Now I have a guess you’re about skip down to the comments section to angrily accuse me of being “anti-science.” Hold on; I beg you to listen a little bit longer. I am not anti-science. I know that all facts of physics are true. I know that if you drop a watermelon and a cherry from a tower at the same time, they will both hit the ground at the same time. I know that all facts about chemistry are true. I know that the salt water in the ocean is comprised of a molecule that is a 1 to 1 ratio of sodium and chlorine in an ionic bond and a molecule with a 2 to 1 ratio of hydrogen and oxygen in a covalent bond. There are other areas of biology I hold to be true. I know plants produce their own food through photosynthesis. And I do believe microevolution to be true. I know if you want to get pink carnations, you breed red carnations and white carnations together. Any gardener knows that. I know that Noah did not load any labradoodles (a cross-breed of a labrador and a poodle) or goldendoodles (a cross-breed of a golden retriever and a poodle) in the Ark. I know they are recently invented breeds. I’m not stupid.
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What people don’t get, and it frustrates me people don’t get it, is that science isn’t as objective as the modern era would like us to think. No scientists go in with a pure, clean, fresh slate. They all have presuppositions that come from their family, their friends, their philosophy and their religions. Evolution scientists come in with a naturalism philosophy, a philosophy that that believes that all that exists is in nature, and there is nothing supernatural. Nothing supernatural means there’s no angels, no demons and no God. What do we call the belief of no God? Atheism. There’s a strong tie between naturalism and atheism, and there’s a strong tie between atheism and evolution. When the Greek philosophers went atheist, it led them to set forth the first building blocks of evolution. When Charles Darwin went atheist, he developed evolution and made it famous. Still don’t believe me? There’s a summer camp out there called Camp Quest. Camp Quest is the atheist equivalent of summer Bible camp or summer church camp. Just like summer church camp, Camp Quest has activities like crafts, games and swimming. They even have a study time to learn. But if it’s not a Bible study, then what is it? You guessed it: evolution. Of all things to teach children, they teach evolution. I beg you, please see the correlation between atheism and evolution.
If you’re still not convince I am not anti-science, maybe this will convince you. I think that Christians have been too harsh on Charles Darwin. Darwin only wrote about microevolution, which most creation scientists will acknowledge as fact. He never wrote on macroevolution. He didn’t even ascribe to a single common ancestor late in life, and even then, he was cautious because he knew everything would have to line up just right by chance. In fact, Charles enjoyed listening to and wrestling with the teleological arguments. Furthermore, although atheist, Darwin never made his evolutionary observations and discovery a vendetta against God or Christians. Therefore, why should Christians have a vendetta against him? Besides, it’s just not showing the kindness and gentleness Jesus taught us to bear. Maybe if Christians were slow to judge Darwin, maybe in turn evolutionists would be slow to criticize Christians for believing differently.
6 Views of Creation
So far, we’ve looked at 8 icons of evolution, seen how they are weak or non-existant, and thus have concluded that evolution is somewhere between a weak theory and a bad theory. Since we took out the main, overall theory, there’s no need to discuss any subtheories or differences because they all hang on the main, overall theory. To use an analogy, we’ve cut off the branch, and killed all the leaves along wth it. Now it’s time to look at the creation side.of the argument. Although I bet there’s many more views, we’ll look at 6 main views of creation. I’ll explain each one of them and provide some of the proofs they give. We’ll look at strengths and weaknesses. Then, at the end, I’ll let you decided which one you like the best, but I will mention theology that all of them need to have.
