Dr Albert Mohler, a past president of the Southern
Baptist Theological Seminary, in a Ligonier conference, does a great job of
answering the question “Why Does the Universe Look So Old?” What follows is a mixture of his words and mine.
Many “experts” think this question is unimportant,
so let’s begin there. Dr. Mohler, looking at it from a Biblical perspective,
says the question is “extremely important; and we need to be ready to give an
answer” to defend what we believe. So
let’s find out why; let’s begin.
Here are relevant verses from God’s Word: Genesis 1:1-5, 21-23, 26-31, 2:1-2, 4a:
In the beginning God created the heavens and the
earth. 2 The earth was without form, and void; and
darkness was on the face of the deep. And the Spirit of God was
hovering over the face of the waters.
3 Then God said, “Let there be light”; and there was
light. 4 And God saw the light, that it
was good; and God divided the light from the darkness. 5 God
called the light Day, and the darkness He called Night. So the
evening and the morning were the first day……21And God saw that it
was good. 22 And God blessed them, saying, “Be
fruitful and multiply, and fill the waters in the seas, and let birds multiply
on the earth.” 23 So the evening and the morning were
the fifth day.
26 Then God said, “Let Us make man in Our image, according to
Our likeness; let them have dominion over the fish of the sea, over the
birds of the air, and over the cattle, over ]all the earth and over every creeping thing that
creeps on the earth.” 27 So God created man in
His own image; in the image of God He created him; male and
female He created them. 28 Then God blessed them, and God
said to them, “Be fruitful and multiply; fill the earth and subdue
it; have dominion over the fish of the sea, over the birds of the air, and over
every living thing that moves on the earth”; and it was so. 31 Then God
saw everything that He had made, and indeed it was very good. So
the evening and the morning were the sixth day.
2 Thus the heavens and the earth, and all the host of
them, were finished. 2 And on the seventh day God ended
His work which He had done, and He rested on the seventh day….4 This is the history of the heavens and the
earth when they were created….
I
have other blogs commenting on these verses, but Dr. Mohler takes a different
approach, so let’s read on.
Dr.
Mohler stresses that the emphasis on days being in succession strongly suggest
a sequence of creation. AND Scripture strongly suggests seven, 24-hour days,
especially with the reappearing phrases “so the evening and the morning….” When you add up generations in Scripture,
their lifetimes, it also suggests the creation of man was under 7,000 years
ago; so it disagrees with what scientists surmise, which is some 200,000 years
as an intelligent being. I should add
that a study of population growth suggests that when evolution says we became
“hominoids,” in the millions of years that have passed since, we should be totally
overrun with people. A younger earth hypothesis, in 7,000 years, comes
closer to explaining current population.
The
younger earth as suggested by Scripture, was believed almost unanimously by the
church until the early 1800s. But four
great challenges to the traditional reading of Genesis have emerged in the last
200 years:
1)
The discovery of the
geological record as a result of expeditions going to new corners of the globe
after the Enlightenment of the late 1700s.
Fossils, and their strata, seemed to be telling a story different from
Scripture.
2)
The emergence of
Darwin’s publication on evolution, in 1859.
Dr. Mohler reminds us that evolution was a hypothesis already in
circulation before Darwin; and since he wanted to prove it and not Scripture,
he therefore was not using scientific protocol.
Because a scientist approaches a theory objectively, with no favorites. Note:
Since true science relies on repeatable observed events, it is
IMPOSSIBLE to have a theory of creation that advances any further than
speculation. Then why was evolution
accepted with such acclaim? I maintain
that people WANTED the theory to be true.
As is the same today. Then they
have no God, so they have no accountability to God for their behavior.
3)
The discovery of ancient
Near Eastern parallels to Genesis, such as the Enuma Elish (a Babylonian epic
of creation), and the Epic of Gilgamesh.
Scholars began to think they were all the same; they were just man’s
speculations on creation.
