Genesis 11:9
“Therefore is the name of it called Babel; because the LORD did there confound the language of all the earth: and from thence did the LORD scatter them abroad upon the face of all the earth.”

“Ancient stone-tool makers spread into largely unstudied parts of North Africa and the Arabian Peninsula surprisingly early” begins an article on the popular Science News website. The article concerns the recent discovery of stone cutting tools at two sites in Algeria. Evolutionary anthropologists have two possible explanations for this. Most evolutionists believe that human beings evolved in East Africa – areas now covered by nations such as Tanzania and Kenya. So the cutting tools found in North Africa suggest to some that there had been early migration of hominids from East to North Africa, or that hominids had evolved separately in more than one region.

The latter idea might well be worrying for classical evolutionists. The Out-of-Africa model of human evolution is more specifically an Out-of-East-Africa model, developed so that evolutionists can claim that all so-called “races” of people developed from the one group in East Africa. This enables neo-Darwinists to shake off the accusation of racism that can certainly be fairly leveled at Darwin’s writings. The Science News article complicates matters further by reporting on the finds of African-style stone axes in the Arabian Peninsula also.

Biblical creationists see stone tools as nothing unusual. People scattering throughout the world due to the Tower of Babel incident can be expected to have made early tools out of easily sourced materials such as stone when they were newly arrived into a region. And a biblical anthropology gives a much more accurate rebuttal to racism than evolution.

creationmoments.com/sermons/a-north-african-stone-age

“On Thursday, the Kentucky Supreme Court issued a unanimous 6-0 ruling in favor of a Lexington-based print shop owner who refused to print messages that violated his deeply held religious beliefs. The case dates back to 2012, when the Gay and Lesbian Services Organization (GLSO) filed a complaint with the Lexington-Fayette Urban County Human Rights Commission against print shop owner Blaine Adamson, who, citing his Christian beliefs, declined a request to print shirts promoting the Lexington Gay Pride Festival. Adamson reportedly declined politely and referred the organization to another printer who was willing to print the shirts. The GLSO complained that Adamson was discriminating against LGBT customers by refusing to promote the event. In 2014, the commission ruled that Adamson must print messages conflicting with his religious convictions. The court system subsequently ruled repeatedly against the commission’s order, until the case eventually made its way to the state’s highest court. The Alliance Defending Freedom (ADF), who helped represent Adamson in the case, maintained that the business owner has demonstrated that he ‘serves all people, including LGBT customers,’ as he did when his shop, Hands On Originals, printed promotional materials for an openly lesbian singer who performed at the Lexington’s 2012 Pride festival. Adamson also has taken a consistent stand on the issue of free speech, ADF underscored, refusing to print other messages that likewise conflict with his Christian beliefs, including shirts advertising a strip club, shirts containing violent messages, and ‘pens promoting a sexually explicit video.’ The ruling by Kentucky’s highest court, ADF argues in the release, ‘highlights why the U.S. Supreme Court should take up the important First Amendment issue at the heart of the case and decide whether governments may force creative professionals who serve everyone to print messages or create art that violates their beliefs.’”

“Supreme Court Rules in Favor, Daily Wire, Oct. 31, 2019

Genesis 6:14
“Make thee an ark of gopher wood; rooms shalt thou make in the ark, and shalt pitch it within and without with pitch.”

In my line of work as an apologist for the Christian faith, I often come across people who want to tell me about their favorite theory about the Ark. Many expeditions have been made to the regions around Ararat, and some of them have turned up what they call evidence that the Ark is still there. Yet, I am skeptical. Why am I so skeptical, you might ask? Don’t I want to see the actual, real-life Ark?

Well, yes I do! I would love it if the Ark were actually found. I would love it if someone found the true cross on which Jesus died. But I doubt we will find either of these objects. They were made of wood. That wood will have rotted away by now.

At first encounter, the motivation for wanting to discover the Ark seems sound. As one visitor to my Creation Center said, “When they see this, they’ll have to believe the Bible is true.” Well, they will have to accept the truth of God’s word one day, but finding the Ark won’t necessarily convince a skeptic to repent. Not even if the full-size Ark is uncovered, and on one side we can read, clearly scratched into the wood, “Ham, Shem and Japheth were here.”

