The Bible, evolution, and Gay marriage…
Jan 28th, 2010 by ljkim
Here’s a question I’m sometimes asked: Are you a conservative or liberal Christian? My answer is “you tell me”: On the one hand I love this historical person of Jesus, and I believe that he is the miraculously born perfect human incarnation of God through whom the universe was created. I also believe that the Bible is not just a regular book, but that it was orchestrated by God. Not that God dictated it word for word, but that through divinely ordained events, and God encounters, God used regular fallible people to create an extraordinary infallible document of who He is. Saying this gets a whole bunch of people I know in a huff – but I’m always up for discussing and debating these things in person, as well as listening to what you have to say about this…
On the other hand, I think that Darwin’s evolutionary theory is probably true…
The miracle of God’s creation is that we all start off as little fishies fertilizing an egg, combining genetic matter and growing into a tiny creature living under water (so to speak) before being “born.” Starting from that kind of understanding of life, the idea of natural selection, an unguided mechanism subject to the same providential work of God as any historic event – seems right in line with how God works in the Bible. I’ve read Darwin’s Origin of Species, I’ve heard the arguments both for and against, and so based on the same line of reasoning that allows me to accept that the earth is round not flat, and revolves around the sun… I believe that evolutionary theory is true – but if I was wrong it wouldn’t shake my faith in anything. I don’t think a person get’s “saved” by believing the right thing about evolution (or believing the earth is not flat) – so it’s not a huge deal for me…
I also believe that in a country like ours, people should be able to decide who is and is not family. It’s not the government’s place to prohibit gay marriage any more than the government should stop me from treating you as my brother or sister… We should be free to determine who is and is not a member of our families – and I see no reason why the government should be able to veto our personal choices. And I don’t see how one could evoke Jesus’ teachings to support extending the government’s power in this way…
Then why do so many Christians think differently about these issues? We’re all influenced by our cultures… There were English Christians who defended slavery, and other European Christians who insisted that the world was flat – and both believed that disagreeing on these matters meant disagreeing with Scripture and Christianity.
Well it’s been a few centuries since those controversial issues have been settled, and scholars are agreed that it turns out there was never anything in Scripture to argue for a flat earth or the right-ness of the slave system… But at the time, the thinking of the world crept into the thinking of those Christians. It’s a constant battle to think for oneself, question assumptions, and really seek after the truth. That’s a struggle that I believe believers and non-believers have in common… Only Christians historically tend to err on the side of holding on too long to failed cultural beliefs – and secularists tend to err on the side of embracing new beliefs before they are fully proven.
Anyway, that’s what it means to be conservative (holding on to traditional beliefs) or liberal (free from traditional beliefs). So what do you call someone who wants to hold on to the old beliefs that are true – and be free to leave those that are not? You tell me.
Related posts: