THERE IS ONE GOD, CREATOR OF EVERYTHING
(Genesis 1:1; Romans 1:18-20; Job 38:1-11)

For centuries, the most indisputable argument for the existence of God was the existence of the earth and the life contained within it. In the 19th century, however, this argument came in to question for the first time in any credible way with the introduction of Charles Darwin’s theory of evolution. Darwin proposed this theory as a model for explaining the origin of life apart from God, and he believed that as science made advances and discoveries in its various fields, especially paleontology (the study of the fossil record) and biology, that these advances and discoveries would prove the correctness of his theory. A little over a hundred years later, the majority of the modern world has come to have unquestioning faith in the truth of Darwin’s theory.

It should be noted that at the heart of this theory is the assumption that there is no God. Its promoters assert that evolution belongs to the realm of science while religious issues such as the nature and existence of a creator belong to the realm of faith. To the modern mind, this is no different than saying that the former is true while the latter is false. Nevertheless, this does not mean that all who believe in the theory of evolution are atheists or agnostics. Many sincere Christians affirm Darwin’s theory while at the same time acknowledging a creator who “started the whole process.” When I was studying biology in high school, I assumed that since my textbooks presented evolution as an assured fact of science, it must be true. Since I also believed in God, I assumed that God must have used evolutionary processes to make the world as we know it.

Although belief in evolution does not necessarily make one an atheist, it does eliminate the need for God and has major implications for one’s view of the Bible. Many believers have followed evolution to its logical conclusion and jettisoned their faith in God, concluding that there is no reason for their existence. And contrary to the view of the Bible which I presented in the previous summary—that it is the inspired and inerrant word of God—many have come to believe that it contains myths and scientific inaccuracies, especially pertaining to the origin of life.

I realize that many who will be reading this summary have a very strong belief in Darwin’s theory of evolution. It is not my desire to suggest that those who hold this belief can not at the same time be genuine followers of Jesus Christ. My desire is only to demonstrate that evolution is not a proven scientific fact but is as much a matter of faith as the Bible’s account of creation. As you consider the following evidence, it is my hope that you will be challenged to question the assumptions that undergird your faith in this theory and have a healthy respect for those who disagree with your position. For those who already believe the Bible’s account of creation, it is my hope that your faith will be strengthened and that you will be encouraged all the more to seek the God who is there and has revealed Himself through the Scriptures.

The first words of the Bible declare that “In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth ” (Genesis 1:1). It further describes the manner in which God created the plants, animals, and mankind through unique creative acts. It does not say that anything He created evolved from anything else. Moreover, the rest of the Bible makes frequent reference to God’s work in creation. The apostle Paul goes so far as to say that certain attributes of God such as His eternal power and divine nature should be evident to everyone from “what has been made” (Romans 1:20). In other words, when people ponder things within the realm of nature, they should arrive at the conclusion that these things are the result of an intelligent designer rather than the result of a series of mutations and a process of natural selection.

In contrast to these biblical assertions, evolutionists declare that the origin of life can be explained without God. They claim that everything that has come into existence can be explained by natural causes, and that scientific discoveries have proven almost absolutely that evolution is a fact. In a recent series of articles in the Courier Journal, an evolutionist by the name of Susan Reigler declared that “This process of organic evolution has been exhaustively documented by scientists since [Darwin’s] time with evidence from the expanding fossil record, DNA mapping, observations in population biology and discoveries in comparative biochemistry.” Since most people do not have time to evaluate the so-called “exhaustive documentation” from these various fields, and since it is assumed that few people would be so foolish as to make such a confident declaration if it were not true, statements such as these receive unquestioned acceptance.

Most people hear statements such as these and remember the evidence they studied in high school and college which seems to support them: the beaks of finches become longer over time, moths change from dark to light coloring, bacteria develop resistance to antibiotics. This kind of evidence is what scientists call “micro-evolution” and refers to small changes within a given species. It should be noted, however, that no one denies the occurrence of micro-evolution, not even hard-core creationists. But at the same time, micro-evolution offers absolutely no evidence that a fish can become a lizard, a lizard can become a bird, an ape can become a human, or any other proposed macro-evolutionary changes. Random mutations do not account for the many variations which can be observed within a given species; these variations can all be traced to information already contained in the genetic code of that species. This is a scientific fact which causes me to ask why micro-evolution is consistently presented as evidence for macro-evolution.

