The pressure is on from all directions, to separate faith from science. Just recently, I had a rather heated debate with a close friend about evolution, and he asked why I didn’t just forget about science and concentrate on spiritual matters in my essays. He believes that in twenty years, science will have proven evolution and I will have been shown to be an imbecile, by believing the Bible regarding origins. He believes that Genesis 1 is poetry and was never meant to taken literally. I, on the other hand, believe that my God created all science and it is therefore inseparable from faith, reality and truth.
So what is ‘science’? If you take an average between various dictionaries, I think a reasonable definition would be: “the acquisition of knowledge through the conduct of observable, testable, repeatable experiments.” Anything that cannot be demonstrated through repeatable experimentation is not science, but rather speculative conjecture, deductive inference, an extrapolation of the available data, an interpretation of the gathered information. Indemonstrable so-called ‘science’ is very much subjective, depending on your leanings. It is much closer to ‘religion’ than scientists would wish to acknowledge.
Evolution cannot be demonstrated or tested. There is no example anywhere in nature, the geological strata, the fossil record, the science laboratory, or anywhere else, of lifeless chemicals organizing themselves into the incredibly complex and information-filled building blocks of life. Neither is there any example of life becoming more complex through the addition of new genetic information, coding for new features, hopefully making it more fit to survive than the earlier version. There is no example of one ‘kind’ of animal changing into another kind. Scientists are sorely remiss in telling us that these are ‘facts’, because they are no more than an interpretation of the data, strongly influenced by the belief system of the interpreters. In the absence of demonstrable examples of genuine evolution (gain of information), in sheer desperation, they point to speciation or genetic adaptation (loss of information) as evidence. The express intention of the ‘scientific’ community is to be able to explain the universe through purely mechanical and molecular interactions, and not “allow a divine foot in the door”. They are determined to prove life, as we know it today, is the result of the millions of years of death and suffering supposedly recorded in the fossil record.
What can be demonstrated is that any examples scientists will readily give us of ‘evolution in action’, when we examine each on a molecular level, we find lossesof genetic information rather than gains. Personally, I consider it deceitful practice, if they are fully aware of what they are doing. Throughout nature we find genetic kinds reproducing after their kind, just as the Bible tells us. And throughout nature we find everything deteriorating genetically as a result of sin (devolving), just like the Bible tells us. Scientists tell us the universe is twelve billion years old; the Bible tells us it is six thousand years old. Both are interpretations of the available data, depending on your world-view. Neither position can be ‘scientifically’ proven. The primary reason for the belief in billions of years is that evolution intrinsically requires massive time-spans to explain its mathematical improbability. The primary reason for belief in six-thousand years, is that the first book of the Bible tells us that God created Adam at the beginning and a genealogical calculation of the life-spans of subsequent generations comes up with a figure of six thousand.
The primary motivations behind the two opposing schools of thought could well be summarized as “atheism vs belief in God”, although many in the Christian faith are now swayed by the extensive brainwashing throughout the Western world that evolution is an indisputable ‘fact’.
What is at stake here is not science and its ‘integrity’. What is really on the chopping board is whether God exists, and whether mankind is answerable to Him. The first few books of the Bible are the absolute foundation of the Christian faith. They explain why we were created in the first place and why the world is in the mess it’s in. They explain the reason we need salvation and why Jesus needed to have His blood shed to save us. They explain the reason for monogamous relationships, for moral behaviour, for forgiveness. They explain the fossil record, genetic deterioration, distribution of world population, the Middle-East conflict. My mate told me Genesis was poetry and the literal Word of God starts at Exodus. But even the Ten Commandments in Exodus declare a six-day creation, and even give the reason why God took so long:
"Remember the Sabbath day, to keep it holy. Six days you shall labor and do all your work, but the seventh day is the Sabbath of the LORD your God. In it you shall do no work: you, nor your son, nor your daughter, nor your male servant, nor your female servant, nor your cattle, nor the stranger who is within your gates. For in six days the LORD made the heavens and the earth, the sea, and all that is in them, and rested the seventh day. Therefore the LORD blessed the Sabbath day and hallowed it. " (Exodus 20:8-11)
So where does God start telling the truth? If the first chapter of the Bible is myth or poetry, not to be taken literally, all of the genealogies from Adam to Noah, through King David to Jesus Himself automatically become myth. And once we have taken it that far, we might as well throw out the entire Old Testament, certainly its books of history and those of prophecy regarding the coming Messiah and end-times. Should we only hold onto the books of ‘poetry’, much of which was penned by Solomon, the king who ended up worshipping other gods (1 Kings 11:4)? If the lineage of Jesus is a myth, what possible claim to fame would He have? Was He really the ‘second Adam’ (1 Corinthians 15:22,45)? Was He really qualified to substitute for the punishment incurred by a mythical first ‘Adam’? Jesus Himself believed in the literal six-day creation: What on earth are we doing if we don’t believe Him, Who is the reason for our faith? How can we even call ourselves ‘Christians’ if we don’t support His worldview? Jesus said:
"But from the beginning of the creation, God ‘made them male and female." (Mark 10:6).
