Today on the verdict with Pastor John Monroe.
Someone asked the atheist Englishman. Bertrand Russell, what he would do if, to his great surprise, he met God after death and was asked why he had not believed. In God. Russell replied, I would look God straight in the eye and say, not enough evidence. Really?
Well, let's look at some of the evidence. First, we want to consider evolution and then creation. Welcome to the verdict, featuring the Bible teaching of Pastor John Monroe. If you attended any secular educational institution, you've been taught a theory of evolution. But when we take an honest look at the evidence, is that what the facts suggest?
Today we're considering the evidence of our origin as we continue our new series called What Would You Ask God?
Now with a lesson titled Creation or Evolution. Here's Pastor John Monroe. What do you believe about the origin of our universe? Where did everything come from? How did it all begin?
We have just started a new series about God. Questions about God and questions we would like to ask God. Last time we thought of the existence of God. And today we're thinking of the origin of the universe. Do you believe in direct creation of the universe by a supreme being?
Or do you believe in evolution? I've decided to tackle this question. But as I do so, I must make it clear that I'm not a scientist. I do, however, like to assess evidence.
So I invite you to consider both sides of this fundamental question. Let's see what the evidence suggests. As always, the verdict is yours. Creation or evolution? Genesis one, verse one.
In the beginning, God created the heavens and the earth And the earth was formless and void, and darkness. was over the surface of the deep. And the Spirit of God was moving over the surface of the waters Then God said Let there be light. And There was light. Creation or evolution?
At the end of this message, I want you to answer this question: where does the evidence point most convincingly? I am a Christian, a follower of Jesus Christ.
So, with millions of Christians down through the centuries, I affirm the Apostles' Creed. I believe in God the Father, Almighty, Creator of heavens. and earth.
So I believe in creation, not evolution.
However, that doesn't mean I've never considered evolution. Other than my seminary training, all of my formal education was at secular institutions where I was taught evolutionary theory. Armed with our microscopes, we studied The amoeba, the paramiseum. other simple organisms until finally where we each handled our scalpel to dissect first the earthworm One of the easier ones to do. Then we were given a cockroach.
I don't know if you've ever tried to dissect a cockroach, but it was then. I realized to great disappointment of my parents that surgery was not my profession. Uh the cockroach. But we were told working up the evolutionary scale, then we were given a dogfish. Remember revealing its amazing semicircular canals and its head, as some of you will remember, I'm sure, or have done.
Then we were given a frog. And then finally, a big plump white rat that we were going to dissect and learn all about. All of the evidence, so we were told. pointed unmistakably to Darwin's theory of evolution. But I, for one, was unconvinced.
I'm not an expert in evolution, nor am I a scientist. But this question, creation or evolution, is not just for scientists. It's one of the most fundamental, one of the most important questions that any of us can consider. How did we as human beings arrive on planet Earth? Did we evolve from a single organism, or is there an all-powerful Creator God who, in the beginning, created the heavens and the earth.
creation or evolution. Although ninety two percent of Americans were told believe in God, atheistic evolution is the prevailing theory in our public schools, in our universities and throughout the media. The current edition of Newsweek, September 11, there's an article on the new naysayers, Richard Dawkins, Sam Harris and Daniel Dennett, who are producing new books, aggressively attacking those who believe in God. I quote from the article. Armed with evolutionary psychology.
And influenced by the 9-11 attacks, these authors treat belief in God. as a superstition the modern world can no longer afford. There we have it. Aggressive attacks. on those who believe In God.
What is your response to such statements? John Calvin said: a dog barks. When his master is attacked. I would be a coward If I saw that God's truth was attacked and yet would remain Silent. As Christians, we must not be silent.
We must be ready and willing to respond to attacks. Such As are being mounted by Dawkins and others.
Someone asked the atheist. The Englishman. Bertrand Russell, what he would do if, to his great surprise, he met God after death and was asked why he had not believed. And God Russell replied, I would look God straight in the eye and say, not enough evidence. Really?
Well, let's look at some of the evidence. First, we want to consider evolution and then creation. This is the second message in the series. What would you ask, God? We appreciate you coming.
We ask that you invite others. As we deal with these important subjects, last week the question was: does God exist? Today the question is creation or evolution. Let's consider evolution. What is evolution?
Evolution believes in change over time. Darwinism maintains that life on earth originated from a single-celled organism. And then progress onwards and upwards in ever-increasing complexity to culminate in man himself. Darwin, Charles Darwin. who for a short time attended my alma mater, Edinburgh University in Scotland.
In eighteen seventy one, Darwin wrote that The descent of man. In that he wrote, I quote, The main conclusion here arrived at is that man is descended from some less highly organized form. Evolution. Here's a typical PBS Nova presentation promoting evolution, I quote. The first organised form of primitive life was a tiny protozoan.
Millions of protozoa populated the ancient seas. These early organisms were completely self-sufficient in their sea water world. They moved about their aquatic environment, feeding on bacteria and other organisms. They were covered with hundreds of tiny whipping hairs called cilia and flagella that made movement possible. From these one-celled organisms evolved All life.
on earth. That's evolution. Evolution explains then that we were created by blind and purposeless material processes. a combination of chance events and impersonal natural laws. The cosmos, the universe.
For the evolution is a closed system of material causes and effects that can never be influenced by anything outside of nature. What's God? God's a product of the human imagination. God, as Dawkins and others are saying, is a form of superstition and has no place in our modern scientific technological world. God is a throwback to a pre scientific age.
Now what was some of the evidence for evolution. I don't know what you were taught, but I I'm sure many of you, like me, learned about the beak sizes of finches on isolated islands And these The beaks of the finches, we were told, changed over time. because of the particular environment, particularly drought. And this was said to be evidence of evolution. Evolution is change over time.
Another example we were told about was moths over time changing from white to grey. Grey moths, as the experiment was carried out in England, blended in well with their sooty and grimy environment. And these moths that were grey rather than white were more likely to be seen and eaten by their natural predators. These are examples of change over time. Birds' beaks, the colour of moths changing, adapting to their environment.
In these cases, Darwinian evolution seems to be supported by scientific data. Although Apparently, the moth experiment has been seriously questioned as to how it was carried out. But microevolution, which I've just described, microevolution must be distinguished from macroevolution. It is true that for population of finches on islands, it's possible for different characteristics of a species to be developed based on the environment, based on inbreeding and mutation. We know that, for example, with dogs.
There's all kinds of varieties of dogs. And through breeding, through the environment, one can breed a large dog or a small dog or a dog that's quiet or a dog that's fierce and so on. But this is micro-evolution. change taking place within individual species. In the experiment about the size of the beaks of finches, please note that the finches always stayed finches.
And in fact, Which I wasn't told when I was at school, but which I now understand. After the drought, the average beak size of the finches returned to normal. But explaining how variation occurs within these limits. is vastly different from saying that natural selection and And random forces can change and, in fact, create organisms that were not already in existence. Macro evolution.
is the belief That life comes from non-life. by random processes over millions of years becoming increasingly complex by mutations and natural selection. That's evolution, that's macroevolution, a belief in the creation of a whole new gene pool. from an entirely different structure. Major mutations then from one type of organism to another.
And so when people talk about Evolution, they're really talking about macroevolution. This is Darwinism. believing that amphibians are modern fish descended from an ancestral fish. That reptiles descended from amphibian ancestors, that birds and mammals descended separately from Reptile. Ancestors, and finally, human beings and modern apes, that we have a common similar ancestor.
Where is the evidence for macro evolution.
Well, if Darwinism is true, one would expect To establish this, at least in part, by the fossil evidence. If one species involved into another, we'd expect to find a lot of transitional forms. The missing links. And it's widely assumed That there are a vast number of these transitional fossils of numerous extinct species. These transitional forms, I think we would all agree, if they existed, would support evolution.
