The Pre-Flood and Early Post-Flood People Part Two

Creation Musuem

Creation Musuem

Phil Jensen

ADVERTISEMENT

In the first part of this series, I said that because of the interdependent systems in living things, human beings and other living things could not wait to evolve.  They had to be created in a fully developed state.

Scientists have now discovered a scientific principle which supports this understanding. It is called the principle of irreducible complexity.  Michael Behe defines it as follows: “By irreducible complexity I mean a single system composed of several well matched, interacting parts that contribute to the basic function, wherein the removal of any one of the parts causes  the system to effectively cease functioning.”[1]

A good example of this is the interacting parts of the human physical body.  We have our cardiovascular system with the heart and veins and arteries; we have our lungs; we have our digestive system, our urinary tract and our bowels; we have our muscular system and skeletal system, and the brain which controls all of those things; working together in order to have life.  This being the case, if you cause the heart to stop functioning, the rest will cease functioning.  The same is true with the lungs.  Take out the urinary tract or the muscular system and the result is the same.  And the same is true of all living things.

Rick Kriebel 2016

ADVERTISEMENT

In other words, living things have within them different parts, different complex systems which are totally dependent upon each other, such that if you take out even one of the parts, the plant or animal cannot live. And so, parts or systems in a living organism cannot wait for another part to evolve.  All of the parts have to be there for the plant or animal to live.

Notice what this means. The evidence is there. God made everything in a mature state.  He did not gradually evolve man out of slime and start them out as brutish creatures and gradually improve them.

Making sub-human races with little intelligence is what a godless evolutionary process would do. This is why, in presenting the evolutionary view, the book The Genius of Ancient Man says, “The naturalistic model depicts the first humanoid beings as brutish creatures evolving out of slime, looking more like apes than humans.  Their behavior would be only slightly advanced above the rest of the animal world from which they were evolving.  These advancements could  include a slowly developing system of communication, living in caves struggling to discover the secrets of fire, and laboring to move and build things before finally inventing the wheel.”[2]

Woodrow Wilcox

ADVERTISEMENT

Does that sound like the humans God created in His image and after His likeness?  Does making a creature like that who was brutish and who looked more like apes than humans sound like what the God who is the Lord of heaven and earth would do?  After all, God knows everything. His understanding is infinite and His wisdom and power are unlimited.  That being the case, there was nothing to keep Him from using His unlimited power to make the perfect human with a very gifted intelligence right at the start.

Notice here, those who don’t believe in this understanding, those who don’t believe in the supernatural creation of humanity are people who are seeking to suppress the truth.  They would say the original humans were just brutes wandering through the world without any knowledge of their Creator. That is suppressing the truth, for that is not the way it was.  God made humans in His image and likeness just like He said He did.

Notice, this not only puts us in a class by ourselves above all the other creatures, but it means He made the human race very good.  And Genesis 1:31 backs this up when it says, “Then God saw everything that He had made, and indeed it was very good,” And everything would include the human race.  And so, the human race was very good.

What does “very good” mean?  It means no imperfections, no DNA mistakes, no weaknesses of any kind.  The first humans were not brutes who looked more like apes.  They were great looking humans.  This is what you believe if you believe in a Creator God with the power, the wisdom, and the righteousness to do it right the first time.

God created them with the intelligence and abilities He intended humans to have for the purpose He would give them.  Notice that God knew what purpose He would give humanity and He equipped them with the intelligence and abilities to carry out that purpose.  I say this because when God made humanity very good in His image, according to His likeness, He blessed them and gave them a purpose. Genesis 1:28 says “Then God blessed them, and God said to them, ‘Be fruitful and multiply and fill the earth and subdue it; have dominion over the fish of the sea, over the birds of the air, and over every living thing that moves on the earth.’”

God also blessed them. This means He empowered them to be successful in what they were being called to do.  He empowered them to be fruitful and multiply.  He empowered them to fill the earth and subdue it and have dominion over everything on the earth. In empowering them to be successful, God would have given them wisdom and strength and the abilities they would need to accomplish these things.

Man’s ability to accomplish these things can be seen in the following passages from Job 28: “Surely, there is a mine for silver, and a place where gold is refined.  Iron is taken from the earth, and copper is smelted from ore.  Man puts an end to darkness, and searches every recess for ore in the darkness and the shadow of death.  He breaks open a shaft away from people” and “ He puts his hand on the flint; he overturns the mountains at the roots.  He cuts out channels in the rocks, and his eye sees every precious thing.  He dams up the streams from trickling; what is hidden he brings forth to light.”

Notice the clear implication of this passage. God gave early humans all they needed in order to subdue the earth and establish dominion over the earth. That alone should cause us to discard any evolutionary views of man as a brutish creature with a low IQ.

