Celebrating Birthdays

During my drive into work this morning, NPR radio noted today is the 200th anniversary of the birthday of America’s most famous president, Abraham Lincoln. Happy birthday, Mr. President!

Upon arriving at work, my laptop showed 2 blog feeds received overnight. One wished Charles Darwin a happy birthday. The other reminded me to exalt my Creator God all year long rather than celebrate a false, anti-biblical, misguided person now residing in Hell.

I like the second feed better. It fits my worldview. It celebrates the Man who loves me unconditionally rather than an as-yet-unproved theory.

Evolution does remain unproved, you know. The gaps in evidence supporting evolution grow larger every year and scientists who once supported evolution are now turning to a creationist view of how earth began and was populated with animals, plants, and man. All within the span of a week. Check out Persuaded by the Evidence.

Speaking of a week, during this one I’ve been reading volumes 1 and 2 of a 4-volume series, Evolution: The Grand Experiment. Written by Dr. Carl Werner who’s spent the last 20+ years investigating evolution on a grand scale, the books are an amazing collection of interviews with scientists around the world, hundreds upon hundreds of photos of fossils both preserved and living, comparisons of animal and plant life during the dinosaur era and the Triassic, Jurassic and Cretaceous rock layers with similar animals and plants today.

Having traveled 3 continents and more than 100,000 miles, Dr. Werner concludes at the end of volume 2, titled Living Fossils, there is much more evidence for a biblical creation as described in the book of Genesis than for evolution with its gaps in fossil records and the fact that proteins, which are essential for life to exist, do not reproduce naturally. How then, could single-cell organisms “evolve” into complex animal, plant and life forms in the 21st century.

Thought-provoking, indeed.

2009: The Year of Darwin, part 4

[Today's post is the final part of an article by Brian Young with the Creation Instruction Association. To order copies of Darwin's Demise, Darwin's Enigma or Darwin's Plantation, please visit New Leaf Publishing Group at http://nlpg.com and search "Darwin."]

As usual, what we see with evolution is an interpretation of the facts, not the facts themselves. The same information can be interpreted with Biblical authority and makes more sense when all is said and done. An example from the Galapogos Islands is the marine and land iguanas. Marine iguanas have traits that allow them to conserve body heat so that when they get into the cold waters they don’t die. An evolutionist looks at this and says, “see, evolution is happening and the iguanas that live on land have evolved into sea creatures.” Not at all. Land iguanas also have the ability to conserve heat, it just isn’t as finely tuned. However, the marine iguanas have salt glands to get rid of salt from the salt water. Yes, and so does the land iguana, just not as finely tuned. Likewise, the marine iguanas have a flattened tail to help them swim. True, but the giant land iguanas have it, too! Both have the same traits, just one is more developed than the other just as a long-haired dog is better developed to live in cold climates than a short-haired one. These traits were simply created by God and they can be turned on or off by environmental factors, leaving the iguanas as iguanas and dogs as dogs, just as different species within the same kind of animal.

Darwin's Demise

Today we see natural selection taking place; however, it really has nothing to do with evolution as taught today. If there is a short-legged sheep within the flock, who is going to get it when the wolf comes? Shorty is history, isn’t he? This is natural selection. Naturally, the weaker ones will be selected out to keep the species strong. One might call it God’s quality control within the animal kingdom. However, this will never make the sheep flock turn into cow, will it? No, yet this is what evolutionists would like you to believe, that by naturally selecting out traits one eventually can reach increased complexity.

The problem is that even though we have observed natural selection taking place on many occasions, it never changes the individual animal, it only changes what percentage of the population has a certain trait. For example, observing finches at the Galapogos Islands for 30 years has shown that when wet seasons produced plent of vegetation, both young and old finches had plenty of food and both survived. However, when dry seasons came and food disappeared, the younger or small-beaked finches declined in population. Today these birds are still finches and suggest that natural selection doesn’t have anything to do with changing a dinosaur into a bird like evolution would teach. Instead, the Bible teaches that there were bird kinds and dinosaur kinds and through natural pre-programmed information being selected or rejected, we can get a variety of dinosaurs from the same kind of created dinosaur and a variety of birds from the same kind of bird, but that’s it. The Bible’s predicitons hold true to science while Darwin’s predictions have failed.

