#04 - Where the Creation Meets the Scar

Have you ever wondered if you could see the place where the pre-flood or “creation” rocks meet the post-flood or “scar” rocks? There actually are many such places, but they are largely buried deep beneath the sedimentary surface where we live or are in hard-to-reach places. These very distinctive rocks are given a variety of names, but we’ll just focus on two for this discussion: the Great Unconformity and the Cambrian Explosion, but before we can venture any further, we must stop and address something very important:

Worldviews and Expectations

Worldview is a huge topic for a later discussion, but it plays a vital role in helping us to wrap our heads around how people can have completely opposing views while looking at the same evidence. Here is a basic worldview definition: “Your worldview is the lens through which you see and interpret the world around you.” The existence of the Great Unconformity and the Cambrian Explosion is accepted by all scientists, but it’s their worldview that greatly impacts how they interpret its cause.

As we specifically consider the earth’s appearance, there are two primary worldviews. One worldview starts with the first verse of the Bible, “In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth” and continues with the understanding that God tells us about the creation, the fall of mankind, the global flood, the dispersion of the nations based on language, and much more. This is a Biblical worldview. Many people hold an opposing worldview which excludes God, and they believe that natural processes taking place over eons of time explains what we see today. Some will say that God used this second process, but the Bible simply doesn’t read that way.

As we go forward, consider your worldview and how it impacts what you see as you explore the world around you. There’s one question I’d like you to keep in focus as we consider all Scargazers topics, including this one: “If there was a global flood as the Bible teaches, what would you expect to see?”

The Great Unconformity

If you look it up, you’ll find a definition something like this: “The Great Unconformity is a geological term for a significant gap in the Earth's rock record, representing a period of missing time where layers of rock either eroded or never formed. The missing time is estimated to be over a billion years.” We certainly agree there’s a large amount of missing material, but time is merely an interpretation based on a particular worldview.

Since the flood was worldwide, we’d expect to see a line in the rock strata (Great Unconformity) all over the earth, and that’s exactly what we find. The rock layers below the line are very different from the rock layers above (an unconformity.) We also see many places where it looks like the lower layer was sheared off in a flat plane (Figure 1) and where it looks like the strata below was removed with so much force that it was disfigured. What force could possibly plane off and create a flat rock surface over such a large expanse? We have some understanding of what large volumes of water can do to any surface, especially when speed and debris are added to the flow. We don’t know where all the material in the sedimentary layers came from, but it must have been significant since we often see sedimentary material that is miles deep.

*Figure 1 - The meeting place of creation rocks on the bottom and sedimentary layers above (Grand Canyon)*

As we visualize what we know about the Biblical flood and what we can study with local floods, we’d expect to see sediments start to form as the water slowed down. The layers of sediments would contain material picked up by the water over large areas and even contain lifeforms that got caught up in the torrent, died, and then got mixed into the debris deposits. We can’t duplicate a global flood to study what happens, but we can observe and study recent floods, and one of those natural laboratories is Mount St. Helens, which we’ll explore later this year.

Even though the Great Unconformity exists all over the world, we’re looking at the bottom of the Grand Canyon where many stacked layers are exposed. We have a friend, Russ Miller, who calls that line “Where Creation rock meets Judgment rock,” and he points out that you can touch both with one hand. I really like his term, and I’m looking forward to putting my hand on that place someday. The picture in Figure 2 provides a broader view of the layers in the Grand Canyon and Figure 3 shows another area far from the Grand Canyon near Cody, Wyoming (another canyon), where we can again see the Great Unconformity.

*Figure 2 - The Great Unconformity in the Grand Canyon*

*Figure 3 - The Great Unconformity near Cody, Wyoming*

Within our Biblical worldview the Great Unconformity is not a mystery, and nothing is missing. It’s exactly what we would expect to see as a result of the cataclysmic, year-long global flood.

The Cambrian Explosion

One of the definitions I found says it like this, “The Cambrian explosion is characterized by the sudden appearance of a wide array of animal phyla in the fossil record.” (Remember, the fossil record is only located in the sedimentary layers on top of the Creation rocks.) One worldview sees the progression of life evolving over eons of time; the other sees the deposits of animals and plants that were swept away and buried as the flood waters rose and receded during the 12-month period of the flood. The Bible even says that ALL land animals not on the ark were killed. As the name implies, the massive appearance of fossils begins in the Cambrian rock layers, right above the Great Unconformity.

*Figure 4 - The Cambrian layer sitting on the Creation rock near Colorado Springs, Colorado*

As we’ve discussed already, we’re all looking at the same evidence and few have any disagreement with what we see. A common example is one I’m sure you’ve learned about at some point, the geologic column. The layers are there for anyone to see, but it’s our worldview that directs our interpretation. In Figure 5 we see a diagram from Encyclopedia Brittanica. It shows the geologic column and highlights where fossils are predominantly found in the sedimentary layers. Note that the time values come from a worldview and not from any timestamp in the layers. Since our worldview says all life was created during the six-day creation week, we don’t see this as a long process of evolution, but rather we see rapid burial in sedimentary layers during the Biblical flood with larger and faster land creatures at the top representing their ability to outrun the advancing floodwaters. (Note: The diagram does not reflect the Biblical timeline or events.)

*Figure 5 - Geologic Column, Encyclopedia Brittanica*

We’re all observing the same evidence, but here at Scargazers we see the Great Unconformity and the Cambrian Explosion as remnants of a catastrophic, year-long global flood as described in the Bible. The line where the Creation rocks meet the Scar rocks falls right in line with what we’d expect to see.

Until next time,

Greg and Sheila Bair