Literal 6-Day Creation
Literal 6-Day Creation reads Genesis 1 and 2 in the most literal straightforward way.God created the world exactly the way Genesis 1 and 2 records it. Every time in the Hebrew Old Testament the Hebrew word yom, the Hebrew word for “day,” gets paired with a number, it always means a literal, 24-hour period. No one believes Jonah lived inside the belly of the great fish for 3 millennia, No one believes Esther and her maids fasted for 3 centuries. In each case, it says 3 days, and they meant 72 hours. The Old Testament Israelites/Jews would have understood the creation to take 6 days with a 7th day of rest. After all, this is why they established the work week to be 6 days long and the Sabbath to be the 7th day of rest. Both the New Testament Jews and the New Testament Christians understood the Creation story in Genesis 1 and 2 to literally happen that way. Jesus quoted Genesis 1:26, the part where God literally creates man on the 6th 24-hour day of creation. Paul, too, refers to Adam and Eve as really real people (cf. Romans 5:9-12, 1 Corinthians 11:8,9, 15:21,22,45-47, 2 Corinthians 11:3, 1 Timothy 2:13,14, and many more!). The Early Church Fathers believed the creation story to be true. The Christians during the Reformation took the Creation literally. Historically speaking, literal 6-Day Creation has been the dominant view for most of history. To believe differently, a person has to go against centuries of historical testimony.
To side with Literal 6-Day Creation, on the other hand, takes a lot of guts. Literal 6-Day Creation opposes secular science the most. To take Genesis 1 and 2 literally, the earth can only exist for 4,000 to 6,000 years. Science puts the Earth at about 4.5 billion years old. Furthermore, secular science says the sun is 4.6 billion years old, making the sun older than the earth. A literal reading of Genesis 1 records the earth as older than the sun by a matter of 3 days. On a similar note, secular science states all light must have a source. How can light exist on Day 1 when the sun or stars don’t exist until Day 4? The Hebrew word yom, while translated “day,” does not always mean a 24-hour period. The Day of the Lord, yom YHWH, does not mean a single, 24-hour day, but rather a time when the Lord reigns. So yom does not have to be restricted to 24 hours. This is why creation literalists need to mention that the number needs to go with the word yom to make it a literal 24-hour period. But it’s not that straightforward either. If a person read Genesis 1 and 2 in the original Hebrew, he or she will notice days 2 to 6 do read with ordinal numbers (2nd, 3rd, 4th, 5th, 6th). Day 1 does not fit this pattern. In Genesis 1:5, yom ehad most literally translate into “one day.” The creation literalists will argue it can be translated to “first day” as well, or “one day” could be considered interchangeable with “first day,” but that’s not always the case. Opponents of the literal creation will say “one day” could mean “some day,” or “a day” or “a certain day,” like the sentence, “One day, Christian learned about evolution in science class.” This sentence does not mean Christian spent 24 hours straight listening to his science teacher lecture about evolution. In the same way, Genesis 1:5 should not be taken that way. On the opposite end, Genesis 2:2 rightfully reads “the seventh day,” but it does not have the typical closing phrase of all the other days: “and there was morning and there was evening.” Does this mean day 7 lasted more than 24 hours? That’s not the only problem with Genesis 2. Genesis 2:4-7 causes a whole lot of problems for the literalist. In Genesis 2:4-7, God creates man before plants and animals, while in Genesis 1, plants and animals come before man. If Genesis 2:4-7 is taken literally, it would seem to contradict a literal reading of Genesis 1.
Day-Age Theory
Day-Age Theory begins by helpfully reminding the reader that Genesis 1 comes for God’s perspective. Then it goes to 2 Peter 3:8, which reads, “But do not overlook this one fact, beloved, that with the Lord one day is as a thousand years, and a thousand years as one day.” According to Day-Age Theory, God sees a millennium as a day. Together, when God says in Genesis 1 it took him a day to create, it really took a millennium. Still, this would only make the earth 6,000 to 10,000 years old, still millennia away from what science says. So Day-Age Theory says that a day is not a literal 24 hours, but rather just a time period, which could be a million or a billion years. Day-Age Theory insists that day does not have to mean 24 hours. They will use the “Day of the Lord” example, saying that the Day of the Lord will last for millions or billions of years. This theory makes so compromise to science, like the age of the sun and the earth, as well as the microevolution, but does not compromise enough to accept macroevolution.
