I had been interested in the study of creation and the evidences of our Creator since a young age. To understand the Bible better, in the 1970s I studied Bible at Southeastern Christian College and Harding College. I studied New Testament Greek at Harding College, and later for two years studied mathematical science at the University of Kentucky. Mathematical statistics became my field of employment for over 31 years. The tools of math and science and the knowledge of Scripture gave me clues to understand the modern need to understand creation.
Romans 1 tells us that men are running away from their Creator. “18For the wrath of God is revealed from heaven against all ungodliness and unrighteousness of men, who by their unrighteousness suppress the truth. 19For what can be known about God is plain to them, because God has shown it to them. 20For his invisible attributes, namely, his eternal power and divine nature, have been clearly perceived, ever since the creation of the world, in the things that have been made. So they are without excuse. 21For although they knew God, they did not honor him as God or give thanks to him, but they became futile in their thinking, and their foolish hearts were darkened. 22Claiming to be wise, they became fools, 23and exchanged the glory of the immortal God for images resembling mortal man and birds and animals and creeping things.
24Therefore God gave them up in the lusts of their hearts to impurity, to the dishonoring of their bodies among themselves, 25because they exchanged the truth about God for a lie and worshiped and served the creature rather than the Creator, who is blessed forever! Amen.” Romans 1:18-25 ESV
How does this apply to modern science? Are people running from the truth?
In one of Charles Darwin’s letters he explained that he had abandoned the concept of intelligent design as taught by his predecessor, William Paley. I had this burning question to investigate this. Who was Paley and why did Darwin reject Paley’s teaching about design in nature? What were his stated reasons?
As I investigated these matters, it became obvious that a great delusion exists in the modern western world, which is being propagated throughout the world. To correct this delusion requires a lot of work even for those of open hearts. I began to develop my own set of lessons on the subjects related to intelligent design and sought to understand Paley and Darwin. I investigated the Greek term Logos in John 1 along with other Scriptures about how the Son of God was involved in creation which provided the Biblical message that will guide us back to the truth..
In 2017 and 2018 I went to Zimbabwe to visit and assist Robert Garrett, our missionary sponsored by churches of Christ. When planning the 2018 trip I invited geologist David McQueen to join us and help to teach creation. I knew McQueen had lectured in many venues, including natural history museum tours. I had participated with him in some of those tours. McQueen had also been a university professor and had taught geology at the Institute for Creation Research graduate school. When I asked McQueen to come to Zimbabwe, he agreed that he and I would team teach in Africa. I would focus on Intelligent Design using the approach of Paley updated by modern science, while he would teach the Biblical geology of creation and the flood.
The summer of 2018 we were invited by the Hatfield Church of Christ, to teach a gospel week on Biblical creation, with David teaching two lessons on Sunday. Then both of us spoke at each evening session on Monday through Friday. The Zimbabweans loved hearing from professor McQueen and also me. Each evening I gave short discussions on DNA and intelligent design topics, then I gave most of the time to McQueen to teach creation related topics.
In January 2019, we organized some of our presentations into a one day seminar. Sam Marsh, the minister of the Belmont Church of Christ, and the Salem Church of Christ in Cynthiana, Kentucky hosted our McQueen and Garrett seminar. We called the seminar, “The Renewal of the Knowledge of the Logos Creator”. Sam Marsh obtained a radio interview for me to discuss the seminar a few weeks ahead. The seminar was conducted on a Saturday. We started at 9:00 AM and concluded in the afternoon after about 2:30 PM, I think. There were over three inches of snow on the ground in the morning, yet we had 12 attendees. I represented the approach of apologist William Paley on intelligent design and included exercises on mathematical probability. McQueen taught on creation and the flood. The church provided lunch. Carolyn Cook assisted us to role play the discussions of Emma Wedgewood Darwin with her husband, Charles. This dramatic presentation highlighted the letters of Emma and memoirs of her husband, showing more insights into how Charles Darwin had abandoned faith.
