What Kind of Deodorant Do You Use?

A while back I was riding down the rode with a friend and the subject of deodorant came up (he is a close friend). First I told him what kind I used and then he told me what kind he used. Then he told me that he left his at school [in the gym] the day before and as a substitute, today he used a lot of cologne to cover up the smell.

Amazingly, it worked wonderfully. Nobody, all day, said or did anything to him. The only problem was he knew. He could tell and he hated the difference.

This story reminds me of 2 Corinthians 2:14. Here Paul tells us that 'through us [God] diffuses the fragrance of His knowledge in every place.' This means that God uses you and me to spread the ‘smell’ of Him to others.

This fact should be enough to make us always willing and ready to be used of God. But what happens when we do not let God use us? What happens when we put something else before God? It is possible that other people will not even notice, like my friend’s deodorant incident. God will and it will grieve Him that we chose something other than His plan for our life. The good news is, however, if we repent and ask Him to forgive us, He will be ready and willing to use us once again.

So, lets check our own lives; what do you smell like? Do you like it?

Read 2 Corinthians 2:5-17

Lesson No. 5d - Origin of Species, Life's Application (continued)

Either way, one must choose a belief and form future theories from this ground work. Once this is finished, one may proceed to current day science which is ‘explanation by observation’.

So what are the implications, if any, of either predetermined idea? Idea one says that naturalistic evolution is the most likely cause of the origin of species. Shackled to this theory, however, is the proposal that (1) The Bible has the possibility for error, (2) The ability of deciphering said errors is reliant upon the enlightenment of man and therefore further possible errors may be accepted as truth while they are in reality a farce (The death, burial, and resurrection of Jesus is now only right until proven wrong.) and (3) God does not exist or at least He did not do what He said He did in creating the earth and all it’s inhabitants.

Disregarding future implications, today, proposal (3) is the most important. If one does not accept the existence of God, the Bible calls this one a fool. Regardless of the number of academic achievements, diplomas, recognitions and number of individuals lauding one as the most knowledgeable in the field of biology, this one is in fact not wise but a fool (Psalm 14:1, Psalm 53:1, Proverbs 15: 7 & 14, Romans 1:18-22). Observation of nature, science, proclaims the presence of God (Psalm 19:1-6)and one that chooses to disregard this flashing neon sign should not be mistaken for a genius but rightly labeled a fool.

‘I believe in God; I just think that I should have an open mind to the possibility of God allowing evolution to be the venue of choice as an explanation for today’s immense variety of animals,’ one might be saying. Darwin, his contemporaries, and great thinkers in ID alike all find this argument wanting. Darwin was a naturalist; he never would have accepted the idea of an esoteric, metaphysical divine creator. Ask any biology department chair in any number of universities typically regarded with esteem, including some ‘Christian’ schools like Baylor University in Waco Texas. They will have no patience with this argument either. Finally, deists, creationists, Christians and ID proponents alike will too disregard this comment either because of its inconsistency with the Genesis account or because it provides for a creationist but has no use for Him.

I hope this series on the origin of species has sparked some interest for further personal research and has helped us rethink the infant two century theory of Darwinian Evolution. If along the way you would like to discuss a topic please send me a comment.

Let us never become so satisfied with spoon-fed ideologies we forget to consider their origins and count the cost of holding on to them.

Good evening.

Lesson No. 5d - Origin of Species, Life's Application

For scientists and non-scientists alike, jumping through the mental hoops of deciphering the most correct theory of the origin of species may seem on the surface to have little use in practical day-to-day living. Hopefully we will come to see, however, that after pealing back the superficial covering of the matter we will come to understand the profound implications that lie beneath.

To begin, we need to understand the core, fundamental purposes and values of the two previously discussed theories. Darwin’s theory of evolution and speciation is at the core dissatisfied with the recorded account of divine biologic creation that preceded it, described in Genesis. Naturalists of the day (1800s), Darwin prided himself as one, approached science from the vantage point of ‘only what is seen can be real’. This approach disregards the possibility of a divine creator and seeks to explain physical bioprocesses from the preconceived notion that they created themselves.

Intelligent Design, on the other hand, was first introduced by Phillip Johnson, in the late 1900s. Johnson, neither of his Ph.D.s held in biology, was convinced that nature is too complex to have created itself and must have been created by a divine creator. Johnson sought out the most convincing arguments for and against the Darwinian Evolutionary theory and concluded that there are too many items that did not ‘seem probable’—to use the words of Darwin—enough to support the deeply held beliefs originating from Darwin.

Now to daily life application; both of these theories require a subscription to a belief that will never be proven in a lab. It is just that: a belief that either Moses, the Jewish patriarch, was inspired by the original Creator Himself and wrote as he was instructed by the Creator, or a belief that no such Creator exists and the origin of species must have necessarily happened without His intervention. It is my estimation that if one subscribes to the theory of DE it is because, like Darwin himself, that one has a preconceived notion that Genesis is insufficient or in error. If one holds to either creationism or ID that one has the belief that Genesis is sufficient and a reputable source for such information.