Day-Age Theory correctly reminds everyone that Genesis 1 comes from God’s point of view, but the theory incorrectly views 2 Peter 3:8. It takes it way out of context. 2 Peter 3:8 serves a reminder that God does fulfill his promises, even though it may not be on our time table (cf. 2 Peter 3:9). The verse has no connection to the creation accounts, and thus has nothing to do with creation. While the theory claims to allow microevolution and not microevolution, it really doesn’t allow any kind of evolution. The theory of evolution states (or at least claims) that for true evolution to happen, evolution cannot have any time period borders. Even with Day-Age Theory having “days” that are thousands, millions or billions of years, they are still time periods with borders, and that would not suit any kind of evolution. Day-Age Theory may have good reasoning behind it, but it still lacks any kind of scientific backing, even if it makes compromises in order to side with science.
Gap Theory
Remember when I told Christian’s testimony, I put God creating the heavens and the earth in the beginning on a separate line than God creating light on the first day? The Gap Theory is that reason. Gap Theory keeps the two as two different, separate events. According to Gap Theory, billions of years ago, God created the heavens and the earth (Gen 1:1). Sometime later, the devil and his demons rebelled, and they were cast down on the earth. This ruined and corrupted the earth, making it formless and empty (Gen 1:2). So God spent 6 days, 24 hours long, recreating and renewing the earth (Gen 1:3-31). Just like Day-Age Theory, it compromises with science on the age of earth, sun, moon and stars, but does not compromise with evolution.
Gap Theory shares a lot of criticisms with Day-Age Theory. If it wants to compromise with science, it does not compromise enough. Evolution will claim that the ancestors of our modern-day animals date back to over a million years ago. Gap Theory would only allow today’s animal’s ancestors to date back to 4,000 to 10,000 years ago. This would really create a problem observing fossils. Again, Gap Theory will not allow evolution because of the time borders. Some will say that Gap Theory’s Biblical Hermeneutics skills need work. A formless and empty earth does not mean the earth is ruined or corrupt. Genesis 3 shows that a fallen world is ruined a corrupt, not Genesis 1:2. The earth being formless and empty just means the earth is incomplete. Gap Theory might have good reasoning behind it, but it still lacks any scientific backing. For this reason, Gap Theory really was just a fad. It was commonly held during the 1970s and 1980s, but it is rarely defended today.
Intermittent Theory
Intermittent is almost a combination between Day-Age Theory and Gap Theory. Intermittent Theory states that God created everything in 6 24-hour periods, yet it also says that these days are not consecutive days, but rather there’s millions to billions of years between them. During these million to billion years, they claim, evolution happened. Once again, most people who hold onto Intermittent Theory believe only microevolution happened; few will believe macroevolution happen. Intermittent Theory will also help account for science’s old age of the sun and earth.
Since Intermittent Theory is a cross between Day-Age Theory and Gap Theory, it encounters a lot of the same problems. Once again, despite allowing millions and billions of years for evolution and old age of the sun and earth, it still would create time borders, which evolution cannot be limited by. Once again, Intermittent Theory makes use good logic or reasoning to compromise with science, but it really has no science behind it.
Literary Framework Analogy
The Literary Framework Analogy first seeks to understand the Biblical background of the Creation story. So prior to looking at the Literary Framework, we have to look at the background of Genesis. First, we have to know who the author is. For simplicity’s sake, we’re going ignore the J.E.D.P. theory (that’s another discussion for another time), and we’ll stick with the traditional answer of Moses. Second, we have to know who the audience is. The audience of Genesis is the Israelites. Now which generation of Israelites depends on how one believes the Torah or Pentateuch (first 5 books of the Bible) was compiled. If one believes that the Torah was written in progression, that is, they were written as they happened, the audience of Genesis is the older generation of Israelites that came out of Egypt. If one believes the Pentateuch was written together, it would be the younger generation of Israelites, who are the children of the Israelites who came out of Egypt, which means they have no recollection of the slavery or the plagues. Although the message would be more important for the latter, it really doesn’t matter. Third, we have to know where they are. The Israelites are encamped in the Sinai Desert, between Egypt and Canaan, the Promised Land. Fourth, we have to consider what’s happening. God has brought his chosen people out of Egypt. He has led them to Mount Sinai to establish a covenant them. Now God is preparing His people for the Promised Land.
