Every morning when I drove onto the military base where I worked I was met with a sober message. For many years it read “Remember the Mission!” and later it said “Our mission is…” The purpose of these “mission” placards was to clarify for service members a single priority so that everyone would refine their performance within their unique duty section to best contribute to overall mission accomplishment.

For instance, I was an Air Force medical officer. Most people intuitively know what the mission of a hospital is. We certainly sought to render the best medical care possible for our patients’ benefit. But our hospital’s primary mission was to feed into the Bomb Wing’s war-fighting mission by ensuring that Wing personnel were medically ready at any time to enter the fight, or that they were treated and returned to the fight as soon as possible. It’s good to be reminded of our priorities and purpose.

While a student at Moody Bible Institute, I was taught that the mission of the church could be organized into three basic functions: worship, edification (building up) of believers, and evangelism. If a church undertook an activity that couldn’t reasonably be plugged into one of these functions, then that activity was a distraction from their mission.

The same goes for the Institute for Creation Research (ICR) as a ministry that exists to support the church. It might be a worthwhile exercise for the ICR staff, our readers, and our supporters to remind ourselves what ICR is about and how we will apply our efforts. ICR’s following five jobs support the church’s mission through worship, edification, and evangelism.

1. Specifically Credit Jesus Christ as Creator

Many churches and ministries have a pithy statement for their purpose along the lines of “to know Christ and to make Him known.” ICR has the same purpose. This purpose, however, presupposes that Christ is understood as the true Creator God. This truth that the Lord Jesus is the Creator is affirmed in many passages such as “In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God….All things were made through Him, and without Him nothing was made that was made” (John 1:1, 3). Unfortunately, science has long been abused by evolutionary selectionism to deny that the universe, life, and the very image of God that humans possess were supernaturally created. In accordance with Romans 1:25, ICR must also expose and oppose all false worship of the creation itself instead of Jesus Christ the Creator.

Thus, as a science-based ministry ICR exists to demonstrate that worship should be the normal response to science by using science as it’s supposed to be used. That is, to render honor and glory in the most basic way that Christians can—by regularly accentuating the rightful credit due to Jesus as our Creator. I devoted my December 2020 Acts & Facts article to discussing at length this ICR mission in which I mentioned that Christians are hungry—perhaps even starved—for the glory of Christ.¹

Thus, the mission of ICR is to consistently exalt the Lord Jesus through everything that we communicate. Our message through articles, books, or videos must highlight the workmanship of Christ—especially as expressed in living creatures—which is unfailingly glorious. All of us at ICR feel privileged to use science to rightfully credit Christ as our Creator and Savior and thus demonstrate why Jesus is worthy to be the center of our deepest love, affection, and devotion.

2. Come Alongside Pastors

ICR’s central ministry is to and through local churches. Thus, a primary duty of ICR is to help pastors lead, feed, and defend their flock.

How? ICR scientists give them the best and freshest biblical and scientific answers to their questions and responses to secular attacks. Our research efforts are targeted toward areas that affirm the Bible’s historical narratives, principally those of recent creation and a worldwide flood, but that also confirm the Bible’s accuracy in general. We provide all Christians with answers to the challenges coming from a huge crowd of secular scientists and skeptics who menace the church here and now.

Dr. Tim Clarey works on his Discovery Center Omniglobe animation storyboards

 

3. Fundamentally Change How People Understand Biology

ICR’s most pressing assignment is to fundamentally change the way people understand biology. Our task is to construct a completely new theory of biological design that incorporates recent discoveries and respects the biblical narrative. The theory would explain hundreds of fascinating examples of creatures’ abilities from an organism-centered, engineering-based perspective that gives glory to their Creator—and not to “nature.” The theory would:

• be the framework guiding the interpretation of biological phenomena;
• assume that biological functions are best explained by engineering science principles;
• restore a holistic view to explain the operation of creatures’ functions;
• reject the simplistic, parts-oriented approach of the status quo; and
• be a clear, concise, and easily communicable design-based theory and not an esoteric mathematical construct.

