Let me begin with what I believe is my most important view on creation: It is a secondary issue. It should not divide us. We should, as the creeds do, agree on the who (God) and the what (created) and not on the when (other than the fact that there was a beginning) or the how, or how long it took, about which they (the creeds) wisely ignore.
So much for the preamble.
My main “hermeneutic” (if I can call it that) for my creation viewpoint is founded on these observations from scripture, which I present as axioms:
Axiom 1: Creation is good; good enough to teach us something about God’s attributes.
Axiom 2: Creation proclaims the glory of God.
Axiom 3: God is not a god of deception or confusion, nor a god of testing our faith to see if we’ll deny our senses.
Axiomatically then, I conclude that creation is as "true" and reliable as scripture, and the two can never be in conflict. Science and theology, the human endeavors which study these two inerrant revelations can be in conflict [3], and neither can claim a priori supremacy. When they are in conflict it has to be resolved on a case by case basis. Neither gets a pass. If we always gave theology the advantage, we’d still be claiming geocentricism.
Here is the list of observations that I believe must be reconciled:
Observation 1: The scientific evidence is overwhelming that the universe and earth are billions of years old. The physical laws that led to the development of the solid-state electronics that allow some Christians to write and blog about the dangers of pointy headed scientists are the very same physical laws that teach us about the antiquity of the cosmos.
Observation 2: The scientific evidence is overwhelming that evolution has occurred (a fake fossil record would violate Axiom 3), including so-called “macro” evolution (there really is no difference between micro evolution and macro evolution.)
Observation 3: God is sovereign, from scripture.
Observation 4: Adam is historic, from scripture. Numerous references to Adam outside of Genesis make this clear. Death entered through Adam, but given that a truthful God said that Adam would surely die the very day he sinned, and yet Adam lived for another nine centuries, leads to the inescapable conclusion that the death was spiritual. Any other conclusion implies that God either lied or changed his mind.
- God created the universe, ex nihilo, some 14 bya.
- God generally allows the natural laws he decreed to “run the show” as secondary means, such as gravity, not angels, moving the planets. This does not mean (may it never be) that he is a deistic god. He is free to intervene supernaturally as he sees fit, and certainly has done so by the evidence of the miracles of scripture. It should be noted about said miracles: they are never described as deceptions or willy-nilly, rather they are up-front isolated events seen as integral parts of his redemptive plan.
- It the same way that gravity moves the planets, it appears that God used evolution to create the diversity of life. God still gets the credit for both orbital stability and biodiversity. However what we can see are the secondary means from which, along with scripture, we infer the primary means.
How often did God intervene in the evolutionary process? Was it zero times or many times? There is no way of saying or discovering through observation. From God’s sovereignty we can be sure that the ultimate goal of this process was our species.
Here it gets very speculative. I believe there were soulless hominids genetically (but not morally) compatible with us (souled humans, or personkind). Whether or not God ensouled two of them, or specially created two of them who were genetically compatible is impossible to say. But through some supernatural intervention Adam and Eve came on the scene. Their sons took mates from the coexistent hominids, but the pure hominid line, those with no lineage traceable to Adam, supernaturally died out. Again this is wild, unscientific speculation. I’m just trying to reconcile. Young earth proponents must also speculate wildly about where wives were found for the sons, and also about the speciation of the planet.
More speculation: Eden was a supernaturally protected enclave, a safe zone. But outside its confines the planet, which already knew sin given the presence of Satan, was red in tooth and claw.
After the fall the story reconnects with Genesis 3.
I cannot get perfect reconciliation with the literal, plain reading of Genesis. I can get decent reconciliation with a number of old earth views, and personally I favor the Framework view of Meredith Kline and others. While not all the ducks are in a row, most of them are, and I’m willing to change my view if you can convince me that you can do better. But to do so you must reconcile both general revelation and special, and not just ignore the former as if it were something of an embarrassment.
[1] Weirdly I get criticized by some of my fellow Christians for not affirming a young earth, and from atheists for my attempts to reconcile science and Christianity. At first the latter surprised me, naively thinking unbelievers would welcome believers who embrace science, but many of them do not, for it robs them of the stereotype.
[2] Self-serving position: I consider it a blunder for leadership to use the reason “new members might not like that [whatever position]”. If the view, per se, is disqualifying. i.e. it is in the mind of the leadership a first-tier issue, then for crying out loud have the courage to say so, don't conveniently pass the buck. If the view is not in and of itself disqualifying, except that it may be offensive to some, then it is irresponsible not to tell prospective members that alternate views on such non-essential issues are acceptable, even in the leadership, and to educate the congregation as such. Coddling rather than correcting the conviction that a secondary belief (for example, a particular creation viewpoint, typically a young earth) is cardinal is bad judgement. You are not doing the prospective members a service, your are only doing your membership rolls a service. In short, you're not doing your job or meeting your fiduciary responsibilities.
[3] Although not nearly as much as people think, since the bible has very little to say in the way of definitive scientific statements. Perhaps only its first three words, which were indeed confirmed by the scientific observation of a beginning, i.e., the Big Bang.
"If the view is not in and of itself disqualifying, except that it may be offensive to some, then it is irresponsible not to tell prospective members that alternate views on such non-essential issues are acceptable, even in the leadership, and to educate the congregation as such. Coddling rather than correcting the conviction that a secondary belief (for example, a particular creation viewpoint, typically a young earth) is cardinal is bad judgement."
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