Why is this all important? The best explanation comes from a Bible verse. Everyone knows Joshua 24:15b, which reads, “But as for me and my house, we will serve the Lord,” but few know the context. The context can be found in Joshua 24:14-15a. It reads, “Now therefore fear the Lordand serve him in sincerity and in faithfulness. Put away the gods that your fathers served beyond the River and in Egypt, and serve the Lord. And if it is evil in your eyes to serve the Lord, choose this day whom you will serve, whether the gods your fathers served in the region beyond the River, or the gods of the Amorites in whose land you dwell.” This passage so well describes the context. Stuck between two lands, the Israelites have two options of religions to worship. They can worship the Egyptian polytheism, which they came out of, or they can worship the Canaanite polytheism, which they are going into. But Joshua reminds them of a third option. They can worship and serve the one and only true God, Yahweh. What makes Yahweh makes one and only is that he’s unique. God wants His people to know that he’s unique and nothing like the other gods in the other lands. Part of the reason we have in Genesis in the Scriptures to show all of God’s people that God is nothing like any foreign god.
So how is God different than other gods? Let’s look at one of the creation myths. Let’s look at the Egyptian creation myth. According to Egyptian creation myth, before the dawn of time, there was a dark, watery chaos known as Nu. From Nu arose Atum, who created himself out of his own intellect and willpower. Atum is an all-seeing and all-knowing god with an all-seeing eye. First thing Atum creates is a hill because he has no place to stand in the water. Atum looks around and is lonely because he sees no one around. He mates with his own shadow to produce a son and a daughter. His son he spits out, names him Shu, and puts him in charge of the air. His daughter he vomits out, names her Tefnut, and makes her goddess of mist and moisture. Atum then commands Shu and Tefnet to make that dark, watery chaos into order and stability by creating principles and laws. These principles and laws Shu and Tefnet called Maat. Using Maat, they separate the chaos into light and darkness, and they give each one a place and time. Shu and Tefnet mate together and produce Geb, the Earth, and Nut, the sky. When they are born, they are two lovers, intertwined into each other’s arms. So Shu had to push Nut up into the heavens. Geb and Nut longed to be together, but they could not in the name of Maat, so they would give gifts to each other. Nut sends rain to Geb, and Geb makes plants out of Nut’s rain. Every day, Nut gives birth to the sun at sunrise and gives it to Geb, where it dies at sunset. But Nu is still not fully conquered and Shu and Tefnut get lost in it. Atum sends his all-seeing eye out to find. Eventually, the all-seeing eye finds them and brings them back to Atum. Atum is so happy he cries tears of joy. Those tears of joy become the first human beings. The humans are commanded to uphold Maat, tend to Geb, and worship the gods. In exchange, the gods would protect and bless the creation, especially the humans.
