Ken Ham's Blog, page 385

Do Young-Earth Creationists “Mess Up”?

Many of you likely heard about the recent controversy over football player Tim Tebow’s bowing out of speaking at First Baptist Church in Dallas. Now, I was greatly encouraged by Pastor Robert Jeffress’s stand in defense of the biblical definition of marriage. He has boldly stood in the face of criticism to defend what the Bible says about this contentious issue.

And this week, Pastor Jeffress appeared on The O’Reilly Factor on the Fox News Channel, hosted by Bill O’Reilly. (You can watch the full interview on YouTube.) O’Reilly has been on the attack lately against Bible-believing Christians, including those who hold to a young earth and a historical Adam and Eve. It was clearly difficult for Pastor Jeffress to explain his positions, considering how much O’Reilly kept cutting in and trying to push his own view that many parts of the Bible are allegorical.

I’ve done numerous interviews like this myself, and it is not easy. You sit in a studio with an ear piece for sound, and you stare into the camera. You can hear the person doing the interview but can’t see them. It can make for a very difficult interview, and it’s hard to cut in when needed. Hosts have total control, and the guest is at their mercy. Under these sorts of conditions, Pastor Jeffress attempted to defend a historical Adam and Eve to O’Reilly, citing Matthew 19:4–5:

And He answered and said to them, “Have you not read that He who made them at the beginning ‘made them male and female,’ and said, ‘For this reason a man shall leave his father and mother and be joined to his wife, and the two shall become one flesh’”?

O’Reilly didn’t accept that answer, claiming that the text doesn’t name Adam and Eve specifically. But it’s clear that Christ is referencing Adam and Eve when he says that it was the male and female God made “at the beginning.” Furthermore, the Apostle Paul in 1 Corinthians 15:45 links Christ to Adam, clearly holding the belief that Adam was a real person:

And so it is written, “The first man Adam became a living being.” The last Adam became a life-giving spirit.

In spite of O’Reilly’s sometimes obnoxious behavior during the interview, Pastor Jeffress continued to defend the Word of God as trustworthy.

However, I was incredibly disappointed in the stand Pastor Jeffress took on the age of the earth. I’ve included a section of the transcript below:

O’Reilly: If you believe in Adam and Eve, there are a number of other things that you have to believe. Incest is one of them because the race had to procreate off the children that Adam and Eve had. Then you have to reject the science of evolution and carbon dating and all of those things—

Jeffress: No.

O’Reilly: So it’s kind of incompatible with science. Or am I wrong?

Jeffress: No, I think you’re wrong on this one, Bill. You’re usually absolutely right, but I think you’re wrong on this one. The Bible does not contradict true science. It may contradict the passing fads of scientific theory that are always evolving. For example, it used to be thought that the cosmos always existed. But then we had Sir Fredrick Hoyle, who named the Big Bang Theory, that said, “Guess what, the universe had a beginning 13.7 billion years ago.” . . .

O’Reilly: Do you believe that—do you believe that the universe started 13.7 billion years ago?

Jeffress: I think it very well could have been. One of things that fundamentalists Christians mess up on is they try to say the Earth is 6,000 years old. The Bible never makes that claim anywhere.

Now, Pastor Jeffress implies that he would allow for an old earth and the big bang idea. Many pastors think that the big bang supports the Bible, as it means there was a beginning to the universe. I believe this is what Dr. Jeffress was trying to say—that there was a beginning. However, the big bang is a secular idea to try to explain the universe without God! Not only that, the big bang idea has the sun coming before the earth—and the earth then is a hot molten blob for millions of years. The Bible clearly states the earth was created before the sun, and the earth was covered with water from the start. This means the big bang idea is just plain wrong—on the basis of the authority of Scripture. And we also have a number of articles on our website citing many problems with the idea of the big bang that conflict with what we’ve learned from science.

Is it the evidence that convinces us that the earth and universe are young? No. We believe in a young universe because of the revelation God has given us in His Word concerning the history of the creation. The evidence only serves as a confirmation of His Word, and it makes sense when looked at through the biblical worldview. Certainly the majority of dating methods contradict the belief in billions of years—but all dating methods are fallible and based on assumptions. The only infallible dating method is the revelation from God concerning the history of the universe He (who does not lie) has revealed in His Word.

