Hey again Bill,
I just wanted to talk about a few of things in your post here. First of all, I don't see you as anything except a fellow brother in Christ, and fellow Truth-seeker, who wants to be led by the Spirit in all things. I'm the same way. I'm not trying to win an argument with you, or trick you into conceding something you don't agree with. If I'm trying to push an "agenda," I'm not aware of it. If I am, I'm here to be shown I'm wrong, so I can get on with the business of pursuing truth. I continuously submit all of my beliefs to harsh criticism, because I don't want to believe something that isn't true. I respect you as a brother in Christ, I want to learn from your experience, and from how the Spirit has guided you. If I want to discuss something that you've said, I'd appreciate it if you give me the benefit of the doubt that I want a legitimate discussion. If you do, I think you'd be surprised about how much we actually agree on.
Again, I don't personally need to, or try to, reconcile every current scientific theory with scripture. I hope I wouldn't attempt to have you do something that I don't even do myself.
When I was in university, there was one Christian working in the science department. Once I got to know him, he shared his testimony with me, and said that he became a Christian because of science. He believed that once he'd confronted some of his key preconceptions, he realised many possibilities for the interpretation of certain scientific observations that eventually caused him to see a creator God as a legitimate, and likely, explanation for what has been observed about the world. My point was not that we should try to reconcile every scientific theory with the Bible. Instead, my point is that we shouldn't be surprised if they are reconciled. God created the universe. Science is just observing the universe. The problem happens when our preconceptions influence the observation process (the experiment design) or the interpretation of the recorded observations (developing the theory).
When I say "interpretation," I think I'm talking about something different than you think I am. Interpretation is just the process of finding meaning. Like, when you see a stop sign, you determine that it's not just a red, flat piece of metal: it has a meaning, and it means that you need to stop your vehicle in front of it. This is interpretation.
So when I say I "interpret" scripture, what I mean is that I try to understand it. Ideally, my interpretive process will be 100% Spirit-led. I hope you can see that when I talk about interpretation, I'm talking about humbly submitting to the Spirit's teaching. If you don't want to use the word "interpret," another way of saying what I said is, we should be aware that our preconceptions can get in the way of actually submitting 100% to the leadership of the Spirit when we read the Bible. Confronting our preconceptions, then, should be an important part of our lives of Christians, and will lead us to a more accurate, increasingly Spirit-led understanding of scripture. The main reason I'm here on these forums is to confront my preconceptions and learn from my Christians brothers and sisters, all of whom are seeking the Spirit's guidance as they read the Bible.