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Believe it or not, this is one of the “nicer” creation myths. Check out the Babylonian Creation Myth, known as the Enuma Elish. Once again, the story begins with a watery chaos. There’s a chief god, Apsu (or Abzu), who is the god of fresh water, and Tiamet, who is the goddess of salt water. Once again, the two of them are lonely, so they mate in order to make more gods and goddesses. Before they know it, Tiamet is pregnant with eight gods. The gods inside Tiamet are very noisy, so noisy that it annoys Apsu and Tiamet. Apsu is so annoyed that he wants to abort the gods, but Tiamet thinks that’s going too far. So the two of them call forth Mummu to serve as a mediator and judge. Mummu ends up agreeing and siding with Apsu. Tiamet, still not wanting for her babies to die, finds the strongest god within her, Ea, and devises a plan to take out Apsu and make Ea the chief god in his place. Together, using magic, they place Apsu in a coma, and they kill Apsu in his coma. To reward Ea, Tiamet releases Ea from her body, along with his sister and wife Damkina. Ea and Damkina mate together and bring forth the god Marduk. They make him god of the wind and give him the winds to play with. Instead of using the winds for good, however, Marduk uses the winds to cause trouble, with tornados and dust storms. This disrupts Tiamet and the gods within her, so much they cannot sleep, which makes the gods cranky. The gods inside Tiamet guilt Tiamet into believing this is her fault, but then they quickly turn the blame to Ea for creating Marduk. They convince Tiamet that the only right thing to do is avenge Apsu by putting to death Ea and putting another god as chief god. Again, Tiamet finds the next strongest god, Kingu, and they conspire a plan. Together, they create 11 monsters who kill Ea. Kingu now becomes the chief god. Kingu and Tiamet rule as tyrants, in fear that another god or goddess will step out of line and cause more disruption and trouble. Kingu and Tiamet rule so fiercly, the other gods and goddesses constantly fear for their lives. Marduk, naturally wants to avenge his fallen father, calls some of the other gods and goddesses to his side to wage war against Kingu and Tiamet. Kingu and Tiamet align gods and goddesses with them as well, and a divine war breaks out. Marduk ends up as the victor. In the end of the war, Marduk and Tiamet fight one-on-one. Marduk completely destroys her. He takes her body, rips it in half, places one half above him and makes it heaven, and he places the other half below him and makes it earth. Using the two halves, Marduk makes the sun, moon and stars in the heavens and the plants on the earth. After fighting Tiamet, Marduk fights Kingu one-on-one. Just like with Tiamet, Marduk defeats and destroys Kingu. The fight is so bloody that fingers and toes fall off of Kingu. These fingers and toes become humans. Like a pregnant teenage girl (sorry if this is too harsh, but it’s the best comparison), Marduk has unplanned human life, and he doesn’t know what to do with it. So Marduk decides to enslave humans as servants of the gods, to do the gods’ bidding. If they do not comply, they will receive curses. Not a pretty picture.
You’ve probably noticed some similarities and some differences in both stories, but what striking is the difference of themes between the polytheistic myths and the Creation story. In the myths, the creation is mass chaos. The god(s) is(are) constantly struggling against the chaos. The gods are fighting one another. Humans are accidently born, and the gods don’t know what to do with them, so they enslave them and treat them poorly. The true God, Yahweh, wants his people to know He is nothing like the gods the Israelites hear about in the foreign nations’ stories. The Lord is sovereignly in control. His creation had a plan and a purpose, with a future in mind. At the creation, there was peace and order from the start, due to his sovereign hand being in control. The creation submits to the creator, and yet love abounds between the Creation and the creation.
Therefore, the literary framework analogy states that Genesis 1 is God taking the creation myths of the ancient Middle Eastern peoples and redeeming it in a way to show who God really is. Just like the other creation myths, this creation story also begins with formless and empty watery mass known as earth. Instead of struggling to subdue it, God spends 3 days forming the formless. Next, God spends 3 days, days 4 to 6, filling the empty. Furthermore, the forming days parallel the filling days. Day 1 and Day 4 parallel each other because Day 1 begins with, “Let there be light…” and Day 4 begins with “Let there be lights…” Day 2 creates the sky by separating water, and Day 5 fills the sky with birds and the waters with fish, therefore a parallel happens. Day 3 forms land, and Day 6 fills the land with animals, thus a parallel exists there, too. Finally, by Day 7, the formless is formed, the empty is filled, so God can rest. In this way, God has created a Creation story, similar to the ones of the surrounding nations, which is easy to remember and teaches the Israelites about the true, loving God.
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Beginning: Formless and empty
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Formless
Given
Form
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Day 1: Separate day from night. “Let there be light.”
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Day 4: Fill day & night with sun, moon & stars. “Let there be lights…”
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Empty
Being
Filled
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Day 2: Separate water from water to form sky
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Day 5: Fill sky with birds and seas with fish
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Day 3: Separate water to form land
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Day 6: Fill the land with animals
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Day 7: Form, filled, complete. Rest.
