Belief in Creation and Intelligent Design Leads to Belief in Christ

As you know, brethren, this has been a very disruptive year. Things have not gone back to normal. It's still in a pretty deep hole as far as the cases around the world of COVID and also economic distress of the nations. And because of that, we've had to, of course, adjust our different activities. We're just meeting here with very few people. People are at home listening to the message and also wishing to do more for the time being. But being faithful, keeping the Sabbath is very important, and this meets the requirement of having a holy convocation, even if you're doing it through Zoom or the webcast at home. And so, because we haven't had different activities, one of those has been the Sabbath in the park that twice a year we're able to meet. And I traditionally give a sermon with all the beautiful nature around us about creation. And I know that many times it's a subject that we don't cover very much, but it is one of those required subjects because God says that we should remember our Creator. He's not only God, but He's also the Grand Designer of the universe, and also, very interestingly, because of our knowledge of God and studying creation and its designs, Did you know that that actually leads to belief in Jesus Christ? If a person logically follows the reasoning and examines what we see in nature and how it is designed, that it eventually leads to being convinced and convicted of Jesus Christ as our Lord and Master. And so in this sermon, I'd like to show you how going from creation and believing in an intelligent designer will logically lead to belief in Jesus Christ as our Savior. I remember the first time I heard that, about 20 years ago, I went to an intelligent design conference there in South Carolina. We had recently moved here to the States, and it must have been maybe 2002 or 2003. And I went to that intelligent design conference, and they had Hugh Ross, who is an astronomer. He lives in Pasadena area, and he brought up the subject, how believing in creation will lead to belief in Christ. And he expounded it, and I never forgot that. But through the years, I've studied the subject deeper and would like to share, just like I did with messages in the Sabbath in the park in previous years. This is the one I would give if I was at the Sabbath in Irvine Park. This is such an important subject for young and old in this ever-growing, godless age. The statistics of surveys around the world show that there's a steep decline in the belief in God. People are focused more on themselves. Through Darwinian evolution taught in schools, promoted in the press, by politicians, and the majority, people are brainwashed. And eventually they say, well, we've been taught that you don't need God to believe in the universe as we see it, and in all of these animals and plants that we see. It can all be explained by science that you don't need God for that. Many are convinced of that, and so this age is becoming less and less believing in God.

There's two scriptures that combine to describe the present situation in the world, and they were both described by the Apostle Paul, inspired by God. Very powerful scriptures that I'm going to read right now, too, that are very important. If you ever have someone that has an open mind toward God, who is seeking God, these two scriptures would come in very handy to just be able to show the evidence of the world in which we're living and the reason why the world is as it is. The first scripture is found in 2 Timothy 3, verses 1-4. I would like to read this in the New Living Translation. It really brings it out in living colors. Paul says, you should know this, Timothy, that in the last days, there will be very difficult times. So as things deteriorate and God is intervening more, it will be difficult times, and we see that in this world. It says, the description of society, for people will love only themselves and their money. So it's interesting that it talks about money in a much more important way than it has been in the past. Money has multiplied in the past decades. For instance, a hundred years ago, people lived in farms. They had chickens, they had cows, they had their needs. They weren't there just obsessed with money. They wanted a roof over their heads, food to eat, dress, enjoy themselves, maybe going to the creek and swimming or at a lake. Life was much simpler. There wasn't any radio, no TV, talking probably more like 120 years ago. But today, money has become universal, and it has multiplied. And of course, people depend on money, on bank accounts, on credit cards, more than ever before. If you think of the multiplication of money, it has multiplied hundreds of times than what used to be, like I said, a hundred, hundred, twenty years ago. So it says here that people will love only themselves and their money. Why do they love themselves more? Because money makes it easier to love themselves, not think about others.

There's a proverb that says money answers the problems of life. You can just be able to pay your way out of the many problems.

