christians in Name Only — who talk the talk but don’t walk the walk. Many professing Christians are biblically illiterate and functional heretics (see the links at “Christian, Find your Bible“). That, plus the fact that I’m a nobody (not having celebrity status is something I’ve freely admitted for years) make for a low number if hits. If I want attention, I’ll write about gaming or something else that’s wildly popular right now and not be doing special interest writing.

To end this segment on background, I’ll just say that after agonizing, seeking counsel, prayer, and so on, I resolved to remain faithful and keep going. The truth is too important, and creation is the foundation of the gospel.

Except…

Something I learned long ago is that anything can be an idol for someone. Obviously, people in Western countries are not fashioning idols out of stone or wood and bowing down to them as their gods. People make other things their gods and ignore the true God of the Bible. Games, sports, relationships, politics, sex, and even church can become our false gods.

People can give such a priority in doing the Lord’s work in one form or another that they forget the Lord. I cannot make creation science into an idol and with it, take undue pride and seek glory to Bob instead of glory to God.

RGBStock / Krzysztof Szkurlatowski

Every once in a while, I get a wake-up call.

There’s a guy (I’ll call him Perse) who posts many creation science links on a few social(ist) media platforms, using various groups and Pages (I capitalize Page because Fakebook does that, and it seems like a helpful distinction). His material is essentially what I call a link mill, sharing content from the big names in creation science but little if any original content.

The other day, Perse posted a link to a video on YouTube. It was “Check this out! a awesome video from Answers in Genesis” that the uploader first had to download from AiG.

Why do that? Although I don’t think AiG would care, it is actually copyright infringement — stealing. When I pointed this out, Perse deleted my comments. After being persistent, he wondered why I had a problem with it, and it was “something that I believe most people would find trivial”.

When I pressed him about deciding what other people would think, he said that I would “cause divisions between brethren who are supposed to be on the same side.” So, stealing is okay because it’s in the name of Jesus? Also, when I made a similar comment on that YouTube channel, my comment was hidden.

From there, he said that I have a problem with him and his content “because I’ve rarely used your content”, and that I have a problem with pride. Well, Perse seems to view my work as competition. If we’re on the same side as he said, why not share the content? Why avoid Question Evolution Day, which was a call to action for biblical creationists everywhere?

Yet I’m the one starting a “needless fight”. This all came about because I asked a question and rebuked the idea that stealing is all right because the end justifies the means. My speculation is that Perse felt convicted and didn’t want to admit it, so he lashed out in anger instead.

While Perse claimed to be glad that I’m doing creation science outreach, he also made several false claims, including appeal to motive. Essentially, he acted like an atheist! Don’t be disunderstanding me here, I’m not calling him an atheist or unbeliever, nosiree. His reasoning and statements were unchristlike. Unfortunately, some of my responses were approaching that same status, and I even declared that he was showing hatred for me.

There comes a time when Christians must correct, admonish, and rebuke one another. Those things need to be done in the Spirit, not from the flesh. A believer can be completely correct in saying something, but when it’s harsh and unloving, it’s likely to be rejected.

My wake-up call was that I began to consider if I have a problem with pride and self-glorification. Sure, an occasional acknowledgement of my work is nice, but I pray almost every day that what I am doing is glorifying to God and edifying to the saints.

Am I achieving my goal in keeping the proper attitude? Frequent praying for that should help. In addition to that, am I making creation science my idol? If that’s the case, I should walk away before I do harm to creation science and be dishonoring to God. I don’t want to be the kind of guy that Perse seems to be.

Yes, we all have sins in our lives, and none of us have achieved perfect sanctification. I get angry when people dishonor God, especially when atheists mock and blaspheme, so I need to work on patience and showing a Christlike spirit. We have to keep working at it through the Word and the Holy Spirit. So, I have to pause, pray, and consider what’s going on. Mayhaps there are believers reading this who will pray for me as well.

Copyright infringement is rampant, and saturates the web, especially YouTube. Sometimes, channels there have arrangements to allow their material to be posted. Although Perse falsely accused me of trying to police it, that would be impossible. It’s up to the owners to issue copyright takedown requests. Many copyright owners leave things alone because of the hassle, lack of financial harm, and gray areas regarding Fair Use.

