What About Evolution?

What about evolution?

"The more statistically improbable a thing is, the less can we believe that it just

happened by blind chance. Superficially the obvious alternative to chance is

an intelligent Designer."

Dr. Richard Dawkins (Department of Zoology, Oxford University, UK)

Proverbs says, “As a man thinks in his heart so is he.” (Proverbs 23:7) What you think about your life and its beginnings has a vast and profound effect on you and what you decide to do with your life. If you evolved from some primordial slime and have wriggled your way to college, it really does not matter what you do with your life. After all, you are only educated slime mold anyway.

On the other hand, if you are the product of a creative, omnipotent God who has designed you for his glory and purposes, then everything changes. It does matter how you live and what you do with the threescore and ten that you have been allotted.

Let’s look at what the Bible teaches at the very beginning. “In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth.” Gen 1:1 (NIV) The Bible is clear: “In the beginning, God!” not, “In the beginning, hydrogen.” This universe has its origin in the mind of God, who has a grand purpose for this creation. When you consider the statistical probability of life evolving by chance random processes, even the laws of statistics say it is way beyond impossible.

Our attempt in this discussion is not to examine all the evidence of science and see if it all agrees with the Bible; rather, we want to see what the Biblical material says and then based on that make the conclusions that Scripture makes. We will not study what current science tells us to believe, because all of what science tells us can only be partial knowledge because science is the tool of imperfect man to view their world through imperfect lenses. The Bible tells us that this world and this universe is now under a curse and man in his fallen condition will not see things clearly. The conclusions that man reaches can be extremely biased against God and His truth, so we will seek to understand what the Scriptures teach and then look at the world and see if the evidence supports the Biblical picture.

If we were to put our faith in what science tells us we would never be able to speak with confidence, because everything in science is only partial knowledge at best. Science is constantly changing due to new information. All the evidence given at the Scope’s Trial in 1925 to support evolution is now considered completely outdated because of new discoveries. If we adapt our understanding of the Bible by what science says, we will be outdated in a few short years. In the words of Jesus, “I tell you the truth, until heaven and earth disappear, not the smallest letter, not the least stroke of a pen, will by any means disappear from the Law until everything is accomplished.” Matt 5:18 (NIV)

For evolution to be true, several things must be substantiated. Among these is the idea of the universe being billions of years old. If you do not have billions of years, you cannot have evolution as the evolutionists demand. You must have a huge fossil record that gives compelling evidence for evolution to be established. You must have evidence of ongoing upwardly progressing evolution. You must have evidence somewhere of information being added to the genetic code of living organisms.

These are just a few of pieces of the puzzle that must be existent for anyone to claim evolution can even exist as a theory. And yet, when the evidence is pooled together you have exactly the opposite. As each piece of evidence is uncovered, the evidence confirms what the Biblical record indicates.

Because this is not intended to be a detailed accounting of the evolutionary model, let us examine the Biblical material and see what the Bible teaches about this topic. When we first open the Bible, we see the very first verse contradicts the teaching of evolution. “In the beginning, God created.” (Genesis 1:1) According to the principles observed in Information Science, there has never been any new information or observation added to the genetic code since the beginning.

All information must have a personal communicator for the information to make any sense. If you are given a bag of 26 letters and asked to draw out three letters until you get a meaningful word, and after several attempts you draw out the letters BAT, what do you have? You might be tempted to answer, “bat.” But that is assuming someone told you what these symbols were. If you were not familiar with the English alphabet, you would not know what you had. The code would only have meaning to those who had the explanation of the code. Without a personal agent communicating the meaning of the code you would not have anything. According to Information Science principles, you cannot have any meaning without a personal agent behind it. This is exactly what the Scriptures support. In the beginning God, a personal agent, communicated to the universe through His creative and personal involvement. The evidence for the creation account is firmly established at the very first verse of Genesis chapter one, verse one.

What about the days in Genesis chapter one? Are these days literal twenty-four hour days or are they something else? Now, remember, we are going to let the Scripture tell us what these days mean, not something outside of Scripture. This is always a good principle of studying the Bible. The Bible has the ability to tell us what each passage means all by itself. By comparing Scripture with Scripture, we learn that the word “Day” in Genesis 1 means a literal twenty-four hour period. You may ask how we can know that. Thanks for asking!

To know what a passage means we turn to other places in the Bible where the same word is used and we also consider the context in which it is used. Concerning Genesis chapter one, we see a very interesting pattern emerge:

And there was evening, and there was morning--the first day. Gen 1:5 (NIV)

And there was evening, and there was morning--the second day. Gen 1:8 (NIV)

And there was evening, and there was morning--the third day. Gen 1:13 (NIV)

And there was evening, and there was morning--the fourth day. Gen 1:19 (NIV)

And there was evening, and there was morning--the fifth day. Gen 1:23 (NIV)

And there was evening, and there was morning--the sixth day. Gen 1:31 (NIV)

Whenever the phrase ‘evening and morning’ is used outside of Genesis 1 without the word day (38 times), it always means an ordinary day—no exception. Whenever the words ‘evening’ and ‘morning’ are used individually with the word day (in fact 23 times each) outside of Genesis 1, the word day always means an ordinary day. Whenever the word ‘night’ is used with the word day (52 times outside of Genesis 1) the word day always means an ordinary day. In other words, whenever the word day is used with a number, or with the words evening or morning, or with the word night, or whenever the phrase ‘evening and morning’ is used, outside of Genesis 1, the Hebrew word for day always means an ordinary day, or the phrase evening morning means an ordinary day.

When you look carefully at Genesis 1, you’ll notice that the first time the word day is used, it is qualified with the words night, evening, morning, and number. And for each of the other times the word day is used for the six days of Creation, we see it used with a number and the words evening or morning. In other words, the contextual usage of the word day in Genesis 1 makes it obvious that it must be interpreted as an ordinary day.¹

Now if these really are twenty-four hour days, then we have a lot of rethinking to do. But let’s suppose for study purposes that we let the Bible tell us these are literal twenty-four hour days. Then we go to the world around us and see what we find. If the world is only 6,000 or so years old then perhaps the rest of the Bible is true as well. Is there a record of a global flood and a dispersion of the races from one common ancestor? Is there compelling evidence of a very young earth?

As I have studied the evidence, I have found compelling reasons to believe the Biblical account of creation and its history over the evolutionary model. Time and space do not allow me to go any further but I suggest you visit two very good websites for further study. The websites are answersingenesis.org and icr.org. Isn’t it nice to know that you are not a primordial slime mold, but you do have a grand purpose for which you were created and this world is not the end but only the beginning.

Now go out and live like you were meant to live, not as an animal but as a human made in the image of God.

Small Group Discussion Questions:

Have you ever been accused of behaving like a monkey? How many times?

Do you view the Bible as a book that speaks with authority on matters of Science and history and anthropology, etc.? Why? Why not?

How has this discussion changed the way you view life?

Do you have any other questions concerning evolution and the Bible?

Consider looking up answersingenesis.org. Perhaps note the next Creation Conference they are conducting nearby, and plan to attend it. Better yet, see if you can bring an Answers In Genesis Conference to your campus.