Anybody that knows anything about me and my faith knows that I do not believe in evolution. Besides the fact there is no evidence for evolution, my primary reason for my belief is that evolution teaches that death, and the subsequent effects of it, like disease and bloodshed, were in the world prior to the existence of mankind. Yet, the Bible clearly teaches that death came through the sin of Adam. Now, this belief may fall on deaf ears when it pertains to unbelievers, but when believers try and fit evolution into the Bible, they don't realize how they inadvertently destroy the Gospel. I recently posted an article about this fact, written by Ken Ham of Answers In Genesis Ministries. It led to the following response from a fellow Christian:
"God's time is not man's time. He is timeless. He is beginning and end and everything in between. In the beginning was the Word and the Word was with God and the Word was God. I believe God (Triune) created Heaven and Earth. I don't believe in full literal interpretation of the Bible. When the creation is described, one might take the word "day" as a literal 24 hour period of time. 2Pet. 3:8 - But do not forget this one thing, dear friends: With the Lord a day is like a thousand years, and a thousand years are like a day. This is not a a mathematic equation, but a statement about God in reference to our temporal view of time. The rest of this passage has to do with His patience, mercy, and His quick judgement...when he is ready to judge. In the end, regardless of what they find on Earth, whether it be dinosaur bones or whatever, God created it!" (sic)
Are you surprised like I am that a supposed Christian would say they "don't believe in [a] full literal interpretation of the Bible"? Now, I know that not everything said in the pages of scripture is to be taken literally. However, this individual is relating his comment to Creation. If you believe in evolution that does not mean that you are not a Christian. If you are born again of the Spirit of God through faith in Jesus Christ, you are saved and have eternal life. But, if you are a Christian who believes in evolution, as Ken Ham states, "it WILL stop you from correctly explaining the gospel message to someone." If death did not come from the sin of Adam, then the redemption purchased by Jesus Christ, the Last Adam, on the cross is for nothing. One also has to realize that you can't take a passage like the one in 2 Peter 3, written in Greek, to determine the meaning of a word in Genesis, written in Hebrew!
Think about it this way. If the days of creation are not ordinary days, when is a day an ordinary day in the Bible? We read where "Jonah was in the belly of the fish three days and three nights (Jonah 1:17)." Is use of day here not literal? Perhaps it means thousands or millions of years. Maybe Jonah is still in the belly of fish. Yes, ridiculous, but it has to be addressed. Furthermore, if we can't take the example of Jonah literally than you have to explain why Jesus did. "For as Jonah was three days and three nights in the belly of a huge fish, so the Son of Man will be three days and three nights in the heart of the earth (Matthew 12:39-40)." I don't know of any Christian, worth their salt, who will deny that Christ was in the grave three days and nights. Yet, Jesus used the example of Jonah as a foreshadow of what He was to endure.
Jesus said, "But at the beginning of creation God 'made them male and female' (Mark 10:6)." I don't think it a coincedence that Jesus, in response to a question about divorce, uses the account from Genesis as His authority. It is plain to see that Jesus believed the creation record as true and divinely inspired. After all, why wouldn't He? He was there. We also see from the words of Jesus that there is no separation between the creation of Adam and Eve and the beginning of creation. He talks about them as events taking place during the same period of time. Yet, more evidence that the days of Creation are literal days. Mankind was created on Day 6 of Creation week, just five days after God started.
There are more examples that reinforce the idea of taking the days of Genesis 1 as literal. You have the 40 day Global Flood of Genesis 6. There is Joshua marching around Jericho for seven days in Joshua 6. The temptation of Jesus took place in the desert over a period of 40 days and nights in Matthew 4. How come people don't question whether or not these events took place over literal 24 hour days? It is because Genesis is the only place you can fit in thousands, millions and even billions of year and be allowed to get away with it. Trying to fit evolution into the Bible is trying to fit man's ideas into God's Word. And you end up destroying the foundation of the Bible when you do it. If we can't take God at His word from the very first word, then when can we? And when we destroy the very Gospel that Jesus gave His life for is it really worth it? I don't think God would call His creation "very good (Genesis 1:31)" if it had already been destroyed by death and bloodshed.
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