Tag Archives: Noah

Abraham the Astronomer

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I am a fan of the website Watch Jerusalem. I copy below one of their articles. It is a fantastic story that combines astronomy, mathematics, history, and the Bible. Click here for the original article if you are interested.

History records a man who lived 10 generations after a great flood who used celestial science to prove the existence of God. He was a skilled scientist, astronomer and mathematician. His astronomical discoveries shook the foundations of Babylonian religion. He heavily influenced Egyptian and Mesopotamian scientific thought. He led armies that altered the course of world history. And all this took place before he became the forefather of the Arab, Turk and Israelite peoples!

This man’s name was Abraham. Yes, the astounding evidence of both biblical and secular history proves that the patriarch Abraham was not only real; he exerted tremendous influence on the entire ancient world!

This influence is recounted in the writings of the Jewish historian Josephus, the Babylonian historian Berossus, the Roman historian Eusebius and others. These records reveal that Abraham used mathematics and astronomy to discredit the pagan priesthood of his time and to prove the existence of the one true God.

Chief Scientist of the Chaldeans

Abraham was born in the city of Ur, in the land of the Chaldees, sometime in the early second millennium B.C.E. This city was then near the outskirts of the rapidly expanding Old Babylonian Empire. The pagan Babylonian priesthood publicly taught the masses to believe that the sun, moon, stars and planets were gods. These priests used their knowledge of astronomy to predict the movements of the heavenly bodies, deceiving the masses into thinking they could communicate with the gods of the Babylonian pantheon (Israel Smith Clare, The Standard History of the World, Vol. 1).

This was the political climate into which Abraham was born.

Now consider the record of third-century B.C.E. Babylonian historian Berossus: “In the 10th generation after the Flood, there was among the Chaldeans a man righteous and great, and skillful in the celestial science” (emphasis added throughout). While Berossus doesn’t give this great scientist a name, first-century Jewish historian Josephus tells us that Berossus was writing about Abraham.

There is even an ancient hymn cited by Clement of Alexandria (second century C.E.) about “a certain unique man, an offshoot from far back of the race of the Chaldeans.” This man was “knowledgeable about the path of the star and how the movement of the sphere goes around the Earth, both in circular fashion, but each on its own axis.” The poem related that this chief scientist of the Chaldeans was the only man of his era to see Zeus, “the ruler of mortal men.”

Of course, ancient Greek poets tended to call the chief god of any religion by the name Zeus. The fact that this poem speaks of a Chaldean scientist who had a special relationship with “the mighty God” isn’t coincidence!

Fourth-century C.E. Roman historian Eusebius cited an earlier source by a man named Eupolemus (second century B.C.E.), titled Concerning the Jews of Assyria. Quoting this source, Eusebius says Abraham “surpassed all men in nobility and wisdom, who was also the inventor of astronomy and the Chaldaic art, and pleased God well by his zeal towards religion.”

Josephus further records that as a young man, Abraham “determined to renew and to change the opinion all men happened then to have concerning God; for he was the first that ventured to publish this notion, that there was but one God, the Creator of the universe” (Antiquities of the Jews, 1.7.1).

Abraham was teaching the people of Chaldea about the one true Creator!

Babylonian Mystery Religion

The Babylonian priesthood established after the Flood by Nimrod and Semiramis was teaching the masses to believe that the sun, moon, stars and planets were manifestations of the gods. They deceived people into thinking priests could communicate with these gods. In addition to being a scientist, however, Abraham was a great teacher. He taught the people physics and mathematics, and showed them that celestial bodies moved according to preordained laws.

Josephus paraphrases Abraham’s words: “If these bodies had power of their own, they would certainly take care of their own regular motions; but since they do not preserve such regularity, they make it plain, that in so far as they cooperate to our advantage, they do it not of their own abilities, but as they are subservient to Him that commands them, to whom alone we ought justly to offer our honor and thanksgiving” (ibid).

Abraham taught the Chaldeans what the priests secretly knew: The movements of the stars and other heavenly bodies are one of the greatest proofs of God’s existence. The presence of law demands the presence of a lawgiver!

