Science vs. God?

A FALSE DICHOTOMY

What if Evolution and Creation weren’t enemies?  What if both were true?  

If you watched the Bill Nye vs. Ken Ham debate, you probably were under the impression that this statement simply can’t be correct.  In fact, my biggest “gripe” with the debate was this picture painted by both sides.  The entire debate seemed to indicate that being a Christian was synonymous with believing in Young Earth Creationism.  Ken Ham especially emphasized this point: that trusting in the reliability of the Bible must mean ascribing to Young Earth Creationism.

However, this is simply not the case.  My hope is that no one walked away feeling like they couldn’t believe in the claims of the Bible because they don’t agree with Young Earth Creationism.  I personally agreed more with what Bill Nye had to say!

My favorite Bill Nye moment:

If the Flood happened only 4,000 years ago, and there were only 7,000 species on the Ark, and being that there are conservatively 16,000,000 species now (some say 57 million), that would be 11 new species every day…that’s just not enough time.

My favorite Ken Ham moment:

While there are variations between species and there is certainly micro-evolution within a species, it is never cross-species.  The variety between finches, for example, is not proof that finches evolved to or from any other species; the finches themselves are still finches.  The idea of cross-species evolution is very difficult to prove through what he called “observational science,” or what we currently observe in nature.

WHO’S FAULT IS IT?

It’s unfortunate that both the American education system and American Evangelical Christianity itself has conditioned people to believe that science and God are incompatible.

Our education system has taught that the Theory of Evolution is synonymous with the word "science," and is an alternative to believing in God and the Bible, when in fact it proves nothing against God’s existence in any way.

Yet the Church has also taught that anything seemingly connected to the Theory of Evolution is wrong, and therefore rejects most modern scientific claims.

It’s a shame, as this doesn’t encourage critical thinking and instead makes Christians unsure of their belief systems.

IS THERE ANYTHING ELSE OUT THERE?

Young Earth Creationism is not the only view of Creationism.  In fact, there are tons of views out there.  The reason these views exist is because they are completely compatible with Christianity and the Bible.  Some of them raise interesting theological questions (which can be grounds for holding or not holding to a particular view), but this does not mean that they don’t work with the Bible.

Examples of other views of Creation:

-Young Earth Creationism

            -Earth 6,000 – 10,000 years old

            -Global flood of Noah

            -Adam and Eve literal people

            -24 hour literal days (in the Creation narrative of Genesis 1)
-Old Earth Creationism
            -Probably not 24 hour literal days
            -Human beings created much later in the overall timeline of history
            -Adam and Eve literal people
            -Global / local flood of Noah?
            -My current favorite

-Gap Theory

            -Gap of time between Genesis 1:1 and 1:2

            -An entire world existed that God destroyed

            -Biblical evidence to support this is quite lacking

-Day-Gap Theory

            -24 hour literal days

            -Not consecutive…gaps of time between days

-God creates on a day, large gap of time, then creates again on another day

-Day-Age Theory

            -Days are metaphorical, are actually ages of time

            -God creates different things in different ages

            -Animals lived and died during these ages

-Theistic Evolution

            -God “kick-started” evolution

            -Possibly guided by God as well

            -Adam and Eve can be literal or non-literal people

This article provides a good summary of some of these views:

http://www.reclaimingthemind.org/blog/2009/05/six-views-on-the-creationevolution-debate/
https://credohouse.org/blog/six-views-on-the-creationevolution-debate

FINAL THOUGHTS

While many of these views are attempts to reconcile modern science with the Bible (rather than seeing simply what the Bible is saying), they are still compatible with the Bible.  The fact that American Christians need to accept is that Genesis is not a science textbook.  God was not trying to teach how old the earth was, or how long it took Him to put the stars in the sky, etc.  While we can definitely explore the different possible views, it’s wrong for anyone to assert their view as being the correct one.  The Bible does not teach any of these views.

I believe that philosophical arguments for God’s existence are much stronger evidence for God.  The Cosmological Argument, Teleological / Fine-Tuning Argument, the Moral Argument, and the Ontological Argument are just some examples, all of which (in my opinion) serve as much better defenders of the Christian Faith.

For more resources on the existence of God and Christian Apologetics in general, check out Reasonable Faith:

http://www.reasonablefaith.org/

Bill Nye vs. Ken Ham Debate:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=z6kgvhG3AkI