It’s true that the Bible doesn’t say exactly how old the earth is—if it said, “The earth is 6,000 years old,” it would eventually be incorrect as the Bible was completed 2,000 years ago! But we can know how old the earth is based on counting up the genealogies the Bible provides. I encourage you to read Bodie Hodge’s article How Old Is the Earth? for more information on how we determine the age of the earth based on biblical genealogies.

Again, we need to understand that the belief in millions of years does not come from Scripture, but from the fallible methods that secularists use to date the universe.

To attempt to “fit” millions of years into the Bible, you have to invent a gap of time that almost all Bible scholars agree the text does not allow—at least from a hermeneutical perspective. Or you have to reinterpret the “days” of creation as long periods of time (even though they are obviously ordinary days in the context of Genesis 1). In other words, you have to add a concept (millions of years) from outside Scripture, into God’s Word. This approach puts man’s fallible ideas in authority over God’s Word.

As soon as you surrender the Bible’s authority in one area, you “unlock a door” to do the same thing in other areas. Once the door of compromise is open, even if ajar just a little, subsequent generations push the door open wider. Ultimately, this compromise has been a major contributing factor in the loss of biblical authority in our Western world.

We are seeing two-thirds of young people in this nation leave the church by college age. Research we have done—published in the book Already Gone—shows clearly that Christian leaders who are compromising God’s Word with millions of years has been a major factor in contributing to why younger generations doubt the Bible beginning in Genesis, and that it puts them on a slippery slide of unbelief through the rest of Scripture.

Christians who believe in a young earth do not “mess up” as this pastor stated, but those who accept billions of years do “mess up” as they are really unlocking that door to undermining the authority of Scripture.

Obviously the age of the earth is not a salvation issue, but it is an authority issue! And we have been losing biblical authority from the culture. I challenge pastors not to compromise God’s Word in any way with ideas from outside of Scripture!

Thanks for stopping by and thanks for praying,

Ken

Steve Golden assisted in composing this blog post.

Do Young Earth Creationists “Mess Up”?

Many of you likely heard about the recent controversy over football player Tim Tebow’s bowing out of speaking at First Baptist Church in Dallas. Now, I was greatly encouraged by Pastor Robert Jeffress’s stand in defense of the biblical definition of marriage. He has boldly stood in the face of criticism to defend what the Bible says about this contentious issue.

And this week, Pastor Jeffress appeared on The O’Reilly Factor on the Fox News Channel, hosted by Bill O’Reilly. (You can watch the full interview on YouTube.) O’Reilly has been on the attack lately against Bible-believing Christians, including those who hold to a young earth and a historical Adam and Eve. It was clearly difficult for Pastor Jeffress to explain his positions, considering how much O’Reilly kept cutting in and trying to push his own view that many parts of the Bible are allegorical.

I’ve done numerous interviews like this myself, and it is not easy. You sit in a studio with an ear piece for sound, and you stare into the camera. You can hear the person doing the interview but can’t see them. It can make for a very difficult interview, and it’s hard to cut in when needed. Hosts have total control, and the guest is at their mercy. Under these sorts of conditions, Pastor Jeffress attempted to defend a historical Adam and Eve to O’Reilly, citing Matthew 19:4–5:

And He answered and said to them, “Have you not read that He who made them at the beginning ‘made them male and female,’ and said, ‘For this reason a man shall leave his father and mother and be joined to his wife, and the two shall become one flesh’”?

O’Reilly didn’t accept that answer, claiming that the text doesn’t name Adam and Eve specifically. But it’s clear that Christ is referencing Adam and Eve when he says that it was the male and female God made “at the beginning.” Furthermore, the Apostle Paul in 1 Corinthians 15:45 links Christ to Adam, clearly holding the belief that Adam was a real person:

And so it is written, “The first man Adam became a living being.” The last Adam became a life-giving spirit.

In spite of O’Reilly’s sometimes obnoxious behavior during the interview, Pastor Jeffress continued to defend the Word of God as trustworthy.

However, I was incredibly disappointed in the stand Pastor Jeffress took on the age of the earth. I’ve included a section of the transcript below:

O’Reilly: If you believe in Adam and Eve, there are a number of other things that you have to believe. Incest is one of them because the race had to procreate off the children that Adam and Eve had. Then you have to reject the science of evolution and carbon dating and all of those things—

Jeffress: No.

O’Reilly: So it’s kind of incompatible with science. Or am I wrong?

Jeffress: No, I think you’re wrong on this one, Bill. You’re usually absolutely right, but I think you’re wrong on this one. The Bible does not contradict true science. It may contradict the passing fads of scientific theory that are always evolving. For example, it used to be thought that the cosmos always existed. But then we had Sir Fredrick Hoyle, who named the Big Bang Theory, that said, “Guess what, the universe had a beginning 13.7 billion years ago.” . . .