Also, I admonish Christian writers to use images legally — just because it’s on the web doesn’t make it fair game. (Information on using images and links to several free sites, see “Images on the Web: An Appeal to Caution.”) Arrogance and theft do not belong in a Christian’s lifestyle, you savvy that, pilgrim?

So if creation science becomes my idol and I’m consumed with pride, I pray that I have enough sense to walk away.

“Featured Image” at the top by Vlad Vasnetsov at Pixabay

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Presuppositional Apologetics’ Round Up: Third Week of February 2022

There are several items here that caught my attention, and I’m grateful that Jim included my detective work article examining how a Christian and his church were attacked. The principles in that can be useful in many other situations.

The Domain for Truth

Here are the links related to Presuppositional apologetics gathered between February 15th-21st, 2022.

1.) Cave to the Cross’ Evil’s Purpose In God’s Story – Ep.164 – What About Evil? – The One True Story – Part 1

2.) Bible Contradiction? When did Absalom rebel against David?

3.) Scientific discoveries could not have been made unless the universe is what the Christian says it is

4.) Detective Work on a Vile Attack 

5.)  Overcoming Metaphysical Bias: Part 7 of Pushing the Antithesis

6.) Watch “Reading the Bible and losing your faith” on YouTube

7.) Not enough evidence, God!  Not enough evidence!

8.) Apologetics Sermon Illustration #71: Without God’s Word in Apologetics is like being in a military combat role without guns

9.) How to Completely Refute Atheism by Jeff Durbin

10.) Would you mind not talking about your holy book please?

11.) A History of Western Philosophy and Theology – John Frame

12.) The Surprisingly Bad Take on Presuppositional…

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Keep Questioning

Thanks to Seeking Divine Perspective for writing this article relating to Question Evolution Day. This year is the 11th annual, and you can find out more here: http://www.piltdownsuperman.com/p/question-evolution-day.html

Seeking Divine Perspective

In honor of Question Evolution Day tomorrow (Thanks, Jimmy and Clyde*), here are some thoughts on questioning.

After three days they found him in the temple courts, sitting among the teachers, listening to them and asking them questions. – Luke 2:46

It was my middle school biology class, second semester. We had spent a good portion of the first semester learning the basics of just what is meant by “science” – what can be observed with our five senses, the difference between “observation” and “interpretation,” and cause and effect – that everything that happens has a cause and every action has an equal and opposite reaction. In other words, nothing happens in a vacuum, nothing happens “just because.”

Now we were getting to the fun part – actually studying LIFE! I was excited to learn just how these bodies of ours worked. I knew we were incredibly complex creations, but…

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Resistance to Question Evolution Day

There are several aspects to Question Evolution Day that many people can support, such as biblical creationists and even professing atheists or agnostics who believe in freedoms of speech, expression, academic, and thought. Fundamentalist evolutionists and atheists find it execrable. They attempt to silence this day as well as creationists themselves through ridicule, misrepresentation, outright lies, and more. I thought an important part of rational and scientific inquiry is to allow the examination of contrary evidence, but I’m just a nobody. It is easy to think that those who claim to believe in freedom of speech only support it if the material supports the consensus.

Here’s an area that I must confess to having inconsistency. There have been several misotheists and anti-creationists who want to slap leather with me over the years, and several times I have pledged to stop featuring their comments and such as examples of bad logic and bigotry. I was giving them the attention they seem to crave. Then they give me something else that needs to be used. C’est la guerre.

Used under Fair Use provisions for educational purposes.

The above image was posted on Fakebook and these misotheists did the usual: share for the purpose of mockery. First, I want to point out that the owner of that Page and his few fans complain when creationists point out that Charles Darwin was a blatant racist, they falsely claim that we are engaging in ad hominem attacks. Then they hypocritically use their own. Frequently.

By the way, notice the “ha ha” emoji. Atheists love those, even when they’ve been caught lying or given irrefutable evidence for something. No intelligent response, just a childish retort.

The two sentences in the comment on the “share” are chock full o’ fallacies, so let’s give them a look-see.

As I said, they use ad hominems frequently. This one has “idiots”, “moronic”, and “clowns”. Some people defend the use of insults and say that are not ad hominems when not used in the course of an argument, but I disagree. It is still to the man and is a way to dismiss what another person or group has to say.

