A Review Of Ken Ham's "Why Won't They Listen?"

Ken Ham, the well known founder and president of Answers In Genesis and the Creation Museum in Petersburg, KY, is the author of numerous books.

Why Won't They Listen was originally titled Creation Evangelism, explores one of the key problems faced by Christians hoping to fulfill the Great Commission in the U.S.A. of the early 21st century, and countries with similar cultures.

What similarities, specifically? A poor understanding of the Word of God.

Mr. Ham equates many societies with the Greeks of the 1st century, with little knowledge of the Bible, little knowledge of the attributes of God, little care for moral absolutes, little history of mankind in a moral sense, and an assumption of the Bible as being little more than stories believed by a strange group of uneducated people.

In the United States, for example, there is a significant downturn in moral values, and a resulting rise in crime and other societal ills, which all seem to date back to the point in the 1960's when public schools became hostile to the Bible and prayer. Adding to this was the introduction of evolution indoctrination as the only viable explanation of why things are the way they are. In an arena where truth was supposed to be king, evolution became the truth, the Bible was relegated to the status of a kept-at-home relic.

As a result the USA adult population, raising younger generations, which have little or no confidence in the Bible as the true Word of God, and little understanding of the moral truths and consequences contained in the Bible.

Mr. Ham contends that evangelists must treat the members of such societies the way Paul did in Acts 17: First you must explain the basic truths contained in the Bible, only then can they understand the true meaning of their sin and their peril without a savior. Part of this explanation must include conveying the fact that evolution is based on faith and theory, it is not the scientific fact so many believe it to be.

The effects of evolution on society is deep and wide-spread. If evolution is true, then we are all the result of random mutations, we are all the result of prior organisms fighting for survival and doing whatever they had to get a step ahead of weaker organisms, if there is no God and no afterlife, then there are no moral absolutes. I can do whatever I can get away with, or convince you to let me get away with. If I amass power, I can do significantly more. There are no boundaries, there is only what someone can get away with.

This is exactly what we find in leaders around the world who reject the concept of God and rise to positions of power. Suddenly pragmatism and greed are king. Murder is a tool to repress opposition, or to motivate the masses.

But we do not need to look at the Hitlers and Pol-Pots around the world to see evidence of those who discount God, we see it in increased child-abuse, abortion, sex-slave rings, divorce, embryonic stem-cell harvesting, all manner of sexual perversions and combination's, and much more.

Why are there so many side effects to evolution? As Mr. Ham states, "[evolution] is a philosophy of life which teaches that man, independent of God and independent of revelation, determines truth. Thus, man’s opinions determine truth."

This is the world that modern evangelists increasingly face.

What is the answer? In the words of Martin Luther, "It was by the Word that the Church was founded and by the Word also it shall be re-established." Put simply: Christians must defend and expose the truth by enlightening people with the Word of God.

The answer espoused by Mr. Ham is not to attack issues, but to proclaim the truth.

As Christians we can reject abortion, we can stand for marriage, we should work to help those who are helpless, we should proclaim the need for civility and honor, but each should be defended and proclaimed using God's word, including Genesis 1 through 11.

When a Christian gets into a conversation about right and wrong, the way to argue for absolutes is to declare the absolute moral giver.

Legislation is not the answer, slick marketing campaigns are not the answer, even passionate arguments are not the answer: the inerrancy and trustworthyness of God's Word, combined with the peril for those who reject it, is the answer.

Mr. Ham proposes a four-step process.

1. Christians must understand and proclaim the inerrancy of Scripture, from Genesis 1:1 through Revelation 22:21, and churches must teach how to defend these truths.

2. Christians must understand that the humanistic movement is an attack on Christianity, and be prepared to give a defense to their falsehoods and propaganda.

3. Those ministries that can reach into the broad media and around the world must join in to promote these truths and pound the foundations of the evolutionists, humanists, atheists, and others.

4. When Christians fight issue battles, they must do so using the Word of God, the only way to prick the heart and achieve long-lasting change.