If it's true that one species isn't uh evolving over a period of time to another, One would expect to find the transitional forms in the fossil evidence. Darwin himself acknowledged. That he had found no fossil evidence for his theory, but said that these transitional forms, these missing links, would be found. Have they been found? No.
Although there's been an enormous amount of fossil hunting, the fossil record today looks much as it did in Darwin's time. For example, the Cambrian explosion, that is what's called biology's Big Bang of 600 million years ago. Has no trace of these transitional forms that Darwinism requires. The fossil record reveals that plants and animals have been organised from the very outset into distinct groups. The Birds remain birds.
Animals remain animals, and so on. The missing links are still missing. The required proof of the transitional forms, simply put, is just not there.
Now, Stephen Jay Gould, now deceased. There's a famous Harvard Paleontologist. And he wrote extensively in defense of evolution. He described, quote, the extreme rarity.
Now, this is from an evolutionist. But he has the honesty to admit it. The extreme rarity of transitional forms in a fossil record, he said it is a trade secret of paleontology.
Now in Newsweek on june 3, 2002, in an article on appreciation of gold The writer said this, and I quote Now this was Newsweek. This is not Christianity today. This is Newsweek. Writing in the middle of the nineteenth century, Charles Darwin anticipated that the fossil record, which was just beginning to be deciphered, would eventually reveal a gradual progression from ancestral species to their descendants. But after one hundred and fifty years of digging, Most of these transitional organisms are still missing.
The missing links are missing. They're just not there. Rather than regard this as an embarrassment, Gould and Eldridge suggested why not accept it as the norm. Species appear on the scene relatively quickly and exist for long stretches in relative stability before dying out and being replaced by something else. They call this this new theory they had devised.
Punctuated Equilibrium. Isn't that amazing? Here is one of the world renowned paleontologists and evolutionists having to admit the absence of transitional fossil forms. Simply put, transitional forms are not found where the fossil evidence is the most plentiful. And rather than accepting that these transitional forms simply don't exist, Gould and others propose a new theory.
But the problem is, punctuated equilibrium, trying to explain why there are no transitional forms, is just that it is just a theory. One scholar writes, quote, It must be the only theory Punctuated equilibrium. It must be the only theory put forth in the history of science which claims to be scientific, but then explains why evidence for it can't be found. Gould says yeah, I've got to admit, there are no transitional farms. The reason there are no transitional forms I'm going to suggest is this punctuated equilibrium theory.
Well, where's the evidence for it? You're a scientist. Where's the evidence?
Well, there is no evidence for it. Evolution. Now let's consider creation. Turn in your Bibles to the book of Romans. Romans chapter one.
A brief consideration of the theory of evolution. Let's now consider creation. Our question is creation or evolution. The scriptures say that the evidence for a creator God is seen in the very evident is seen in the very universe. Bertrand Russell is saying very smartly: if there is a God, I'm going to say to God, the reason I didn't believe in you, God, is that there is not enough evidence.
Paul the Apostle is going to say that is preposterous. There is abundant evidence. For God. Romans 1. Versus Eighteen.
Incidentally, this is how Paul begins his exposition of the Gospel, which Romans is all about. For the wrath of God is revealed from heaven against all ungodliness and unrighteousness of men who suppress the truth. In unrighteousness. In what way does man suppress the truth? Verse 19.
Because that which is known about God is evident within them. for God made it evident to them. The existence of a God is evident to people. God made it evident You say, How did he make it evident? Verse 20, 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. The creation of God. is evidence. that there is a God. Here's The writer says, Paul, the invisible attributes, God's eternal power, His divine nature are clearly seen in what God has made.
So consider, first of all, the size Of our universe. Genesis 1, verse 1: In the beginning, God created the heavens and the earth. In his book, A Brief History of Time, Stephen Hawking, the British scientist and atheist, describes Earth as a medium-sized planet. orbiting around an average star in the outer suburbs of an ordinary spiral galaxy. I like that.
