Creation vs. Evolution

Evolution?

"It is now commonly accepted in scientific circles that human beings have become what they are today as a result of millions of years of evolution. Beginning as a one-celled animal...." So read our biology textbooks used all over America.

"In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth. The earth was formless and empty...." So begins the book of Genesis. The Christian student faces a conflict: whom to believe?

Probably no other issue has drawn a sharper divider between religious and nonreligious thought in our society than that of the origin of the human race. Were we, as Genesis 1 and 2 state, placed here by special divine creation? Or did we evolve from nothing into one-celled animals and on up in the zoological chain into Homo sapiens? That's what we're told by proponents of Darwinian evolution, including many contemporary educators, philosophers, and others. Or perhaps there's a third option-God created people, using the process of evolution as his "laboratory."

Many young people feel the uneasy tension that exists among these views. Their spiritual authorities- the Bible, the church, the pastor, and the youth minister- stand firmly in the intentional design camp, while the public education system, their biology teachers, and probably the majority of their peers lean heavily toward the evolutionist viewpoint. Who's right?

The Bible doesn't spell out in precise detail how human beings came to be. It does, however, give us some basic truths. First and foremost, human beings, like all the rest of the universe, are intentional creations of God. The Bible states that fact in the clearest of terms- God is mentioned performing some part of his creative work 31 times in Genesis 1 alone! The idea that we simply materialized out of nothingness is a logical and scientific impossibility. The 1stlaw of thermodynamics tells us that energy (and therefore matter,) can neither be created nor destroyed by natural causes. For the Darwinist/evolutionist, this is an impossible dilemma. If only natural causes were involved, how did nothing turn into something? Next, how did it become something animated- how does life evolve from one-celled organism to plant to animal? Then, how does that animated life-form become personal? And finally, how did that living thing, personal something develop intelligence, morality, personality, and spirituality? By chance? Impossible. Absolutely, scientifically, intellectually, and logically impossible.

The Christian, then, turns to the supernatural: God did it. It is a simple but utterly profound rationale. "In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth," and that sums it up. It does not rule out the possibility of some kind of God- directed evolution; neither does it give it any support. And honest Darwinist will admit that their beliefs involve as much faith and speculation- if not more- as the creationists'. Nobel Prize winner Ernst Chain said in 1970:"To postulate that the development and survival of the fittest is entirely a consequence of chance mutations seems to me a hypothesis based on no evidence and is entirely irreconcilable with the facts.... It amazes me that [classical evolutionary theories] are swallowed so uncritically and readily, and for such a long time, by so many scientists without a murmur of protest."

So the Bible, and Genesis in particular, gives us one bedrock fact about the origin of humanity; God created us in his own image. Exactly how he did that remains a matter of faith, open to investigate by scientific inquiry. But the creationist position is as intellectually respectable as any of the alternatives. Every Christian can draw strength and confidence- and awe for his or her Creator- from knowing that.