Most of my life has found me in Sunday school and church on Sunday morning. I was taught as a boy to go and I feel guilty if I am not there. Numerous denominations have found me in the pew. A preacher I am not, but a listener I am and an old and experienced listener. For many years I have imagined I was taking along an unbeliever, an atheist, an agnostic, or a skeptic and listened carefully to what he would have heard. Most of the messages are presented to an audience that the preacher must imagine are all saved.
The person I take along wants to know if God is real. He wants to know why you think God is real. He wants to know what life is all about. Why am I here? He wants to know why we Christians trust the Bible. He wants to know where did he come from? He wants to know if there is life after death. About all he is told is Bible stories. These Bible stories are without meaning if not connected to real history. If the Bible’s history isn’t true they are nonsense.
Since Darwinism invaded the culture 150 years ago, the church largely has presented only an emotional gospel. I think most of the thinking people stay away from the church because it is boring, and most of the church members are emotional Christians only. Why should an unbeliever agree with a preacher about anything, if the preacher doesn’t believe the Bible means what it says?
The Bible says creation took six days and then God rested for one day, and this was so important God wrote it on stone with his own finger. Why would a Christian want those days to be long periods of time? The pulpit avoids that subject like the plague.
The Bible tells us how many generations there were from Adam to Christ, but nobody sees any importance in this information unless you understand it is saying no millions of years.
The Bible says Eve was the mother of all living and so could not have evolved, but most preachers are taught that God may have used evolution in his creation, and never seem to condemn evolution from the pulpit.
The Bible does not even hint that this creation might be millions or billions of years old but the pulpit never touches the subject and remains silent while the media and educational system indoctrinate little children with this unbiblical idea that destroys the gospel message. Is our silence an indication we are not afraid of a millstone collar and crash landing into the depth of the sea? Why won’t we Christians defend precious innocent little children from error? Are we too lazy? Would we have to begin to think? God says come let us reason together.
The Bible says death came into the world because Adam disobeyed his Creator. If evolution were true there would be millions of years of death before Adam appeared on the scene. Why should the Second Adam come and die to correct this sin if the first Adam wasn’t the cause?
Now John 3:16 means something.
Sidney C. Phillips MD
March, 2003
