I believe what Jesus believed

I believe what Jesus believed - FROM: www.answersingenesis.org

13 June 2005

In 2005 Philip Bell, a British biologist and staff member of Answers in Genesis, one of the world’s largest creation apologetics ministries, visited Hungary. Mr. Bell gave a series of lectures on creation / evolution, which is a heavily debated topic among many. On Saturday afternoon Philip gave an interview to the readers of Bible and Congregation, a Christian magazine published by the Hungarian Bible Union in Hungary. The magazine was represented by Istvan Weber, a sociologist.

Istvan Weber [IW]: You give convincing lectures on the importance of Creation. Why is it important to you?

Philip Bell [PB]: It really goes back to my days in university. I was brought up in a Christian home to believe the Bible from the very first verse and I defended that literal creation view all the way through high school until I was sixteen or seventeen. I had, really, the faith of my parents—I was loyal to them. But when I studied more advanced biology at the age of seventeen I was influenced by a Biology teacher who was a Christian and a lovely person, a great teacher of Biology. She gave me a love for the subject and taught me the evolution view. The evidence she provided at that time seemed quite plausible to me. And so, without really thinking through the implications for my Christian faith, I decided that yes, God must have used evolution. I swallowed the idea that the Bible tells us why God created and science fills in the details of how He did it. But then I got to University as a committed believer in evolution and I fully expected to find more evidence for the theory. But, I was not a sceptic but rather a true believer in God.

Two things happened at university. First of all my faith became a living faith as I really understood the doctrine of grace; I was sure of my salvation for probably the first time in my life. That was tremendous as my faith was now coming alive. At the same time I was looking at what I was learning in Zoology and Botany and I realised they were asking me to believe certain things without supporting evidence. For instance, I remember well, I was taught that insects without wings evolved into insects with wings. Fine, I thought: Let’s see the evidence. I was not shown a single fossil of a creature with partly-formed wings that was on the way to becoming an insect with wings. And I realised, Wow, this is really ‘believed by faith’! And then I was told that land mammals evolved into creatures like whales and dolphins which went back into the ocean. Again I expected to be shown some information, some fossil material to support this idea. I was not shown a single example. And with such a lack of evidence I seriously began to question the biological data and the whole theory that was built around it. At the same time, because of what was happening in my Christian life, I decided I had to sit down and very carefully go through Genesis, really reading what the Bible was communicating about Creation. And though I had read it many times before, I realised then that it is written as history—that came to me very forcibly. And I also began to see that my approach to Genesis affected the way I approached the rest of Scripture. What was written as real history, I had re-interpreted because of outside opinions from science. Why didn’t I do that with the Virgin Birth, with the Resurrection, with Jesus’ miracles, walking on the water, turning water into wine and so on? Science would say you cannot have these things happening but Christians believe them by faith. In the same way I reasoned that I ought to—if I was consistent—accept the miracles of Creation and the Flood by faith. At the same time I had the scientific data to wrestle with. I had a choice to make.

So the second thing that happened to me is that I decided to reject evolution, partly because of the lack of scientific evidence but also because I saw that it was in direct conflict with the Bible’s teaching about Creation. And I found a tremendous release in my Christian faith from that point on. I have changed my mind on some of the details since then, but I rejected evolution as an explanation for origins and a little bit later I rejected the millions of years that went with it. And it made a great difference to my Christian faith.

[For his answers on such questions as:
- A lot of Christians have compromised and believe that the authority of the Bible is in contradiction with the results of scientific research. How do you approach this question?
- Why is Creation important for today’s Christianity?
- How can we use the Creation account to address the post-modern man?
GO TO: http://www.answersingenesis.org/docs2005/0613hungarian_interview.asp]