Abraham taught that the stars and planets were only physical objects created by the one true God. What many historians are unwilling to admit is that Abraham possessed advanced astronomical knowledge that would not be rediscovered for thousands of years. Josephus further records that Abraham wasn’t the first astronomer in his family. The study of astronomy originated with Seth, the third son of Adam. He wrote that “God gave [those who lived before the Flood] such long life that they might perfect those things which they had invented in astronomy” (Antiquities, 1.3.9).

Other records, such as Jean Lemaire de Belges’s Illustrations of Gaul and Peculiarities of Troy (1513), indicate that Noah had knowledge of maritime astronomy involving navigating by the stars, and that he established a college in ancient Armenia to teach religion and astronomy. This noble and elderly patriarch likely brought knowledge of mathematics, astronomy and other sciences from one side of the Flood to the other, passing it down from generation to generation to Abraham!

Father of the Faithful

When the pagan Babylonian priests gained power and influence, they lost patience with Abraham and his teachings about the one true God. Josephus records that the Chaldeans and other peoples of Mesopotamia “raised a tumult” against Abraham, forcing him to flee the country. Unlike the priests of this Babylonian mystery religion, Abraham refused to teach lies to receive the praise of men. These pagan religious leaders would have killed Abraham for publishing the truth and likely did kill his older brother Haran. The Bible records only that “Haran died in the presence of his father Terah in the land of his nativity, in Ur of the Chaldees” (Genesis 11:28). Josephus adds that a monument was erected in Haran’s honor, and that “Terah [hated] Chaldea, on account of his mourning for Haran” (Antiquities, 1.6.5).

While Terah himself fell into idol worship, Abraham never lost faith in the existence of the great Creator of the universe.

To recount all the various histories of the things Abraham suffered during this period would fill many pages. Through his trials and tribulations, however, Abraham stayed faithful to his belief in God. And when Abraham was 75 years old, God Himself actually appeared to him and spoke to him to make a covenant that would change the course of history!

I hope you will agree this historical background on Abraham is wondrous. What resonates with me is that, around 4,000 years ago, Abraham used science and mathematics to show others the existence of God. That is what I have tried to do in my books.

May the Lord bless you and hold you in the palm of his hand.

Doug Ell

Hell’s Creek

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Hell’s Creek lies in Montana, and lends its name to a geological structure called the Hell Creek Formation, which we’ll abbreviate here as the HCF. The HCF spans eastern Montana and vast areas of North Dakota, South Dakota, and Wyoming. It averages around 575 feet in depth, and is made up of sedimentary rock, rock laid down by water.

The HCF contains rich beds of dinosaur fossils. On August 12, 1990, Sue Hendrickson, an amateur paleontologist, discovered the most complete (approximately 90%) and largest Tyrannosaurus skeleton, known today as “Sue,” later purchased by the Field Museum of Chicago for $8.3 million. It is thought Sue reached full size at age 19 and died at 28, the longest estimated life of any Tyrannosaurus known. It appears the skeleton was immediately covered by mud, which preserved it well, and that the watery death was violent, because the hip bones were found above the skull and the ribs were mixed with the legs. Sue is 40 feet long and stands 13 feet high at the hips. The skull is 54 inches long and weighs 600 pounds; it is so heavy that it is kept separately and a replica is used in the main display.

In 2000 alone five T. rex skeletons were recovered from the HCF, including one called “B-Rex.” B-Rex contains soft tissues which indicate the specimen was female. The soft tissues preserve transparent, flexible, hollow blood vessels.

Sue and B-Rex are astonishing fossil finds. But, to me, what is most astonishing is that the HCF also contains, interspersed among these T. rex and similar specimens, fossils of six different species of sharks. The sixth shark species was announced in January 2019. Think about it – how could the fossil record, now preserved in rock, contain a mixture of huge land animals and sharks? What event produced that combination?

