He does address Exodus 20:11 in some detail. He describes what activity is being rested from (the creation of the temple), explaining that the word for “rest” here is “to cease the preceding activity”.

He then goes further and refers to Psalm 132:7-8 and 13-14, which describes the temple as the resting place. The terminology used in Ex 20:11, according to him, means transition into a condition of stability (“nuha”) in His resting place (“menuha”).

Walton’s bottom line is that “sabat” is the transition from building a functional temple into the condition of living in the temple and ruling and managing His kingdom “cosmos” from there.

In humans terms then, Walton proposes that the Sabbath is the day that we acknowledge and honor the Ruler, as Israel did.

1) Gen. 1:31 “And God saw all that He had made, and found it very good”.
Exod. 39:43 “And when Moses saw that they had performed all the tasks as the LORD had commanded, so they had done”.

2) Gen. 2:1 “The heaven and the earth were completed and all their array”.
Exod. 39:32 “Thus was completed all the work of the Tabernacle of the Tent of Meeting”.

3) Gen. 2:2 “God finished the work which He had been doing…”
Exod. 40:33 “When Moses had finished the work…”

4) Gen. 2:3 “And God blessed…”
Exod. 39:43 “And Moses blessed them…”

5) Gen. 2:3 “…and sanctified it…”
Exod. 40:9 “…and to sanctify it and all its furnishings…”

Having said that, this view, as interesting as it is, has no bearing on the age debate, and could be used in compliance with YEC, Day-age, or any other view. Does Walton address Exodus 20:11. I wonder how the “functional” creation view functions here. While we certainly want to acknowledge that Genesis was meant to be understood by early near easterners, we certainly don’t want to suggest anything other than Divine origin just for the purpose of trying to get science off of our backs.

Speaking if miracles, according to Darwinian evolution, time itself performs the miracles and yet they claim that their beliefs are not faith based!

Whenever I debate them and bring this up, they always run away.

Dawkins is a wimp.. A kindergarten kid with enough knowledge could bring him down. And he knows it!!

In the meantime, I’ll definitely be interested in ay nuggets that you wish to blog on.

The old testament prophets prophesied of the messiah who would take away all our sins, the lamb of God. Eye witnesses in the new testament saw and it was recorded of how Jesus Christ by the holy spirit was the messiah. The story of Jesus exorcising demons by the name of ‘legion’ is one of the many testimonies of his true identity as the demons recognised him as the son of God..’remember they were in heaven before they and their master lucifer were chased out’.

I come from the kikuyu tribe in Kenya who traditionally used to worship God whom they believed was the creator of the whole universe; by facing mount Kenya. In times of strife, they offered sacrifices of lambs without blemish to God and true enough, God always answered their prayers i.e for rain, children, peace etc. Not everyone did such sacrifices and those who did had to undergo a cleansing process and were even secluded from the rest of the community prior to offering such prayers and sacrifice for they believed God was holy. The lamb to be sacrificed was also well fed and put in it’s own enclosure.

Despite their very pious way of worship, the kikuyus embraced and indeed God must have quickly enlightned them to the fact that it’s only through His altimate sacrifice in the form of His son without the blemish of sin who is the only way to God.

Sacrifice and the shedding of blood even in the old testament was the only way of atoning for peoples sins. Jesus Christ is the final and the only justifying sacrifice before God. Oprah, we have all sinned and fallen short of the glory of God, we all need Jesus to cleanse us and make us right with God.

God is holy and man in his worldly sinful form can’t even see Him let alone be Him. By God’s grace and so much love, He created man in His own image. The closest we get to God is through Jesus Christ who is His own image. The closest we can get in experience is by receiving His Holy spirit who is our counsellor through accepting Jesus as our Lord and saviour. Oprah, seriously, man with all his weakness can’t be God.

God is jealous because of His great love for His children created in His own image. He is greatly offended when His children whom He has given a free will to obey or disobey Him put their faith, trust and believe in any other being or item which is also created by Him!. God father, God son and God holy spirit is everything unto Himself, the begining and the end. Jesus Christ who is God the son came so that we who believe in him will one day see God and have an everlasting life, a life of abundance; our bodies will by then be transformed to be like Jesus Christ himself.

This scripture says it all-
John 14:6 Jesus saith unto him, I am the way, the truth, and the life: no man comith unto the father, but by me.
Mathew 19:26 “With GOD all things are possible”
Thank you JESUS

He also does not quite go for the day-age creation theory, essentially saying that it also requires some exegetical manipulation. The end result is that he holds to a view where the days of creation are viewed as being analogous. The framework view is a subset of the analogy view.

He touches on a lot of the same issues that I have been struggling with, and although I don’t agree with everything he said, it did help me discover that there are some other views which are acceptable within a Scriptural framework, while also stimulating some further thoughts.

Thanks,
G -