In a
blog post titled Is It Even Possible for God to Use Evolution? dated 14th April, fundamentalist theme park manager,
Ken Ham states the (false) general theological premise that guides much of his
young earthist thinking:
KEN: Is it even possible for God to use evolution to create? Think about it for a moment—could God use millions of years as part of his creation of life? “Of course he can. He’s God—he can do whatever he wants!” is the response I’ve received from many Christians and Christian leaders who believe God did use evolution and millions of years. But the answer to that question is actually no—he couldn’t have!
You see, God didn’t create the world the way we see it today. After he finished creating, he declared everything “very good” (Genesis 1:31). [With Evolution] One would then have to accept that God is calling death, diseases like cancer, and violence “very good.” That is an attack on the character of God.
MY COMMENT: According to Cambridge biologist and evangelical Christian Denis Alexander the Biblical sense of “Very good” is not "perfection" but “Fit for purpose". Even in our own language something can be “very good” but far from perfect. We can talk of human beings as "very good" but they are all tainted by Sin, the progressive moral disease spelt with an "I" in the middle. Also, that humanity was commanded to subdue the Earth (Gen 1:28) is evidence that it was no finished work of perfection. The story of the serpent also tells us that even before the The Fall humans were not in a perfect world, for at least one created being ( Colossians 1:16) had already fallen. But the strongest evidence for an imperfect creation is found in the very fact that two of its main created protagonists, Satan and Mankind, had the potentiality to fall to temptation; unlike Jesus whose moral perfection meant that he did not fall when tempted. A propensity to fall will, presumably, not be the case in the metamorphosed creation mentioned in the New Testament.
KEN: So, could God use evolution and millions of years to create? No! Since it’s impossible for God to deny himself and go against his character, it’s impossible for God to use a bloody, death-stained process like evolution to create life.
God could not use (or could not have used) evolution and millions of years for this same basic reason. It would be impossible for him to do so because it would go against his character.
MY COMMENT: Even if for the sake of argument one accepts Ken’s 6000 year time scale his reasoning still collapses. Unless we are deists, we believe that God's work didn’t stop at the end of the creation days: Novel and original reified history is constantly emerging everywhere and everywhen from the platonic world of possibility: Death, disease, violence and evil are being reified hour by hour into the secular realm. Since God is unconditional sovereign, this can only be the case if God’s Permissive Will allows it. Two very significant reifications were the fall of Satan and humanity. Like many other evils these "free choice" events weren't blocked from reification, but for inscrutable divine purposes they secured God's permission to enter the created world. They are evidence that Satan and humanity were subject to vanity from the start: God, of course, being omniscient, knew the potential consequences of this vanity, but nevertheless suffered to bring forth this story of imperfection from the platonic realm into the reified created realm.
But according to Ken's "logic" it is impossible for God to reify this ongoing catalogue of evil because his nature denies that he can make use of such. But, apparently, He is making use of it (Romans 8:28ff). We are of course wading into deep water here: This is the famous and perplexing question of suffering and evil, a problem which has consumed the thought and ink of many a theologian and philosopher: Viz: How can a just, loving and omnipotent God allow suffering and evil in his world and moreover sustain its existence on a day-by-day basis? What use can he make of the bad choices of humans and Satan? Why doesn't He block these choices? Why also, is the natural world permitted to be a source of suffering? I'm certainly not going to address these perennial questions here: I just want to point out that Ken's argument touches on deep mysteries few of us understand. The suffering and death entailed by evolution is not a sufficient theological reason (as opposed to any scientific reasons that may be tendered) to rule it out. It appears that Ken hasn't twigged that his problem with evolution is just another manifestation of the age-old problem of suffering and evil. He's carelessly floated an argument without seeing its implications: If we follow through with Ken's logic then we would conclude that our flawed world should never have been reified at all.
But in the face of suffering the Bible does gives us hope: As Romans 8:18-22 says:
I consider that our present sufferings are not worth comparing with the glory that will be revealed in us. For the creation waits in eager expectation for the children of God to be revealed. For the creation was subjected to vanity, not by its own choice, but by the will of the one who subjected it, in hope that the creation itself will be liberated from its bondage to decay and brought into the freedom and glory of the children of God. We know that the whole creation has been groaning as in the pains of childbirth right up to the present time.
Our world with all its pains and its flawed protagonists, evolution or no evolution, is the world that God has brought out of the platonic realm by his permissive will, but the above verses tell us there is a happy ending. However, a
KEN: Indeed, as I’ve said before, Christians who believe in evolution and millions of years are condoning a process that is a direct attack on God’s character.
MY COMMENT: That's right Ken now use your toy-town logic to slander Christain evolutionists and thrust into their mouths a confession of blaspheming God's character! You would have done The Inquisition proud!
KEN: A Salvation Issue? Let me pause to state something very clearly: I am not saying people who believe in evolution and millions of years can’t be Christians. Salvation is not conditioned upon what one believes about the age of the earth or evolutionary processes but is conditioned upon faith in Christ. I have never said the age of the earth and what you believe about creation are salvation issues. However, evolution and millions of years are issues that undermine biblical authority and attack the character of God. And I consider those very serious issues indeed! Also, such compromise has greatly weakened much of the church, causing many to doubt God’s Word, and many end up rejecting the Bible as God’s Word.
MY COMMENT: I once asked a Jehovah's Witness whether joining one of the Watchtower's Kingdom Halls was a necessary condition for the JW's concept of salvation: He said "No" and that God may well have servants beyond the walls of the Kingdom Halls. But I knew and he knew that certainly would not include someone like myself who claimed Christ's Saving work but rejected the Watchtower doctrines. His admission that there may be saved individuals outside of the organization was window dressing helping to make his religion look a little less like a cult. We see something similar in the quote above: At first sight it makes AiG look less cultish than it actually is and acts as soft soap. In practice Ken in no-way respects the faith of those Christians who disagree with him: Just look at the accusations he flings out at old earth Christians (See here and here): Ken tells such Christians that they are attacking Christ and the Gospel. Accusations of being at odds with the divine don't come much stronger. Clearly the above quote is lip service which helps deflect accusations of cultishness.
Ken's right-wing extremism invites an extreme counter-response: Viz: His cartoonish organization, AiG, has weakened the church and caused many to stumble and reject Christianity. For you can be sure that if I find Ken's views destructive of the Gospel many others of a more secular frame of mind certainly do! Ken should repent of his Trump voting, his implicit QAnon support and his cultish attitudes.
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