Science and logic actually depend on the Bible being true, not the other way around. The best evidence that the Ark existed is clear for all to see – it is written in the pages of God’s word.

creationmoments.com/sermons/the-best-evidence-for-the-ark

“During the American Civil War the opposing armies of the Federals and Confederates on a certain occasion were facing each other. One night a Confederate sentry was on duty when he heard the sound of singing coming from the Federal lines. He proceeded cautiously in their direction, and observed an enemy sentry pacing up and down, singing ‘Jesu, Lover of My Soul.’ Bringing his gun to his shoulder, he was about to shoot, when the singer came to the words, ‘Cover my defenceless head with the shadow of Thy wing.’ This was too much for the Confederate and he lowered his weapon and allowed his would-be victim to go unharmed. Many years passed, and the Confederate, now a private gentleman, was aboard an excursion steamer on the Potomac River, when he heard an evangelist singing this hymn. Memories were aroused, and thinking he recognised the voice, he made his way to the singer and in conversation found that the evangelist was indeed the sentry he had nearly shot. Great was their mutual joy when he revealed to the singer the peril from which he had been saved in that night long ago, when on sentry duty he besought divine protection by singing, ‘Jesu, Lover of My Soul.’”

Dr. Julian’s Hymnology

Isaiah 59:5
“They hatch cockatrice’ eggs, and weave the spider’s web: he that eateth of their eggs dieth, and that which is crushed breaketh out into a viper.”

Not every spider can kill you if it bites you! But I have never really warmed to the eight-legged monsters. It’s the sheer legginess of spiders that repels me. And jumping spiders are the worst.

So, when I came across a science news article about a particular jumping spider called toxeus magna, I didn’t think it was something I wanted to read, nor did I want to see the pictures. But, despite myself, I found this one fascinating. The mother spiders are actually good mothers and carefully look after their babies.

This particular species was discovered in a park in Singapore. When scientist Zanqi Chen found the species, he found a female surrounded by babies. Yet, other jumping spiders are loners and sometimes even eat their young. This one was nursing them.

Chen’s surprise deepened when he studied them in the lab. The mother spider was observed to be leaving droplets of white secretion around the nest, and the babies drank it up. Sometimes, babies clung to their mother and appeared to be suckling. Closer analysis showed that the baby spiders could not survive without this liquid, which, for a period, provided their only sustenance. Despite not being a mammal, these spiders appear to suckle their young on what is, for all intents and purposes, a liquid acting like milk.

God has made some remarkable creatures, and I never cease to be amazed at the marvels that He has created.

creationmoments.com/sermons/a-good-mother-spider

Of the 2016 Orlando nightclub shooting Steven Anderson said, “The good news is that there’s 50 less pedophiles in this world, because these homosexuals are just a bunch of disgusting perverts and pedophiles” (“Gay Hating Preacher,” Sunday Express, Sept. 16, 2016). He said it was too bad some of the homosexuals survived. Of transgender celebrity Bruce (Caitlyn) Jenner, Anderson said in a sermon, “Listen to me – I hate him with a perfect hatred. I have no love for this Bruce freak. I hope he dies today, I hope he dies and goes to Hell – he’s disgusting, he’s filthy, he’s reprobate” (Adam Salandra, “Pastor Prays Caitlyn Jenner’s Heart Explodes,” NewNowNex, n.d.). Anderson teaches that there is no hope for homosexuals to be saved. On his video, “Born That Way?” he says, “Well, I’m just saying that the Bible teaches in many places that it can become too late for a person before that point sometimes, if they reject Christ enough. And I would say homosexuals fall into that category” (about 7:07f). He says, “There are no queers allowed in this church. No homos will ever be allowed in this church as long as I am the pastor here. Never!” (youtube.com/watch?v=ttxumEkHnKE). This is unscriptural nuttiness. Any sinner should be welcome to attend church services as visitors, so long as he doesn’t cause trouble, because the church’s commission is to invite all people to God’s salvation. Christ made the propitiation for the whole world (1 John 2:2), meaning He made salvation possible for all men, and He commanded the gospel to be preached “to every creature” (Mark 16:15), and every creature means every creature! On any given week we have adulterers, fornicators, homosexuals, polygamists, idolaters, thieves, liars, and demon possessed people in our church services. Anyone is welcome to attend to hear the preaching of God’s Word. On the other hand, church membership requires born again salvation with evidence. The membership of the church of Corinth is described as follows: “Know ye not that the unrighteous shall not inherit the kingdom of God? Be not deceived: neither fornicators, nor idolaters, nor adulterers, nor effeminate, nor abusers of themselves with mankind, Nor thieves, nor covetous, nor drunkards, nor revilers, nor extortioners, shall inherit the kingdom of God. And SUCH WERE SOME OF YOU: but ye are washed, but ye are sanctified, but ye are justified in the name of the Lord Jesus, and by the Spirit of our God” (1 Corinthians 6:9-11). Here we see that homosexuals can be saved and experience a changed life in Jesus Christ, and they are saved in the same way as any other sinner: by repenting of their sin against God and believing on Jesus Christ as Saviour with all the heart. “Testifying both to the Jews, and also to the Greeks, repentance toward God, and faith toward our Lord Jesus Christ” (Acts 20:21). Then, again, Steven Anderson doesn’t believe in biblical repentance, and this is probably his chief heresy. (See What about Steven Anderson? available as a free eBook from www.wayoflife.org.)

