Digging Up the Truth About Dinosaurs

Walk into just about any kindergarten
classroom and ask
the children, “When did dinosaurs
live?” In nearly every case, they
will respond, “Millions of years ago.”

Regularly repeated in children’s
books, television shows, and movies,
this refrain of dinosaurs living millions
of years ago has permeated our
society so thoroughly that the majority
of children grow up assuming it’s true.

Contradicting the Bible

The evolutionary view of dinosaurs
may be the most effective tool secularists
use to promote their ideas
about millions of years. However, the
teaching of evolution and millions of
years contradicts the biblical account
of creation at numerous points. For
example, the Bible reveals that God
made all land animals and the first
two humans on the sixth day of creation
week and that each of these six
days was the length of a normal day.
The Bible, God’s inspired Word, also
records the world’s true history and
timescale. From its genealogies, we
deduce that the sixth day was only
thousands of years ago. We can conclude
then that, according to the Bible,
dinosaurs did not live millions of years
before humans. Sadly, because our sin
brought death and disease into the
world, we are ultimately responsible
for the extinction of these beasts.

Furthermore, God said that he would
send two of every kind of land animal
for Noah to take aboard the ark, and
that must have included dinosaurs.
People often scoff at such a concept,
arguing that the ark would not have
had enough room. However, among the
estimated 50–80 dinosaur kinds, the
average adult was about the size of a
bison. This means the ark had adequate
space for every kind of dinosaur, particularly
if God sent juveniles to Noah.

Understanding the Evidence

When we say that people lived at the
same time as dinosaurs, people often
accuse us of being unscientific and
lacking supporting evidence, but these
accusations are simply untrue. We can
better understand all the evidence for
dinosaurs through the lens of Scripture.
For example, dinosaur fossils
are found with the remains of sea
creatures buried in sedimentary layers
stretching across continents. These finds indicate that these layers were deposited
by a watery event large enough to
cover the continents and that these
creatures died during that event. The
global flood described in Genesis 7–8
provides a perfect explanation for
such large-scale sedimentation.

Scientists have also discovered soft
tissue and blood cells in some dinosaur
bones. While evolutionists have
scrambled to find a mechanism that
could have preserved these features
for more than 66 million years, biblical
creationists simply argue that the
soft-tissue find fits perfectly with our
belief that dinosaurs lived just thousands
of years ago.

Some of the many dragon legends
from around the globe also seem to
confirm the biblical view that humans
encountered dinosaurs. The creatures
described in dozens of these tales
sound very much like what we call
dinosaurs today. Also, certain carvings
and paintings strongly resemble dinosaurs,
though they were completed centuries
before dinosaur skeletons were
being excavated and reconstructed in
museums. If dinosaurs truly died out
millions of years ago, how could so
many people groups throughout history
have passed on stories about them
and depicted them in various ways?

Displaying God’s Glory

Besides contradicting the Bible’s
creation account and historical timeline,
the evolutionary view of dinosaurs
undercuts a fundamental biblical
truth. Scripture tells us that all things
were made by and for their Creator,
Jesus Christ (Colossians 1:16). Just as
the heavens declare the glory of God
(Psalm 19:1), the rest of God’s creation
also clearly displays his eternal power,
infinite wisdom, and divine nature
(Romans 1:20), including the creatures
that God made.

To display his splendor and might,
the Lord directed Job to consider the
behaviors and abilities of many creatures.
In addition to mountain goats,
wild donkeys, ostriches, horses, and
hawks, God spoke of a creature called
behemoth in Job 40:15–24. The description
of this beast stresses its strength
and enormity, emphasizing God’s
matchless might. This creature’s tail
resembled a cedar tree, and its bones
and limbs were compared to bronze
and iron, respectively. People typically
identify the behemoth as a hippopotamus
or elephant, but neither animal
matches every detail.

What better land
animal could
God have chosen
to illustrate his
power than a
titanic sauropod?

One category of creature, however,
fits each of the criteria in this passage
of Job: long-neck sauropod dinosaurs,
such as the Apatosaurus. Sauropods
were the largest creatures to ever walk
the earth. One variety, the Argentinosaurus,
is estimated to have reached
over 100 feet long and 24 feet high at
the shoulders while weighing a mindboggling
55–80 tons. What better land
animal could God have chosen to illustrate
his power than a titanic sauropod?

Huge sauropods were not the only
kinds of dinosaur that magnified
God’s glory. Consider the fearsome
Tyrannosaurus rex. We all know about
its incredible strength, but tyrannosaurs
sported many other features
exhibiting the Lord’s creativity. The T.
rex’s
thick, muscular tail balanced its
tiny arms and massive head, allowing
it to walk on two feet. Speaking of its
massive head, fossils indicate that the
T. rex’s olfactory bulb and nerve were
very large, meaning that it had an
extremely keen sense of smell. The
gigantic skull also boasted large openings,
making it both light and strong.
And with plenty of surface area for
muscle attachments on its skull, the T.
rex
had an estimated bite force exceeding
all other known land predators.

The Pachycephalosaurus had a robust
vertebrae and skull that grew thick
and domed with age, seeming to indicate
that it sparred by butting heads
like bighorn sheep, although likely at
lower speeds, perhaps to win mating
rights. Another dinosaur, the Parasaurolophus,
reached 40 feet in length and
featured a large, bony crest on its head
that may have been used for regulating
body temperature and for generating or
hearing low-frequency sounds. These
creatures walked on all fours although
they likely ran on their significantly
larger hind legs.

Countering Evolution

We could cite many other dynamic
examples of God’s creativity in making
dinosaurs. Each one of these marvelous
beasts displayed part of the
unfathomable majesty of our Creator.
We must counter the evolutionary
indoctrination young people receive
in our culture and direct them to Jesus
Christ, the almighty God who created
these spectacular animals and who
humbly died in our place and rose
from the dead to save us from our sin.

As you think about dinosaurs or
as you look at the world around you,
reflect on the boundless power, wisdom,
and creativity of our Creator who
made this world not long ago and filled
it with constant reminders of his magnificent
glory.

Tim Chaffey holds a master of divinity degree specializing in
apologetics and theology and a ThM in church history and
theology from Liberty University School of Divinity. He is
content manager for Answers in Genesis’ attractions division.

https://answersingenesis.org/dinosaurs/digging-truth-about-dinosaurs/ This article originally appeared on answersingenesis.org

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