Dinosaurs—a Divine Deception?

Well, God is not the author of deception. It simply isn’t consistent with the character of God, who is truth, to create something merely to confuse or deceive us. But we don’t have to try and creatively explain away dinosaurs—the Bible gives us the history we need to understand them.

This helps children build a proper understanding of history—using the Bible as the history book of the universe—and understand how that history explains dinosaurs.

In my children’s book Dinosaurs for Kids, I teach kids about the 7 Ages of Dinosaurs. This helps children build a proper understanding of history—using the Bible as the history book of the universe—and understand how that history explains dinosaurs. Here are those 7 ages:

1. Formed. God created dinosaurs on day six of creation week, along with all the other land creatures and man. It’s only evolutionary assumptions—based on the wrong starting point, man’s fallible word—that gives people the idea that dinosaurs couldn’t possibly have lived with man. But we must reject man’s reasoning, and, instead, start with the only perfect, eye-witness account of history, the Word of God.
2. Fearless. Originally, God’s creation was “very good” (Genesis 1:31), and mankind and the animals were all vegetarian (Genesis 1:29). Dinosaurs didn’t eat other animals and were no danger to man. Sharp teeth and claws were originally used to shred and chomp various plants and fruits. It wasn’t until after sin that death and carnivory came into creation.
3. Fallen. When Adam and Eve sinned, they broke God’s original “very good” creation. Death came into the world because of that sin, and animals began to eat each other.

4. Flood. About 4,350 years ago, God judged man’s increasing wickedness with a global flood. As I teach children, if there really was a global flood, we’d expect to find billions of dead things buried in rock layers laid down by water all over the earth. And that’s exactly what we find! The fossils—including the dinosaurs—are a testimony to the worldwide catastrophe of the global flood.

   Now, Noah took two of every kind of land-dwelling, air-breathing animals, seven pairs of some, aboard the ark. This would’ve included dinosaurs (and probably juveniles for the few dinosaurs that grow very large).

5. Faded. After the flood, dinosaur kinds slowly began to die out probably due to climate change, human hunting, or changes in their environments (the same reasons creatures die out today!). Slowly, the memory of dinosaurs began to fade, but it never completely disappeared—it remains (in exaggerated form) in dragon legends found around the world, art, and recorded even in the Bible, in the book of Job, chapter 41 (“behemoth” was likely a sauropod dinosaur).
6. Found. In 1841 dinosaurs were first named “dinosaurs” (or “fearfully great lizards”) by Sir Richard Owen as scientists began to dig them up and study their fossils.
7. Fiction. Sadly, many scientists interpreted, and continue to interpret, these fossils through the lens of millions of years and evolution. Suddenly dinosaurs became a great mystery, belonging to a lost world. But they’re only a great mystery when we ignore the history God’s given us in his Word!

Dinosaurs aren’t some kind of deception from God to confuse us. They’re amazing creatures God made on day six of creation week that were buried during the flood and slowly faded from memory. You can learn more in this article: “What Really Happened to the Dinosaurs?”

Get More Answers on Answers News

This item was discussed yesterday on Answers News with cohosts Avery Foley, Bryan Osborne, and Tim Chaffey. Answers News is our twice-weekly news program filmed live before a studio audience here at the Creation Museum and broadcast on my Facebook page and the Answers in Genesis Facebook page. We also covered the following topics:

• Canadian court disregards religious freedom.
• Teachers celebrate pride month with Jesus as a transgender person.
• Songbird’s singing is incredibly complex.
• And more!

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Thanks for stopping by and thanks for praying,
Ken

This item was written with the assistance of AiG’s research team.