(Friday Church News Notes, November 1, 2019, www.wayoflife.org [email protected], 866-295-4143)

Genesis 1:21
“And God created great whales, and every living creature that moveth, which the waters brought forth abundantly, after their kind, and every winged fowl after his kind: and God saw that it was good.”

Whalebone was used for all sorts of ornaments and structural purposes as a gently bendable, yet firm material. Today it has been replaced by plastics. But it wasn’t really bone. It came from the mouth of the whale. The structure is known today as baleen, and it is made of keratin, like your fingernails. The whale swallows huge quantities of water, then spits it out, sieving it through the baleen to catch the small krill organisms on which the baleen whale thrives.

Evolutionists have to believe that this baleen evolved, as they believe that the ancestors of the whale had teeth – as do non-baleen whales today. A recent article on one popular-style science website stated that “rivaling the evolution of feathers in dinosaurs, one of the most extraordinary transformations in the history of life was the evolution of baleen.” The comparison is appropriate. We have remarked many times on the sheer impossibility of the evolution of feathers, and so it is with the evolution of baleen.

The difficulty for evolutionists is working out a possible mechanism for the imaginary intermediate forms. Would the intermediate have had both teeth and baleen, or would there have had to be creatures with neither teeth nor baleen? If the latter, would those animals not have starved to death?

As is usual, it makes more sense to suppose that God designed baleen whales exactly as they needed to be so that they can live successfully in the oceans.

creationmoments.com/sermons/when-the-whale-lost-its-teeth

Earlier this year, Steven Anderson’s bank account was frozen by Bank of America and his funds were held for weeks before being returned via a cashier’s check in the mail. He was told, simply, that his account was terminated, he would not be told why, and the decision was irreversible (“Bank of America Freezes,” Pulpit & Pen, Apr. 16, 2019). He has also been frozen out by Paypal, Easy Tithe, and six other financial platforms, none of them giving a reason. He has been banned from traveling to about 34 countries, including England, Canada, Ireland, South Africa, New Zealand, and the Netherlands. This has to do with Anderson’s stand against homosexuality and possibly, too, his denial of the Holocaust. Anderson is a Baptist preacher who has wide influence through his YouTube videos and movies. He is laden down with heresies, as we warn in the book What about Steven Anderson? but corporations like Bank of America and PayPal should not be in the business of judging and punishing belief systems. Why should it be their business what their customers believe? This is moving in the direction of Communist China’s Social Credit system, but in this case it is faceless global corporations doing the rating and the punishing.

(Friday Church News Notes, November 1, 2019, www.wayoflife.org [email protected], 866-295-4143)

Colossians 2:8
“Beware lest any man spoil you through philosophy and vain deceit, after the tradition of men, after the rudiments of the world, and not after Christ.”

What evidence could we provide that would prove to an evolutionist that evolution was false?

Apparently, the late evolutionary biologist J.B.S. Haldane (1892–1964) addressed this question, and his answer was, famously, “Precambrian rabbits”. More exactly, he opined that if fossils of rabbits were found in precambrian rocks, then this would just about wrap up the case for evolution. So the answer about precambrian rabbits has been used over and over again – I have been offered the same answer, with the person concerned having no idea who had first given the answer.

