The origin of life?
In the beginning, pieces of cosmic debris, or eternal matter, collided with one another, forming the earth's mass. Soon thereafter, the earth was struck by one or more huge objects, and the entire globe melted. Lethal vapors, carbon dioxide, water vapor, nitrogen, carbon monoxide, hydrogen sulfide, and hydrogen cyanide filled the earth's atmosphere. For millions of years, violent volcanic activity shook the earth's crust. Comets and asteroids bombarded its surface.
Now the earth was formless and void. Pinkish-orange gases hovered over the surface of the deep. And then, about 4.2 billion years ago, the earth cooled and solid rocks began to form, and water began to condense and fall as rain. The earth's surface stabilized and oceans began to form.
And a random mixture of water vapor, methane, ammonia, and hydrogen was supercharged by lightning, giving rise to twenty-one amino acids-- the building blocks of protein. Tiny bubbles called proteinoid microspheres, with tiny permeable membranes capable of storing and releasing energy formed and began to synthesize and catalyze through a series of chemical reactions, causing DNA to emerge. DNA molecules are the building blocks of life. These proteinoid microspheres began to acquire the irreducibly complex biochemical machinery characteristic of living cells, and through entirely natural processes, molecular non-life gave birth to cellular life.
The proteinoid microspeheres formed into photosynthetic bacteria. And the bacteria consumed the deadly gases in the atmosphere, and began churning out oxygen-- the breath of life! Then the bacteria evolved, and evolved, and evolved some more. And then the bacteria separated, some forming plant life and some forming animal life. And the bacteria continued to evolve, each according to different kinds, and different species, first as single cell creatures, then two celled, then multi-celled organisms, and now here we are. Aren't we lucky? Adapted from descriptions of origin of universe in Kenneth Miller and Jospeh Levine. Biology. Pearson Education: Boston, pages 553-558.
What I just shared with you comes out of a biology textbook being used at Chatham-Glenwood. What I just shared constitutes the scientific consensus, the dominant view among scientists, regarding the origins of life as we know it. It is a naturalistic explanation.
Scientists offer a naturalistic view of creation.
Remember Hebrews 11:3 (NIV) from last week? It says, "By faith we understand that the universe was formed at God's command, so that what is seen was not made out of what was visible." As Christians, we are ridiculed for believing in an eternal Creator, and we are ostracized for simply acknowledging the intelligent design of our universe! We are told that people of faith are naïve, unintelligent, brainless, and dim-witted. We are told that scientists are so wise and factual.
But what if we changed Hebrews 11:3 around to accommodate the scientific worldview of our times? It might read something like this. "By faith, scientists understand that the universe, and all of life on earth, was formed by chance processes, so that what is seen entirely evolved from that which is visible."
Are scientists somehow exempt from faith? From mere belief? Are they not mere mortals like each of us? In that same high school textbook, I found a couple of quotes that will help us understand what science is and what it is not.
What is science and what is not?
Quote number one (Miller and Levine, page 5): "One goal of science is to provide natural explanations for events in the natural world. Science also aims to use those explanations to understand patterns in nature and to make useful predictions about natural events."
Notice the repetition of the word natural and nature. By definition, science limits itself to what is visible and tangible, testable, verifiable, and reproducible. Science limits its own understanding. By definition, it rules out consideration of the invisible, the supernatural, and the divine.
Quote number two (Miller and Levine, page 5): "Science is an organized way of gathering and analyzing evidence about the natural world. It is a way of observing, a way of thinking, and a way of knowing about the world."
In Romans 1:20 (NIV) Paul describes, "For since the creation of the world God's invisible qualities-- his eternal power and divine nature-- have been clearly seen, being understood from what has been made, so that men are without excuse." Romans 1:19 describes how God has made everything plain to us! Despite the propaganda of scientists, the overwhelming majority of people believe in a creator-- over ninty percent! Even those who do believe in evolution, as improbable as evolution is, there is widespread acceptance that God was at the controls, not chance!
But here is something else Paul says in Romans 1:18 (NIV), "....men who suppress the truth by their wickedness." This was the subject of Ben Stein's documentary called, "Expelled." He brilliantly demonstrated how the scientific community actively suppresses any knowledge of God, and any consideration of intelligent design or an intelligent designer.
Science in itself isn't irreligious, or antireligious, per se. Yet science can become a vehicle for suppressing knowledge about God. This is exactly what Paul suggests in Romans 1. Science can become an excuse to deny what God makes plain.
But back to our main point. What is science? You will find this interesting. Quote number three (Miller and Levine, page 6): "Scientific methodology involves observing and asking questions, making inferences and forming hypotheses, conducting controlled experiments, collecting and analyzing data, and drawing conclusions."
Scientists can speak about things with authority, even arrogance. But the truth is that scientists are men just like you and me. Every scientist puts his/her faith in trusted authorities. And like you and me, they aren't above making inferences or forming hypotheses. They are not exempt from conjecture.