O’Reilly: Do you believe that—do you believe that the universe started 13.7 billion years ago?

Jeffress: I think it very well could have been. One of things that fundamentalists Christians mess up on is they try to say the Earth is 6,000 years old. The Bible never makes that claim anywhere.

Now, Pastor Jeffress implies that he would allow for an old earth and the big bang idea. Many pastors think that the big bang supports the Bible, as it means there was a beginning to the universe. I believe this is what Dr. Jeffress was trying to say—that there was a beginning. However, the big bang is a secular idea to try to explain the universe without God! Not only that, the big bang idea has the sun coming before the earth—and the earth then is a hot molten blob for millions of years. The Bible clearly states the earth was created before the sun, and the earth was covered with water from the start. This means the big bang idea is just plain wrong—on the basis of the authority of Scripture. And we also have a number of articles on our website citing many problems with the idea of the big bang that conflict with what we’ve learned from science.

Is it the evidence that convinces us that the earth and universe are young? No. We believe in a young universe because of the revelation God has given us in His Word concerning the history of the creation. The evidence only serves as a confirmation of His Word, and it makes sense when looked at through the biblical worldview. Certainly the majority of dating methods contradict the belief in billions of years—but all dating methods are fallible and based on assumptions. The only infallible dating method is the revelation from God concerning the history of the universe He (who does not lie) has revealed in His Word.

It’s true that the Bible doesn’t say exactly how old the earth is—if it said, “The earth is 6,000 years old,” it would eventually be incorrect as the Bible was completed 2,000 years ago! But we can know how old the earth is based on counting up the genealogies the Bible provides. I encourage you to read Bodie Hodge’s article How Old Is the Earth? for more information on how we determine the age of the earth based on biblical genealogies.

Again, we need to understand that the belief in millions of years does not come from Scripture, but from the fallible methods that secularists use to date the universe.

To attempt to “fit” millions of years into the Bible, you have to invent a gap of time that almost all Bible scholars agree the text does not allow—at least from a hermeneutical perspective. Or you have to reinterpret the “days” of creation as long periods of time (even though they are obviously ordinary days in the context of Genesis 1). In other words, you have to add a concept (millions of years) from outside Scripture, into God’s Word. This approach puts man’s fallible ideas in authority over God’s Word.

As soon as you surrender the Bible’s authority in one area, you “unlock a door” to do the same thing in other areas. Once the door of compromise is open, even if ajar just a little, subsequent generations push the door open wider. Ultimately, this compromise has been a major contributing factor in the loss of biblical authority in our Western world.

We are seeing two-thirds of young people in this nation leave the church by college age. Research we have done—published in the book Already Gone—shows clearly that Christian leaders who are compromising God’s Word with millions of years has been a major factor in contributing to why younger generations doubt the Bible beginning in Genesis, and that it puts them on a slippery slide of unbelief through the rest of Scripture.

Christians who believe in a young earth do not “mess up” as this pastor stated, but those who accept billions of years do “mess up” as they are really unlocking that door to undermining the authority of Scripture.

Obviously the age of the earth is not a salvation issue, but it is an authority issue! And we have been losing biblical authority from the culture. I challenge pastors not to compromise God’s Word in any way with ideas from outside of Scripture!

Thanks for stopping by and thanks for praying,

Ken

Steve Golden assisted in composing this blog post.

Museum Exhibit Featured on National TV Tonight

I recently learned that the Verbum Domini Bible manuscript exhibit inside our Creation Museum—which is a part of the Green Collection that will be on display in Washington DC in the future Museum of the Bible—will be featured tonight in a segment on the nationally syndicated program The List.

The show’s website describes the program as “a television news magazine that finds the intersection between the news of the day and pop culture … founded around something we all use to stay on track – lists – to look at daily consumer issues and the hottest news trends.”

This new syndicated program is broadcast in several major markets—a list of channels and tonight’s broadcast times is available at this link. Viewers in the Cincinnati area can watch it on WCPO-TV channel 9 at 7:00 PM tonight.

Ken

The End of an Era

A special friend—and fellow warrior in the battle for the hearts and minds of people—has gone to his eternal reward.