For that matter, an insult can also be a form of poisoning the well to discredit what the other says before any statement is made. If someone states, “No, that’s not an ad hominem, I simply insulted you”, it should not be allowed to stand. It does nothing to advance an argument or position, and is harmful.

Note the viperine conflation of evolution with science, which is common among anti-creationists. This is frequently expanded so that, if we reject atoms-to-atheist evolution, we reject science. Not hardly!

If you study on it a mite, you’ll see that their attitude is anti-science. You betcha, since those who

One need not be a creationist or Intelligent Design proponent to have doubts about evolution. It is in no wise “settled science” or “proven”, since science can’t prove anything, and a true spirit of science it so seek knowledge (which includes adjusting or even rejecting bad theories), not protecting the prevailing paradigm.

Dissent from Darwin has been signed by over 1,200 scientists (and MDs who are also professors of medicine). As discussed at Piltdown Superman, this is essentially blaspheming Darwin and, therefore, hazardous to their careers. If there were more professional, academic, and other freedoms, there would undoubtedly be more signers.

I am once again reminding people that there are many credentialed scientists in the creation community that have published in refereed journals in their own fields. Of course, evidence refuting evolution and supporting creation is not allowed in the secular science industry. It makes Darwin frown.

Interestingly, while I was writing this, another Admin at The Question Evolution Project re-posted something I wrote a spell back about how creationists embrace science. That same Page owner under discussion here called me a liar in his comments. Because atheism.

Implicit in the line, “As if a bunch of Creationist clowns are going to cause science to abandon evolutionary theory”, is an appeal to motive fallacy. Since that Admin uses the genetic fallacy as an excuse to avoid reading creationist material, he doesn’t know what Question Evolution Day is about in the first place.

When I started QED, I never said that it would cause the secular science industry to abandon one of their foundations. (Indeed, glance through this collection of Darwin Day images and notice the religious fervor. Somehow, a couple of QED images made it into the mix.) I am a nobody. Fact. I wasn’t being facetious before. And I know I don’t have much influence or power. This is a movement by and for the people who actually care about getting out the truth and prompting people to think for themselves instead of floating down the stream of “consensus science”.

This may put some people off, but mayhaps some of my history will be useful.

Creation Ministries International had a Question Evolution! campaign that included several videos and questions that evolutionists cannot answer. I made a comment that there should be a Question Evolution Day. Didn’t happen, so, being a cowboy at heart, I took the initiative and started the observance. Not much happened.

I asked for other people to participate, and had a boost a few times from Creation Today. Ian Juby promoted QED on Genesis Week a couple of times. Many other people wrote weblog articles (Duane Caldwell has done several at Rational Faith), and people on social(ist) media had their own material as well as sharing hash-tagged #questionevolutionday posts.

In addition, I sought out interviews on radio and podcasts (here is one of my favorites; a skilled interviewer brings out good responses from the subject). A few times I got my name “in print”, such as The Christian Post and The Washington Post (via Religion News Service.) Like I said, I was being a cowboy. Being a nobody, however, hindered getting doors opened.

Writing that stuff makes me uncomfortable because I have long said (and pray to remind myself) to seek glory to God, not glory to Bob.

Even so, one point to QED is that a passel of us common folk can get together and spread the world. We can hope and pray that people will realize that they are not getting all the facts from atheistic materialists. They may question evolution and realize that the God of the Bible is the Creator — that means he makes the rules and we should find out what he has to say.

As for angry atheists…they can’t hurt us. Sure, ridicule and say all sorts of evil things, it’s who they are and what they do. But they can’t stop the truth, and people don’t need to spend much time on hard-hearted trolls, you savvy?

I hope all y’all will get involved in Question Evolution Day, our protest against Darwin-mandated science philosophies can be heard!

The convoy starts here. (Made at PhotoFunia.)

Let There Be Light

There are many speculations about what provided the light before God created the sun. I lean toward the “physically manifested shekinah glory” suggestion, but others have speculated on angels, temporary light sources, and others. The Bible does not say, so we can’t be barking dogmatic about the answer.

Bible-Science Guy

(2 Minute Read. 29Dec2021)

Recently Reader Madison asked an intriguing question in a comment on this BibleScienceGuy article: The Big Bang!

Madison’s comment included this question on the creation of light in Genesis 1:
“What is the difference between the great light created in verse 3 and the one created in verse 16?”

