Never a Dull Moment

At AiG and the Creation Museum, we often have the privilege to sit under the teaching of Christian leaders. Some of us also get to meet members of the media and other interesting visitors from around the world. This past week was no exception. As I sometimes say, “there is never a dull moment at AiG!”

Christian Leaders

This is not yet the extremely busy season at the Creation Museum. It really picks up starting Memorial Day and continues through August. (By the way, I urge you to read my previous blog on all the special five-year anniversary celebrations that will be going on at the Creation Museum May 25–28.)

Yet it’s been busy at the museum with all kinds of special visitors—both for and against the museum. It’s also been busy in another way, with a hectic week of traveling, flying back from a great seminar in Eden Prairie, Minnesota on Tuesday, and then on Thursday I flew to Florida for a seminar in Lutz.

In my day and a half back in the office, I had the wonderful opportunity to meet with some Christian leaders representing influential churches in the south.

On Tuesday, as I was flying back from Minnesota after the conference in Grace Church, our staff was treated to a devotional by Pastor Jim Perdue, Senior Pastor of the Second Baptist Church of Warner Robbins, Georgia. I missed his message, based on the book of Nehemiah, but I connected with him later in the day and we had dinner together.

Below is a photo of Pastor Perdue, as he presented a message to our staff on how Christians should deal with discouragement. He was certainly aware that a ministry upholding biblical authority like AiG is constantly criticized.

You can find more information about Jim and his church in Georgia on their website.

His last name may be familiar to many of you. His father was Governor Sonny Perdue, who was the first Republican governor in the state of Georgia in about 130 years. Gov. Perdue served from 2003 to 2011. You may recall the name because he became controversial a few years ago when his state was going through a horrible drought. Gov. Perdue (with other elected officials) prayed for rain at the Capitol in Atlanta, and secularists blasted him.

On Wednesday morning, we had a special chapel session with Pastor Hayes Wicker of the First Baptist Church of Naples, Florida. This church will be hosting AiG for a conference next year. In his message, Pastor Wicker mentioned, among many things, how he was recently at the bedside of Watergate figure (who was later born again), Chuck Colson, just before Chuck passed away.

It is such an encouragement to know that these two speakers who were at our chapel are representing churches that have a wide influence in their region and are so supportive of AiG’s ministry. You may read Dr. Wicker’s bio on the church’s website.

On Thursday morning, as I was preparing to leave for Florida, it was unfortunate that I did not hear Dr. Bill Dickens speak to the staff. He’s the headmaster of Calvary Christian School in northern Kentucky, where many of our staff have sent their children for a good Christian education. Since yesterday was the National Day of Prayer in America, Dr. Dickens talked about the importance of making sure that Christians are not just active in the culture as voters and maybe activists, but that they should remember most of all to go before God to pray for this nation. As someone who has been deployed overseas in the US Air Force a few times, Dr. Dickens also stressed that we pray for the safety of the U.S. military men and women overseas—but most importantly, that we pray that they will get saved for eternity.

Find out more information on Calvary Christian School, which is an outreach of Calvary Baptist Church (a Bible-upholding church in our region) on their website.

Journalists

On the flip side, we had two radio broadcasters from Europe tour the museum and interview staff members on Wednesday, and they were not warm towards our message of biblical authority. One is a broadcaster (both radio and TV) for BBC Northern Ireland and the other is with Germany’s version of America’s National Public Radio. Both journalists were very skeptical of the museum’s content. Even before arriving here, the Northern Ireland broadcaster was tweeting his followers with a disparaging comment about meeting a “science expert” (he put the words in quotes to show his disdain), and then he met AiG’s Dr. Georgia Purdom, who certainly is a scientist (she has a PhD in molecular genetics from Ohio State University). After his visit, the man sarcastically tweeted “My jaw was dropping with all the learning ;)” continuing to mock us.

On the same day, the German journalist expressed a lot of skepticism as she interviewed Dr. Purdom, so we wonder how her report will turn out. We do know that she walked through the museum with a professor from Marshall University in West Virginia who attends a theologically liberal church and, we understand, is supportive of gay and lesbian issues. As they walked through the museum, this prof was being interviewed by the German reporter. So we have a hint at the future program’s probable anti-museum thrust.

Thanks for stopping by and thanks for praying,

Ken