Is creationism driving young people out of the church?

In my last post, I made some comments about an articled titled, 5 Ways Creationism Is Bad For Christianity. Just recently, someone I am friends with on FaceBook linked an article from the Huffington Post titled, Creationists Drive Young People Out Of The Church. The headline might sound similar to my last post but I'm going to make different points. Bear with me.

My first thought when I read that article was that it is fake news. It's not fake in the sense that I don't believe it's correct (although it is very misleading). I'm saying it's fake in the sense that it's not news. Does anyone really believe a left-leaning site like The Huffington Post is at all concerned with young people leaving the church? The point of the story isn't, “What are we going to do about these young people leaving the church?” It's more like, “Ha, ha. Look at how stupid these young people think creationists are.” The author seems to want to shame people away from believing in creation. It's a common tactic which I've written about years ago. Consider this quote from the first paragraph:

Particularly disturbing is the finding that only 27 percent of evangelical pastors “strongly disagree” with the statement that the earth is 6,000 years old.

Do you see what I mean? The author finds a belief in a young earth, “particularly disturbing.” In spite of its headline, the article is less about young adults leaving the church and more about getting Christians to stop believing in creation. But the liberal bias and shoddy reporting of The Huffington Post is not the point of my post today. I was more interested in what my FaceBook friend said. When he posted the link to the article, he commented:

Young Earth Creationists need to think about this.

Now, I can't claim to know exactly what this person was thinking when he said this. He seems to be making the same point that unbelieving evolutionists make when they write similar comments; he seems to be saying to creationists, “Just stop it because you look silly.” Maybe this person was trying to make a legitimate point that completely escapes me. I've thought and thought about his comment and the only thing I can conclude is that it is a blatant appeal to consequences.

Let me ask this: if a six-day, literal, miraculous creation is the correct understanding of the Genesis account, then what else is there think about? If I tell people the truth, and they leave the church, am I wrong for having spoken the truth? Should I not tell the truth for fear of offending someone? What else about the truth should I water down? What if people leave the church because I tell them Jesus was rose from the dead? Another reason cited for people leaving the church is that they are uncomfortable with the exclusivity of Christianity. So then are we to teach universalism instead? Jesus is one way but any way is fine.

If people leave the Church because we believe the Bible about creation, that does nothing to prove a belief in a miraculous creation is wrong. And if creation is correct, then why should we compromise on the truth of it in order to make the Bible seem compatible with the incorrect theory of evolution?

Articles like this one and comments like that made by my FaceBook friend are pointless. It's a worthless argument. But I have something to say to Christians who make these arguments: I think you're doing far more harm than good with your compromise!

The Bible commands us to love God with our minds (Deuteronomy 6:5, Matthew 22:37, et al). Evolution is a worthless theory. It is rife with difficulties, it makes no useful predictions, and it has made no contribution to any scientific advancement made in the last century. If a young person is wavering in his faith because he sees a conflict between “science” and the Bible, you need to know how to defend the Bible rather than giving credence to some useless, fairytale dreamed up by men how proudly boast that miracles never happen. Do you think it's helpful to say to an inquisitive youth, “Well, the Bible doesn't always mean what it says”? I think young people are leaving the church because they don't see the church as having any authority. When Christians pick and choose which parts of the Bible they will believe, it sets a bad example that these young people can see.

Jesus faced this same problem during His ministry. He preached the truth and people turned away because of it. John 6:53-68:

So Jesus said to them, “Truly, truly, I say to you, unless you eat the flesh of the Son of Man and drink His blood, you have no life in yourselves. He who eats My flesh and drinks My blood has eternal life, and I will raise him up on the last day. For My flesh is true food, and My blood is true drink. He who eats My flesh and drinks My blood abides in Me, and I in him. As the living Father sent Me, and I live because of the Father, so he who eats Me, he also will live because of Me. This is the bread which came down out of heaven; not as the fathers ate and died; he who eats this bread will live forever.” These things He said in the synagogue as He taught in Capernaum. Therefore many of His disciples, when they heard this said, “This is a difficult statement; who can listen to it?” But Jesus, conscious that His disciples grumbled at this, said to them, “Does this cause you to stumble? What then if you see the Son of Man ascending to where He was before? It is the Spirit who gives life; the flesh profits nothing; the words that I have spoken to you are spirit and are life. But there are some of you who do not believe.” For Jesus knew from the beginning who they were who did not believe, and who it was that would betray Him. And He was saying, “For this reason I have said to you, that no one can come to Me unless it has been granted him from the Father.” As a result of this many of His disciples withdrew and were not walking with Him anymore. So Jesus said to the twelve, “You do not want to go away also, do you?” Simon Peter answered Him, “Lord, to whom shall we go? You have words of eternal life.

Jesus spoke the truth. People left following Him because they didn't want to hear the truth. I will be like Peter and accept the truth no matter how difficult it seems. I will not be like those Christians who compromise on the truth of the Bible for the sake of making it seem more appealing.

Bill Nye on video lying about evidence!

Bill Nye on video lying about evidence! I wrote that headline to grab people's attention. It's a little sensational, I'll admit, but I still mean it to be literal. I'm referring to the 2 hour video released by Answers in Genesis where Nye debates Ken during a tour of the recently opened Ark Encounter. Is it just me or is Nye really that rude of a person? He referred to several AiG staff scientists as “incompetent,” despite their doctorate degrees from reputable colleges like Harvard or Ohio State; he told Ken Ham he needed to study geology more; he told Ark visitors they needed to go to university; and concluded his tour saying that he couldn't be friends with someone like Ken Ham, though he might try to rescue him if he were drowning or something like that. That last comment was real big of you Nye! //RKBentley rolls his eyes// Look, there are people with whom I disagree but who aren't jerks. Bill Nye is a jerk. Maybe it's not very Christian of me to say that. I must say that Ken Ham was very gracious with Nye, even praying for him after Nye's comment that he might rescue him from drowning (which I guess also means he might not). But you can see in the video that Nye seemed to annoy even Ham at different times.

