Global Warming and God’s Word

by Bruce Mills

As I have watched the weather reports this year—storm after storm dumping record amounts of snow in the eastern US, unprecedented long periods of cold weather in Florida, unusually warm weather in the northwest—I understand how many people are led to question the validity of the global warming claims.  But the truth is that a single extra long and cold winter does not prove that global warming is a myth anymore than an excessively hot summer proves its validity.  Climate patterns are established over lengthy periods of time, not by a single year’s weather. 

However, I admit that I find the science behind the claims of man’s impact on the world’s climate to be highly questionable at best and completely bogus at worst.  The recent revelations that the Nobel Prize winning organization, the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), went to great length to manipulate the data, to marginalize opposing viewpoints, and to mask the truth about the lack of global warming over the past fifteen years by destroying the records, has intensified the criticism of the claims of the climate change scientists.

But the primary reason why I do not worry about global warming and its alleged impact on our future environment is because God has clearly stated in Scripture that nothing will alter His created climate until He chooses to alter it.  Genesis 8:22 says, “While the earth remains, seedtime and harvest, and cold and heat, and summer and winter, and day and night shall not cease.”  Clearly, God intends to sustain this earth and its climate until He destroys it all at the end of the age (2 Peter 3:12).

Believers need to understand that the great reformational statement, Sola Scriptura (Scripture alone), is essential to our faith when we are faced with the so-called “scientific evidence” that contradicts what God has said.  We must never allow man’s wisdom to be given greater credence than God’s wisdom.  He has revealed His truth in His Word, and for Christians, God’s Word must be given the supremacy in every conflict with man’s scientific claims.  This is particularly true with such issues as evolution and global warming.

So when your unsaved friends (and even some of your saved friends) buy into the world’s philosophy and alleged “scientific proof” that climate change is in the process of destroying our world, don’t buy it!  Remember: God has clearly said that He will sustain the environment just as it is until the day that He chooses to destroy the earth.  So trust Him and His Word more than you trust man and his science!

Christians and Climate Change

by Bruce Mills

Over the past couple of weeks, many people in our world have focused on Copenhagen, Denmark where representatives from 183 countries met to try to come to agreement on how to best reduce mankind’s “carbon footprint” on our world.  By now I’m sure you are aware that the summit was largely a failure, as developing countries became greedy in their demands for money from developed countries (primarily the United States and western Europe) to help them meet the standards that would be imposed under the proposed accord.  In addition, they demanded greater reductions from the United States than our nation was willing to do, and China played the old “bait-and-switch” game with their numbers on how much they would reduce their carbon output.

As I listened to the various news stories about the events in Copenhagen, I noted that the world’s perspective on global warming and climate change is based on an entirely humanistic, evolutionary, God-denying approach which sees no place for divine revelation and preservation in the climate change equation.  In their minds, biblical truth about creation (Gen. 1:1-31) and God sustaining the world (Gen. 8:22) until the day He sovereignly chooses to destroy it by fire in order to create a new earth (2 Peter 3:7-13; Rev. 21:1) are mere myths and fables which have no place in the climate change debate.

Many evangelicals have become caught up in the whole global warming environmental discussion, often adopting the same perspective as the secular world, sometimes even reinterpreting biblical texts to give them a “green” interpretation rather than what God intended those passages to say and mean.  For example, some bible teachers have tried to say that Isa. 24:4-6, which talks about the distress of the earth and then states, “The earth is also polluted by its inhabitants,” is referring to air and water pollution rather than moral pollution which is clearly the meaning when the overall context of the passage is considered. 