Dr. Duane Gish, former senior vice president of the Institute for Creation Research (ICR), went home to be with the Lord on Wednesday morning. I knew Dr. Gish for over 30 years and worked with him at ICR. Dr. Gish was a great defender of the Bible, and he participated in 300 debates with evolutionists. Over the years, he became known as “Creation’s Bulldog” because of his vigorous defense of the Genesis account of creation. He was without a doubt the world’s foremost creation-evolution debater for biblical creationists.

I’ll never forget the time I obtained a copy of his book Evolution: The Fossils Say No. I was still living in Australia and was involved in founding the biblical creation apologetics ministry that started in our home in Brisbane, Queensland. And I’ll never forget the joy in my heart when I saw the very first major children’s book on dinosaurs by Dr. Gish, Dinosaurs: Those Terrible Lizards. We imported these two books (as well as many others) and thousands of them were purchased and distributed throughout Australia.

Dr. Gish visited Australia in the 1980s and spoke for our ministry (then known as the Creation Science Foundation).

When Mally and I—and our children—moved to America to initially work with Dr. Gish and Dr. Henry Morris at ICR (in the San Diego area at that time), Duane adopted our kids to be their American grandfather. He will always have a special place in our family’s hearts.

Dr. Gish earned a PhD in biochemistry from U.C. Berkeley, and he was the author of a number of books, especially Evolution: The Fossils Say No! Before he joined the Institute for Creation Research, he worked as an assistant professor at Cornell University Medical College and later with the Upjohn Company as a senior research associate in biochemistry. During that time in the 1960s, he helped form the Creation Research Society.

Many AiG staff members can attest to the impact that Dr. Gish’s life and work had on them. He influenced many people in the course of his life, and he has left a godly legacy behind.

Dr. Gish and the late Dr. Henry Morris will always be two of my heroes of the faith. Both men have now received their eternal rewards. We at AiG stand upon the shoulders of these men who exhibited such courage and boldness in their uncompromising stand on the authority of God’s Word beginning in Genesis.

In June of last year I enjoyed a very special time with my good friend Duane while I was speaking in Colorado. Dr. Gish was visiting his daughter, and she arranged for both of us to meet. At that time Dr. Gish kept telling me how thrilled he was with our Creation Museum and what a blessing it was for him to have seen this new facility. He was also joyful to know that others are helping to carry on the ministry that he and Dr. Morris were so integral in starting in the USA. Here is a photograph taken of the both of us as we met this past June.

Yes, it really is the end of an era as these two greats (Dr. Gish and Dr. Morris) who were a part of the beginnings of the modern biblical creationist movement have moved on to their eternal homes.

AiG cofounder Mark Looy has written an article about the life and ministry of Dr. Gish. I urge you to read this article—and read it to your kids—to learn about the life of a great Christian warrior and his influence on a certain teenager forty years ago. Since this year’s ministry theme is to reach young people and rescue them from the secularists, I urge you to read Mark’s article.

Thanks for stopping by and thanks for praying,

Ken

Monkeys Using Tools?

Every so often, another story comes up in the news about animals that are supposedly demonstrating a more human intelligence because of their ability to use tools. On the Answers in Genesis website alone, we’ve collected and commented on a variety of reports about animals using tools. From spear-making chimpanzees to crows that can use tools to their advantage, evolutionists love to use these as alleged proof that animals are closer to human intelligence than we think.

For example, in 2005, we wrote about widely circulated stories of gorillas in the wild using tools in an article titled Gorillas and Tools? And do you know what the observers found so impressive then?

A female gorilla crossed a pool of water by using a detached stick to test the water depth and then trying to use it as a walking stick. The second case involved another female gorilla who picked up a dead shrub and used it to lean on while looking for food in a swamp. According to the BBC report, she then placed the trunk down on the swampy ground and used it as a bridge.

You can read two more stories on apes using tools from our weekly News to Note publication at the links below:

News to Note, “BBC News: ‘Ancient Chimps Used Stone Tools”
News to Note, “BBC News: ‘Chimpanzees “hunt using spears”’

In another example from 2009–2010, there were a few stories about the intelligence of crows. One of the cases involved crows who were able to use one tool to retrieve another tool, and so on, until they were able to use an appropriate-length tool to retrieve food deep inside a tube. Now, it’s important to note that the crows only used one tool after another—they didn’t actually use these tools to create a new tool. (Read our article on this topic at this link.)

