As a kid growing up I used to visit the Museum of Natural Man in San Diego. There I would see all of the great exhbits of dinosaurs and other pre-historic animals. Of course the center piece of all of these displays was Tyrannosaurus Rex. There it would stand above all of our heads with this sheepish; somewhat sinnister grin on it's face. Our classroom would leave the museum with our little minds full of fear mingled with fascination and mostly glad that we didn't have to live in pre-historic times with those great monsters we had just seen.
Later as I grew up and began to embrace Christianity, the images and thoughts of what I had witnessed at the museum, began to puzzle me and cause considerable doubt in my mind concerning the authenticity of the bible. I knew that dinosaurs must be real because I had seen them (or their representation-which is another point all it's own), with my own eyes and yet I had never heard a preacher or other Christians talk about them. Somewhere in the back of my mind was the nagging desire to know if God, dinosaurs and the bible could co-exist.
It wasn't until many years later while studying the bible that I discovered just where these great creatures (which we call dinosaurs today) are spoken of in the bible. The following verses are a few places where God Himself describes these massive creatures to His servant Job. In the book of Job chapter 40 verse 15 we hear God refer to these beasts as behemoths. This passage makes it clear that these animals were the "chief" or greatest of God's creations in terms of size, strength and scope. The Hippo and Elephant (which had other Hebrew names), don't qualify as the largest animal described by God at that time. Nor does their anatomy fit the clear language found in Job 40:17. In this verse these great creatures are described as having tails like "cedar trees." In Job chapter 41 we find a description of a terrible animal called a Leviathan by God. The Leviathan is said to have "sharp teeth, and was a scaled sea animal whose habitat was in deep waters.
These are just a couple of places in which dinosaurs can be found in the bible. I would encourage you to take the time to read the book of Job Chapters 40 and 41 for a little more detailed regarding these great animals.
Tomorrow's blog? did God create the Dinosaur or did they evolve over millions or billions of years ago?
