Up From The Scum Series

Intro: 8 out of 9 school board members in Dover, PA were voted out last November. It would have been 9, but only 8 were up for re-election. It’s kind of a national tradition that being a school board member is a thankless job. But when was the last time people lined up to take the place of everyone on the school board? There’s even a court case coming up against their actions. What did they do? Misuse funds? Deceive the community? Neglect education? It’s even worse…

They dared to require a one-minute classroom statement that suggests an intelligent designer as an explanation for the complexity of some parts of the universe.

Now, the people of Dover who voted are just sure that those creationist wackos are threat to their community. I beg to differ. In fact, I’m going to urge upon you this morning that the teaching of evolution is a clear and present danger – a danger that’s threatening our generation.

So it’s going to shock you when I say this: Let’s quit fighting it. Let’s give in. Let’s go ahead and become good little evolutionists – or at least for today. Let’s try it. If it doesn’t work out, we can go back, or, maybe we can find a happy medium – maybe we can be both or something. OK?

I mean, if you want to really understand, you have to put yourself in their shoes…right? Do you want to understand your atheist neighbor? Do you want to understand your friend who just goes and partys all weekend? Do you want to understand Michael Newdow – the guy who’s trying to get “under God” removed from the pledge? I mean, wouldn’t you like to at least understand what’s behind that? Maybe this will do it! Let’s just give up the struggle! Let’s quit being the minority we’re told we are. Let’s quit being mocked in the eyes of academia. Let’s take the simplest answer – the Big Bang – and let’s relate to those people who just swallow…I man, adopt such a view. Maybe we’ll realize it’s not a clear and present danger we’ll have a lot less concern to stress us, OK?

Whew! I feel better all ready! I mean, after all, this argument has been raging on in the US since the Scopes trial of 1925. Up to that point, it seemed like science and belief in God the Creator went hand in hand. Then, something changed. God didn’t. Belief in God didn’t. Instead, science changed and began to apply its processes and energies to a new pursuit. Instead of being the discipline of learning about God’s work, it became a work to replace our need for God. After all, God is a crutch, isn’t He? There was a guy who wrote years ago that “religion is the opiate of the masses.” His name, by the way, was Karl Marx.

At the time evolution made its entrance, the biggest hitch to this liberal science agenda was creation.

Nothing could explain the existence of everything. Ps 19: “The heavens declare the glory of God; the skies proclaim the work of his hands. Day after day they pour forth speech; night after night they display knowledge. Creation really gets in the way of living like there is no God. So, until the entrance of Evolutionary theory, there was no intelligent alternative to creation.

Other cultures had offered some unintelligent alternatives: Atlas, holding the world on his shoulders, a giant turtle holding the earth on his back. But not many North Americans took such stories seriously.

Much of science made its new goal to put away our dependence on God, rather than our constant discovery and enjoyment of Him and all He has done.

Enter Charles Darwin and others. For the first time, theory that was spoken only in secret became published and was quickly adopted.

I find that, if I’ll just let go of all those things I used to tenaciously cling to, I can let go of some other items. They go away…sort of.

1. No Personal God

If you’ve been running from the idea of a personal, loving God, here’s your chance.

In order to accept Evolution, I’ll have to jettison the Bible, since it clearly teaches something other than evolution. If that part of the Bible isn’t true, I can’t trust any part of the Bible, can I? – including everything it tells me about God. A God Who just lights the fuse and runs away isn’t at all like the God described in Genesis Who comes walking in the Garden of Eden in the cool of the day, Who visits Abraham in person, and Who shows His glory to Ezekiel and to John. He’s certainly not like the God Who comes to live among us in the form of His Son in a human body.