I agree with Mr. Ham that the earth is relatively young. A day is a day, and not billions or millions of years. I also agree with the literal reading of Genesis 1-11. There was no death until the fall of Adam and Eve, and consequently evolution is a fallacy. I also agree with his call to action: proclaim the truth and stand upon God's Word!

However, I think he overstates his case a bit with statements of how no one can understand God, including Christians, if they disagree. Mr. Ham states,

"And because the non-Christian has been indoctrinated to believe in millions of years of death, suffering, disease and bloodshed, he doesn’t understand how there can be a God of love. This person is not going to understand about a God of love until he puts on the true, uncompromised, biblical glasses, including the timeline of history: from Creation, through the Fall, the Cross and Resurrection, and the final Consummation of all these. Also, until the Christian has put on these same glasses, he will not be able to explain this seemingly contradictory world of death and life, health and disease, and joy and suffering to the non-Christian."

I must disagree with the distance Mr. Ham attempts to reach here. I was, until enlightened, just one of these non-Christians. I was, until enlightened, just such a Christian: believing in the atoning work of Christ while also believing that people in lab coats were diligently working to find truth wherever it lay. My heart ached for the lost, and in my own poor way I was attempting to share the gospel.

I now know the lengths to which scientists will go to bend the results and the interpretation to preclude a conclusion of anything divine. Take for example the declaration of Richard Lewontin, an evolutionist biologist and geneticist:

"We take the side of science in spite of the patent absurdity of some of its constructs, in spite of its failure to fulfill many of its extravagant promises of health and life, in spite of the tolerance of the scientific community for unsubstantiated just-so stories, because we have a prior commitment, a commitment to materialism. It is not that the methods and institutions of science somehow compel us to accept a material explanation of the phenomenal world, but, on the contrary, that we are forced by our a priori adherence to material causes to create an apparatus of investigation and a set of concepts that produce material explanations, no matter how counter-intuitive, no matter how mystifying to the uninitiated. Moreover, that materialism is an absolute, for we cannot allow a Divine Foot in the door." Richard Lewontin, Billions and billions of demons, The New York Review, p. 31, 9 January 1997.

I also understand that many Christians, with a desire to understand God's handiwork displayed before us, are responsible for many scientific discoveries, and their faith is enhanced, not challenged.

Mr. Ham makes a great point, however, in that by neglecting our responsibility to defend God's Word modern Christianity has self-inflicted cracks to form in our own foundation.

Overall, Mr. Ham has produced a book that is a worthwhile read which sheds light on the difficulties a Christian will encounter in modern "civilized" society.

This book is available online, for no cost, in its entirety. It is also available in paperback from the same page.

Armor up Christian!

Those Who Are To Be Accursed Can Be Closer Than You Think

"False prophets are to be found in the circles of the most orthodox, and they pretend to have a fervent love for souls, yet they fatally delude multitudes concerning the way of salvation. The pulpit, platform, and pamphlet hucksters have wantonly lowered the standard of divine holiness and so adulterated the Gospel in order to make it palatable to the carnal mind...Any preacher who rejects God’s law, who denies repentance to be a condition of salvation, who assures the giddy and godless that they are loved by God, who declares that saving faith is nothing more than an act of the will which every person has the power to perform is a false prophet and should be shunned as a deadly plague." - A. W. Pink

"As we have said before, so I say again now, if any man is preaching to you a gospel contrary to what you received, he is to be accursed!" - Paul, Galatians 1:9

Be on guard and be ready to give your defense.

Dave finds it "disturbing" that someone is watching?

David Letterman, who found it "creepy" and "disturbing" to discover that someone was watching him, seems to have missed the fact that God is omnipresent.

If Dave Letterman thinks the man who planned to blackmail him wanted payment, he needs to consider the fix he will be in on Judgment Day without a savior.

This interesting article by Russell D. Moore examines all of these issues, and the irony, in detail.

Show Me The Proof!

A frequent argument proclaimed by atheists and agnostics is: "There is no proof of God. Show me some proof."

There are many answers to this. I will discuss two in this post.

First, such non-believers do not want to know the truth, so they simply deny the obvious. This has been true ever since the first men walked the earth.

