Welcome to The Creator Revealed.
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I'm Tim Standish,
and I'm a scientist.
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I work at the
Geoscience Research Institute
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in Loma Linda, California.
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I am also a Christian.
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That means that I
believe the Bible,
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and I believe the
account of creation
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that's recorded in the Bible.
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Amen.
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And we have enjoyed
so much the knowledge
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that you have shared
with us during the series.
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This is something that,
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you know, when we
all encounter people
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who believe
differently than we do.
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But when you
encounter someone like that,
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how do you share
these beautiful evidences
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of the biblical creation?
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That is really a
very tough question.
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And it's one that obviously
I've struggled with a lot
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because I have many friends,
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and I've had
colleagues over the years
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who have very
different views about origins.
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But the first question
I think we need to address
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is why would we
bother to tell them.
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What's so important about this?
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So let's turn to the Bible
because it actually gives us
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the reason.
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This is Revelation 14:6 and 7,
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it's probably a
familiar text to many people.
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But I want you to
look at specifically
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what is telling believers to do.
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"Then I saw another angel
flying in the midst of heaven,
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having the everlasting gospel."
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So hey, this is important.
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This is the everlasting gospel
and what is to be done with it?
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It's "to be preached
to all those who dwell
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on the earth to every nation,
tribe, tongue, and people."
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Wow, that's
everyone, this is it.
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This is the one.
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I know that when I was young,
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I heard people talking about
the gospel and I'd asked them,
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"What is the gospel?"
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And usually, it was,
"Well, Jesus died on the cross.
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So, you know, we've
been saved from our sins,"
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and that is the
gospel without a doubt.
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But here, it's coming at it
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from a little bit
of a different angle.
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It's one that I as a scientist
can actually understand,
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hopefully, reasonably well.
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So I read this
text to this point
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and it's gotten
me quite excited.
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Okay, here it is.
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And this angel is
saying with a loud voice,
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"Fear God and give glory to Him,
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for the hour of His
judgment has come, and..."
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Oh, dear me, if
it's stopped there,
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I would be thinking,
"Ooh, that's pretty bad news.
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Judgment, I don't like that."
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But remember,
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we're talking about
God's judgment here.
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This is righteous judgment.
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This is not arbitrary judgment.
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God is not wanting to
come and destroy His creation.
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Actually, God's
judgment is the restoration
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of His creation.
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Amen.
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This is an amazing...
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this is fabulous, good news.
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And...
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And He judges in
favor of the saints.
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Precisely. Precisely.
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And it goes on,
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and it tells us this is
what we should be doing.
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It says, "Worship Him
who made heaven and earth,
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the sea and the
springs of water."
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So this is it.
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This is the everlasting
gospel that we as Christians,
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all of us, have been called
to preach to all the world,
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and as we can see,
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at its very
core, is the creation.
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Amen.
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Worship of the
Creator God who is coming back
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to do a new creation here.
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It's fabulous, fabulous news.
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To me, understanding the Creator
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that God is it
helps us understand...
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I mean, if we
understand his character,
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we understand creation better.
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But if we understand creation,
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we understand
his character better
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because His invisible attributes
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are shown in the
things that He has created.
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The creation is such a
powerfully beautiful thing.
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Who wouldn't want to share it?
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And who wouldn't want
to worship a God like that.
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I know, it's amazing.
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So what I've got here are
six things that we can do.
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Okay.
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That I believe will be
helpful as we seek to share
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this wonderful
truth with the world.
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Number one,
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only ever speak on
subjects you know more about
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than the person
you wish to convince.
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In other words...
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In other words, Shelley Quinn,
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don't go to a
geologist with his PhD,
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who is an atheist
and try to explain
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everything to him
when he knows more than I.
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Exactly. Okay.
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Exactly.
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What we have, all
of us, is a testimony.
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And that
testimony is unquestionable,
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that is your experience.
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So you certainly have that.