As we picture early man as being very intelligent, very quickly acquiring the skills to subdue the earth, we need to remember another advantage early man had which would have enabled him to make great progress.  This is the fact that early man lived much longer than we do today.  According to the record in Genesis, chapter 5, they lived to be hundreds of years old, some 900 years old.

Now that seems incredible. And it would be unbelievable except for three things. First, we need to understand that when Genesis 1:31 tells us that everything God made was every good, it means exactly that. Think of how long we could live today if we were genetically perfect.

Secondly, as I mentioned in the previous chapter, in Genesis 6:3 we have God’s sovereign decision at the time of the Flood to lower the life span.  And so, we have a clear statement from God in Scripture telling us that we live a shorter life today because God decided we would.

The third thing we need to be aware of is in recent decades evidence has come to light that the pre-Flood world had characteristics that enabled people to live longer. These things, such as more oxygen, were mentioned in the previous chapter.  They certainly would have given people at that time a definite advantage.

That ability of being able to live much longer would have been a tremendous help in accumulating knowledge and perfecting skills and passing those skills and knowledge on to their descendants. Therefore, there was every indication that they had what they needed to have to make a lot of progress during the pre-Flood years. They had 1656 years to do it.

We know this because according to the early chapters of Genesis, the pre-Flood civilization had farms, livestock, music, cities and tools. In fact, by the fifth generation of humanity, the pre-Flood people already knew what a city was, how to play the harp and the flute, and how to forge instruments of brass and iron.  With the intelligence to bring those things about, no doubt, a lot was accomplished after that.  In 1656 years, there would have been enough time to make a lot of progress.  This series of articles is from Bob Wittstruck’s new book, The Forgotten Factor of History God Rules.

[1] Michael Behe, Darwin’s Black Box: The Biochemical Challenge to Evolution, (New York: The Free Press—a division of Simon and Schuster, Inc, 1996), p. 39. Fair Use.

[2] From (The Genius of Ancient Man) by (Don Landis general editor), (first printing 2012); (page 18), Used with permission from the publisher (Master Books            a division of New Leaf Publishing Group, Inc.)   This book provides a lot of evidence for pre-flood man and early post-flood man.

Forgotten_Factor_Banner_Ad_653x197

ADVERTISEMENT


This article is printed with the permission of the author(s). Opinions expressed herein are the sole responsibility of the article’s author(s), or of the person(s) or organization(s) quoted therein, and do not necessarily represent those of American Clarion or Dakota Voice LLC.

Comment Rules: Please confine comments to salient ones that add to the topic; Profanity is not allowed and will be deleted; Spam, copied statements and other material not comprised of the reader’s own opinion will be deleted.


Similar Posts:

Bob Wittstruck was a pastor for 33 years, was the associate director of the Black Hills Creation Science Association, and is a supporter of both Christian schooling and home schooling. His latest book, The Forgotten Factor of History God Rules, is being printed in February or March of 2016. His email address is [email protected]
Bob Wittstruck
View all articles by Bob Wittstruck
Print Friendly
  • DCM7

    “in Genesis 6:3 we have God’s sovereign decision at the time of the Flood to lower the life span”

    That’s actually a common misunderstanding. When God says man’s “days shall be one hundred and twenty years,” he’s not saying people would now only live to be that age. He’s saying it would be 120 years until the Flood came.

    The reason lifespans started dropping so drastically after the Flood was that mankind, after being reduced to a population of just eight, went through a major genetic bottleneck that greatly increased genetic defects from that point on.

    • WXRGina

      DCM, I disagree. When the Lord proclaimed He’d had enough of contending with man up to the point of His declaration in Genesis 6:3, He did not give any limit to the timeline. He didn’t say “until the flood.” He said our days will be limited to 120 years, period. It has been so ever since.

      • I don’t get too dogmatic over it, because I don’t think it’s spelled out in full clarity. However, I do lean toward the “120 years until the flood” interpretation.

        AIG has some interesting information on this subject:

        https://answersingenesis.org/bible-questions/why-did-people-have-shorter-lives-after-flood/

        https://answersingenesis.org/bible-timeline/genealogy/did-adam-and-noah-really-live-over-900-years/

        BTW, the author of this article was a founding member of a creation science group I used to be a board member of. It was a conference that he and his fellow group members put on that led me to change from being a theistic evolutionist to a young-earth creationist. I later joined the group and was asked to serve on the board after I had changed my thinking.

        • WXRGina

          Thanks, Bob. I’ll have to read the linked columns you posted. My comment to DCM was just my observation that since the Lord’s proclamation, no one lives (much) longer than what He declared. I don’t blame Him, because we are a hard-headed lot. ?

          • I wouldn’t put up with us 1/10th as long as He does. ?

            • WXRGina

              ? Me, neither.

  • Pingback: Pre-Flood and Early Post-Flood People, Part Three()