Not too old to be Expelled

by D. Russell Humphreys

Movie still from www.expelledthemovie.com

Ben Stein ponders Darwin’s legacy

When I went to see Expelled at a local movie theatre, I was prepared to be told lots of things I already knew. When I became a young-earth creationist thirty-eight years ago, I found out pretty quickly that the evidence against naturalistic evolution was so great that I didn’t want to spend time gathering more. It was like beating a fossil horse … those who had any ability to think reasonably about the subject could easily see, without further help from me, that evolution is not in the fossils, not in nature today, nor in the lab. So Intelligent Design (only a subset of young-earth creationism) as the only scientifically believable explanation of the existence of life, one of the main themes of Expelled, seemed like a good thing to explain to the general public, people who still believe everything they see on public TV science programs or read in the New York Times. But what would the movie have for me?

The other big theme of the movie, that the academic establishment censors people who try to present evidence against naturalistic evolution, would also be no surprise to me, I expected. Every creationist scientist who has tried to publish new evidence for a young, non-evolved universe knows this suppression first-hand. I, like most creationists, have seen attacks upon my career and credibility frequently. Sure, the movie would be good for the naive majority that thinks that the science establishment even-handedly accepts evidence on all sides of the issues. But how was the movie going to keep me awake?

The answer was that it kicked me in the gut. It made me see—no, feel—that I’d grown accustomed to the intolerable. I’d been taking the censorship as something in the natural order of things, and as the suppression increased, I just adjusted to it, like the proverbial frog in hot water. But the movie made me realize that our God-ordained right of free thought and speech is under systematic and increasing attack. By controlling the public “microphone”, as Phil Johnson says, the Darwinists have been hoodwinking our minds.

I’d also been only intellectually aware of the consequences on people’s lives. But as I saw the human wreckage made by Darwinism, as at one of Hitler’s ghastly facilities for weeding (by execution) physically and mentally unfit humans out of the race he wanted to purify (just helping out natural selection a bit), I began to realize deep down that the idea of evolution is truly evil. Looking at Dachau through the eyes of a little Jewish man, Ben Stein (the producer and protagonist), brought home to me that Darwinism is a religion of death. It claims that to improve some, others must die. How could any sane person promote such a religion?

Yet some people do promote it, and I’ll let you judge whether they are sane. Ben Stein’s penetrating interviews with dedicated Darwinists such as William Provine and Richard Dawkins will open your eyes. You begin to see through new eyes the despair and hatred of God that propels such people. The interviews brought fresh conviction to me that these men know deep in their hearts that they are wrong. But out of a fierce desire to maintain their independence in this world, these fully-aware intellectual leaders will fight God even as they fall into the lake of fire. It apparently gives them comfort to try to bring others with them by deception, misleading millions into worshipping “an image in the form of corruptible man and of birds and four-footed animals and crawling creatures” (Romans 1:23).

So, even if you’re an experienced creationist, this world-class documentary will open your eyes. If you’re not that experienced, it will be an epiphany.

Related articles

• Expelled: New movie exposes persecution of anti-Darwinists
• Cracking the wall in science
• The Darwinian roots of the Nazi tree

Further reading

• Contemporary suppression of the theistic worldview
• Discrimination against creation scientists

Recommended Resources

The Battle For Truth

by David A. Noebel

One way for Christians to better know their own faith is to know the alternatives that are shaping our world. David Noebel’s landmark book Understanding the Times has established itself as an outstanding tool for meeting this challenge. Now, the same thorough discussion of the impact of the major worldviews that compete with Christianity for the hearts and minds of modern men and women is available in a new, abridged, easier-to-read edition. This book provides Christians with a readable, comprehensive treatment of the most popular worldviews of our day—worldviews that have a surprisingly powerful presence in education, business, politics and the media. 384 pages.

Published: 29 August 2008(GMT+10)

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