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But also, you know, for example,
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if you're a pastor
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or you're a
student of the Bible,
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it is highly probable
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that you know
more about the Bible
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than the person that
you're sharing it with.
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You know, be a
source of information
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that that person is
not already expert in.
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Be helpful in that way.
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Don't come in and
try to pretend that
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you know more about
their area of specialty
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than they do.
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That's simply not going to work.
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It's a temptation
sometimes, but don't do that.
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You will lose, then
you will not honor Christ.
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Now I want to give
this quotation here,
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from Charles Darwin,
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as an example of something
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that anybody
should be able to spot.
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Hey, this is...
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there are areas
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where you may
not be a scientist.
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But as you see
statements like this,
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all Christians should be
able to recognize what it is.
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So let me read it
and tell you about it.
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So Darwin wrote,
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"I would give absolutely nothing
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for the theory
of Natural Selection
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if it requires
miraculous additions
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at any one stage of descent."
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And...
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So Darwin would not approve
of progressive creationism,
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the idea that God created
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or he put the
materials out there,
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then he let something
developed and he did a miracle
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and he let something develop?
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No. No, he doesn't.
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He is a materialist.
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Can you see
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that it is his
materialistic philosophy,
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this is a religious belief
that Darwin is expressing here,
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we should be
able to recognize that
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this is not science.
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I mean, if we observe a miracle,
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we should be able to
document that as scientists.
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Why?
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Why would we not be...
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Who?
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Where does this
arbitrary rule come from?
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That is philosophy or religion.
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Okay. It's not science.
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So we should be able
to tell the difference
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at least to some degree,
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perhaps not 100% of the time.
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But this is an example.
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So as we talk
about these things,
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keep an eye out for that.
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Don't try to
argue about the science
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that you
probably know less about.
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But certainly you can
spot the religion in there.
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Okay.
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Because we are religious people.
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We believe the
Bible, we're Christians.
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A second recommendation
that I would make,
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get your facts straight
and then stick with them.
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Stick with the facts.
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Don't go in with some
half-baked crazy theory.
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And hyperbole.
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Exactly. Yeah.
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If you hear somebody who,
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you know, sounds
like they're making
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really dramatic
claims and things,
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check, double-check,
triple-check those,
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make sure that's really
true because if you go in there
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and you have your facts wrong,
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I'm afraid you're going
to lose your credibility.
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And that loses your ability
to share Christ with people.
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You know, the Bible
talks about this sort of thing.
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Lying lips, even
if it's unintentional,
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"Lying lips are an
abomination to the Lord,
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but those who deal
truthfully are His delight."
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So these are things
that the Bible actually
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lays out for us as well.
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Better to keep
silent than to say something
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that turns out to not be true.
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Number three, avoid speculation.
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You know, the
world is full of people
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who are speculating
about everything all the time.
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It seems to be
the hobby of choice.
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That's right.
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We're Christians.
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We like facts.
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We like reality.
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We don't have to make up
stories and speculative things.
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We don't have to have
imaginary extra universes
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and stuff like that.
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When you...
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You know, I see people
doing it on a regular basis.
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And generally speaking,
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these speculations
are the filling gaps
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where there are questions.
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Some questions actually
we do not have answers to.
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We don't know everything,
neither does anybody else.
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If somebody is acting
like they know everything,
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they are simply
ignorant themselves
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or they're trying to
trade on your ignorance.
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Makes me think Proverbs 4:18,
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"But the path of the
righteous grows brighter
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and brighter
until the coming day."
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So we're in a
continual learning process,
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and to act like
we have all the truth
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or know everything is wrong.
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That would be absolutely wrong.
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Here, Paul writes about this,
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"Let no one deceive
you with empty words,
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for because of these
things the wrath of God
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comes upon the
sons of disobedience."
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We should not be
deceitful, or speculative,
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or use empty words
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to try to convince other people,
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it's no better going either way.
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Number four, seek to understand
what's holding the person back
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from believing.
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It's almost never the science.
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So let me let me
just point this out.
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Scientists are human beings.
