Amen Beryl. And contrary to people ..that doesn't mean we have our heads stuck in the sand and "igoring truth". Instead our focus is on the truth in God's word and taking him at His word. Does that mean we have arrived? No, but we have someone that has "arrived" and that is the God of the Bible and we can trust him explicitly, unlike any human.

And that's a good thing. However, some people insist on reading the Bible literally. Then what are we left with?

Some portions of the Bible are to be read literally and some is obviously prophetic (such as there are no creatures like the beasts in Daniel's vision)The week of creation can't be "prophetic" as or the Sabbath has no significance. If the days were prophetic then the plants and animals existed and grew for thousands of years with no sun.

Or there could be some other reason the story is told the way it is.

That's exactly what the Jehovah's Witnesses believe, because they believe that each "day" of creation was actually thousands of years long. They base that on their belief that the seventh day had no end, and therefore, from the JW's viewpoint, God was still resting over 4,000 years after the time of Adam.

I have asked Jehovah's Witnesses about the point you make regarding plants. They believe that the sun and moon were out in space long before the first "day." It is just that no light from them was reaching the earth at that point. Light came to be visible on the first day. But the sun still could not be seen because of the thick cloud-layers. So on the first day there was diffused light, but the source of the light became visible on the fourth day.

There seems to be some support for this view in the original language, because the word for "light" on the first day is different than the word "light" used on the fourth.

Or maybe God was the source of light. Actually the me the biggest proof that it was a literal 7 days is simply because the Bible says so but mainly because if not, the 7th day Sabbath wouldn't make any sense...as it would be thousands of years long..and no one could live if they couldn't work for thousands of years and went to church every day for that time.

I agree.

I see lots of problems with the idea that each day was a long period of time. It would mean, for instance, that the trees and flowers would have to exist for thousands of years without insects and birds, as well as much light. Also, if the seventh day was a long period of time, that would mean Adam lived an incredibly long time. It seems to me that it makes thing worse and not better when we start adding long periods of time to the creation week.

This is why I argue that no denomination that as a group accepts the truth of the 4th commandment - has also promoted evolutionism as fact.

in Christ,

Bob

And again I ask: What if the SDA church decided to do something different?

It would disprove my claim if the SDA church decided that the 4th commandment was literal and binding and yet the timeline it specifies for creation week is in error.

The resulting self-conflicted innexplicable position would be an option I never considered possible for them.

(Remember the Sabbath day - SIX DAYS you shall labor... for in SIX DAYS the Lord MADE..) seems impossible to "miss" for the SDA denomination.

Holding to one half while flatly denying the second is a cognative dissonant position that I doubt any denomination would ever sign up for which is why all those denominations embracing Darwinism today - first had to cross the bridge of editing and downsizing (flatly ignoring in most cases) the 4th commandment.

in Christ,

Bob