Evolution Shames Africans

Photocredit: Wikemedia Commons

No doubt you have seen the above diagrams….well at least the last one, if not the first two adaptations!

That same story that was taught to me over 40 years ago in a Western schoolroom is also taught in the schoolrooms here.

Although almost all African's believe in God in some way and have various styles of 'creation stories' of one version or another, what is taught at school is put in the compartmentalised box of what one is supposed to believe in regard to 'Western Science'.

However, the teaching of evolution has tried to take on African roots as well.

Just a few hours drive from where I live, is a place that is supposed to be the boast of Africa - 'The Cradle of Humankind'.

It is supposed to be the site of the first humans in the process of evolution.

And Africa is meant to be 'proud' that it is the source of all humanity. It is supposed to be an honour to be the ones from whom all the rest of humanity evolved.

However, it is far from being a position of honour.  I find it so sad, to see Africans tricked into believing something is their honour  when it is actually their shame, and keeping them 'lower' than the rest of the world, in people's thinking.

You see, if one is to believe in evolution and the diagrams above, that man evolved from apes/monkeys/baboons, then African's are the 'type' of human that is the least advanced, the least intelligent and the least developed and the least capable of 'modern' life.  

If evolution is about progressing from the least developed and advanced creatures to ever advancing creatures and 'humanity' which started in South Africa, and continued to 'progress' to 'higher' levels of humanity across the globe, then evolution puts Africans in a 'least human/almost monkey' category.

We have even heard Westerners make comment here that Africans are just not 'capable' of certain things mentality speaking!  How, derogatory!

African are just as much humans as any other human being on the planet. They may not have had the same opportunities as others on the planet, the cultural worldviews may have placed certain boundaries that determined what was allowed and permitted to occur in life, but an African is no less intelligent or able.  If Ben Carson can become a world renowned Neurosurgeon, doesn't that tell us something about the fact that skin colour makes no difference to potential inherent ability?

Evolution is full of conundrums.

The latest is that supposedly a newly discovered type of dinosaur (Ingentia Prima, in Argentina) which is being debated whether it walked on two legs or four. Some are saying it started out walking on two legs (a biped), and the other two front 'legs' were more like hands….a bit like a kangaroo. However unlike the human evolution, the scientists are having trouble working out how it seems these dinosaurs 'evolved' from two-leg walkers to later become four-leg walkers. Why I ask, would dinosaurs want to 'evolve' in the opposite direction to other supposed evolution which was pressing toward the humans 'progressing' to be two leg walkers from four leg monkey walkers?

God's word tells us that he made each animal for it to reproduce according to its kind. He made the first human as fully human. There was no gradual process. He made humans as uniquely human - the only creature to have God's life breathed into him. Every human being - no matter the skin shade - is made in the image of God, and equal in value in the sight of God.

Africans are fully human, fully able to do what any other skin colour human can do, fully able to know God through Jesus Christ and serve God to the full capacity of a human being indwelt by Christ.

The gospel is the truth that sets Africa free from the place of shame - and being seen as 'less than' - in which the evolutionary tree has said they should be placed.

Hope for this September Day at the Edge of the Kalahari

Well today is the day when we have equal time of exactly day and night here on the edge of the Kalahari Desert - sunrise is 6.10am and sunset is 6.10 pm!

But it is also about the middle of September which, in Australia I was taught was the month that marked the beginning of Spring!  It is the season emerging from the cold of winter when all the plants start flowering and fresh green growth is sprouting everywhere!

It is supposed to be like an opposite of Autumn - known as 'Fall' in the USA, that comes before winter.

However, this year for us the weather seems a bit confused. 

We had a mild winter with unusual days of rain. And no days, as we usually would do, below zero degrees, and we only had one day that was almost zero degrees C.

So it wasn't until after the end of 'winter', and some warmer days were followed by a short but later 'colder snap' a couple weeks back at the beginning of September, that the leaves of the trees started to turn red and fall, carpeting the dirt and rocks beside our house in a carpet of beautiful colour.  

And it is only now that the tree outside our window and most other trees in the bush around us, have become basically leafless!

Spring is almost not a season at all here. We just skip it altogether!…especially this year it seems!

Instead, we go from 'winter' into 'windy', and 'windy' is 'hot windy'!  It is dust storms and super low humidity  (as you can see from the first photo above saying humidity as only 6% and since I took that screen capture on my phone it later dropped to 4%), and high temperatures! It's when you wash your hair and it is air-dry in just minutes and to get croutons you just leave bread on the counter for an hour!

Like today…

Maximum temperature 37 or 38 degrees C with single figures humidity in the afternoon. - same as yesterday - and predicted to continue for a few more days yet, before the Max temp. might drop a couple of degrees later in the week. Friends further north are already experiencing temperatures over the 41 degree celcius mark!  And even just the other side of the city from us registered 41 degrees!

And this is just the 'warm up' to summer itself!  October is usually the hottest month of the year! I think we are in for a scorcher!

But its good to be reminded that despite what we feel is topsy-turvy confusion with the seasons, and the world's fears of 'climate change', our hope and trust is not in what 'looks confusing', but we can press on in peace with our hope and trust in the Creator. We don't have to fret and worry about 'what will become of us'?  We can go into the day, the week, the year, the future, with confidence knowing that our times and the seasons are in His hand. Our hope is secured in eternity in Christ.

Whether the day is hot, cold, cold, windy, dry, wet, or whether leaves are falling at the expected time or not, we can trust in the Lord.

Though the fig tree should not blossom, nor fruit be on the vines, the produce of the olive fail and the fields yield no food, the flock be cut off from the fold and there be no herd in the stalls, yet I will rejoice in the LORD;

 I will take joy in the God of my salvation. 

Habakkuk 3:17-18