Notice what he's saying, he's writing as a scientist. He is describing our earth Tiny Tiny earth. In the huge cosmos, in the huge universe. He said it's a medium-sized planet. Orbiting around an average star.
What's the average star that Earth orbits around? The Sun. which is a million times the size of Earth. It's pretty big, isn't it? But he says This is in the outer suburbs of an ordinary spiral galaxy.
What is our ordinary spiral galaxy? Milky Way. We are part of the Milky Way. This says Hawking, from a scientific standpoint, as you think of the size of the universe, the Milky Way is just an ordinary spiral galaxy.
Well, what size is the this particular galaxy? It is six hundred twenty-one thousand million miles across. But as far as the universe is concerned, it's just an ordinary galaxy. Our galaxy, the Milky Way, contains one hundred thousand million stars. That's quite a galaxy, isn't it?
But from a scientific point of view, as we think of the size of the universe, it's just an ordinary one, and our planet is somewhere on the suburbs of this ordinary spiral galaxy. And the Milky Way is just one galaxy. How many galaxies of are there? We don't really know, but there's millions of galaxies. What's the size of our universe?
It is mind blowing. The size. of our universe. Just think of it. The Bible says that we have a sense of eternity in our hearts that God has put a sense of eternity in our hearts.
We're spiritual beings. Don't you experience that sense of eternity when you look out at the night sky and see the tiny stars. Suspended. In the blackness. A space.
Don't you have that? sense of eternity when you look at the expanse of the ocean. Or that sense of eternity as you look at the sinking red sun. going down in the west. against the black the backdrop of a spectacular Sunset.
Don't you feel very, very puny? Don't you have a sense that there must be something more to life than our fleeting existence on this tiny planet, this tiny planet which is just like a speck of sand in our huge universe, and you are one of six billion people on this planet? Makes you really small, doesn't it? Makes you really tiny. Makes you really wonder that how on earth can you be the center of the universe?
Mark Twain and Huckleberry Finn said, We had the sky up there all speckled with stars. and we used to lay on our backs and look up at them and discuss about whether they was made, or only just happened. The stars, the universe, made or just happened? Creation or evolution? In this huge universe, our small planet of Earth is just at the right distance from the Sun and the other planets.
If we're closer to the Sun, we'd burn up. If we're further away, we would freeze. Because Earth's orbit is nearly circular The slightly elliptical shape means that we enjoy quite a narrow range of temperature, which is important to life. The speed of the rotation of the earth On its axis, completing one turn every twenty-four hours means that the sun warms our planet evenly. What is the size?
Not to speak of the order of our universe pointer. What do you think? Creation? A revolution. This is the verdict, featuring the Bible teaching of Pastor John Monroe.
There's still more to hear when John returns in just a moment, so stay with us. From matters of truth and identity, to the subjects of love and grace, our world seems more confused than ever. but to find truth and certainty about who we are and find peace, we must turn our attention away from the world and look to the Word of God. To help you do that, John wrote a booklet titled Eternal Security, Finding Certainty in a Chaotic World. Through this special resource, John shares his personal testimony, along with a careful examination of Scripture, to offer us clarity on matters of eternity.
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Now, here's Pastor John Monroe.
Well, what's your verdict? This question of creation or evolution is very important. Many of you, like myself, were taught evolution at school. Others of you, no doubt, were taught creation by your parents or your church or have come to these conclusions on your own. Of course.
If you don't believe in God, you can't believe in creation by God. But... How can something come from nothing? Why is there something at all? Join me next time as we continue to think of creation or evolution.
As always, the verdict is yours. Thanks for joining us today on The Verdict. I'm Michelle Davies. Today's program with Pastor John Monroe was produced and sponsored by Calvary Church in Charlotte, North Carolina.
