Did God Use Evolution?

There are a lot of Christians that hold to “theistic evolution” (TE)– that is, God used evolution to create us. They usually believe this as a way to reconcile “science” with the Bible. The general sentiment is that the creation account in Genesis is simply an allegory to express a deeper truth. Of course, I’m not sure what “deep truth” they’re talking about beyond God being the Creator. What’s so “deep” and mysterious about that? Why didn’t the Bible just come out and say, “God created everything” instead of couching it inside a story so antithetical to the truth (assuming evolution is true)?

It’s true that the fledging Hebrew nation at the time of Moses didn’t know everything we know, but they weren’t idiots. If God wanted to say that He created over billions of years, He didn’t have to say “six days” because these Jews were too stupid to understand anything else. The Bible has very clearly demonstrated its ability to convey enormous numbers by comparing them to things like the grains of sand in the sea (as in Genesis 41:49).

But besides that, there’s another point of disagreement I have with TE folks. Online the other day, one TE Christian made the following comment: “...[God] used evolution to create other living creatures, culminating in us.”

If God created us via evolution, where exactly are we in the process? Have we evolved any since Adam? Have we reached perfection and ceased evolving? If things continue, what will we look like in 100,000 more years? 1,000,000 more years? Are we in the image of God now or will we be in another few millennia?Most evolutionists I know believe evolution is still occurring. I've heard the stats about things like the average height of humans and the density of our teeth even over the last few decades that evolutionists use to support their claims. If God created via evolution, it hasn't "culminated in us." We are just the current model. It seems to me, some people who hold to TE haven’t thought out the consequences of their belief.

There are a lot different “interpretations” of Genesis. Besides TE there are theories like “progressive creationism” and the Gap Theory. The common theme in all of these is they all attempt to show how the Bible is compatible with “science.” The sad fact is that whenever scientific opinion seems to conflict with the Bible, these folks immediately begin to “re-interpret” the Bible. I guess it doesn’t occur to them that it’s the scientific opinion that could be wrong.

In future posts, I intend to detail some of the more mainstream theories people use to warp Genesis to fit science as well as discuss the failings of such compromises. In the meanwhile, let me issue a blanket objection: the plain reading of Genesis is the correct one. We need not look for some other way to read it.