Over the last several years evolutionists have done a remarkable job convincing people that the debate over origins is one between science and religion. However, both parties essentially have access to the same data, and both parties ultimately have to go by faith on certain issues, like how the first life form came to be for example. It is not something that can be scientifically observed, you either believe God did it or it created itself through a series of chance events - your conclusions having been influenced either by man's theories or God's Word. So because these theories are often taught as fact many people now doubt a literal interpretation of the Bible and have tried to bend scripture so that it can be harmonised with these "alternate ideas". One of these theories is known as The Gap Theory.
The gap theory proposes that there is a time gap of millions or billions of years between Genesis 1:1 and 1:2. The story says that God once created a world full of dinosaurs and ape men which are often referred to as the Pre-Adamic race. At some point here the devil rebelled against God who then destroyed that world with a flood (not to be confused with Noah's flood). God then supposedly started the creation process afresh about 6000 years ago which is where Genesis 1:2 kicks in. The problem with this is that the Bible gives no indication that any of this happens, it actually paints a rather different picture of how events unfolded which goes something like this.
In Exodus 20:11 we read that God made the heavens and the earth and everything in them (which would include the angels) in six days; based on the life spans and genealogies given in Genesis scholars place the date at around 6000 years ago. At the end of the first week God looks at His creation and declares everything to be "very good" (Genesis 1:31), He probably would not have said this had the devil and a third of the angels rebelled yet. Scripture actually reveals that it was only after the Garden of Eden was created that Satan rebelled, we read in Ezekiel 28:13-19 that he was in the garden, perfect in his ways and called the anointed cherub before he became prideful at his own beauty. So his fall must have occurred somewhere between the creation of man and the temptation of Adam and Eve later on in chapter 3 of Genesis.
Contradictions, contradictions...
Placing a gap of millions of years between the first two verses of Genesis causes several contradictions to materialize later in the Bible. For example, Jesus taught that the creation of man was the beginning (Mathew 19:4); had mankind only arrived on the scene 4.6 billion years after the beginning then He would have been wrong.
Paul would also have been wrong in several scriptures. He taught that death, disease and suffering were a result of the fall in passages like Romans 5:12-14, 8:22 and 1 Corinthians 15:21-22. We have to ask ourselves, if sin never brought death into the world as these scriptures teach and they are not a result of man's disobedience, then why did Jesus have to die?
John would have been wrong as well - when speaking of a future new heaven and new earth he stated in Revelation 21:1 that the world we currently live on is the first earth, why did he not say it is the second earth if one was destroyed previously?
Logical arguments can be raised as well, for instance, because people who accept the gap theory also accept the long time spans evolutionists need for their theories to sound legitimate. They must accept that sharks and crocodiles have been on our planet for millions of years. Now if God destroyed everything in verse 1 of the Bible to such an extent that He had to recreate the sun and plants later on, how then did these animals survive through this period of destruction? Another question worth pondering on is if Satan did indeed fall before man was created, why would God judge a spiritual being by destroying the earth with a flood? It seems like everything but Satan and the fallen angels would have perished in that judgement.
With a little study one can see that most of man's opinions fall short and simply cannot stand against God's Word. Once we start elevating our theories to the same level as the Bible then we start reading things in the scriptures that are not there. May His Word be our final authority and guide us into all truth!