Anyway, back to my point of Nye lying. I haven't counted, but I would guess Nye used the term, “evidence” at least fifty times during his tour of the Ark. How he used the term, though, was often, grossly misleading.

Before I get into Nye's use of the word, let me talk a little bit about what evidence is and what it's not. Evidence is raw data. It's facts or observations. Contrary to the popular expression, facts don't really speak for themselves. Evidence just is. What we do, then, is look at the evidence and invent theories to try to explain why the evidence is the way it is. What is this thing? How did it get here? What might I conclude from it? Theories are our attempts to make sense of the evidence. A good theory should seem to explain the evidence reasonably well. In any case, the evidence itself is mute and doesn't care about our theories. In other words, the evidence is never really “for” a theory.

Some people, like Nye, conflate their theories with the evidence. During the video, Nye routinely makes comments like (paraphrasing), “All the evidence says that the earth is 4.5 billion years old.” Do you see what I mean? The evidence doesn't say anything. Bill Nye subscribes to a theory – his interpretation of the evidence – that says the earth is billions of years old. But he never says, “My theory is that the earth is billions of years old”; he merely repeats over and over, “The evidence says it.”

Evolutionists believe they have a monopoly on the evidence. It's sort of a game of dibs where, once evolutionists explain the evidence, that evidence is not available to explained by any other theory. The earth can't be young because they've already said it's old. There is no evidence for creation because it's already been used for evolution! Evolutionists do this so that when we disagree with their theory, it looks like we're disagreeing with the evidence. Tsk, tsk.

Nye certainly did this in the video. On a couple of occasions, Ken Ham tried to pin Nye down on the differences between the evidence and the conclusions we draw on the evidence. About 52 minutes into the video, for example, Ham and Nye are talking about tree rings. It's Nye's contention that there are living trees that can be dated to before the time of the Flood based on their rings. Ham counters that the rings aren't evidence in the sense that Nye is using them. Rings are something that simply exist in the present. We could count the rings of a tree and extrapolate backwards (4,000 rings means 4,000 years old) but we know that trees sometimes grow more than one ring per year. So 4,000 rings is the evidence and 4,000 years is a conclusion about the evidence. Even after Nye acknowledged that multiple rings can grow in trees each year, when Ham asked him if he could then be wrong about his conclusion, Nye stubbornly refused to concede even that simple point. “No. Absolutely not,” Nye says, “.... My interpretation with respect to the age on the earth in this regard is absolutely correct.” Time after time during the entire video, Nye offers his theory while calling it the evidence.

But look, if all Nye did was conflate his theory with the evidence, I wouldn't necessarily say he was “lying” - though it is still grossly misleading. However, Nye made other statements that were even more misleading. At about 1:17 in the video, Ken Ham mentions the account in Joshua where the sun stopped in the sky. Bill Nye replies, “Why would it do that? There's no evidence for that.”

That's very curious. What type of evidence would Bill Nye expect there to be for such an event? Historical events cannot be studied scientifically. I could ask, for example, “Where is the evidence that George Washington crossed the Delaware?” You can't study the river and discover it. The only way we can know it happened is because people who lived at the time wrote that it happened. The written accounts are the only evidence we have. And the evidence we have for Washington's crossing of the Delaware is the same evidence we have for Joshua's long day. Nye doesn't have to believe the written account but to say there is no evidence is a lie.

From there, Nye segues into a point he made several times in the video. He defines science to mean “the search for a natural explanation.” According to Nye, any time you invoke a miracle, it's not science. Of course, however a person defines science does not change what is true. If God stopped the motion of the planets for 12 hours, then that is what happened regardless if Nye thinks it's scientific. Nye desperately wants people to believe that, if something isn't scientific, it's not true. Nye told Ham he was “absolutely” wrong about Joshua's long day. Such a rebuke implies that Nye has absolute knowledge of the event. We know he doesn't. Therefore, Nye's continuous appeals to the “evidence” or to an arbitrary definition of science is pure bluff.

This leads me to Nye's most blatant lie about evidence. While Nye was waxing on about the account from Joshua and how science does not allow miracles, Ham interrupts him and asks, “Why should I accept your definition [of science]?” Nye pauses for a moment, then, with a straight face, replies, “Because we have so much evidence for it.”

You can watch him make the offensive remark at 1:18 on the video. Nye actually claims there is evidence for natural-only definition of science. Incredible! Please, Nye, show me this evidence! Where in the universe can I observe it? Can I put it under a microscope or weigh it on a scale or hold it against a ruler? Can I put it in a test tube?

Perhaps Nye is ignorant about how much of science is based on philosophy rather then evidence. In one Big Think video, Nye admits he's skeptical of some of the claims of philosophy. What he doesn't seem to realize is that his “natural only” view of the universe has a philosophical premise. It's a tenet of science – a belief akin to religious faith.

In his dogged determination to prove Ken Ham wrong, Nye repeated the word “evidence” over and over and over. He said there was no evidence for miracles but there was evidence for his definition of science. Watch the video for yourself. Time and time again, Nye lied about evidence.