Since the observations from micro-evolution cannot be used to prove evolution, one must turn to other scientific fields for evidence to support the theory that the origin of life can be explained without God. Perhaps the most difficult hurdle for evolutionists has been the question of how living things could evolve from non-living things. In 1924 a man by the name of A.I. Opparin made a proposal for how this might have happened. He suggested that the earth’s earliest atmosphere was quite different than it is today and that it consisted of ammonia, methane, and hydrogen with some water vapor and no oxygen. The reason he proposed this constitution of the earth’s earliest atmosphere is that, if it did not consist of these things, then the formation of the simplest building blocks of living things would be virtually impossible.

In 1950, a student by the name of Stanley Miller conducted an experiment based on Opparin’s hypothesis which seemed to prove that life could arise out of a “primordial soup.” He created a synthetic environment containing the elements which Opparin suggested and then introduced a tiny spark of electricity into it. After several days, Miller observed a reddish substance that had formed on the walls of the tank and which reportedly contained the sugars (among other things) which were critical building blocks of RNA and DNA. For several decades evolutionists hailed this experiment as evidence that life could evolve from non-living things. Unfortunately for devout evolutionists, no one has been able to reproduce the results of Miller’s experiment. In fact, most scientists now recognize that the reported results of Miller’s experiment were false. In 1986, “Robert Shapiro, a Harvard-educated DNA chemist from New York University, showed that the widespread but second- and third-hand claims regarding synthesis of … sugar in Miller-type experiments were traceable to one ambiguous paper. He subsequently demonstrated that making … sugar under pre-biotic conditions was essentially impossible.”

Moreover, additional research has shown that the earth’s atmosphere could not have consisted of those elements which Opparin suggested, elements which are vital to the success of his theory. One reason that this could not have been the earth’s atmosphere is that unlike Miller’s experiment which had only one tiny spark, the earth’s earliest atmosphere would have been constantly exposed to ultraviolet radiation from the sun. The result of this constant exposure is that “the methane gas in the hypothetical earth’s atmosphere would have been converted to an oil slick ten meters thick .” Moreover, the “ultraviolet radiation would have also converted the water vapor into hydrogen and oxygen. But oxygen has disastrous consequences on prebiotic simulation experiments .” For these and other reasons, “… a consensus has developed since the late 1970s that the early earth’s atmosphere never contained significant amounts of ammonia, methane or hydrogen .” The bottom line is that at this time, scientists do not have a plausible explanation for the formation of the building blocks of life. Despite these facts, Miller’s experiment is still cited as evidence for the theory of evolution. Unfortunately, most people will never hear about the fact that his results were falsified and that subsequent research has refuted Opparin’s proposed atmosphere.
Assuming that at some point in the future a plausible explanation for the generation of life from non-living things will be found through an experiment under the watchful eye of an intelligent being (sorry so wordy, but please take note of the emphasis), let us set this question aside and examine the current evidence in support of macro-evolution, the change of one species into an entirely new species. Evolutionists propose seemingly plausible models for the progressive development of different life forms. A “light sensitive” spot is a precursor to the eye, and an ape is a precursor to a human, for example.

Although one can propose a logical progression between different life forms, this in no way explains how this progression could have possibly occurred. In fact, there is no plausible explanation for even the simplest life forms in these suggested progressions. When Darwin proposed his theory, he knew that it carried a heavy burden. He wrote that, “If it could be demonstrated that any complex organ existed which could not possibly have been formed by numerous, successive, slight modifications, my theory would absolutely break down .” In other words, everything that currently exists in nature must be the result of constant, slight modifications to some original life-form. He knew that if anything existed which must have all of its constituent parts at the same time in order to fulfill its function, then his theory would have serious problems. Another name for this burden is the problem of “irreducibly complex systems.”
An illustration of an irreducibly complex system is a mouse trap. A mouse trap consists of several parts which must all be present in order for the mouse trap to function properly. If the mouse trap did not have a base, for example, then the other parts would not be attached to anything. If it did not have a spring, then the hammer would just lay there. If it did not have a hammer, the mouse could dance on the trap all day without suffering any consequences. If it did not have a latch, then the hammer would snap back immediately after being set. All of these parts must be present in order for a mouse trap to function as a mouse trap. So, too, if anything exists which must have all of its constituent parts to function properly, then it is an irreducibly complex system.

