49 Don,

The point of my mentioning this is when Cheryl assumes a young earth in some of her arguments, she goes where people who believe in an old earth do not go in their interpretation/understanding.

I try hard not to assume anything. I use the inspired words and the inspired grammar to understand the account in its full context. I try not to disregard any part of the account because I believe that it was inspired as it was written for a reason. The fact that God created animals after the creation of Adam does not pose any problems for me. Nor does the fact that God created the seeds first and that these seeds didn’t sprout until after man was created, does not cause me a problem at all since I do not have any assumed thoughts that animals were created thousands or millions of years before man was. If I had those assumptions, I would have to reject the inspired words of scripture and make them a parable or some kind of non-literal rambling of myths written by people who did not know the truth of creation. If I myself believed that there were millions of years between the animals and Adam and even between Adam and Eve, I would likely chuck most of the foundation of Genesis as unnecessary, meaningless (or at least meaningful only in the eye of the beholder to whatever each individual wanted the myths to mean). But since I come to the text without having to force the text to conform to either young earth or old earth, I can let the text speak for itself. If the text “speaks” old earth (i.e. millions of years of death and decay before Adam was created) then I am willing to hear the other side. Each side needs to be tested by the Word of God to see if there is any conflict with other scriptures or within the passage itself. The correct view should have no conflicts. The view that is incorrect will have problems with the inspired words, inspired grammar, the complete context and other witnesses from the scripture. I cannot in all good conscience see myself standing before God and telling him that I didn’t believe Genesis as it was written.

Don, I would like to understand you and your view. However I cannot pinpoint your assumptions until you answer my question about how you judge between what is historical and what is “poetry”? I would really like you to consider answering these questions that I posed earlier:

So what is it about the three accounts that makes you take one or two accounts or parts of each account as a piece of poetry and other parts or accounts as the facts of creation? What other witness do you use that interprets the “poetry” of Genesis? And do you see poetry as the actual facts of creation put into a certain flow of words while still presenting the actual truth, or is poetry actually a myth or a story that isn’t true but which presents some spiritual value outside of factual truth? I am wondering if the word “poetry” is meaning something different to each of us.