Christ or Creationism?

First, I want to introduce you to a post from Gordon, and then we’ll discuss Ken Ham. I know, lame pun, but in all sincerity, it is a problem when one person hogs the gospel for himself, and loves to root around in the slop while hamming it up for others, fattening himself up on misdirection and anti-intellectualism.

Gordon writes,

My own faith was shipwrecked by this issue because I had been told time and again that belief in a young earth and creation of the species as they currently are without evolution was essential to being a proper, soundly converted, bible believing Christian….

And yes, Ken Ham will state that one doesn’t have to believe in YEC, but will roundly attack those who do not. Gordon goes on to note what is actually in the doctrine of Young Earth Creationism, rightly, I believe. When you view of God is based on having to accept something as literal, when we have a long history of it not being required as well as it being proven wrong… you have no real connection to God.

Next up, Ken is again attacking in a very shrewd way Dr. James McGrath. If my readers will remember, I’ve dined with the good Doctor and his family. I have a great respect for him and none for Ken Ham. Why? What fruit is found in Ken Ham? What humility? What is his gospel message? Did Paul so rebuke Reason? Intellectualism? Did Paul add to the Gospel’s message? If Ken is the Christian that he says he is, where are his answers, in season and out of season? As a matter of fact, he is on record stating that he will not be asked questions. And his staff? What credentials? And his love? Does Ken Love anyone anymore?

And to blame the collapsing of a Christian World View in the U.S. on such as Dr. McGrath is silly. Instead, I would charge that if we had a Christian World View, if we were truly a Christian nation at any point in our history, that the likes of Ken Ham is what is causing the downfall with his insistence on something more than Christ. We no longer look to Christ, but our own interpretations of Scripture, believing that they are inerrant. His notion of the authority of the word of God is bound up in his interpretation, and not reality.

I am a believe in Jesus Christ. I believe Him to be just what the Scriptures state He is. I believe in Scripture as inspired. I believe that all are lost but through Christ’s faithfulness righteousness is imputed. I believe that God is still calling through Christ, that we must respond, that Scripture is central, and that sin is real. I do not believe that creationism or evolution makes one more or less a Christian, a believer, or even sanctified. I believe instead that we must endeavor to understand the word of God as it was meant to be understood and that I don’t have to understand it all in order for it to be Truth. I further believe that my understandings and interpretations are second, third – fourth! to what the word of God actually says.

I believe that people like Ken Ham are causing undue divisions in the Body of Christ and instead of reaching towards one another in Christ, we are doing our best to fracture even more our mission. Christ asked us to believe upon Him. I do. I believe that my life has forever been changed because of my faith in Christ, because of, if you will, an unquantifiable religious experience and a continued presence by the Spirit of the Living God.

I believe that both Ken and James are brothers in Christ, but that one is rejecting the Father and in doing so, becoming a home-wrecker.

I believe in

God the Father Almighty,

Maker of heaven and earth:

And in Jesus Christ his only Son our Lord,

Who was conceived by the Holy Ghost,

Born of the Virgin Mary,

Suffered under Pontius Pilate,

Was crucified, dead, and buried:

He descended into hell;

The third day he rose again from the dead;

He ascended into heaven,

And sitteth on the right hand of God the Father Almighty;

From thence he shall come to judge the quick and the dead.

I believe in the Holy Ghost;

The holy Catholick Church;

The Communion of Saints;

The Forgiveness of sins;

The Resurrection of the body,

And the Life everlasting.

Amen.

Anything else you need me to believe in to be saved?