Final thought on local flood vs global flood
In my last post (Part 2 of this review) I discussed some of the pros and cons concerning a local flood and a global flood. It must be stated that one of the obvious reasons for leaning against a local flood comes from God Himself. In Genesis 9:11, God says, "never again shall there be a flood to destroy the earth". Now remember BCS believes the word "earth" here means land, ground or country rather than the whole planet. So if God promises to never present a local flood again, and if BCS applies this consistently, then there has never been large, local floods on the earth since Noah. Is this true? No, there has been huge local floods over the centuries that has destroyed livestock, drowned people and devastated land and property. I suppose BCS would rationalize this away by saying God promised never to being a local flood again that would destroy all flesh in a particular region. However, this again leads to endless speculation as to what the size of a local flood should be which matches Noah's and how much devastation is needed in order to "destroy" a local region. Is it not simpler to accept that God is speaking about a world -wide flood that will never happen again?
Biological Death and Evolution
One of the strangest conclusions of the authors of BCS occurs in chapter 11 of their book where they challenge the belief of biological death being the result of the curse on Adam. In their view, the fall did not affect the earth nor the ecosystems but just Adam and his descendants. It others words, the fall is man-centered but not earth-centered. So biological death was in the world prior to the fall of Adam. Another strange fact is BCS never defines for us what they mean by biological death!! If eating a leafy vegetable or a fruit from a tree is an example of biological death, then I agree, there was death before the fall. But if we define biological death as the actual death of a living soul with flesh and blood, then the Bible suggests that this occurred after the fall. BCS states that if a global flood radically altered much of the topography and climate of the earth, then young earth creationists must believe in hyper-evolution in order to explain how animals could specially adapt to harsh climate conditions like the arctic and many of our deserts. They illustrate this by asking, "Did some bear-like ancestor from the ark just have a hankering for this new cold climate and migrate into the new arctic, adapting rapidly as it trudged north?" No true young earth creationist would ever claim to believe in hyper-evolution but would grant that microevolution(adaption and genetic variation) has taken place. Granted, BCS asks the same questions that have been troubling both evolutionists and creationists for centuries. Science (which the Bible agrees with here) does seem to suggest that the Earth did have a different climate at one time. So how did both these harsh climate regions and the animals that live in them come about? The evolutionist would respond -through the mechanism of evolution and millions of years. The young - earth creationist would say adaptation, genetic code variation, and micro-evolution (a word that BCS does not use). BCS does not explain to us how these animals came about but one can deduce from their writings that these animals existed prior to the flood and were not destroyed by the flood, since to BCS, it was a local flood anyway. Inevitably BCS has to come to an old - earth perspective in which millions of years are necessary for the great climate changes and diversity of species that we see in our present world.
BCS presents three graphs to illustrate three different views as to the progression of the creation to our present world to Revelation 21 and 22. BCS holds to the third view and can be found on page 210, the other views are on pages 200 and 209. Views one and two represent young and old earth creationism respectively. In reality the only difference between view two of old-earth creationists and view three of BCS is that BCS views the world of Revelation 21 and 22 as equivalent(fulfilled) to the world of today rather than a world that is yet to come.
