Wednesday, May 27, 2009

Creation? Evolution? What does it matter, after all?

I may reveal myself as the totally uneducated and uninformed Christian that I am as I divulge the following information here… but I feel compelled to post this just on the off chance there might possibly be other people out there who know as little about the subject of evolution versus creation as I did.

Or maybe I might possibly offend you if you hold views other than those which are presented here.

But I’m willing to take that chance. Because I wish someone else had told me this stuff years ago.

So here goes.

I grew up in the government public school system and though I was raised with a basic Christian upbringing, I never really took the biblical account of creation as the whole truth. But I never really believed that we evolved from some cosmic sludge fifty bazillion years ago, either. As I went through school, I clearly recall the evolutionary model being presented as pure fact – just minus a few key missing links that the text books and scientists were sure to find sooner or later. Every museum I went to, ever book I read, every kids movie I watched, every dinosaur picture book I ever flipped through… it was all there in black and white… billions and billions of years ago, the earth was formed. Somehow, some way… we’re not quite sure how, maybe Big Bang, maybe something else. But that’s not important. But we do KNOW that the earth is gazillions of years old.

And as a Christian (sort of – but not quite scripturally raised) I just knew it wasn’t quite right. But it also seemed a bit farfetched to think that the earth was really created just 6000 years ago in six short days. I mean, the sun wasn’t created until day 4, so maybe a “day” could mean just about anything. And after all, scientists had PROVEN that the rocks on the earth were really, really old. So something wasn’t quite right.

And the whole world wide flood thing? Who knows? I mean maybe the Bible wasn’t LYING per se, but it could be figurative – or it could mean the whole local area of the world that was populated at that time in history.

So fast forward a decade or two and here I am, a full adult Christ follower since 2005, home educating mother of now four children. In my own path as an adult, Christ has revealed to me that the Bible is the truth. Period. I know I do not understand every word of it, and I know that there are parts that might be left out or hidden as part of God’s plan. But I do not believe the scripture is fallible. I just can’t buy that He’d leave behind his one and only physical connection to the generations of people to come after His time on earth and let it get so tainted that His people could be lost for the rest of eternity. It just is TRUE.

But I’ve still been stuck in the same old mindset. Is there a “gap” somewhere in the creation account? What happened between the time when God created Adam and Eve and the moment they ate of the fruit of knowledge of good and evil? Maybe billions of years did pass before they sinned.

But what it really has come down to for me over the past 4 years is that it didn’t matter. I don’t know it all. God does. And that’s OK with me. If He wants me to know just how and when He created everything on earth, He’d tell me when I get to heaven. I’m really OK with that. After all, science is science, and though the Bible must be true, I’m neither a biblical scholar nor a geologist. So I’ll just leave the “knowledge” to others and I’ll stick with faith. And when my kids ask, I can just tell them that no one really knows, even scientists, and it’s all just a guess. But the Bible does say it happened this way, so we can just go with that.

So here is the part where you may be thinking, “Man, what a dummy you are, Benny. Have you never picked up a creation science book or article? Do really not know how this whole thing works?” But bear with me here. This is going somewhere…

So I went to this great Christian homeschooling conference a month or so back and really got so much out of it just in hearing the speakers. But I also stumbled across the Answers in Genesis booth and spoke with a very fascinating man named Mike Riddle. He’s a scientist and a math whiz and a whole long list of other things… but in a nutshell, he’s a very smart and well educated guy.

And the nice Mr. Riddle has a very lovely pack of DVD’s that I ended up buying. I do not normally just buy things like that, but somehow it just felt like something our home needed. I’m not exactly sure what the name of the DVD series is called, and each of the six DVD’s has a different name. But basically it’s a whole set of DVD’s with tons of scientific support and evidence for God’s creation – and a whole lot of discrepancies and falsehoods brought forth in regards to the evolutionary model.

Did you catch that? There are actually major holes in the theory of evolution. MAJOR HOLES.

OK. So I could go on for pages and pages here. I mean there are six DVD’s all an hour+ long just in the one series I purchased. But I have been just awed and amazed at the amount of true scientific evidence supporting both the six day creation about 6000 years ago, as well as the Genesis flood, which would have been about 4000 years ago. Fossil formation. Faulty dating methods. Sea fossils found on mountain tops. Observable evidence from recent earthquakes, floods and volcanic eruptions that make in just days geological changes once thought to have taken thousands or millions of years. The list goes on and on.

My faith has been strengthened by just the two movies I’ve watched so far. And more than that… my husband, who I might have mentioned is not actually a believer, has really been enjoying the series. It has not proven anything to him, but it has really opened his eyes to some major untruths that have been presented as solid fact, and so far he has not been able to argue any of the points Mr. Riddle has made supporting scientific evidence for the Creation account. My Man has even said that if a created earth 6000 years ago were proven beyond doubt, that he would probably be a full believer. That evidence alone would be enough to make the whole rest of the Bible just be true for him.