I submit the answer is undeniable. Only a global, catastrophic flood, the flood of Noah, could have this result. Only a massive tsunami could tear sharks out of the ocean and bury them together with retreating herds of land animals. Perhaps for that reason, secular scientists rarely discuss or admit the shark fossils in the HCF, and even many Biblical creationists are not aware. Two years ago I was told by a quite full-of-himself Harvard professor that there were absolutely no fossil beds that contained large dinosaurs and sharks. Yet the fossil record across all continents contains dinosaurs mixed with marine fossils. A 48-foot long Spinosaurus, “spine lizard,” one of those dinosaurs that looks like somebody glued half a fan to its back, was found in Morocco with car-size fossils of coelacanths, fish that still live in the deep ocean.

And let’s not overlook the soft tissue. The existence of dinosaur soft tissue is denied by some scientists, but there are now well over 100 finds reported world-wide. Last I read secular scientists have proposed five different theories for how very fragile tissue could survive for 60+ million years, all of which have been rejected by careful published scientific studies. Simply put, there is no scientific reason to think that biological soft tissue could survive anywhere near that long.

The flood of Noah and burial of those dinosaurs and sharks was not millions of year ago but thousands of years ago. If you date it using the Septuagint, the oldest known version of the book of Genesis that exists today, the flood occurred about 5,300 years ago.

True science confirms the Bible. Thanks for reading, and I urge you to share the good news.

Doug Ell

Is Genesis History?

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If you follow my posts, you probably know I love the new scientific evidence for the literal truth of the Book of Genesis – a real Adam and Eve, a real Noah, and a real Flood.

In January, I gave two 45-minute talks on “Is Genesis History?” You can view them here: http://trinityvero.org/is-genesis-history.

I discussed scientific flaws in the “old-earth” paradigm, and did my best to summarize the overwhelming new DNA, geological, and astronomical evidence. I also explained why I believe this issue is important to Christians.

I hope you enjoy the videos. I would appreciate feedback – what you like, what you don’t like or follow, what I could do better. I hope to speak on this subject in other places, and would appreciate suggestions on forums.

Modern science reveals God and the truth of the Bible. I urge you to share the good news. Together, we can bring hope and defeat the Atheist paradigm of a meaningless universe.

Thanks for reading.

Doug Ell

How Do You Get An Ice Age?

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Here’s a fact that may surprise you: secular scientists have no good explanation for the ice age. They have theories, but none work. “It’s a killer,” says one scientist. “It’s maddening,” adds another.

The most common theory, the one you’ll probably find if you look it up, is the astronomical (or Milankovitch) theory. It is that a very slow and very slight change in the Earth’s orbit dramatically changed the climate on Earth. In the 1970s scientists measured chemical variations in layers of deep arctic ice, assigned dates to those layers, and claimed the dates matched astronomical cycles. Under this theory there were about 50 ice ages in the last 2.5 million years, with the most recent peaking around 20,000 years ago.

Jake Herbert, a scientist with the Institute for Creation Research, has written several articles in Acts and Facts that destroy this theory. (I lean on his articles heavily in this post, and if you haven’t yet subscribed to that wonderful (and free!) magazine, I encourage you to do so at icr.org.) Herbert notes that the dates scientists now ascribe to those chemical variations no longer match the astronomical cycles. In other words, the calendar foundation of the astronomical theory has been ripped out from under it.

Herbert notes a second problem – even if the cycles still matched, why did the climate change so severely? Noted astronomer Fred Hoyle mocked the astronomical theory:

If I were to assert that a glacial condition could be induced in a room liberally supplied during winter with charged night storage heaters simply by taking an ice cube into the room, the proposition would be no more unlikely than the Milankovitch theory.

The heavens operate like a precise clock. Computers today can model the distance of the Earth from the Sun going back thousands or (using secular deep-time assumptions) even millions of years. They find no significant deviation.

I think most scientists are willing to overlook the mismatch in the cycles, and the failure of computers to simulate an ice age, because they have no better hypothesis. But here’s a fact that kills all astronomical theories. None of them can explain ice miles thick.

The glaciers were two miles or higher in many places, including much of North America. The seas worldwide dropped almost 400 feet. No theory based solely on decreasing sunlight can explain this. If the Earth simply got colder, evaporation would slow, and snowfall would subside. You don’t get ice two miles high. So how do you get an ice age?