4)
The development of
higher criticism, which began to dominate thinking in the late 1700s. It’s also called the “documentary hypothesis.” They wanted to treat the Bible as a merely
human document. They asserted that the
writers did not receive inspiration from the Holy Spirit. So it is not inerrant. They attacked particularly the first five
books of the Bible (the Pentateuch). One of their proofs is, Moses didn’t write
all of the Pentateuch, as Scripture says. The books have different writing
styles (their proof is weak), so there were different writers. They thus called God a liar. They also
insisted that some Books were written later than was previously believed, because
it contained impossibly precise prophecies that came true. Here’s a case in point: The Book of Daniel, since it is filled with
specific prophecies that came true after he died—is clearly implying these
prophecies had to come from God, who knows the future. So God was telling Daniel what to write,
which upholds the Bible as inerrant in the original, and contains all Truth. Well, science had to attack this Book. Even though Daniel is listed as the writer in
4 places (chapters 8-10), and we all agree that he lived around 570 BC, they
refused to accept those dates or him. So
with an all-consuming desire to leave God out of it, when you look up Wikipedia
on the Book of Daniel, they say it had to be written around 167-164 BC, which
was “conveniently,” I add, after the last prophecy in the Book was fulfilled. So
Wiki says an “anonymous writer,” was really just writing history, and
pretending to be the prophetic Daniel. Oh,
foolish scientists! Did you know that
Wikipedia uses modern scientific cohorts for truth, and has constructed the
name “Bible Wiki” to its version of the bible, which are often anti-God? I might add, they also say that part of Daniel
is “legendary.” Of course, they don’t
point out which part was “legendary,” but they get away with smearing Scripture
anyhow.
So
let’s focus more on defense. First,
science is not exact; it is a moving target, changing dates and order when new knowledge arises. Over the years, the universe’s birth date has
gotten older and older. The scientific
consensus “right now” is that Earth and our solar system are approximately 4.5
billion years old. (These high numbers are convenient for evolutionists: they allow us to speculate gigantic changes
in animal life, leaping out of families to a totally different kind, for
instance. (vs. Scripture, which stresses that every generation is “in its kind.”
See above Genesis verses.) They even have the audacity to suggest that apes
evolved to man. No reference to a soul, or belief in a Higher Power. Of course, that’s just the way they like it.
So even if we never see anything suggesting such changes, we allow that it
could happen, Given Enough Time). The
universe is 13.5 billion years of age, they say. (The difference between those two numbers is
due to how the “Big Bang” hypothesis worked out). PS: I
hasten to add that the Big Bang theory is only 90 years old, and it began from
the fertile mind of a Catholic priest and cosmologist. (The word “cosmologist” sounds scientific,
but those folks work from their imagination more than fact. You can get more fact out of a cosmetologist). Dr. Mohler notes that much of this scientific
data comes from “physical extrapolation”—i.e., “walking back” using current cosmological
trends and direction, and timing. This is using a theory called “uniformitarianism,”
the idea that you can safely walk back millions of years, assuming that
physical processes measurable now have always been measured the same, so you
can measure them the same way in the past.
It’s
easy to blow holes in that; processes can’t be measured back with accuracy that
far, because they don’t stay the same. A
perfect example is the Flood. Despite
how scientists suggest it was a local phenomenon, Scripture says it covered the
whole earth, above the tops of the mountains.
(Every ancient civilization we’ve “dug” had a story of a gigantic flood;
if it were local, that wouldn’t have happened.
Are we supposed to believe that all the writers’ imaginations from different
points on the earth thought the same “fantasy” at the same time? No, because
it’s not a fantasy—it really happened). Imagine
how that Flood moved the strata; imagine the tremendous pressure under 25,000
feet of water; God could have generated oil in that one year. Ask any submariner about water pressure 5
miles down; he gets real nervous. Obviously
things were not “uniform” (as science assumes) over the earth’s history.
For
instance, it’s possible that the weather changed tremendously before and after
the Flood. Christian scientists have proof all over the earth by digging up well-preserved
mammoths and such that the Flood flashed a tidal wave of Ice Age freezing and a
tsunami of frozen mud that preserved ancient creatures; you can even see their
blood vessels. Their fat, their skin,
clearly show that they lived in the tropics—but they were discovered in the
Arctic. So, no uniformitarianism on
weather. Consider how the sun’s rays
could gigantically differ before and after the Flood, assuming that the sky was
blanketed with clouds, which then emptied themselves. That, it so happens, affects Carbon-14 dating,
relied upon by scientists today to back up dating their speculations. Carbon-14 is from cosmic ray action, which is
used to date bones and such. They like to assume cosmic rays have been uniform,
but they very likely weren’t. (Carbon-14 is only good dating things to 60,000
years back, as scientists will admit; why they publish really old dates for
some bone “using carbon-14” is an outright lie.) Scripture also records a drastic drop in
average life after the Flood compared to before, which suggests that there were
heavy clouds sheltering us from toxic rays of the sun before the Flood, but we’re
exposed to now, so it shortens our lives.
