posted by Phil Johnson
The PyroManiacs devote some space each weekend to highlights from The Spurgeon Archive. The Following excerpt is from Spurgeon's autobiography.
t one of the memorable gatherings under "The Question Oak," a student asked Mr. Spurgeon, "Are we justified in receiving Mr. Darwin's or any other theory of evolution?"The President's answer was:—"My reply to that enquiry can best take the form of another question,—Does Revelation teach us evolution? It never has struck me, and it does not strike now, that the theory of evolution can, by any process of argument, be reconciled with the inspired record of the Creation. You remember how it is distinctly stated, again and again, that the Lord made each creature 'after his kind.' So we read, 'And God created great whales, and every living creature that moveth, which the waters brought forth abundantly, after their kind, and every winged fowl after his kind: and God saw that it was good.'
"And again, 'And God said, Let the earth bring forth the living creature after his kind, cattle, and creeping thing, and beast of the earth after his kind: and it was so. And God made the beast of the earth after his kind, and cattle after their kind, and every thing that creepeth upon the earth after his kind: and God saw that it was good.'
"Besides, brethren, I would remind you that, after all these years in which so many people have been hunting up and down the world for 'the missing link' between animals and men, among all the monkeys that the wise men have examined, they have never discovered one who has rubbed his tail off, and ascended in the scale of creation so far as to take his place as the equal of our brothers and sisters of the great family of mankind.
"Mr. Darwin has never been able to find the germs of an Archbishop of Canterbury in the body of a tom cat or a hilly goat, and I venture to prophesy that he will never accomplish such a feat as that. There are abundant evidences that one creature inclines towards another in certain respects, for all are bound together in a wondrous way which indicates that they are all the product of God's creative will; but what the advocates of evolution appear to forget is, that there is nowhere to be discovered an actual chain of growth from one creature to another,—there are breaks here and there, and so many missing links that the chain cannot be made complete. There are, naturally enough, many resemblances between them, because they have all been wrought by the one great master-mind of God, yet each one has its own peculiarities.
"The Books of Scripture are many, yet the Book, the Bible, is one; the waves of the sea are many, yet the sea is one; and the creatures that the Lord has made are many, yet the Creation is one. Look at the union between the animal and the bird in the bat or in the living squirrel; think of the resemblance between a bird and a fish in the flying fish; yet, nobody, surely, would venture to tell you that a fish ever grew into a bird, or that a bat ever became a butterfly or an eagle. No; they do not get out of their own spheres.
"All the evolutionists in the world cannot 'improve' a mouse so that it will develop into a cat, or evolve a golden eagle out of a barn-door fowl. Even where one species very closely resembles another, there is a speciality about each which distinguishes it from all others.
"I do not know, and I do not say, that a person cannot believe in Revelation and in evolution, too, for a man may believe that which is infinitely wise and also that which is only asinine. In this evil age, there is apparently nothing that a man cannot believe; he can believe, ex animo, the whole Prayer-book of the Church of England! It is pretty much the same with other matters; and, after all, the greatest discoveries made by man must be quite babyish to the infinite mind of God. He has told us all that we need to know in order that we may become like Himself, but He never meant us to know all that He knows."
20 comments:
...and they still have yet to find any such link. Spurgeon's prophecy stands!
This is great!
I had a hard time with the second part of this line, can someone explain it to me? ... "In this evil age, there is apparently nothing that a man cannot believe; he can believe, ex animo, the whole Prayer-book of the Church of England! "
Wow. What a demonstration of how wisdom is given to those who know, trust and hold the scriptures high. Aside from the reference to Darwin never being able to find a "germ" rather than "gene", of the Archbishop of Canterbury in the body of a tom cat or a hilly goatabsent in an animal", the biology is correct. Common stucture does not equate to common ancestry, but does reflect a common designer/creator. The begining of wisdom is the fear of God. Thank you Lord for blessing us through Charles Spurgeon,s life and ministry!
"for a man may believe that which is infinitely wise and also that which is only asinine"
Ain't that the truth...
Daryl,
Not only that, but haven't we all been there ourselves? Not necessarily on this issue, but I've had my share of asinine beliefs that I have held right along with orthodox ones! Only the grace of God has worked to change that...praise God!
wv: comicat
"There are, naturally enough, many resemblances between them, because they have all been wrought by the one great master-mind of God, yet each one has its own peculiarities."
Wonderful words from brother Charles. Thanks.
I was talking with some unbelievers the other night, and it was good discussing how wolves can breed with dogs, and make a wolf-dog, but a fox is no way able to. Interesting, ain't.
But when you talk with one of these Darwinian, they have it nailed down, and they use a lot os wrods, (a lot of words), to try and prove their point.
"for a man may believe that which is infinitely wise and also that which is only asinine"
Doesn't that just describe Christians who believe that God used evolution~~
I love Spurgeon's aphorisms. They reflect his confidence in His Creator and His Lord of all creation and wisdom that rested in his heart
"Wisdom reposes in the heart of the discerning and even among fools she lets herself be known"-Pr.14:33
There are massive redemptive implications for asserting that the Creation and the Adamic accounts were just fanciful allegorical stories.
It means that Christ is not really the eschatological Last Adam whose redemptive work reversed the curse of the first Adam, for those who are *in Him*. And it means that the New Creation has not already broken into human history through Christ's resurrection and outpoured Spirit.
Great! Someone needs to speak more on this evolution issue. Science is amazing, but they don't have all the answers and likely the new answers will leave far more unanswered. When scientists try to claim evidence for evolution look at what they say. They don't give the evidence, they give their interpretation of the evidence assuming evolution true. Plus in mainstream science when it comes to evolution it's a bunch of competing theories and a game of connect 100 dots when they only have 20, they create theoretical ones claiming it as fact. Here's a link: http://www.icr.org/article/6497/
Thanks for speaking on the issue!
