Sermon Cloud

            In 1999, all Kansans who believe in the inspiration of our Holy Scriptures won a major battle in the cultural war for the soul of our country.  Questions regarding the Darwinian Theory of evolution was removed from statewide standardized tests.  And as teachers would admit, if it’s not assessed it’s not taught.  So this decision basically removed all teaching on the theory of evolution from Kansas classrooms.  This decision was later reversed, putting questions about evolution back on the statewide tests.  Of course, during the congressional primaries during the summer of 2000 it was turned into a major political issue.  So many Christians believed, we’ve gotta keep fighting this battle for the souls of our kids.

            In 2005, another shot was fired in this battle.  A KU Religious Studies professor was all set to teach a class entitled, “Special Topics in Religion: Intelligent Design, Creationism and other Religious Mythologies.”  He was hammered with emails saying he was mocking Christians so he decided to cancel the class.  But even with the class cancelled, a group of guys who clearly spent a lot of time studying the example of Jesus, chased him down on a rural road, drug him out of the car and beat him.  While punching him over and over they declared, “this is for that class.”

            It’s not just Kansas.  In 2005 a Dover, Pennsylvania HS teacher, Ken Miller was using a biology text book he had written to teach his students evolutionary theory.  There was a big trial over his classes and his widely distributed book.  The day after the trial, he received 5 e-mails declaring he was going to burn in hell.  Ken Miller claims to be a committed Christian. 

            How many HS teachers answer the phone one evening just to hear to the pleasant voice of a parent yelling about the godless atheists who are trying to secularize our country and destroy our Christian heritage?

            Central to our Christian beliefs is that God is creator.  And that idea is revealed to us in the first few words of our Bible, “In the beginning, God created.”  But does the scientific theory of evolution undermine the Bibles’ description of God as creator?  Does a HS science teacher that claims to be a follower of Christ have any business teaching evolution? 

            There was just an unspoken but known fact growing up; it’s that Charles Darwin is now living in his own special little place in hell.  And being the Godless Athiest that he was, he earned that spot. 

            But it’s interesting to note that in chapter 15 of Darwin’s Origen of Species he goes into detail explaining why his evolutionary theory is dependent upon a creative Diety beginning the whole process.  Maybe we can move Darwin up from the pit of hell to the top floor of hell.

            It’s heartbreaking to see the way people fight over this issue.  Missing from most of these creation-evolution debates is the attitude of “let’s work to strengthen each other’s faith in Jesus Christ.  Or if you don’t yet have that faith, I want you to know how good it is to follow Christ.” Instead, there’s this attitude of “I’m going to do whatever necessary to tear you down and prove why I’m right and you’re wrong.”   A person must not only put their faith in Christ, but they’re only ‘in’ when they ascribe to the ‘right’ view of creation. 

            No one is sure who originally said it, but a theologian from the middle ages first introduced an idea that needs to guide this discussion, “In essentials unity, in non-essentials liberty, in all things charity” – unknown. 

            This debate starts with the question how are we to interpret the creation story from Genesis 1?  Here are 4 options. 

            Young Earth Biblical Literalists  Creation happened in 6 24 hour periods in the order we read in Genesis.  The Hebrew word ‘day’ that we read in Genesis 1 has no other option but to be defined as a 24 hour period.  Dinosaurs and humans lived together, but Dinosaurs died during the Noah’s flood that covered the whole world.  And the fossils that scientists believe point to the earth being millions or billions of years old were created in a short time by the pressure of all that water pushing down on them.   The world is actually only about 10,000 years old, a number based upon the genealogies given in Genesis.

            But there is a serious problem in basing the age of the earth on the list of ancestors in Genesis.  We translate the Hebrew word apa as son of.  Isaac apa (son of) Abraham.  Problem is, that word apa could mean son or it could mean great, great… grandson. 

            And of the Christian scientists I read in studying for today, there was a common consensus that research presented that proves carbon dating or fossil records are wrong or misinterpreted, to prove the world is only about 10,000 years old or so is based upon very shoddy scientific methods.  Doing whatever it takes to find a predetermined outcome.  But of course, young earth scientists would fire back the same indictment.

            Old Earth Biblical Literalists  We need to follow the order of things being created in Genesis 1, but we can give more wiggle room with the word ‘day.’  They cite 2 Peter 3:8 which tells us for God a day is like a thousand years and a thousand years are like a day.  It’s a poetic way of saying God isn’t bound by time as we are.  Day 1, Day 2… in Genesis 1 could each represent millions or billions of years.  Dinosaurs could’ve lived and died millions of years before humanity was created.

