YEA Lesson Library

Objectives

At the end of this lesson, students will be able to:

1. Explain that creation requires a plan, design, and an Intelligent Creator.

2. Discuss that life on this universe is interdependent upon many other things for survival. Therefore, life forms would die off before
certain needs were met through the evolutionary process.

3. Explain that God chooses companionship.

Topics & Themes

Creation
Creator
Evolution
God’s Plan
Intelligent Design
Jesus Christ, Birth of
Jesus, God the Son
Jesus Christ, the Word
Light

Materials Needed

Bible, YEA students' and teacher's books, attendance and memory verse charts, paper, pencils, 20 coins, songbook, CD or cassette tape, music player

How to Teach This Lesson

After opening the class with prayer, divide the group into two teams. Give each team ten coins. If your class is small, do the experiment without dividing the class in teams. If necessary, you can be a part of the game. Evenly divide the coins among the students. Explain that when you say "go," each team or person is to begin flipping their coins together (some students may have two or more coins to flip) until all ten coins come up heads at the same time. The first team to accomplish this wins. If neither team wins, stop the game after a while. Ask: What are the odds of having ten coins come up heads the first time? (One in 4,132,800.)

The Computer Comparison
Ask: What are the chances that a computer just evolved? How do new computer programs get written and installed? (The computer programmer writes the program and the computer user installs it.) How many of you have seen a computer that created itself from nothing or evolved from something else? How many of you have seen a computer that programmed itself? Is a computer less complex than this universe? How would you compare programming a computer to a human mind?

Darwinism
Explain that Darwin's evolutionary theory claims there were no programmers for genetic programs: the process was blind, self-driven. In other words, it all happened without a programmer. According to Darwin's theory, how does the genetic programming for a plant or animal evolve so that it can be written and installed? How can it be that a computer can't create itself or program itself, yet we're expected to believe that a very complex universe with vegetable and animal life did? If this could happen, shouldn’t it be possible for scientist to artificially create a computer "environment" in which the computer could program itself?

Creation requires a Creator
Ask: How many of you would agree that it took an intelligent mind to create a computer? What are some of the complexities of our universe? Lead the students in a discussion of its complexity and how one thing is dependent upon another for survival. Ask: What are the possibilities of man or animal surviving a week, let alone millions of years without such things as light, food, water, oxygen? What did God create first? Who was the Creator? What did God create on the second day? What did He create on the third day? How many days were there before God hung the sun, moon, and stars? Why was this important?

Second Activity
Divide the class into groups of threes. Give them a piece of paper and pencil. Tell each group to first plan and design a simple, pesky fly. They are to list all of its components, tell what materials each component will be made of, explain how they will make it fly, and how they will give it life. Give them a few minutes to do this and call the class back together.

Debrief
Ask: How did you feel trying to create a fly, make it aerodynamic, and give it life? What does this mean to you? How did your experience agree or disagree with what you're being taught in school about how the universe and everything on it came about without a Creator? How will this experiment affect the way you think about the universe coming into being without a plan, a designer, and an intelligent Creator?

God’s Creation
Say: All of creation is interdependent. "Before there could be a man, there had to be a place for man, and that place had to be carefully designed. Man would be physical, so his environment had to be physical. He would need food, air, water, a survivable temperature range. He would need companionship (animal and human), and the opportunity to grow and develop. All this took thought and planning." (I'll Make Me A World . . . by Ronald L. Dart).

Teacher-Directed Activity

Go over the students' Activity and encourage the sharing of the symbols they used to mark different Scripture passages and why they selected each one. One purpose for this activity is to help students to begin marking their Bibles for better recall and study.

REACH Activity

Memory Verse Spotlight
Look up the word for “God” from Genesis 1:31 Write down the Hebrew word and its meaning. Then find three other Scriptures where this word is used. You will have to look for this word in a concordance because our Bibles translate many words to “God.” You may wish to start a special section in the Memory Verse Spotlight section of your Bible notebook just for the names of God. Each name tells a little more about who He is and what He is like. Share what you find in Genesis 1:31 with your family.

Where in the World? Eden
Using a Bible encyclopedia or Bible map, find where scholars believe the Garden of Eden might have been. Remember, this was prior to Noah’s flood, so the landscape would have changed a great deal. Remember to file what you discover into your Bible notebook.

They Did What Back Then? Interdependency
Another great argument against evolution is the need (in evolution) for many pieces of an animal’s (or plant’s) design to be in place in order for it to survive. You can’t have wings without porous bones. Similarly, trees need the carbon dioxide which animals exhale; animals need the oxygen and glucose produced by the plants. In your Bible notebook, write down three more examples of interdependency. They can be elements within the same organism or elements in two different organisms that depend on each other.

Making It Mine: Psalm 8
Since this is the memory work assigned for this book, take this psalm apart and start analyzing it verse by verse. Make your notes in your Bible notebook.

Verse One - Look up the two words that are translated “LORD” and “Lord.” Write down their meanings. Then find how “majestic” is translated in other versions. Finally, write how you think God sets His glory above the heavens.

Verse Two - This verse is cited in the gospels. Where? Why? How does this silence the enemy? Do you ever praise God with this thought in mind?

Verse Three - What part of the heavens amazes you? The constellations, the individual stars, black holes, comets, the Sun, the Moon, our solar system?

Verse Four - Do you ever wonder why God cares about you? How do you know that He cares about you? If you have doubts that He loves you, ask your parents, pastor, or sabbath school teacher to show you proof of God’s love.

Verse Five - What do the Bible commentators think this verse is referring to? Who are the heavenly beings? What does it mean to be crowned with glory and honor? Do you realize that when you take the name “Christian,” you are telling the world that you are an ambassador for Jesus Christ? Do you do that job well?

Verses Six-Eight - Where would you find the dominion mandate given to man - in both the Old Testament and the New Testament? Write this down in your Bible notebook. We have a responsibility to care for the creation God has put in our care. Write a few sentences to describe how we can care for God’s creation without going too far - getting certain populations of animals so numerous that they become diseased or killing off others species to the point of extinction? What do you think of the current state of caring for our environment? Is global warming actually happening? Can we do anything about it, if it is? What has God put into our care? What will we answer to Him about?

Verse Nine - Does this verse look like any other verse in Psalm 8? It’s called an “inclucio.” It’s like bookends. The same thought starts and finishes the psalm. Can you think of a song that has these words in it? If not, look one up.

Worldview Collisions: Creation vs. Evolution
One of the hardest arguments for evolutionists to counter is the intelligent design that is evident in all of creation. A simple demonstration of this is the argument of the watch. How long would it take you to stir all of the various gears and pieces of a watch before it all came together and functioned properly as a watch? That is absurd and impossible. The universe is vastly more complicated than a watch. There was obviously an Intelligent Designer involved in creation.

Questions
As you’re working through the YEA lesson, Daily Devotionals, doing the activity, or reading the Bible, be sure to write down any questions you have. That way you’ll remember to ask someone. Also remember to share the really interesting things you’re learning with family and friends.

Song

“Morning Has Broken” is on page 7 of The Group Songbook.

Closing Prayer

Have the students form a circle and join hands. Ask for a volunteer to lead in prayer thanking God for revealing that He is the Creator of this awesome universe.