I’m from Missouri and I missed a few of these. Here are twenty MO cities/towns that you probably pronounce incorrectly. Check out the comments too it’s funny to see the arguments.
It’s Time to Interrupt Someone
This is something that I am slowly learning, so I found this a timely article.
Al Mohler had front-row seats at the Nye-Ham debate. These are his reflections.
Interesting question. (HT: Challies)
Wow. Here is another one of those videos of people receiving Bibles for the first time:
(HT: JT)
I hate how such debates leave us with this either/or possibility, as if you must be Ham/Mohler’s 6-Day literalist OR you must be Nye’s agnostic/atheist.
Christian history leaves us other possible interpretive mechanisms. And, as I’ve said many times before, the genre of Genesis 1 must be the FIRST priority in this debate for Christians. If Genesis 1 is a liturgical poem (as most scholars agree), then THAT NECESSARILY shapes how the text is to be read. The genre is a contract between reader and writing. For either party to violate the contract, it must be intentional. And poetry is a very different kind of contract than a historical account. Poetry can be equally ‘true’ as history without being literally true.
In short, I always tell my students/parishioners, we don’t read the Bible literally, we read the Bible literarily. It is literature. That means genre matters.
I didn’t watch all of the debate, but the part that I did watch I couldn’t help but think that it would have been interesting to have an old earth creationist. That’d have been quite interesting.
Do you think Jesus and Paul read Genesis 1 as a poem?
Yeah, that would’ve made for a better discussion.
Yes. Sure. Why not? And so do almost all modern scholars – that’s why Genesis 1 is indented in our Bible translations.
Do you not read Genesis 1 as poetry?
And just to be specific – I think it is liturgical poetry that is intended as a polemic against Ancient Near Eastern mythology (either in written or oral or cultural form). It’s a poem written NOT to discuss the origins of matter, but the FUNCTION of each different part of creation (greater light to rule the day, humans to represent God’s dominion, etc.).
A good read on this is John Walton’s book, ‘The Lost World of Genesis 1.’ Walton has also written the NIV App Commentary on Genesis, and it’s excellent, too.
He argues that the ancient Israelites that it’s a liturgical poem written for the Jewish new year – a 6 day celebration of God’s providential and sovereign ordering and preservation of creation, which culminates in Sabbath (when the king takes his throne, not to ‘knock off work’ but to rest int he knowledge that his creation is now FUNCTIONING as he designed it.
Anyway, it’s worth reading. And his argument is totally better than my paragraph can justify.