The answer is in the Bible. The Bible tells us there was a great Flood, the Flood of Noah, thousands of years ago (I like the estimate of 3300 BC for the Flood). Genesis 7:11 tells us “the fountains of the great deep burst forth.” I think this refers to both volcanoes and underground oceans. The whole Earth was flooded, and tsunamis wiped out all land life not in the Ark. Continents crashed into each other like freight trains, and the collisions built the mountains we see today. Particles from smoldering volcanoes blocked sunlight for perhaps three to five hundred years, and hot lava heated the oceans worldwide to a warm bath. You had reduced sunlight and warm water for hundreds of years. Think of a giant El Niño. Hundreds of years of reduced sunlight and warm oceans are the only explanation for ice two miles high.

The Flood was a real event. In my post Memories of the Flood, I describe the flood memories of cultures worldwide, from the jungles of Indonesia to Hawaii to the deep Amazon. How did ancient Hawaiians get the name of Noah right and know that he and his three sons built an ark? You think the Hebrews sent them a letter?

In his most recent article in the November issue of Acts and Facts, Herbert notes that the Biblical model solves another major mystery – the existence and then disappearance of millions of wooly mammoths in Siberia. He points out the strong evidence that large numbers of mammoths lived in Siberia during the Ice Age, and notes that winters in Siberia today are far too cold (Minus 40 Fahrenheit is common) for these animals. Herbert states that the only logical theory is that Siberia’s climate was more temperate during the Ice Age, which is what we would expect from warm oceans without Arctic ice. Herbert notes that the coastal lowlands of Siberia were never covered by ice, even though secular ice age models predict they would have been. Finally, Herbert points out that the Biblical model tells us why the mammoths went extinct. When the arctic ocean finally did freeze over, and the moderating influence of warm sea air was no more, the climate changed quickly. The Biblical model predicts that colder high-latitude temperatures, combined with a dryer climate at the end of the Ice Age, would have resulted in enormous dust storms, which buried the mammoths alive. Herbert notes that many mammoth carcasses are found in frozen hills of wind-blown silt.

How do you get an Ice Age? If you look to the word of God, to the Bible, you will find the answer.

Thanks for reading. Please spread the good news of modern science. Together we can change the world.

Doug Ell

The Institute for Creation Research

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Thursday I was privileged to spend a few fantastic hours at the Institute for Creation Research (ICR). I visited with staff and scientists at their Dallas campus, and previewed the Discovery Center. When finished, hopefully next year, it will feature a state-of-the-art planetarium, animatronic dinosaurs (imagine a flying pterosaur swooping down!), fossils, a model of Noah’s Ark, geological evidence of the Flood, and so much more.

I met many of their distinguished scientists, dedicated and humble people who spurned more lucrative positions to confirm God’s word. Their powerful intellect was matched only by their passion. We shared the wonder of some of my favorite subjects, like the DNA evidence of recent creation and a real Adam and Eve, the mind-blowing technology of life, multiple discoveries disproving the Big Bang theory (spiral galaxies, absence of anti-matter, blue stars, double stars, comets, and heavy elements, to name just a few), and the evidence for a single ice age.

If want to know the literal truth of Genesis, read their publications, and, when it is finished, get yourself to Dallas and the Discovery Center. ICR offers a fire hose of evidence. An easy way to start is by signing up for their free monthly magazine, Acts and Facts, which is available here.

One of their favorite subjects, one we came back to again and again, is dinosaurs. They noted the term “dinosaur” is relatively new; before that they were called dragons. I saw an enormous fossil head of a 35-foot-long sea monster that was instantly buried during the Flood. I saw fossils with authentic, preserved dinosaur proteins, tested by a secular lab to be just thousands of years old. The worldwide discoveries of dinosaur “soft tissue,” original blood in some cases, shatter the secular myth of an old Earth.

ICR needs funds to complete their Discovery Center. I invite you to join the cause and be part of this exciting project. You can donate here.

Let us thank God for the Institute for Creation Research. They are a beacon of hope in our confused world.

Thanks for reading.