Later in 2019, we produced a 27 minute video that expanded the Emma and Charles conversation that highlighted the Darwinian rejection of intelligent design. David McQueen, Carolyn Cook, Swen Halverson and I produced this drama. The video uses quotes from Emma’s letters and Charles’ memoirs to help us understand Darwin’s naturalism. This helps us to understand the modern followers of Charles Darwin. Many of them reject intelligent design and tend to disparage the Creator. In this drama, I was the narrator and also appeared as William Paley. Carolyn played Emma Wedgewood Darwin and David McQueen played Charles Darwin.
After that production, David and I went to Zimbabwe for four weeks. We spoke at churches and conducted two gospel weeks. At the Mbare Church of Christ we taught an overview of the whole Bible from Genesis to Revelation in seven lessons. The two of us alternated, so one taught four lessons and one taught three lessons. Among other topics, David covered the original creation and the new Jerusalem. At the Glen Norah Church of Christ, we taught most of the book of I Corinthians in seven lessons. Among other topics, I covered chapter 1 which identified the false wisdom of the world and introduced God’s higher wisdom, and chapter 8 which shows the cause of false knowledge and clarifies the role of God the Father and God the Son in creation. We had positive comments from brethren who enjoyed our Biblical teaching.
In the years after that, David hoped to be able to return to Zimbabwe and bring Shirley. Although that didn’t happen, I kept up with David, as he continued to teach on creation and Genesis. He appeared many times on Standing for Truth, a YouTube program on creation and evolution. David and his wife, Shirley, also produced a series of Facebook live videos to teach Genesis and creation apologetics. During this time, I also continued to develop my lessons on intelligent design and presented some of these in Zoom video conferences to small groups.
Recently, David passed on to the Presence of the Lord in April 2025. He will be remembered, and greatly missed.
For my part, in memory of David, I will continue to teach my creation seminar as God opens the doors. David thought my intelligent design message was important. He appreciated my use of mathematical probability which helped show the impossibility of life coming from an accident. My memory of David encourages my desire to use God given gifts in apologetics as God permits.
Zimbabwe still had open doors for my ministry to encourage churches and teach Bible and creation. In late 2022 I invited a friend, a Church of Christ minister named Larry Miles, to join me to visit Zimbabwe. Our goal for this trip was to encourage the churches. In November 2022 we spent four weeks there and spoke at several churches of Christ. We also stayed at the Central Africa Christian College (CACC) and made contacts with students and staff there. CACC is related to Christian churches and churches of Christ.
Three years later, Larry and I began to plan another trip to Zimbabwe intended for late October and November 2025. This time I was prepared to teach my all day seminar, “The Renewal of the Knowledge of the Logos Creator”. I prepared a schedule to advertise a six hour meeting, with breaks for tea and lunch, so about 5 hours of teaching. I sent example videos of some of my lessons to some Zimbabwe leaders and asked them to provide some venues in which to conduct my seminar. Especially I wanted to focus on young people. My intention for this seminar is to help young people to understand how modern science, when properly understood, shows the glory and power of our Creator.
The seminar starts with the history of how William Paley taught intelligent design as seen in living things. Paley had insights that are shown to be far, far ahead of modern science. The seminar then covered how Charles Darwin rejected Paley. Darwin sought to explain all the designs in living things as the result of natural selection. Darwin’s view claimed that environmental factors are the cause of the designs, and that there are no intentional or purposeful designs. In the seminar we declare the Biblical view that the Logos is the source of all things. The Logos is the logic and reason for the universe and all life comes from Him. My goal is for this seminar to prepare young people to be successful in the study of science, while we give glory to our Creator. There is no need to follow Darwin, we should follow Christ to understand the universe.
