The Ravaging of the Earth

There is considerable concern these days about the accelerating destruction of earth’s natural resources. Water and air are being polluted, lush forests are dwindling, and an increasing level of wildlife is nearing extinction. Conservationists, legislators, and educators are vitally interested in these matters. Perhaps some understanding of the causes of these problems would contribute toward determining the remedy needed for their solution.

In many instances man is careless and wasteful. He has not properly respected the gifts of God and managed well the realm over which he has been given dominion (Genesis 1:28). This cannot be denied nor ignored, but the problem is much deeper than that.

Humanity has failed to recognize (or has completely ignored) the fact, that our environment is the product of design by the Creator of this planet. Jehovah planned man’s earthly domain with a variety of balanced elements, and to destroy or dissipate any segment of that balance is to endanger the whole.

Serious people might well reflect upon the following points.

1. The great Flood that came in the days of Noah left a devastating effect upon the globe; one that had permanent consequences. That Deluge was directly a result of human rebellion against God (Genesis 6:5ff), and the legacy of it abides today as a tragic reminder of man’s stubbornness and his passion to cut loose from divine restraint. For further study, see “Natural Disasters: Why Do They Happen?”
2. False ideologies about the structure of “nature” have led to further deterioration. Some years ago Dr. Robert E.D. Clark, one of Great Britain’s very fine scholars, pointed out that the dogma of Darwinism has greatly contributed to the degeneration of our natural resources.

   Professor Clark observed that for many years a great host of scientists, operating upon the premises of organic evolution, refused to see “nature” as a balanced arrangement of different units of life that constitute a divinely designed habitation. Instead, following Darwin and others, they viewed the world as “a nightmare of disharmony and chaos.” Hence, rather than diligently working to solve the problems that plague the environment, they spent their time constructing fictitious “family trees” and ruminating over man’s alleged “ape” origin (see: Robert E.D. Clark, Darwin: Before and After, Chicago: Moody, 1967, pp. 122-123).

3. Similarly, today, rather than utilizing the nation’s financial resources in seeking new ways to provide the fuel and energy sources necessary for the maintenance of a prosperous economy, or finding cures for numerous deadly diseases, our political leaders spend billions of dollars exploring outer space, looking for signs that somewhere in the universe life has “spontaneously generated” itself—as Darwinism contends it once did, and for which there is not one micro-speck of evidence.

   The evolutionary connection to these projects was clearly illustrated a while back by a European attempt to probe Mars in an effort to discover whether life forms ever populated the red planet. All of this, of course, is the result of the evolutionary myth that inorganic matter has the ability to generate life.

   Significantly, the space module was named Beagle II, in memory of the ship upon which Charles Darwin sailed to his adventure of studying various forms of biological life in the Galapagos Islands. That trip was the basis of his infamous book, The Origin of Species, which launched the modern evolutionary movement almost a century and a half ago. Of course Beagle II was lost—which gives new meaning to the quaint expression, “That ole dog won’t hunt.”

Our beautiful planet has been egregiously decimated over the centuries by wickedness, waste, and ideological weirdness. This is the consequence of the disposition that progressively attempts to erase the image of God from the soul of man.