Dr.
Mohler now backs up and asks “why are we asking this now?” His answer is the liberal shifting going on
amongst “Christian” intellectuals and seminaries who are swallowing modern
science whole (even though it is populated by anti-God agnostics) and which leads
people to not trust God or Christian evangelicalism. Here are his cases in point:
1. Bruce Waltke (Reformed Professor of Old
Testament at Dallas Theological Seminary and four other Christian seminaries) made
a video and said that unless evangelicals accept evolution, “we will be reduced
to the status of a theological cult.” So our occult leader is Jesus. The Pharisees had the same unforgivable sin,
attributing Jesus’ miracles to the occult Devil.
2. John Stott (Anglican cleric, at one time at the
forefront of the evangelical movement) in the 1980s suggested that Adam was “an
existing hominid” that God plucked out of evolution’s slow progress as it went
from hominid to hominin to homo sapiens, going from ape to man. Thus, God
adopted him instead of creating him. God
then ensouled him. (But that would suggest that God didn’t ensoul many of the
same level of homo sapiens. Sounds like Calvinism “over the top” to me). He
felt that Protestant beliefs became, unfortunately, “inward looking.” He was on a “holistic mission” to merge Christianity
with secularism as much as possible. Scientists
may have liked parts of Stott, but never will a scientist suggest that God gave
him a soul; that would be to suggest that he was in the image of God. Maybe they’ll
admit that if there were a God, He just gave Adam improved surroundings.
3. Denis Alexander (on National Committee of
Christians in Science for almost 30 years, a prolific writer for Huffington
Post, et al.) in his book, Creation and Evolution: Do We Have to Choose (spoiler: the answer he gives is NO) has an intriguing
quote: “God in His grace chose a couple of Neolithic farmers (!) to reveal
Himself in a special way…so they might know Him as a personal God.” This “scientist” has obviously with such a
quote won acceptance by his brothers. But the quote is an Insulting, Non-redemptive,
and vague and aloof pronouncement. Thus
he reveals more “scientist” and far less Christian. Don’t expect balance between those two; there
isn’t any. “Christians in Science” is largely an oxymoron. As any history buff will tell you, from World
War I; middle ground is only for dead people.
Our Congress is learning that too.
I could go on and
on about other weak “evangelists,” but let’s comment quickly on the mainline
scientists:
Richard
Dawkins, Daniel Dennett, Sam Harris, and Christopher Hitchens are the “four
horsemen of new atheism.” Three of them
are scientists. Dawkins said that Darwin
has allowed him to become an “intellectually fulfilled atheist.” They argue that evolution is the “final nail
in the coffin of theism (belief in God).
Of course, they cannot answer the simple question: “Where did the
original matter come from?” You can’t
generate a big bang from nothing. Here’s
a scary quote: Dawkins says that deniers
of evolutionary theory “should be scorned and marginalized as Holocaust
deniers.” He blathers on to say that it
is “arcane” if anybody still call evolution a “theory.” It is a fact that no intelligent person can
deny. Evolution is “the universal
acid.” It destroys every belief we have
about Christianity and creation.
So you can see that
the scientists are cocky. You need to
also learn that the intellectual elites are also puzzled, since the belief in
evolution is still a minority among North Americans and Europeans, and seems even
to be in decline. Dr. Mohler cites an
article in the New York Times, where the author concludes: “I am frightened to
live in a society where there are more people who believe in the virgin birth
than in the fact of evolution.” You’ll
be even more frightened on Judgment Day, friend.
The intellectual
“Christians” also urge us to get with it:
Dr Peter Enns, a frequent author writing in BioLogos (an outgrowth of
Biola “Christian” University) says we will “lose credibility in sharing the
Gospel if we do not shed ourselves of our anti-intellectualism.” Well, in partial answer to that, evolution
suggests millions of deaths of half-ape/half-men (of which we can’t find a
single bone without hoaxing). But
Scripture clearly indicates Adam brought about sin, and that led to death. (Romans
5:12). This placement of death is
extremely important; shall we shoot the lethal effects of sin backwards a million
years, and throw away a critical part of the Gospel? Scripture says death was after Adam. Evolutionists say it had to happen before
Adam. Which do you believe? Upon Adam is the whole doctrine of sin nature,
and its dire result; it’s important to get that right. Go with Scripture.
After all this,
what are our recalculated options?
1.
