In the Beginning: But We Had God’s Word!

Illustration by Viktor Miller-Gausa

Ken Ham, President/CEO
Answers in Genesis

Over the years, many people have told me they wished that, when they were young, they would have had all the apologetics books we have today with so many answers to questions about God’s Word, particularly in Genesis. Many have told me they made wrong decisions in their lives because things they were taught at school or even in church caused them to doubt God’s Word, often leading to unbelief.

I also receive similar feedback regarding our two attractions, the Ark Encounter and Creation Museum. Many people have said their lives would have been different if these had existed when they were younger or had existed for their parents or church leaders at that time. Some have told me it would have helped them to have had answers when they were kids, but they’re thrilled to have them now for their children.

However, I do want to make a statement: We had God’s Word!

Now please don’t misunderstand me. I am ecstatic that God has allowed us to provide all the apologetics resources we have today and to build the two attractions to help make the Bible come alive and provide answers to the skeptical questions of our day. And it is important to have such answers. One of my favorite verses of Scripture for the Answers in Genesis ministry is 1 Peter 3:15:

But in your hearts honor Christ the Lord as holy, always being prepared to make a defense [give answers] to anyone who asks you for a reason for the hope that is in you; yet do it with gentleness and respect.

What Do I Mean?

When my family was struggling for answers about the supposed millions of years and other evolutionary beliefs, I remember my father teaching me how to approach God’s Word. He said something like, “When something man says contradicts the Bible, first you go to the Bible and make sure you are taking the words in context. Then if you’re sure of what God’s Word is clearly teaching but there’s still a contradiction, then something is wrong with man’s word. After all, humans know nothing compared to an infinite Creator God, and we must never allow man’s fallible word to reinterpret God’s clear Word. If we don’t know how to answer what man is saying, then we need to wait for answers. But you never change God’s Word to fit man’s ideas into it.”

We live in an era that really began in the 1800s. At that time, atheists (and deists) who rejected the Bible as God’s Word and rejected the global flood of Noah’s day began to popularize the idea that the fossil layers were laid down slowly over millions of years. Sadly, at that time, a church leader in Scotland accepted the idea of millions of years and added them into a supposed gap between the first two verses of Genesis. This gap theory became very prevalent in many churches. Even the great expositional preacher Martin Lloyd Jones “toyed” with the gap theory, though he wasn’t convinced. According to a couple of his sermons, Charles Spurgeon, the prince of preachers, was also impacted by the millions of years belief. Many of the great Bible teachers of past generations taught the gap theory (and some taught the day-age theory, theistic evolution, and so on).

Believing Fallible Man

Now my point is that for nearly 2,000 years we have had the complete Word of God. As we look at this now, we can see that the gap theory, day-age theory, theistic evolution, and the other many positions attempting to fit millions of years into the Bible are totally inconsistent in many ways with what the Bible clearly teaches. For example, belief in millions of years requires believing that death and diseases like cancer (as seen in the fossil record) existed before sin. But the Bible teaches that our sin is responsible for the groaning world (Romans 8:22) we live in today.

We are prone to believe the words of fallible man rather than the Word of the infallible God.

It’s easy to look back and say that these great men should never have made such compromises with millions of years. But we are only human, and it’s easy for us to be overwhelmed by teaching from those whom we esteem as great scientists and academics. I am very sympathetic to the situation they were in. They hadn’t studied these matters as much as we have today. They didn’t have the answers we have today. And our sin nature (Genesis 3:1) is such that we are prone to believe the words of fallible man rather than the Word of the infallible God.

But my point should be a reminder for all of us. Let’s be on guard that we are not capitulating to false ideas and reinterpreting God’s Word and undermining its authority. I’m sure we all fall into the trap in ways we don’t even realize and maybe people in the future will look back on us and wonder why we had certain views just as we look back on those before us.

Even many who lived at the time of Jesus during his earthly ministry, saw all that he did, heard what he said, and witnessed all that happened to him didn’t understand it all, though they had God’s clear Word. So let’s try to learn this lesson:

And he [Jesus] said to them, “O foolish ones, and slow of heart to believe all that the prophets have spoken! Was it not necessary that the Christ should suffer these things and enter into his glory?” And beginning with Moses and all the Prophets, he interpreted to them in all the Scriptures the things concerning himself. (Luke 24:25–27)