Faith and Science: Evolution of Races

Last week, we discussed the idea of death before sin. We talked about how sin brought death; death is the punishment of sin. We must consider this fact when discovering our worldview. Any worldview that puts death before sin is in opposition to God’s word.

As we continue to look at life through the lens of the Bible, our next stop is the Evolution of Races.

Evolution of Races

We’re going to try something a little interactive today. This will help get us ready for our new series coming up in September.

> Faithlife Study Bible app slide

Everyone, get out your phones, your mobile devices. Open your app store and download the Faithlife Study Bible app.

If you need to be connected to wifi, you can connect to Canyon Creek Guest; the password is Redeemedlife

Heres the question.

How many races are there in the world today?

One. God only created one race, the human race.

But why do we hear so much about race in the media and politics lately?

If there is only one race, why do we have racism?

Any time you have to fill out some type of formal paperwork, there is almost always a question asking about your race.

>Tell us about your race slide

This slide is from an actual state medical application.

Believe it or not, the idea of race is a worldview. The term “race” wasn’t widely used until the beginning of the 18th century.

So where do we get the idea that there are multiple races in the world.

Watch this quick video.

>The Origin of Races video

Have you ever thought about how we are all the same color, just different shades? All humans are brown; some are a darker brown, some are a lighter brown.

But we all do it.

What color am I? White.

I’m not white; this is white. There’s a big difference.

So why do we categorize each other based on how dark or light our skin is?

Darwin and Racism

A man named Charles Darwin published a work of scientific literature that is still considered the foundation of evolutionary biology.

In this book, commonly titled “The Origin of Species,” Darwin suggests that populations evolved over millions of years through a process of natural selection. Teaching that different groups or “races” of people evolved at different times and rates, so some groups are more like their apelike ancestors than others.

>Origin of Species image

The full title of Darwin’s most famous work is: On the Origin of Species by Means of Natural Selection or the Preservation of Favoured Races in the Struggle for Life.

Remember, I was raised in Tulsa, Oklahoma. If you haven’t been there, you might not realize how many “dark brown” people there are. All throughout school, elementary through high school, I had classes where I was the only “white” kid out of 25 students.

I remember sitting in science class, sinking low in my seat when we started learning about Darwinian evolution.

> Darwin’s Tree of Life image

We’ve all seen Darwin’s tree of life diagram.

We have the origin of life at the very bottom and life branches out into all sorts of living things over millions of years. At the top, you come to realize; we were once monkeys.

>Human evolution image

I remember sitting in class the first time I saw an image like this, looking around at my “dark brown” friends, feeling bad for them.

I can’t remember if the teacher outright said it, but it was implied that those with darker skin we’re closer to the ape then the person with lighter skin. That lighter skin was proof of a more advanced race.

Wow. How would you take that if you had darker skin? That you were second-rate to someone because their skin was a little lighter than yours.

Interestingly, Darwin’s work had a significant influence on Hitler. And we all know how that went.

“Racial” Differences

If you were to take any two people from anywhere in the world, the primary genetic differences between the two would be around 0.2 percent.

>No Big Difference image

We are programmed to recognize at external appearances. That is how we justify races. We look different, so we must be different.

The main differences between people groups stem from culture, not biological makeup.

So, instead of thinking in racial terms, think in people group terms.

Race - focused on the outward appearance

People group - focuses on culture or behavior

Melanin

No one really has red, or yellow, or black skin. We all have the same primary color, just different shades of it. We all share the same pigments—our bodies have different combinations of them.

Melanin also determines eye color. If the iris of the eye has a larger amount of melanin, it will be brown. If the iris has a little melanin, the eye will be blue.

The production of melanin also influences hair color. Brown to black hair results from a higher production of melanin, while lighter hair results from less melanin. Those with red hair have a mutation in one gene that causes a higher proportion of the reddish form of melanin to be produced.

DNA also controls the basic shape of our eyes. Individuals whose DNA codes for an extra layer of fatty tissue around the eyes have almond-shaped eyes (this is common among Asian people groups). All people groups have fatty tissue around the eyes; some simply have more or less.

If we all go back to Adam and Eve, then to Noah and his family, how do we get different people groups? How do we get variations in skin shade, eye shape, etc.?

>Tower of Babel image

Tower of Babel

Remember Pentecost? Back when God began his plan to regather the disinherited nations?

God disinherited the nations back at the Tower of Babel because of their rebellion. God told the people to multiply and fill the earth, but they decided to stay together and build a great city.

God judged them by confusing their languages. Everyone spoke one language. This made it impossible for groups to understand each other, so they split apart. Groups of people who spoke the same language went their own way, finding a different place to live. They were forced to scatter over the earth.

Some believe that the languages were divided among family units, which would make sense considering list of Nations.

>Table of Nations slide

lists all of the descendants of Japheth, Ham, and Shem, the sons of Noah. This is often referred to as the table of nations.

Genesis 10:4–5 NLT

The descendants of Javan were Elishah, Tarshish, Kittim, and Rodanim. Their descendants became the seafaring peoples that spread out to various lands, each identified by its own language, clan, and national identity.

Genesis 10:4 NLT

The descendants of Javan were Elishah, Tarshish, Kittim, and Rodanim.

Genesis 10:20 NLT

These were the descendants of Ham, identified by clan, language, territory, and national identity.

Genesis 10:31 NLT

These were the descendants of Shem, identified by clan, language, territory, and national identity.

Genesis 10:32 NLT

These are the clans that descended from Noah’s sons, arranged by nation according to their lines of descent. All the nations of the earth descended from these clans after the great flood.

The very next chapter in Genesis explains how all of these nations came into existence.

Genesis 11:1–2 NLT

At one time all the people of the world spoke the same language and used the same words. As the people migrated to the east, they found a plain in the land of Babylonia and settled there.

Genesis 11:8–9 NLT

In that way, the Lord scattered them all over the world, and they stopped building the city. That is why the city was called Babel, because that is where the Lord confused the people with different languages. In this way he scattered them all over the world.

>One Race image

Here’s a quote from Answers in Genesis website.

“Because of the new language and geographic barriers, the groups no longer freely mixed with other groups, and the result was a splitting of the gene pool. Different cultures formed, with specific features becoming predominant within each group. The characteristics of each became more and more prominent as new generations of children were born. If we were to travel back in time to Babel and mix up the people into entirely different family groups, then people groups with completely different characteristics might result. For instance, we might find a fair-skinned group with tight, curly dark hair that has blue, almond-shaped eyes. Or a group with very dark skin, blue eyes, and straight brown hair.

Some of these (skin color, eye shape, and so on) became general characteristics of each particular people group through various selection influences. For example, because of the protective factor of melanin, those with darker skin would have been more likely to survive in areas where sunlight is more intense (warmer, tropical regions near the equator), as they are less likely to suffer from diseases such as skin cancer. Those with lighter skin lack the melanin needed to protect them from the harmful UV rays, and so may have been more likely to die before they were able to reproduce.”

Here’s to point.

There is only One Race

Acts 17:26 NLT

From one man he created all the nations throughout the whole earth. He decided beforehand when they should rise and fall, and he determined their boundaries.

all humans are one race, one family, all equal before God.