And there’s much more.  Here are just a few of the many examples:

Otters have been observed using rocks to crack open their food (e.g., oysters and crustaceans).
Elephants use rocks as damaging weapons.
The Egyptian vulture uses rock-throwing to crack open large ostrich eggs.
Molting Brown bears in Alaska have been observed using rocks to exfoliate.
Several species of wrasses (fish) have been observed using rocks as anvils to crack bivalve shells.

Well, the newest report comes from Live Science. The article’s main point is in its title: “Nut-Cracking Monkeys Show Humanlike Skills.” So what’s so skillful about how these monkeys are cracking open nuts?

The monkeys actually place the nuts on a stone anvil to keep them steady for cracking. While this is a remarkable demonstration of how God has gifted animals for survival, the researchers have taken their conclusions too far:

That means the monkeys are able to not only use tools, but to use them with finesse. This ability may be a precursor to humans’ ability to adapt tools to different circumstances and to use them smoothly under varying conditions.

This ability is really nothing special. Animals are clearly able to make use of objects and even to create tools for basic purposes, like hunting or getting past obstacles. So what distinguishes an animal’s use of tools from a human’s? Well, although animals can create some basic tools, they haven’t been able to create tools and then use those tools to create more advanced, precise tools. Humans do that.

Only humans make tools that can make more tools. Man was made in the image of God, clearly distinct from animals and birds (Genesis 1:27), which means that we can think and create at a level that no animal ever could. A good example of this is man’s use of grammar and syntax, which no animal has ever exhibited. Intelligent behavior in apes and other animals, whether it’s innate, learned, or imitated, does not discount this biblical truth—no matter how much evolutionists claim it does.

What I usually find is that when it is an ape or monkey seen to be using something as a tool, it’s headline news. Why? Because humans are supposedly closely related to apes and also to monkeys.  It doesn’t work for evolutionists to talk about a fish or an otter or crow using an object as a tool, as those creatures (from an evolutionary perspective) are not closely related to man!

Thanks for stopping by and thanks for praying,

Ken

I thank Steve Golden for his assistance in composing this blog item.

Spanish-language Summit and Strategy Day at AiG

Last week was an exciting time in the AiG Worldwide Outreach ministry. The first Spanish-language strategy day had ten invited guests who brought a wide range of experience in reaching out to the Hispanic community—domestically and internationally—with the creation/gospel message.

The goal of this summit was to explore how AiG could increase its footprint of “creation evangelism” to Latin and North America. This is in response to our Lord’s command to go to the entire world with the gospel (Matthew 28:18–20). The main focus of discussion centered upon furnishing Hispanic churches with the message of biblical authority through our conference-teaching ministry, and then by equipping Christians through a wide variety of translated materials. Also, reaching out to colleges in Latin America was a major point of discussion.

A number of key issues were brought up, including effective publishing, distributing the new resources, and marketing them in the U.S. and Latin America. The importance of building relationships and being aware of cultural differences were also discussed.

Among our summit guests were Creous and Elizabeth Ramdath, full-time missionaries in Lima, Peru, who also spoke to the entire AiG staff on Thursday.

The Ramdaths are directly involved in creation evangelism to the Hispanic church in South America (under the auspices of our friends at American-based Canopy Ministries, with the direction of James Gardner). Creous is from Trinidad and Tobago, and Elizabeth is a native Peruvian. This dynamic husband-and-wife team has a love for the gospel as it relates to the book of Genesis, and their burden takes them into schools, camps, and churches throughout Latin America. Their input was invaluable to all who were there at our summit last week. Take a peek at their Spanish-language website.

Here is a photo of most of the people who attended the summit:

Seen in the photo above include experts in the fields of missions work, pastoral ministry, publishing, marketing, conferencing, etc. With the changing demographics in America and with so many millions of Latin Americans living in this hemisphere, AiG is increasingly burdened to minister to these souls. We are grateful to God for the doors now being opened to present the creation/gospel message to the several nations where Spanish is primarily spoken, and also to the millions of people who speak Spanish in the U.S.

A few years ago, we produced a DVD set of my talks that were simultaneously translated into Spanish. Filmed in Mexico, the Creation Mini-Series (Spanish) set included talks such as Learning to Think Biblically and The Origin of Races.

Please pray that this video series, plus new resources to be produced in the Spanish language, will see a wider distribution as more channels are now opening to AiG materials. And pray that people will come to know the reliability of God’s Word and the credibility of the gospel message as a result.

