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A Call to Unity

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Today (April 30, 2023) the board of the Creation Theology Society finalized a statement calling for unity and civility in our interactions with one another as fellow young age creationists.[1] We ask that you read the statement and consider becoming a signatory by requesting that we add your name to the list of signatories at the end of the document. You can access the statement here, or by means of the link in the banner at the top of the website page, or by going to the statement by means of the drop-down menu under About at the top of the home page.

Our founding documents call for us to be a society committed to biblically based theology and irenic engagement with fellow members and all other persons pursuing the study of the events recorded in Genesis 1–11. It is our hope that many individuals will commit themselves to the principles enunciated in “A Call to Unity.” Our prayer is that it will encourage us to model a Christlike behavior in all of our interactions formally and informally, personally and publicly.

Endnotes:

[1] We are using “age” in place of “earth” because we believe the universe is also young, not just the earth.

Dr. John D. Morris (1946–2023)

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Former president of the Institute for Creation Research (1996–2020) John David Morris entered his Savior’s presence on January 29, 2023 at the age of 76. Dr. Morris championed biblical young-earth creation and followed ably in the footsteps of his father, Henry M. Morris, in his love for the Lord, His inerrant Word, biblical creationism, and the Institute for Creation Research.

Dr. Morris earned a B.S. in Civil Engineering from Virginia Tech University in 1969, then his M.S. in 1977 and Ph.D. in 1980 from the University of Oklahoma. His doctoral studies were in the field of Geological Engineering. He joined ICR in 1984.

Again and again Dr. Morris returned to Mt. Ararat in search of any remaining evidence for Noah’s ark. During one of those expeditions he was struck by lightning and nearly died. In the creation community he has become our own Indiana Jones. His life and career overlapped with those of the two most highly regarded founders of the modern creation science movement, his father and John C. Whitcomb.

John D. Morris together with John C. Whitcomb and Henry M. Morris

The ICR website lists a number of books written by John D. Morris well worth reading and recommending to others. Here is a brief listing:

  • The Global Flood
  • The Young Earth
  • The Fossil Record
  • Searching for Noah’s Ark
  • Noah’s Ark: Adventures on Ararat

Dr. Morris leaves a legacy for all of us in the young-earth creationist community of a life of Christian humility, devotion to Scripture, irenic discourse among ourselves, and a determined dedication to investigate the evidence in the Bible and the world. May we each do our part to advance that same cause with the same humble, irenic, and gracious spirit.

A video of the March 3 memorial service for Dr. Morris held at First Baptist Church, Dallas, TX is available on Vimeo. Watch it and praise God for what the Lord has accomplished through him. Keep on praying for his wife Dalta and the whole family as they continue on without him.

The Christ Child and the Creator

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Amazing! Wonderful! Mind blowing! Stupendous! Marvelous! No adjective in the English language seems to do the event justice. At the heart of the Christmas message we behold the Creator of everything making His appearance as an infant in Bethlehem. He who created the earth and fashioned its layers of stone was laid within a stone manger normally used for providing food and water for livestock.

The Christ child known as Immanuel (“God with us”; Matthew 1:23 and Isaiah 7:14) created the heavens with all their glorious array. He who is beautiful (Isaiah 4:2) provides beauty in the heavens so that we are without excuse when we ignore their revelation concerning His Godhood and power (Romans 1:18–32).

These truths are part of the wonder of Christmas. For that reason we look beyond all other gifts to the greatest gift of all, Jesus the Messiah and Savior. 

Enjoy a Christ-centered and Christ-glorifying Christmas season. May we all continue to stand in absolute awe of the miracle of the First Advent of our Savior. Our Creator came to this sin-cursed earth to bring salvation to fallen human beings. He who possesses the greatest power came in the form of a servant (Philippians 2:5–11) to accomplish what He alone could bring about — a new creation: “Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation. The old is passed away; behold the new has come” (2 Corinthians 5:17 ESV). 

Fall Symposium Video

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On the evening of December 8 CTS hosted its first Online Fall Symposium with twenty-one CTS members logging in. The topic for our symposium was “The Biblical Flood in the Literature of the Dead Sea Scrolls” led by our President, Dr. Jeremy Lyon. Wipf and Stock published Jeremy’s Qumran Interpretation of the Genesis Flood in 2015. If you have an interest in this topic, this book provides very helpful translations, descriptions, analyses, and discussions of four scrolls: the Genesis Apocryphon (1QapGen), a Genesis pesher (4Q252), a fragment of an admonition based on the Flood (4Q370), and a fragment of a paraphrase of Genesis and Exodus (4Q422).

