February 12, 2009. Today is the 200th anniversary of Abraham Lincoln's birthday. But that isn't the reason countless atheists and evolutionists around the world are celebrating today. Today is much more important than just the man who helps abolish American slavery. Today is also the 200th anniversary of Charles Darwin's birth.


2009 is also the 150th anniversary of Darwin's famous book "On the Origin of Species," and the secular culture is not letting us forget! Countless evolutionary organizations are promoting this day in hopes of making this a memorable day of atheistic evangelism. Some people are even calling today "Christmas for atheists." But this evangelism it isn't just limited to today. Many groups are making this entire year a year of praise for Darwinian orthodoxy. Museums (such as the Smithsonian) are opening new exhibits, TV specials are being shown, magazines published, and there are even parades, all in praise of the man who, according to Richard Dawkins, made it possible to be an "an intellectually fulfilled atheist." The religious determination of secular humanism and Darwin-worship (even billboards of praise) this year will no doubt be intimidating to many people, but as Christians this year represents something other than the promotion of evolutionary dogma. This year shows a unique opportunity for Christians around the world to present the Gospel message, and with even more urgency in the face of atheism.

Despite the fervent promotion of "Darwin Day," there are still many organizations who are celebrating God's creation as recorded in Genesis today, while pointing out the flaws of Darwin's theory. Just to quickly name a few:

• Answers in Genesis, for example, has an entire page set up on Darwin and his legacy (called 200 Lost Years), complete with numerous articles and links to other information. They have also devoted an entire issue of their popular Answers Magazine to Darwin.
• The Institute for Creation Research also devoted their latest Acts and Facts magazine to Darwin's legacy.
• Creation Ministries International has some recent articles on Darwin's birthday, as well as a high-quality documentary coming out soon.

As these articles and many more show, Christians have no reason to fear this year. We should not be discouraged by the militant fervor of some evolutionists, but rather should find courage and preach His word to the masses. Instead of making this a year of intellectual decay, let's make this a year of learning and growing spiritually by educating ourselves on the issues of the Creation/Evolution debate, and show the creation message "gently and respectfully" (1 Peter 3:15-16). You can do this in any number of ways, such as:

1. Keeping up to date on the latest issues in creationism. Some groups have weekly articles featuring the latest Creation/Evolution news (such as AiG's weekly News to Note articles).
2. Watching creation videos. These can be bought from almost any creationist organization. If you don't wish to purchase anything, there are also plenty of free video resources. AiG posts a new portion of one of their DVD's every week. Watching their talk "Origin of the Species: Was Darwin Right?" would be a great way to start educating yourself on Darwin's theory. CMI also has a "Creation Magazine Live!" feature. You could even borrow some videos from your local church!
3. Tell your pastor/youth leader to visit The Creation Letter Project and sign the letter. I even encourage you to sign the letter and get involved!
4. Find a group of people and friends and get involved! It could even be as simple as talking about current creation/evolution issues or even starting a mini Bible-study on Genesis and creation. Starting a small group is a great jumping-pad for actually talking to people about creationism vs. evolution. It is often easier to talk to someone when you have Godly friends to back you up.
5. And most importantly, read the Bible. While creationists often stress the first book of the Bible, Genesis isn't the only place that talks about creation. Jesus Himself referred to Noah, as well as Adam and Eve.

Often it can be easy to get caught-up with the scientific aspects of the creation/evolution debate. We have to remember, though, that while the creation message is certainly important, it is not the true message of the Bible. The true message of the Bible is that the God of the universe became a man and died on the cross, bearing our sins. He then rose three days later, conquering death once and for all. And He offers life to all of us, if only we will trust Him to take away our sins as our Savior. What an amazing God we have, that he would die for us. This is what we are always trying to accomplish when learning and talking about creation: to always give glory to God.

Happy Trails,
Sam.

Welcome readers to the final day of the ICC '08 coverage. It has been a long journey filled with late nights, quick food trips, and likely the most concentrated amount of creation science anywhere. This final ICC '08 coverage post will include more talk-overviews, more pictures, more interviews with great scientists, and once again... MORE! So without further adieu, let's jump headfirst into the Genesis vs Darwin Blog's last day covering the Sixth International Conference on Creationism!

Before we get to the session coverage, I would like to point out once again the diversity of creation organizations present at this conference. For instance, there were even two tables set up with creation materials in different languages. I have included a picture of some resources from one of the tables below.



The first talk of the day was entitled "Significance of Highly Discordant Radioisotope Dates for Precambrian Amphibolites in Grand Canyon, USA" and was presented by Dr. Andrew Snelling. It outlined the area where they obtained samples and presented the obtained dates for rocks when different radiometric dating techniques were used. For instance, a rock was 405.1 ± 10 ma (ma = million years) using one technique, and 2574.2 ±73 ma using another dating technique. That's a difference of about 2169.1 ma depending upon what dating technique you use. Ironically, the evolutionary date of the formation is supposed to be 1740-1750 ma. What is the evolutionist to do when neither of the clearly untrustworthy dating techniques agree with their dates?

Yesterday, Andrew Snelling also gave two talks on radiohalos, their significance, and their evidence for the Flood. I was able to catch Dr. Snelling for a quick interview about his talks, as well as about a presentation he is giving tonight for the conference closing called "The Creation Model: Its Past, Its Present, and Its Necessary Future." (below, followed by a picture)

(if audio does not load go to direct link)
(to download: right-click direct link and "save as")



I was also able to catch the very end of another talk at the same time entitled (once again, excuse the long name) "Analysis of Barry Hall's Research of the E. coli ebg Operon: Understanding the Implications for Bacterial Adaption to Adverse Environments" by Dr. Georgia Purdom. I wish I had heard more of this talk, as she talked about things such as Barry Hall's widely publicized research, as well as bacteria and their genes in different environments, etc. (picture below)