Here are the relevant passages about the light God created on Creation Day 1 (verse 3) and later on Creation Day 4 (verse 16):
In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth. The earth was formless and void, and darkness was over the surface of the deep, and the Spirit of God was moving over the surface of the waters. Then God said, “Let there be light”; and there was light. God saw that the light was good; and God separated the light from the darkness. God called the light day, and the darkness…

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Jesus and Santa-ism

by Cowboy Bob Sorensen

Misotheists try to prove their intellectual superiority to us st00pid dujmb theists by using risible logic, which includes invalid comparisons.

“We don’t believe in God in the same way we don’t believe in Santa Claus”, or “We don’t hate Jesus, nor do we hate Santa, the Easter Bunny, etc.” Let’s give a look-see on why such remarks are ridiculous. Instead of going at this as a formal logic lesson, this article will take the reader along a different trail.

At first glance, this may remind people of an argument from silence, and I’ll allow that there are superficial similarities. (A quick example of an argument from silence is that in the comments area of a post, I responded to the request to mention a movie that needed its ending explained. I asked for The Quiet Earth. No responses. To assume that nobody can answer would be fallacious.) What follows can be more properly considered an argument from conspicuous absence.

Santa Claus from the Victorian era from Free VINTAGE Illustrations
Notice how this is very different from modern portrayals

There really was a Saint Nicholas of Myra in the 4th century, and he was a generous, godly man. Legends and modern mythology have very little to do with the real person. It is highly unlikely to find a sane adult who actually believes in the fat guy at the North Pole who has elves working for him, flies around the world pulled by reindeer on Christmas Eve, and defies physics. Ain’t happening, Hoss.

There are other things that won’t be found:

• Science supporting his existence, including physics, archaeology, biology, paleontology, and more.
• Gatherings of people who sing his praises, offer worship, and give exegetical teachings from the Book of Santa.
• Prophecies that have been fulfilled, and others waiting to be fulfilled, from that same book.
• Testimonies of people who have experienced miracles or had their lives changed by Santa.
• Folks coming to the door or talking in the park, imploring people to come to salvation through the Claus Clause.
• Disaster relief efforts spearheaded by organizations like Santa’s Purse.
• Schools, hospitals, and so forth being built by believers in the modern version of Santa Claus.

For people who claim that they take Jesus as seriously as they do Sinter Klaas, they sure do spend a passel of time hating God, but no effort to hate Santa. For that matter, many professing atheists seek their personal value and identities railing against someone they claim doesn’t exist! However, they do know that God exists (Romans 1:18-23). They need to repent. It would be great if they did it at Christmas time.

Bible Contradiction? Where did Joseph and Mary live before the birth of Jesus?

Historically, Skeptics challenged knowledge claims of others. It seems to me that skepticism implies a willingness to consider evidence or epistemological arguments, and as a Christian and creationist, I encourage healthy skepticism regarding assertions by atheists and evolutionists.

Today, it seems to me that “skeptics” have already decided that what they dislike is untrue, and would be more honest if they called themselves scoffers.

Here is an example of how atheists will do selective citing and are sidewinders when alleging contradictions in the Bible. While Jim easily eviscerates the contradiction claim, take note of the process so you can use it your ownself.

The Domain for Truth

In light of the upcoming season as we head towards Christmas today’s post will tackle another question that the Skeptic Annotated Bible asked: “Where did Joseph and Mary live before the birth of Jesus?”

Here are the two answers which the skeptic believes shows a Bible contradiction (the emphasis and what is skipped over is done by the skeptic):

They lived in Nazareth, and traveled to Bethlehem because of a census.

Now in those days a decree went out from Caesar Augustus, that a census be taken of all the inhabited earth.² This was the first census taken while Quirinius was governor of Syria.³ And everyone was on his way to register for the census, each to his own city.⁴ Joseph also went up from Galilee, from the city of Nazareth, to Judea, to the city of David which is called Bethlehem, because he was of the house and…

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A Matter of Perspective on Thanksgiving Day

by Cowboy Bob Sorensen

For my wife and me, this is a day of mixed emotions.

We see images of happy gatherings for Thanksgiving, the Macy’s merchandising parade is on TV as I write this, food and abundance…

Today is the anniversary of the birth of two people who are no longer with us. We think of others who have also passed on. The celebration is just the two of us.