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Something to appreciate about the Literary Framework Analogy is its use and understanding of Biblical background. It knows the Creation story was not written in timeless, spaceless bubble, but rather was written in at a time in real history, at a place in real geography, and in a real culture. It knows this story needs to be observed in those contexts. It even goes as far as seeking to understand the ancient writings in order to get a better understanding of the context. Something else that someone might appreciate is that it requires no compromises with science. In fact, science can be 100% right, which could even include Big Bang Theory being right and evolution being right. If the purpose of the creation story is to teach that God was in control of his creation and that he loved his creation, then the purpose is not to teach on how the world came to be about, and science can give that answer. Thus, it’s OK to believe in a sun billions of years old and an earth millions of years old. It’s OK to believe in humans coming from a common ancestor of apes, which came from a common ancestor of lizards, which came from a common ancestor of fish. Why? Because how the earth and the species came to be is not the point of Genesis 1! The point is that God created it, He was in control, and he loved it.
On the flip side, the biggest criticism of Literary Framework Analogy can be summed up in a sentence uttered by Pontius Pilate in John 18:38: What is truth? Those supporters of Literary Framework analogy will say that the true being conveyed in Genesis 1 is that God was in charge, God was in control and God loves. But when it comes to the truth on how the world came to be, evolutionary science has that truth. If evolutionary science has the truth for the earth’s origins, and it’s different than what’s written in Genesis 1, does that mean Genesis 1 is a lie because that’s not how the earth came to be? If Genesis 1 is a lie, and Christians believe the Bible, including Genesis 1, is the Word of God, does that mean God lied? But doesn’t God always speak the truth? Literary Framework supporters will come back and say, “Isn’t God putting a full grown garden with full grown, fruit-producing trees lying because the garden is only a few days old? If God made a tree to look like it’s been around for years, but it’s only been around for a few days, isn’t that a lie?” Opponents come back and say that it’s necessary and would foolish not to. When God created man and woman, he could put an infant boy and an infant girl in the Garden. They needed to be a full grown humans to survive. Supporters of the Literary Framework says this further proves their point. It goes back and forth. As stated already, it comes down to how someone defines “truth.”
Theistic Evolution
Theistic evolution is exactly what the name implies. It is pretty much evolution to its fullest. The sun, moon, stars and earth are billions of years old. Life started as a single cell bacteria and evolved over millions of years into the species that exist today. The only difference, and the big difference, is that God is the originator. God started off evolution and let it go from there. How much God intervenes throughout the process depends on which theistic evolutionistic is asked. They range from no interaction whatsoever to God specially making man. As for Genesis 1, it’s not historically or scientifically accurate. It might be a myth, a legend, a fable, a parable, a story or an allegory, but it’s definitely not history, and it’s definitely not science.
Theistic evolution’s greatest strength is where all the other views failed into being weaknesses. There is no contradiction with evolution whatsoever. The galaxy can be billions of years old, life can be millions of years old, and there’s nothing wrong with that. In fact, it’s very right because it 100% agrees with science. While theistic evolution fully backs the science textbook, it sacrifices the Bible in order to do so. If Genesis 1 isn’t historically credible, then it’s easy to say Genesis chapters 1 to 11 isn’t historically credible either. And if Genesis 1-11 isn’t historically accurate, it’s possible to question the historical accuracy of the whole book of Genesis. Someone who believes that one weak spot in the Bible weakens the whole message of the Bible will greatly be offended by theistic evolution. Theistic evolution also has logical problems. Theistic evolution is sometimes called the “God of the gaps” theory. Theistic evolutionists have a habit of explaining everything with science, until they can explain no more, then the rest they attribute to God. What happens when science advances and finds out the answer? All of a sudden God isn’t there anymore? It weakens the power of God.
