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Creation 34(4):6, October 2012

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iStockphoto Two theologians

A tale of two theologians

Editorial

by

Our ministry has long pointed out that belief in a literal creation is not essential for salvation.1 But we have also affirmed that there are many glaring inconsistencies between evolution and biblical Christianity. So when people learn more biblical truth, there are only three main alternatives:

  1. Just live with the inconsistencies, as some manage to do, suffering cognitive dissonance. We can be thankful for ‘blessed inconsistency’ in those infrequent cases where it does not overtly affect a believer’s walk of faith.
  2. Affirm the Bible and throw out evolution (and its prerequisite, billions of years).
  3. Reject even more of the Bible, including even Christ’s own words.

The two theologians in this tale illustrate choices 2 and 3.

The first is Pastor Esa Hukkinen (see interview, p. 49). He was already a Pastor with a fine Christian testimony, but had also swallowed evolutionary ‘science’. Fortunately, a young man in his congregation challenged him to read our little booklet 15 Reasons to Take Genesis as History. This led him to research this issue, both biblically and scientifically.

Pastor Hukkinen realized that evolution impacts even the Gospel itself, and as a result, he now has a more consistent Christianity. He is more confident about sharing his faith, and says it has even helped him counsel people about the biblical teachings on other issues such as marriage, which began in Genesis. Indeed, when Jesus Himself was asked about marriage, He cited Genesis 1:27 and 2:24 as real history, to justify marriage as a union between one man and one woman (Matthew 19:3–6, Mark 10:3–6).

The second theologian, who went down the opposite track, is Rev. Keith Mascord. Until 2006, he taught at the renowned Sydney Anglican Moore College, which was once sound on its teachings on Genesis. It still has a reputation of being soundly evangelical, but is now hostile to biblical creation. They would claim that the Bible doesn’t really teach a young earth and a global flood, as hard as that is to believe. Mascord is actually far more consistent, but in the wrong direction.

He recently wrote a column in the Sydney Morning Herald advocating that Christians should accept gay ‘marriage’.2 Of course, he realizes that the Bible opposes this. But no matter: we can just ‘re-think’ (code for ‘disbelieve’) these clear passages. And his justification? We don’t believe Noah’s Flood any more either. He points out (contrary to what many compromising evangelicals teach) that it was not meant to be local or allegorical:

“Moreover, whenever the story is referred to elsewhere in the Bible, the writers appear to take the story as factual. Jesus appears to have accepted the story in this way (Luke 17:26–27). Jewish and Christian interpreters have also mostly taken it that way as well, until the past few hundred years.”

So, because we shouldn’t believe Jesus on the Flood, we shouldn’t believe Him on marriage either:

“There is good reason to think we will need to do the same [i.e. overturn ‘the plain (and church-history-long) reading’ of the Bible’s words] with the issue of marriage equality.”3

Thus the question of origins is no side issue—even the explicit teachings of Christ are rejected!

Fortunately, in Creation magazine, we always have articles to show why we can trust the Bible, and that real science supports it with regard to the Flood. For the Flood, we have evidence that granites formed very quickly, not over millions of years (p. 20). We feature revived bacteria allegedly 100 million years old (p. 35). And with regard to science in general, every issue has an interview with a top Bible-believing scientist (in this issue, a theoretical physicist, p. 16). On matters of morality, we have a surprising hostile witness to the value of the Bible—‘Darwin’s bulldog’ T.H. Huxley (p. 40).

So, by spreading this magazine, we can help to produce more theologians/theology of Type 1 (choice 2) and fewer of Type 2 (choice 3)!

Posted on homepage: 15 August 2012

References and notes

  1. E.g. Moritz, K., Can Christians believe evolution?, 21 October 2010. Return to text.
  2. Mascord, K., Beliefs must be tempered by facts, smh.com.au, 18 June 2012. Return to text.
  3. For more information, see Sarfati, J., Gay ‘marriage’ and the consistent outcome of Genesis compromise, creation.com/gay, June 2012. Return to text.

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