William Lane Craig on Romans 9

I've been recently confronted with a number of debates about Sovereignty and free will. Willaim Lane Craig has this to say about Romans 9 and the corporate view of election, which essentially says election is not about God individually predestining some to salvation and others to condemnation, but God choosing a "people", those who are "in Christ". Craig writes:

"[L]et's talk about Paul's doctrine of election in Romans. I want to share with you a perspective on Paul's teaching that I think you'll find very illuminating and encouraging. Typically, as a result of Reformed theology, we have a tendency to read Paul as narrowing down the scope of God's election to the very select few, and those not so chosen can't complain if God in His sovereignty overlooks them. I think this is a fundamental misreading of the chapter which makes very little sense in the context of Paul's letter.

Misquoting Augustine Part 5

Having looked at Augustine’s view of Genesis from his “City of God”, it is clear Theistic Evolution advocates should not use Augustine’s “Literal Meaning of Genesis” to make that case because Augustine was fairly thoroughly committed to positions that are in direct opposition to their central premise.

I have my reasons for trusting the “plain meaning” of scripture where scripture seems to be plain, though I acknowledge not all in scripture is equally plain. There are many quotations from Augustine, Athanasius and others in the early church as well as the reformers, well prior to the “modernist/fundamentalist” controversy of the early 20^th century, that assert long held belief in the trustworthiness of scripture.

Having said that, I do not completely accept the Young Earth view in many details because I am not sure the text is entirely clear as to its meaning. I do not think the age of the earth is a critical issue and I think the length of a day in the creation week seems a fairly secondary concern, hardly central to the faith.

I am, however, sympathetic to the main concerns of YEC. Those concerns are

1) that the definition of science must not be limited to naturalism and

2) Christianity without the historical fall of Adam and Eve is more like a placebo than a medicine. I settle my own mind by focusing on a couple of key ideas.