Thanks for stopping by and thanks for praying,

Ken

Coming from Both Directions to the Museum

Last June, I mentioned in my blog that an AiG supporter, Ellen Bauer, has brought six groups with her all the way from Iowa, perhaps 250 people total, to our Creation Museum. Now, she does not live just down the road from our northern Kentucky museum. She makes about a 1,100-mile round-trip journey! And she has visited the museum many times on her own—she has lost count!

Ellen is planning another museum group trip this September, so if you live in Iowa or states surrounding, this would be an excellent piggyback opportunity for you to join a group of Christians as they spend two days at the museum. Indeed, Ellen has been here so many times, that she knows that spending just one day at the Creation Museum is not enough to take it all in. In fact, last year we instituted a new two-day ticket policy, where each ticket would be good for two days at the museum (consecutive days). It was advice from people like Ellen who suggested that we add a second day as a bonus (at no extra charge).

Here is a link to a web article announcing Ellen’s next museum trip, which also includes taking in a St. Louis Cardinals baseball game. She has made all the arrangements, so most of the planning has already been taken care of for you.

Ellen has traveled from Iowa to the Creation Museum about 20 times in five years! She’s probably logged well more than 20,000 miles, back and forth. She will spend many months promoting her bus tours to the museum, and as a result, she often finds passengers from many nearby states who will join her.

Here is a photo of the group she brought a couple of years ago:

Now, coming from the east rather than the west on a group tour of the museum are our friends Marc and Sheila Jacobs of Pittsburgh. They will lead several people on a five-hour drive here to northern Kentucky. Here is what Sheila posted to Facebook about their next trip here, which happens later this month:

NEXT CREATION MUSEUM TRIP — hosted by Marc Jacobs….. Touring the museum on Fri, March 22nd. We usually travel down on Thurs. (where we stay overnight is only a  4-1/2 hour trip, so it can be driven after work or school on Thurs, and we stay about 45 min away from museum.)

Some drive back after the museum trip on Fri night. It closes at 6 PM — and many stay 2 nights at the Hampton Inn where we stay off I-71 (right where an outlet mall is) and leave Sat.

If you want more info — please let me know! We have many friends who have asked about going, SO ANYONE is welcome!!! Even if you live in another state ….. You can meet up with us!!! Honestly you will have the BEST tour with my husband along!! We have been maybe 15 times now; taken over 400 people! He answers questions & explains things ~ it’s just amazing!!!! HOPE YOU CAN COME!!!!

Find out more about this group coming from Pennsylvania—and think about joining them—at this link.

Over the years, Sheila and Marc have hosted more than 400 visitors, with over 30 people already signed up for the trip this month.

So, if you live in or around Iowa or Pennsylvania and would like to visit the Creation Museum, much of the planning has been done for you!

We have been thrilled with the attendance at the Creation Museum during this winter. On many days, the number of visitors exceeded those for the same time last year!

Go to creationmuseum.org to find out more about the Creation Museum.

Thanks for stopping by and thanks for praying,

Ken

Thanks for Healthy Skepticism

Every now and then, amidst all the sad things I inform you about concerning the state of the church and culture, I like to encourage you as others encourage us. Here is a letter we received from a family in Illinois:

My family and I recently took a road trip from central Illinois to Utah and southern Colorado. One of the trip highlights was our stop in Vernal, UT where we visited the modestly sized but high quality “Utah Field House of Natural History State Park Museum”

Prominent in their display content were some beautiful fossilized leaves that were found by manually pulling apart layers of sandstone slabs commonly found in that region.  Every vein and delicate texture of the leaves were preserved as dark imprints against the light colored sandstone.

A teachable moment presented itself when viewing the short video and inscription of how these fossils came to be. Their conclusion went something like this: Millions of years ago, the area was once a lake surrounded by trees. Every year, the trees would shed their leaves which then settled on the lake bottom along with tiny amounts of other sediment. Through countless ages the bottommost leaves and sediment compressed and eventually became fossilized when the conditions were right.

As an outdoorsman, I have had the messy occasion to walk some present day lake beds while fishing, swimming, etc. Having slogged through the thick, submerged layers of decomposing leaves and watching the gas bubbles rise to the surface in response, I can tell you that when the leaves pile up and age they eventually decompose into common mud. I am confident that no matter how deeply I wanted to dig into that mush, there would be no pristinely preserved leaves to be found.

Rather, the only rational answer of how such leaves could be preserved would be by very rapid burial with heavy sediment turning quickly to rock, and not a gradual burial over millions of years. Clearly, such an extreme sedimentary situation is consistent with the major deluge and upheaval described in Genesis of the Old Testament.