Richard Dawkins commented on Haldane’s answer in his book The God Delusion. He wrote:

Evolution makes the strong prediction that if a single fossil turned up in the wrong geological stratum, the theory of evolution would be blown out of the water…. No such anachronistic fossils have ever been authentically found.

In practice, this is not the case. There are plenty of out-of-place fossils discovered. Usually, such fossils are linked by ghost lineages. It is ironic that the Dawkins quote just given came from a chapter about the “God of the Gaps”, which he accuses us of believing in, while ghost lineages represent a clear case of “evolution of the gaps”.

However, evolutionary philosopher Peter Godfrey-Smith suggested that precambrian rabbits would simply point out errors in the system that needed to be re-written, without overthrowing the whole edifice of evolution. You see, the issue is not about the evidence, and it never has been.

creationmoments.com/sermons/a-rabbit-in-the-precambrian

“The US military operation that resulted in the death of ISIS leader Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi [in Syria on Oct. 26] was dedicated to Kayla Mueller, a young Christian woman who was kidnapped, tortured, and murdered by the Islamic State. Mueller, 26, was abducted by ISIS in August 2013 in Aleppo, Syria while serving on a humanitarian mission with Doctors Without Borders. US officials said Baghdadi tortured and repeatedly raped her at his compound before announcing in 2015 that she died in captivity. Her body has never been recovered. White House National Security Adviser Robert O'Brien told NBC's Meet the Press on Sunday that the operation against Baghdadi was named after Mueller. ‘The chairman of the joint chiefs of staff named the operation that took down al-Baghdadi after Kayla Mueller, after what she had suffered,’ O'Brien said, adding that Baghdadi was the ‘most vicious, cruel man.’ Her father, Carl Mueller, recounted his daughter's last days in an interview with The Arizona Republic shortly after President Donald Trump announced Baghdadi's death. ‘What this man did to Kayla — he kidnapped her,’ Mueller said. ‘She was held in many prisons. She was held in solitary confinement. She was tortured. She was intimidated. She was ultimately raped by al-Baghdadi himself. He either killed her or he was complicit in her murder,’ Mueller said. ‘I'll let people who read this article make up their own mind how a parent should feel.’ Mueller's fellow hostages, who were later freed, told ABC News in 2016 she never stopped caring for others and even defended her faith against the infamous British ISIS executioner named Mohammed Emwazias, also known as ‘Jihadi John.’ Mueller also spoke extensively about how she relied on her faith in a hand-written letter given to her parents while she was in captivity. Mueller’s cellmates who were eventually freed gave the letter to her family in the spring of 2014. Mueller wrote: ‘I remember mom always telling me that all in all in the end the only one you really have is God. I have come to a place in experience where, in every sense of the word, I have surrendered myself to our creator b/c literally there was no else.+ by God + by your prayers I have felt tenderly cradled in freefall...I have been shown in darkness, light + have learned that even in prison, one can be free. I am grateful.’”

“Baghdadi Operation Named after Christian Woman,” CBNNews, Oct. 28, 2019

Colossians 2:8
“Beware lest any man spoil you through philosophy and vain deceit, after the tradition of men, after the rudiments of the world, and not after Christ.”

If you look up an animal in an encyclopedia, whether that animal is extant or extinct, you will usually be presented with a cladogram, which looks like a sideways family tree, and it represents the supposed evolutionary descent of the creature. Building up these cladograms has been a highly sophisticated feature of evolutionary theory and research for a long time. What you may not have realized is that some parts of these cladograms do not represent real creatures. These portions of the cladograms are referred to as ghost lineages.

The reason for a ghost lineage is as follows. Evolutionary geologists and paleontologists have agreed on the age for certain rock layers. This is because geologists date rocks based on the index fossils within them while paleontologists date the fossils according to the rock layer in which they were found. But sometimes an out of place fossil gets found. For example, certain plesiosaur fossils were found in Cretaceous rocks. When a plesiosaur was found in Jurassic rock, which evolutionists thought to be 50 million years older, they had a dilemma. On the one hand, they could re-date one of the rock layers – but that would alter the dates of other fossils. So they chose to invent a lineage between the “older” and “younger” fossil across their 50-million-year gap.

