Category: Evolution

Spring Meeting 2014

The lesson is a review of the contention of a religious writer for the Huffington Post, who claimed that Christians should just stop saying:

1. The Bible is the inerrant, infallible Word of God
2. We just believe the Bible
3. Jesus is the only way to heaven
4. The rapture of Jesus is imminent
5. Homosexuality is a sin against God
6. The earth is less than 10,000 years old

Audio

Ron Doss shared with me a word that he recently came across, with which he and I were not familiar. The term was fideity, or fideism. (Interestingly, my spell checker in the computer program I use to prepare this bulletin doesn’t know the term either).

There are two definitions for fideism I want to share with you—both from online dictionaries. 1) exclusive reliance in religious matters upon faith, with consequent rejection of appeals to science or philosophy—dictionary.com; 2) The doctrine that knowledge depends on faith or revelation—oxforddictionaries.com.

The term would be used disparagingly toward Christians, as clearly indicated by the first definition. The question is, is it true? Well, it depends a bit upon the actual definition of the term. According to the second definition, absolutely so! We are dependent upon God’s revelation regarding what is true. Even if such revealed truth is counterintuitive to what we think would be true, we accept revelation above our own thoughts. “Indeed, let God be true but every man a liar” (Romans 3:4). However, if it is claimed that belief in God and His word is contradictory to true science or philosophy, and in order to believe we must be unreasonable, that is categorically untrue. As Paul wrote, “For since the creation of the world His invisible attributes are clearly seen, being understood by the things that are made, even His eternal power and Godhead, so that they are without excuse” (Romans 1:20).

If you want an example of unreasonable dependence upon faith, how about the idea that all you see today is the result of mere chance? Now that is a true example of fideism!

This past week I came across a YouTube video, where an apologist for the theory of evolution was seeking to explain the origin of the universe. Said apologist is taken with a book written by Lawrence Krauss, A Universe from Nothing , which posits that the universe came from, as the apologist states, “literally nothing.” Please read the following quotes carefully from that video:

Continue reading “In the News: Something from Nothing” →

In 2009 the European Space Agency launched a satellite designed to record and map cosmic background radiation. In the time the satellite has been in orbit, scientists have compiled a 50 million pixel image of that radiation. Basically, 15 months were spent recording the radiation, and filtering out dust emissions and radio frequencies.

From this data and image, stellar evolutionists have postulated a new age for the universe. The new guess is that it is 13.81 billion years old, about 80 million years older than previously believed.

Continue reading “In the News: The Age of the Universe?” →

Wayne explains how the reality of Dinosaur fossils fits into a worldview that is centered in a belief in the Bible.

Audio

Powerpoint Slides

In a recent article at the Science News website (sciencenews.org), writer Daniel Strain noted the following:

In Germany’s Eider River, spiders not only swim with the fishes, they kind of breathe like them, too.

Eurasian diving bell spiders (Argyroneta aquatica) survive entirely underwater by living in large air bubbles, which the crawlers trap in silken webs. A new study shows that these bubbles work like a “physical gill,” drawing oxygen in from the water to match much of the spider’s consumption. Researchers from Australia and Germany report their findings in the July Journal of Experimental Biology .

Everywhere around us is the evidence of design. This is one example among millions we could use to illustrate the same basic point. This universe, earth, and the life on it are all too complex to be the product of chance. As the Psalmist put it:

Continue reading “In the News: The Eurasian Diving Bell Spider” →

This sermon contends that the Biblical account of Creation, recorded in Genesis 1, affirms that the universe was created in six days. That the term “day” in the text should be taken as a literal day, not an indeterminate period of time.

Sermon Audio: Click Here .

Kris Braddock’s first sermon in our Spring gospel meeting is a comparison of the Christian’s world view and that of a secular society, as it impacts the environment. The Bible shows man to be the pinnacle of God’s creation, given the responsibility of stewardship in the world. In contrast, society today paints man as simply an animal, and often refuses to accept the preeminence of man over the earth.

Sermon Powerpoint: Click Here .

Sermon Audio: Click Here .

The sermon asks and answers the questions, Is there any way to reconcile the evolutionists claim that the universe is 12-14 Billion years old with the Creation account of Genesis 1? Is there any need for such a reconciliation? Can the Genesis account be accepted as literal?

Sermon Powerpoint: Click Here .

Sermon Audio: Click Here .

The April 8, 1966 issue of Time Magazine had in big red letters on its cover the question, Is God Dead? The cover story sought to answer the question, 44 years ago, had belief in God become irrelevant in our modern society? The form of the question echoed the contention of German philosopher Friedrich Nietzsche who in his book, The Gay Science (1882) said that God is dead in the hearts of modern men — killed by rationalism and science.

In the Time Magazine article, the author stated, “Even within Christianity, now confidently renewing itself in spirit as well as form, a small band of radical theologians has seriously argued that the churches must accept the fact of God’s death, and get along without him.” So, 130 years have passed since Nietzsche’s proclamation that “God is Dead”, and 44 years since Time reported that some religious people agree.

Continue reading “Worse Than A Fool” →

Sermon text: 1 Corinthians 1 & 2. Those who deny God and His Son are extremely foolish. Paul contrasts such human wisdom with God’s “foolishness”, and finds the wisdom of men sorely lacking.

Sermon Audio: Click Here .

The eighth lesson in a continuing series titled “Simple Answers to Troubling Questions.

The sermon asks the question, Can the General Theory of Evolution be true? The sermon contends that evolutionary theory does not adequately explain the origin of the universe, the evident design present in the universe, and the existence of morality.

Sermon Powerpoint: Click Here .

Sermon Audio: Click Here .

Last Thursday I was reading an article in the July 2009 issue of Science News Magazine, titled Microswimmers Make a Splash. The article pointed out that very small bacteria have novel ways of moving in water, required because the relative viscosity of the water is much greater for them than for larger organisms. While talking about a particular bacterium, spiroplasma, Greg Huber, a physicist at the University of Connecticut, said:

“What we find is that, just from those constraints alone, the optimal one (method of locomotion) is coincidentally the one nature found! Is that coincidence, or is that evolution?”

It is interesting that scientists use a supercomputer to run simulations in an attempt to find the best method for locomotion, and find that it is actually in use in nature. Though it takes a “supercomputer” to ascertain what that form of locomotion is, the only two explanations this physicist considers for its presence in nature have as their absurd common denominator — blind chance.

In reality, it is as the apostle Paul wrote, “For since the creation of the world His attributes are clearly seen, being understood by the things that are made, even His eternal power and Godhead, so that they are without excuse” (Romans 1:20). God is obviously behind this design, whether man admits it or not!

The Large Hadron Collider is in the news again. The Collider is a large, underground tunnel built in the form of a ring. The equipment within it is designed to accelerate and collide photons to help scientists better understand the nature of matter.

Why is this such a big deal? I am sure that there are “hard science” benefits, but the main reason the Collider exists is to give scientific “proof” that the theory a “Big Bang” began the universe is valid.

Interestingly, a similar Collider, to be built in the United States about 15 years ago was scrapped because of cost overruns, and the fact that Congress could not be convinced of its “scientific value.”

So much ado about nothing! All they need to know about the origins of the universe, they can read in Genesis 1:1.