The Fall 2022 Online Symposium video can be accessed via this link. In this way, those of you who were unable to join us can still hear the presentation and the subsequent Q&A.

Watch for announcements regarding future online symposia. We plan to offer at least two each year — one in the Fall and one in the Spring. The symposia provide only members the privilege of live-stream watching and participation. Every active member receives a Zoom invitation ahead of time so they can join the symposium. Post-symposium access to the videos are available to anyone through the CTS website.

Tax Exempt Status

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Praise the Lord! The IRS granted tax exempt status to the Creation Theology Society under Internal Revenue Code (IRC) 501(c)(3). That means that donors can deduct contributions they make to CTS. It also means that CTS is qualified to receive tax deductible bequests, devises, transfers, or gifts. We filed for this exemption as a non-profit organization on August 3 — and we received a positive response in less than one month! The IRS even made the CTS effective date of exemption August 4, 2020, covering our entire history as an organization.

Thank you for praying for this important process and approval. We invite you to visit our Donate page by clicking on the appropriate link in the running head at the top of all our website pages, or by going to Donate in the drop-down menu under Home. Or, just click on this link. 

JCTS Issue 1 in Mail

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Issue 1 of the Journal of the Creation Theology Society has been printed and is in the mail to all our members! Click this link to go to the Journal page for the latest information and for a free download of a sample article.

Soon we will announce a Members Only page where members can access the digital version.

JCTS First Issue Published

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The premier issue of the Journal of the Creation Theology Society has been published! For a first issue, this one is packed! — over 200 pages! Thanks to the labors of our Senior Editor Steve Boyd and his staff (Lee Anderson and Doug Smith) CTS members will soon be receiving their hard copy of JCTS in the mail (snail mail).

In the near future we will establish a members-only page on our website so a digital copy can be viewed. Stay tuned for that future announcement, right here on the CTS blog.

In addition, we will soon be making it possible for anyone to purchase a digital copy of CTSJ articles or the full issue online.

Update on CTS Journal

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As we enter the Passion Week and look to Resurrection Sunday, we have the Journal of the Creation Society (JCTS) in typesetting stage with a goal to having it off to the printer as soon as possible. Keep an eye out for future announcements. This inaugural issue almost fills a full-sized book and will make a significant contribution to biblical creation studies, especially with its interdisciplinary nature.

Call for Papers: Origins Conference 2022

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Now that Origins Conference 2021 has wrapped up, we invite all CTS members to look forward to Origins Conference 2022. For everyone who attended the recent conference in person or online, the various presentations stir our enthusiasm for research and writing in the field of creation science. What topic would you like to pursue with a view to presenting a paper for the general sessions of the next Origins Conference? We have set no specific theme for the general sessions, so you have a great deal of freedom in choice of topic.  Any topics dealing with the text, philology, hermeneutics, theology, and apologetics of Genesis 1–11 and any other texts dealing with primeval history will be gladly accepted for consideration.

To submit your proposal, follow Guidelines for a Paper Proposal (click on link to download this one-page aid).

Deadline for Proposal: September 1, 2021

Deadline for Paper Submission: January 31, 2022

Submit to: Dr. Steven Boyd at sboyd@creationtheologysociety.org

Why so early? Since CTS papers that go through the full approval process will be published in our Journal of the Creation Theology Society, we must have time for

  1. our consideration of your proposal and response to you,
  2. your research and writing,
  3. our submitting your paper for peer review (minimum of 3 peer reviewers),
  4. peer reviewers’ return of their comments,
  5. your completion of necessary revisions, and
  6. our approval for your final paper to be presented and published.

CTS’s inaugural issue of the Journal of the Creation Theology Society (JCTS) will feature this year’s Interdisciplinary Session papers and edited transcription of the panel discussion. We will also publish Origins Conference 2021 general session abstracts from our sister societies (Creation Biology Society and Creation Geology Society). The journal plans to include CTS papers from general sessions only after those papers have undergone full peer review and editing procedures. Simply presenting a paper in the general session does not guarantee publication in the journal.  

We will publish our inaugural volume in both hard and digital copies around year’s end or early in 2022. Watch the website for its announcement.