It continues on. It says, they will be boastful and proud, scoffing at God. So when you talk about God, or creation, or intelligent design, they scoff at that in great part because of the theory of evolution. People say, well, I don't need to believe in God. Science has told me how all of these creatures just evolved and they spontaneously arose from a warm pond and chemicals got together and all of a sudden you had the first living cell and then it reproduced. Also, it says because of these wrong beliefs, it says disobedient to their parents. So people will be more spoiled. Money makes that more possible. Now, again, money can be good or evil, depending on the use. There's a wise use for it. The Bible does not condemn money as per se. It condemns the love of money, which properly translated would be the lust of money. But it can be used. God used men like Abraham, who are very wealthy men, but they always used it to a good end.

Continuing on, it says they will be ungrateful to their parents. They will consider nothing sacred. Why? Because also, in great part, evolution has taught them that there's nothing holy here. This can all be explained by blind evolution, creating apes and then humans. We're just this product. We don't have to believe in God or something spiritual. They will be unloving and unforgiving. They will slander others and have no self-control. Boy, talk about in the news today, and you just turn it for a while, you'll see a lot of slander, which is the way to insult, undermine, say lies about others and have no self-control. They will be cruel and hate what is good. Again, they'll be sadistic, like to do violence to others and hate what is good. They will betray their friends, be reckless. That was brought up by Mike in the sermonette about recklessness, being foolhardy, lack of wisdom in decisions, be puffed up with pride and love pleasure rather than God. So they will focus on pleasure, whatever that is. People can turn sports into idolatry, where they're just obsessed with it. Now, again, sports has a place. I enjoy watching sports, especially tennis. It's one of my pastimes. But you cannot do that at the expense of other things. In other words, when you have everything done, then you're able to give yourself a treat, watch something else. But family comes first, God comes first, Bible study comes first. So here's a description of society, again, contaminated by beliefs and blind evolution. And the second scripture, which actually, when you look at both of them, you can see that Paul had meditated on this. And Romans 1, 18 through 32, provides the context and background for the description of 2 Timothy 3, 1 through 4. So here it explains how people have become the way they are.

And so I'd like to read this from God's Word version, Romans 1, 18 through 32. It says, God's anger is revealed from heaven against every ungodly and immoral thing people do as they try to suppress the truth by their immoral living. So here, Paul's not mincing any words inspired by God's Holy Spirit, shows God's attitude. He is a loving God, but He's also a righteous God. And He's not going to put up with unrighteous behavior.

It says, what can be known about God is clear to them because He has made it clear to them. From the creation of the world, God's invisible qualities, His eternal power and divine nature have been clearly observed in what He made. In other words, the intelligent design of the universe. Intelligent design has all of these arguments. And if you examine this, you know there is an intelligent designer. This is not some blind, accidental evolutionary process that went from slime to human beings. No, there is an intelligent designer and creator. It goes on to say, As a result, people have no excuse. And another translation has it that people have an inherent understanding that things around us did have to have a superior being. That's just even a little child. And we have little grandkids and I sometimes will quiz them. Who made that tree? They would say, God, why do you think God made that tree? It's so beautiful and no human being could make that. But then when you're 30, you believe, yes, it can all come from something besides God. But there is this inherent understanding that there is a superior being needed to explain what we see.

It says, as a result, people have no excuse. They knew God but did not praise and thank Him for being God. So they didn't thank Him for being their creator. Instead, their thoughts were pointless and their misguided minds were plunged into darkness. So now they went over to the dark side of their thinking instead of the light side of things. That light is something equated with righteousness, darkness with unrighteousness. It says, while claiming to be wise, they became fools. They exchanged the glory of the immortal God for statues that look like mortal humans, birds, animals and snakes. You see that throughout world history, man creating idols, worshiping like Egyptians, all kinds of snakes and all kinds of creatures.

And then even the Greeks, they had their own statues, not only of gods but of all kinds of beings that were part of the figment of their imagination. For this reason, God allowed their lusts to control them. As a result, they dishonor their bodies by sexual perversion with each other. And so in the Greek world, in the Roman world, it is pretty acceptable to just go with someone else, whatever sex they were.

And these people exchanged God's truth for a lie. So they have become ungodly and serve what is created rather than the Creator, which is part of what evolution teaches. That you should be thankful to evolution, a blind force of nature through mutation and natural selection. And you have all these millions of species that arise just by luck. Continuing on, it says, So they have become ungodly and serve what is created rather than the Creator, who is blessed forever. Amen. For this reason, God allowed their shameful passions to control them.

