The “Christian” Evolutionist: Peddling Darwin to the Church

How does the theory of evolution impact Christianity? Bruce Malone, President of Search for the Truth, writes:

• “Acceptance of evolution is a poison which will destroy true Christianity. The evidence for this can be seen in the decline of the evangelical belief in Europe as the acceptance of evolution has increased.” 

Marvin Olasky, Editor in Chief, World Magazine, has also observed its impact:

• Disavowal of biblical teaching about creation is particularly serious because that perspective underlies so many other positions: In dozens of once-Christian colleges a slip-sliding-away from the first three chapters of Genesis has led to abandonment of the rest of the Bible. (World Mag. October 4, 2014, 60)

Why does this happen? The two worldviews (WV) are in direct opposition to each other. While the evolutionary WV posits a bloody fight for survival from the get-go, the Bible presents a picture of peace and harmony before the Fall. The living creatures didn’t evolve through a fight for survival. Instead, each species had been created according to its “own kind” (Genesis 1:12, 21, 25). Instead of pain and the shedding of blood, even the animals had been created as herbivores (Gen. 1:30). Humankind didn’t evolve but instead was directly created in the image of God (Gen. 1:26-27; 2:7). Instead, of a world where every beast was fearfully fighting for its life, God regarded His entire creation as “very good” (Gen. 1:31). In fact, it was so good, that Adam and Eve went naked, experiencing no shame and no fear of being devoured. Nor did they devour. Death wasn’t introduced until sin brought it forth (Gen. 3). In fact, there is not a verse in the entire corpus of Scripture that gives the slightest encouragement to evolution!

How does the “Christian evolutionist” (CE; They used to call themselves “theistic evolutionists” until they realized that as “Christian evolutionists,” they could better gain acceptance in the churches.) explain this blatant contradiction? Easy! Create a false and deceptive distinction! They claim that evolution is only concerned about the physical world and the Bible is only concerned about the spiritual world. Miraculously, this contradiction disappears, since the two systems are concerned about entirely different things!

This, of course, is laughable. Evolution is quite interested in also explaining the origin of morality and religion (the spiritual world), while the Bible has a lot to say about the physical world! Just one example is necessary: A theology of the Cross (spiritual world) depends on the history (what actually happened in the physical world) of the Cross. If Jesus didn’t historically die on the Cross, there can be no theology of the Cross.

There are many other examples of the same thing. Clearly, Jesus understood Genesis 1-3 as teaching something about the physical (historical) world. And what God had accomplished in the physical world was essential to the spiritual or theological world. For example, when the Pharisees challenged him about divorce, He based His answer on the physical work of God in Genesis 1 and 2:

• "Haven't you read," he replied, "that at the beginning the Creator 'made them male and female,' [quoting Gen. 1:26-27] and said, 'For this reason a man will leave his father and mother and be united to his wife, and the two will become one flesh'? So they are no longer two, but one. Therefore what God has joined together [quoting Gen. 2:24], let man not separate." (Matthew 19:4-6) 

If Jesus regards Genesis 1-3 as historical, Christians have little choice but to also regard these accounts as historical. Meanwhile the CE claims that they are allegorical. However, no New Testament book denies their historicity. (However, this doesn’t deny that they also have a deeper allegorical meaning.)

All of the NT regard Adam as historical, without giving the slightest indication that Adam might simply be allegorical. In fact, if Adam is merely allegory, then Noah, Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob must also be allegorical, since they are connected by the same genealogy.

Meanwhile, CEs even deny the historicity of Adam and the Fall. CE Karl Giberson, past co-head of Biologos Foundation, wrote:

• Acid is an appropriate metaphor for the erosion of my fundamentalism, as I slowly lost confidence in the Genesis story of creation and the scientific creationism that placed this ancient story within the framework of modern science. Dennett’s universal acid dissolved Adam and Eve; it ate through the Garden of Eden; it destroyed the historicity of the events of creation week. It etched holes in those parts of Christianity connected to the stories—the fall, “Christ as the second Adam,” the origins of sin, and nearly everything else that I counted sacred. (Saving Darwin, 9-10)

Nevertheless, he assured his readers that he is still a Christian. However, a couple of years later, he wrote negatively of the Old Testament Deity as a:

• “tyrannical anthropomorphic deity,” “commanded the Jews to go on genocidal rampages…but who believes in this deity any more, besides those same fundamentalists who think the earth is 10,000 years old? Modern theology has moved past this view of God.” 

