| An aura of mystery surrounds the dinosaurs. We have no doubt that these reptiles once roamed the earth; we find their fossilised remains all over the globe. What is a mystery, is when did they roam the earth, and more importantly, when did they seemingly die out?
In these areas, Christians have an advantage over other people. Why? Because we have the Bible, the Word of one who has always been there, always will, and knows everything. Finding out when dinosaurs first appeared on the Earth is not difficult at all. In Genesis 1:25 it states “God made the wild animals according to their kinds, the livestock according to their kinds, and all the creatures that move along the ground according to their kinds. And God saw that it was good.” And this was on the sixth day of Creation, some six thousand years ago. Now, as dinosaurs were land dwelling animals, it makes sense that they were Created on the same day as Adam and Eve. And no, the tyrannosaurus rex would not have had Adam and Eve for dinner as God also makes it clear that before sin, every animal was an herbivore “I give you every seed-bearing plant on the face of the whole earth and everytree that has fruit with seed in it. They will be yours for food. And to all the beasts of the earth and all the birds of the air and all the creatures that move on the ground – everything that has the breath of life in it – I give every green plant for food.” [Gen 1:29-30] (Which makes sense, as death is a result of sin, so nothing would have died before the fall of man)
So now we know when dinosaurs were made, when did they did out? Well, that question is very much up to interpretation. Scientists have suggested theories such as: they starved to death, died from overeating, poisoning, mammals ate their eggs, volcanic dust, poisonous gases, sunspots, meteorites, mass suicide, constipation, parasites, etc etc.
Personally, I believe the dinosaurs were saved from the global flood aboard Noah’s ark, and then became extinct afterwards. Evidence? Well, in Job 40, God describes the “behemoth” to Job. The behemoth’s tail “sways like a cedar and the animal “ranks first among the works of God”. Now in the footnotes, they’ve said that the behemoth is “possibly the hippopotamus or the elephant”, but can you really believe that a hippopotamus or an elephant has a tail like a cedar tree? (Remember that only the written text is inspired by God, the footnotes are not) Also, frequently in the Old Testament, there is mention of “dragons”, but no mention of “dinosaur”. This shouldn’t be surprising as the word “dinosaur” was invented by Dr Richard Owen in the 1800s. However, since the Bible was translated into English in the 1600s, we would not expect the word “dinosaur” to appear in the Bible. In passages containing the “dragon” we find that the word “dinosaur” works just as well!
As to why there aren’t any dinosaurs today, I suppose all the extinction factors after the flood, such as competition for food, over hunting by man, loss of habitat etc (the usual reasons for an animal to become extinct today).
When we look at the world through Biblical glasses, using the infallible Word of God to judge the accuracy of fallible mans’ theories, we find that some mysteries, aren’t really mysteries at all. |