5 Icons of Creation
We just looked at 6 View of Creation. Looking at the 6 major views, we can see similarities among the first 5. The 6th one, theistic evolution, leaves us hanging because the similarities in the first 5 are hard to find in the 6th view. I propose we call the 5 similarities the “5 Icons of Creation.” Just like all evolutionists believe in the Icons of Evolution, the Icons of Creation are beliefs all Christians need to believe from the Genesis 1 narrative to really be true Christians. Each icon had importance to the original audience in the ancient times, and each icon also significance for the modern-day reader in the modern era. This section will discuss these 5 Icons of Creation and their important in a progress manner. Then, in the conclusion, we will line up the 6 Views of Creation to the 5 Icons of Creation to determine if each View of Creation is legitimate.
God (Yahweh) created
Genesis 1 clearly establishes the Lord God, Yahweh, the Great I AM, as the creator. For the ancient audience, this meant none of the other gods of the other nations could take credit. Atem of the Egyptians cannot take credit. Marduk of the Babylonians did not create. Baal of the Canannites did not have any role. Chemosh of the Philestines is absent from creating. It’s the one and only Yahweh. For the modern-day creator in a growing atheistic world, this means that a God, a Divine and Supernatural Being, is the creator. Chance cannot be credited for bringing about the universe. Random events did not bring about life. This earth and the life on it had an intelligent designer, and Christian call him God. (Nehemiah 9:6, Psalm 124:8, Isaiah 66:2, Acts 17:24, Colossians 1:16, Hebrews 1:2, Revelation 4:11)
God created everything out of nothing
As we saw in the 2 of the creation myths, the earth and its inhabitants came from the gods’ body parts (fingers, toes, teeth, etc.) or the gods’ excrements (vomit, spit, tears, sweat, blood, snot, etc.). Later on, the atheistic Greek philosophers rejected this, stating that matter, the building blocks of the universe, was eternally present and available. The Bible, especially Genesis 1, rejects both sides. The Bible makes it clear the only one who is eternal is God Himself. Everything else finds it origin from God. God did not give birth to anything, nor did he use his own self to spawn a creation, but rather he created, by his voice and by handcrafting it. For the modern-day, this once again rejects the idea that a Big Bang came from nowhere and caused a chain reaction of random events to create everything seen today. Every reaction must have a source action, and that source action Christians call God. (John 1:1-4)
God willinglycreated everything out of nothing
As stated earlier, a lot of the ancient creation myths have humans coming about unplanned. Just like a pregnant teenage couple, they have no idea what to do with this new life. Pretty much, life on the earth is like a mistake. Modern-day evolution doesn’t really help this cause either. When random chance is involved, anything can go. There’s no plan, and things can exist by mistake. Not so in Genesis 1. When Genesis 1 shows God actively involved, the reader can tell God is willingly creating everything. Nothing he created is unplanned, nor is it a mistake. If it’s there, God wanted it to be there. What a relief it is for the Bible believer! If the reader exists, then God wanted him/her to exist! (1 Corinthians 8:6)
God willingly and lovinglycreated everything out of nothing
There’s not much love going around in the creation myths. When gods bring forth unwanted humans, the humans end up being enslaved by the gods, forced to worship them or suffer the consequences. Evolution may not be concerned with love, but no wonder a society that believes in evolution shows little concern in taking care of the environment and places little value in human life (suicide, homicide, abortion, etc.)! From start to end, the creation narrative in Genesis 1-2 displays a God who loves his handiwork. God’s close attention to detail alone proves. If God takes the time to know how many hairs on a human head and what a human thinks before the human thinks it, don’t you think God loves that human? Looking at the creation story, anyone can see love. It’s harder to see love in evolution or warring gods. (Psalm 139:1-4,13, Matthew 10:30)
God willingly and lovingly created everything out of nothing with a plan and a purpose
When the ancient gods of the ancient myths find out they have human life, they must quickly devise a plan on the spot, and it’s never a pretty one. With evolution having life randomly coming about, it’s hard to give life a deep meaning. Sure, it may give some liberty to choose a purpose as seen fit, but the purpose has no deeper connection to everyone and everything around it, and when that human life is up, the purpose dies with the human. Genesis 1 preaches quite the opposite. If God willingly creates something, God has in mind a role for the creation in part of the larger creation. When God lovingly creates something, he wants it to share in His divine will and plan. When God brings something to existence, it doesn’t go to waste. It will bring about fulfillment to the creation, fulfillment to itself, and glory to God. (Jeremiah 29:11, 1 Timothy 4:4)
Conclusion
We’ve been on a long, tough and crazy ride. We’ve explored what the testimony of the “typical” Christian might look like, and how he (or she) can get caught up between the war between creation and evolution. We’ve looked at history’s testimony, how it has had its own long, tough and crazy ride, and the war between creation and evolution has become rougher over the years. We’ve observed 8 Icons of Evolution, and we saw how 6 are outright false and the other 2 are microevolution, not macroevolution. We’ve examined 6 Views of Creation, and we detected each had strengths and weaknesses. Then we noticed similarities, and we made them 5 Icons of Creation, beliefs that all Christians need to believe to be true believers.