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Here's a wonderful quote,
this is from a philosopher,
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I believe.
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It's not recent,
but still it's true.
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Human nature doesn't change.
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He wrote, "It is a
form of scientific idolatry
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supposing that
scientists are entirely free
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from the passions
that direct men's actions,
00:11:05.83\00:11:08.83
and we should have
little patience with it."
00:11:08.86\00:11:11.73
Scientists are human.
00:11:11.77\00:11:13.37
So let's look at
an example of this
00:11:13.40\00:11:16.97
in Charles Darwin's writing.
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This is in his
autobiography, he writes,
00:11:18.94\00:11:22.68
"I can indeed
hardly see how anyone ought
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to wish Christianity to be true,
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for if so the plain language
of the text seems to show
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that the men who do not believe,
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and this would
include my Father,
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Brother and
almost all my friends,
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will be everlasting punished.
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And this is a
damnable doctrine."
00:11:41.93\00:11:45.57
And, you know, I
have to agree with him
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with the final
sentence at least,
00:11:48.57\00:11:51.41
that teaching and it is in
air and I grew up believing that
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we were going to
be burned for forever.
00:11:57.78\00:12:00.78
And it wasn't until I
did deep Bible study on this
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and realized the
truth, God isn't like that.
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God is not like that.
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We have a beautiful,
wonderful God to share.
00:12:09.39\00:12:11.49
Not a God who is wanting
to throw us into hell of fire
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and burn us there for eternity.
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And that's pretty
clear in the scriptures.
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Darwin was
taught that falsehood,
00:12:18.20\00:12:21.84
but it put fear into him.
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And I will tell you
that I encounter people
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all the time who throw
out this very argument.
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Absolutely.
00:12:29.54\00:12:30.88
It's not logical.
Almost every atheist.
00:12:30.91\00:12:33.01
It is not logical.
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Yeah. Okay.
00:12:34.58\00:12:35.92
If that God exists, man,
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you better sit
up and take notice.
00:12:37.32\00:12:39.12
But this is not
the God of the Bible.
00:12:39.15\00:12:42.02
Amen. Amen.
00:12:42.06\00:12:44.23
Number five, do not
argue to show that you're right
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and the other person is wrong.
00:12:46.36\00:12:47.70
I mean, come on...
00:12:47.73\00:12:50.53
Christianity is
about love and humility.
00:12:50.57\00:12:54.64
And we're trying
to save these people,
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not make them look foolish.
00:12:56.30\00:12:57.91
And I chose to illustrate this.
00:12:57.94\00:12:59.71
Ephesians 4:14 and15,
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"We should no
longer be children,
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tossed to and
fro and carried about
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with every wind of doctrine,
by the trickery of men,
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in the cunning craftiness
of deceitful plotting,
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but, speaking the truth in love,
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may grow up in
all things into Him
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who is the head, Christ."
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This is what...
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you know, this
is what we're trying
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to do as Christians,
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we're not trying to
make ourselves look smarter
00:13:27.44\00:13:29.00
or more correct
than everyone else.
00:13:29.04\00:13:31.17
And finally, I encourage people
to share what is beautiful
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about the creation
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and encourage
contemplation of this,
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rather than
fixating on questions
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for which there is no answer.
00:13:42.42\00:13:43.89
There are plenty
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of unanswered
questions out there.
00:13:45.29\00:13:47.19
We'll find
answers to many of them.
00:13:47.22\00:13:49.19
We'll have to
wait until Jesus comes.
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Yes. Yes, we do.
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But there are profound,
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beautiful truths in
scripture that we have to share.
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And those truths are evident
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in the Bible as well.
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That's what we have to share.
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Let's share that glorious truth.
00:14:08.18\00:14:10.58
Great advice. Great advice.
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And as Paul told Timothy,
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when someone disagrees with you,
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you must gently
instruct in hopes
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that God will give
them a change of heart.
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Please stay tuned.
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We'll be back in just a
moment with a special guest.
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