Creation Basics: Did We Come from Apelike Creatures?

Compromise always begets more compromise.

Sadly, many Christians in the past accepted man’s ideas of millions of years based on naturalism. Eventually, many began to accept biological evolution as well, while still trying to hold to the supernatural creation of mankind. But compromise always begets more compromise, and now many Christian academics and even many pastors reject a literal Adam and Eve. They believe some variation of “God created these first humans from a group of apelike creatures, somehow stamping them with his image and giving them a soul, thus making them human.”

But, of course, such an idea completely contradicts the Bible’s account of origins. We’ve already seen that evolution and millions of years puts death before sin and that there are major biblical problems with trying to squeeze evolutionary ideas into Genesis, but the problems only increase when one tries to fit human evolution into the Genesis account.

Consider that God says he created man from the dust of the ground, not from the body of an apelike creature. And after Adam and Eve sinned, God said to Adam,

Till you return to the ground,
    for out of it you were taken;
for you are dust,
    and to dust you shall return. (Genesis 3:19)

Adam didn’t return to an apelike creature when he died! He returned to the dust from which he came. This verse is meaningless if Adam didn’t literally come from the dust of the ground.

Jesus reminded us that humans have been here since the beginning of creation and that we’ve always been male and female (and that’s why marriage is for one man and one woman).

And when Jesus is asked a question about marriage, he said, “But from the beginning of creation, ‘God made them male and female’” (Mark 10:6). Notice Jesus said, “from the beginning of creation.” In the evolutionary story, humans have only been here for a blink of an eye with supposed billions and billions of years of history preceding our entrance. But Jesus reminded us that humans have been here since the beginning of creation and that we’ve always been male and female (and that’s why marriage is for one man and one woman).

A literal Adam who really did sin and bring death into God’s creation is essential to the gospel. Right from the very beginning of the Bible, we see mankind disobeying God’s commands, highlighting our need for a Savior. This Savior, the last Adam, would then come and do what we could never do—perfectly keep God’s law. But if Adam just evolved from an apelike creature, then death was always a part of creation. Adam and his wife were doomed to die anyway, so what did sin really do? The idea of human evolution undermines the gospel!

So what do we do about the so-called “ape-men” and all the supposed “evidence” for human evolution? Well, that discussion would make this post too long, so I’ll link to an excellent chapter from an anatomist featured in The New Answers Book 2 that you can read for free.

Mankind did not evolve. We were created by God as the crown of his creation on day six of creation week. Adam and Eve lived in a “very good” world until their sin marred creation, bringing with it the penalty for sin, which is death. But praise the Lord, Jesus Christ came as the last Adam, perfectly obeyed God, died in our place, rose from the grave, and now offers the free gift of eternal life with him to all who will turn from their sin and trust in him. If you have never received the free gift of salvation, I urge you to do so today.

Thanks for stopping by and thanks for praying,
Ken

This item was written with the assistance of AiG’s research team.