Doug

The DNA of Eve

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One spectacular achievement of modern science is the ability to sequence DNA. We can now “read” the exact DNA code of you, me, and every other living creature. Human beings have about 3.2 billion letters of DNA code in almost every cell. By “reading” the code, and comparing differences, we can trace genealogy and recreate the history of the human race. When we do that, we get fantastic confirmation of the Bible.

You may have heard of “mitochondrial Eve.” It is now commonly accepted, even by Atheist scientists, that all human beings are descended from a single female. This woman, this mother of all humanity, they call “mitochondrial Eve.” Of course, people who believe in molecules-to-man evolution aren’t suggesting the Bible is true, but they are agreeing with the Bible that we are all descended from a single female. Secular scientists will tell you that mitochondrial Eve lived about 200,000 years ago. The Bible tells us Eve lived around 6,000 years ago.

Mitochondria are energy factories in cells. They have their own DNA, and each person receives their mitochondria DNA, also called mtDNA, only from their mothers. By measuring differences in mtDNA from one person to another, we can measure the “genetic drift” from mutations over generations, and get an idea of how closely people are related. If we know the total number of mtDNA differences in human beings, and know how fast mutations/differences pile up over generations, we can estimate the time back to Eve, Biblical or otherwise.

The original studies assumed that mtDNA mutations occurred as at the same rate as mutations in normal DNA. The data now reveals a much faster rate of mutations in mtDNA than in normal DNA. If Eve lived 200,000 years ago, the total number of differences in mtDNA among humans living today should be around 470. If Eve lived 6,000 years ago, as the Bible tells us, the total number of differences in mtDNA should be around 80. Guess what — the measured number is 80!

Science again proves the Bible is correct. You might also be interested in an earlier post noting that, using differences in DNA from the Y chromosome, which men inherit only from their fathers, the data indicates that all men are descended from a single man who lived about 4,500 years ago. (Hint – there was a big flood.) You can find it here: https://countingtogod.com/memories-of-the-flood/

Going back to Eve, the mtDNA analysis confirms the Bible in a second important way. If you look at a chart (Answers magazine, Jan-Feb 2018, Vol. 13 No. 1, page 59) connecting related individuals according to their mtDNA, you will find three points, or “nodes,” from which all mtDNA is related. These nodes represent the wives of Noah’s three sons. They are close to each other on the chart, because they were each possibly 10th generation descendants of Eve. From these three nodes the chart spreads out, as the mtDNA of all humanity is descended from one of these three women.

Dr. Nathaniel Jeanson, who has a Ph.D. from Harvard in cell and developmental biology, recently published an excellent book titled “Replacing Darwin.” I hope to write more about this exciting book. Dr. Jeanson has studied mtDNA differences in a variety of species. In every case, from chickens to fruit flies roundworms to bakers yeast, the data contradicts the predictions of millions of years of evolution. The actual number of mtDNA differences is much less than those predictions.

It is sad that our “popular” media purposely ignores scientific results that confirm the Bible. Instead, our biased media hypes stories intended to make the Bible look unreliable. I noted a few months ago where it was reported, and read by hundreds of millions of people, that DNA testing of people living today in Lebanon contradicted the Bible. These stories got it absolutely backward, because the DNA findings were exactly what the Bible says, that, despite God’s instructions to kill all Canaanites, the Israelites disobeyed, and let some live. Here is my post on that: https://countingtogod.com/dna-and-the-bible/

How are we to overcome this enormous bias, this deliberate withholding of the truth? I am not aware of a single major newspaper, magazine, or TV channel that reported the new data on mtDNA mutations, this stunning discovery, this scientific revelation that Eve lived about 6,000 years ago. Perhaps the only way to fight this bias is through the combined efforts of ordinary people, people like me and you. Friends don’t let friends be Atheists, at least not without exposing them to science that reveals God.

We need to spread the good news of true science. Together we can change the world.

Thanks for reading.

Doug

Full Strength Christianity

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Christianity is on the decline. A recent poll found the percentage of Americans professing to be Christians declined by 7. 8% between 2007 and 2014. I’m back from Europe, where I was able to visit churches and cathedrals. Some took a century or more to build; they represent the greatest architecture and art of the Middle Ages; they are increasingly empty.

