Noah - Unsure

[Rollo Tamasi]

White Mountains, New Hampshire.
200 miles from the seacoast.
4000 plus feet in the air.
When they blasted the rocks, they were loaded with sea shells.

So much for regional flooding.

 

[Sparkey]

Does a story have to be literally true to speak truth about God's nature?

If the "story" is given to demonstrate the Judgment of God on the Whole Earth, then?

It's not a fictional account; the Bible is the Word of Truth and not a myth. That kind of thing was common in Jesus' day. The Greeks would often use mythos to illustrate their truths. They would demonstrate a pattern of attitudes and values and took that method of teaching to a high degree of art.

God, on the other hand, is incapable of deceit. Peter said it directly, "We have not followed after cunningly devised fables." I'll take his word over the opinion of anyone. He was an eyewitness to the Power of God and actually saw and experienced at first hand what God had planned.

"Is God a man that He should lie??" <---- This question, for me, has been asked and answered many thousands of years ago. Numbers 23:19 is hung upon the truth of the matter.

 

[Claudya]

White Mountains, New Hampshire.
200 miles from the seacoast.
4000 plus feet in the air.
When they blasted the rocks, they were loaded with sea shells.

So much for regional flooding.

That obviously wasn't a regional flood, but maybe the result of geological processes that turned a former sea floor into the White Mountains of New Hampshire.

 

[Tristan]

Ah, but how old are the fossils? If it was millions of years, it makes sense for those mountains to hold sea fossils because it gives plenty of time for the mountains to rise. 6000 years for Mt. Everest to rise over 8km? That would mean a rate of well over 1 meter per year, and we haven't been seeing that.

I honestly don't think God would create a universe and then proceed to break his own rules/guidelines. I don't have an issue with anyone (like YECists) as long as they aren't militant and aggressive about it.

 

[chessman]

That obviously wasn't a regional flood, but maybe the result of geological processes that turned a former sea floor into the White Mountains of New Hampshire.

Thus the name, "White Mountains"

1. a natural elevation of land rising more or less abruptly to a summit, and attaining an altitude greater than that of a hill.

Or as the Bible uses it:
Pro 8:25 "English Standard Version (ESV)
25 Before the mountains had been shaped,
before the hills, I was brought forth,"

 

[Rollo Tamasi]

That obviously wasn't a regional flood, but maybe the result of geological processes that turned a former sea floor into the White Mountains of New Hampshire.

Your statement is one of disbelief.

 

[Claudya]

Your statement is one of disbelief.

Admittedly I disbelieve in young earth creationism and in taking the book of Genesis for an accurate history book.

Ah, but how old are the fossils? If it was millions of years, it makes sense for those mountains to hold sea fossils because it gives plenty of time for the mountains to rise.

Exactly. Plus there's another aspect to consider. There are entire mountainsides made of limestone. I'm living on a limestone hill, basically. Limestone is pretty much chalk (CaCO3), and that chalk is composed of skeletal remains and sedimented remains of sea organisms (shells, fish bones, crustaceans, corals, and so on). If you're lucky you find fossils of those animals in limestone formations. Unfortunately where I live the limestone has been eroded too much you'd have to dig for a chance of finding fossils.
Now imagine the flood of Noah getting all sea creatures alive in one area at that time landlocked and then killed. You'd sure find some chalk stone. But that would be just one generation of organisms dying at once. Sedimentation often compresses it's incredients (like coal is very compressed sedimented wood), so how thick a layer of limestone would you get from all sea organisms of Noah's time dying at once? One meter? I'd guess a lot less, but I don't really know exactly. But I am fairly certain that it's way not enough to form the huge limestone formations you find all over the world. It would take many generations of sea organisms to live and die and return to the floor of the ocean and be sedimented from the pressure of the water and the weight of the next generations of bodies falling onto them. Thousands or hundret thousands of years would be needed. Limestone formations, especially those far from the sea shore, cannot be explained within the idea of a young earth. A 6000 year old earth just couldn't have possibly had enough sea animals alive within that short time to form huge limestones.

That one's in Spain.

 

[Tristan]

It's not deceit. It literature. Jesus spoke in parables. Are those literal too?

I won't look at God's creation and say 'no it cannot be'. Instead I understand that it's the mechanism by which God works. If some form of evolution is how we developed, I'd like to tell God that he's very clever. I see nothing diminishing God's power to see his will manifest over millions of years.

It's the same with the flood. It doesn't have to be literal to speak about God's character and human nature.

 

[Angel]

Interesting, Tristan.

 

[Rollo Tamasi]

Let's see, the earth and life are millions of years old.
Adam and Eve were not first.
Noah's flood was not real.
No way the Ark could hold all those animals.

Let's continue in Genesis.
The Nephelim were aliens.
Abraham was only a figurative person.

What else do we want to believe in Genesis?
Let's rewrite the whole book.