Let’s take at the last two, the 6 Views of Creation and the 5 Icons of Creation, one more time. Let’s put them together to see if the former accepts the latter, and thus the latter validates the former. Take one of the Views of Creation and the Icons of Creation, put them in this question, and then answer the question: “Does [View of Creation] believe that [Icon of Creation]?” Do it for all combinations of all views and all icons. What did you get? How did you answer? For the first 5 views (Literal 6 Days, Day-Age Theory, Gap Theory, Intermittent Theory, Literary Framework Analogy), the answer can clearly be “Yes!” Therefore, those 5 views can be acceptable views on how God created the world (although, when it comes down to it, God only created the world one way, but with no human there to witness the whole thing, we’ll never know, so your guess on the beginning is as solid as your guess on the end times). The 6th view, theistic evolution, however, is not so smooth. When it comes to theistic evolution and the Icons of Creation, some people would answer “yes,” while other people would answer “no.” So the best answer is “possibly.” I think what makes theistic evolution so indecisive is due to being a compromise between creation and evolution. The creation side of theistic evolution answers “yes” to all the questions, but the evolution side answers “no” to all the questions, so the answer becomes “possibly.” So it comes down to everyone’s individual conviction to determine whether or not theistic evolution is a legitimate view of creation. For me, I have 2 issues with theistic evolution. First, I have taken the time to prove the 8 Icons of Evolution are mostly false, and thus discredited evolution. Therefore, why would I support a view that still clings to it? Second, I believe I have proven a strong correlation between evolution and atheism (with maybe naturalism as an in-between stop). With such a strong correlation, the term “theistic evolution” is pretty much an oxymoron.
![](https://contextualiteralist.wordpress.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/09/2a662-hg2tg.jpg?w=128&h=200)
That leads us full circle right back to our introduction, right back to Arthur Dent in the Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy. On one of his adventures, Arthur meets Slartibartfast, one of the engineers who built the earth. Arthur cannot wrap his mind around the fact that he’s meeting an engineer of the earth, possibly because he’s been taught there was no creator, designer or engineer. Slartibartfast asks Arthur, “Have you ever been to the fjords of Norway?” Arthur quickly says no. “That’s why,” Slartibartfast replies,” for if you would have, you would have seen I signed my signature in one of the glaciers” (italics is mine for emphasis). Going from a sci-fi book to a God-breathed book, Psalm 19:1 reads, “The Heavens declare the glory of God, the skies proclaim the work of his hands.” The Lord has signed His handiwork, and we cannot deny that. The big theological term is “natural revelation.” Looking at the beauty of the earth, no one will say, “Man, am I a sinner desperately in need of a savior to die for my sins,” for that’s special revelation. But looking at the beauty of the earth, men and women should say, “Wow, this earth is so beautiful, there has to be a creator, and there has to be a God.” That is natural revelation. God has created life and the universe and has revealed himself in it. We cannot allow any religion, philosophy or science to deny God that credit. No matter what view you choose to hold of Creation, remember to give God credit and worship God as the Creator.