Darwin's Enigma

Darwin realized that the fossils were a problem for his theory. To explain the gaps in the fossil record he said that the fossils they had were too imperfect or incomplete and that new transitional ones would surely be found. After 150 years, how has his prediction stood up? We have failed to find any transitions that are not easily refuted. The fact is that there have only been a few places in Asia and South America where any new and unusual fossils have been found.

If evolution were true, we should be consistently and continually finding new fossil species, but the opposite is the case. Even in Asia and South America the new species being found are lessening all the time. We must also realize that Archaeopteryx, which was first found shortly after Origin was published, is still being held as one of the best evidences for missing links. All of this despite the fact that many evolutionists today say it is nothing but a perching bird. We have discussed this bird in other newsletters on our website, but, suffice it to say that since Darwin, nothing new of any significance at all has been found in the fossil record, and what has been found is only interpretative, not empirical, science.

Darwin's Plantation

In essence, the reason Darwin was so popular was because he lived at a time when the world had compromised on God’s Word. For the most part, many in the church were beginning to believe in an old earth (based on Lyell’s book, Principles of Geology) and they were already looking for an explanation of why new species of animals could be found. In a culture that believed in fixed species when the evidence was suggesting otherwise, people were ready to grab onto anything that could explain the apparent contradiction. The problem was, people weren’t looking to the Bible for their answers, so Darwin’s book filled the void that everyone was looking for. I suggest that there are many today who are continuing to search out the meaning of life and science, but have come up empty-handed because they refuse to humble themselves, repent and acknowledge God as their Creator. Therefore, as many celebrate evolution in 2009, they must ask themselves if their idol and his beliefs have truly withstood the logical conclusion as seen from true observational science. If they are honest with themselves, they will have to answer “No.” For all those searching, I can tell you where the answers will be found. In the Holy Scriptures alone! As Paul warned, “Timothy, keep that which is committed to thy trust, avoiding profane and vain babblings, and opposition of science falsely so called: Which some professing have erred concerning the faith. Grace be with thee. Amen.” (1 Tim 6:20-21).

Anyone needing more information on this topic or having a need for a speaker to come and share further answers from the Bible about today’s questions in science and morality can contact this ministry at http://www.creationinstruction.org or call (402) 519-0301. Free DVD locations can be located on your website or you may call us if there is nothing near you.

2009: The Year of Darwin, part 3

[Today's post is part 3 of an article by Brian Young with the Creation Instruction Association. Additional parts will be posted on following days. To order copies of Darwin’s Demise, Darwin’s Enigma or Darwin’s Plantation, visit New Leaf Publishing Group at http://nlpg.com and search “Darwin.”

In Darwin’s day, the popular belief was that God created the animals and the species were fixed, meaning the created kind would not change. This teaching had originated in the Greek philosophy that things are unchanging and, by the 1700s, this was believed to be fact when related to species. Darwin clearly saw species changing, just as we do today, therefore, he was correct in challenging this Greek philosophy, but was incorrect in leaving the Bible out of its replacement explanation. The Bible tells us that animals reproduce “after their kind” which is why “fish have guppies, dogs have puppies and people have yuppies.” Though there are a variety of shapes, sizes and colors in each of these kinds, never do we see a dog producing a kitten or even cat features. What we observe in science today is exactly what the Bible stated would happen.

Another misunderstanding today is that Darwin came up with the idea of natural selection. The fact is, Darwin never once mentioned this in his journals from the Beagle years. It wasn’t until 1838 after he wrote, The Voyage of the Beagle, that he read, Essay on the Principle of Population, by Reverend Thomas Malthus. Here Malthus explained that there was such misery on earth because humans reproduce faster than the food supply can keep up with them. His solution was to get rid of welfare and let the poor starve to death. If you just let the poor reproduce, they would only continue to put a strain on the resources meant for others. Darwin wrote, “Yearly more are bred than can survive; the smallest grain in the balance, in the long run, must tell on which death shall fall, and which shall survive. Let this work of selection, on the one hand, and death on the other, go on for a thousand generations; who would pretend to affirm that it would produce no effect?” (Foundation of the Origin of the Species, pg. 70)

