Once again, we are trying to cover a tremendous amount of ground in a short time. Please email or comment with questions and I will be happy to expand or explain as requested.
Lie #1 - Darwinian Evolution "A Cosmic Accident"
B) What is our identity? Where does it come from?
Ideas have consequences, and here we begin to see that the long reach of Darwinism extends far beyond the science classroom. If we are the result of random, purposeless forces - what is our value as human beings? What is the worth of a single human life? What is the value of an unwanted baby (or fetus, some would prefer)?
"When it comes to pain, love, joy, loneliness, and fear, a rat is a pig is a dog is a boy. Each one values his or her life and fights the knife." Ingrid Newkirk's statement is a chilling one, once you think it through. Reading on from PETA's own website, we find that we shouldn't discriminate, even on the basis of species. An animal should have every right that you do. Now, some would say that PETA is a rather extreme choice for an example of the evolutionary mindset. But taking that viewpoint to its logical end, their ideas makes perfect sense: what is the difference between the species? We are all made of the same stuff, we all come from the same place, and we all have our spot in the natural world. A rat is a pig is a dog is a boy; don't bother me with a starving child in Africa when an entire insect species is going extinct. What is the life of one child when measured against the extinction of a species? If I say - as the compassionate heart would like to - that a child is worth more than even millions of bugs, what is my basis for saying so? If I say "Well, in my heart I know what is right," then how do I establish moral superiority over someone like Newkirk, who "knows" a different truth in their heart? Who is right? Where do I go, what truth do I claim, to win this argument? For that matter, from a purely evolutionary mindset, why do I care about a starving boy, anyway? If he can't feed himself, let him die. He was clearly not fit, and natural selection is taking its natural course.
Thank God for Scriptural truth! For we find in the very beginning that man is created in the very image of God (Genesis 1:26-27). His value is innate, his worth established because it is ordained by the Creator. Every unborn child, every starving person on some distant continent - they are all created in the image of God. Human life has greater value than that of the natural world, over which we were given stewardship and authority (Genesis 1:28-29).
We further find that, in addition to being created in God's image, mankind has specific purpose in this world, even before sin entered it (Genesis 2:15-24). Man created to work, woman created to help him; we have distinct roles in both responsibility and relationship.
What does the world say? Just a few days ago, a report on gender (in regards to terrorism) was given to the UN. This viewpoint, that gender is a social construct and not part of who we are created to be, is taught to children everyday in this country in the public schools. And this conclusion follows logically from evolution as well. With the natural world established as the boundary of reality, it follows that there is no behavior that we can engage in that can be considered unnatural. If a man chooses to act as a woman, this is natural. If a woman chooses the life of a man, this is natural. In short, there is no particular role or relationship that cannot be redefined, since these things are merely social constructs in the first place.
Reality doesn't line up with this worldview, however. Read the news, check the Internet. We are surrounded everyday by more and more broken people, wearing themselves out trying to be something they were not created to be. As Christians, this should break our hearts, and here is where we often go wrong: we focus on the sin, and not the sinner. Where we have the chance to show the love of Christ, to show hurting people that it does not have to be like it is, that there is a better way, a plan - instead we judge, so intent on being self-righteous that we forget our own moral corruption. That is, we forget that sin is sin and we are no better than anyone else, we are just saved by grace. None of us are righteous (Romans 3:23). God's grace in our lives is all that separates us from anyone, not that we do anything to deserve it, but that God gives it freely (Ephesians 2:8-9) to those who believe.
In addition to different roles in society, we see different roles within marriage. The Bible teaches clearly that God's order for marriage is the husband in a position of leadership and the wife in a position of submission (Colossians 3:18-39, Ephesians 5:22-33). But here again we need to be careful about using Truth as a bludgeon. The example of our - husband's - leadership is Christ as we witness him here on earth in the Gospels (Matthew, Mark, Luke and John). Christ willingly surrendered his rights as God to take on the role of Savior, remaining God as He was here on earth but using only the authority given Him by the Father. Jesus set aside everything He was in order to meet the need of a fallen world for a Savior, ultimately dying on the Cross for the forgiveness of sins. Somehow I don't think that kind of leadership is a problem for women, were they to see it properly lived out by the men in their lives. As for women, their submission is to be that of the Church to Christ. Christ did not give the Church a list of do's and don'ts, expecting simple mindless obedience. No, a Christian's life should look different because it is a response to a loving relationship almost beyond comprehension. A wife's submission is the loving, respectful response to the husband's servant leadership and sacrifice.
