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Creation Science Evangelism: Reaching Students and Educators with the Gospel

By Jerry and Donna Layton, Philippines

In the early years of ABWE, tent campaigns were an effective means to mass evangelism. In the twenty-first century, creation science evangelism is getting similar results throughout the Philippines, with consequent church growth from a largely ignored segment of society: the skeptical intellectual elite of universities and public education.

 
A Ministry Born in ABWE’s Birthplace: Iloilo City, Philippines

In 1999, young visionary pastor Danny Balm Escobar, of Doane Baptist Church in Iloilo City, challenged us to partner with church members to take creation science into public schools. Pastor Escobar has a biology background, and shares our burden for Christian youth in our churches who are becoming less interested in either science or church because of evolution.

The Open Door:

“See, I have set before you an open door, and no one can shut it.” Revelation 3:8

In the last five years, our ministry has entered open doors of more than 186 universities and schools throughout the Philippines, using PowerPoint® lectures to present creation science as a welcomed alternative to evolution. More than 37,400 students and educators have attended, resulting in 4,400 recorded decisions for Christ. Wherever follow-up by local pastors and workers is effective, many of those responding have become active, baptized members of our churches.

Why are so many coming to Christ?

“If I have told you earthly things and you do not believe, how will you believe if I tell you heavenly things?” John 3:12

The most common response of Filipinos is: “We’ve never heard these things before!” Their educational history makes no mention of the creation/evolution debates familiar to Americans, and evolution was only recently added to the curriculum. Since Filipinos consider themselves a “Christian” nation, Bible teaching applied to science, history, and values education is generally well-accepted in public education, even coming from a Baptist preacher.

Since Atheism is unthinkable, students and educators are appalled when we show them the anti-God bias of evolution. Their tears and intense silence at the end of seminars is evidence of their inward conviction of sin, and they welcome the closing “sinner’s prayer” as an opportunity to get things right with the Creator who will someday judge them. They record any decisions for Christ on a response slip where they may also write their questions. School officials usually allow the local pastors to announce follow-up Bible study.

Genesis Foundations for our Churches

“If the foundations are destroyed, what can the righteous do?” Psalm 11:3

A common misconception we correct in church seminars is that our ministry is not relevant for fundamentalists because we don’t believe in evolution. We explain that Christians compromise when they use assumed “facts” of secular science and history (the “Big Bang,” “millions of years” to evolve, etc.) to interpret the Bible, rather than seeing the Bible as foundational to science and history. The saddest consequence of this fallacy is that many college students give up on church because they are not taught how to defend their faith. The Bible is not a textbook, but the essential foundations of all true science and history are found in Genesis, chapters one through eleven. Our resources from the Answers in Genesis ministry and the Institute for Creation Research make these foundations exciting and easy to master.

The Amazing Potential through Multiplication

“For the weapons of our warfare are not carnal but mighty in God for pulling down strongholds, casting down arguments and every high thing that exalts itself against the knowledge of God.” 2 Corinthians 10:4-5

The central battle in this war is not creation versus evolution or even secular humanism, but rather the absolute authority of God’s Word. God is advancing where Christians have previously been intimidated by our enemy’s attacks against the Bible. With a vision for sending forth a powerful army equipped to fight for God in the schools, Doane Baptist Church invited us to establish a Creation Evangelism Training and Resource Center in the missions training facilities of their new building.

Our first training began summer 2005 for ten carefully-selected disciples, all with secular degrees as well as Bible-school training. Three graduates with degrees in communications, two engineers, a marine biologist, a scientist from the Coconut Research Institute, and a forestry graduate were all part of this first group. They all share a desire to introduce the foundational truths of Genesis as the weapons for tearing down secular strongholds in universities throughout the Philippines. They in turn will equip others, and later some may go with us into other Asian nations, further multiplying our efforts to “bring every thought into captivity to the obedience of Christ” (2 Corinthians10:5b). 

Answers in Genesis: www.answersingenesis.org
Institute for Creation Research: www.icr.org