An engineering-based, organism-focused framework shows why we should abandon Darwin’s worldview of selectionism that sees organisms as modeling clay being passively shaped over time by the vicissitudes of their venerated view of nature.² And that same design-based approach to biology shows us why we should begin to view creatures as active, purposeful, problem-solving entities.

We hope this theory will become the fundamental, design-based principle uniting biological explanations in Christian textbooks and museums educating future generations of young believers. We pray that an engineering-based approach to biology will spark a second creationist revival…and once again stir up a sense of certainty in Christian truth.

 

 

4. Spread and Defend the Gospel

We at ICR recognize three important facts as the gospel relates to the Bible’s doctrine of creation. First, convincing someone to think correctly about creation isn’t the ultimate goal, but helping people to believe in Jesus as their Lord and Savior is. Second, people may believe in Christ for salvation but still be misled about biblical clarity and authority by simultaneously believing in evolution, an ancient creation, or both. I was one of those people for several years.

Third, the widespread, government-sanctioned teaching of evolutionary selectionism is a major reason people don’t believe the Bible is God’s Word and thus don’t take the claims of Christ as Savior seriously. ICR often includes the gospel message directly in the avenues of our communication. We also affirm biblical clarity³ and defend specific biblical narratives that are commonly under secular attack. These actions fulfill Peter’s admonition to “sanctify the Lord God in your hearts, and always be ready to give a defense to everyone who asks you a reason for the hope that is in you, with meekness and fear” (1 Peter 3:15).

We show the ways in which science confirms that natural processes cannot explain the Bible’s miraculous accounts of recent creation, the worldwide Flood, and Christ’s resurrection. Our research activities serve to defend the gospel. Paul was imprisoned for the defense of the gospel and wrote to the believers in Philippi: “Just as it is right for me to think this of you all, because I have you in my heart, inasmuch as both in my chains and in the defense and confirmation of the gospel, you all are partakers with me of grace….knowing that I am appointed for the defense of the gospel” (Philippians 1:7, 17).

5. Win Scientists and Science Back to Christ

Without a doubt, ICR continues toward the goal of ICR founder Dr. Henry Morris, which was that “we must try not only to win individual scientists and educators to Christ, but also to win science itself, and education itself, to Christ.”⁴ We will build on the solid foundation laid by those who came before us—not only Dr. Henry Morris, but our recently departed CEO Dr. Henry Morris III, current President Emeritus Dr. John Morris, Dr. Duane Gish, and so many others.⁵

References

1. Guliuzza, R. J. 2020. Jesus Christ, Our Savior and Creator. Acts & Facts. 49 (12): 5-7.
2. Guliuzza, R. J. 2017. Engineered Adaptability: Adaptability via Nature or Design? What Evolutionists Say. Acts & Facts. 46 (9): 17-19.
3. Biblical clarity teaches that God clearly communicates what He wants to say to people at any time and in any culture when an accurate translation of the Bible’s words gives their normal meaning in their normal context like any other piece of literature. Practically, this means that the average person who doesn’t have either an advanced degree in science or in theology can understand the Bible’s teachings at face value without necessarily being informed by theological, historical, or scientific experts and source material.
4. Morris, H. M. 1994. Beginning at Genesis. Acts & Facts. 23 (2).
5. Guliuzza, R. J. 2021. Unity Worthy of Our Creationist Heritage. Acts & Facts. 50 (1): 5-7.

* Dr. Guliuzza is President of the Institute for Creation Research. He earned his M.D. from the University of Minnesota, his Master of Public Health from Harvard University, and served in the U.S. Air Force as 28th Bomb Wing Flight Surgeon and Chief of Aerospace Medicine. Dr. Guliuzza is also a registered Professional Engineer and holds a B.A. in theology from Moody Bible Institute.