            This approach is based on an accurate translation of the Hebrew word for “day.” This word isn’t limited to solar period of 24 hours, but the word is ambiguous enough to leave it open to an extended period of time. 

            So during the 3^rd time period (day) God commands the earth to bring forth vegetation.  And the earth begins to produce vegetation.

            On the 6^th day, God commands the dust of the earth to form “adam”, the Hebrew word for humanity.  Our first parents arise from the earth.  3,000 years later, scientists ‘discover’ human bodies share the same compounds as the dirt we’re standing on. 

            Naturalistic and Mythological approach  The Genesis creation story was made up for a bunch of ignorant, prehistoric people who needed a belief in God to explain the planet we live on.  I fully ascribe to this theory – just kidding.  Us modern people are way too educated to need some belief in God.  This is chucking God out the window.  We don’t need faith, we don’t need the Bible – because science answers all of our questions.  As Christians whose faith is informed by these stories (bible) we can’t just chuck it.   

            Biblical – Scientific Synthesis  This view works to affirm what Genesis 1-3 does teach and what it doesn’t teach.  This view is held by the majority of Christians and most Christian scientists.  Which there really is such a thing, by the way. 

            Who would’ve first heard this story?  The Israelites.  The Israelites were surrounded by neighboring countries that worshipped stars, sun, moon – you name it, they worshipped it and they had some sort of story as to how that thing created the world.  This story was meant to form their identity as people who worshipped the actual creator.  The moon that their neighbors worshipped as god, isn’t a god – it’s one more thing the real God created.  God created all of it.  The God of the Israelites was not just another regional diety, or mascot.  He is the being who spoke it all into existence. 

            Genesis 1 and 2 are beautiful poetry describing the dawn of time.  A beautiful song of creation.  Epic descriptions of the bedrock of our faith – in the beginning, God created.  He is the origin of all life.  At the time of creation, everything was good.  And you can see his reflection throughout all of creation.  God created, so he could give of himself to his creation.  Genesis contains stories of faith but they’re not a science textbook.  

            Can you imagine if Genesis read like a science book?  Genesis 1 – “In the beginning were sub-atomic particles.  And then these DNA strands came together to give you brown hair.”  “Wait, I ran out of room, I’ve gotta get a new rock to write on.”  We must understand the original audience. 

            Theology and science are different disciplines, asking different questions.  One of my favorite authors says we have to stop putting “vs.” between science and faith.  

            These stories, inspired by the Holy Spirit, taught prehistoric back then, teach modern people now and whoever will follow us that God created.  And when we anchor our faith in the theological understanding of Who created and Why he created we can then branch out and deal with the scientific question of ‘how.’  The scientific method can reveal a lot about “how”, but it can’t answer the ultimate question about “who.” 

            And many scientists with a rock-solid belief in God as creator believe that Darwinian evolution is the best description of how God brought about life.  But it’s still only a theory, it could change.  Can you ascribe to this theory and still be a Christian – yes, millions do. 

            But what if we moved beyond arguments over “how.”  What would happen if we stopped arguing over this?  We stopped saying “biblical Christians believe in a 10,000 year old earth.” Or “Educated Christians ascribe to Darwin’s theory.”  The loving and biblical thing for us to do as Christians is to stop making this an ‘in/out’ issue.   

            Those who are at least open to the idea of Darwinian evolution probably aren’t going to condemn a 24 hour literalist to hell, but are you smug in tolerating their ignorant beliefs?  That’s not Christlike.

            And if you’ve always just assumed that evolution contradicted the Genesis story, what would happen to your faith, your relationship with God if you explored other understandings of how God created? 

            But there are several extremes found in evolutionary theory that Christians must avoid.  The first is Social Darwinism.   In the natural world, evolution is about survival of the fittest.  Take that into society and you have the Arian race and genocide of Nazi Germany.  The poor, the weak, the different, the handicapped. let them slip through the cracks.  Let evolution weed them out or we speed up the process. 

            There’s the extreme of Materialism.  Evolution, not God, is the reason we’re here.  All you can see is all there is, so might as well live as you please, because it doesn’t really matter.  You make your own meaning, determine your own reality.  Karl Marx took it to this extreme and wanted Darwin to write the intro to Communist Manifesto, but Darwin refused.

            And evolutionary theory can lead to the extreme of Meaninglessness.  If I’m just here from the dumb luck of evolution, what’s the point of my life? 