Can a person lose his salvation? Part 4

I don't believe a person can lose his salvation. In this series until now, I've cited verses in the Bible that clearly say that our spiritual birth is like our physical birth – it is a transforming event that permanently assigns who we fundamentally are. Furthermore, once we are saved, God promises to keep us. In light of these verses, I cannot see how salvation could be temporary or conditional.

Of course, other people will cite other verses that seem to suggest that it is possible to lose our salvation. When confronted with two passages that seem to present differing ideas, the solution is not to decide which passages we believe are correct. The reality is that both verses are correct and the truth lies in a harmony of the two. In this post, I will discuss some of those passages often cited to support the idea that a person could lose his salvation.

Some passages that people cite, seem to include a condition of continuity. Consider Revelation 3:5:

He who overcomes will thus be clothed in white garments; and I will not erase his name from the book of life, and I will confess his name before My Father and before His angels.

In my first post in this series, I quoted a website that used the analogy of a free car to represent salvation. That author was full of analogies. When discussing Revelation, he said this:

Notice that God's pencil, which wrote your name in the Lamb's book of life, also has an eraser at the other end. The name can be erased from the book of life if you don't overcome.

Can I just say that I find it odd that someone would quote a promise where Jesus says He will not do something and use it as evidence that He might do it? Anyway, the author is attempting to highlight the condition that a person must overcome or else his name will be erased from the Book of Life. There are other verses that seem to carry similar conditions:

But Christ as a son over his own house; whose house are we, if we hold fast the confidence and the rejoicing of the hope firm unto the end. (Heb 3:6)

For we are made partakers of Christ, if we hold the beginning of our confidence stedfast unto the end; (Heb 3:14)

By reading just these verses, the implication seems to be that we must continue professing our faith until the end in order to receive our reward. But as I've already said, our understanding of any verse must be tempered with the rest of the Bible. In a previous post, I cited 1 Corinthians 1:7-8:

Therefore you do not lack any spiritual gift as you eagerly wait for our Lord Jesus Christ to be revealed. He will also keep you firm to the end, so that you will be blameless on the day of our Lord Jesus Christ.

If my continuance in the faith rests in my own hands, then my salvation is in peril. My flesh is weak. My faith wavers. But Jesus has saved me and He lives to continuously makes intercession for me. Those verses that talk about salvation being conditional on my continued faith must be in harmony with the promise that I am kept by the power of God. I know I will stay fast to the end because He has promised to keep me firm until the end.

There are other verses I could cite but I don't want to make this post too long. In short, it's my opinion that nearly all of the verses usually cited could be characterized as “negative arguments.” This is where a verse says one thing and the argument is made about what would happen if the opposite were true. I can't say I never make negative arguments but I don't believe negative arguments are strong arguments. I might say, for example, “I work hard so I can get ahead.” The opposite would be, if I don't work hard I won't get ahead. Perhaps I wouldn't, but where in that argument is found the possibility that I won't continue to work hard? I believe the same thing is true of the Bible. Perhaps if I stopped believing I could lose my salvation but that doesn't necessarily mean it is possible for a truly saved person to stop believing.

Perhaps the most cited verse to support the possibility of a person losing his salvation is John 15:1-2:

I am the true vine, and My Father is the vinedresser. Every branch in Me that does not bear fruit, He takes away; and every branch that bears fruit, He prunes it so that it may bear more fruit.

This is almost cited like a “gotcha” verse. At first reading, this verse is also a type of condition where God “takes away” any branch not bearing fruit (“cuts off” in the NIV). In other words, if a branch doesn't bear fruit, it's cut off. I very, very seldom appeal to the original language but, in this case especially, I believe most, mainstream versions of the Bible don't accurately translate this verse.

The word being translated is the verb, airw (airō, Strong's 142). It is sometimes translated as “takes” but the primary meaning is “lift up.” Even in verses where it is translated as “takes,” the meaning is still usually, “take up” or “pick up.” In the parable of the sower (Mark 4:15), for example, Satan “takes” the word which had been sown; the picture painted in the parable is of a bird “picking up” the seed that fell by the way.

In John 15, Jesus creates the metaphor of the Father as a husbandman. Every branch that abides in Him will bear fruit. He “lifts up” the downtrodden branches so that they are able bear fruit and He prunes the fruitful branches so that they can produce even more fruit. This is easily understood by anyone who has seen a vineyard. Even today, branches are still tied and held up from the ground. Note that in verse 6, it is only those branches that do not abide in Him (i.e. are not Christians) that are cast into the fire.

I believe the problem is that we sometimes see instances of people who profess to be Christians and seem to be saved, but later they reject Christ and live like they're lost again. They fit the bill of people who seem to have been saved but did not continue in the faith. Earlier I used the term, “truly saved.” I chose that deliberately because I believe many of the verses that seem to talk about someone losing his salvation are actually talking about people who were never saved. That will be the subject of my next and final post in this series.

Read the entire series

Part 1

Part 2

Part 3
Conclusion

Can a person lose his salvation? Part 3

Salvation is given by God. Can we all agree on that? I didn't earn it. I don't deserve it. God would be perfectly just to judge me according to my sins BUT because He is loving and merciful, He has made salvation possible through the shed blood of His only Son. By believing in the death and resurrection of Jesus and by accepting Him as my Lord, I am saved (Romans 10:). End of story....

or is it? You see, there are some people who believe that, while salvation may be a free gift, we have to work to keep it. So even though some call it a “free” gift, they still believe it comes with a lifetime of conditions. We could be the most vile sinner ever and be saved, right? But once we're saved, we'd better become sinless or we will meet the same fate we faced before coming to Christ. Before I even get into the Scripture, let me say that something about that just doesn't sound right. Christ will forgive a wallowing pig but will condemn a dirty sheep? Hmm.