To what do we attribute this loss of faith? Our “popular” media twists true science and often mocks belief. Our tax dollars are used to indoctrinate children in the Darwinian delusion that technology so advanced we cannot understand it (like the human brain) arose by accident. Our scientists invent nonsense theories, theories without a shred of evidence, to remove God from the creation of the universe and the creation of life.

Sadly, many churches share the blame. Many offer watered-down Christianity. Some acquiesce to the contradictions of “theistic evolution,” they embrace the Darwinian delusion of technology by accident, yet try to convince people God is in control. Some treat Adam and Eve, and Noah and the flood, as fable. Some even question the divinity of Jesus.

This retreat can lead to spiritual death. I quote now from an Atheist. His starting premise is wrong, but his logic from that false premise is compelling:

The most devastating thing though that biology did to Christianity was the discovery of biological evolution. Now that we know that Adam and Eve never were real people the central myth of Christianity is destroyed. If there never was an Adam and Eve there never was original sin. If there never was an original sin there is no need of salvation. If there is no need of salvation there is no need of a savior. And I submit that puts Jesus, historical or otherwise, into the ranks of the unemployed. I think that evolution is absolutely the death knell of Christianity.

Do you see my point? Without the metanarrative, the overarching theme, of Creation – Fall – Redemption, what is the purpose of the cross? How can Jesus be the “last Adam” (1 Corinthians 15:45) if there was no first Adam? The Christian faith is diluted to something like “please love your neighbor and do good things. ” Why get out of bed on Sunday for that?

Another way of looking at it, as a friend pointed out to me, is if you don’t believe that Adam and Eve were real people, at what point do you start believing the Bible? Until recently, I didn’t grasp this logical problem. I would not consider the evidence for Adam and Eve, and Noah and the flood, just as many will not consider the overwhelming scientific evidence for the existence of God. I was afraid others might think me crazy. Now that my eyes are open, I am astonished by the evidence.

If you haven’t seen it, I recommend “Is Genesis History?” which is available on Netflix. It will answer many of your questions and concerns.

I have learned to embrace the Bible as the literal word of God. When my eyes were opened to the true evidence, I felt a great peace. When I learned I could trust the Bible, from Genesis to Revelation, from sin to salvation, I was overjoyed.

I invite you to take Christianity full strength. Full strength Christianity can satisfy your soul. Overall, Bible-based churches with full strength Christianity are growing. This is great news. Modern science increasingly, with new discoveries every year, backstops full strength Christianity. In recent posts I’ve touched on DNA evidence of Adam and Eve, and memories of Noah and the flood. There is so much more that supports the literal truth of the Bible.

Thanks for reading. I appreciate the work of many of you to share the good news of true science. Together we can change the world.

Memories of the Flood

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I think, overall, it was mostly two things in high school that pushed me towards Atheism. First was the Miller-Urey experiment. When I read (falsely) that life could have arisen by chance, I began to think science and religion were in conflict. (For a detailed explanation of why life could not have arisen by chance, see Chapter 10 of Counting To God.) Second was the Genesis account of Noah and the flood.

The flood story seemed crazy. A global flood covers the highest mountains? Noah and three sons are warned and build a large boat, an ark? Land animals of every kind come two-by-two onto the boat, and stay on it for months? Noah sends a dove out to see if the land is dry? The animals repopulate the Earth, and all people are descended from the sons of Noah and their wives?

I had many questions, and no one to talk to. I thought that, if the flood story wasn’t true, why should I believe other parts of the Bible? Perhaps nothing in the Bible has been attacked as strongly as the flood story of God’s judgment. It is rejected by most secular scientists. It is often mocked.

I am now absolutely convinced, for many reasons, that it is true. I was astonished, blown away, to learn there more than 500 different memories of the flood. In at least 300 of them, it is clear the flood is global. This from the NW Creation Network:

Native global flood stories are documented as history or legend in almost every region on earth. Old world missionaries reported their amazement at finding remote tribes already possessing legends with tremendous similarities to the Bible’s accounts of the worldwide flood …. Ancient civilizations such as (China, Babylonia, Wales, Russia, India, America, Hawaii, Scandinavia, Sumatra, Peru, and Polynesia) all have their own versions of a giant flood.

