Wednesday, June 30, 2010

No. 1004

The Whenever I Get A Chance Newsletter

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How Much Dirt Can Be Made In A Day?

What may come as a surprise to some people is that not all rock layers were laid down during Noah’s Flood.  In fact, evidence indicates that more geologic layers may have been formed during Day Three of Creation Week than during the Flood.

The opening verses of Genesis 1 tell us that at the beginning, on the first day, God created the earth with water on its surface.  We are not told what was under the surface water.  Perhaps God had created the earth’s internal structure of core, mantle, and crust, which were located under the water.  What we do know is that on the second day God placed some of the waters of the earth above “the firmament.”  Then on the third day God commanded the earth’s surface waters to be gathered into seas and the dry land to appear. 

This statement in Genesis 1:9 is simple yet geologically profound:

And God said, Let the waters under the heaven be gathered together to one place, and let dry land appear: and it was so.  KJVER

Although the verse indicates that the waters moved, it does not indicate exactly how the land came to be above sea level.  Keep in mind that the firmament is not ground.  The firmament is the air.  How do we know this?  From Scripture.  In Genesis 1:14 (KJVER), we are told:

And God said, Let there be lights in the firmament of heaven to divide the day from the night;

And then on the fifth day God tells us, in Genesis 1:20b (KJVER):

... and fowl that may fly above the earth in the open firmament of heaven. 

Note: Birds do not fly through the ground... more than one time.

One possibility is that God used catastrophic earth movements to almost instantaneously raise and lower blocks of the earth’s Day One crust to form dry land and sea basins.  If that were so, as the crustal blocks were raised, the surface waters that had been covering them would have drained rapidly off the land.  Rapidly moving water catastrophically erodes, so massive erosion must have occurred.  Thus laden with sediments, these waters would have drained into the ocean basins, where the sediments would have been deposited rapidly.  Because neither plant nor animal life had yet been created, the resultant sedimentary rocks would be devoid of animal or plant fossils.

When most people visit Grand Canyon in northern Arizona, their eyes are riveted on the spectacular walls, which display about 4,000 feet of flat-lying sedimentary rock layers made up of limestone, sandstone, and shale.  Filled with the buried remains of plants and animals, these layers must have been deposited during the Flood, which God sent to destroy every living substance on the face of the earth, as shown to us in Genesis 7:23:

And every living substance was destroyed which was upon the face of the ground, both man, and cattle, and creeping things, and the fowl of the heaven; and they were destroyed from the earth: and Noah only remained alive, and they that were with him in the ark.  KJVER

Underneath these layers, near the bottom of the canyon, are many other layers that do not contain plant or animal fossils.  Violent processes, including volcanoes and rapidly moving mud and sand, must have created these layers. Many tilted sedimentary and volcanic rock layers (about 13,000 feet thick) sit on top of other folded and metamorphosed layers of both sedimentary and volcanic rocks that are estimated to have been originally about 40,000 feet thick.  After these metamorphic rocks formed, hot granites from deeper in the earth must have intruded into them.

Why Did God Create Viruses?

There are some fundamental differences in how creationists and evolutionists view life.  Biblical creationists believe that God created life according to their kinds with the ability to reproduce and fill the earth.  This view includes the concepts that God had purpose in what He created, and that His creation was very good... originally.

In contrast, evolutionists view life as all descending from a single common ancestor by natural chance processes. Evolutionary arguments tend to imply that life is not really very complex or well designed.  For example, 100 years ago a cell was promoted as being nothing more than a blob of protoplasm, implying that it would not be difficult for it to arise by chance.  This proved to be wrong; cells are incredibly complex structures.  At one time evolutionists argued that organs or structures with no known function actually had no function; at the time this included hundreds of organs and structures in the human body.  Instead these were believed to be vestiges of evolution.  This argument has become rather vestigial itself, as these organs have been found to have function.

Yet, this argument reappeared in genetics.  Most of the DNA in our bodies does not code for proteins, so it has been labeled “junk DNA” by evolutionists who have assumed it has no function.  As research continues it is becoming clear that this DNA has numerous essential functions.  The evolutionary worldview has a dismal track record for anticipating the astounding complexity in life uncovered by empirical scientific research.

If God created everything good and with a purpose, why are there disease-causing bacteria and viruses in the world? It is true that we first learned about bacteria and viruses because of the problems they cause.  Bacteria have been studied in considerable detail and are now recognized to be mainly helpful and absolutely essential for life on earth; bacteria that cause disease, which occurred as a result of the Fall of Adam and Eve in the Garden, are the exceptions, not the rule.  But what about viruses: what purpose could they possibly have?

Dr. Jean K. Lightner answers this question very eloquently for us:

Viruses are a bit of an enigma.  They contain DNA or RNA which are found in all living things.  This is packaged in a protein coat.  Despite this, viruses are not usually considered living because they are not made up of cells and cannot reproduce by themselves.  Instead, the virus will inject the DNA or RNA into a living cell, and the cell will make copies of the virus and assemble them so they can spread.

Viruses vary considerably in their ability to cause disease.  Many known viruses are not associated with disease at all.  Others cause mild symptoms that may often go undetected. Some, like the HIV virus that causes AIDS in people, appear to have come from another species where they do not cause disease.  Given our current knowledge of viruses, it is quite reasonable to believe that disease-causing viruses are descended from viruses that were once not harmful.  It  has been suggested that they have played an important role in maintaining life on earth—somewhat similar to the way bacteria do.  In fact, they may play a role in solving an intriguing puzzle that faces creationists.

Evolutionist Quote of the Month

"There are only two possibilities as to how life arose; one is spontaneous generation arising to evolution, the other is a supernatural creative act of God, there is no third possibility.  Spontaneous generation that life arose from non-living matter was scientifically disproved 120 years ago by Louis Pasteur and others.  That leaves us with only one possible conclusion, that life arose as a creative act of God.  I will not accept that philosophically because I do not want to believe in God, therefore I choose to believe in that which I know is scientifically impossible, spontaneous generation arising to evolution."

Dr. George Wald, evolutionist, Professor Emeritus of Biology at the University at Harvard, Nobel Prize winner in Biology.

Until the next time!  Enjoy every second that
God has given you.  For indeed it is a blessing.

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