In other words, they built up addictions. Their women have exchanged natural sexual relations for unnatural ones. Likewise, their men have given up natural sexual relations with women and burned with lust for each other. So homosexuality is nothing new. There's always been. But now it's deemed just another alternative lifestyle. Nothing wrong with it. Men commit indecent acts with men, so they experience among themselves the punishment they deserve for their perversions. And the consequence of this not only messes up their minds, but also has as a result venereal diseases that are just a type of pandemic that we don't talk about. Because this other is more like a flu, but venereal diseases since 1980, when AIDS became one of those venereal diseases, over 30 million people have died from that.

Still, millions get infected every year. Much more die of that than they do of COVID. Far more. Well, I don't want to just continue. You can read all the way to verse 32 when you get a chance. But it shows here in those two scriptures, the world in which we're living. And so I'd like to go and give you seven points about why creation and proofs of intelligent design refute Darwinian evolution and leads to believe in Christ.

The first is that those that believe in evolution, whether you're taking college courses or high school courses, the ones who teach naturalistic, which means that you don't have God involved. This is all just matter and energy combining to create things. Naturalistic evolution can't adequately explain the orderly complexity of the universe. They say these are all chance occurrence, and this just happened in a universe, just mixing all these things together. They don't start with who brought forth the universe itself. They start out with the creative universe.

It reminds me of that story about this person that came up to a professor after his class that all of this natural processes created living beings. One came up and said, well, can we do an experiment? You say that out of this you can actually mix chemicals and you can start primitive life. The professor said yes. The fellow said, well, let's start. The professor goes and gets a bunch of chemicals and dirt and all of this, and he starts putting it in his test tubes. The other fellow said, hold on. No, you have to get some dirt that wasn't created by God. So you have to start with something that God didn't start.

And then, of course, the professor just threw his arms up and said, oh, well, if I can't even use what God made or dirt or anything else, how can I go on? But it is God's dirt. It is God's atoms. I can't explain how that came to be in existence. All the laws of the universe maintain the orderly and seamlessly picture that we have of the universe.

They interact with each other. And, of course, the classic explanation or example is the bike lock. If you ever had a bicycle and you had a bike lock, it had several dials to it. And usually they have four dials on it. And you have, you know, the combination. Someone else can't open it unless they have the right numbers. Now, if you only have one dial that has the ten units, that would mean that with one number out of ten, you could open that lock.

If you have two dials, then it has one in a hundred that you have the opportunity to get the right combination. If it has three dials, that's one in a thousand. And most bike locks have four, which means one possibility out of ten thousand that you get the right numbers. Well, Douglas Axe, who is a biology professor, did an experiment, and he figured that to make a protein that comes from DNA, which are 150 amino acids, it's a very small protein.

Some go up to a thousand amino acids, but just to have 150 lined up properly, it would be the equivalent of 70 rows or dials of ten units each to get it right. Seventy, not four, like a bike log, but 70 dials you'd have to have all in position to get those 150 proteins in place, which is ten to the seventieth power.

And that's just one little protein. So you already, the laws of probability, are saying nothing could be created without somebody intelligent intervening to get the right combinations.

Secondly, Darwinian evolution can explain the rise of intelligence in the universe. We see the foresight in biology, where you are anticipating and planning. And how would a blind force come up with foresight and planning? And many of our own organs and cells, they have backup programs. Something happens. There's always a second and third contingency plan built in. So we don't all fall apart with the first error or mistake. We see in humans the ability of abstract thought and consciousness. How does that evolve? Scientists have not been able to give an adequate explanation for consciousness and abstract thought, that you can actually plan everything in your mind before you carry it out.

Can brain cells just do all this by themselves? Or do you need the spirit in man, which the Bible talks about, which is the mind? Mind is not the same thing as brain. Thirdly, science can't explain why quantum mechanics does not follow the typical pattern of cause and effect. When Einstein came up with this wall, this idea of the quantum mechanics that he had to deal with, he rejected it because he wanted a cause, clear mathematical cause, that gives absolute answers. And when he couldn't do it, he called it quantum mechanics, spooky actions at a distance, things that are ghostly and seem magical, but they do happen. Science cannot explain how quantum mechanics truly functions without cause and effect, like other physical properties.