That is the power that scientific evidence can hold to so many out there who have doubts about Christ and Yahweh the creator. And the DVD’s make so many good points about how Christians who show that same lack of understanding and faith in the creation account that I had can often undermine the faith, because people who do not yet believe see us as inconsistent… if we can’t even prove and support what our Bible says about how the earth was made, why and how can we believe any of it?

So anyway. This is the DVD set that I bought. And it was worth every penny of the $39.99 I spent on it – and I’ve only watched a third of the set so far! I just feel so happy to know that I do not have to disprove science to show that my God did make the world and that His Word is true. True science actually supports God’s creation. And I just think that’s so cool! And honestly, I’m a little peeved at the textbooks and schools that present everything else as hard, solid fact… when it’s really just as faith based as creation… they just have faith in time and chance, whereas we have Faith in a one true Creator of everything and everyone. I think I’ll take my chances on that Faith, thank-you-very-much. ;o)

7 comments:

Mom Of E's said...

Great post, Benny! I'm curious if this DVD set addresses any dinosaur issues?? Elle asked us about how dinosaurs fit into all this, and we had no idea what to say. We went to our (vacancy) pastor, and he basically told us that no one really knows. That answer just didn't sit well with Elle. It's like you said.....science seems to claim to have all the answers. And since science seems to be able to explain everything, I think Elle is just naturally drawn to it. I'm very intrigued to hear that the science is actually behind the truths stated in the bible. I think I might have to check this out.......maybe they'll be at the homeschooling conference I'm going to next week!

Benny said...

Try going to www.answersingenesis.org and looking at their info. They offer a lot of free information online, plus a ton of resources available for purchase. I know there are quite a few resources on dinosaurs.

I hope you come to some compelling conclusions that help you, Elle and your pastor!

Benny

mary grace said...

Mind if I link to your post? You could have a lovely little discussion on your hands here.

Benny said...

Sure Mary Grace. Don't mind at all. I would enjoy such a discussion.

Benny

Anonymous said...

Thank you for your honesty in this post. I LOVE Answers in Genesis. To anyone out there who hasn't checked out their site, you should. I was a new Christian when I began homeschooling and their info has been a tremendous help in teaching my kids as well as myself. They have tons of DVDs, books, articles and they even publish a magazine called Answers. My favorite part of their site is that they respond (quickly!) to every new "discovery" in the science world regarding evolution, big bang, etc. and refute it with evidence for creation. My husband is also an unbeliever and their DVDs are one thing he is open to watching. They have really opened his eyes to the problems with evolution. Oh, about being angry with the textbook people, watch the movie Expelled with Ben Stein about how the "scientific" community completes ignores all the evidence for creation and intelligent design. It's shocking.
Amanda

Benny said...

Thank you Amanda for your comment. I haven't yet seen that movie but I have wanted to. I was pretty amazed and excited to see so many mistakes in the "science" behind evolution in the Mike Riddle DVD's. I just want to share it with the whole world!

I think Satan really has made a big dent in the followers of Christ by planting that seed of doubt with the whole evolution thing. Obviously God is bigger than that and will win out in the end. But it is weird to see it for what it is... one of the great Deceiver's powerful lies.

Benny

Nameless Cynic said...

Well, aside from the dishonesty in AiG's site, let's consider a few things.

If the Bible is literally true, there is no allegory and the whole thing is, as has been specified many times, "breathed out by God," please consider the following basic geography issue.

The Biblical cosmos consists of a vault of heaven (the Hebrew shamayim, or "firmament"), which contains the sun, moon and stars (Gen 1:14-17). These heavenly bodies move across the stationary earth (Psalms 19:1-7), while the firmament rests on pillars (sometimes mountains — Job 26:11) which are rooted in the earth.

Under the earth is the underworld (or Sheol), the land of the dead (Numbers 16:28-34, I Samuel 28:13-15, Isaiah 14:9-11; Ecclesiastes 9:10). The earth, usually pictured as a disc or circle (Job 26:10), supported either on water (Psalms 24:2) or in empty space (Job 26:7). Although it's usually spoken of as a flat disc, there are mentions of the "ends of the earth" (Deuteronomy 13:8, 28:64; Isaiah 5:26; Psalms 135:7) and the "four corners of the earth" (Isaiah 11:12, Ezekiel 7:2) which refer to distant lands, but could just as easily indicate that the earth is rectangular or square. Or at least a parallelogram.

So, having failed basic geography, where do we go? Is the Bible an inerrant source of all truth, or are parts of it perhaps poetic interpretations of life? And if it's poetry, who's to decide which parts are reality, and which parts are allegory?

I'm just curious.