Introduction: the purpose of this teaching is three-fold:
1) to demonstrate that belief in the theory of evolution does not prove God does not exist and one can believe both in the theory of evolution and God at the same time.
2) to demonstrate evidence for the existence of God as creator which does not require or exclude the theory of evolution.
3) to demonstrate specific scientific difficulties with the theory of evolution.
I. A Compound Argument for the Existence of God
A. “Why is there something rather than nothing?”
> when we look around the room we begin to realize that for everything we see there is a chain of cause and effect relationships that got them there.
B. the problem of “infinite regression”
1. we cannot infinitely keep tracing the effects and their causes there must be a starting point, one cause that started it all. an uncaused cause.
2. actual infinites do not exist (illustration of a rabbit & turtle race: if the turtle is given any amount of lead the rabbit could never catch up if there is an actual amount of infinite points of distance to cross)
C. what is this first cause? call it “nothing” for now
> what came out of it of the first cause?
1. mass, matter, energy
2. space, time
3. genetic material (this is an argument for the existence of God all by itself called the “Design” or “Teleological” argument)
a. when we see “John Loves Mary” written in the sand we know someone of intelligence wrote it. thus, information implies intelligence.
b. information one cell of a strand of DNA double helix is 6ft long with over 25,000 pages of the New York times worth of information.
c. thus, genetic material is the product of a greater intelligence
1) chance theories impossible. requires 1 in 1044 tries. at one try a second would be 1023 years. but universe is in largest estimates 1010 years old.
2) same chance as a tornado hitting a junk yard and out coming a 747 airplane
4. morality (also an argument for existence of God by itself called the “Moral Argument”)
a. we all have a sense of universal morality. (Illustration of stealing: if i can believe what i want and
have the right to my own beliefs and to act on them, i can come to your house steal your stereo)
> “true for you not for me” doesn’t work. right and wrong = matter of religion
b. tracing back the causes of morality leads back to a 1st cause
c. an impersonal source cannot explain universal morality
1) morality can’t be herd instinct. if it were we would never help anyone.
2) morality can’t be something made up. someone did not make up math (also a universal).
3) morality can’t be a law of nature. you cannot break a law of nature (i.e. gravity).
4) morality can’t be just imagination. you cannot get rid of it.
d. a finite personal source cannot explain universal morality.
> a finite human being cannot be the source/creator of the universal moral law.
e. therefore, only an infinite personal source can explain universal morality
5. what sort of things can cause things? > only personal beings with a choice.
D. 1. mass, matter, energy > all-powerful }
2. space, time > everywhere present }
3. genetic material > all-knowing } GOD!
4. morality > all-good }
5. being of choice > personal being }
E. what began looking like “nothing” now looks a lot like the traditional conception of GOD!
II. Theistic-Evolutionists
A. “theistic evolutionists” are people that believe both in God and evolution
B. “theistic evolutionists” believe God is the first cause, is personal, moral, allknowing,
everywhere present, and all powerful.
C. “theistic evolutionists” believe the first cause God caused was evolution and that He created the world through an evolutionary process. (i.e. the big bang)
III. Problems/Difficulties with the Theory of Evolution
A. some definitions
1. evolution: a theory that all existent things (data) came about by a natural process where simple
forms of life developed into more complex forms of life.
2. adaptation: adjusting to enviromental conditions (example: if i move to alaska my body will adapt to
the weather). thus, there is no “mirco-evolution” only adaptation (my body’s adaptation to alaska
whether was not a micro evolutionary step)
3. theory: a possible explanation developed in order to explain a set of facts or data and their relation
to one another. (example: in a courtroom theories about what happened are developed to explain evidence).
4. law: an unchanging principle which always and continually operates.
B. the evidence
1. the law of entropy, also known as the second law of thermodynamics
a. definition – all energy within the universe moves from a state of order to chaos. (examples = hot cup of coffee cooling down, smell of perfume going away, light)
b. the theory of evolution defies the well established scientific law of entropy and says rather than things going from order to chaos things go from chaos to order.
2. irreducible complexities (discovered with the technology of today’s mircoscopes)
a. irreducible complexity: something composed of several parts and each part is absolutely necessary for the structure to function (example of mousetrap).
b. the cell & the eye are irreducibly complex machines that can’t have evolved.
1) the cell – the cilium (part of a cell) is a complex motor. 25 nanometers in diameter (3,000 times smaller than the diameter of a single human hair). the flagellum (part of the cilium) is a propeller that moves back and forth with speeds up to 100,000 rpm’s and can travel ten times its body length a second (same as a human running at 40mph) and it can stop moving in one direction and instantly turn around and move the other direction at the exact same speed. A cell has around 40 intregal parts that must all work at the same time for a cell to exist compared to the 5 parts of a mousetrap that are needed.