Quote number four (Miller and Levine, page 6): "An inference is a logical interpretation based on what scientists already know. Inference combined with creative imagination can lead to a hypothesis." Interpretation? Inferences combined with creative imagination? Well that does sound scientific!
Here is one final quote that rings true (Miller and Levine, page 13): "...no theory is considered absolute truth. Science is always changing; as new evidence is uncovered, a theory may be revised or replaced by a more useful explanation."
All quotes from Kenneth Miller and Jospeh Levine. Biology. Pearson Education: Boston.
What should science be?
Science is to be an exercise of humility. A good scientist should possess an insatiable curiosity for how things work. But he/she must also maintain an attitude of skepticism and open-mindedness. Maybe there is more than a naturalistic explanation for all things on heaven and earth. Maybe Genesis 1:1 (NIV) really is plausible. "In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth."
Much of the science about the beginning of the world is inference.
It should be underscored that much of what we read in textbooks about the age of earth or about the evolution of all life from a primordial soup is nothing more than inference. For example, consider the methods for aging or dating the earth. I don't believe the earth itself is 15 billion years old, but I don't disbelieve it either. But the basis for establishing the age of the earth is radiometric dating. Go online and google, "unreliability of radiometric dating." Consider the tests they took on the lava dome of Mount St. Helen. The specimens were taken from rock that eleven years old, but radiometric dating put the rocks at 1.5 to 3 millions years old! The age of the earth is a matter of conjecture, not fact.
Likewise, evolution is presented as fact, when in reality, it is nothing more than a theory. It is the dominant theory taught in secular universities and public schools, but it is only a theory! Let's talk about evolution for a minute.
Micro-evolution versus macro-evolution.
Even your most hardcore creationist believes in evolution, to an extent. It just depends what kind of evolution you are talking about. For example, everyone believes in micro-evolution. When Noah put animals on the ark, he wouldn't have had room for golden retrievers, schnauzers, toy poodles, and thousands of other dog breeds. Creationists believe that Noah brought one breed of dog onto the ark, from which other breeds evolved. So over thousands of years, various breeds could have easily developed.
So in your biology textbooks, squirrels on the west side of the canyon are gray, while squirrels on the east are brown. Some birds, which get their food from deeper waters, have longer legs, while those who are more land-based have shorter legs. Birds that rely upon their wings have larger spans, while those who don't have shorter wings. This is what is known as micro-evolution or variation of the species. Created things adapt to their environmenst. Those who adapt the best, survive and multiply. Viruses can mutate and overcome antibiotics.
What is taught in our schools is something called macro-evolution. The idea behind macro-evolution is that all life, every species, originated from a common ancestor. Some scientists believe in gradualism, that things gradually evolved. Some believe that things rapidly evolved, as evidenced by the Cambrian explosion. Some take other positions.
To support this claim, scientists use their creativity and create illustrations of plant cells that look structurally similar to animal cells. They draw pictures of how monkeys evolved into human beings, or how lizards became whales. What they don't mention is the lack of fossil evidence supporting macro-evolution. Where are the billions of transitional fossils?
Here is another quote from Miller and Levine, page 473. "...any questions that remain are about how evolution works--not whether evolution occurs." This statement is true only if it is referring to micro-evolution. But the authors would have us believe macro-evolution is irrefutable fact.
The testimony of scripture about the origin of life.
Here is the testimony of scripture about the origin of life, truths that remain unchallenged by evolutionary theory even to this day.
Genesis 1:1 (NIV) says, "In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth."
Genesis 1:24 (NIV) tells us, "And God said, 'Let the land produce living creatures according to their kinds: livestock, creatures the move along the ground, and wild animals, each according to its kind.' And it was so."
Genesis 1:26 (NIV) says, "Then God said, 'Let us make man in our image, in our likeness, and let them rule over the fish of the sea and the birds of the air, over the livestock, over all the earth, and over all the creatures that move along the ground.' "
1 Corinthians 15:39 (NIV) tells us, "All flesh is not the same: Men have one kind of flesh, animals have another, birds another and fish another."
Here is our conviction as Christians.
Any questions that remain are about how God created all things, not whether God created all things. Next Sunday we will pick up this matter and talk about God's goodness as it relates to creation. But this morning we conclude with Hebrews 11:3 (NIV) which says, "By faith we understand that the universe was formed at God's command, so that what is seen was not made out of what was visible."
We worship and serve a powerful God, who created the heavens and earth! In Isaiah 40:25-26 (NIV) God asks, " 'To whom will you compare me? Or who is my equal?' says the Holy One. 'Lift your eyes and look to the heavens: Who created all these? He who brings out the starry host one by one, and calls them each by name. Because of his great power and mighty strength, not one of them is missing.' "