About Duane Caldwell

Duane has served in many different capacities including pastor, elder, project coordinator and flight instructor. He is an ordained minister of the gospel of Jesus Christ by the Evangelical Church Alliance and holds a Master of Divinity from Trinity Evangelical Divinity School, a Trinity International University school and a BS in Aeronautics from Parks College, St. Louis University.

Do Ancient Chronologies Challenge the Bible? Part 1: The Date of the Exodus

Moses parting the Red Sea so the children of Israel could cross during the Exodus

Editor’s note: This article began as a demonstration of errors in Egyptian chronology, but to get there it was necessary to  first lay down foundational information concerning the exodus. Which pushed back the Egyptian info to part 2. What follows is the foundational info on the exodus. 

A common way to try to discount Biblical truth is to to challenge the event based upon the age. The challenge comes either because 1. Scientist think the Biblical account is too young (e.g. age of the earth/universe) 2. Scientist can’t find evidence of the event at the time period they think it happened (e.g. The Exodus) or 3. Scientists believe they have found evidence that disproves the Biblical time line (e.g. ancient artifacts like the Dendera Zodiak or the below Egyptian pyramids.) 

This is ironic because out of all the things science can do, one thing it cannot do is measure age directly.  Age – the amount of time passed – is not something you can measure with instruments after the fact.   Yet it is one thing scientists tend to get the most adamant about. But when scientists claim to be measuring the age, what they’re really doing is measuring a property of something that usually varies regularly with time, such as the number of half lives of a radioactive element, or the number or rings in a tree trunk. But strictly speaking, they are not measuring age. And more importantly – the assumptions they make when attempting to determine the age are often wrong, throwing the estimated age off.[1]

Continue Reading

A tale of two stories – a Christmas day meditation

The Nativity (Detail) by Franz von Rohden (19th century)

A Christmas Day Meditation

The word “story” is a rather ambiguous word.  It’s ambiguous in that the word itself does not tell you whether the story is true or not. Thus we’ve come up with phrases to help us with that.  When the story is true, we use phrases like ” the true story of…” or   ” (story name), a true story”,  or “the real story of” – to differentiate true stories from stories full of common misconceptions.

We also have ways identifying stories that are not true. When we tell “fairy stories” we’re telling a story we’re acknowledging to be a fanciful, made up fictional string of events.  Or we may end an explanation with “… that’s my story and I’m sticking to it.”  Most people understand this as a tacit admission that parts or all of the story might not true, but the teller of the story is unwilling to tell “the truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth” as you would in a court of law. Continue Reading

Detecting Design and Entropy on a Beach

We had the pleasure in vacationing in Jamaica this past summer. Of course we made it to the beach where I waded in and sat, enjoying the warm waters. As I looked around at the sand and rocks beneath the water I found a rock which  appeared to have the impressions of a leaf embedded in it. With the possibility of having found a fossil I was, of course motivated to look for more. I found another one which appeared to have impressions of some type in it. I made a mental note to find someone knowledgeable about fossils to take a look at these to confirm whether these are what I thought they are.

As I continued to look for rocks in the warm water I came across an item I didn’t expect to find. It was perfectly square, about 1/8″ inch thick, flat on the bottom with beveled edges on top. It was blue with white speckles on top with a shiny coat covering the top, and solid white on the bottom. Continue Reading

Taking Pride in Creation: Genesis: Paradise Lost | Movie Review

 

Genesis: Paradise Lost movie

Since the limited run  of  Genesis: Paradise Lost is almost over (there’s a final encore on December 11, 2017), you may be wondering why another review. We’ll get to that in a moment. But first let me note that a number of even handed reviews have already been written. Here are 3 of them: Continue Reading

Is the Big Bang a Faithful and True Account?

Martin Luther and his 95 theses in front of a depiction of the Big Bang

Today we will apply the advice of apologist Sean McDowell. McDowell, son of “Evidence that Demands a Verdict” apologist Josh McDowell and an author[1] and college professor in his own right, suggests:

With his PhD and years of experience, starting no doubt as a child at the foot of his apologist father, many Christians turn to McDowell for advice on witnessing. And what he provides above is solid advice. So here’s the question: is using the Big Bang as a witnessing tool to back up the Biblical account being faithful to Christ? Let me answer as Jesus often did: with a question. Would you use the details of the back story of Superman to support the miraculous powers of Jesus? Such a story (a work of fiction I would remind you) might go something like this: Continue Reading

Are You Ashamed to Be A Creationist?

Are you ashamed to be called a “creationist”? If you’re taking cues from certain Intelligent Design (ID) proponents, you might feel like the label “creationist” is a label to avoid at all costs. Here’s why that’s both the wrong approach and dishonoring to God. Continue Reading

The Nashville Statement and the boy who cried wolf

Google “Nashville Statement” (or Bing, or DuckDuckGo – whatever your search engine of choice is).  After a listing for the site, (sometimes even before it) among the first entries you’ll find are a number of articles very critical of the statement – some complete with name calling.  Produced by the CBMW (Council on Biblical Manhood and Womanhood)  on biblical sexuality, the document called the Nashville Statement was released in 2017 and is a follow up to the 1987 Danvers statement on male and female distinctions, roles, and inherent equality before God. But in this age of gender confusion and so called gay “marriage” being legalized in country after country[1] – a statement on Biblical gender identity was clearly needed. Continue Reading

Multiverse thinking: though magical doesn’t exclude God’s existence – it proves it

The multiverse – a product of magical thinking.

Many physicists  have begun to cloak themselves in what they hope is the  protective garment of the theory of the multiverse to protect them from the deluge of evidence that the universe is finely tuned.  As I point out in my previous article, that the universe is finely tuned is not a question:

“We have a lot of really, really strange coincidences, and all of these coincidences are such that they make life possible,” [physicist Andrei] Linde says.


Physicists don’t like coincidences. They like even less the notion that life is somehow central to the universe, and yet recent discoveries are forcing them to confront that very idea.  …

 

Call it a fluke, a mystery, a miracle. Or call it the biggest problem in physics. Short of invoking a benevolent creator, many physicists see only one possible explanation: Our universe may be but one of perhaps infinitely many universes in an inconceivably vast multi­verse.[1]

Continue Reading

Total Eclipse: The Sign and the Wonder

Total Eclipse March 20, 2015

We’re all aware of the total eclipse of the sun on August 21st, 2017. But perhaps you’re not aware why so many are excited:

Image archive

For us Americans, this will be the first total eclipse of the sun viewable in the states since 1979. So we don’t have to fly half way around the world  to see a total eclipse as astronomer Guillermo Gonzalez did in 1995, flying to Northern India to see the eclipse on October 24th of that year. Continue Reading