Readers Respond to Answers January - March 2010

Editor’s Response: Yes, Dan Brown is ultimately responsible for his spiritual condition, but Peter tells Christians to “always be ready to give a defense” of the gospel (1 Peter 3:15). A pastor, of all people, should be equipped to do that and not simply dismiss the questions of those under his care—particularly on such a fundamental issue as the authority of God’s Word.

Dr. Andrew Snelling, director of research at Answers in Genesis, responds: Actually, the catastrophic plate tectonics model has only a few minor remaining problems. However, we recognize that it is a model, and subject to revision or complete replacement. We do not tout CPT as fact, but it is by far the most viable Flood model at the moment, and thus to follow a two-model approach would be inappropriate and misleading.

Editor’s Response: We agree that personal opinion is not the focus, and that homosexuality needs to be examined with the greatest care. That is why the magazine looked for an author whom we believed would be most suited to speak from a biblical perspective on this central cultural issue. Dr. Mohler is the president of the Southern Baptist Theological Seminary and has worked for years with his best faculty and others to refine a biblical understanding of many high-profile cultural issues, such as homosexuality.

The article you refer to is an excerpt from Dr. Mohler’s book, Desire and Deceit, which goes into much more detail. It is, of course, impossible to include all the details in a short article. Dr. Mohler’s work was subjected to expert review before publication.

Dr. Andrew Snelling, director of research at Answers in Genesis, responds: Before the Flood the earth would have been fairly stable with ideal conditions for life, except for minor occurrences, such as where algal mats were building mounds (called stromatolites) around hydrothermal vents. All pre-Flood fossils found in what is understood to be pre-Flood strata are either algae/bacteria or invertebrate metazoans (the Ediacara “fauna”), which had no “nephesh” (life in a biblical, Hebrew sense).

Relatively few fossils formed prior to the Flood, because conditions for fossilization were very rare. Even if some rain, volcanic eruptions, or localized flooding occurred, these events were nothing compared to the scale of the Flood. Apart from occasional stromatolites, Precambrian sedimentary rocks are largely devoid of any fossils visible to the eye, as you would expect if they were pre-Flood.

(For greater detail on this subject, see Dr. Snelling’s new book set, Earth’s Catastrophic Past.)