 

[Tristan]

Don't start the slippery slope argument. We don't need to rewrite Genesis.

Some of it (like the beginning) is literary. That doesn't diminish God's power at all. We don't need to throw the baby out with the bathwater.

 

[chessman]

What else do we want to believe in Genesis?
Let's rewrite the whole book.

I thought we were discussing whether sea fossils were deposited on top of mountains by the flood versus moving there as the mountains formed. I posted a Scripture that indicates mountains move ("were shaped")long ago. Do you have a Scripture that says they were washed up there by Noah's flood?

I'd personally be much more likely to believe they washed up there if you could point out a Scripture that indicates they were.

Nothing personal toward your view, however.

 

[Rollo Tamasi]

I thought we were discussing whether sea fossils were deposited on top of mountains by the flood versus moving there as the mountains formed. I posted a Scripture that indicates mountains move ("were shaped")long ago. Do you have a Scripture that says they were washed up there by Noah's flood?

I'd personally be much more likely to believe they washed up there if you could point out a Scripture that indicates they were.

Nothing personal toward your view, however.

I just look at things by faith.
The flood waters came on the whole earth.
All living creatures were wiped out.
If someone chooses not to believe that, then they are questioning God's Word and are instead trying to come up with some human understanding as to what really happened.

As a soldier of Christ, I defend God's Word.

 

[Sparkey]

6000 years for Mt. Everest to rise over 8km? That would mean a rate of well over 1 meter per year, and we haven't been seeing that.

Sometimes we like to ignore what we see because the implications of what is shown are not considered or accounted for. I live near Mt. St. Helens. Catastrophe happens and it happens dramatically. What you say could not happen in 6,000 years could actually happen in 1 year. We've seen evidence of this. But let us not trust our eyes, especially if what they show us conforms to what we read in the Word of Truth, right?

~Sparrow

 

[Vaccine]

A global flood and Jonah and the whale were two of the biggest obstacles for me to become a Christian. I wanted eternal life so I accepted these stories as figurative not literal.
What changed my way of thinking was Matt 24:37
But as the days of Noah were, so also will the coming of the Son of Man be. 38 For as in the days before the flood, they were eating and drinking, marrying and giving in marriage, until the day that Noah entered the ark.
It occurred to me I would be calling Jesus, the very person I was relying on for salvation, mistaken. I would have to face him one day and say, we'll perhaps you meant to say like an ark or partial flood, or even easier to accept, someone else attributed that to you Lord because surely that is not what you meant for us to believe.
Sine Jesus specifically mentions an ark and Jonah, I accept these as literal events based on faith. Sure, it helps sea creature fossils in the Andes and other mountains but the bottom line is these events are hard to believe. Then again so is the resurrection. It seemed wrong to me I would be willing to accept what Jesus did to avoid hell, yet reject what he said to avoid looking silly. Call me silly then because I believe it, even if I can't fully explain it.

 

[WIP]

When I read Matthew 24 and then encounter verses 37 and 38 I hear Jesus basically saying that nobody knows when the end will come. We will continue living our lives as we always do ignoring the warnings until things suddenly change just as it did when the flood came. People didn't heed Noah's warning and kept about their business as usual until one day they found themselves desperately trending water and then it was too late.

We too must listen to the warning, put our faith in Jesus Christ, and be ready.

 

[Sparkey]

Part of the unwillingness that is found today stems from the fact that the Bible speaks about God being directly interactive with His Creation. The ages of men changed then too. It's not just about a "flood story". It's about God Himself and His actions.

That stumbles some right at the start. But if we think that's a stumbler, just wait until Jesus returns. The Bible speaks the truth about that too. Those who are willingly ignorant of the fact that God has indeed judged the world shall likely be the very ones that call out to the mountains that they might be covered and not have to face Jesus, the Son of the Eternal God, especially in the light of what they think He has in store for them.

Although the thought of the Judgment of God is indeed scary (even for the most 'holy') it is better to go willingly and ask for this, knowing that Judgment comes first to the House of God. "Spare yourself the terror," is one thought.

Cordially,
Sparrow

 

[chessman]

As a soldier of Christ, I defend God's Word.

. Me too. I don't find a need to defend sea fossils washing up on mountain tops though.

 

[farouk]

. Me too. I don't find a need to defend sea fossils washing up on mountain tops though.

...although there are seashells on mountain tops...

 

[jasoncran]

It's not deceit. It literature. Jesus spoke in parables. Are those literal too?

I won't look at God's creation and say 'no it cannot be'. Instead I understand that it's the mechanism by which God works. If some form of evolution is how we developed, I'd like to tell God that he's very clever. I see nothing diminishing God's power to see his will manifest over millions of years.

It's the same with the flood. It doesn't have to be literal to speak about God's character and human nature.

if the first chapters of genesis is a parable then satan, sin and so forth is just a story and we are meant to be evil by gods design.