Could Christians Believe Theistic Evolution?

            Darwinian evolution is the unguided change in the gene pool of a population through mutation, natural selection, and genetic drift over long periods of time. The key word in Darwinian evolution is “unguided.” The term “unguided” refers to God’s absence in the neo-Darwinistic evolution equation.

            Theistic evolution, on the contrary, reconciles Darwinian evolution to theism by importing God into the fabric of evolution. Since evolution is diametrically opposed to creation (a belief that God created the universe as in the creation narrative in the book of Genesis), the question we need to ask is “Was God involved in evolution or did God create the living and the non-living as in the Biblical narrative?”

            Theistic evolution broadly states that God guided the evolutionary process over millions of years. This view of evolution smuggles God through the back door into the neo-Darwinistic evolution equation! This evolution seems to be for science-lovers and Bible-doubters (of the creation narrative) who believe both in God and the Darwinian evolution.

            Christians who believe in theistic evolution ought to resolve these strong dilemmas:

Diluting God’s Attributes

            On one hand is the creation account where God created everything by the power of HIS Word in six days. On the other hand, the theory of evolution, under the assumption of being scientific, posits the evolved existence of the living and the non-living over millions of years.

            Why did God wait for millions of years to create? It seems that God’s powerless; hence HE waited for HIS creation to evolve over millions of years. Attributing powerlessness to God is a severely debauched position.

            While creation is teleological with a purpose, goal and an end, evolution is accidental. Chaos is a means to evolution, for evolution is absolute randomness.

            The wise and almighty God would not create the universe through chaos. In other words, what mandates God to create the universe out of randomness? God would not cause construction from destruction, for to cause it in such a manner is to mitigate God’s wisdom.

Debunking Adam, Eve & The Bible

            Those who believe in evolution discard Adam & Eve as the first human beings. Science does not provide us with any evidence whether the first human evolved was a male, female or a transgender or whether both man and woman evolved at the same time.

            Discarding Adam & Eve is infinitely troublesome for a Christian.

            To reconcile evolution without Adam & Eve from within the biblical framework would essentially undermine the Bible. The Bible teaches that Adam & Eve were actual human beings created in the image of God.

            Adam & Eve are not limited to the book of Genesis but they appear repeatedly in the Bible. In Luke 3: 23-38, Christ’s genealogy is traced back to Adam. Adam being a myth would contradict Luke. Why did Luke go through the trouble of tracing Christ’s lineage if Adam was a myth? If Adam was a myth, then the Bible cannot be trusted.

            The Bible speaks about Christ as the last Adam. If Adam was a myth, then Christ may also have not existed. Therefore, theistic evolution effectively undermines the Bible. (Thankfully, both the Bible and extra-biblical resources affirm the existence of Christ.)

Disbelieving Christ

            Theistic evolution, in its essence, motivates a disbelief in Christ.

            Consider this simple instance. Evolution scandalizes Adam & Eve into mythical personalities. But Christ taught the existence of Adam and Eve, ““Haven’t you read,” he replied, “that at the beginning the Creator ‘made them male and female’” (Matthew 19: 4, NIV, Emphasis Mine).

            If Christ referred to the existence of Adam & Eve, we should either believe evolution or Christ. We cannot believe in both evolution and Christ, since they mutually contradict each other in the context of Adam and Eve.

            Evolution implies that Christ lied about Adam & Eve. If Christ lied about Adam and Eve, then one could think that Christ lied about everything else also. Hence, theistic evolution motivates a disbelief in Christ.

Demeaning Salvation

            Creationism posits goodness of all God’s creation. Although he was created good, man disobeyed God when he ate the fruit of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil a.k.a. the fall (Genesis 3: 6-7).  Salvation was necessitated by the fall of man.

            If Darwinian evolution is true, there was no fall to begin with. Death and suffering are intrinsic to the world even before the creation of human beings. Theistic evolution posits man’s intrinsic selfishness and negates the fall of man, “According to Karl Giberson in Saving Darwin, human beings were flawed and sinful from the very start because they were produced by an evolutionary process driven by selfishness. Thus, there was no “Fall” from original goodness in the history of humanity.” ¹

            If there was no fall – an act of disobedience to God, there is no need for salvation – an act of belief and obedience to God.

            Moreover, the future of salvation is to restore everything to its original state of goodness by eliminating evil and death to usher new heavens and a new earth for an eternal cohabitation of man with God (cf. Acts 3: 21). If theistic evolution is true, the original state of the earth was death and suffering, not goodness. Death will continue to exist without a plausibility of restoration.

            Salvation presupposes man’s sinfulness, and is predicated on the fact that Christ, God-incarnate, came into the world (in the form of a man), to sacrifice HIS life to save man of his sins.

            Sin, according to the Bible, was not caused by God but entered into the realm of mankind through the freewill of angels and man. Theistic evolution, by virtue of undermining Adam & Eve and the subsequent fall, posits sin and evil’s existence even before the existence of the first humans. Notwithstanding that, the theistic evolutionist posits God as the creator of evil and sin.

            This view of the divine renders God as a maximally evil being. An evil God would not liberate man from evil and sin. Therefore, biblical salvation is demeaned by theistic evolutionists.

Denigrating Biblical Interpretation

            The Bible should interpret itself. You and I cannot impose our views into the Bible. Similarly, science cannot interpret the Bible.

            Theistic evolution interprets the creation account from within the framework of science. Allowing science to interpret the Bible is gross injustice to God and HIS living Word.

            Science does not possess the power or the authority to interpret God’s Word. God is greater than science. God causes science. In fact, science is a mere means to understanding God’s architecture of this universe. So the “means” has neither the power nor the authority to interpret the actions of the “cause.” 

Conclusion

            Organizations such as BioLogos² advocate for harmony between science and religion. They seduce and strangle the Christian churches to evolve their teaching from creationism to theistic evolution so to be aligned to the 21^st century thought.

            That which undermines God should be rejected categorically. Theistic evolution rigorously undermines God, “In the initial years after Darwin’s theory was proposed, most theistic evolutionists believed that God guided the evolutionary process to specific ends. However, as the Darwinian view of the undirected nature of evolution gradually solidified in the scientific community, defenders of theistic evolution increasingly disowned the idea of guided evolution. Consequently, many leading proponents of theistic evolution today insist that Darwinian evolution by definition is an undirected process and that not even God knows what the process will produce with certainty or specificity.”³

            Theistic evolution is “design by chance” - an oxymoron. Just as the concept of “married bachelor” cannot even be a figment of one’s imagination, design by chance is an utterly imaginative concept.

            Significantly, theistic evolution presents strong dilemmas as stated above. Therefore, Christians should not believe in theistic evolution.

Endnotes:

¹ http://www.discovery.org/a/10091

² http://biologos.org/

³ http://www.discovery.org/a/10121