Evolution, Part 1

Guess I should say something about it. After all I do have a degree in basic molecular biological evolution. Before I went back to school I actually taught literal seven day creation to a Sunday school in the church I attended. Then I went back to school, got a dual degree in Biochemistry and Molecular Biology and changed my mind. Sounds easy, but it wasn't an easy change to make either. In fact, I had to re-evaluate everything I had learned about Christianity. Seems I had built my religious ideologies on what I call first thoughts, which can be dangerous, because many times first thoughts on subjects are shallow and just plain wrong because deeper and wiser thoughts have not yet prevailed. My previous fight against evolution had been a personal struggle that made me quite adamant that those who believed it could not be saved, so when I was confronted with its utter truth I faced my own failures in figuring out who God was and what He thought about life and human ideology. I had built my own house on a foundation God laid for me and had to literally clean the entire structure off of the foundation and start over. It was hell. That foundation was simply this, God is real. Yeah that was it. Then I made sure that the cornerstone was Christ, and everything else was deconstructed leaving these two things as all I knew to be true. I no longer trusted anyone who preached the Word of God, because I felt that if I had been so easily misled then there is no way I could trust thier opinions. Maybe they did know the truth, maybe they didn't, I couldn't be influenced by such things if I could not tell the difference. And I did NOT want to go right back where I had just been. Looking back I see it as a blessing, maybe even a saving that God made me start over because the wisdom I sought after that was hard to come by and carefully thought out, not quick to judge, not easily swayed by the latest goodtime message. So I owe something to my gay atheist Biology professor who told me that when I was done with his class I would also be an atheist because he did make me question what I believed and he gave me information I could not look away from, heck I had to learn it to make a good grade. That was during my first semester, I had many more to go.

Well I didn't become an atheist, nor a homosexual, but I did become a more critical thinker and I certainly abandoned some religious and social philosophies I had held previously. My poor wife, she had to be put on hold while her husband found out who he was. But hopefully I am now a much better husband than I would have been had I not been educated as to my mistaken philosophies of life and religion. God be praised. So as to the question of evolution, am I convinced of it? You bet I am. In fact, I see evolution as a proof of God. But it is random, you say, and God didn't randomly create us. Okay, let me explain it this way. In chemistry there is an equation that we use to explain how reactions proceed called Gibbs Free Energy. In this equation we use a factor called S or entropy, which is a measure of the randomness of a system, yes it is measurable. Without this factor there would be NO chemical reactions at all. Not even the ones that take place in your body this very minute. It is a necessary part of the system, if there isn't this randomness then there is no life, period. And it is this randomness that drives evolution and the chemistry of life. If you look at randomness over time you will see it is not so random as we might like to think, there often times is a clear pattern, known in statistics as a Bell Curve. It is my personal belief that randomness is the curtain behind which the Master works without being seen, letting the result of His work speak for Him clearly. That is the existence and maintenance of the creation itself, evolution being one of the necessary results of the laws of nature that maintains life in this universe, like gravity.

It is not necessary to believe in evolution to get along in life. People have gotten along without it for thousands of years. There is only one thing included in the gospel as far as I know, and that is faith in Jesus Christ. I have yet to read where any gospel message included political or scientific beliefs as prerequisites for trusting in God and His technique of salvation, and yes even evolutionists can completely believe God's Word without taking the first two chapters of genesis as literal and still, somehow, be saved. I know I am saved without doubt. I am a simple man and God is a powerful God, only He has the power to save me and I completely trust that He has both promised it to me and is able and willing to keep His promises despite my stupidity. I could post the finer points of evolution I guess, if anyone really needs convincing. I shouldn't say that the material is easy because it is not, but it is not out of reach for anyone who really wants to understand it. For now I will refrain from such an exercise. Be kinder to your evolutionist friends and assure them that there is plenty of hope that they can be saved despite thier beliefs in what is probably true.