I suspect that most CEs have also “moved past this view of God.” The CE must not only deny Genesis chapters 1-3 but also everything that the NT says about these chapters. Also, by separating the Bible from the physical world, they have dismissed apologetics, the proof of the faith. Without the physical evidence, it is hard to prove the spiritual assertions of the Bible. Here’s one example:

• The wrath of God is being revealed from heaven against all the godlessness and wickedness of men who suppress the truth by their wickedness, since what may be known about God is plain to them, because God has made it plain to them. For since the creation of the world God's invisible qualities--his eternal power and divine nature--have been clearly seen, being understood from what has been made, so that men are without excuse. (Romans 1:18-20)

Romans claims that the evidence for both God’s existence and character have been made plain, so plain that no one has an excuse. However, against the claims of Scripture, the CE claims that the physical world offers no evidence of God. CE Ron Choong, founder of the Academy for Christian Thought, claims:

• Darwin suggested that there is no scientific evidence to support the existence of God. That is correct!

Well, if Choong is right, the Bible is wrong in claiming that we are “without excuse” for not recognizing the evidence for God’s existence.

The Apostle Paul had reasoned with the Athenians in favor of the goodness of God:

• Yet he has not left himself without testimony: He has shown kindness by giving you rain from heaven and crops in their seasons; he provides you with plenty of food and fills your hearts with joy." (Acts 14:17)

However, if unguided evolution is a fact, Paul’s argument about the goodness of Paul is wrong. The Athenians then should thank evolution (or chance) and not the hand of God for these “blessings!”

In fact, if the CE is correct, the entire worldview of the Bible has been undermined, as Giberson suggested. Instead, Paul claimed that Jesus is the “second Adam,” reversing the death that Adam had brought into the world:

• For since death came through a man, the resurrection of the dead comes also through a man. For as in Adam all die, so in Christ all will be made alive. (1 Corinthians 15:21-22) 

If the Bible is wrong about Adam and how he introduced death into the world, what reason do we have to believe that it is right about Jesus! Jesus’ work corrects the evil done under Adam. According to the worldview of the CE, Jesus’ work, since it didn’t reverse the Fall, must have reversed the death and struggle for survival introduced by the Father’s original bloody creation design! Of course, such a notion is theologically unsupportable.

Paul also supported the Genesis account of death and the Fall in this way:

• For the creation was subjected to frustration, not by its own choice, but by the will of the one who subjected it, in hope that the creation itself will be liberated from its bondage to decay and brought into the glorious freedom of the children of God. (Romans 8:20-21) 

Romans does not claim that creation had been created in “frustration” and “bondage to decay.” Instead, it claims that creation was “subjected to frustration” and “decay” by God’s will in agreement with the Genesis 3 account of the Fall.

However, these insurmountable problems have not stopped the CE from pushing Darwin into the church and regarding it as ignorant, as Ron Choong does:

• Darwinism exposes Christianity’s weakness in keeping up with the growing scientific knowledge. We use the fruits of scientific technology and blissfully ignore its implications for a contemporary and comprehensive worldview.

Why doesn’t the CE care about the very obvious contradictions between these oppositional worldviews? Jesus alerted us to the dangers about serving two masters:

• "No one can serve two masters. Either he will hate the one and love the other, or he will be devoted to the one and despise the other.” (Matthew 6:24)

The CE has made it abundantly obvious which master has won his devotion.

Bias, Suppression, and Intimidation in the Science Lab

Drug companies do not have to report on all of the evidence or experimentation regarding new drugs they want to market. This means that they can merely report on the one positive test out of the 50 negative trials. However, this kind of biased, unbalanced reporting can be used to “prove” the value of any drug!