            Life gets screwed up when you remove faith in God from your life.  So we anchor ourselves in scripture.  Not the ‘how’, but the ‘who’ and ‘why’ of the Bible.  The Bible easily counters all those extremes.  Jesus taught we’re most like him when we serve the poor and weak, when build bridges to the different.  The Bible gives us a glimpse of the spiritual reality.  And someday we will stand before the creator and give an account of our lives.  And you can’t make it out of the 2^nd chapter of the Bible before you discover why we’re here.  It’s not chance, however he chose to do it, when God formed us into existence, it was for a purpose.  To know him. 

            There’s a guy named Matt Whitlock, mid to late 20’s, who works in the ministry Youth With a Mission.  Matt leads teens and college students in mission trips all over the world.  And he leads a lot of training events in Christian colleges.

            At one teaching assignment, Matt arrived a day early and spent the day observing the class.  The students were being trained on how to prove God’s existence.  They did research and gave full-proof presentations refuting evolution and proving intelligent design. 

             The next day Matt got up to teach and he asked the class a question.  “By a show of hands, who knows someone who is not a Christian because of evolution?”  He asked a couple times, no one raised their hand. 

            Then he asked, “how many of you know someone who fully believes in evolution but is open to talking about and believing in God?”  Almost every student in the class raised their hand.  And they told story after story of friends that easily assumed evolution yet wanted to know about God the creator. 

            Some of you have been sitting through this entire sermon thinking “what’s the point.  The evolution debate just doesn’t matter anymore.  I’m not gonna fight someone else’s battles.”  You love dialoguing with people about God but you’re not gonna listen to some red-faced bible-thumpin’ warrior, screaming about the evils of evolution while his veins are about to pop out of his neck.  If you’re at that point, congratulations, you’ve evolved – just kidding. 

            Where ever you are in thinking through this idea, I challenge you to do a couple things.  Anchor your faith in God; not theories, not arguments over interpretation, but God.  And learn what questions people have.  If evolution is a non-issue, then don’t make it an issue.  If it’s a barrier to someone, explain how God is the ultimate “Who” and he gave us brains to discover the “how.” 

            What if we became so captivated by the beauty of “in the beginning, God created” and we were so awed by the power and love of our God that arguments over “how” repulsed us?  We didn’t want to do anything that would mar the beauty of God’s others-centered act of creation. 

             But if you read through Genesis, you will find a serious threat to our faith in God.  Chapter 3, it’s sin.  The man and the woman sinned in the garden and man and woman have been sinning ever since.  We’ve been calling our own shots in life, rather than trusting God.  And that screws everything up.  God created a beautiful world full of wonderful opportunities and then we went and screwed the whole thing up.  God creates, humanity destroys.  But God doesn’t quit.  God is continuing to perform miracles that make creation seem easy.  God recreates!  When we turn from our sin and follow Jesus Christ, God takes the pain and wounds in our lives and recreates something beautiful. 

            In 2 Corinthians chapter 5, Paul tells us that when we give our lives to Christ, we’re transformed into a new creation.  Out with the old, in with the new.  Recreation.  And his new creation, we’re then commissioned to turn our fallen, screwed up world into a beautiful place again.  God recreates us so we can recreate the world! 

            As scientists probe deeper than electrons and neutrons, into sub-atomic particles and quauntum physics.  All of which I am well versed in.  But what I can understand scientists saying is this – creation was not a one-time event in the past.  Quantum physics is revealing that creation is on-going.  Nature isn’t so much moving forward from some point in the past as much as it continues to swirl and create new life. 

            God isn’t done with us.  Creation is ongoing.  He’s calling us forward.  I know what’s in your past, let me make something new.  Through your new life, through my son Jesus – we’re all going to make this whole world new.

            This morning we acknowledge and celebrate God’s act of recreation through Christ by sharing communion together. 

Communion

Prayer

Blessing

fides quaerens intellectum - St. Anselm of Canterbury

“Faith seeking understanding” 

May your faith seek understanding.  May you have a faith that is mature enough to pause and get the facts right before jumping to conclusions.  An unanxious faith that exhibits confidence in the face of ambiguity and difficulty.  A faith that trusts the truth, knowing that any truth – whether scientific or religious – must come ultimately from God.  May you have a faith that sees itself as a seed, a seed willing to grow, blossom and expand.  A faith that is willing to deepen and enjoy the searchable as well as the unsearchable riches that God has placed before us.