To hear evolutionists tell it, all you need is time. Take a few billion years here to get galaxies up and running, a gross of millennia there to line up those pesky organic chemicals the right way for life, and an epoch or two to morph some ape-like creatures into humans.
Evolution sounds incredibly mysterious that way, dressed up in decades and centuries and eons. But all those years really just obscure the deeper issue.
While evolutionists toss years around like a football, they ignore a fundamental flaw in Darwin’s idea. What’s that? Even trillions of years wouldn’t be enough time to produce the simplest cell.
People gamble in hopes to beat the odds and win big. But the slot machine of evolution has no chance to get the jackpot of life arising from non-life.
Secular science textbooks make the origin of life sound simple enough. Throw in some chemicals, zap them with electricity, and you’ve got organic stew. At some point long, long ago, one such chemical concoction hit on the magical formula to succeed. After that, natural selection and genetics took over and marched toward humanity. Given enough time, these books assure us, it was bound to happen.
But that formula for life is like multiplying by zero. No matter how big the other numbers, you’ll still end up with zilch. In other words, throwing in as much time as you like would still get you nowhere. It’s sort of like this:
Darwin’s idea × billions of years × 0 (chance of actually happening) = 0.
When mathematicians crunch the numbers, they come to some pretty staggering conclusions. The chance of evolution actually happening is about as likely as a blindfolded person throwing a pebble into outer space and knocking down a satellite that then crashes onto a target on the back of a truck speeding down the highway. Even with billions of years, that’s not going to happen. (For those of you who like math, you can see some numbers here.)
To be sure, Darwinists have tried to massage those impossible odds to work in their favor, but no amount of number obfuscation can get around the facts. Time is not their friend.
So, if evolution is impossible no matter the eons, what else is there? The answer to that is simple. Based on real observations from scientific studies, we have no reason to believe life started by itself. According to the laws of biology, life always comes from life. Beyond that, information science shows us that information (such as the DNA necessary for life to begin) requires an intelligent source. Finally, without starting from an evolutionary bias, the study of genetics helps us understand that the variety of animal kinds on the earth could never lead back to a single ancestor.
Add all that up and you’re left with an inescapable conclusion: there must be a powerful and super-wise Creator. With such a Creator, you no longer need billions of years. He could create everything in much less time—say . . . six days.
According to the Bible, this Creator—God—did exactly that. He gave us a clear record (the Bible) of how He created the world, how long it took Him, how humans fell into sin, and how God the Son (Jesus) came to earth to save us. And of that you can be 100 percent certain. After all, God doesn’t leave anything to chance—not in a billion years (if there had really been that much time, that is).
Answers in Genesis is an apologetics ministry, dedicated to helping Christians defend their faith and proclaim the good news of Jesus Christ.