Is this same bias endemic to other areas of the scientific enterprise? Evidently! Foundations and governmental bodies pour millions, even billions, into research universities, not to find the truth, but to prove evolution. Meanwhile, I am not aware of any such money funding studies to prove ID or creationism.

What will be the inevitable result of such an imbalance in experimentation? Researchers will inevitably “find” what they are looking for!

However, it is not even as simple as this profound imbalance. Intimidation has also become the standard in suppressing unwanted findings. Bruce Malone gives one example of what happened when someone contradicted the establishment orthodoxy pertaining to the dating of the dinosaurs:

·       Mark Armitage, the discoverer of the osteocytes in the triceratops horn, and instructor at a microscopy lab at California State University… showed his students the material. They returned to their Earth science departments excited to share the inconsistency of these finds (which contradicted the evolutionary teaching they were being taught) with their geology, anthropology, and paleontology professors. The result – Armitage was fired from his job within days of his paper being published in July 2013. This was in spite of years of stellar performance and excellent reviews setting up and running the university’s microscopy lab. (Brilliant, 23)

Many such incidents suggest that such repression of divergent voices is standard operating procedure – enough to make even the most gullible suspect of what is currently marketed.

Converting the Church to Darwin

Theistic evolutionist (TE), Nathanael Yates, doesn’t think that the evolution-creation debate and the conclusions we come to on this issue matter:

• As a Christian it doesn't matter to me whether the Earth, and all that is in it, was created by a process of evolution or creation. 

• Debate around evolution and creation in the church is an interesting intellectual discussion, but doesn't concern salvation. Suggesting that it is may actually make nonbelievers who believe in evolution less receptive to Christianity.

• I don't believe that debate on this issue is likely to improve our character and relationship with God.

However, many have testified that this issue matters profoundly. In God: the Evidence, former atheist, Patrick Glynn, cautions about the persuasiveness of Darwinism in rejecting the biblical faith:

• “I embraced skepticism at an early age, when I first learned of Darwin’s theory of evolution in, of all places, Catholic grade school. It immediately occurred to me that either Darwin’s theory was true or the creation story in the Book of Genesis was true. They could not both be true, and I stood up in class and told the poor nun as much.”

In fact, many present evolutionists also testify how Darwinism weaned them from the faith of the childhood. Bruce Malone, Founder of Search for the Truth and one who returned, also testifies of the persuasiveness of Darwinian thinking:

• “Prior to graduation from college, I had not once been shown any of the scientific evidence for creation either in school or in church. Little wonder, that by the time I started my career [as a chemist], God had little relevance in my life. It wasn’t as though I had any animosity toward God or religion. It simply held no relevance to the world around me. This should be no surprise when the subject never came up in school and everything seemed to be explained without reference to a Creator.”

I’ve often observed that those who adopt a theistic evolution stance, abandon the physical world to Darwin, leaving only the spiritual world to the Bible. Consequently, the entire apologetics enterprise – this takes what we know of the physical world and uses it to validate the spiritual – is undermined. For instance Ron Choong, founder of the Academy for Christian Thought, writes:

• “Darwin suggested that there is no scientific evidence to support the existence of God. That is correct!”

Try telling that to former atheists like Anthony Flew! By abandoning this crucial evidential basis for the Christian faith, we inevitably compromise it in favor of what we regard as more certain – Darwinism! Choong writes:

• “Darwinism exposes Christianity’s weakness in keeping up with the growing scientific knowledge. We use the fruits of scientific technology and blissfully ignore its implications for a contemporary and comprehensive worldview.”
  

Marvin Olasky, Editor in Chief, World Magazine, has observed the impact of this kind of compromise on the integrity of once-Christian schools:

• Disavowal of biblical teaching about creation is particularly serious because that perspective underlies so many other positions: In dozens of once-Christian colleges a slip-sliding-away from the first three chapters of Genesis has led to abandonment of the rest of the Bible. (World Mag. October 4, 2014, 60)

Why does this slide seem to inevitably occur? I think that there are many reasons for it. Once we “spiritualize” the first three chapters of Genesis, upon which everything else rests, emptying it of any historical content, we create for ourselves a highly slippery slope upon which no one can stand.