Creation was done in a sequential pattern
of 24-hour days. Its advantage: Its
literal reading is easy to follow (sort of an Occam’s Razor effect). It is strongly suggested by “evening and
morning,” as I mentioned, and combined with Gen. 2:4: “this is the history
of the heavens and the earth when they were created.” There are scientific proofs to the Scriptural
order of events, too (See AnswersinGenisis.org for a much better
treatment).
2.
The “Day-Age” view. This says the Hebrew word “yom” (day or Day) does
not always mean 24-hours. Each “yom”
could be millions of years. God could
have taken millions of years to do His thing.
It does not require evolution, but it leaves room for evolution. All we’re trying to find out is, is the earth
old? This version says that it’s old, so we can agree with science on fossil “records.” So we agree with science—in part. (They would
require evolution).
3.
The Gap theory. This holds that millions of years ago, between
Genesis 1:1 and 1:2, there was evil, usually presumed to be the rebellion of
God’s highest angel, who became Satan (see Isaiah 14:12ff) followed by a
destruction of earth (did they have a fight?)—and then, Much later, a
restitution. (Blue letter Bible is my
source. I’m not saying they believe in
it; they’re just expounding the view, like I am.) After the earth’s orderliness is propped up
again (but with scars), you read the rest of Genesis chapter 1:3. Note that
evolution is not required here either. The
Noahic Flood then becomes the second divine destruction. Many deaths occur before Adam, which is
un-Scriptural, and I comment on it later.
I have a problem with 2 and 3: first, because we look
so eager to be bought out by the agnostic scientists (I have a blog on Pierre Tielhard
de Chardin, a “scientist” who faked discoveries of Piltdown Man, etc; these are
the kind of people they are.) Do we really
want to stretch the clear literal 24-hour days, or do we speculate on an
undescribed, wiping out of the whole earth (wouldn’t God want to say something
about that?), just so we can open the possibility of evolution grinding its way
over the great length of time, or just to kowtow to “fossil records” (Christian
scientists have an answer for that, too), just so we can be friends with the
agnostic scientists, so we can be accepted in society as reasonable as “they
are.”
4.
Finally, there are two options which are
pretty much alike; the “framework” theory, that suggests Genesis 1 is not history
at all. It’s just a story, a literal way
to express the providential creation by God.
We are not to trouble ourselves by length of time, or if they are
sequential. The fourth option also
denies the historicity of Genesis, by suggesting that is simply a parallel
ancient Near Eastern text, written for Israel.
It is a creation myth, a mythological rendering that marks the beliefs
of the ancient Hebrews.
Of
all these options, only #1 necessitates a young earth. And only a young earth maintains the
historicity of Adam, from whom the entire doctrine of Sin, and of our sin
nature, explains. Dr. Mohler, who
believes as I do that the Bible is God’s inerrant Word, asserts that #1 is his
choice--24-hour days, even though it is scorned. His quote: “It seems to me that God gave us
this text with such rich detail and sequential development” so we wouldn’t think
His Word is “vague” on specifics, allowing us to stretch the truth or to
“speculate.” How can we take Scripture with such rich content, and accept a
theory that ignores what God is specifically saying? Anyway, I totally agree with him. Of course, neither of us are scientists, so
the scorning wouldn’t be by workmates If
you’re wanting more science, a beautiful explanation of the Flood occurs on
Youtube—look for: www.youtube.com/watch?v=hRoQL7W5jg8&ab_channel=YoungEarthCreation
The
scorning still would come, from people that we try to bring the Gospel to. When you imagine Noah answering questions by
neighbors asking about the giant boat he was making on land, he had many
chances to speak about God and judgment and Old Testament Gospel (II Peter 2:5). Scripture records that he didn’t save a
single soul. It was only his closest
family that he was able to drag into the ark (I wonder if they even believed
him). This age has parallels; it is the
Laodicean age, I believe (Rev. 3:14ff).
Many people say they are Christians, but they never consider reduction
from the world, or changing their lifestyles of sin, or worry (or hear from
their pastors) about judgment. They are
not concerned about pleasing or forming a relationship with God, or obeying
Him. This is hell-bound stuff (see John
15:1-6 for proof). They are equally
deceived, and will scorn us too. Noah
feared God (see Hebrews 11:7). Nobody
else did, and few people do now (Hebrews 12:28-29).
Dr.
