Origins Is all about Christ
Henry Huxley “Known as Darwin’s Bulldog” said this about following the fact to where they lead.
“Sit down before fact as a little child, be prepared to give up every preconceived notion, follow humbly wherever and to whatever abysses nature leads, or you shall learn nothing. I have only begun to learn content and peace of mind since I have resolved at all risks to do this.”
Facts are curious things. Because many people have difficulty determining where the observation or facts end and the inference or hypothesis begins. History is not science it can never be science. Grab a friend and tell them what you did yesterday. How did they know what you did? You may say that you told them, but how do they know that you are telling them accurately.
Interpretation, gets even more complicated when you try to add in the causes why you did what you did yesterday. If different things happened the day before would it have caused your actions to be different?
The day is gone. The events leading up to that day are gone. Time does not run backward. Events that are time dependent can never be replayed again. That is why history is beyond the scope of science. So to say that science proved anything in history is an impossibility.
You can preform this thought experiment yourself. Describe the events that happened yesterday to a friend of yours. What you are describing are the events as you perceived them at the time. You may have had a project that was going to be late. So every event that you describe would be interpreted from your need to finish the project. So every interruption that happened would be interpreted from that point of view.
Someone who interacted with you at the time, who may have had the same report due but had already finished it would interpreted your actions from a different point of view. The one who had the report done might be interpreting this situation as a lack of efficient planning. The you might have been thinking of all of the responsibilities that have been placed on you. Same events two totally different interpretation of the events.
To put in a different way interpretations are formed by association to our previous experiences, and thoughts. If associations are different then our interpretations are going to be different.
You put these two facts together and you have the modern origins debate.
We cannot rewind history to watch what actually happen for ourselves we cannot experimentally change single events at a time to see what would happen if we changed them. But we do have a description of what happen and the time frame of when it happen. Like in our story above it was a story of one day. Anyone who witnessed the event can describe the time frame in which it happened. Anyone who witnessed the event can describe the major events that happened in the day.
There was only one who witnessed creation.
Many times as Christians we seem to be afraid to remind people of this. And yet many atheist wonder why did God not leave a clear message of creation and the flood.
The sad thing about this is that God did leave a clear message. In fact, God came down to Earth to communicate His love for man and to show man His mercy. Jesus came down from heaven and invaded the world of man. And there is abundant evidence that Jesus walked this Earth. Jesus is our eyewitness to the event of creation.
John 1:1-5
In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. He was in the beginning with God. All things were made through him, and without him was not any thing made that was made. In him was life, and the life was the light of men. The light shines in the darkness, and the darkness has not overcome it.
Jesus said in Mark 10:6
“But from the beginning of creation; he made them male and female” Here Jesus is equating the beginning of creation with the same time that God made man.
Jesus also believed the flood was an actual event. In the sermon on the mount Jesus said this.
Matthew 24:38 -39
“For as in those days before the flood they were eating and drinking, marrying and giving in marriage, until the day when Noah entered the ark, and they were unaware until the flood came and swept them all away, so will be the coming of the Son of Man.”
This is the issue. Is Jesus who He said He was? Was He the Word made flesh and did he dwell among us. Do we have proof that God came down and dwelt among us? For if He did then He told us when and how the universe was made.
An old seminary professor of mine Gary Habermas is one of the foremost authorities on the resurrection of Jesus Christ. He is the author of the minimal fact argument. He compiled a list from over 1400 scholars on the Bible, many of them skeptical of Christianity. He compiled a list of 12 facts that all of them would agree with. There are reasons why they would all agree with this twelve. All twelve have been well argued out with points made and counter points until there was consensus. The following are the twelve.
1. Jesus died by crucifixion.
2. He was buried.
3. His death caused the disciples to despair and lose hope.
4. The tomb was empty (the most contested).
5. The disciples had experiences which they believed were literal appearances of the risen Jesus (the most important proof).
6. The disciples were transformed from doubters to bold proclaimers.
7. The resurrection was the central message.
8. They preached the message of Jesus’ resurrection in Jerusalem.
9. The Church was born and grew.
10. Orthodox Jews who believed in Christ made Sunday their primary day of worship.
11. James was converted to the faith when he saw the resurrected Jesus (James was a family skeptic).
12. Paul was converted to the faith (Paul was an outsider skeptic).
From these 12 facts it must be concluded that Jesus died and rose again. Only God can do that. The disciples called Him God, they preached that Jesus was God, He was crucified because He said he was God.
"My bibliography is presently at about 3400 sources and counting, published originally in French, German, or English. Initially I read and catalogued the majority of these publications, charting the representative authors, positions, topics, and so on, concentrating on both well-known and obscure writers alike, across the entire skeptical to liberal to conservative spectrum. As the number of sources grew, I moved more broadly into this research, trying to keep up with the current state of resurrection research. He said this again at William Lane Craig's "On Guard" conference, "1 Corinthians is one of six to eight books all accredited critical scholars accept. You can count the exception on two hands, probably one hand. I have 3400 sources in a bibliography from 1975 to the present (2012). When I say you can count the guys on one hand who disagree with this it is not very many. They believe Paul is the best source, and 1 Corinthians is one of the most dependable sources. They allow 1 Corinthians and Galatians. Both are on the accepted list. Bart Ehrman says they are the authentic Pauline epistle. So does most everybody else. Whatever you write, these two books are allowed [indicating Paul's genuine belief]. Paul is writing a mere [no more than] 25 years later. That is incredible. We have no other founder of a major world religion who has miracles reported of him within a generation." Gary Habermas
And for those who may not believe that most scholars support the 12 facts here is a quote from the always supportive website to Christianity “rationalwiki.”
An important tactic of conservative Christians in their attempts to dominate the world is to try to use science to prove that Jesus really did exist. Ironically, their attempts to do this are not blocked or dismissed by scholars, because many, if not most, scholars already accept the idea that Jesus was a real man who, in or around 30 CE, was acting as teacher, mystic, spiritualist, healer, political activist, or religious revolutionary. The scholarly claims are primarily made and backed up not by historical records, of which there are a precious few, but through accepted claims on the nature of mythology and new religions.
Jesus is who He said He was, God. He gave us a book that gave us the events of creation and the fall in the time frame they happen in.
“Sit down before fact as a little child, be prepared to give up every preconceived notion, follow humbly wherever and to whatever abysses nature leads, or you shall learn nothing. I have only begun to learn content and peace of mind since I have resolved at all risks to do this.”
Many do not want to go where these 12 facts go.
John 3:19-20
“And this is the verdict: The Light has come into the world, but men loved darkness more than light, because their deeds were evil. Everyone who does evil hates the Light, and does not come into the Light for fear that his deeds will be exposed”
Jesus came into this world to save you from yourself. If you confess your sin He is faithful and just to forgive you from your sin and to cleanse you from all unrighteousness.
