Attention must be given to the thought expressed by Christians in using the word ‘creation’! Creation is the assertion that the entire material world has a spiritual first cause. Jesus (and all writers of the Bible) teaches us that ‘God is spirit’ (John 4:24). As we teach children in our catechisms, ‘God is a spirit and has not a body like men.’ There is no material aspect to God. So, we go on to teach our children, ‘I can­not see God, but he always sees me.’ God cannot be known by empiri­cal or sensual detection! Yet God uses no material preceptors to have full knowledge of man.

Material and Spiritual Reality⤒🔗

Therefore these truths have profound implications for the ‘debate’ over creation or evolution: First, ‘science’ as we now know it cannot have anything to say about origins. If there is spiritual reality, science has pledged itself to ignore what is spirit. Science has made the law of its studies that it will speak of nothing that cannot be proven by em­pirical measurement. By its very definition, spirit is never empirically perceived. It is a dogmatic presupposition of science that nothing but the material (that which has empirically observable qualities) exists. But Christians dogmatically assert that the most profound elements of reality are entirely spiritual. Christians are always speaking about the heart or the soul of man. Beyond that, their system of reality includes entirely spiritual beings – God, angels, and devils.

Evolution Is Incapable of Explaining Beginnings←⤒🔗

What is more, if science is devoted to the proposition that all mate­rial reality has only material causes, and that it will speak only about empirically discovered causes and effects, then science cannot speak of origins or beginnings! There can be no first cause of material reality if you assume that material things all have material causes. Science as a system of thought implicitly asserts the eternal existence of material things. Hence evolution cannot be an explanation of the beginning of anything. Evolution assumes the existence of material reality prior to the discussion of any development or effect.

Christians too must cease and desist from attempts to prove crea­tion by means of the scientific method. Christians must radically re­define science by denying that it is a method of discovering all truth by entirely empirical methods. Under the scientific system we have no right to speak of that which eludes all empirical observation by being entirely spiritual. Yet a world without spirits is not a biblical definition of the world!

Knowledge Comes by Faith←⤒🔗

It is ‘by faith we understand that the universe was created by the word of God, so that what is seen was not made out of things that are vis­ible’ (Heb. 11:3). God declared to us in his divine verbal revelation that he created all things in the beginning. This declaration permeates the entire Bible. So the entirety of the world was not made out of things that are empirically defined or perceived! We are certain that evolution is not the explanation of our world’s beginning. But our knowledge comes by faith and not by science. God who is spirit told us of creation by his Holy Spirit. By the same Holy Spirit’s working in us we were given faith to receive this truth from Scripture.

What is more, we are certain that empirical science can neither plumb the depths of the present order of material creation nor explain it fully. We know of a certainty that our universe is not now self-suf­ficient for its existence. God’s Son is continuing even now to uphold the universe by the word of his power (Heb. 1:2-3). The actions of divine power keep the world in existence and in its present order. Fur­thermore, God, angels, devils, and human spirits profoundly impact the course of human history. Man himself is more than the sum of his material make-up. Man, although having a body formed of the ground (and therefore similar to those of the animal realm), also has a soul made in the image of God. That the invisible spirit within man interacts with God, angels, devils, and other human souls to make human history renders it impossible to view the world as having merely mate­rial elements. This of necessity means that our world is not entirely available to empirical examination. To give just one example, could you enjoy reading a strictly scientific description of love between two people, with neither person’s spirit taken into consideration? Anyone whose view of human existence, life and history is confined to material cause and effect has a very narrow and insufficient outlook.

Some will object by pointing to Psalm 19: ‘The heavens declare the glory of God and the sky above proclaims his handiwork. Day to day pours out speech, and night to night reveals knowledge’ (verses 1-2). Paul taught that God’s invisible attributes, namely, his eternal power and divine nature have been clearly perceived ... in the things that have been made (Rom. 1:20). This is also true. All creation is God’s handiwork. If a man’s spirit has been caught up in the glory and won­der of what God has made, with a soul informed by Scripture that the Lord God made it all, that man senses a great deal about God. In addi­tion, even the unconverted man who despises the Bible cannot escape his own spiritual dimension. This is because even while denying the divine, to please his scientific regulators of politically-correct thought, a witness is inwardly given him demanding pause to contemplate the Creator.

Whatever method one uses to speculate about the beginning of our material world, the smallest pinch of humility would keep the greatest thinker from being dogmatic. When there is the least whiff of meekness in a scientist, he will speak of theory, not of certainty. To start with, neither evolutionist nor creationist was an observer of the beginning of our world! The Christian’s advantage over the secularist has nothing whatever to do with his own studies or contemplations. Neither party should exude personal confidence in his studies.

The Christian has heard from the gospel of John concerning Jesus that, ‘He was in the beginning with God. All things were made through him and without him was not anything made that was made’ (John 1:2-3), and he believes this by faith! A full account of the history of Jesus’ life, death, and resurrection has been recorded which is well known throughout the world. He who rose from the dead can speak with a voice of authority about the beginning. He was there! He was intimately involved in the entire work of creation. We must trumpet his witness to the origins of our universe everywhere, even by telling it to scientists!

It is, of course, possible for a Christian to engage in ‘scientific stud­ies’, but it is not possible for him to deny the Lord Jesus who bought him. Through scientific studies and discussions, one may show the ab­surdity or falsehood of some scientific ‘conclusions’ about the issue of creation versus evolution. Yet it is not possible through science alone to prove creation. We know that by faith. Believing scientists should assert their faith. But faith, by its very definition, can never rest upon scientific methods.