First, it should be mentioned that this was not an original idea to Darwin. Charles Lyell, one of Darwin’s mentors, spoke of it in Principles of Geology in 1830. Edward Blyth, a creationist of those days even coined the term, “struggle for existence,” and said, “How beautifully do we thus perceive…the balance of nature preserved…the slightest deviation from the natural hue must generally prove fatal.” Blyth believed, as I do today, that natural selection simply kept the species strong by keeping weak genes out of the pool of life. This sounds almost exactly like what Darwin wrote simply because Darwin was taking earlier ideas and expanding upon them. Many didn’t conform to the idea of natural selection because they did not think it could lead to a new species. Some argued that if an animal gained a beneficial trait, it would lose it when mating with an animal that didn’t have that trait. Others argued that natural selection couldn’t explain how complicated structures like the eye could come about since they wouldn’t work unless fully formed.

I agree with these men of old, however, by the 1930s and 1940s, scientists began accepting natural selection under a new model called neo-Darwinian synthesis. Gregor Mendel had crossed pea plants by taking a tall one with a short one, getting all tall plants. Surprisingly, when the offspring were crossed, one-quarter of them were small. This showed that these “dwarf” traits were were passed through a generation of tall pea plants and could reappear later. This caused people to not worry so much about the origin of species, but rather the origin of traits. Basically, by the 1930s they had combined Mendel’s idea on genetics with Darwin’s views on beneficial traits to come up with the neo-Darwinian synthesis that is believed today by many evolutionists. However, as you will see, this idea falls short of an explanation. Once again, truth will never be found without going to the authority of the Bible.

How can Christians explain what we see in science today? Simply by admitting that God created “kinds” of animals and that those animals can reproduce with one another. Just as GM makes cars that have air conditioners and heaters, not knowing where the cars will go, God created animals with a variety of information that could be used in different circumstances or environments. If the car goes to Alaska, it has the ability to produce heat and will never access the A/C. It could also go to California and never need the heater, but will use the information built in to produce air conditioning.

Likewise, a dog might go to a colder environment and will use information for the long hair trait programmed into its DNA at the time of creation about 6000 years ago. In other words, God has put information into each kind of animal to allow for it to have a variety within its own kind. This is why we get big dogs, little dogs, cute dogs and ugly dogs, but they are still dogs. We never get a half dog and half frog called a “watch frog,” do we? Therefore, speciation is simply pre-programmed information from within a kind.

[Editor's note: For more information about Charles Darwin and creation science, visit http://masterbooks.net and search “Darwin.”

2009: The Year of Darwin, part 2

[Today's post is a continuation of the article by Brian Young with the Creation Instruction Association. Additional parts of the same article will be posted on following days.]

The latest Answers Magazine from Answers in Genesis is dedicated to educating people on Darwin’s life and beliefs and answering questions like “what did Darwin really teach, believe, and what motivated him?” Charles grew up in a wealthy middle-class family with a father who wasn’t very close and a mother who died when he was just 8 years old. The loss of his mother nearly devastated him and later helped to shape his view of God as distant and unloving. Fresh out of school, he was taken on the HMS Beagle at the recommendation of Rev. John Henslow. The ship’s captain was Robert FitzRoy, a man who wanted Darwin to join him for good intellectual company and to document the different species of plants and animals on this long journey (1831-1836). When he returned, he obtained almost instant fame due to his meticulous records, yet his interpretations of those findings were not published until nearly 20 years later in 1859.

Despite urban legend, Darwin never recanted his ideas on his deathbed. Though he did read his Bible, it wasn’t with the intent of seeking God, but in comparing the opposing philosophies of his day. He recorded in his journals daily, giving us a firm grasp on his thoughts and beliefs. He married Emma, who was very concerned for his soul and even wrote a letter to her husband urging him to take John 3:16-17 to heart. Though he kept and cherished the letter, there is no indication that he ever grasped the meaning of those verses. Just as is happening to many today, Darwin was simply a product of his times and even before setting sail, had already been brainwashed and biased against biblical authority in the sciences. As he had been taught, he believed the earth was very old and that species were fixed and didn’t change.