We took an opportunity to share this though with our children, and it served to open their eyes to the fact that not all material prepared by “grown-ups” is automatically reliable and to be treated as fact … particularly if it presents a departure from history as recorded in the Bible.

Thank you AiG for helping to equip us as parents, and for encouraging a healthy level of skepticism toward the claims of modern science and of those who have chosen a worldview which doesn’t acknowledge our Creator. Please keep up the good work.

Many families have been impacted by AiG as this one has. How we praise the Lord for the way He has used AiG to help families in raising a godly generation. It reminds me once again of our theme for this year: “Standing Our Ground, Rescuing Our Kids” (Galatians 1:4).

Thanks for stopping by and thanks for praying,

Ken

A Great Family Vacation

If you’ve not yet made your summer vacation plans, I want to suggest something that would not only be wonderful fun for your entire family, but you’ll also learn practical scriptural truths—all in a scenic part of America.

Every year AiG holds a national family conference, and this July we’ll be gathering once again in Sevierville, Tennessee, on the northern edge of the beautiful Great Smoky Mountains. We held our annual conference three years ago in the same excellent venue, and 2,900 people turned out. This time, we’re having even more programs for children, including a Vacation Bible School (VBS) that will run concurrently with most sessions that the adults will be attending. Also, there will be some teen breakout sessions.

With this conference, in addition to our excellent presentations on biblical apologetics and creation evangelism, you’ll hear very practical talks on how Christians can live in an increasingly secularized society: we’ll have major sessions, including one led by Tony Perkins of the Family Research Council, on topics like the sanctity of life and God’s plan for marriage. These are such timely topics.

We can help you do most of your planning. Just simply go to our conference website at www.answersingenesis.org/outreach/answers-mega. Not only will the website show you how the content of this conference is family friendly, but it will list many attractions in the area that reveal why the Great Smoky Mountains are considered one of the most popular places in America for families to visit. Our website also lists hotels in the area that have offered special convention discounts, plus attractions that will offer price reductions for those who attend our Answers Mega Conference.

A Conference Bonus

As a bonus, your registration to the Answers Mega Conference includes free admission to the Creation Museum. You can stop by and visit the museum on your way to or from Sevierville (we are a four-hour drive away). But if your travels do not take you through northern Kentucky, the ticket voucher is valid to the end of the year to use at your convenience.

By the way, here’s a short video of keynote speaker Tony Perkins appearing on the Fox News Channel TV program Huckabee last year after a shooting at Perkins’ Washington DC offices: www.frc.org/frcinthenews/18aug2012/tony-perkins-on-huckabee

Tony hosts a new radio program heard nationwide from 5–6pm ET—check his website for more details. www.frc.org/get.cfm?c=RADIO

Our conference site again is: www.answersingenesis.org/outreach/answers-mega

Thanks for stopping by and thanks for praying,

Ken

Influential Australian Christian Stands with the Atheists

Dr. John Dickson, a professing Christian and a scholar in ancient history (particularly the history surrounding Christ), recently appeared on the Australian TV show Q & A. (The transcript and video are available at this link.) Sadly, Dr. Dickson didn’t go on the show to defend the accuracy of the history in the Bible. What Dickson apparently wanted to do was show his support for much of the mission of the New Atheists. That’s right—an influential Australian Christian was seen on national TV standing with the atheists.

Now, Dr. Dickson has a degree in theology from Moore Theological College (Sydney) and a PhD in ancient history from Macquarie University (Sydney). He teaches a course on the historical Jesus for the Department of Jewish Studies at the University of Sydney. He’s written a number of books, one of which is titled Investigating Jesus. Another of his books, The Christ Files: How Historians Know What They Know, is about Christ and was made into a major television documentary. Dr. Dickson is a codirector of the Australian Centre for Public Christianity, which promotes discussion about social, ethical, and religious issues.

Dr. Dickson was on a panel on the Q & A program with a number of others, including Dr. Lawrence Krauss. I recently wrote an article about Dr. Krauss’s accusation that teaching biblical creation to our children is a form of “child abuse.”