In my second post of this series, I talked about the transforming nature of salvation. When we become saved, we are a new creature. Our old selves are passed away and we are born new of the Spirit. That is the picture of salvation given in the Bible. If we believe that we could lose our salvation, it makes salvation seem more of a status – something that could change. It's like going to work for a new company; as long as we work there, we enjoy the benefits of our employment but we could be fired or we could leave and then we would be the same person we were before. In this light, salvation isn't transforming but, rather, is conditional.

If we can all agree that salvation is given by God, my next question would be to ask who is responsible for keeping our salvation? Those people who believe we can lose our salvation obviously believe it is up to individual believers to keep their salvation but I don't believe such an idea can be found in Scripture. Instead, I think the Bible is clear that God not only saves us be He keeps us. Consider the following verses:

Therefore you do not lack any spiritual gift as you eagerly wait for our Lord Jesus Christ to be revealed. He will also keep you firm to the end, so that you will be blameless on the day of our Lord Jesus Christ. (1 Cor 1:7-8)

Wherefore he is able also to save them to the uttermost that come unto God by him, seeing he ever liveth to make intercession for them. (Heb 7:25)

Being confident of this very thing, that he which hath begun a good work in you will perform it until the day of Jesus Christ: (Philippians 1:6)

Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, which according to his abundant mercy hath begotten us again unto a lively hope by the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead, To an inheritance incorruptible, and undefiled, and that fadeth not away, reserved in heaven for you, Who are kept by the power of God through faith unto salvation ready to be revealed in the last time. (1Peter 1:3-5)

You can see from these verses that the same God who saved us also keeps us. We aren't kept by feeble works of the flesh any more than we were saved by feeble works of the flesh. How can we possibly reconcile the idea of losing our salvation with the idea that our salvation is kept by the power of God? Is God able to save us but not keep us?

Jesus Himself often testified that He keeps those that the Father gives Him.

And this is the Father's will which hath sent me, that of all which he hath given me I should lose nothing, but should raise it up again at the last day. And this is the will of him that sent me, that every one which seeth the Son, and believeth on him, may have everlasting life: and I will raise him up at the last day.... Whoso eateth my flesh, and drinketh my blood, hath eternal life; and I will raise him up at the last day. (John 6:39-40, 54)

The flesh and blood in this passage is a reference to the crucifixion, where Jesus give His life as an atonement for the sins of the world. By “eating” His flesh and “drinking” His blood, Jesus says we have eternal life and with that He makes another promise - “I will raise him up at the last day.” There is nothing about that verse that is ambiguous.

Our salvation is not a “one and done.” The sacrifice of Jesus didn't only forgive some of our sins – those committed before accepting Him. His blood covers all of our sins, those we have committed and those we will commit. This is expressed in several familiar passages but I believe some people don't grasp what is being said. David said, “mercy will follow me all the days of my life” (Psalm 23:6). John said, “For of His fullness we have all received, and grace upon grace” (John 1:16).

I wasn't just forgiven once; I'm forgiven continuously. Every day is new mercy. Every day is new grace. Every day God pours out new blessings upon me, not because of my obedience but because of Christ's obedience. Am I so vain that I think I can obey God in my flesh? Is my opinion of Christ's sacrifice so small that I believe His blood will not cover my next sin? Will I rob God of His glory by claiming it is my works that keep my salvation and not Him? No, no, and no!

Read the entire series:

Part 1
Part 2
Part 4
Conclusion

Can a person lose his salvation? Part 2

When we try to describe who someone is, there are certain qualities that are transitory and some that are permanent. I could describe a person as a teller at a bank. That's a transitory quality because he may not always be a teller. Next week, he could be working at a department store.

It's not always easy to decide if a quality is transitory or permanent. Take apples, for example; there are some varieties that are green, like Granny Smith. In that case, being green is a permanent characteristic of the apple. However, we sometimes use the word “green” to describe fruit that isn't ripe. So the phrase, “That apple is green,” is ambiguous. It could mean the apple isn't yet ripe – a transitory quality that could change as the fruit ripens or it could mean the apple is a Granny Smith – a permanent quality that will not change.

If we say that someone is saved, we must determine if that is a transitory or permanent condition. We can do this by examining passages in the Bible that describe the nature of salvation. We'll start by considering 2 Cor 5:17:

Therefore if any man be in Christ, he is a new creature: old things are passed away; behold, all things are become new.

In light of this verse, it's hard to imagine how salvation could be transitory or temporary. When we become saved, our old self ceases to exist. How then can we go back to being that person? This verse describes salvation as a fundamental change to who we are. It gives the strong impression that salvation is a permanent condition rather than temporary. Of course, we should never take a single verse as a proof text on matters of doctrine. Instead, we should always interpret any passage in the context of the entire Bible. Consider also the following verses:

Verily, verily, I say unto you, He that heareth my word, and believeth on him that sent me, hath everlasting life, and shall not come into condemnation; but is passed from death unto life. (John 5:24)

Being born again, not of corruptible seed, but of incorruptible, by the word of God, which liveth and abideth for ever. (1 Peter 1:23)

Salvation is clearly being described as a change to our essential nature. We have passed from death to life. We are born again of incorruptible seed. These verses, and many others like them, see to affirm that the most obvious understanding of 2 Cor is indeed the correct one. Being saved means a fundamental change in our very nature. Jesus Himself described salvation as being “born again.” Read His conversation with Nicodemus regarding the subject:

There was a man of the Pharisees, named Nicodemus, a ruler of the Jews: The same came to Jesus by night, and said unto him, Rabbi, we know that thou art a teacher come from God: for no man can do these miracles that thou doest, except God be with him. Jesus answered and said unto him, Verily, verily, I say unto thee, Except a man be born again, he cannot see the kingdom of God. Nicodemus saith unto him, How can a man be born when he is old? can he enter the second time into his mother's womb, and be born? Jesus answered, Verily, verily, I say unto thee, Except a man be born of water and of the Spirit, he cannot enter into the kingdom of God. That which is born of the flesh is flesh; and that which is born of the Spirit is spirit. (John 3:1-6)

Nicodemus scoffed at the idea a person could be born a second time. He was right in a sense because a second physical birth is impossible but Jesus wasn't talking about a second physical birth but a new birth – a birth from the Spirit. What would it mean to be born a second time of the flesh? You're already born so it would mean nothing new or different. Furthermore, how could a person ever become “unborn” of the flesh or “lose” his birth of the flesh? It doesn't make sense. When Jesus compared our spiritual birth to our physical birth, I believe He intended many of these parallels. If we could lose our salvation, what does that say about our spiritual rebirth? Do we become “unborn again”? It doesn't make any sense.

Are we agreed that salvation is a description of who we are? Next we will consider some passages that describe the permanency of our salvation:

My sheep hear my voice, and I know them, and they follow me: And I give unto them eternal life; and they shall never perish, neither shall any man pluck them out of my hand. (John 10:27-28)

Think about that verse for a moment. Jesus gives us eternal life and says His sheep will never perish. If you received eternal life, then lost it and perished, you have made Jesus a liar. There are many more verses along these lines.

And Jesus said unto them, I am the bread of life: he that cometh to me shall never hunger; and he that believeth on me shall never thirst. (John 6:35)

As far as the gospel is concerned, they are enemies for your sake; but as far as election is concerned, they are loved on account of the patriarchs, for God’s gifts and his call are irrevocable. (Romans 11:28-29) You might want to look up the definition of “irrevocable.”

Take special note of the words the Bible uses: eternal life, you will never hunger, God's gift is irrevocable. How can have eternal life and then not have it? It's like saying I used to be immortal but now I'm going to die. The use of these kinds of words suggests permanency of our salvation.

I believe people who think we can lose our salvation have the understanding that salvation is like a status, a condition that can change. It's as though being saved is like being a bank teller – you're a teller until you quit or until the bank fires you. I think this is an incorrect view that is contrary to Scripture.

Read the entire series:

Part 1
Part 3
Part 4
Conclusion

Does God hide himself?

In a list of arguments against God's existence, one critic at Backyard Skeptics questioned the existence of God based on what he called, “Divine Hiddenness.” From the article we read the following:

Why is God so stingy with direct evidence?... [T]he supposed miracles that attest to a supernatural power all happened in ancient, pre scientific, times, in which there existed no means of reliable verification. These supposed miracles are not being duplicated today so that we could see that such things are possible. Scientific errors in the Bible and its other flaws, including the commanding of atrocities, all make Scripture much harder to believe. A loving God would not erect such high barriers to belief and then further compound the difficulty in believing by providing us with such strong evidential circumstances against the supernatural, such as the inviolability of the laws of nature.

The implication being made is that, if God were real, He would openly reveal Himself to His creation; since He doesn't openly reveal Himself, it is evidence that He is not real. I've heard this same argument raised many times. Often, critics will sum it up with the question, “If there is a God, why doesn't He just appear to us?” I don't recall having heard the term, “divine hiddenness” before but it seems to make the same point. Here are some of my thoughts on that subject.

First, I would question the premise that God would necessarily reveal Himself. In the above quote, the author stated rather firmly, “A loving God would not erect such high barriers to belief.” Really? I've always considered it a bit presumptuous of people to tell me what God will or will not do. I agree that I might expect Him to appear, but on what grounds could one argue that He must? I can't think of any reason that obligates Him. Constructing a false narrative about how God should act, then criticizing God for not acting according to the false narrative is a logical fallacy known as a straw man.

Beyond that, though, I would say that God does not hide Himself. At the most fundamental level, we see God behind His creation. Psalm 19:1 says, “The heavens declare the glory of God; the skies proclaim the work of his hands.” The enormity, the complexity, indeed, even the existence of the universe tell us plainly that there is a Creator who made it all. Romans 1:20 goes even further, “For since the creation of the world His invisible attributes, His eternal power and divine nature, have been clearly seen, being understood through what has been made, so that they are without excuse.”

God also revealed Himself in special ways to people of the Old Testament. He appeared to Moses in the burning bush. He lead the freed children of Abraham through the desert as a pillar of fire or a cloud of smoke. The people heard His voice audibly at Mt Sinai. These examples and others show that God is a personal God who has made Himself known to His people.

God also made Himself known through the prophets and apostles. In many passages, the writers recite the words of God verbatim, prefacing their remarks with, “Thus saith the LORD....” As evidence that they were speaking with the authority of God, they were often given the ability to perform miracles. By extension, the words given to the prophets of old have become our Scriptures today. The canon of Scripture is God's revealed word to us.

But above all these is the incarnation – the birth of Jesus, our Emmanuel (God with us). John 1:14, 18 says, “And the Word became flesh, and dwelt among us, and we saw His glory, glory as of the only begotten from the Father, full of grace and truth.... No one has seen God at any time; the only begotten God who is in the bosom of the Father, He has explained Him.” God has revealed Himself in the Person of the Son. He told us who He was and proved it through many miracles including His own resurrection. He told us that we can have eternal life through Him and He gave His own life as the atonement for our sins.

