“Where did we come from?”

This is the most fundamental question concerning man’s existence.

“In the beginning God made the heavens and the earth.”

The Bible declares that God made man out of the dust of the earth.

As such, mankind is accountable to God and finds purpose only in Him. The evolutionists propose a very different answer to the question of man’s origin. They claim that we came about through a gradual process of millions of years of evolution. There was no Creator, no Designer.

The Scientific Method vs. the Historical Method

The scientific method widely used today is based on observations of repeated experiments. For example, a hypothesis is put forth; the hypothesis is tested through experimentation; and after many tests, the hypothesis is proven true, and a law is established.

Using the scientific method of repeated experimentation to prove the claim of the Bible that God created the universe is not a possibility. We cannot ask God to recreate the universe for us to observe. Likewise, the naturalistic evolutionists cannot test and observe the whole span of cosmological, geological, and biological evolution from the “Big Bang” to the formation of planets, to the start of life—all the way to humans. That would take billions of years. Neither the Bible’s claim nor secular evolutionists’ proposals for determining where we came from can be repeated by experiment.

The question of origins really lies in the realm of the historical method, not the scientific method. When we want to know what happened in the past, we look for contemporary, first-hand sources—eyewitness accounts from people who lived in that time. A group of revisionists who claim that the Nazi Holocaust during WWII was just a hoax have a hard time convincing people of this because survivors of the Holocaust are still alive today to tell the story. Eyewitness accounts are trustworthy sources. Archaeological evidence also provides answers to the question of origins. The ancient city of Jerusalem has been destroyed and rebuilt many times, each time leaving remnants of the foundations from the previous city. These remnants and ruins that still exist today tell much about the history of the city. The fact remains that the scientific method is not adequate to explain where we (the universe, people, and the diversity of life on Earth) came from. Only the evidence left in the modern-day world is adequate to test our hypotheses. Each hypothesis should be able to predict evidence we can find in our world today. For example, if Genesis is correct, then we would expect to find such things as the earth gradually wearing out as we move away from the “very good” original design, and to find every animal in a distinct category with their “own kind,” rather than reptilian-bird creatures. If naturalistic evolution is correct, then we would expect to find spontaneous generation of new information in the genetic code, and transitional “missing link” animals. We can evaluate the tenets of each model against the evidence present in the world today to determine which model of history makes best sense. The two factors in the historical model— eyewitness accounts and archaeological evidence—are both laid claim to by the Bible. The Genesis account and numerous other verses throughout scripture make claims about things we should find true in the world today (e.g., the earth being round and “suspended in nothingness”), and we can compare these predictions with what we actually find. Beyond that, the Bible claims that there is an eyewitness account of creation— we weren’t there, but God was! Genesis 1 is His eyewitness account of how it happened.

Scientific Facts vs. Scientists’ Opinions

A common misperception confuses scientific facts with scientists’ opinions. A fact of science is hard evidence, something that exists today and can be examined by everyone—like a rock, a leaf, or a fossilized bone. But questions like, “How old is this rock?” or, “How tall was the creature from which this bone came?” belong to the realm of interpretation. Each scientist can form his or her own opinion on the issue, and you can too.

Because the question of origins is not answerable by the scientific method, it really is not an issue of science, but an issue of worldviews. The worldview, or framework of presuppositions that we start with, is the set of tinted glasses through which we see the evidence. If we start with the presupposition that there is no God and, therefore, no intelligent Designer, then viewing the evidence through that worldview can result in a naturalistic evolutionary answer to the question of origins. But if we allow the possibility that there might be a God who made things as outlined in the Bible, then the same physical evidence points to a Creator. In truth, both evolution and creation as models of origins are issues of belief or faith—and in my opinion and evaluation, it takes more faith to believe in evolution than it does to believe in biblical creation!

Genesis: the Eyewitness Account

Though the claim of Genesis cannot be tested through the scientific method, it is validated through much historical evidence. Many great scientists, including some of the most famous in history, believe in a literal account of creation as described in Genesis. The creation story is the foundation for all the rest of scripture. The Bible is not a science textbook; it is better than a textbook because it does not change with the shifting opinions of men. In Genesis we have the firsthand, eyewitness account of creation, written by the only One who was there—God Himself!

Sean Ho describes himself as a child of God, an ordinary guy saved by Jesus’ extraordinary grace. He’s also a self-described computer and gadget geek .He grew up in Seattle, Washington, as the youngest of four children, and recently joined the Computing Science faculty at Trinity Western University in Langley, B.C. In his spare time, he enjoys taking naps and jamming on his acoustic guitar.