There was a time when scientists believed the universe did not have a beginning, it was thought to be eternal. That view eventually gave way to the idea that the universe had a beginning called the Big Bang about 13.7 billion years ago. More recent figures say the Big Bang happened 13.81 billion years ago.
Now Rajendra Gupta with the University of Ottawa has put forth a theory claiming the universe may be 26.7 billion years old almost twice the age first theorized.
The truth of the matter is that the whole scientific community is not in possession of a single observable fact regarding the beginning of the universe, when the earth was form, or how life began. Science has no facts regarding these events just theories.
And those theories require vast amounts of time, because scientists believe the only way to explain the universe and the complexity and diversity of life on earth requires huge amounts of time and chance. Of course, time and chance cannot account for how matter came from nothing, or how non-living matter evolved into living matter.
When I was in high school trying to reconcile the claims of evolution with the narrative of creation in the Bible caused me to embrace certain views of the Bible that were untenable.
A month ago my wife and I had an opportunity to visit the Creation Museum and Ark Encounter in Kentucky. I had reached a point in my reading and studying the Scriptures where I believed in the young earth view, that is that the universe and earth were relatively young, anywhere from 6,000 to 10,000 years old. The trip to Kentucky lent very reasonable facts to justify that view.
I believe the “heavens and the earth” were created in six 24 hour days as record in the first chapter of Genesis and based on the generations and genealogies recorded in the Scriptures the universe and earth are only about 6,000 years old.
The long periods of time evolutionists claim have transpired since the “beginning” are theories predicated on more theories. Places like the Grand Canyon where there are sedimentary layers upon sedimentary layers are indicative of a worldwide flood as recorded in Genesis 6-9.
It was clear science has no clue about things in the distant past or when a native fisherman caught a coelacanth off the coast of Madagascar.
The Coelacanth was first “rediscovered” in 1938 when a recently caught, but badly decomposed, specimen was examined by Rhodes University ichthyologist J. L. B. Smith. Familiar with fossilized remains of the Coelacanth, Smith readily recognized the recently caught fish as a Coelacanth. Thought to be extinct the Coelacanth was soon dubbed the “living fossil.”
Christians do not doubt the past existence of those life forms represented in the fossil record, but we do take issue with how evolutionists interpret that record. The Coelacanth is a case in point.
The Coelacanth was a well-known ancient fish because it was widely represented in the fossil record beginning 420 million years ago, but thought to have gone extinct with the dinosaurs about 65 million years ago. Interpreting the fossils of Coelacanths, paleontologists believed the Coelacanth was an intermediate life form between fish and amphibians.
Ergo, it was believed to live in coastal areas and also had lungs to breathe during brief forays on land even though sarcous tissues like skin and internal organs typically do not survive fossilization. It was thought to be capable of walking on land with its three pair of ventral fleshly lobed fins while searching for food.
But Christmas came early for creationists on December 22, 1938, when a native fisherman caught a supposedly extinct Coelacanth off the southwestern coast of Madagascar. Evolutionary theories about the Coelacanth collapsed faster than a house of cards hit by a leaf blower when that native fisherman hauled up a net full of facts.
Here is the first mistake made by scientists, and it is a big one, the Coelacanth is not extinct. Not only were there several colonies in the waters between south Africa and Madagascar but other colonies exist in the Indian Ocean and waters of Indonesia.
The Coelacanth is a pelagic, it is a deep-sea fish, it is not a coastal dweller. It swims everywhere it goes and does not attempt to walk even on the ocean floor as observed in an expedition by Hans Fricke funded by National Geographic. It is a true fish with gills and does not have lungs.
Scientists were amazed that the Coelacanth had remained relatively unchanged for more than 400 million years. This is why ichthyologist Smith so easily identified the specimen he examined because it was almost identical to the fossil record. This confirms the biblical account that living things reproduce “after their kind,” Genesis 1:21.
This is why Paul warned Timothy, about the false interpretations made by those who say they are scientists, because scientists do not always know what they claim to know.
“O Timothy, keep that which is committed to thy trust, avoiding…oppositions of science falsely so called; which some professing have erred concerning the faith,” 1 Timothy 6:20-21 (KJV).
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