Assuming evolution to be true, and ignoring both the Scripture and science against it, his organization exists to attack the historical reality of a physical Adam. In 2010 BioLogos president Darrel Falk wrote (emphasis added): “Option #1 [that Adam and Eve are actual historical people] is the standard argument put forward by those who believe in a young earth created by God in six twenty-four hour days less than 10,000 years ago. BioLogos exists in no small part to marginalize this view from the Church. A fundamental part of our mission is to show that Option #1 is not tenable.”
The secular philosopher George Santayana wrote, “Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it.”1 King Solomon, the wisest person in all history said, “What has been is what will be, and what has been done is what will be done, and there is nothing new under the sun. Is there a thing of which it is said, ‘See, this is new’?” (Ecclesiastes 1: 9–10).
This is especially applicable to Church history. There is no new heresy under the sun, and those who aren’t familiar with the battle for truth throughout the past 2000 years are doomed to repeat the same errors that have plagued the church since it began.
Today we Christians find ourselves at an interesting place in Church history. Although Scripture has been with us for 2,000 years (and is sufficient for determining how and when God created), we now have decades of research that supports what the Bible has always said. Today we are blessed with mountains of scientific evidence supporting the biblical record of a recent creation followed by a global flood and all humans originating with Adam and Eve. Despite all of this, aspects of an old heresy relating to the creation account are increasingly infiltrating the Church. This is the falsehood known as Pelagianism.
No Adam: no original sin, no need for the cross
The heresy of Pelagianism (see the box below for details) asserted that Adam’s sin had no effect on the human race, that we have not inherited a sin nature from Adam, and that all humans are born with the ability to live a sin-free life. This renders the work of Christ on the cross superfluous. If we can achieve Heaven without any work of God whatsoever (that is, if we have no sin) then there is no need (it is even nonsensical) for God to bear the penalty for our sin. The reality is that at the cross Christ died for us as a substitute. He paid the penalty that we incurred, in our place and simultaneously transferred His righteousness to us. 2 Corinthians 5:21 describes this double transfer. The sinless Christ pays for our sins in our place (so that we don’t have to!), and His righteousness is transferred to us. That single verse is Paul’s simple one-sentence summary of the Gospel. The whole Gospel message is contained in outline in those words and is, of course, detailed throughout the rest of Scripture.
Bible scholars at the time of Pelagius recognized the contradiction between his teachings and Scripture. As a result, Pelagianism was condemned as heretical at many church councils including the Councils of Carthage (in 412, 416 and 418), the Council of Ephesus (431) and the Council of Orange (529). The intervening 1600 years have merely strengthened and further refined the biblical truth confirming that Pelagianism is heretical. This rich history of the battle for truth is a great advantage for us today. When Pelagianizing tendencies infiltrate the church today we should simply look back at that history, remember the error of the past, and avoid repeating the same error. Unfortunately, Pelagianism is alive and well today. One of its modern forms, mutated and renamed, is called ‘theistic evolution’.
Theistic evolution: different time period, same error
BioLogos is a leading voice for ‘theistic evolution’, though not all theistic evolutionists would agree with BioLogos at every point. BioLogosteaches that people do not all originate with Adam and Eve but that, “humans descended from a group of several thousand individuals who lived about 150,000 years ago.”2,3
This organization was founded by professing Christian Dr Francis Collins, a leading geneticist who uncritically accepts evolution over millions of years. Assuming evolution to be true, and ignoring both the Scripture and science against it, his organization exists to attack the historical reality of a physical Adam. In 2010 BioLogos president Darrel Falk wrote (emphasis added): “Option #1 [that Adam and Eve are actual historical people] is the standard argument put forward by those who believe in a young earth created by God in six twenty-four hour days less than 10,000 years ago. BioLogos exists in no small part to marginalize this view
Therefore, a ‘fundamental mission’ of BioLogos is to advance anti-biblical ideas that have been condemned by church councils throughout the history of the Church. Or, said another way, their mission is to promote heresy.5 Ironically the subject ‘tag’ applied to Darrel Falk’s article above is “Christian Unity”. According to God’s Word, unity in the Church is achieved as believers rally around the truth of Scripture. Paul writes, “And he gave the apostles, the prophets, the evangelists, the shepherds and teachers, to equip the saints for the work of ministry, for building up the body of Christ, until we all attain to the unity of the faith and of the knowledge of the Son of God”. (Eph 4: 11-12) The purpose of the various gifts God gives is, “So that we may no longer be children, tossed to and fro by the waves and carried about by every wind of doctrine, by human cunning, by craftiness in deceitful schemes.” (Eph 4:14) This unity can never be achieved by teaching against biblical truths.
There are many problems with ‘evolutionary creation’ but one of the greatest errors (among many serious errors BioLogos promotes) is the elimination of a physical Adam from which all people descended and the sin that he transferred to the rest of the human race. This is because it strikes directly at the heart of the Gospel: the need for the ‘last Adam’ to provide for us an escape from the wrath of God against sin incurred by the first Adam. In this way the error of theistic evolution is identical to that of Pelagianism.