It was true when the Israelites wandered in the desert; one minute in the presence of God, the next minute seeking their own solutions.

It was also true during the life of Christ that men denied who He was.

In Matthew 12:38-45, Jesus talks about those who see Him in the flesh, hear His words, witness His miracles, and still refuse to believe because He would not show them a sign when they demanded one. Christ said to them,

"An evil and adulterous generation craves for a ​​sign; and yet no ​​sign will be given to it but the ​sign of Jonah the prophet; for just as ​Jonah was three days and three nights in the belly of the sea monster, so will ​the Son of Man be ​three days and three nights in the heart of the earth."

What Jesus meant by this was that He would not be commanded by them, to show the particular sign that they wanted to see. He is God, not the sinner. He is not slave to the sinner, desperately hoping and waiting to be called upon to demonstrate His abilities. Instead, He says, He will demonstrate His divinity according to His timing, according to His plan. Amazingly, He lets them know exactly what to look for as The Sign: His resurrection from the dead.

Secondly, mankind already has many facts, many signs and many wonders that are certain proof of God's existence, they simply choose to deny them. Here are just a few:

1) Creation demands a Creator. Otherwise you must believe that nothing, with no cause, created everything in an orderly way. Not just animals, but space, time, dust, rocks, water, DNA, order itself, laws, mathematics, gravity, and on and on.

2) Evil demands God. What? Yes, I said that correctly. Here is how: You agree that there is evil in the world? Of course you do. But, how can there be evil unless we agree that there is a standard of good outside your opinion and my opinion? This standard of good must be something other than human, or the opinions of good and evil would vary widely, but they do not. This means there must be a Moral Law Giver who transcends humanity, and established the standard for 'good'. This Moral Law Giver is God.

3) The Bible. OK, I can hear some readers moaning already. You will argue, "You can't prove the existence of God by using the Bible." Why not? Can't I use the symphonies of Bach as proof that he was real, or the writings of Benjamin Franklin as proof that he was real? Of course I can, and therefore I can use the Bible, which claims to be the Word of God, as proof that God exists and caused the Bible to be written down.

4) The resurrection of Christ. Some will immediately say, "But there's no proof of that." Oh, yes, there is. First of all, eyewitness testimony is documented in the Bible (there were over 500 witnesses). Non-Biblical sources from contemporaries also establish that something quite unusual happened in Jerusalem after the crucifixion. They Jews, who tried to end the worship of Jesus, could not produce a body. In addition, the followers of Christ, who scattered widely during His trial and crucifixion, came back - bold and certain of their faith. Finally, the resurrection was such a momentous event in human history that the calendar suddenly changed.

These are just a few of the many proofs of God's existence. The most personal, however, is your conscience.

The word conscience means 'with knowledge'. You know that you have violated God's moral standard (the Ten Commandments) every time you stop and think about them.

Consider: how many lies you have told in your life, how many times you have been unjustly angry with others, how many times you have used God's name in a casual or disgusted way (this is blasphemy), or how many times you have taken something (regardless of value) that did not belong to you? If you have done each, you are a liar, a murderer at heart, a blasphemer, and a thief in God's eyes (and these are just four of the Ten Commandments). You know this is true because God placed the knowledge of His absolute good moral code inside you. Your conscience, which is right now telling you that these are wrong, and that (absent salvation) when you stand before Him on Judgement Day, you will be guilty.

You know it by how you feel: ashamed, perhaps embarrassed, convicted. You also know that guilt demands punishment, and the Bible tells us that the punishment for sin is eternity in hell.

If that concerns you, then you should also know that Christ died on the cross, and was resurrected three days later, just as He said He would, as a sign to you and all of humanity that He is the only way of salvation from the coming judgment. Once you understand this, you need do only two things: repent, and make Christ your Lord.

Repentance means to stop in your tracks, recognize that you are a sinner, that you are tired of a lifestyle as a rebel. You are ready to conform to God's desire: To seek after God; To live for God.

Making Christ your Lord means that you will pray to Him, read His Word (the Bible), and obey His commandments. You recognize that He is in charge and that you are ready to allow Him to control your every thought and deed.

