An Apostle's View of Evolution
IN his second letter, the apostle Peter says: "Knowing this first, that in the last days mockers shall come with mockery, walking after their own lusts, and saying, Where is the promise of His coming? for, from the day that the fathers fell asleep, all things continue as they were from the beginning of the creation. For this they wilfuly forget, that there were heavens from of old, and an earth compacted out of water and amidst water, by the word of God." 2 Peter 3:3-5. The above text not only tells us that men will scoff, in the last days, when the doctrine of the second coming of Christ is preached, but it also tells us that the ones who will do this scoffing have willingly forgotten that the heavens and earth were from of old created "by the word of God." God's Word plainly tells how creation was accomplished. The record is, "In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth." And it tells how He created them, in these words: "God said, Let there be light: and there was light." And again, "Let the waters under the heavens be gathered together unto one place, and let the dry land appear: and it was so." And still again it is stated: "And God said, Let the earth put forth grass, herbs yielding seed, and fruit-trees bearing fruit after their kind, wherein is the seed thereof, upon the earth: and it was so." Thus plainly does God affirm that He created this earth by the mighty power of His word. The psalmist has, in the beautiful rhythm of Hebrew poetry, expressed the matter thus: "Let all the earth fear Jehovah:
Let all the inhabitants of the world stand in awe of Him.
For He spake, and it was done;
He commanded, and it stood fast." Ps. 33:8, 9. And after the same tenor the author of the Hebrew letter says, "By faith we understand that the worlds have been framed by the word of God, so that what is seen hath not been made out of things which appear." Heb. 11:3. The foregoing texts make it clear that the Bible teaches that the mighty God has created all things by His intelligent power, through His word. It is clear that space, and time, and many other things that might be mentioned, are absolutely infinite. There is no end to these things anywhere. The orderly arrangement of the universe shows that there is a God who is just as infinite in His power and all the rest of His attributes as the space He inhabits. In the inspired and inspiring words of the psalmist, "The heavens declare the glory of God; and the firmament showeth His handiwork." And it is far easier for the mind that has not been blinded by "science falsely so called" to grasp the fact that this majestically infinite Being has created these worlds by His power, than to go through the unnatural process of trying to persuade one's self that they evolved into their orderly relations to each other from some unaccountable whirling cloud of dust — this dust having been found drifting in space from nobody knows where or how. But observe that Peter, in the first text quoted, specifies that the scoffers in the last days will be willingly ignorant of the fact that the worlds were created by the word of God. In other words, these last-day scoffers will be evolutionists; they will say that the worlds made themselves by evolution; they will affirm that no Creator is needed. Now since Peter boldly affirmed, over 1,800 years ago, that the last days would produce those who would scoff at the doctrine of the second coming of Christ; and since he further shows that they will be evolutionists, because they refuse to be informed that God created the worlds by His word; and since the times in which we live are fulfilling all these predictions, ought we not to be led to have faith in the prophetic utterances of the divine Book?