The Effects of the Curse
The main problem with BCS's thesis of biological death happening before the fall is that the Bible appears to suggest the opposite. Ironically (I say this because they scoff at young - earth creationists who challenge the illusion of the great age of the universe), BCS goes to great length to defeat this illusion and to prove their thesis. In chapters 11 and 12, which deals with this issue, there are no Scriptures given by BCS that clearly supports their thesis. They bring up the warning of God in Genesis 2:17, "for in the day that you eat of it you shall surely die" as evidence physical death had to exist outside the boundaries of the garden in order to serve as a spiritual warning to Adam. Otherwise, Adam could not understand at all what God meant by "die". This is an argument from logic not Scripture. They then go to Adam's naming of the animals to prove, indirectly, that animals did eat one another before the fall. For example, the word for "lion" in Hebrew means "violent", the word for "hawk" means "tearing". So BCS deduces that Adam observed these characteristics in these animals which is why he gave them these names. I will address this later but again BCS is using logic to prove their point, no direct Scripture. They do this as well with other Scriptures where they take similes and extrapolate from them proofs of the physical world prior to the fall. They come finally to a New Testament text when they address the passage of Romans 8: 20 - 22 (pages 234 - 236) where Paul suggests that the whole creation was subject to the fall. This is an important passage and BCS has to address it if their view is correct. Here, they appear to contradict themselves. They agree with Whitcomb and Morris that Paul is referring to the time when God placed the curse on creation at Adam's fall; yet they state earlier in the chapter that the fall did not cause a radical physical transformation in our world. Remember, BCS believes that biological death occurred prior to the fall. So we are left to ponder what part of the curse did come upon the creation. What is the creation groaning about? What is this "deliverance" from the" bondage of corruption" that the creation will one day be granted? It appears that Paul is clearly teaching about the physical universe. Ah, not so fast, says BCS. Incredibly, BCS states that the word for "creation" in Romans 8: 20 - 22 is referring to God's people, "The creation, the entire body of God's covenant people, was being 'brought into the glorious freedom of the children of God'"(page 354). I do not know of any reputable commentary (outside of possible preterists) who take this view. The Greek word here for creation is ktisis which literally means "the act of creating, or the creative act in process . . . . it also signifies the product of the creative act(Vine's Expository Dictionary of New Testament Words). We see this word in Romans 1, verses 20 ("since the creation of the world") and verse 25 where Paul states that one of the attributes of ungodliness is to worship the "creature" rather than the "Creator" . Clearly Paul is referring to non-covenant people here in Romans chapter 1 for he argues the gospel is the power of God to salvation to the Jew first and also the Greek prior to his comments in verses 20 and 25.
Radical Transformations
So, exactly what was and is the curse that God put upon mankind? BCS would tell us the idea of animals eating each other has nothing to do with the curse. They may be right. I don't know. However, Genesis appears to suggest that maybe all animals were herbivores prior to the fall. We read in chapter one, verse 30, "Also to every beast of the earth, to every bird of the air, and to everything that creeps on the earth, in which there is life, I have given every green herb for food and it was so". Strangely, BCS never addresses this verse. Again, we must not succumb to the temptation of imposing what we see in the natural world today upon the world of Adam and Eve. It is possible that animals eating each other has nothing to do with the curse but with what God imposed or allowed after the flood. We read, after the flood, in Genesis 9:3 that " every moving thing that lives shall be food for you. I have given you all things, even as the green herbs." It is here that God adds a stipulation, man is not to eat flesh with blood in it. We have another clue that the animals were possibly affected by the curse when we read what God said to the serpent. He said that the serpent was "cursed more that all cattle, and more than every beast of the field." This suggests, and I am not dogmatic about this, even the cattle and beasts were cursed but the serpent was more so. Even the serpent was to undergo a radical transformation. He would now go on his belly! What the serpent was in the garden, we don't know. We do know that it could talk and that Satan either was the serpent or used the serpent. Many think that the snake today which crawls on its belly is the serpent of the garden. It is true Adam named the animals but we are not given any example of these names. It is entirely possible that different names were given to animals, after the fall or the flood, who were no longer herbivores. I am not sure about this but we have a clue in Nimrod. We are not told that Adam or his sons or Noah and his sons were hunters prior to the flood. But after the flood, we read that Nimrod was a mighty hunter before the Lord - Genesis 10:8,9. The only name Adam gives us is the one he gave his wife. He actually named her twice!! He called her woman and named her Eve. That the curse was upon mankind all agree. What BCS and others disagree on is whether the curse was upon all biological creation and the universe. I find it strange that BCS does not believe any radical transformation occurred to the physical world (page 212) because of the fall. How does one explain the plain language of the text in Genesis 3: 17 - 19. Do we not have thorns and thistles in our world today? Does not mankind live on bread - the herb of the field - due to much effort and sweat? Do we not become dust eventually? Are these not radical physical transformations, if we consider man was meant to live forever in a beautiful garden? The