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Evolution

Do Christians Believe in Evolution?

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Francis Bacon once wisely said, “God has, in fact, written two books, not just one. Of course, we are all familiar with the first book he wrote, namely Scripture. But He has written a second book called creation.” The Christian community is divided on the issue of evolution for a variety of reasons, but the primary reason for this division has to do with the perceived tension between the Bible and science (the study of nature). A secondary factor of this division has to do with the definition of evolution itself.
In order to determine whether or not Christians believe in evolution, it is important to address these two issues. We will look at them in reverse order.
The Definitions of Evolution
Evolution has four primary meanings. The first of these meanings is simply a synonym to the word “change.” This is not what we are talking about when we ask whether or not Christians believe in evolution.
The second and third definitions are related. One of them refers to naturalistic evolution as a worldview or philosophy in life. This naturalistic evolutionary worldview advocates for evolution on the macro scale (macroevolution) as the theory of the origin of life. 
Macroevolution is a theory that says that the entire universe has a purely material cause and came about by chance. This theory posits that the Big Bang was the starting point some 13.8 billion years ago. At that time, life began through the formation of a single-celled organism. That cell reproduced, and over a period of billions of years, it produced offspring that underwent slow and progressive change that became gradually more complex until arriving to today.
Microevolution refers to the small changes within a species over a short period of time that occurs largely in response to environment. It is separated from the naturalistic evolutionary worldview, and it does not believe in the transformation of one organism into another organism. Under this theory, a human has always been a human and a bacterium has always been a bacterium. There is no such thing as species hopping under microevolution.
The Tension Between Science and Christianity
Some Christians have tried to merge the naturalistic evolutionary philosophy with Christianity to form theistic evolution or evolutionary creation. Many have seen the need to do this because they perceive tension between science and the Bible, particularly in terms of the age of the earth. They also note the gradual changes in the fossil record as well as genetics, comparative anatomy, and molecular biology. 
Evolutionary Christians acknowledge the Bible as true but interpret the first part of Genesis as purely symbolic in nature. They posit that God actually created the world through evolution by setting it all into motion in the beginning and then sovereignly letting it play out through the natural laws that He established.
The Importance of a Literal Interpretation of Genesis 1-2
Salvation is available to all who call on the name of Jesus in faith and repent from their sins. There are certainly some evolutionary Christians who are true believers, but they have some serious and dangerous theology as a result. Macroevolution implies that we as humans descended from lesser beings, but Genesis 1 explains that God created us in His image. 
Moreover, the entire message of the gospel comes from the fact that Adam was a real man who really served as the representation for all of humanity before God and really sinned. His sin literally passed down to every human in history. But Jesus came while we were still sinners to save us from that sin. Jesus became our new representation, and He became our perfect Sacrifice. 
Without a literal Adam, there is no concept of original sin. It doesn’t make sense to say “for since by a man came death, by a man also came the resurrection of the dead” (1 Corinthians 15:21-23). Evolutionary Christians are trying to hold onto both science and the Bible, but they are compromising the gospel as a result. God did not create the world through macroevolution. He created the world with intentional and distinct species from the very beginning.
Possible Solutions for the Perceived Tension Between Science and Christianity
The evidence for microevolution is vast. God designed species to change and adapt to the world around them. But the evidence for macroevolution is far more lacking than the general science textbook makes it seem. From the smallest molecule to the biggest galaxy, the scientific evidence against macroevolution is staggering. The simplest living organism is practically a mirror of the cells of more complex organisms. This suggests that God literally designed each living thing according to its own kind rather than lesser organisms developing gradually into greater organisms.
Furthermore, living cells are irreducibly complex according to science, which means that they could not have developed one part at a time through the slow process of billions of years. And they are surprisingly resistant to change. Scientists have discovered that when new information accidentally makes it into the genetic code, the cells actually go back and correct the deviation with a staggering degree of accuracy.
There is no evidence for common ancestry between all organisms in a tree of life because there is no evidence for transitionary species. The fossil record indicates microevolution, but there are no cases of confirmed macroevolution at all.
In terms of the perceived tension between science and Christianity regarding the age of the universe, there are many solutions that do not require Christians to play theological gymnastics. Some Christians believe that God literally created the universe but that He did so with days that were millions or billions of years long rather than 24 hours.
But far more likely is the fact that God created the world over a period of seven literal, 24-hour days. The Bible does not specify exactly when God created the angelic world, but it implies that He did so before the first day of creation in Genesis (Job 38:4-7). It is quite possible that there is a large time gap between Genesis 1:1 and Genesis 1:3. It is also possible that God created the earth old to start out with. He created the Garden of Eden with full-sized trees on day three and Adam and Eve as adults on day six. So, the earth could have been billions of years old on day one.
Moses is the author of the creation account of Genesis, but have you ever stopped to think about how he himself knew what to write? After all, he wasn’t there at the time of creation. The answer seems to come in Exodus 32 when Moses goes up to Mount Sinai and stays there with God for 40 days and 40 nights. It appears that God Himself most likely revealed to Moses exactly what to write in the beginning chapters of Genesis. Our God is not a God of confusion, and the simplest explanation is that God Himself revealed exactly how the beginning of the world came about. 

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