Text: Job 36:24-33

 

I.         In outlining the sins of the people of the world, Paul noted that the Gentiles could be justly charged with sin - Romans 1:18-23

            A.        No one has the excuse of not knowing that God exists.

            B.        He and even His nature can be seen in the things God has made, leaving all without any excuse.

            C.        Over the years I’ve been collecting examples of the handiwork of God, which I would like to share a few with you

II.        Why incremental change doesn’t work

            A.        Have you played a word game where you start with a word and can make only one change: you can alter one letter, add a letter or remove a letter. The resulting word must still be a word.

            B.        Basically evolution says that is the rule under which life as we know it developed. One small change, an addition, or a subtraction, one at a time where each resulting system remains functioning life.

                        1.         But they add an additional rule, the change must result in an improvement that makes the life form more survivable than the prior form.

                        2.         What people are finally recognizing is that this one change at a time method cannot explain life as we know it.

                        3.         There are far too many complex designs in the world which contain interdependent systems. All parts must be in place in order for the system to function.

                                    a.         Scientist refer to these system as irreducible complexities

            C.        You can’t even avoid these complexities by saying the system developed on the side.

                        1.         If it isn’t functioning, then it can’t be selected as an improvement.

                        2.         What would drive hundreds of independent, unneeded parts to start functioning together?

            D.        By the way, this is where scientist for decades talked about vestigial organs

                        1.         There was a long list in the human body for a while. You know how many are left? ZERO!

                        2.         It took a while, but we found reasons for every organ’s existence.

                        3.         The reason they were labeled vestigial was simply because the human body was able to compensate when these organs were absent or not functioning. But being able to function did imply it was the ideal state.

                        4.         So now the fad is to look for “junk” DNA

                        5.         Notice that these evidences are based on lack of information, not actual knowledge.

III.       Evidence from Biology

            A.        Let’s take a look at your kidneys

                        1.         This organ is extremely complex, yet is so reliable that a human can survive with a single kidney operating at a fraction of its capacity.

                        2.         Its primary function is to filter impurities and toxins from our blood

                                    a.         Each kidney has three layers, the cortex, medulla, and the pelvis

                                    b.         Blood flows into the cortex and medulla through the renal artery, which then branches into smaller vessels which then connects to a blood filtration unity called a nephron.

                                    c.         Two normal kidneys have about two million nephrons, making up about 60 miles of filtration surface if combined, which purify all the body’s blood approximately every 50 minutes.

                                    d.         That means it is handling about 400 gallons of blood each day. And after being purified about 99% of the blood’s fluid is recycled back into the body.

                        3.         Many engineers, spending countless hours have worked to design an artificial kidney. We marvel at their feat of engineering, but we can’t see the engineering God has placed into two fist size organs in our body?

                        4.         Psalm 139:14-16

                        5.         Oh, and while it is filtering the blood, the kidneys also regulates the pH balance of your blood, your blood pressure, and your blood plasma volume. And it communicates with other organs in the body through hormones.

            B.        How about your eyes?

                        1.         It would take thousands of changes to genes in the proper order to cause a sightless creature to develop a crude light-sensitive patch. It would take countless more changes to turn that light-sensitive patch into a fluid-filled eyeball.

                        2.         An eye that is not fully developed does not provide sight, so any mutation that doesn’t provide some advantage would be eliminated by natural selection.

                        3.         So how did the eye develop?

                        4.         There is no living evidence or fossil evidence in animals showing a gradual development of an eye.

                                    a.         Every known creature has a fully developed compound eye, a fluid-filled eyeball, or a light-gathering spot.

                                    b.         No one has been able to describe a sequence of step-by-step changes to get from one to the other

                        5.         Let’s just consider the lens of your eye. It is a marvel of chemistry

                                    a.         It contains a very high concentration of protein molecules in a transparent water solution.

                                                (1)       Did you know that protein molecules in a water solution are not transparent, but opaque? (Think milk)

                                                (2)       For example, here is a slide of keratin, the protein that make makes up your hair and fingernails in a water solution

                                    b.         But eyes need the lens to be transparent to let light through

                                                (1)       After much research, scientists learn that the concentration of protein molecules are so high that the proteins pack together like the molecules of window glass.

                                                (2)       What is normally opaque suddenly becomes transparent.

                                    c.         So how many yeas was an evolving creature stumbling around blind before “random” mutations happened upon the perfect concentration to pack protein in just the right way to make the lens of the eye transparent?

                                                (1)       Shouldn’t natural selection make the creature with the non-working lens extinct before it could randomly hit upon a functioning lens?

                        6.         Here is another little fact, if you cut your skin, the cut heals from the bottom up and as a result scar tissue forms.

                                    a.         But not the eye! When the cornea is scratched the cells of the separated walls move toward each other and close the scratch, therefore no scar tissue forms.

                                    b.         If scar tissue formed every time we scratched our corneas, we would be looking through a jumble of cloudy lines by the time we reached middle age.

                        7.         Psalms 111:1-4

            C.        The Unusual

                        1.         There is a rare Australian aquatic frog which has an unusual method of raising young. After the eggs are laid and fertilized, the female swallows them.

                                    a.         Once swallowed, the mother stops eating for the next 8 weeks.

                                    b.         After 8 weeks, fully developed little frogs come out of her mouth!

                        2.         Other animals, including most frogs can’t do this because the stomach acids would destroy the young.

                        3.         But these gastric brooding frogs can because the young release special chemicals which prevent the mother’s stomach from making digestive acids, so the newly fertilized eggs actually change their mother’s stomach from a digestive organ into a nursery.

                        4.         So how did the first baby frog learn to turn off their mother’s digestion? And how did mom learn to survive eight weeks without eating?

                        5.         Psalm 104:24-28

            D.        The Common

                        1.         Ever wonder how those thin leaves on trees manage to survive high winds?

                        2.         Sure, many leaves get torn down, but look how many stay up.

                        3.         There are small grooves on the stems of leaves. These groves give the leaf stiffness in the up and down direction, so a leaf can face the sun, but allows rolling and twisting in other directions.

                        4.         It is this flexibility that reduces drag and in particular in high wind a leaf will curl into a cone and groups of leaves will curl into a cone shape that has minimal drag

                        5.         Proverbs 3:19-20

IV.      The number of examples is endless

            A.        The point is not only is there ample proof that there is a designer, but that God is meticulous in His care and in the details

            B.        Psalm 144:1-4 - Man is so feeble, yet God took care of the details and still cares

            C.        He watches and tends - Isaiah 40:10-18

            D.        Yet He does not wishes any to perish - II Peter 3:9

            E.        That is the God nature in part reveals