And so we go now from the physical universe to how this leads to belief in Jesus Christ. First, this is point four, the life and miracles of Jesus Christ do not fit the description of a magician or a spiritist. What he did is not the typical pattern of a magician using tricks to deceive or a spiritist using demons. His life was one where he did not deceive people, he did not trick people, and he lived a life without sin. So what he did was genuine. Nobody else can ever say the same thing.

The fifth point is that the miracles that Jesus carried out, hundreds of them. John said that if he was to write a book, he said there wouldn't be enough books for all the things that they saw daily. The miracles fit well with Jesus' life and his claims as being the Word that became flesh. Let's think about that. No one else claimed that he came from heaven, and he was the Word with God, and he was God. He came down to the earth because he was going to sacrifice himself, and he was going to give mankind an example. So miracles do apply to a God who came down, walked amongst us, and was still divine. He still was the Word. And so it makes sense that he could do supernatural things through his Father, through the Holy Spirit that was not given with limits, as it says in John 3, verse 34. John 3, verse 34, the New Living Translation, says, So that's the way he was able to do miracles. Since he was sinless, he wasn't going to do any harm. He had full power. If he wanted to use it. And, of course, being the Word, he had exercised full power. The sixth reason is the solid evidence backing the resurrection of Jesus Christ. So all of the witnesses, all the happenings converge. And I once mentioned this Jim Wallace, who was a Los Angeles detective. He had been in thousands of cases. He was a homicide detective. He didn't believe in God. He was as hard-nosed as they came. But his wife started attending a church. And so she finally begged him to come one day, and he came. And it intrigued him about the life of Jesus Christ. And he started studying it, thinking he could refute it. But as he applied his detective skills to the Gospels, he became convinced that this was a very well-solid-backed evidence for the resurrection of Jesus Christ.

His book is called Cold Case Christianity, because he had to solve all these cold case crimes. I would heartily recommend that book.

So when you look at all of the evidence, it makes the miracles more convincing. So all is tied together. That God became flesh. He was what is called Immanuel. God with us. That's called, in technological theological terms, the incarnation. How God became flesh. That was a miracle itself. Then Jesus, living a sinless life, shows that he wasn't just a mere human being. He came from above. And then the resurrection confirmed that he was God in the flesh. All of these converge to show that Jesus Christ is extraordinary. All the proofs, all the miracles he did, the healings, helping because he had godly compassion. He didn't use it to try to focus on himself and his grandeur. No, he focused on others that way. And so what they call the incarnation, the way he came, the way he lived, and how he was resurrected, point to a being that could do miracles, as no one else, quite in the same way, has done them. We've had other prophets in the Old Testament, the apostles, they were able to do miracles. They never claimed they were sinless. They never claimed that they were God in the flesh. Only Jesus Christ can do so. And so from the evidence of science, seeing how this whole universe has been designed, and all of these laws interacting by a wise and powerful creator, and then going and saying, well, then that powerful creator in the figure of Jesus Christ could come down and perform the miracles that we read about those four gospels about Jesus Christ's intervention. And that takes me to the point that Jesus Christ not only did that, the way he came down, born of a virgin, a miracle, then he performed the miracles during his life without limit, and then his resurrection confirmed that he was the Son of God, that he was the Word. And so it all makes sense. It's all logical, like nothing else would be. And Jesus Christ is active in our lives now. That same being is alive at the right hand of the Father. He's our intercessor. He understands us because he was here on the earth. He knows how to apply mercy, how to explain our situation, how to receive forgiveness, how God empowers us through Jesus Christ as well. So it makes sense. We need that advocate. We need that helper in Jesus Christ.