People who would claim that God remains hidden have to ignore the clear evidence for His existence in His creation; they have to ignore His revealed word in the Bible; and they have to ignore the historical certainty of Jesus Christ. Of course, some critics still complain saying that the Bible was written so long ago and where is Jesus now? I'm sorry, but God has already made Himself known to them and there is no obligation that He reappear every few years to remind them that He is still Lord of the universe and that they will someday have to give an account of their lives to Him.

Even if Jesus did appear today, it still wouldn't change the mind of some people. Many of the people He appeared to in the Bible refused to believe in Him. It's not so much that God is hidden from them but rather they have blinded themselves to the truth.

Let me tell you what I find offensive...

So, I'm having breakfast with my wife at McDonald's on Saturday and I read this headline on FaceBook: Community Shocked Over Christian Church Sign: 'Muhammad not Greater than Jesus.' And they aren't kidding when they say shocked. One resident, Eric Cohn, is reported as saying, “I literally had to stop and back up and make sure I saw what I saw, and I was profoundly offended and upset by it.” Cohn also felt moved to write a letter to the editor of the local paper where he said, “Disparaging another group’s God is completely out of line.... Please, take it down — now.”

Another offended resident said in the same editorial, “I want to complain openly about the marquis in front of the Missionary Baptist Church on Belmont Drive. The message on the west bound side of the sign promotes ignorance, bigotry and hatred, none of which are regarded as true Christian values.”

In John 14:6, Jesus said, “I am the way, the truth, and the life: no man comes to the Father but by me.” The message of Christ is one of exclusivity. There is only one name by which men may be saved: it's Jesus – not Allah, not Muhammad, not Buddha, not Confucius. If Jesus is right, then all these other religions are wrong. Liberals say I'm intolerant but the truth pretty much is exclusive. I find it offensive – and more than a little hypocritical – that liberals say I'm bigoted and intolerant for believing the words of Christ. They say I'm wrong for believing someone else's religion is wrong yet liberals can't see how they are calling my religion wrong.

Even the mayor of Hood River, OR, had an opinion on the sign. Mayor Blackburn said, “I was really annoyed and sad. I am annoyed that in this political season there's a solid case of ugly going on. I think it norms up this kind of behavior like 'oh it's okay to be a bigot now.'”

The other thing that offends me is when elected, public officials abuse their office. Is this mayor aware that the Constitution protects our freedom of speech and the right to freely exercise our religion? If private citizens want to write letters to the editor or protest a church, they have a right to do so. But when the mayor, a representative of the state, uses the sway of his office to mock and ridicule the religious speech of a church, it erodes our liberty. Mayor Blackburn is a despot, a tyrant, and an offender of freedom!

OK, now fast forward to Sunday. My wife and I are having lunch after church and see the news of the shooting in FL. A radical Muslim called 911 and pledged allegiance to ISIS before shooting more than 100 people, killing 50 of them (later it was amended to 49). How sad.

I find it strange that the “peaceful” religion of Islam continuously spawns worshipers who would shoot people in a night club, burn Christians alive, behead people on TV, fly planes into buildings, and strap bombs to themselves to blow people up in a mall, while brain-damaged liberals continuously call for tolerance. Yet let a Christian church puts out a sign that says Jesus is greater than Muhammad and militant bleeding-hearts seem ready to riot. Really?

Oh, and I'm getting a little offended that the shooting is being characterized as an attack on gays. It's sort of like the President calling the Ft. Hood shooting a case of workplace violence. This was a jihadist. He would have found any reason to shoot innocent people. If it weren't a gay nightclub, it could have been a bus full of first-grade kids. It didn't matter to the shooter. At the end of the day, he wanted to create terror. If we don't identify the problem for what it is, it only distracts from the issue. We need to deal with radical Muslims who want to kill all of us; this is not the time to talk about gay rights or gun control.

It is God's will that we should all come to believe in the Son and have life (John 6:40). It is the plan of terrorists to kill non-believers. Christians want the lost to hear the truth. We want to reach them with the gospel – the good news. There is life in Jesus and none other. We plead with people, we reason with them, we pray for them – we don't shoot them. Are liberals really so thinned skinned that they're offended by a sign that says the Muslims are wrong?

I'm offended by stupidity.

Five Reasons Why I Reject Theistic Evolution: Part 4

4) It gives the wrong impression of death

The Bible is very clear that death is the judgment for sin. There are several passages that illustrate this: For the wages of sin is death, Romans 6:23. By one man sin entered into the world, and death by sin, Romans 5:12. He which converteth the sinner from the error of his way shall save a soul from death, James 5:20, et al. We die physically because we are descended from Adam (1 Corinthians 15:22) but, after we die, the lost will be judged for their own sins before the Great White Throne (Revelation 20:11-14). At that Judgment, everyone whose name is not written in the Book of Life, is cast into the Lake of Fire; this is called, the second death (Revelation 20:14-15).

When we are born again, the Bible says we pass from death into life (John 5:24). The gospel is the good news that we can have life in Christ. As Christians, our sins are forgiven by Christ's blood. Our physical death becomes that time when we are rid of these vessels of clay and enter into eternity knowing that we will have no part in the second death. In 1 Corinthians 15:55, Paul rejoices, saying, O death, where is thy sting? O grave, where is thy victory?