But the toughest aspect within marriage is the call to do our part, regardless of our spouse's choices. As a reflection of God's unconditional love for us, we must be loving to our wives and respectful to our husbands; the direction of the Bible here is clear (Ephesians 5:33) and unconditional. And this extends to Christians within society as a whole: we need to be living out lives full of grace so that others can see Jesus Christ in us. We need to worry about what we can do for others, and not what others can do for us. We need to focus on our responsibility as Christians, and not our rights. We need to follow the two commandments Jesus Himself gave as the greatest: to love the Lord, and love our neighbors as ourselves (Mark 12:28-34).
To review, we have looked at the authority of the Bible in relationship to evolution; that is, the Bible has no authority if evolution is true, because they cannot coexist. The Bible claims perfection, and if this perfection is lost (due to falsehood in the Genesis account) the whole effort is a waste of time, other than perhaps to "feel good" in some vague religious sense.
And if we embrace evolution, we see that society suffers because the roles of men and women are no longer defined in an absolute way. A person has no greater worth than an animal. A man has no different a role than a woman, and in turn neither has a call to be anything more than an animal here on earth. In contrast, the Biblical model for society lived out offers the greatest joy a person can have. A loving father, a caring mother, obedient children, and a family as a whole putting the needs of others before their own. It sounds Utopian, and yet it is society as it was created to be. Will we embrace it? Will we live in such a way that the world will begin again to see the value in God's social order?
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In regards to the problem of human and animal suffering, I'd like to refer you to a concept which was very important to Charles Darwin: sympathy. It was sympathy for humans that drove Darwin to become an abolitionist against the crime of slavery. We understand that other people suffer; we know what that feels like...in fact, to a large extent, we feel it ourselves. When you talk about a starving child, if I were to imagine it fully, or better yet, meet that child, I would, quite literally, feel his pain.
ReplyDeleteDarwin wrote, 'Those who look tenderly at the slave-owner, and with a cold heart at the slave, never seem to put themselves into the position of the latter...picture to yourself the chance, ever hanging over you, of your wife and your little children...being torn from you and sold like beasts to the highest bidder. And these deeds are done and palliated by men, who profess to love their neighbors as themselves, who believe in God..." Today, we often remember that the leading abolitionists were Christians. And it's true, they were. But, and this is the point, *so were the slave-owners*. How do you suppose they rationalised this cruelty? Guess what: they used the Bible. They also used science. and attempted to show that Africans were not a human species. It made Darwin's blood boil. So, you know what he did? He proved that we are all the same 'race' as it was called then. The abolitionist society Charles Darwin belonged to, at that time, had a slogan: 'Am I not a man and a brother?' printed under an image of a chained slave. Well, according to some pseudo-scientists at the time, the answer was, 'no.' Many Christains also believed in doctrines such as 'Hamitic' races and so forth. Darwin proved them all wrong. He showed that we are all the same race, and proved the 'polygenists' as they were called then, wrong.
I also want to extend a word of caution. You are setting up a lot of people to becoming atheists, if you encourage this all-or-nothing approach to Scripture. Evolution _is_ true, AND we can prove it. You may not think so, but that doesn't alter the fact. If you say, 'It's evolution or your faith,' well, evolution is going to win, a lot of the time. Some better approaches might be 'truth can not contradict truth,' as Pope John Paul II wrote. Or, you could admit that human beings are fallible creatures, and they make mistakes, including in their understanding of Scripture, as the history of slavery shows. Your own understanding of Genesis I and II could be flawed. You are looking through a glass, darkly. Your understanding of what those books are about could be wrong. In the 1st Century, AD, a theologian known as Philo of Alexandria looked at Gen I and II and concluded that, because there were discrepancies, it meant that a reader must read between the lines, and interpret what they read. What is God saying in this passage? What is He saying to me? Is this really a straightforward history, or am I meant to understand it as a creation myth, which reveals a deeper truth?
It's your call. But this approach will tend to lead to two results, which I can't believe you want to see: 1. Your children become atheists. 2. They become educationally disadvantaged.
Take care,
Andy Phillips, from Facebook.(I wrote the 'anonymous' ones too)