I’ll just offer one example. If Jesus had entirely spiritualized Genesis 1-3, the TE would have been able to stand more securely. However, He understood it historically:

• "Haven't you read," he replied, "that at the beginning the Creator 'made them male and female,' [quoting Gen. 1:26-27] and said, 'For this reason a man will leave his father and mother and be united to his wife, and the two will become one flesh'? So they are no longer two, but one. Therefore what God has joined together [quoting Gen. 2:24], let man not separate." (Matthew 19:4-6)

Genesis records the historical work of God! How does the TE answer these kinds of objections? He pleads that “We have to be humble regarding our interpretations.” In other words, we cannot have any sense of assurance about the teachings of the Bible as we can have regarding evolution.

Yates does not seem to be concerned about any of this and therefore concludes:

• As a church we should spend less time debating amongst ourselves and focus our energies on what we all desire: salvation for all.

If only this were true! Instead, for the TE, it seems that “salvation for all” is a matter of converting the church to Darwin.

·      

Does Evolution have more Explanatory Muscle than Design?

Which paradigm – evolution or design (ID) – best explains the findings? Not only does each species reflect profound evidence of design, each displays an elegance of functionality. This is opposed to what evolutionist had predicted - a hodgepodge of non-functional “leftover” organs (“vestigial organs”), accumulated from its ancestral life forms. (If an organ has no function, then it would contradict ID’s prediction/assumption that every organ has a function.)

Evolutionists had identified at least 200 human leftover/vestigial organs as proof of evolution. However, as new findings arrived, proving that these non-functional “leftovers” actually have a function, the definition of “vestigiality” had to be revised. Consequently, Wikipedia now makes a claim that is far less bold - that “vestigiality” is not a matter of non-functionality but of lesser functionality:

•  Although structures commonly regarded "vestigial" may have lost some or all of the functional roles that they had played in ancestral organisms, such structures may retain lesser functions or may have become adapted to new roles in extant populations.

However, since these vestigials are admittedly serving some use, albeit “lesser functions” – but perhaps we fail to grasp the fullness of their functions – they can no longer be confidently called “vestigial” or “leftover” organs. Instead, they reflect design by virtue of their functionality. Score “1” for ID!

I think that we have become insensate to the overwhelming evidence for design. Bruce Malone offers the woodpecker as one example of intelligently integrated design features:

• The woodpecker’s beak is unlike any other birds; it is so tough that it won’t shatter when it hammers a tree hundreds of times a minute. The stiff tail feathers create a tripod with its two short legs. The foot of a woodpecker has two toes in front and two toes in back whereas most birds have three toes in front and one in back, allowing the woodpecker to move all around a tree trunk… he has a built-in shock absorber in his head. Special cartilage between his head and beak absorb the pounding… the woodpecker’s tongue is four times longer than its beak. Its long slender tongue is used to probe inside insect tunnels in the tree. When it finds an insect, barbs on the tip of the tongue will poke the insect. To make sure the bug is secure, the tongue is coated with a sticky glue-like substance that glues the insect on. This special glue does not stick to the woodpecker’s beak. (Inspired Evidence)

If any of these features were not simultaneously present, the woodpecker would die. While ID can explain the simultaneity of these features, evolution cannot.

Malone also provides the incredible example of the bat, who finds its prey by echolocation:

• To make high-pitched sounds, a bat has a specialized larynx which makes intense, high-frequency ultrasounds. From these ultrasonic sound pulses and their echoes, bats can determine the distance, size, shape, surface texture and speed of their prey… Within a few thousandths of a second, the bat has built a mental image of its surroundings – much like we do with our eyes.

However, in order to do this, larynx, ears, and brain all have to be simultaneously fine-tuned and coordinated together in a way that staggers our understanding. Nevertheless, this doesn’t prevent the evolutionist from expecting to find a natural mindless explanation.

If we apply the little we know about the products of design and the products of a chance collision of mindless forces, it would appear that the entire biological world reflects the workmanship of an intelligent Designer.