I aim to post the final part of Lesson No. 5 this weekend...

Lesson No. 5c - Introduction to Intelligent Design

Intelligent Design (ID), first coined by Philip Johnson, is an explanation for the origin of species and current day variation found therein. Other notable scientists, see Recommended Reading selection, have since joined Johnson in an Intellectually Honest refute to the long held ‘theory of fact’ touted by many high school and college professors. The basic premise of ID is 2 fold:

1. Life as we understand and as we can observe has been created; a discussion of the creator(s) is reserved for philosophers. Current day life (human, animal, plant, fungus, protozoan) is much too complex to have evolved by undirected, random, happenings of chance regardless of any amount of time allotted for the transformation.

a. Life is intrinsically irreducibly complex (MJ Behe). If it cannot be reduced to a more simple state, it cannot have evolved from such a state to one more complex. It was designed complex.

2. Observation of nature provides all required information for statistical and biological validation of point number one.

No specific examples have been given here as they require detailed discussion to flesh out. The purpose of this posting is to spark interest and offer supplemental reading for individual or live group discussion. For more information about ID please read:

• Darwin's Black Box: The Biochemical Challenge to Evolution (MJ Behe)
• Dismantling Evolution: Building the case for Intelligent Design (RO Muncaster)
• Intelligent Design: The Bridge Between Science & Theology (WA Dembski)
• Darwin's God: Evolution and the Problem of Evil (CG Hunter)

For questions about a specific topic please post under the comment section and a the topic will be discussed or a future post will be used for further discussion.

Thanks for stopping by.

Lesson No. 5b - Flaws in the Darwinian Evolution Theory

Darwinian Evolution: n, a theory that explains current day biological / cosmic variation as a product of unguided, random happenings that is leading toward both speciation of the living and their concurrent genetic improvement.

Below are some snippets of erroneous examples for Darwinian Evolution that I ran across while in college. Once I understood their argument, I was dumbfounded by the blatant, gross academic leaps that are required to accept them as valid theory.

During this time of enlightenment, I also decided to visit some local Jr. High and High School science classrooms; I was afforded the opportunity to peruse current texts. I was again taken aback when I found these same examples littering secondary school text books.

Again, these are just a few examples that are currently used by Darwinians in an attempt to capture the minds of young budding (pardon the ‘yeast’ reference!) scientists. The problem with them is that following in-depth discussion, they do not come close to ‘holding water’ yet they continue to appear in text books at all levels of education.


Inaccurate examples classically used in high school and college textbooks to support DE.

1. Peppered Moth – discovered to be erroneous and flawed, published in Nature, 1998.

2. Beak Variation in Galapagos Finches – this is at best a microevolution issue and therefore does not support DE’s theory of speciation.

3. Resistance in Bacteria to Antibiotics in Humans – this is a microevolution issue. Bacteria that posses resistance to 1 antibiotic are not killed while all the others that are susceptible do die. The ‘bug’ population then micro evolves to a resistant population.

4. Viruses – the reason that you have to get a yearly flu vaccine is that the virus or virus population micro-evolves. In this way, viruses typically start to express the variation found in their RNA (or DNA). The viruses remain however a virus containing both H and N protein (these are how flu viruses are identified as different).

5. Mitochondria – mitochondria provide the ‘energy currency’ for human cells to function & are hypothesized to have been originally independent cells that were engulfed by a larger cell. The theory says that the current day mitochondria then lost all of its ancillary abilities, focusing solely on producing energy. One major problem with this theory is that DNA / functionality did not increase; it decreased as the engulfed cell lost all of its previous abilities. The ‘energy currency’ is similar to that of gasoline used to power an automobile. This theory has never, to my knowledge, been displayed in a lab (this of all DE theories ought to be recreated in the lab) and in my opinion is not likely to have happened. There are too many biochemical anomalies that would not favor such an event. Also the DE theory requires gained DNA; here it is only lost.



If any of these topics, or another, interests you, please speak up and we will have a more in depth discussion about the intricacies involved. You can also search your local library for publications concerning these issues or you can look through the 'Recommended Reading' list here, on the right side of this blog

Lesson No. 5a - A Definition of Terms

In a discussion such as this, there may be several definitions to important words. Below are some such words and the definitions that will be used henceforth.

1. Evolution – a process of continual change including both MACRO- and MICROevolution; from a less ordered, more simplistic state toward a more ordered, more functional, more complex state.

2. Macroevolution – evolution at species level; speciation; the formation of new, survivable species from previously nonexistent species; the formation of a new entity from a previous nothingness.

3. Microevolution – a change in frequency of genes within a population (ie. if the most prevalent eye color world wide is currently brown and this changes to green because of any number of events that resulted in the death/extinction of humans with brown eye color)

4. Natural Selection – a process by which organisms expressing favorable traits are better suited for survival (and subsequently propagating this trait to progeny) than those organisms not expressing the favorable trait.

5. Intelligent Design – the theory that an intelligent, directed process best explains the ‘Origin of Life’, no identification of this ‘intelligence’ is provided.