"For if you believed Moses, you would believe Me; for he wrote about Me. But if you do not believe his writings, how will you believe My words?" (John 5:46-47)
Can you see what is at stake? I’ll be totally honest with you, I told my mate that if in twenty years time evolution becomes a ‘proven fact’, my faith would crumble. He felt that showed my faith was weak and fragile. On the contrary, my faith is firmly planted on the Rock of my Salvation and God’s Word.
Maybe you now can see behind the ‘scientific’ motivations for radio-metric methods of dating rocks or carbon-dating tissue, and identify the hidden agendas. Maybe you now have a new appreciation as to why the age of the earth is so critical. The whole argument could be settled, if only we could determine how long the earth has been around.
If it is billions of years, the whole of the Gospel message crumbles. If it is six thousand years, God can no longer be denied.
DATING THE EARTH
I have just finished reading “In Six Days – Why 50 scientists choose to believe in creation” edited by John F Ashton. It was an eye opener. Much of the information in this essay comes from that book and other literature available from the “Creation on the Web” ministry.
Few of us are probably aware that all so-called ‘dating methods’ are based on an array of assumptions. Scientists assume how much of a particular isotope (parent) must have been in a rock to start off with, measure how much is left and how much ‘daughter’ substance is there, and hence determine a date. The method also assumes the rate of decay has always been what it is today, and assumes a figure for the parent/daughter ratio in the original sample upon solidification.
For instance, Uranium 238 breaks down to lead and helium during a half-life of 4.5 billion years. If they measure the amount of lead in a rock also containing Uranium 238, they might derive an age of (say) three million years. They don’t tell you the assumptions they’ve made. They don’t tell you that if they measure the level of helium locked in the same rock, they come up with an age of 5000 years! They don’t tell you that before they started testing, they were told an ‘expected age’, and if the test results don’t measure up, the tests are thrown out.
Recent 30 year old lava flows have been dated as being thousands, sometimes millions of years old. Very often the ‘expected date’ is determined by fossils found inside, rather than letting the tests stand on their own merit. And the age of the fossils is determined by speculation on evolutionary preconceptions. The whole thing is an outstanding example of ‘circular reasoning’ with no logical foundation.
Carbon-14 dating deals with the remnant of the heaviest carbon atom, 14C, in whatever once living material we want to test. 14C is produced by cosmic rays bombarding atoms of Nitrogen-14 in the atmosphere. 14C is radioactive and has a half-life of just under 6000 years, breaking down back to nitrogen. The air we breathe contains both common carbon atoms 12C (not radioactive) and 14C, and these are absorbed into our tissue. So when living things die, the common carbon remains constant, while the radioactive form decreases. Hence a date is determined based on the remnant ratio. Anything older than 50,000 years should not have any detectable level of Carbon-14 left. So the dating is based, not on what is there, but on what isn’t! And that again involves a wide range of assumptions not mentioned when the ‘facts’ are published, things like the ratio of carbon-14 to carbon-12 in the atmosphere at the time of death; like the carbon take-up rate of different tissues; like the strength of the earth’s magnetic field at the time (which would affect the level of cosmic rays entering the atmosphere).
EVIDENCE FOR A YOUNG EARTH
There are numerous indicators of a ‘young’ earth:
•The amount of helium in the air indicates around six thousand years.
•The amount of salt in the sea indicates around six thousand years.
•The amount of mud on the ocean floor supports around six thousand years.
•The level of land erosion supports six thousand years (All of the world’s land masses should disappear over 10,000 years at the current rate of erosion).
•The thickness of dust on the moon surface indicates around six thousand years.
•The number of people on this planet supports six thousand years, based on standard rates of population growth. (If we had been here much more than 6000 years, multiple billions of people would be hanging off the sides of cliffs trying to find accommodation, and bulldozers shifting skeletons would have a full-time job making room for them!).
•The number of comets in the night sky supports six thousand years.
•The rate of decay of the earth’s magnetic field supports six thousand years.
•Fossils on the highest mountain tops support a world-wide flood 4,500 years ago.
•Many examples are found where petrified trees cross the rock strata of ‘thousands of years’, with no explanation as to how the tree would not rot away while it was slowly being buried.