@donsands
Another comment: I am not sure how well versed you are in creation models but, the majority reflect the opinion that God created a kind, where they contained all the information (I forget the exact word) for them to adapt. For instance, wolves, foxes, coyotes and dogs are all likely of the same kind though different species and even genuses. This perfectly explains the ark as well. One common objection is that there are two many species, yet when one follows this idea that the created kinds were basically mutate and speciate according to their surrounds then the picture becomes clear. Biblical kinds were aboard the ark that contained the information for the new species to appear. Observational science has shown that is speciation is quite rapid and can happen in a matter of years,
"For instance, wolves, foxes, coyotes and dogs are all likely of the same kind though different species and even genuses."
And the fox is closer to the species of the cat really, is what I heard.
It would be good to know a little science, though it is imperative for us to know the Gospel and fullness of this truth that saves a sinners soul from hell.
"I am not sure how well versed you are in creation models but, the majority reflect the opinion that God created a kind, where they contained all the information (I forget the exact word) for them to adapt. For instance, wolves, foxes, coyotes and dogs are all likely of the same kind though different species and even genuses. "
Not only is this unscientific, it's unbiblical. It'd be interesting to know exactly how much a species can change before one can no longer call himself a creationist. And also, how is "information" defined?
I fail to see how such is unbiblical: bassett hounds didn't exist up until the last 500 years at most, this was created through a net loss of information and at the dogs' health expense.
read this: http://creation.com/variation-information-and-the-created-kind
if this model is somehow unbiblical then I will wholehardely embrace evolution and say that Genesis 1-11 is mere myth.
Interestingly Spurgeon was an Old Earth Creationist
Neat cards. Looks like an Upper Deck, Topps, Donruss or Fleer set of Spurgeon 'baseball' cards.
I should have been collecting those instead of all the over-produced worthless baseball cards I wasted money on in the 80's.
Uh-oh, I hope I havent given any ideas for an escalation of the 'celebrity Preacher' situation.
But I sure wouldn't mind having a rookie Dick Lucas, Don Carson, Thabiti Anyabwile, or Carl Trueman card in mint condition and even autographed :)
@horace
Can you show me evidence that Spurgeon believed in an old earth? I wasn't aware of this.
http://www.beyondcreationscience.com/index.php?pr=Why_Doesnt_Answers_in_Genesis_Tell_You_the_Truth
See here.
Part 1/2
The sermon where Surgeon teaches old earth creationism and sends to allude to evolution is from 1855 when he was 21. The sermon quoted in the article is from 1887 when he was 53, just 5 years before he passed. The sermons contradict each other in that he says in the older one,
"Our planet has passed through various stages of existence, and different kinds of creatures have lived on its surface, all of which have been fashioned by God. But before that era came, wherein man should be its principal tenant and monarch, the Creator gave up the world to confusion." This "confusion" described by "different kinds of creatures" that die and are fossilized (see next quote) and "stages of existence" sounds like an allusion to the evolutionary process. God isn't the author of confusion, so why else would he talk about "millions of years" and "confusion" as an expository preacher when it's not in the Biblical text? It's a worldview imposed on the text, a teaching that's as old as even ancient Egypt, and something every believer must come to use his mind to process and compare with Scripture to be convinced in his own mind of what Scripture indicates plainly. Evolution as a philosophy had been around for centuries at that point. He was wrestling through the text as a 21 year old living in a time before Darwin's Origin of Species was published (though there was another published before his that wasn't as famous), and all the scientific dialogue with the church, and the examination of the theory became more fleshed out. And the church was then allowed to give a robust response from Scripture. Another example of this evolutionary presupposition he used to have as a young man in another sermon from the same year (1855) speaks of a "discovery" being that which informed his thinking:
"Years ago we thought the beginning of this world was when Adam came upon it; but we have ***discovered*** that thousands of years before that God was preparing chaotic matter to make it a fit abode for man, putting races of creatures upon it, who might die and leave behind the marks of his handiwork and marvellous skill, before he tried his hand on man."
"Die and leave behind the marks of His handiwork," hmmm, sounds a lot like the fossil record as alleged proof of God's creative process, or "handiwork." Why else would an expository preacher like Charles Surgeon say that animals died before God "tried his hand on man" when death didn't enter the world until Adam and Eve's sin and Fall, and the whole creation was cursed?
Part 2/2
As Spurgeon aged, he came to understand the problem with that thinking, which is why he says in the more recent sermon which is quoted in the article above,
"Besides, brethren, I would remind you that, after all these years in which so many people have been hunting up and down the world for 'the missing link' between animals and men, among all the monkeys that the wise men have examined, they have never discovered one who has rubbed his tail off, and ascended in the scale of creation so far as to take his place as the equal of our brothers and sisters of the great family of mankind," and "after all, the greatest ***discoveries*** made by man must be quite babyish to the infinite mind of God." There he speaks of "discovery" again in this context of evolution as a bad thing, whereas before his worldview was informed and shaped by the "discovery" of earth's origin. Sounds like a change of view for Charles Surgeon. The 1887 was his most recent and spiritually mature articulation of his conviction from Scripture. Let's not quote him out of context from all he's said, especially when he's made more recent statements about an issue that override the old ones. I wouldn't want people quoting many things I thought to say when I was a new believer (or Heaven forbid, before then) as a representation of what I now think, for example.
Unmerited grace, peace in Christ, and agape!
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