I’ve been keeping track of the progress of the creation museum for many years now, from the time it was just a dream in the heart of the staff at Answers in Genesis. I basically knew what I would find during my visit. I had seen maps of the museum layout and had read of number of articles detailing the approach and rationale of the message the museum would convey. I was prepared for the content. I was not prepared for the overall quality of the experience.
My family’s visit to the Creation Museum was part of a three day excursion to the Cincinnati area. We stayed at a very nice downtown hotel. We went for walks in the very nice downtown area, past the new football and baseball stadiums, the park-like riverfront setting, and over the people bridge, that takes leisurely walkers and serious exercisers across the Ohio River to Newport Pier. There, among shops and restaurants, is the Newport Aquarium, rated one of the best aquariums in the Midwest. We took in the aquarium the day before our visit to the Creation Museum. The day after, we stopped by The Beach, one of the biggest and best water parks in the Midwest. The Creation Museum had a lot of competition from some quality attractions, and it easily stood head and shoulders above the rest.
If a person was going to base his assessment of the Creation Museum’s message on quality, he would have to say it is a message worth listening to. From the parking attendants to the book store workers, from the moving dinosaurs to the tree of life (complete with 20,000 hand painted leaves), from the special effects theater to the planetarium, everything about the Creation Museum experience exudes quality and professionalism. So many times, well-meaning Christians tend to go the cheaper route in the name of good stewardship. And I will grant that sometimes it is simply necessary. Congregations don’t always have the resources to make everything the level of quality they’d prefer it to be. But when God puts it on the heart of his people to give, as the supporters of Answers in Genesis have (including our congregation) to the Creation Museum project, it’s exciting to see that level of giving come out in quality unsurpassed by any other museum I’ve attended. Human beings naturally form opinions about the significance of an organization based on the quality of its building, grounds, furnishings, etc. The only material a critic of the Creation Museum will find to work with is its message, and that is only because the truth is sometimes hard to take.
Some highlights of the Lange family Museum experience:
- Beth appreciated the logical flow of the layout as visitors progressed from room to room. Visitors were confronted with the two alternatives offered by a creation versus an evolution starting point. The Museum very effectively showed how an evolutionary perspective leads ultimately to hopelessness.
- “The White Room” has 22 minutes of never-before-seen video highlights of the best creation arguments. The DVD is also available in the book store. To me, it’s probably the best 22 minutes of video ever produced by Answers in Genesis. A lot of great material is packed into a short amount of time.
- The Grandparents Lange (who drove over from St. Louis to meet us) appreciated the Noah’s Ark room. Speculations about possible ship-building techniques give visitors a more sophisticated view of the ark than before. And why not? If Noah was the 10th generation from Adam and Eve, who were created perfectly in the image of God, he and his family were sure to have some know-how.
- The Lange children enjoyed the special effects theatre, complete with rumbling seats and misting water during the flood scene. They also enjoyed the beautiful, park-like grounds of the Creation Museum, with a picnic area, walking path almost a mile long, and man-made waterfall.
- We all enjoyed the Planetarium, with a computer presentation developed by Answers in Genesis astrophysicist Dr. Jason Lisle. It truly gives new meaning to Genesis 1:16b; “He made the stars also.”
As I walked through the Creation Museum, overhearing various guests having “A-ha” experiences (most touching was an African-American family realizing for the first time that we are all one blood descending from Noah’s family), a thought came into my mind. I don’t know if it was just my own musings, or if it was from the Holy Spirit. I pictured a day when the mounting evidence against evolution becomes so overwhelming that evolutionary theory, as it is currently known, will cease to exist. I don’t know if that day will come in my lifetime, but I wouldn’t be surprised if it comes in the next few hundred years. When the evolutionists are laughed at as “ignorant flat earthers” (some of the terms applied to creationists today), I pray that the creationists of that day will carry the majority view more graciously than the evolutionists of today have. Then all the distractions of science versus religion will be stripped away and the central question will be laid bare, Will you acknowledge the Lord of the universe, or not?
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