Thinking back on how Basement Cat was so thrilled and just had to have her turkey, she would reach up and tap my wife’s arm, “Hurry up!” Afterward, she would take a contented nap. We really miss her.

Christian liberties are being destroyed in Western nations, governments are becoming increasingly Marxist and totalitarian. I’m the worst of the worst, what with being white, male, heterosexual, Christian, married, and a biblical creationist. That last point is probably the worst for atheists and leftists, since we promote the foundations of the gospel message. Wouldn’t be surprising to be given a one-way ticket to the Land Down Six Feet Under in the near future.

Yeah, pilgrim, lots to be sad about. Angry. Bitter.

We have a home, shelter, food, tremendous wealth compared to others in the world (or even in these formerly United States), and more.

There is a God, he has made himself known in his Word. I thank him that I have been promoting the truth through online ministry efforts, even if people only care about “memes” and pithy sayings. Ministries and apologists… we do our “watchman on the wall” parts, so if others remain unprepared, that’s on their own heads.

All I am, all I have, is through God. Jesus Christ has blessed me — and Christians — to live godly lives. God the Son died on the cross for my sins, was buried, bodily raised on the third day. Believers are raised with him, and seated with him in glory with God the Father. We have victory in Jesus, and are indwelt with God the Holy Spirit. He is coming back. There will be a great reunion with our Savior and believers who have gone home before us.

God is greater that the world. With the right perspective, I can be thankful and not bitter. But I need to pray that I don’t let other things take my eyes off Jesus. Praise, glory and honor to God!

Image credit: Unsplash / Priscilla Du Preez

Startled by the Light

by Cowboy Bob Sorensen

Not so long ago, I wrote a short article where I laughed at at myself, and my wife joined in. Sure, why not? It was funny. This one takes a different approach where my reaction to something would have been humorous if someone had been with me, but it is also an example of the design work of the Master Engineer.

The incident was simple enough. I was in the kitchen of our apartment rustlin’ up some grub. Suddenly, I saw a very bright flash on the wall out of the corner of my eye. We’re bein’ nuked! A few seconds later, I saw a box truck used by a major delivery company pull up to the curb on the wrong side of the road.

The truck had big windows just off perpendicular just like this one from Unsplash / Talv Bansal that I cropped and modified.

Too bad WordPress won’t let me put the image on the left and add the text to the right of it.

Anyway, a number of things galloped through my mind in a second or two. One is that I was drawing from memory. The “road”, as we call it, is actually a long driveway through the apartment complex. (Although it’s paved, I heard that the potholes can be seen from the International Space Station.) This road is like the side roads in the area where cars can travel in both directions. It also curves up an incline toward the back. Just then, the truck was being driven down the curved grade. People are not supposed to park facing traffic, but he did that anyway.

It was a bright sunshiny day, so the windows caught the light as he drove around the bend toward my building. The light reflected from the truck’s big windows, through our big sliding glass door, and onto the wall in the kitchen where I was standing. It was there for a fraction of a second.

All those details, and I understood what occurred in just a few seconds. The other thing that happened to me was even faster.

The flash got my heart a-pounding and I had a surge of adrenaline when I was startled by it. This was probably the “fight-or-flight” reflex kicking in, so I was finding the source of the light, but also ready to take action if needed.

My reaction is the humorous part of this. A related but far more serious incident where I awakened to keep from dying is at “Inner Survival Alarms“.

Darwin’s Flying Monkeys™ are content to say the rapid thinking that accessed memories of the terrain, weather conditions, the fight-or-flight (as well as the inner alarm from that other article) are all evosplained by the Stuff Happens Law. That is, “it evolved” followed by vague speculations and faith-based assertions without evidence. The logical conclusion is that evolution was not involved. These things are further examples of the work of our Creator.

Responding to Objection of 6 or 9 and argument there’s no right and wrong — The Domain for Truth

Have you seen anyone post this on social media or other similar meme?  How does one respond as a Christian? First off it is true that 6 can look like a 9.   The illustration involves only two referents both who are viewers.  What’s missing is the author of the number.  Authorial intent matters. Given […]

Responding to Objection of 6 or 9 and argument there’s no right and wrong — The Domain for Truth