If one were to search for an irreducibly complex system, the logical place to start would be with the most complex life forms. Accordingly, the last place one would expect to find such a system is with those life forms considered to be the simplest, i.e. bacteria. Even so, this is precisely where one can find an irreducibly complex system. Bacteria are propelled by numerous, hair-like structures called cilia. But despite the fact that they are found on the simplest life forms, these tiny structures are more complex than the engine under the hood of your car, and nobody has any idea how they could have possibly evolved. If any of its constituent parts were missing, a cilium could not function as a cilium.
One biochemist who studied the cilium quite extensively concluded that “All of [its] parts are required to perform one function: ciliary motion. Just as a mousetrap does not work unless all its constituent parts are present, ciliary motion simply does not exist in the absence of microtubules, connectors, and motors. Therefore we can conclude that the cilium is irreducibly complex—an enormous monkey wrench thrown into its presumed gradual, Darwinian evolution .” Moreover, after conducting a search of the professional literature on the cilium, he wrote that, “The amount of scientific research that has been and is being done on the cilium—and the great increase over the past few decades in our understanding of how the cilium works—lead many people to assume that even if they themselves don’t know how the cilium evolved, somebody must know. But a search of the professional literature proves them wrong. Nobody knows .” Although evolutionists can conceive of a possible progression between various life forms, this cannot possibly be construed as evidence. Contrary to Susan Reigler’s assertion in the Courier Journal, the evidence from biochemistry has not “exhaustively documented” the theory of evolution; it has undermined it.

This is also true of the fossil record. Darwin believed that as paleontologists unearthed more of the fossil record, the truth of his theory would be demonstrated. It was believed that if evolution were true, then the fossil record would be teaming with millions of transitional forms. The exact opposite is the case. More than a century after the publication of Darwin’s theory, there is no more evidence from the fossil record than there was at his time. In fact, the fossil record does not reveal animals evolving over time but staying the same. Even to an evolutionist, there are strikingly few transitional forms (I would argue that there aren’t any). If, as Susan Reigler unequivocally stated, “the fossil record has exhaustively documented” the theory of evolution, then why have evolutionists proposed the theory of “punctuated equilibrium?” The sole purpose of this theory is to explain the absence of transitional forms in the fossil record! As Niles Eldridge, a leading paleontologist and evolutionist, confessed, “We paleontologists have said that the history of life supports [the story of gradual adaptive change], all the while really knowing that it does not.” Unfortunately, you will not see any reference to this confession in the Biology textbooks in the classroom.

In trying to find evidence of missing links, evolutionists have made some embarrassing mistakes. Have you ever heard of “Piltdown man?” That was a hoax. Have you ever heard of “Nebraska man?” Nebraska man was concocted from a single tooth (how on earth you can determine what a man looked like from a single tooth is beyond me). This tooth was later discovered to be a pig’s tooth. Have you ever heard of “Lucy,” the missing link between primates and humans? They found the rest of her skeleton and discovered that Lucy was actually an ape. Despite these mistakes, you will still hear evolutionists make reference to these “discoveries” as missing links. The truth, however, is that the term “missing link” is not a misnomer; the missing link is still missing?

The theory of evolution is not a scientific fact. The evidence from biology does not support it. The evidence from biochemistry does not support it. The evidence from paleontology does not support it. Its leading supporters admit that they do not know anything for certain about evolution (there are numerous quotes along these lines that could be cited). The bottom line is that evolution should not be called a theory. In the same article in the Courier Journal, Susan Reigler suggests that because evolution is called a theory, and because a theory is a “hypothesis that has been confirmed or established by observation or experiment,” that evolution is true. But just because something is called a theory does not make it true. The question is: “Does it deserve to be called a theory?” It is my belief that if a theory has been confirmed and established by observation and experiment,” then evolution is not a theory. Has anyone ever conducted an experiment which demonstrated evolutionary change? (Messing with the genetic code of fruit flies so that their legs come out on top of their heads doesn’t count—they are still fly legs!). Did anyone alive today observe the beginning of life. (From a creationist perspective the answer to this question is “yes.” From an evolutionist perspective, the answer to this question is “no”). Has anyone today ever witnessed one species evolving into another? The answers to these questions should be obvious. Unfortunately, for many they are not.

The evidence presented in this summary is only the tip of the iceberg. There are many more arguments that could have been presented (try explaining from an evolutionary standpoint the instinctual patterns of monarch butterflies which fly from Canada to the same place in South America every three years). This evidence is not meant to change anyone’s mind, but to demonstrate that believing in the Genesis account of creation is not akin to turning off your brain. There are scores of brilliant scientists who have examined all of the evidence and still believe the creation account. If anyone would like to examine the writings of a few of these men, I would recommend first, Darwin on Trial, by Philip Johnson, then Darwin’s Black Box, and finally, The Creation Hypothesis.