Creation Science Rebuttals

Does Young Earth Creation Science Teach a Second Creation?

First Published 31 January 2003

The Bible says in Genesis 2:1-2, "Thus the heavens and the earth were finished, and all the host of them. And on the seventh day God ended His work which He had made; and He rested on the seventh day from all his work which He had made.”

Creation ended at the end of the sixth day. Or did it? If you ask a young-earth creationist, it didn't! How can I say this?

Catastrophic Plate Tectonics

In order to get the Flood model to work, and create the many geologic features we have today, young-earth creation science advocates have created the theory of catastrophic plate tectonics. The claim is that the earth was not the shape it is now before Noah's Flood. There are a number of reasons why the young-earth creationist needs catastrophic plate tectonics.

First, there is not enough water in the earth to cover all the lands in a global flood. But, if you decrease the size of the mountains before the flood, then you come closer to being able to solve this puzzle.

Second, many rock layers in the world have undergone massive deformation. If these rock layers were laid down by the Flood, then they must come up with some mechanism to explain the deformation. Catastrophic plate tectonics can do this.

Third, many of you are familiar with the concept of the continent known as Pangea. Geologists claim that millions of years ago, the continents were together in one "super" continent. The young-earth creationist must accept this also, because of the evidence of common plant and animal species in regions of South America and Africa that bordered each other on the "super continent” (when I run across this claim again, I’ll link it here). Catastrophic plate tectonics gives them the model they need to move these continents apart, while accounting for the common species.

To be fair, not all young earth creationists accept catastrophic plate tectonics. See the Answers in Genesis website for a discussion on this.

Second Creation

But wait a minute. They are claiming that God made mountains, valleys, and oceans at the time of the Flood of Noah. That can't be...after all, God said in Genesis 2:1-2 that His creation was complete. In Genesis 1:9, on the third day, God gathered the dry land together, and the oceans were set in their place, and God was FINISHED with creating the land and oceans.

I know how they will defend this. They will claim that the plate tectonics were a natural event, caused by the gravitational potential energy both of the cold, dense pre-Flood ocean plates and of the hot, buoyant rock in the thermal boundary layer at the base of the mantle.”¹ It was merely a natural process using physical laws God had already set in place. So, considering Pangea, you have to move these continental plates apart over the year the earth was covered by flood waters. Let's see, that's 3,135 miles, or about 8.45 miles a day that they moved apart!

If so, this “potential energy” was already there…why didn’t it happen sooner…or later. In fact, it could happen again as I sit here typing this! So from my vantage point, you need divine intervention to move the plates…which is a creative act on God’s part, because it created new mountains, valleys, ocean floors, etc. You also need divine intervention to stop the plates. Once these mechanisms were in place, what stopped them in their present location? They should have kept going until they collided with each other, opposite the planet from Pangea.

Conclusion

Is divine intervention of this magnitude, which created mountain ranges, called "creation?" Decide for yourself.

If you are not a Christian, and you have been holding out on making a decision for Christ because the Church always preached a message that was contrary to what you saw in the scientific world, then rest assured that the Bible is the inerrant Word of God, and you can believe in Christ and receive salvation, while still believing in an old earth. Click here for more.

Are you a Christian who believes in young earth creationism? Now that we have shown the many difficulties of the young earth creation science model in this and many other articles, how does this impact your Christian life? If you are a young earth creationism believer, click here.

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Old Earth Creation Science Articles

To learn more about old earth creationism, see Old Earth Belief, or check out the article Can You Be A Christian and Believe in an Old Earth?

Feel free to check out more of this website. Our goal is to provide rebuttals to the bad science behind young earth creationism, and honor God by properly presenting His creation.