Christ conquered death for Christians but, for the lost, death still holds sway. We seldom know when death will overtake us so we need to make a decision for Jesus while we have the opportunity. If a person dies before he has repented, he has forever lost the opportunity for salvation. Ezekiel 18:21-23 says, “But if the wicked will turn from all his sins that he hath committed, and keep all my statutes, and do that which is lawful and right, he shall surely live, he shall not die. All his transgressions that he hath committed, they shall not be mentioned unto him: in his righteousness that he hath done he shall live. Have I any pleasure at all that the wicked should die? saith the Lord GOD: and not that he should return from his ways, and live?” God wants all people to come to repentance (2 Peter 3:9).

In an interview with the NY Times, Bill Nye made these following comments:

NYE: I think the fear of death figures prominently in creationist thought. That the promise of eternal life is reassuring to people who are deeply troubled by the troubling fact that we’re all going to die. And it bugs me, too. But I press forward rather than running in circles screaming.

NY TIMES: And ultimately, death is a part of evolution.

NYE: It’s the key. The key is that you can pass on improvements by having kids. And there aren’t enough resources for any population to go completely unchecked, whether the population is humans or crickets. There isn’t enough for everybody, so you compete. And this is one of Darwin’s enormous insights.

According to Nye, death is the key to evolution. You see, it's not just that death happens during evolution, death is prerequisite to evolution. It's the hero of the story. It's the champion of the theory. Yet in spite of this, I still think that most of the people who believe in evolution never fully grasp exactly how critical a role death plays.

Natural selection is sometimes described as the “survival of the fittest.” Of course, this must also mean the demise of the unfit. According to the theory, a creature is born with some unusual trait (either through a fortunate combination of existing genes or through random mutation). On rare occasions, this unusual trait conveys some advantage to its host – perhaps the host can run faster, see keener, or jump higher. Because of this advantage, the host will hopefully live longer and leave more offspring than its neighbors without the trait. The offspring that inherit the advantage will likewise tend to have more offspring and eventually, the creatures having the trait will replace the entire population. The more fit live, the less fit die, and the entire population evolves. That is how it is supposed to work. If the less fit did not die, then the more fit really have no advantage to select.

Because it plays such a key role in evolution, some people almost regard death as noble. Biologos, a group that identifies itself as Christian, has an article titled, Death and Rebirth: The Role of Extinction in Evolution. Wow, “death and rebirth”! It almost seems to put evolution on equal footing with the Resurrection! In the article, the author makes this claim:

Extinction is actually a common feature of life on earth when viewed over long (e.g. geological) timescales. By some estimates, over 99% of the species that have ever lived have gone extinct [this is a lie, by the way].... Such an extinction event (of a single species, or perhaps a handful of species) alters the environment of other remaining species in an ecosystem. This, in turn, may influence the ability of some of these remaining species to reproduce compared to other species.... As the ecosystem landscape shifts due to loss of species, new biological opportunities, or niches, might arise. These new niches are then available to support new species to fill them.

There you go. Animals go extinct but that makes way for new animals to evolve. It's the circle of life. Some things live and some things die and it's good. When a tsunami or earthquake kills thousands of people, critics often say that such tragedies are evidence there is no God. They also say that such events have happened frequently in the world's history and that they are mechanisms that give some species the opportunity to evolve.

The role of death in evolution is the complete opposite of what death truly is. Death is an intruder into the creation. It is the consequence of Adam's sin and later, of our own sins. It is an enemy that will one day be destroyed (1 Corinthians 15:26). Death should be dreaded by the lost and they should seek a way to avoid it. The gospel – the good news – is that there is life in Jesus!!

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Five Reasons Why I Reject Theistic Evolution: Part 3

3) It diminishes the Person of Jesus

One reason so many Christians are ready to embrace evolution is that they don't see it as an important issue. It's the Old Testament, they will say, and we live in the New Testament era. It is the opinion of many that our belief on origins is not relevant to our salvation so let's not worry about that and just tell people about Jesus. What these same people don't realize is that our understanding of our origins has a direct effect on our understanding of Jesus.

Jesus came to fulfill the law. He said this overtly in Matthew 5:17, Think not that I am come to destroy the law, or the prophets: I am not come to destroy, but to fulfil. But what does it mean to “fulfill” the law? He accomplished this in several ways. A Savior was necessitated by Adam's sin in the garden. When Adam fell, he brought death into the world and death has passed on to all men because all have sinned (Romans 5:12). But even as God judged with the Curse, He also promised a Redeemer, the Seed of the woman who would crush the head of the Serpent (Genesis 3:15). Jesus fulfilled that promise.

When Adam and Eve sinned, the Bible says their eyes were opened and they saw that they were naked (Genesis 3:7). They tried to cover themselves with fig leaves but God killed an animal and made skins to cover their nakedness. This is the first recorded death in the Bible and ushered in an era of sacrifices where the followers of God would sacrifice animals as a covering for their sins. Hebrews 9:22 says that without the shedding of blood, there is no remission of sin. But the system of sacrifices proscribed in the Old Testament was only temporary; they were pictures of the ultimate sacrifice that would come: Jesus, the Lamb of God who would take away the sin of the world (John 1:29). The death of Jesus did away with the need for animal sacrifices. He fulfilled the Law by covering our sins permanently with His own blood.

But what if there was no Adam? No first sin? No Fall? According to theistic evolution, death is just the way it's always been and not the judgment for sin. Then what did Jesus fulfill? It would be like having the answer to a question that was never asked. 1 Corinthians 15:45 says, “And so it is written, The first man Adam was made a living soul; the last Adam was made a quickening spirit.” If the first Adam never lived, what need is there for a second Adam to quicken us? The Incarnation of Jesus was only necessary because there was a literal Adam; if you remove a real Adam, you diminish the need for Jesus. One, outspoken atheist, Frank Zindler, described it this way (as quoted by William Debski):

The most devastating thing, though, that biology did to Christianity was the discovery of biological evolution. Now that we know that Adam and Eve never were real people, the central myth of Christianity is destroyed. If there never was an Adam and Eve, there never was an original sin. If there never was an original sin, there is no need of salvation. If there is no need of salvation, there is no need of a savior. And I submit that puts Jesus, historical or otherwise, into the ranks of the unemployed. I think that evolution is absolutely the death knell of Christianity.