Darwin had many trials throughout his life. Besides the death of his mother, upon his return from his journey at the age of 30, he was suffering from terrible stomach pains that caused him and his family to go into seclusion. It wasn’t until much later when genetics were better understood that he suspected this was a genetic problem. His parents had been first cousins and Emma, his wife, was his first cousin. Therefore, inbreeding took its toll on Darwin’s family, the precise reason God had forbid it in the book of Leviticus. Had Darwin taken the Bible as authority, he could have been spared many of these trials. Instead, because of his worldview and inbreeding, his daughter, Anne, died at 10 years of age from the same stomach illness he suffered from for 12 years. He couldn’t understand how a loving God could allow for disease and suffering and thus reasoned that this God was distant, impersonal and not actively involved in our lives. In fact, he wrote a note to his family that was apparently intended to be read after his death saying, “I can indeed hardly see how anyone ought to wish Christianity to be true; for if so, the plain language of the test seems to show that the men who do not believe, and this would include my father, brother and almost all my best friends, will be everlastingly punished. And this is a damnable doctrine.” From this there can be no question that Darwin understood the intent of the Scriptures and the ramifications of denying Christ Jesus as one’s personal Messiah and Savior. This worldview of his day caused him to look for alternative explanations for species and natural laws without God’s involvement.

It is the same today. How can we dare celebrate a philosophy in 2009 that is based on the denial of truth, logic and the authority of the Bible? There are so many today who are refusing to look at Jesus because they do not want to be accountable to His rules or have such a hatred toward God because they do not want to give up their control and lives to Him. These are men like Richard Dawkins or Paul Myers who are influencing our children with the propaganda of evolution. Just as Darwin was influenced by the culture of his day, our children are turning away from God because they have no understanding of the Scriptures and their authority for truth in every area of our lives.

[Anyone needing more information on this topic or having a need for a speaker to come and share further answers from the Bible about today's questions in science and morality can contact this ministry at www.creationinstruction.org or call 402-519-0301. Free DVD locations can be located on our website or you may call us if there is nothing near you.]

[Editor's note: For more information about Charles Darwin and creation science, visit http://www.nlpg.com and search "Darwin."]

2009: The Year of Darwin, part 1

[Today's post is contributed by Brian Young with the Creation Instruction Association. It is Part 1 of an article about The Year of Darwin; additional parts of the same article will be posted on following days.]

This February is marking the 200th anniversary of Darwin’s birth and the 150th anniversary of the publishing of his book, Origin of the Species by Natural Selection, or the Preservation of Favoured Races in the Struggle for Life.” (This was the full title of his book, but isn’t widely known for its obvious racist implications.) As a result, there are over 850 special events planned to celebrate evolution and idolize Darwin, many such events being held in churches througout the world. Millions of dollars will be spent on this propaganda in 2009. Don’t think that this isn’t a big deal because back in 1959 when the 100th anniversary was celebrated, the Biological Sciences Curriculum Study (BSCS) was formed with the intent to spread evolution in the schools. At that time evolution was usually only a chapter or parts of a chapter in textbooks. The BSCS was established through a grant from the government-funded National Science Foundation and was primarily involved in creating textbooks with evolution throughout all chapters. By 1975 almost half of all high schools used BSCS while many other textbook publishers had been influenced by the BSCS and had increased evolutionary content. If this could happen in just 16 years of pushing propaganda, don’t think that 2009 won’t affect what your children and grandchildren will be taught if the church doesn’t stand against it. As a result, the Christian Instruction Association will be combating this lie by giving away 3000 DVDs explaining a biblical explanation for science, morality and eternity through Jesus Christ. On a KFUO radio program I did recently out of St. Louis, the host asked me if I was a defender of the faith or a confessor of the faith. I thought that was a great question we all need to ask ourselves. My answer was that we are confessors of the faith because in our confession God defends through His Holy Word. Let’s make 2009 a year of confessing Truth and Light to a world in darkness.

[Anyone needing more information on this topic or having a need for a speaker to come and share further answers from the Bible about today's questions in science and morality can contact this ministry at www.creationinstruction.org or call 402-519-0301. Free DVD locations can be located on our website or you may call us if there is nothing near you.]

[Editor's note: For more information about Charles Darwin and creation science, visit http://www.nlpg.com and search "Darwin."]