Monday, January 27, 2014

CHRISTIAN FAITH IN A SECULAR CLASSROOM


 USE YOUR OWN DIRT

 By Ada Brownell

 

An excerpt from Ada Brownell's (non-denominational) motivational Bible study for youth

Imagine the Future You


 A psychology professor openly ridiculed Christians in one of my university classes. As the instructor made sarcastic remarks about Christians in the news and preached his atheistic ideas, I wondered why no one challenged him. One day I raised my hand.

 “You said this textbook will be outdated in ten years,” I began. “So what you're teaching might not be true in ten years?”

The questions flowed.

“Can you prove evolution? Isn’t it true you accept it by faith? Are you aware many scientists threw out missing links because in the more than a century since Darwin they can’t find them? Did you know scientists are even putting forth the idea that man might have fallen from outer space?

“How did creation turn out so perfectly without a Designer? Why aren’t monkeys turning into humans now?”

He admitted that, yes, the textbooks and the theories and knowledge in them would soon be outdated; that he didn’t have all the answers; and, “Yes, we do accept some things by faith. But when something is universally accepted, we treat it as fact.”

I should have asked, “Then because the God of creation and the Resurrection of Jesus Christ are universally accepted, that should be treated as fact?”

Although I accept that many Christians believe the theory with God starting the process, a few weeks later, I asked a science professor if the laws of thermodynamics violate evolution. The teacher had opened the class on the environment stating everything would be based on evolution.

No more than thirty-five pages into the text, Living in the Environment, by G. Tyler Miller Jr., the class was studying the law of energy degradation, also known as the second law of thermodynamics. The law states that matter, if left to itself and undergoing physical or chemical changes, will always change in the direction of decreased order and decreased energy content. The entire universe obeys this law, and this includes every chemical reaction.

In words plain and simple, the law means anything left to itself will slowly fall apart. Every old barn with the roof sagging and the walls falling in demonstrates this law. Despite galaxies thought to be expanding (are they expanding, or are we increasing our knowledge?), scientists will tell you the entire universe is slowing down, growing old, and, as the saying goes, is running out of steam.

The second energy law also tells us energy tends to flow or change spontaneously from a compact and ordered form to a dispersed and random, or disordered, form.

“No one has ever found a violation of this law,” Miller states.[1]

When the teacher read that, I put up my hand. “Isn’t evolution a violation of this law?”

In order for evolution to occur, many complex chemical changes must take place, and they must all be in the direction of increased order and energy to move from the simple to the com­plex.

The teacher paused a moment, cleared his throat, and said, “Well, evolution is the only violation.”

The theory of evolution also violates the first law of thermodynamics, which simply says energy (or matter) neither can be created nor destroyed.

A story goes that God and Satan were having a discussion.

“I can do anything you can,” Satan said, stretching his puny body so he looked taller.

God smiled. “OK. Make a man.”

Satan bent over and began scraping up dirt.

God grabbed his shoulder. “Use your own dirt.”

NOTE: Imagine the Future You does acknowledge many Christians believe in evolution with God starting the process. Some believe in age-long days of creation. The chapter goes into much detail and research into things that relate to evolution, including the Piltdown Man, and evidence about missing links, new evolutionary theories such as punctuated equilibrium, the latest scientific discoveries from respected sources, and how belief in a loving Creator changes your future.

The link for the book: http://www.amazon.com/-/e/B001KJ2C06



[1] G. Tyler Miller Jr., Living in the Environment (Belmont, CA: Wadsworth Publishing Co.), 34–43.

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