Dr. Dickson wholeheartedly agreed with Lawrence Krauss’s points throughout the discussion on creation (except for the accusation of “child abuse”), at one point saying that the discussion between him and Krauss would be an “agree fest.” At one point, Krauss made his usual fallacious claims that evolutionary ideas are tied to operational science, and that teaching creation is “child abuse.” Dickson responded to Krauss:

I agree but for one thing that I think lowers the tone. On the science I totally agree and you’ll find that most mainstream Christians are very comfortable with science and with all of the discoveries of science, including the 13.72 billion years ago there was a bang and evolution by natural selection. This is standard. When you go to theological college you are taught how to read Genesis 1 and it’s quite clear that Genesis 1 is written in a style that is most unlike the historical prose we know from other parts of the Bible. The style is not quite poetry but it’s more in the direction of poetry. It uses number symbolism in a way that would blow your mind. The artistry of it is clear. Now, this is not Christians in the modern world scared of evolution or the findings of science and so changing what they think of the Bible. . . . So I think whatever science discovers and can truly demonstrate, I sign up for. Absolutely.”

This is an issue that we’re seeing more and more from Christian leaders and scholars—they are lifting evolutionary ideas above the authority of God’s Word and using evolutionary belief and millions of years to reinterpret God’s Word. Here, Dr. Dickson not only affirms much of what Krauss has said, but he attempts to discredit the historical value of Genesis in favor of evolutionary ideas.

In the course of the discussion, Dickson made his compromise on Genesis clear: “I’ve got plenty of friends who are six day creationists and I’m going to get some love mail after this for sure. But, look, you know, I have great relationships with them, I just think they are wrong. Wrong on the science. Wrong on the Bible.”

While Dickson correctly tells Krauss that calling the teaching of creation “child abuse” is unnecessary, he then makes an incredible remark to Krauss—he says that Christians like him can be the “friend” of the New Atheism:

JOHN DICKSON: But what you should be doing, Lawrence—what you should be doing—here’s a tactic—hand them over to us. People like the Centre for Public Christianity, where I work, who are trying to educate not only the general public but also the Christian public on biblical scholarship and scientific scholarship. To call it child abuse, I just think, is all wrong.

TONY JONES: When you say “Hand them over to us”, do you mean the people who are teaching these things should actually be handed over to you for re-education?

JOHN DICKSON: Yeah, look, we have this little prison out the back. No, look, I just mean we could be the friend—we could be the friend to the new atheism and have the effect you want. I think all you are doing is firming up the opposition.

Now, there is a very big problem with Dr. Dickson’s statements: the mission of Christians and the mission of atheists are contradictory. You see, Krauss wants to explain the world without God, while Dickson, as a professing Christian, should want to explain the world using God’s Word. But instead, Dickson has offered to take up the mission of the atheists and use his organization to “educate” Christians and non-Christians on how evolution fits with the Bible.

From the context, I believe Dickson is saying that Christians (like those of us at AiG) who take Genesis as literal history, are actually a stumbling block to atheists.  But those (like Dickson) who are prepared to accept the secular ideas of evolution and millions of years, can be a friend to the atheists as they have so much in common—but somehow supposedly use this to try to convert the atheists to Christianity.

Actually, from my experience, I believe the atheists just love such compromise. They really see such an effort by Christians as just adding God to their secular naturalistic beliefs—and the atheists consider that totally unnecessary! Actually, atheists have said that such compromisers are really a help to their atheism.  For instance, consider the words of  Dr. Eugenie Scott, an atheist, who heads up the anti-creationist organization NCSE. Back in September 2000, in her opening statement at the American Association for the Advancement of Science Conference titled “The Teaching of Evolution in U.S. Schools: Where Politics, Religion, and Science Converge,” she said the following:

You can’t win this by scientific arguments . . . our best allies were members of the mainstream clergy . . . . The clergy went to school board meetings and said, evolution is okay with us . . . they didn’t want the kids getting biblical literalism five days a week either, which meant they’d have to straighten them out on the weekends.

In a fundraising letter a couple of years ago, Dr. Scott made a statement similar to the one she has made before on her website about how she seeks to recruit religious people to help her atheist group: “Find common ground with religious communities and ally with them to promote the understanding of evolution.”

Really, Krauss in my opinion probably sees Dickson’s position as helping and affirming his atheism. I can’t imagine standing before God and giving an account of such compromise with the atheists!

Sadly, this sort of compromise is becoming more prevalent in the church. We as believers must stand firmly on the authority of God’s Word from the very first verse. I urge you to learn the Scriptures and be equipped with answers to the secular attacks on God’s Word of this age. When your pastors and other church leaders make any statements of compromise with secular ideas about Genesis, you can firmly challenge your leaders to stand boldly on the authority of Scripture and stop helping the secularists.

Thanks for stopping by and thanks for praying,

Ken