Biblical creationists understand that almost all fossils were made during the Flood, so the concept of out-of-place fossils does not arise.

creationmoments.com/sermons/ghosts-and-fossils

At a Truth Matters Conference at his Grace Community Church, October 16-18, 2019, John MacArthur was asked at a Q&A session about Beth Moore. MacArthur answered with two words, “go home.” He followed this with, “There is no case that can be made biblically for a woman preacher. Period. Paragraph. End of discussion. I think this is feminism gone to church. This is why we can’t let the culture exegete the Bible.” That is biblical exhortation, 100%, and MacArthur will certainly not regret it at the judgment seat of Christ. While we can’t accept MacArthur’s Reformed theology, we very much appreciate outspoken preachers in this cowardly era. And he said this on the 50th anniversary of his ministry. In May of this year, Moore said that she has come to the conclusion that men who oppose women preachers are jealous and carnal. Apparently she had a revelation that gave her the ability to judge the heart motives of other people. After SBC professor Owen Strachan of Midwestern Baptist Theological Seminary said that “women should not preach on Sunday to the church,” Moore publicly reproved him on her Twitter account, saying, “I would be terrified to be a woman you’d approve of.” In so saying, she is admitting that she refuses to be a woman the apostle Paul would approve of, since he is the one who forcefully forbade women to “teach nor to usurp authority over the man, but to be in silence” (1 Timothy 2:12). Beth Moore is not very good at being in silence, or, it would seem, with exhibiting the “meek and quiet spirit, which is in the sight of God of great price” (1 Peter 3:4). She called Owen’s biblical position “sexism and misogyny.” Not surprisingly, MacArthur was widely criticized, including by J.D. Greear, Southern Baptist Convention president, and Danny Akin, Southeastern Baptist Theological Seminary president. Some criticized MacArthur for his view, others for his “tone.” But those who think John MacArthur is harsh need to spend more time with the old God-approved Bible preachers such as Enoch, who said of this present generation, “And Enoch also, the seventh from Adam, prophesied of these, saying, Behold, the Lord cometh with ten thousands of his saints, To execute judgment upon all, and to convince all that are UNGODLY among them of all their UNGODLY deeds which they have UNGODLY committed, and of all their hard speeches which UNGODLY sinners have spoken against him” (Jude 15). How about that for “tone”! I wonder if Enoch is a misogynist?

(Friday Church News Notes, November 1, 2019, www.wayoflife.org [email protected], 866-295-4143)

Leviticus 11:3-6
“Whatsoever parteth the hoof, and is clovenfooted, and cheweth the cud, among the beasts, that shall ye eat. Nevertheless these shall ye not eat of them that chew the cud, or of them that divide the hoof: as the camel, because he cheweth the cud, but divideth not the hoof; he is unclean unto you. And the coney, because he cheweth the cud, but divideth not the hoof; he is unclean unto you. And the hare, because he cheweth the cud, but divideth not the hoof; he is unclean unto you.”

Every so often, you will come across an unbeliever who has managed to get a snippet of information from the Bible without knowing where that information is from or what it really means. One example of this is the accusation that the Bible says that rabbits chew the cud, but they don’t, so obviously the Bible is wrong.

To save time, the relevant passage is part of the food laws in Leviticus 11:6. The Israelites are given permission to eat animals with cloven hooves, that chew the cud. So the rabbit or hare is specifically excluded because “he cheweth the cud, but divideth not the hoof”.

Ruminants, such as cattle, sheep and goats, pass the test, so to speak, because they do indeed chew the cud and have cloven hooves. Notice that “divideth the hoof” is not an action, but rather a description. These ruminants swallow grass relatively unchewed into one stomach. They later regurgitate this partially digested grass, chew it again (chewing the cud) and swallow it again, whereon it passes through the other stomachs.

But the Hebrew word does not describe this action. Instead, it describes “raising up what has been swallowed”. Rabbits do indeed do this because they produce partly digested light fecal pellets, which they eat, digest further, then defecate the more familiar, darker fecal pellets. So, the complex digestive system of the rabbit does match what the original Hebrew actually says even though the English appears to be different.

creationmoments.com/sermons/do-rabbits-prove-the-bible-wrong