Hugh Ross is trying to rewrite the biblical account of the flood. In this episode of Answers News, the hosts, Bryan Osborne, Avery Foley, and Dr. Terry Mortenson, share their perspectives on this topic as Bible-believing Christians.
Answers in Genesis is an apologetics (Christianity-defending) ministry dedicated to enabling Christians to defend their faith and proclaim the good news of Jesus Christ effectively.
‘Progressive creationists’ like Dr Hugh Ross,2 who insist on interpreting Genesis in the light of man’s theories like the ‘big bang’, and the supposed ‘proof’ of an old earth (billions of years), insist that those who teach a young earth and literal Genesis 1–11 are the ones putting a stumbling block in the way of scientists and others accepting the Gospel message. However, time and time again, we have found that the opposite is true. Compromising Genesis with man’s ideas from outside of Scripture opens the door to this ‘slippery slide of unbelief’. It becomes a major stumbling block to people being receptive to God’s Word and the Gospel. Unbelievers are generally unimpressed when they see Christians clearly evading the obvious meaning of the beginning of God’s Word.
Your faith will be strengthened by listening to Dr Terry Mortenson defend a young earth by presenting the evidence for Noah’s worldwide flood and the billions of dead things buried all over the world including fossil fuels formed from all the vegetation that was buried.
It is important to remember that Jesus spoke of Noah’s flood when he was telling His disciples about His second coming to earth. He believed that Noah’s flood was worldwide killing all but the eight people on the Ark.
“But concerning that day and hour no one knows, not even the angels of heaven, nor the Son, but the Father only. For as were the days of Noah, so will be the coming of the Son of Man. For as in those days before the flood they were eating and drinking, marrying and giving in marriage, until the day when Noah entered the ark, and they were unaware until the flood came and swept them all away, so will be the coming of the Son of Man.” Matthew 24:36-39
Moreover, many of the things Jesus said would occur at this time have played out already exactly as He said they would. After Jesus return to earth to rescue Israel at the battle of Armageddon, His Millennial Kingdom is next on God’s agenda for planet earth. Go to http://www.millennialkingdom.net to prepare to rule and reign with Jesus for the next 1,000 years.
In this lecture, Danny Faulkner examines the evidences for both a young and old earth. Dr. Faulkner received his PhD in astronomy from Indiana University. He is distinguished Professor Emeritus at the University of South Carolina-Lancaster, where he taught astronomy and physics for over 26 years.
Conventional scientists believe that many events of earth history contradict the Bible. One of these is the millions of years they claim for the Greenland and Antarctic Ice Sheets. Drilling down into the Greenland Ice Sheet, conventional scientists have counted 110,000 annual layers, like counting the rings in a tree to determine its age. In the Dome C Antarctic ice core, 800,000 years have been claimed. These ages are vastly older than the Biblical age of about 6,000 years
The Bible provides the proper framework in which to understand the evidence for Ice Age conditions. Michael Oard, author of the new book, The Frozen Paradox: Ice Cores versus Deep Time has worked together with other scientists on the Ice Age for almost half a century. A single, intense Ice Age would have been caused by the conditions at the end of Noah’s Flood in Genesis 6–9. Moreover, meteorology, climatology, geology, glaciology, and paleontology applied to the climatic consequences of the Genesis Flood can readily explain the Ice Age.
The biblical Ice Age also solves many other mysteries that secular science has not been able to solve for over 200 years …
This book [covers] an important subset of the Ice Age. That is, how the ice sheets with their ice cores fit into biblical earth history …
He examines the claim of 110,000 annual layers in the Greenland ice cores, as well as the belief that the Dome C Antarctic ice core records 800,000 years. He shows that both these deductions are based on circular reasoning with the assumptions of uniformitarianism and deep time (the millions of years) built in. But he not only challenges the conventional interpretation of ice cores, but also how creation scientists can explain the ice cores and ice sheets within biblical earth history. As a bonus, chapter 8 shows how the model of the Ice Age can explain a major mystery of atmospheric science, and that is the well-watered ‘green Sahara’.
In 2005 the first popularized find of dinosaur soft tissue rocked the scientific world, and many refused to believe it was real, despite the evidence, because “soft tissue can’t last that long.” But subsequent studies, including a brand-new one, have confirmed that, yes, the soft tissue is original to the fossil.