We have been wrongly led to believe many other things:
•They used to tell us it took millions of years to make a diamond, now they can make them in days in the lab.
•They used to tell us it took thousands of years to make a stalagmite. Now they have massive ones formed in thirty years or less.
•They told us it took millions of years to carve out the Grand Canyon, yet similar (but smaller) canyons have been carved out in a matter of days! All it takes is lots of water!
•They told us it takes thousands of years for substances to petrify (turn to stone), yet numerous examples of petrifaction of modern materials are now available for all to see.
LAWS OF THERMODYNAMICS
Seeing we’re talking ‘science’, let’s get really scientific! The first law of thermodynamics says that energy can neither be created nor destroyed. Mass is just another way of expressing energy (E=mc2). Basically it means that in any closed system, the total amount of energy remains constant. The second law of thermodynamics says that in such a closed system the amount of energy available to do work will always decrease until it reaches a state of equilibrium, and no energy is left to perform work. Basically it means the level of order in any system will always degenerate into disorder (entropy).
Together, these two laws mean that a cup of coffee will always cool until it reaches the temperature of the room it is in, never gain heat from the air. A running engine will wear out rather than improve. An iron stake in the ground will rust rather than turn into stainless steel. Uranium 238 will breakdown into lead and helium, but lead and helium will never turn into uranium. And all lifeless chemicals will inevitably turn into more simple ones and can never organize themselves to become the incredibly complex polymers of life. Information, such as the instructions in the genetic code, is order which will breakdown until there is no useful information left.
Scientifically, the laws of thermodynamics say evolution is impossible.
MATHEMATICAL PROBABILITY
Mathematically, John Baumgardner, in his essay in the above mentioned book “In Six Days”, says science estimates there are 1080 atoms in the Universe (10 followed by 80 zeros); he gives a generous maximum of 1012 for the average number of atomic interactions per second per atom; and, if evolutionists have their way, thirty billion years have 1018 seconds; giving a total of 10110 possible atomic interactions in the entire history of the universe. To get a chance line up of a basic useful sequence of 200 amino acids, (the building blocks of life), leading to the formation of a single, relatively short protein would be in the order of 20100(100 possible amino acid sites and 20 possible amino acids) or 10130 possible trials. This is 100 billion, billion times the upper limit for possible atomic interactions in the history of the universe! Forget the fact that at least 1000 of these proteins are needed for even the simplest of life forms, and 100,000 to make a human. Forget that they have to be somehow isolated into purely left-handed chirality, an essential requirement for living tissue.
Mathematically, the odds of life arising spontaneously out of a lifeless soup might as well be 0.
ORIGIN
Even the ‘Big Bang’ theory is no more than speculation. For evolution to be even remotely plausible, enormous time spans are required, as demonstrated above, just to accommodate the sheer odds against it happening. In the 1998 version of the Encyclopedia Britannica, the Big Bang is claimed to have occurred at least 10 billion years ago. Today 30 billion years is considered more ‘scientifically’ feasible, and we are already heading towards 40. The Big Bang model is not an explosion (contrary to popular perception) that occurred in a single spot (singularity) somewhere in an infinite vacuum. The model actually calls for instantaneous generation of equal quantities of matter and anti-matter all over the universe simultaneously, something very difficult to come to grips with intellectually.
The huge problem facing science is the mysterious absence of all the anti-matter.
STARLIGHT
One of the things that really puzzled me for years, and that seemed to strongly favour the long-ages view, was light traveling from the stars having taken an undeniably long time to reach the earth. For years creationists struggled to explain away this apparent anomaly and came up with numerous improbable suggestions.
Russell Humphreys in his book “Starlight and Time”, (Master Books), has come up with what is probably the most plausible theory yet as to how this phenomenon could correlate with six-day creation six thousand years ago. Einstein’s General Theory of Relativity allows for the existence of both Black holes and White holes and for the passage of time being altered by gravity. A black hole contains massive amounts of compressed matter resulting in gravity so great, not even light can escape. And peculiar things happen to time in those circumstances. Black holes suck in any new matter that happens to stray too close to their ‘event horizon’, and the swallowing of this vanishing matter results in an ever increasing gravitational pull. A white hole is a black hole running in reverse. Nothing can enter, not even light. And any matter already in this hole is ejected with unimaginable force and speed, until it is fully spent and ceases to exist. During such eruption, billions of light years can pass outside the hole, while only hours pass inside.