All such an approach does is change the focus of scripture from one which deals with man’s sin against a holy, righteous God, and how that sin can be forgiven and man’s relationship to his Creator restored, to one which deals with peripheral, temporal issues which have no eternal consequence for man’s soul.  This is borne out by the approach of such influential men as Rick Warren, pastor of California’s Saddleback Church, and Duane Litfin, president of Wheaton College, who have endorsed the “Evangelical Climate Initiative,” a movement which focuses on stopping global warming in order to demonstrate our appreciation of God’s creation and our love for our fellow man.  Instead of focusing on evangelizing the lost souls of countless millions who will spend eternity in hell if they do not hear the good news of Jesus Christ’s substitutionary death for sinners and forgiveness through faith in Him, they focus on a social agenda which includes everything but moral sin.  In fact, this has become a pattern with Warren, to the point that before he interviewed Barack Obama and John McCain when they were running for President of the United States, he was described in Time magazine as shifting the focus away from sin issues such as abortion and gay marriage to the issues which he felt united people, including “poverty, HIV/AIDS, climate change and human rights” (Time, 8/7/08).

So what should believers think about the issue of global warming, climate change, and environmental protection?  Any answer to that question must be grounded in biblical truth.  Thus, we should appreciate the creation and glorify the God who made it, but we must also be careful not to adopt the secular, naturalistic, evolutionary mind-set that characterizes the world.  We turn nature into an idol when conserving it is given a higher priority than obeying the clear commands of scripture, starting with the greatest commandment, which is to love the Lord God with all our heart, soul, mind, and strength (Mark 12:29-30).

According to Scripture, the world was created for man, and not vice versa.  God told man that he should be fruitful and multiply and subdue the earth (Gen. 1:28).  He went on to tell man to cultivate the earth (Gen. 2:15) and to use both plants and animals for food (Gen. 1:29; 9:1-3).  Therefore, any environmental position which imposes population growth restrictions, unduly limits the cultivation of the earth for food, or attempts to prohibit the eating of meat should be rejected.  If we claim to believe the Bible to be the inspired, inerrant, sufficient Word of God, then we must not allow ourselves to be distracted from obedience to its commands by the world’s humanistic perspectives.  As Christians, we are not called to focus our resources on preserving this planet.  Rather, the responsibility upon which we are to focus our time and resources was articulated by Jesus in what we call the Great Commission:

Go therefore and make disciples of all the nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit, teaching them to observe all that I commanded you; and lo, I am with you always, even to the end of the age (Matt. 28:19-20).

So, instead of being distracted by attempts to save our broken planet, we should focus on the primary mission God has given to the church.

We must keep in mind that God has revealed in His Word that one day He will bring devastation to this planet like no man has ever seen.  During the Great Tribulation which is spoken of in the book of Revelation, there will be world-wide plagues and destruction of such extent that millions of people will die.  There will be famine and disease; there will be cosmic cataclysms which cause vast destruction; a large celestial body will strike earth and one-third of all fresh water will become poisonous, causing many deaths (Rev. 8:8-11); and there will be droughts and devastation at a level which no one can comprehend.  And ultimately, after His millennial reign and mankind’s final Satan-led rebellion against Him, God will destroy the world with fire before He creates a new heaven and earth (2 Peter 3:10-13).  So this world is a temporary planet, but one which will last and which God will sustain just as it is now (Gen. 8:22) until He finally comes and brings about ultimate climate change as He moves forth in His wrath to accomplish His purposes.

So we are called to be good citizens and submit to our government (Rom. 13:1-7), to love our neighbors as ourselves (Matt. 22:39, Rom. 13:8), and to wisely use those resources which God has entrusted to us (Luke 16:10-13), but we must not become distracted or preoccupied with political agendas or concerns which distract us from our primary mission in this world, which is to win lost souls to Jesus Christ.  To do anything else is to deny the truth of His Word and to bring dishonor to His name.

Liars and Lying

by Bruce Mills

I was reminded this week of how intrinsic lying is to the fallen human nature.  First, there was the story of the global warming scientists who manipulated and destroyed climate and temperature data in order to support their position that global warming is getting more and more severe and will eventually destroy the planet if drastic steps are not taken to curb human activities that allegedly cause the increased temperatures.  Their emails, which were leaked to the media, revealed that they systematically did all they could to prevent viewpoints which contradicted theirs from ever being presented or published, and deliberately manipulated the data to make it appear that their position was the correct one.  Of course, there were billions of dollars in research grants at stake from which they would benefit if they were successful in convincing the world's governments that they were right.