Mohler maintains that there is a “theological cost” of attaching to the old
earth theory, which progressive evangelicals are not thinking seriously about. They are not concerned enough of the need for
integrity in interpretation, or to consider what they are messing with (a warning
is in Rev. 22:18-19). Every word in the Bible is inspired by the Holy Spirit. Let
me lay out the main guts of the Bible they’re playing with: We have, in Genesis 1-3, in as few words as
possible, God’s redemption narrative:
namely, Creation, Fall, and Redemption (the last of these is in Gen.
3:15). Looking at the first 3 chapters,
I can see why he maintains that “the doctrine of Creation is absolutely
inseparable from the doctrine of Redemption.”
The same themes, plus the Consummation (Judgment to Hell, or New
Creation), run together in that order throughout the Bible. Just as God had to kill an animal, and shed
its blood, to provide a covering to wear for Adam and Eve’s sin, He knew from
the earth’s beginning that the blood of His Son would have to be shed to
provide a covering to protect us from His holy wrath now.
Therewith,
God shows us the answer to many questions: How everything came to be, and why. (It also shows that God is not at fault for
the sad condition on earth; He created the angel that devolved into Satan,
knowing that the angel would fall. Thus,
all of us have freedom of choice: Do we think, or act, out of God, or of Satan?
Do we give glory to God, or do we choose the world, and cause Satan to laugh in
God’s face, for our sinful behavior, as he does as the Accuser in Job? “It is a purposive account of why the universe
was created. In the theater of His glory,”
He is demonstrating, even before Creation, He has a way of escape from what we
deserve. In Redemption, His mercy and love as conquering all obstacles, even
our sin before a holy and just God, if we would let Him. A sovereign God creates each one of us with a
soul, but being sinful we fall, but God has a plan, repeated over and over, for
our release from the prison of sin.
I
wouldn’t want to mess with that. I wouldn’t
want to distract people from God’s truth, by getting on any sidelight of evolution.
Ride with the four horsemen into hell?
No thanks.
By
the way: you cannot argue that “multiple
translation and copying introduces errors.”
As we find more ancient texts, they do not change one word of Hebrew, so
there are not “other translations” to throw us off what is right in front of
us. I think God, on purpose, knowing when
we first consider His Word, forces us into a decision right away: we have to decide, do we want to accept the
world or Him, right in the first chapter of the Bible. He may want us to accept
things that are peculiar or run against society, but that’s what faith is all
about.
As
you can see from above, we are opening, very widely, a Pandora’s box if we
accept anything but 24-hour days. I
might add that scientists should do more study, and publish more articles, that
seriously consider the Bible account. There is a lot of science backing up the
Bible, but it is censored from the media, and it is done only by several
dedicated Christians. So they are
automatically considered wacko, and “real scientists” won’t seriously read past
Page One of their publications.
Truth
is, believers were the first wave of true scientists in the Enlightenment, because
Scripture, heavily read at the time, teaches us that revealed nature is
intelligible. God, after all, told Paul
in Romans 1 that His invisible attributes are clearly seen, and can be understood. This verse was a spur to science by the
believers. When Galileo (1600) said that
the believer ought to be accountable to the book of nature and to the Scripture,
we only add this modification: an idea is
morally acceptable only if you start from the anchor of truth, Scripture, and measure
happenings from that as your vantage point.
If they don’t seem to agree, you dig further. Now, the opposite seems to be the quest. The
Flood is the best case in point, totally wrecked by “scientists.” One could wish
that today’s scientists knew what they are fooling with; God’s wrath is also
revealed from heaven in Romans 1 (v.18), and one could also wish that they knew
the eternal cost of distorting the truth.
Let’s give the relevant verses, which seems to fit most modern
scientists so well:
For the
wrath of God is revealed from heaven against all ungodliness
and unrighteousness of men, who suppress the truth in unrighteousness, 19 because what
may be known of God is manifest in them, for God has shown it to
them. 20 For since the creation of the world His
invisible attributes are clearly seen, being understood by the things
that are made, even His eternal power and Godhead, so that they
are without excuse, 21 because, although they knew God,
they did not glorify Him as God, nor were thankful, but became
futile in their thoughts, and their foolish hearts were darkened. 22 Professing
to be wise, they became fools…who, knowing the righteous judgment of God, that those
who practice such things are deserving of death, not only do the same but
also approve of those who practice them.
As is typical in the New
Testament, “death” means hell. Fools and
hellbound. Such is the destiny of many scientists who suppress the truth of
Creation.
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