In this new study, researchers used advanced mass spectrometry and protein sequencing to detect bone collagen in a well-preserved hip bone from an Edmontosaurus uncovered in the Hell Creek Formation in South Dakota. This unexpected find is encouraging other researchers to pull fossils out of storage and look at them with these new technologies. And why? The experts hope they will uncover the biochemical pathways that enabled the preservation of organic compounds over millions of years. How these proteins could remain for millions of years is a big mystery. Evolutionists try as they might, have yet to be able to present a plausible explanation for the existence of soft tissue in supposedly ancient fossils.
A better interpretation starts with God’s Word. The fossils aren’t millions of years old—they are only about 4,350 years old. They are a stark reminder of God’s judgment on a sin-filled world but also of his mercy in preserving Noah, his family, and two of every kind of land animal (seven pairs of some) onboard the ark.
The Bible tells us, that Satan has “blinded the minds of unbelievers so that they cannot see the light of the Gospel” (2 Corinthians 4:4), and the extent of this mind control is truly remarkable. The insistence that it is a fact that ‘primitive’ life emerged out of the oceans, by purely natural processes, is breathtaking, given that scientists have absolutely no idea how it could have happened. Evolutionists are hard-pressed to identify more than one or two mutations that appear to have added information to genomes,1 yet they insist that this happened billions and billions of times throughout history, to create all the interconnectedness and complexity of the living world. The dogma of an exceedingly ancient Earth, when current rates of erosion indicate that the continents would have been flattened many times over, were they really millions of years old, is nothing less than self-inflicted blindness.
In an interview on the Andrew Marr Show,3 shortly before becoming the UK Secretary of State for Education, Michael Gove stated, “Well, to my mind, you cannot have a school which teaches creationism. And one thing that we will make absolutely clear is that you cannot have schools which are set up which teach people things which are clearly at variance with what we know to be scientific fact.”
Telling children that all their faculties, and all humanity’s achievements, can be attributed to a process of ‘survival of the fittest’ and ‘natural selection’ is surely fraught with danger, and the idea that such a belief system will not lead to the most selfish and violent of societies is folly of the highest order. Moreover, teaching that the different ‘human races’ arose through evolutionary processes will inevitably cause people to ask, “Have some evolved more than others?”—and denying that such a view of humanity will not give rise to a return to state-sponsored racism, is naive in the extreme. God has given people the necessary intellectual ability to think these things through, yet most scientists, educational institutions, and politicians have swallowed these deceptions, lock, stock, and barrel.
The insistence that belief in evolution is necessary for scientific advancement and medical progress is astonishing, given the difficulty scientists have in pointing to technological breakthroughs that arose from evolutionary thinking. As pointed out by Dr. Marc Kirschner, founding chair of the Department of Systems Biology at Harvard Medical School,
“In fact, over the last 100 years, almost all of biology has proceeded independent of evolution, except evolutionary biology itself. Molecular biology, biochemistry, physiology, have not taken evolution into account at all” (Peter Dizikes, Missing Links, Boston Globe, 23 October 2005. Accessed, November 4th 2010 at www.boston.com).
Godlessness leads to the suppression of the truth (Romans 1:18) and those who love evil deliberately avoid it (John 3:19,20)
The Bible, when read in a plain and straightforward manner, provides a clear framework for our faith, without which we will flounder. Only by refusing to compromise in our interpretation of Genesis can we provide a coherent message. If we believe the Bible from the very first verse, then when people ask us why there is so much suffering in the world, we have an answer: It was not part of the original creation and came into the world only as a result of man’s sin (disobeying God, his Creator). Evolution explains this death and suffering as a good thing for mankind because it supposedly led to our evolution—not a reminder to us that the Creation is cursed (Romans 8). The evolutionary view thus immunises people from realising their fallen state.