In the seminar I showed that the updated science demonstrates that Paley’s prediction of extreme complexity in living things was correct. Darwin had no idea of this extreme complexity. Somehow Paley recognized that extreme complexity existed in nature and the engineering designs show the glory and greatness of God. The ability of living things to reproduce themselves is so amazing that Paley declared that the designer was exercising the “supreme art”. The seminar in five hours of teaching and exercises sought to show that God’s thoughts and plans are higher than man’s, as the heavens are higher than the earth, so are God’s thoughts higher than man’s. As a part of the seminar I presented some videos on intelligent design produced by the Institute for Creation Research. I used two 23 minute lessons from the series, Made in His Image, which gave detailed explanations of the formation and function of the human eye and the human hand. I was the facilitator and main speaker.
So on this 2025 trip, in addition to speaking to churches of Christ at Sunday services and Bible study meetings, we sought to find audiences for the seminar.
One of the Zimbabwe brothers, Isaiah Mawubire, took the lead to find venues who would host the seminar. Isaiah is one of the brothers who preaches, teaches and leads worship at some of our churches, especially at the Budiriro Church of Christ. Isaiah let the Church of Christ brethren know about our seminar and the National Youth of Churches of Christ invited us. Isaiah also found three nondenominational minister’s groups who wanted this seminar to be presented to pastors. As a result, we had three venues that invited pastors, and one venue that invited youth from age 14 upward.
We did not charge admission fees for this seminar. Also we paid the costs for lunch and tea to be prepared and catered at each venue. These costs plus travel costs were covered by the Belmont Zimbabwe Education and Relief fund. I also gave away DVDs on Intelligent Design produced by Illustra Media plus some books and DVD presentations on other creation topics especially the flood.
Isaiah Mawubire helped to manage the logistics, lead worship at these seminars and provided transportation. At the fourth seminar in Gweru, Godfrey Justice joined us and assisted by interpreting portions of the lectures into Shona. The rest of the time we lectured in English only.
There were a number of logistic issues. The screen in Rimuka was a curtain that was not flat and reflective, so slides were hard to read. Power sharing is erratic, so we sometimes lost power in the middle of a lecture or video. However, the Grace Bible church in Rimuka managed to run a generator successfully during a few hours of outages. However, the other places did not have screens or generators, so after the Rimuka experience we bought our own generator and screen to use at the last three venues.
Attendance was as follows.
Wednesday, October 29, 2025. The sponsor was the Evangelical Fellowship of Zimbabwe. The venue was the Grace Bible Church in Rimuka, near Kadoma. Fifty-one pastors signed the attendance sheets.
Saturday, November 1, 2025 The sponsor was National Youth of Churches of Christ. The venue was the Mbare Church of Christ in Harare. Forty-four young people aged 14 and upwards signed the attendance sheets.
Monday, November 10, 2025 The sponsor was Evangelical Fellowship of Zimbabwe Glen Norah A. The venue was at a small shelter for a pentecostal church in Glen Norah. Fifteen pastors signed the attendance sheets. By their request we started at 10 instead of 9, but due to errors in setting up, it was closer to 10:30, so we didn’t cover as much and forgot to hand out the free DVDs.
Saturday, November 15, 2025 The sponsor was Prison Ministries, a nondenominational minister’s group that works to reach people in prison. The venue was Academy of Music in Gweru. Seventy-five pastors signed the attendance sheets.
This last group in Gweru was very enthusiastic and we had a great time. Many of them arrived quite early, by 8:30 AM. And there were a lot more than 70 still there at 3:00 PM for our closing when we handed out the free DVDs and certificates of completion. Brother Justice attended at Gweru and interpreted portions of the seminar into the Shona language. This was helpful, since although the people speak English, there are accent differences. Having an interpreter makes the lectures and materials much clearer.
Yes, thanks for your prayers. And thanks to God for increasing the outreach. This seminar demonstrated that God’s thoughts are higher than man’s as the heavens are higher than the earth. Our hope is that these pastors will guide young people to recognize the teaching of the Scriptures on the Logos and recognize the greatness and power and glory of our God as seen in nature.