If you are ready to repent and surrender, then cry out to Him in prayer. He will hear the prayer of the repentant. Then, read your Bible and do what it says. Find a local church (you can get help here or here). Living Waters also has some material that may help: Save Yourself Some Pain.

Men frequently deny the obvious. The Bible foretells that although men deny God's existence, they will have no excuse on Judgment Day:

"For ​​since the creation of the world His invisible attributes, His eternal power and divine nature, have been clearly seen, ​​being understood through what has been made, so that they are without excuse." Romans 1:20

The time to stop denying is now.

Ask Jesus Into Your Heart? What Verse Is That?

So many people today believe they are Christians because at some point they "asked Jesus into their heart". In addition, many of these same people try to lead others to Christ by giving a testimony and encouraging them to "ask Jesus into your heart".

Isn't this the way people are supposed to come to salvation, by asking Jesus into their heart?

No, it is not. To prove it to yourself, try to find a Bible verse to support it. You cannot. The fact is, asking Jesus into your heart is a man-centered gospel message.

I have asked several people who believe in this approach to salvation, "Where in the Bible do you find support for telling someone to 'ask Jesus into your heart'?" The responses are typically: Romans 10:9-10 and Acts 8:37.

Let's consider each of these verses, beginning with Acts 8:37, which reads (NASB):

"And Philip said, “If you believe with all your heart, you may.” And he answered and said, “I believe that Jesus Christ is the Son of God.”

This occurs during a conversation between Philip and an Ethiopian eunuch. The conversation follows the command from an angel of the Lord for Philip to go over and speak to the Ethiopian.

During this conversation, Philip explains how Jesus was the fulfillment of the Old Testament prophecies, and clearly shares the gospel. In addition, from the context we can confidently infer that Philip explained baptism as an act of obedience to demonstrate your re-birth as a Christian. (Acts 8:25-40). It is at this point that Philip says, "if you believe with all your heart, you may." Philip is talking about Baptism, which should only follow true repentance and faith. Philip understood this, and it is clear from the context that the Ethiopian understood this as well. It is also clear that 'asking Jesus into his heart' is not what happened here.

In addition, the Greek word that is translated "believe" is pisteuo, which means to commit one's trust to, or to place your confidence in. It is clear that a belief such as this is not the type of hope that is associated with crossing one's fingers, or hoping that just maybe something might be true. This is a belief that is certain. This is a belief that allows you to take confident steps in an uncertain and ever-changing world.

What about Romans 10:9-10, which says:

"that if you confess with your mouth Jesus as Lord, and believe in your heart that God raised Him from the dead, you will be saved; for with the heart a person believes, resulting in righteousness, and with the mouth he confesses, resulting in salvation."

Frequently, those who claim that "asking Jesus into your heart" is all that is required, skip right past the opening phrase, "if you confess with your mouth."

Confess what? Read on as the passage explains that you must confess "that Jesus is Lord."

Salvation is not about you asking Jesus into your heart, it is about confessing that Jesus is Lord. As Lord, He decides if He will provide salvation, not you. How does He make this decision? According to his own words, only if you "Repent, and believe the gospel." (Mark 1:15)

Repentance means that you agree with God that His standard is the right standard, that you have fallen short of His standard through the many sins you have committed, and you are ready to give up control of your life to Him. You are saying, 'Not my will, Lord, but yours. Not my way, Lord, but yours.' Turn from your life of seeking to fulfill the pleasures of the flesh, and begin to obey Christ as Lord of your life.

Once you confess in this way by crying out to God for mercy, you have demonstrated that you believe in your heart (that is, you place your confidence in God). Only then will Jesus save you from the wrath you deserve.

Jesus is not a product that can be taken off the shelf at your whim, consumed to make you feel better, and then put into the pantry until you need Him again. You are a sinner. Your lying, theft, lust, hatred, disobedience, dishonoring God, coveting others' possessions, and more have condemned you. You are not in control. You deserve to be cast out. Christ will save you only if you repent, and believe the gospel.