“The heart is deceitful above all things, and desperately sick; who can understand it? “I the Lord search the heart and test the mind, to give every man according to his ways, according to the fruit of his deeds.”Jeremiah 17:9-19
“What comes out of a person is what defiles him. For from within, out of the heart of man, come evil thoughts, sexual immorality, theft, murder, adultery, coveting, wickedness, deceit, sensuality, envy, slander, pride, foolishness. All these evil things come from within, and they defile a person.” Mark 7:20-23
When people question us about whether God cares about us in our fallen state, we can tell them that, no sooner had man sinned, God announced His plan of salvation (Genesis 3:15). When they ask us why the sedimentary rocks contain billions of fossils, and billions of tons of coal and other fossil fuels, we can point them to the Noahic Flood (Genesis 6-8). When they ask us where the different ‘human races’ came from, we can point them to the dispersal at Babel (Genesis 11:1-9) and explain that there is only one human race, the one descended from Adam. When they ask us how Christ could die for their sins, we can explain that just as all sinned in Adam, so all may be redeemed in Christ (1 Corinthians 15:21-22). According to Jesus, the greatest commandment is that we should love the Lord our God with all our hearts and with all our souls and with all our minds (Matthew 22:37). How can we do this if we have lingering doubts that we do not get answered? If our commitment is to be total, we must have a reference point, a clear set of beliefs and a certain path to follow. Only the Bible can provide this, through its perfect revelation of God and His ways, and His great and precious promises, which enable us to participate in the divine nature and escape the corruption of the world (2 Peter 1:4). And making the Bible central and preeminent in our thinking will make God central and preeminent.
Article in Journal of Creation Volume 37, Issue 2, 2023 by Carl R. Froede, Jr, and A. Jerry Akridge
Naturalists often confuse their worldview invoking eons of geologic time with empirical science. Many are so indoctrinated with the concept of deep time they overlook conflicting evidence. A recent article, published in the monthly open-access GSA Today, demonstrates this problem. The authors state: “Astronomy and geology require contemplation of time scales and length scales far outside those of human experience. Granitic plutons are intruded and crystallized at depths ranging from a few kilometers to tens of kilometers, over durations of 10–5 [100,000] to 10–7 [10,000,000] years, at temperatures comparable to the melting temperature of gold, from magmas at least 10,000,000 times more viscous than water. Human experience is not relevant to these conditions and can be highly misleading.“
This statement assumes the Genesis Flood never occurred and humans did not exist on Earth when granite formed in the subsurface or possibly later became exposed through the erosion of the overburden. Is this statement a matter of empirical science or the projection of a naturalistic worldview?
Flood-formed granites
The formation of granite and granite landforms has been studied by many young-earth creationists (figure 1). Creationist research indicates that water-enriched granitic melts can form, move upward through the crust, and crystallize in days to weeks. This occurred during Creation Week (most likely Day 3) and also during the Flood—two periods of Earth’s past when geologic intense activity is expected based on the outline in Genesis.
The rapid creation, mobilization, and crystallization of granite would have been enhanced by aqueous conditions associated with the breaking up of the fountains of the deep with the onset of the Flood. Entrained water within the rapidly heating rocks and sediments would have decreased the melting temperature, increasing melt mobility, and enhancing its rapid crystallization.
In some instances, remaining latent heat within subsurface granitic melts/crystallized masses generated during the Flood would have allowed them to continue as heat sources up to the present age timeframe (figure 2). Today, hot springs and other geothermal areas may indicate these features.
The biblical outline of Earth’s history allows for this conceptualization and provides a framework to test our worldview relative to the development of granite.
The naturalistic perspective
While not within a period of time compatible with the Bible, some naturalists acknowledge the rapid formation, ascension, and crystallization of granitic melts is possible over short periods of time (<100,000 years). However, with little water in the slowly forming melt, naturalists envision the entire granitic formation-to-crystallization process would extend over millions of years due to the slow-moving tectonic processes essential in melt generation, movement, and eventual crystallization. During this lengthy time interval, most of the water / hydrothermal fluids within the subsurface rocks and sediments would be driven off, thereby reducing its effectiveness in generating a more mobile granite melt at lower temperatures. The naturalistic worldview imposes limits in both the conceptualization of granitic development and the empirical methods used to test its ideas.
Interestingly, pegmatites that cross-cut granites (figure 3) are postulated by naturalists as having formed and crystallized rapidly—”in days to months, not in thousands to millions of years as previously believed.” This view is not isolated, as many other petrologists invoke days to months for the formation and development of pegmatites. There is no current naturalistic model that emplaces pegmatites in a water-depleted environment. They are always associated with water-enriched feldspars, quartz, and minor trace elements within a slowly crystallizing granitic melt. Missing is the reasoning to minimize water and other hydrothermal fluids from the original granitic melt.