These flood tales are frequently linked by common elements that parallel the Biblical account including the warning of the coming flood, the construction of a boat in advance, the storage of animals, the inclusion of family, and the release of birds to determine if the water level had subsided.

Ken Ham is the founder of Answers in Genesis and the Ark Encounter in Williamstown, Kentucky, which features a full scale replica of the Ark. He writes:

I met two missionaries who visited the Creation Museum while on furlough from their missions work. They are missionaries who are the first contact with certain tribes in the Amazon. At the time, they were the first in contact with two different tribes. I asked if those tribes had a flood or creation legend. They said the tribes did and they even had a legend where the languages split apart too!

(The splitting of languages is a memory of the Tower of Babel.)

Flood memories can be found on many websites. Parallels to the Bible are stunning. Hawaiians have a memory of a time when the world became a wicked place, and only one good man, Nu-u, was left. Nu-u built a great canoe with a house on it and filled it with animals, and only Nu-u and his family were saved. Chinese have a memory that Fuhi, his wife, three sons, and three daughters escaped a great flood and were the only people alive on Earth. Ancient Babylonians have a memory in the Epic of Gilgamesh, stone tablets discovered in 1853 that mirror many features of the flood story in the Bible, including sending out a dove to see if the waters had receded.

When you read these stories, you know they are based on real events. You just know. Unrelated tribes and cultures from around the world could not possibly have this memory if the flood did not occur. Differences in the details of the flood stories are exactly what you would expect when cultures pass down memories for thousands of years. Associates for Biblical Research date the flood at around 3000 BC.

Imagine a world that was much flatter. Imagine that world rocked by enormous volcanos as the “fountains of the great deep burst forth.” (Genesis 7:11). The fountains may have included water from underground oceans in addition to massive amounts of lava. Huge tsunamis washed over the entire Earth, and the volcanic activity and rapidly shifting tectonic plates created the mountains we see today, either during the flood or shortly after.

I recommend Ken Ham’s easy-to-read book: A Flood of Evidence. He provides solid answers to the most common questions and objections. He notes the many flaws and inconsistencies of radioactive dating. All fossils, coal, and diamonds contain Carbon 14, an isotope with a half-life of 5,000 years, which could not possibly be detected if those items were more than 100,000 years old. Fossils, coal, and diamonds cannot be millions of years old!

The flood of Noah explains a great deal. It explains why sedimentary rocks and fossils are found all over the world. It explains the Ice Age. You don’t get an ice age if the Earth just gets colder; there isn’t enough moisture to build sheets of ice miles high. You need warm oceans for evaporation and cool summers so the snow doesn’t melt. After the flood, perhaps for centuries, the oceans were warmed by volcanic activity but the summers were cool because of volcanic dust.

As I noted in an earlier post, human DNA provides strong evidence that all men are descended from Noah. Here’s two other items. First, if humanity is tens of thousands of years old, why don’t we find stories of people who lived more than 5,000 years ago? Second, if the layers of rock in the Grand Canyon were laid down over tens of millions of years, why are they so level with no sign of erosion?

Jesus spoke of the flood, and compared it to his second coming:

For as were the days of Noah, so will be the coming of the Son of Man. For as in those days before the flood they were eating and drinking, marrying and giving in marriage, until the day when Noah entered the ark, and they were unaware until the flood came and swept them all away, so will be the coming of the Son of Man.

Matthew 24: 38-39. The flood is noted in the letters of St. Paul and St. Peter. Peter predicted that “scoffers will come.” “For they deliberately overlook this fact … that the world that then existed was deluged with water and perished.” 2 Peter 3:4-6.

I never ask you to believe despite the evidence. I ask you to believe because of the evidence.

Thanks for reading. Please ask others to consider the truth. It could change their life.