Christ endured horrific pain in the flesh, and (more importantly) the pouring out of God's wrath so that you and I could be forgiven. The fact that some people think salvation is a matter of placing a courtesy call to the Lord God makes me shudder in fear for their false confidence.. (Matt 7:21-23)

Revelation Song

The Revelation Song is about how God has revealed Himself to us, not about some fresh understanding of God. We already have an understanding of who God is:

Holy, Holy, Holy, is the LORD God Almighty. He alone provides salvation, through Jesus Christ, for fallen sinners like you and me.

If only people would not forget this.

He is Holy. He is Just. He is God. He is all we need.

There is nothing wrong with looking for a new revelation, a new understanding, a deeper, fresh understanding... as long as you are looking for it in God's Word.

That is called spiritual growth. Along with such growth comes an increased desire to please the Lord, to live for the Lord, to surrender to the Lord, to rely upon the Lord.

Unfortunately, too many people think they can find new understandings through men who proclaim new revelations, new insight, which God has revealed uniquely to them and only as they allow their mind to break free of the chains of the plain meaning of the text.

Such proclamations mock God. He was able to record His Holy Word for mankind to understand plainly. Mankind did not need to wait 2000 years before, suddenly through a fallen man, the Holy Bible could be understood.

"There is a way which seems right to a man, but its end is the way of death." -- Proverbs 14:12

Surrender to Christ alone. Read the Bible. Do what it says. Repeat. Spiritual growth is no more complicated than this. Then, go and tell the gospel to someone who does not know the Lord.

As for the Revelation Song... I love this song because it recognizes the holiness of God. This always leads to true worship.

Christian: Remember What You Have Heard

Have you ever done a "double-take"?

You know, where you look at something, look away, then feel compelled to look again?

The term supposedly originates from movie directors wanting to study a scene one more time to make certain everything was filmed correctly. This double-look at the take eventually found its way into the common vernacular to mean: looking a second time, or looking more intently.

In a recent Bible Study, our group was looking at a passage from Revelation 3. As the discussion continued, I found myself doing a double-take, and looking intently at verse 3.

To quickly summarize, Revelation 3:1-6 documents a letter to the church of Sardis which Christ had the apostle John write down. Christ acknowledges the works of the church, but condemns them for activities that are empty of worship. In His words, "you have a name that you were alive, but you are dead."

Christ then says, "Wake up..."

It is a stern, forceful, attention grabbing command. He wants their full attention.

We now arrive at verse 3, where Christ gives the church direction. His instruction, which caused me to double-take, is "remember what you have received and heard;"

What had they "received and heard"?

We need to remember that Christ is writing a letter to the church in Sardis. The church is the body of Christ, so these are believers; or non-believers who are part of a body of believers. Therefore, what they had "received and heard" was the Holy Spirit, the Word of God, and very specifically, the gospel.

Why was it important for the church of Sardis to remember what they had received and heard? I think the answer is two-fold. On first read, I think he is telling them to remember the source of salvation: Christ alone. As they perform their works, they are to perform them as an act of worship to their savior.

In addition, I think He is telling them that going out into the world and doing a bunch of works is meaningless if they do not share the gospel!

How do I draw this conclusion? Because the church of Sardis was known as an active church in a mostly non-Christian city. They were actively involved in the community. This was probably similar to how many churches today are involved in communities: clothing drives, feeding the hungry, helping the sick, caring for those who are at the end of their rope, taking in the homeless, or repairing damaged homes. The list of things churches, then and now, get involved in is endless. But without the gospel, it is also meaningless for more than a short time.

Christian, "Wake up!" Remember what you have received and heard!

Looking good before a fallen world is meaningless if you leave those you help as hopeless, lost, and doomed as they were before you dug the new well, painted a few walls, or filled an empty belly.

Remember that "faith comes from hearing, and hearing from the Word".

Remember that we are not called to go into the world and act like nice people, we are to go into the world and make disciples! (Matt 28:19).

If you are involved in community activities, thank you for physically expressing the love of the Lord. But sooner or later your witness must become verbal. As Paul wrote in the second letter to the Corinthians, "But having the same ​spirit of faith, according to what is written, “​​I believed, therefore I spoke,” we also believe, therefore we also speak..." (4:13)