This atheist seems to understand the incompatibility of evolution and Christianity better than most Christians.

The other way theistic evolution diminishes the Person of Jesus regards how Jesus viewed Genesis. Jesus is Creator (John 1:3), therefore, we would expect anything He says about the creation to be accurate.

Jesus quoted from Genesis often. When asked about marriage, for example, Jesus said, “Have ye not read, that he which made them at the beginning made them male and female, And said, For this cause shall a man leave father and mother, and shall cleave to his wife: and they twain shall be one flesh?” (Matthew 19:4-5). In this passage, Jesus is quoting from both Genesis chapters 1 & 2. He speaks of Adam and Eve as though they were real people. He also said they were created at the beginning of creation – not billions of years after the alleged Big Bang. On another occasion, Jesus mentioned Abel, saying that he'd been murdered (Luke 11:51). In still another passage, He compares the world at His return to the world just before the Flood (Matthew 24:38).

If Jesus spoke about all these things as though they were history, what does it say about His authority when people who claim to be Christians say none of it ever happened? According to theistic evolution, there was no Adam, no Abel, and no Flood. Jesus said to Nicodemus, “If I have told you earthly things, and ye believe not, how shall ye believe, if I tell you of heavenly things?” (John 3:12). Christian evolutionists say we don't have to believe what Jesus said about the creation or Flood, but we need to trust Him for salvation? It doesn't make any sense.

Finally, Jesus did not mince words when He condemned the Pharisees in John 5:46-47, “For had ye believed Moses, ye would have believed me; for he wrote of me. But if ye believe not his writings, how shall ye believe my words?” Jesus says it plainly; the Pharisees, who claim to be disciples of Moses, did not believe in Him because they really didn't believe in Moses. It is a simple matter of cause and effect and I believe it applies even today. People who do not believe in the creation also tend to not believe in Jesus.

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10 Evidences for Biblical Creation: Conclusion

#1: The Bible: The best evidence we have for any event from antiquity is not “scientific” evidence but rather it is the historical records written down by people who were witnesses to the event. The same is true for our origins. No one alive today was there to observe the start of the universe. What we have is the revealed word of the Creator Who tells us how it was done. Even if we had no scientific evidence at all about the creation, we could still know with confidence that the world was created recently, that the first man was created miraculously, and that the world was once judged by a global flood. We know this because the details have been revealed to us by God.

Critics, of course, object on the grounds that the Bible could not be considered “scientific” evidence. The irony is that what is considered scientific evidence is usually determined by philosophical reasons. Most of the philosophical underpinnings of science could not pass scientific scrutiny. Even the principle of seeking only natural explanations is a philosophical assumption. Please show me, for example, the scientific evidence that demonstrates all phenomena must have a natural explanation. Nothing about the secular definitions of science precludes the Bible from being true. If God created the universe by fiat, that is the truth regardless of whether or not it is considered scientific.

It's sad but true that way too many Christians trust the shifting opinions of fallible men over the inspired word of the Creator. A tired cliché is that the Bible tells us that God created the world and science tells us how. Really? As I've already discussed in this series, science has no explanation for the origin of matter, or energy, or physical laws, or life. The only thing that secular theories of our origins tell us is that some unknown process caused chemicals to come alive and this unidentified being was our first ancestor which gradually evolved over billions of years to become all the different kinds of life we see now. In other words, “science” tells us precisely that God didn't do it while really having no idea how else it could have been done.

In John 3:12, Jesus said to Nicodemus, “If I told you earthly things and you do not believe, how will you believe if I tell you heavenly things?” I believe the reverse is also true; if we claim to believe the Bible about heavenly things, how can we not believe what it says about earthly things? The Bible is not ambiguous about the creation. Genesis 1 is very clear about the six days of creation. Exodus 20:11 affirms these were ordinary days: “For in six days the LORD made the heavens and the earth, the sea and all that is in them, and rested on the seventh day; therefore the LORD blessed the sabbath day and made it holy.” Why should I reject the clear words of this passage and seek some obscure meaning of the term “six days”? Because “science” tells us it's not really six days? No, thank you!

Jesus often would chide the Pharisees by reminding them of what the Scriptures say. He would preface His remarks with the stinging words, “Haven't you read...?” Whenever He did this, He always relied on the clear meaning of the passage to make His point. He never appealed to some tortured interpretation of any text. He often quoted from Genesis. When asked about marriage, Jesus responded by saying, “Have you not read that He who created them from the beginning made them male and female....?” (Matthew 19:4). Jesus mentioned Abel by name in Matthew 23:35 and spoke of him as a real person. In Luke 17:26, Jesus says His coming will be, “just as it happened in the days of Noah.” If Noah Flood wasn't a real event, then is Christ's return a real event? Time after time, Jesus spoke of the people and events of the Old Testament as matters of fact.

Is the Bible the revealed word of God? Is Jesus the Word who created all things (John 1:3)? If yes, then how can we not trust what the Bible – and Jesus specifically – tells us about the creation and the Flood? The Bible is – by far – the best evidence we have for the miraculous, recent creation of the universe!

Read this entire series:

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Part 2

Part 3

Part 4

Part 5