And that takes us to the final point, which is faith in God, in his Word, and what he has created. Hebrews 11, verse 1, it says, Now faith is the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen. So faith is believing the evidence of what God's Word says, and that is strengthened by logic and reason. So you don't have to have this false sense of faith that you can't look at the evidence and strengthen your faith through it. God does not want us to have this just emotional faith or blind faith. He wants us to have a logical faith based on the evidence of the creation, the evidence in our lives, the evidence of what Jesus Christ has done, and that he's there for us now. Notice in 1 Peter chapter 3, verse 15, it says, And so to give a defense to everyone who asks you a reason for the hope that is in you with meekness and fear, having a good conscience, that when they defame you as evildoers, those who revile your good conduct in Christ may be ashamed. And so to give a defense of the faith, it's not some blind hope that we have. It's based on evidence. And you can go from creation all the way to Jesus Christ. It's all a logical sequence of what creation shows us, of a loving, all-powerful God and designer, and how he's rescuing us from evils and sins of this world and helping us to have that relationship with him and with Jesus Christ.

In 2 Timothy chapter 3, final scripture, in verse 16, Paul says, All scripture is given by inspiration of God. So everything God supervised and allowed to be written as he wishes, using human beings that were inspired by the Holy Spirit, but God in that sense vetted it. The term vet means what a veterinarian would do once the animal was examined by a veterinarian and checked out, and then it was known what disease it had. And so when somebody sold an animal, they would say, well, has this been vetted by the doctor?

In other words, the doctor had checked it out. It's a healthy animal, right? But it's the same way here. God vetted the scriptures. He said, this is the way I want it to be placed. All scripture is given by inspiration of God, means God breathed, and is profitable for doctrine, for what we believe, for reproof, to be able to refute. Wrong ideas for correction. So it teaches us how to correct ourselves. For instruction in righteousness, the right way of living, that the man of God, and it includes here the woman as well, may be complete, thoroughly equipped for every good work.

As Sir Manette mentioned about studying scriptures, like the book of Proverbs, to be thoroughly equipped for every good work. So we've covered these points, showing that belief in the creation and intelligent design, which actually is a subset of studying creation, how there is design in the universe, all the different types of proofs of design, and how this leads to belief in Christ.

Because a God who created the universe, out of love, created us, of course, was concerned about our sins, and so they had a plan. He and the Word had a plan to redeem mankind. Makes perfect sense. I'll just finish with a quote from a professor who was an atheist and came to believe in God and intelligent design. It's an article by Michael Eggnor. He's a pediatric neurosurgeon and intelligent design supporter who writes for the Discovery Institute up there in Seattle. He is a professor at the Department of Neurological Surgery at Stony Brook University, a position he has held since 1991. He mentions how he read a book, and actually, it's shorter than a book.

It's a tract by Alexander Solzhenitsyn, who was a prisoner, 11 years in the Soviet concentration camps. It is called, Live Not by Lies by Alexander Solzhenitsyn. This is what Dr. Michael Eggnor concludes. He says, Their power is not in the violence, but in our complicity. Don't be complicit. In other words, don't go along. Don't back it. He says, don't participate. Don't give assent to Darwinism or atheism or Marxist lies.

This is the doctor talking. If you're a teacher, let your students know implicitly, if you cannot do so explicitly, that the Darwinism you are forced to teach in the schools is not, as the censors insist, a perfect doctrine with strengths only and no weaknesses. If you're a scientist, don't include nonsensical Darwinist ideas in your publications or even in your conversations. When others tell Darwinian fairy tales, if you are not in a position to openly reply, equip or a joke they're terrified of ridicule, or just a smirk or rolled eyes is resistance.

You can always just walk away. Sensors of all sorts depend on the cooperation of their victims. Don't cooperate. Don't participate. Serve only the truth. Live not by lies, as Solzhenitsyn said. That's how he survived the Soviet regime. They couldn't corrupt him. They couldn't make him complicit to their lies. And so, as we have seen these points apply to what Romans chapter 1 says about the rejection of God, the suppressing of the truth, and the teaching of lies. In Genesis 1, it clearly shows us that God created all the creatures according to their kind, not one kind becoming another kind or evolving.

It talks about God creating each one of these kinds, or what you would call here phylum, which are the classifications. Now, within the dogs, you have all kinds that can vary, but dogs do not turn into cats. They don't change into another kind of creature. And so, brethren, our goal is then to live by no lies in our lives and our beliefs.