Battling worldviews
Understanding the conceptual geologic history of granites demonstrates the differences in worldviews between naturalists and Bible-supporting young-earth creationists. This is not a battle over empirical science, but rather over the framework of our ideas (i.e. philosophy/theology). These foundational assumptions drive the investigation of geologic features like granites. Oftentimes these foundational assumptions impede scientific progress because they limit possibilities in designing appropriate models for further testing.
Conclusions
Ultimately, through scientific testing, a dominant theory for the origin, movement, emplacement, and crystallization of granite will emerge. The naturalistic worldview rejects everything but the physical universe and its many geologic concepts operating over millions of years. Most young earth creationists accept both the physical and the supernatural—as conveyed through Scripture—in the scientific investigation of geologic features found across Earth.
Satan (the leader of a group of fallen angelic beings) wants to ensure humans leave God out of everything concerning the world he now controls due to Adam and Eve’s original sin. This is of cause absurd, Satan only rules because God has permitted him to do so within the parameters He allows. The Book of Job, given to us in God’s Word, is to show us that this is true. God has also given us the entire story of the world He created for His purposes, the Bible. Fulfilled Biblical prophecies, is all the proof we need, to know God has preserved its integrity.
We, therefore, know that God made us in His image, to be in a relationship with Him. We also know that God gave us free will and that Adam and Eve chose to disobey God giving us a fallen world with Satan and his minions controlling the lives of most of its inhabitants. God’s redemptive plan is amazing and it demonstrates how important we are to God. The second person of the Trinity, God’s son, Jesus, became a human to pay the price for our sin of rebellion, death on a wooden cross. We now have a way back into a renewed relationship with God the Father.
“Jesus said to him, I am the way, and the truth, and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me.” John 14:6
Have you accepted the wonderful offer of eternal life made possible by Jesus’ sacrifice?
Jesus made it possible for our Heavenly Father to send the Holy Spirit to indwell the spirit of all those who do accept His wonderful offer. The Holy Spirit enables believers to live a life devoted to doing the will of God. He is your counsellor, teacher, and comforter. He produces the fruit of the Spirit (Galatians 5:22) in your life and provides the gifts of the Spirit for ministry (1 Corinthians 9).
“Do you not know that your body is a temple of the Holy Spirit within you, whom you have from God? You are not your own, for you were bought with a price. So glorify God in your body.” 1 Corinthians 6:19-20
As I mentioned in my post, “Age of the World is a Critical Issue for Understanding the Bible”, Dr. Humphreys reveals in his book Evidence for a Young World that there is a great deal of evidence for the short timescale given in the Bible: galaxies wind themselves up too fast, comets disintegrate too quickly, not enough mud on the seafloor, not enough sodium in the sea, the earth’s magnetic field is decaying too fast, biological materials (found in dinosaur bones) decay too fast, too much helium in minerals, and toomuch carbon -14 in deep geologic strata.
Last post we looked at the earths magnetic field and the fact it is decaying too fast for the world’s history to be more than thousands of years, certainly not billions.
Dr. Humphreys was part of a very important RATE project (Radioisotopes and the age of the Earth). It involved eleven Ph.D. scientists pictured below. This helped answer a major old-earth argument about radiometric-dating.
Front row: John Bamgardner, Larry Vardiman, Russell Humphreys, Gene Chaffin, Middle row: Andrew Snelling, Steve Austin, Don DeYoung, Back row: John Morris, Ken Cumming, Bill Hoesch, Steven Boyd.
Dr Humphreys work concerned small, hard mineral crystals called zircons, which often contain radioactive elements. As these decay, they produce helium. Helium leaks out quickly due to its very small hard atoms. The hotter the material the faster it leaks out. Dr Humphreys measured amounts of helium in zircons, and compared it to the amount expected from the decay and helium leakage measured in the laboratory.
Zircon crystals from a borehole in New Mexico have a helium leakage of about 6000 years. In contrast the uranium-lead age of the crystals is about 1.5 billion years. The uranium-lead age of course assumes that the decay rate is the same slow rate we measure today.
The Bible reveals that God created a mature world. Hence the Rate Team believes the decay rate initially was speeded up, also the catastrophic plate tectonic upheaval at Noah’s Flood would have had an effect on the decay rate. It cannot be assumed that no daughter elements existed at the beginning and the decay rate was uniform.
There is a great deal of evidence for a young world that supports the Bible’s history of around 6000 years, certainly not billions of years.
LIVING ETERNAL NOW 