DNA and the Bible

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The Bible was under attack this week in newspapers around the world. Here’s one headline: “The Bible got it wrong: Ancient Canaanites survived and their DNA lives in modern-day Lebanese.” Here’s another: “Study disproves the Bible’s claim that the ancient Canaanites were wiped out.” The next four paragraphs are from the New York Times:

“There is a story in the Hebrew Bible that tells of God’s call for the annihilation of the Canaanites, people who lived in what are now Jordan, Lebanon, Syria, Israel and the Palestinian territories thousands of years ago.

‘You shall not leave alive anything that breathes,’ God said in the passage. ‘But you shall utterly destroy them.’

But a genetic analysis published on Thursday has found that the ancient population survived that divine call for their extinction, and their descendants live in modern Lebanon.

‘We can see the present-day Lebanese can trace most of their ancestry to the Canaanites or a genetically equivalent population,’ said Chris Tyler-Smith, a geneticist with the Wellcome Trust Sanger Institute who is an author of the paper. ‘They derive just over 90 percent of their ancestry from the Canaanites.’”

I hope you noted the words “or a genetically equivalent population,” which destroys the argument that these scientists had somehow disproved the Bible. But, even worse, these supposedly quality publications failed to actually read the Bible! Yes God told the Israelites to wipe out the Canaanites,” that they may not teach you do according to all their abominable practices that they have done for their gods.” Deuteronomy 20:17. But the Israelites DISOBEYED! The Bible explicitly records that a variety of Israelite commanders let the Canaanites live. Judges 1:27-35. God then said OK, but you’ll be sorry. “So now I say, I will not drive them out before you, but they shall become thorns in your sides, and their gods shall be a snare to you.” Judges 2:3. So we are left with dozens of articles, read by perhaps hundreds of millions of people, making false claims against God. How sad that, in our upside-down world, people try to sell newspapers by attacking God.

Equally sad is that, when science supports God and the Bible, you never read about it in the popular press. In September 2014 scientists claimed that, over the course of human history, women had migrated significantly more than men. Men inherit the DNA in their Y chromosome only from their father, whereas all people inherit the DNA in their mitochondria (little energy factories in our cells) only from their mothers. A study found greater variability in a population in the female-inherited DNA, the mitochondria DNA, and claimed it was because women traveled more for marriage.

Really? Over all known history men have overwhelmingly been more likely to travel, whether for trade, curiosity, or war. Women generally marry within the community in which they were born. So this scientific study seemed strange to me. Last weekend I learned that greater variability in female DNA is exactly what the Bible predicts. Deuteronomy 32:8 states that when God divided mankind after the Tower of Babel, “he fixed the borders of the peoples according to the number of the sons of God.” In other words, from one group, humanity was divided by paternal lines, and the women went with their husbands regardless of their family background. So the females in a given populations should have greater variability in their DNA, exactly as the 2014 study found.

Last weekend I also heard a talk on Y chromosome variability by Nathaniel Jeanson, a research biologist with a Ph. D. in cell and developmental biology from Harvard. Dr. Jeanson measured variability in the Y chromosome over time. To do that he needed a population that had been separated at a known time in the past. He used African Americans, and compared their Y chromosomes to the Y chromosomes of the population that stayed behind in West Africa. There are statistics on the number of people who came to the United States in this brutal way, and it is known that the mean point of the slave trade was around 1800. By comparing the variability in Y chromosome between African Americans and those who stayed behind, he got a measure of genetic drift in the Y chromosome.

Dr. Jeanson then presented a chart that showed differences in the Y chromosome among all males worldwide. The chart shows clear connecting points, nodes if you will, that strongly point to a common ancestor. According to the Bible, all men trace their Y chromosome back to Noah, who with his three sons, and their wives, were the only people on the ark. Dr. Jeanson used his estimate of how fast the Y chromosome drifts to estimate the time back to the central nodes. It’s not clear which one could be Noah; the data doesn’t establish that clearly. But the time back to all the nodes was around 5,000 years, which is when the Bible tells us Noah lived.

The bottom line here is that modern DNA analysis strongly supports the Bible. Unfortunately, that story rarely makes the secular press. I highly recommend the magazine Acts and Facts, which spreads the good news of true science every month. You can get a free subscription here:
http://www.icr.org/subscriptions/signup/

Thanks for reading. Please spread the good news of science.