If creation started in a white hole, this theory would explain much. It differs from the ‘big bang’ theory in that it calls for boundaries to an expanding universe. And it requires the earth to be roughly in the centre. Einstein’s formulae allow both Humphreys’ theory and the ‘Big Bang’ to be possible. Humphreys’ theory makes Earth special, being located near the centre, implying divine intent. The Big Bang places earth anywhere other than the centre, implying purely random processes. The night sky displays roughly equal distribution of matter in the universe, as observed from anywhere on the globe. This can only be explained either by Earth being near the centre, or by an unlimited, unbounded universe, going on forever.
I like Humphreys’ theory. It goes a long way towards satisfying curious minds like my own. However, personally, I tend to lean towards the view that, at the time of creation, God wasn’t bound by the natural laws He was in the process of making up. He merely spoke, and it was so. Even since He ceased creating, He has often seen fit to by-pass natural laws: the burning bush, water from a rock in the desert, water into wine, a few loaves and fishes into enough food for thousands, healing of the deaf, the blind and the crippled, raising the dead; do all of these miracles have a technical explanation that can satisfy scientists? I have no problem with God operating in the supernatural and doing things that have no ‘scientific’ explanation.
SUMMARY
The ‘theory of Evolution’, and its essential requirement of billions of years, is as much a supposition as the ‘theory of Creation’. Neither can be reasonably described as ‘scientific’, because neither can be scientifically demonstrated. However, there are sinister motivations moving the authors of anti-God theories. And it is unfortunate that so many well-meaning Christians feel pressured to compromise the Word of God in order to accommodate the deceitful assertions of those authors.
God asks Job:
"Where were you when I laid the foundations of the earth?" (Job 38:4)
He is asking us the same question. He has gone to great lengths to tell us how long He took, because it has great meaning in the Big Picture of the Gospel message. He could have done it in one micro-second. Instead He dragged it out over six days, because He was setting a pattern for our own behaviour. We too are to set apart a day for rest. A day for reflection. A day for worship of the One Who made it all.
I guess where science is concerned, I look at the whole thing from both perspectives - knowledge as well as spiritual. I freely admit that when the two clash, I give the Creator of knowledge precedence.
With the theory of evolution, some of the big spiritual objections are:
1. The fossil record, if science is to be believed, indicates death did not enter the world through one man's sin.
2. If Adam was not a real historical person, all the genealogies in the Bible become a myth.
3. The fourth commandment, to keep the Sabbath holy, becomes a joke.
4. If the genealogies are a myth, the entire Bible becomes 'sus' and doubt is thrown on the very validity of Christ's claim to be the Messiah.
5. If the Bible is not to be trusted on either origins, genealogy, history or source of sin and death, the entire gospel message has no foundation and we can all make up our own 'God' to suit our own preferences and purposes. (Which is exactly what is happening today.)
6. If God insists we worship only Him, surely it is unreasonable for Him to expect us speculate about who He is, on the basis of our fallible reasoning, imagination and intuition. This is a recipe for chaos and He is not the author of confusion (1 Corinthians 14:33). The observable evidence shows it causes untold division, because, in practice, everyone tends to invent a different god.
7. There truly is a war going on for the minds and hearts of our children. The education system and the media tell them that faith and science cannot stand together in unity. Faith is something for the weak minded, and doesn’t have to make sense. Our kids read the Word, see the conflict, and then believe the academia and reject the Bible.
Science constantly changes its mind, as new data enters the equation. The Word of God never changes.
CONCLUSION
I can’t prove the age of the earth any more than the scientists can. But what really get up my nose is the plethora of brazen claims throughout the media of‘scientific facts’, that are neither scientific nor fact. These claims are brainwashing our kids, the next generation, and destroying their chances of salvation by subtly hinting the Bible cannot be trusted. And by implication, neither can God be trusted. To me, both scientifically and scripturally, the Biblical explanation of how we got to be here makes a lot more sense than the speculative imaginings of atheistic scientists. Should we take our spiritual advice from atheists acting on the hidden agenda of proving God doesn’t exist? I thank the Lord there are still many Bible-believing scientists around, who haven’t succumbed to the pressure to compromise His word.
When I look at the fossil record, I see masses of dead creatures buried in a massive catastrophic event, just as described in Genesis. When I ask myself which came first, the chicken or the egg, I recognize that the whole created chicken, accompanied by a created rooster, had to come first! When I look at the incredible irreducible complexity of life, I see a magnificent Designer. When I observe the sky and nature, the mind-blowing intricacy of the multitude of factors making life on this planet possible, I worship the Creator. And when I look at the human condition, and the unnecessary pain we inflict on one another, I see the result of sin and the curse of death.
I bow down, filled with awe in recognition of the omnipotence and omniscience of the divine Creator, Who bothered to tell us how and why He took as long as six days to put the universe together.
And I shudder in concern for those of us who would argue with Him, and tell Him He’s a liar.