Then there was Tiger Woods, undoubtedly the finest golfer who has ever picked up a golf club.  He is a man who seemed to have it all--over a billion dollars in earnings and endorsements, a trophy wife, and the finest life that wealth can buy.  He is a man who outwardly seemed to be in complete control of his life and his golf game.  But he was living a lie.  He was cheating on his wife and when discovered, he lied to cover his sin until he was faced with incontrovertible evidence that revealed to the world that he was lying.  Only then did he admit the truth.

Lying has been a part of a corrupt nature since the Garden of Eden.  Satan lied to Eve, telling her that she and Adam would not die if she ate of the fruit (Gen. 3:4), even though God had clearly said that they would (Gen. 2:17).  Shortly thereafter Cain lied to God about murdering his brother (Gen. 4:9), and the same pattern of lying and deception continues to be seen throughout the book of Genesis.  Abraham encouraged Sarah to lie about being his wife in order to save his own skin (Gen. 12:10-20), Jacob and Rebekah lied in order that Jacob would receive Isaac's blessing rather than Esau (Gen. 27:19), and Joseph's brothers told their father that he had been killed by wild animal rather than admit that they had sold him into slavery (Gen. 37:31-34).  In fact, in addition to these examples, there are no less than five more incidents of lying recorded in the book of Genesis alone (Gen. 18:5, 20:2, 26:7, 29:18-24, 39:17).  You can easily find many more examples throughout the rest of the Scriptures.  Jesus bluntly said that lying originates from Satan and those who are characterized by it are his children (John 8:44).

At the same time, the Bible is clear about God's requirement that men and women be honest and truthful under all circumstances.  In the list of the seven deadly sins found in Prov. 6:16-19, lying is specifically mentioned in two of them.  Prov. 12:19 says, "Truthful lips will be established forever, but a lying tongue is only for a moment."  Prov. 19:5 proclaims that "A false witness will not go unpunished, and he who tells lies will not escape."  A few verses later in Prov. 19:9, Solomon reiterates the same idea with these words: "A false witness will not go unpunished, and he who tells lies will perish."

For the believer, lying is never sanctioned.  Eph. 4:25 tells us, "Therefore, laying aside falsehood, speak truth each one of you with his neighbor, for we are members of one another."  Col. 3:9 says, "Do not lie to one another, since you laid aside the old self with its evil practices."  In other words, since we are a part of the same family and are new creatures with a new nature which does not practice sin, we are to stop lying and tell the truth. 

I think a lot of Christians today have adopted the world's perspective that lying isn't really a big deal.  But God doesn't see it that way.  In His infinite mind, it is a very big deal.  It is so important because He Himself never lies and is incapable of doing so (Titus 1:2, Heb. 6:18).  Since we are called to be imitators of God (Eph. 5:1), lying is not to be found in a believer's character.  Jesus said that we are to "let [our] statement be, ‘Yes, yes’ or ‘No, no’; anything beyond these is of evil" (Matt. 5:37).  In other words, we shouldn't have to take an oath in order to confirm the validity of what we are saying.  We should be so characterized by truth-telling that those around us will know that they can implicitly trust what we are saying.

Think about this issue in your life.  Do others know that everything you say can be trusted to be the truth?  Or are you characterized by fudging the truth; stretching it to fit the circumstances you are in so that you look good, avoid getting into trouble, or profit from the outcome?  Psalm 15 describes the righteous man who will dwell with God, and one of the things which characterizes him is that "He swears to his own hurt and does not change" (Ps. 15:4).  In other words, he tells the truth, even if telling the truth will mean difficulty for himself.

I recognize that this is a high standard.  But I'm not the one who set the bar this high; God did.  Everyone of us has failed in this area; sometimes very badly.  But those of us who claim the name of Jesus Christ must turn from this sin and live godly lives which are characterized by truthfulness.  Not so that we will be considered to better than others, but so that when others are amazed at our honesty (and believe me, they will be), we will be able "to give an account for the hope that is in [us]" (1 Peter 3:15).