increase in pain in child bearing has to be radical if the curse is a curse. Even the balance and equality of the man and woman will be changed as the man would rule over the woman. And, don't these physical transformations affect us all, not just covenant people? This had to be so in order for Christ to be the Savior and Redeemer of all people - whether male or female, Jew or Gentile. There is something else here that is not mentioned in the fall, the word, sin. Now it is mentioned by God to Cain concerning the anger of Cain towards his brother, Abel. Paul tells us that "through one man sin entered the world, and death through sin, and thus death spread to all men, because all sinned" (Romans 5:12). So in light of what Paul says to us, we must go back and re-examine the curse. The curse tells us that a disease was passed upon all mankind after Adam sinned, "For as in Adam all die, even so in Christ, all shall be made alive" (I Cor. 15:22). This disease is the sinful nature which passed upon all mankind. I can't think of a more radical transformation than to see the effects of sin. We get a glimpse of it prior to the flood, "So God looked upon the earth and indeed it was corrupt; for all flesh had corrupted their way on the earth" Genesis 6:12. The radical transformation that took place in the physical world was so much that Lamech named his son, Noah, for he hoped that this boy would give them comfort from the work and toil of their hands because of the ground which the Lord has cursed - Genesis 5:29. The other radical transformation that happened due to the fall is that Christ (the Seed of a woman) would have to leave the glory He had with the Father and become flesh so that we all could have the gift of eternal life which Adam and Eve lost in the garden. Paul puts it this way, "He chose us in Him before the foundation of the world, that we should be holy and without blame before Him in love, having predestined us to adoption as sons by Jesus Christ to Himself, according to the good pleasure of His will" - Ephesians 1: 4, 5, and "made Himself of no reputation, taking the form of a bondservant and coming in the likeness of men. And being found in appearance as a man, He humbled Himself and became obedient to the point of death, even the death of the cross" - Philippians 2:7, 8.
Could Jesus Die Even Without Sinning
I need to rebut BCS's view that Jesus would have experienced biological death at some point in his life because he was human, even though he had not sinned (see page 225). BCS is correct when they say that Jesus paid the true penalty for Adam's sin when He was cut off from fellowship and communion with God the Father. However, Jesus became sin who know no sin (2 Cor 5:21), thusly, He paid the price of both the Law and the curse put upon Adam - the double penalty: biological death and separation from His Father. For that matter Adam himself is a type of Christ (Romans 5:14). He not only died a biological death but he also faced separation from God as God banished him from the garden. So the second Adam had to face a biological death and to taste the eternal separation that we all deserved. We are not saved from biological death but from the second penalty - which is eternal separation from the Father. As Paul put it, " but has now been revealed by the appearing of our Saviour Jesus Christ who has abolished death and brought life and immortality to light through the gospel" - 2 Timothy 1:10. Christ did not come to abolish biological death but to bring to light that eternal death, eternal separation is now removed through Him.
Well, I have gone long again. Very difficult to adequately review this book in a short fashion. I did not get to how BCS views the early chapters of Genesis as biblical apocalyptic language rather than straight prose or historical narrative. An example of their thinking on this is page 274 where they state, "Many who clamor for a 'scientific' literal reading of Genesis forget that Genesis comes to us from the original authors through Moses the prophet". BCS suggests to us that since prophecy is in the early chapters of Genesis (such as 3:15) then that is a hint the creation account should be read according to a prophetic literary style. Due to the importance of this subject, I will do a Part 4 of this review in order to cover this ground.
Summary
1. When God promised not to send a flood on the earth to destroy all flesh, He must have been talking about a global flood not a local flood as there have been many large local floods on the earth after Noah.
2. BCS believes that biological death was here prior to the fall and that the curse was not earth - centered but man-centered. No definition of biological death is given by BCS. They accuse young-earth creationists of believing in hyper-evolution in order to explain how animals could have adapted to climate changes. However, young-earth creationists have always accepted micro-evolution - a word that BCS does not use.
3. BCS uses logic rather than clear Biblical texts to prove that death had to happen before the fall. They do not believe any radical physical transformations affected the earth after the fall. Yet, we have many Biblical texts which suggests the opposite. BCS claims that the word, "creation" in Romans 8:20-22 refers to God's covenant people. Yet, the literal meaning of the word and other texts would suggest that Paul is referring to the whole product of the creative act of the Creator.
4. There were radical transformations after the fall. The Bible even suggests transformations after the flood. The most severe transformation was God's plan to present the Christ in physical form to undo the damage that was done in the garden.
5. Jesus died to fulfill the Law but also to undo the curse given by God, not upon creation nor the animals, but the curse upon mankind. While the creation does groan for its redemption, Christians will not have to face the second penalty for sin. Adam was a type of Christ, in that he faced a double penalty: physical death and separation from God. Jesus had to die physically, who became sin, so that all of us would not have to face the second penalty - eternal separation from God.
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