2) the eye – it has around 15 different parts that must all be in place at the same time in order to function (epidermis, scerla, choroid, retinal pigment epithelium, neural retina, fovia, optive nerve, blind spot, iris, anterior chamber, cornea, conjunctiva, lens, and virteous chamber).
3. the fossil record
a. evolution requires a large number of sequential steps with very small changes at each point along the way. but of the millions of fossils found a very small number of controversial transition forms have been found in contrast to the thousands required.
b. Australopithecus afarensis or “Lucy” (one of the few controversial fossils)
1) is only a little over 3ft tall
2) it could not have walked upright like humans (its legs lack the bone and muscle
architecture/mechanism needed in the lower half of the body)
3) other seemingly human features are the same of apes today
c. Neanderthals (first humans. oldest = estimated 200,000 years old)
1) studies done on plaster casts which do not match fossils
2) KP 271 human fragment dated at 4.5 million years can’t be human
3) human Skull 1470 dated at 2.9 million years
d. radoactive, paleomagnetism, and fission track methods of dating often give conflicting age
estimations (example: Mount Saint Helens erupted in 1980 and created many fossils as a result.
dating methods on the fossils concluded that they were millions of years old even though we know
they were only from 1980).
4. uniquness of humans
– are the only purely bipedal, dextrious (intricate abilitites with fingers etc.), creative, beings with a mind.
C. worldview bias
1. naturalism: all there is to reality is what one can see, feel, taste, touch, and smell.
> naturalism cannot account for the supranatural entities such as numbers, the mind, and morality
(i.e. love, right/wrong etc.)
2. why the refusal to account for the evidence?
a. the only other options for not believing in the theory of evolution is creationism or theistic evolution which is undesirable to many because then one is accountable to God.
b. the scientific evidence is against evolution. new evidence of DNA & cell complexity is shaking the scientific community so that a large number of scientists no longer hold to the theory of evolution. yet, because God is the only other option to explanation the evidence, many have become “agnostics.” however, as a result such compelling scientific evidence some states, such as Ohio, now require that intelligent design creationism be taught alongside evolution in public schools.
D. Scripture
1. arguments from Scripture are only valid and authoritative for those who have been convinced that the Bible is 100% accurate in everything that it says (thus arguments from Scripture are not usually helpful in discussing evolution with a non-Christian).
> for arguments of the 100% accuracy of the Bible see sources for “inerrancy”
2. interpreting Genesis – literally (a literal reading/understanding of the word “day” in Genesis to mean
a twenty-four hour period. thus, the six twenty-four hour periods in Genesis 1 eliminates the possibility
for evolution to take place since evolution needs millions of years to take place)
a. Jesus interpreted Genesis literally (Mk 10:6)
b. Paul interpreted Genesis literally (1Cor 15:45; 1Tim 2:13)
c. Peter interpreted Genesis literally (2 Pet 3:4)
d. Genealogies which go back to Adam always are always literal
e. the word “day”
1) is the Hebrew word yom which is defined as a 24 hour day (Gen 3:5) and is always referred
to as a 24 hour day in the Pentateuch.
2) Ex 20:9-11 compares the Sabbath day of rest with the six day of creation, both are
considered as a twenty-four hour period in this text.
f. other elements of the Genesis account (the polemical nature, the narrative structure, and the
overall purpose) all support a literal understanding of creation.
g. one primary rule of interpreting Scripture and indeed all of written material is that “a text can
never mean what it never could’ve meant.”
> thus, Hebrews living during the times of the Old Testament never couldl’ve conceived that
the creation account was describing an evolutionary process. that notion would’ve been
completely foreign and ridiculous to them.
h. if Genesis is interpreted symbolically (example = “day” could be thousands or millions of years), then Adam must also be interpreted symbolically and if Adam is intepreted symbolically then Jesus
Christ must be interpreted symbolically since He is the second Adam (Rom 5). if Jesus Christ was purely a symbolic figure and not really a human (which no evidence or real scholarship suggests), then we are still dead in our sins and His death and resurrection accomplished nothing (1Cor 15).
conclusions: (1) there are well-supported reasons to believe God exists regardless of whether or not the theory
evolution is true [i.e. cosmological, design, and moral arguments]. (2) one can believe both in the theory of
evolution and the existence of God by believing that God created the evolutionary process. (3) the scientific
evidence does NOT support evolution and Scripture does not leave room for evolution.