~~The BioLogos Foundation is committed to trying to get the church to reconcile evolution with the Bible. In 2012 BioLogos offered grants through their Evolution and Christian Faith program to people who wanted to produce “new resources and opportunities to engage the community on the topic of evolutionary creation” (which is really just another name for theistic evolution). The grants ranged from $23,000 to $300,000, and BioLogos awarded 37 of them.Now, the materials created using grants from BioLogos certainly aren’t going to be teaching the authority of God’s Word beginning in Genesis. That much is obvious. But I thought you should be warned about one of the projects that BioLogos is funding—a curriculum called Author of Life.Available online for free, Author of Life is sadly the creation of Joshua Hayashi, a school chaplain and youth group leader, and Diane Sweeney, a biology instructor and youth group leader. The series is being filmed in Hawaii, and the authors’ goal is to “encourage students to think about the relationship between their faith in the God of the Bible and the process of Evolution.” In episode four of their short videos, titled “God as Artist of Evolution,” Sweeney claims that she isn’t out to change students’ minds or to “shake up” their faith. But the Author of Life curriculum actually attempts to do just that. In fact, it’s really nothing more than a course to indoctrinate young people in the church to believe in evolution and compromise this secular religion with the Bible.As with many such attempts to reconcile evolutionary ideas with Scripture, the authors of the curriculum assume that the terms science and evolution mean the same thing. For example, in the leader’s guide to episode four, the writers suggest the following question for students:If we as Christians are meant to interpret Genesis 1 and 2 as it is written (6 literal 24 hour days, all things created in the order described), then we must reject much of what science tells us. Should this concern Christians? Should Christians look to alter their interpretation of Scripture or assume that man’s wisdom falls short of God’s wisdom?Does that look like a question that’s not intended to change minds? Students are told outright that if they accept Genesis as literal history, they have rejected “science”! No, once again we need to emphasize (as I did in my debate with Bill Nye “the Science Guy” last month) that there are two different types of science—observational science that is based on empiricism and the repeatable test (the science that builds our technology), and historical science that concerns one’s belief about the past.Sweeney and Hayashi are really pushing students to believe the historical science of the secularists based on naturalism (atheism)—their beliefs about the past concerning origins. For example, they claim, “Fossil evidence shows transitional forms in perfect sequence, especially in mammals such as whales and horses and amphibians especially tiktaalik.” But even most secularists acknowledge that so-called horse evolution has been debunked. And we at AiG have responded to claims about tiktaalik and whale evolution many times.What else do Sweeney and Hayashi have to say about evolution and the Bible? Well, in episode five, titled “The Beauty of God’s Creative Process,” Sweeney gives a lengthy discussion of the genetics of the finch, and how a single family of finches “evolved” into 60 different species over “millions of years.” Of course, this wasn’t evolution and it didn’t take millions of years, and the point is that the different species are all still finches! Speciation is not part of an evolutionary mechanism—in fact, this is opposite of evolution.Sweeney is prepared for that argument, however. She goes on to assert that a great deal of evidence has been found that suggests that birds did evolve . . . from dinosaurs. She cites the supposed similarities between theropod dinosaurs and birds to back up her claim. Contrary to these claims, we have several articles dealing with this issue.The most egregious demonstration of how Sweeney and Hayashi attempt to erode the authority of Scripture in Genesis comes in episode three, titled “The Creation Story.” In this video, two students stand next to each other. As they recite portions of the creation account in Genesis 1, they alternately explain how the process of evolution could be fit into various parts of Genesis 1. One of the students calls the creation account a summary of this process, and even claims that after millions of years, God chose ape-like creatures and gave them “the gift of an eternal spirit”:This gift enabled these first humans to understand sin and gave them the choice to willingly rebel against or to serve God.But even Jesus in Matthew 19 quoted from Genesis concerning the first man and woman, acknowledging that the woman came from the man (“one flesh”)—she did not come from an “ape-woman.”Sadly, this kind of compromise with the Bible is what two Christian leaders and teachers are promoting to students in Hawaii. Sweeney and Hayashi note on their website that “The release of [episode 3] occurred just before the very publicized debate between Ken Hamm [sic] and Bill Nye. I think people are looking for an alternative to a debate. Rather than choosing sides, people want to see that God’s Word and God’s Work are not in conflict.”The people at BioLogos aren’t interested in promoting the authority of Scripture. Instead, they are declaring that man has authority over God’s Word to change it and fit the Bible with what the secularists are saying. Such compromise is rampant through our Christian colleges, churches, and seminaries. Sadly, organizations like BioLogos are using millions of dollars to undermine the authority of the Word. No wonder so many young people are leaving the church by the time they reach college age.If you haven’t read my newest book Six Days on compromise in the church, Christian schools, and seminaries, then I urge you to order it today. We must stem the tide of compromise among Christians and call our church leaders back to the authority of God’s Word!Thanks for stopping by and thanks for praying,Ken