Is Redeemer Presbyterian NYC Teaching Evolution?

Note: Ron Choong is supported as a "missionary" by Redeemer Presbyterian Church in NYC and other churches in NYC such as Calvary Baptist. Redeemer staff, including Tim Keller, are aware of Ron Choong's teaching and continue to support it. Ron is a member of Redeemer. Here is another excellent essay by Daniel Mann:

A “pocket” Christian worldview statement might be simplistic, but perhaps handy. It can serve as a measure we can quickly pull out to check other worldviews against it. It might go something like this:

1. God did everything perfectly (Gen. 1:31), and created for us the perfect environment where we felt no discomfort, even in our nakedness (Gen. 2:25).

2. But we rebelled and screwed everything up (Gen. 3; Rom. 8:20-21).

3. Therefore, God had to redeem us through the “second Adam” (1 Cor. 15:20-22; Rom. 5:18-19), changing our rebellious nature (Rom. 8:6-7; John 3:3-5; Ezek. 36), ultimately restoring His entire creation (Acts 3:21; Rom. 8:18-25).

We’re the problem; God’s the answer! However, evolution would have it that life was always a bloody mess. Consequently, God is the problem, and Adam, Eve, and Cain were merely following along with His established program of “survival of the fittest,” whether it required lies, “taking care of #1,” or simply murder.

Ron Choong, Academy for Christian Thought, has no problem with evolution. He writes,

“Darwinism exposes Christianity’s weakness in keeping up with the growing scientific knowledge. We use the fruits of scientific technology and blissfully ignore its implications for a contemporary and comprehensive worldview.”

What are these “implications?” Choong believes that our Christian worldview should take into account the “truths” of Darwinism. He recommends that we “construct a biblically faithful comprehensive worldview that accounts for the growth in scientific knowledge.”

Although we certainly shouldn’t regard science as a threat to our faith-- the One who authored our Bible is also the Author of science—it’s entirely another thing to regard Darwinism as “scientific knowledge” and then allow it to lord itself over the Bible. What would Choong’s Christianity look like? Certainly not like Christianity! All structures reflect their foundation. If God’s creating work is the basis for all subsequent theology—and it is—then everything built upon the Genesis foundation will conform to its original dimensions.

What are the dimensions of evolution? Sin and death from the get-go! How then do we understand the Fall if sin and death were part of God’s original order? And what are we being redeemed (to be bought back) into? Sin and death? Go figure! John Whitmore writes,

“There is a danger of becoming so indoctrinated by evolutionary thinking that we become closed to Christianity.” Bruce Malone, Search for the Truth (p.45)

Whitmore is right. The two worldviews are incompatible. The more ground Darwin takes, the more the Bible is diminished.

--Daniel Mann
www.knowingscripture.com