Evidence that GOD Created Dinosaurs

Photography By Lonnie Paulson https://www.lonniepaulsonphoto.com

Why Dinosaurs?

Some of you may be wondering why I decided to write about dinosaurs. Recently, I heard of a contemporary political activist who claimed she didn’t believe that dinosaurs existed. I never heard of anyone denying the existence of dinosaurs. We have fossils from all over the world that show various types of dinosaurs. I found on the internet that there are people that claim that they are Christian and do not believe in dinosaurs, but I haven’t found any established organizations that hold to this conspiracy like the “Flat Earthers.” Some people in the flat Earth conspiracy also claim to be Christian.

As a boy I loved dinosaurs. I had small toy dinosaur figures which had the name of the animal printed on the belly. I memorized these names and played with these dinosaurs often. When I was older, I started reading books from my school library about dinosaurs. I learned that the scientists who dug up dinosaur fossils were called paleontologists. In my imagination I dreamed about finding dinosaur fossils. It wasn’t until my seventh-grade summer science class that we went to a limestone quarry and I found some fossils. What we came home with was several marine invertebrate fossils from the Cambrian period. I found a limestone plate measuring about seven by five inches that I still have today on a bookshelf which contains many brachiopods, and some crinoid fossil rings. I still have my rock hammer that I bought from Sears for $7.95 in the late 1960s. We did not find any dinosaur fossils there but had fun digging up these marine invertebrate fossils. It seemed like they were everywhere. To decorate my apartment, I have bought the largest toy dinosaurs I could find on Amazon. They are displayed on my bookshelves.

I also believe that God created the dinosaurs. The dinosaurs would have been created on day six.  “Then God said, ‘Let the earth bring forth the living creature according to its kind: cattle and creeping thing and beast of the earth, each according to its kind’; and it was so” (Genesis 1:24 NKJV). These huge beasts which today we call dinosaurs living along with other beasts were created from the loving hand of God. Humans along with Adam and Eve would have lived alongside these dinosaurs. I will point out to you that what we call dinosaurs are also written about in the Bible. The main reason why I am writing about dinosaurs is that I love dinosaurs!

How Dinosaurs were discovered

 Many centuries back before the time of modern science all over the world large bones and strange shapes of creatures in stone, which today we call fossils, were found. When you see something, you can’t explain, it can be fearful. These strange stones were mystical. These stones were often used as a talisman to hang on to for good luck. These talismans could prevent evil in your family and have magical powers. They were sometimes treated as religious artifacts. The larger fossils and bones were thought to have come from monsters, dragons, or giants. Some have even speculated that these bones and stones were created by the devil himself. As humanity became more educated, they started to research the validity of these bones and fossils. Robert Plott, who was a chemist in 1677, made the first drawing of a large bone which he figured came from an elephant. Now we know it to be a femur bone from a dinosaur called Megalosaurus. In 1842 Richard Owen addressed the British Association for the advancement of science about the reality of these large reptiles. He named these animals dinosaurs which in the Greek language meant “fearfully great reptile.”

What is a Dinosaur?

What is a dinosaur and how were these large beasts different from other animals? First, these beasts share basic characteristics of reptiles. 1) They laid hard shelled eggs in nests. 2) Their fossilized skin displayed scales like snakes, lizards, and alligators. 3) Looking at their skulls, they have two holes behind the eye sockets like reptiles. 4) They have similar teeth to crocodiles. For example, the skeletal structure of some early dinosaurs found such as the Megalosaurus found in 1824 and the Iguanodon found in 1825 have teeth and bone structures that resemble modern lizards today. So, you see a dinosaur is a reptile, but during the age of the dinosaurs not all reptiles were dinosaurs. The dinosaurs walked upright and the large rib cages of these reptiles would only work with long straight legs. A dinosaur did not drag its belly when it walked as a lizard does. Other types of reptiles lived alongside these giant reptiles. Today we have some very large lizards such as monitors and iguanas. Some grow six to nine feet long. The Perentie of Australia can grow as long as eight feet. The king of modern-day lizards is the venomous Komodo dragon from Indonesia which can grow over 10 feet and weigh over 300 pounds. These lizards are not dinosaurs. The largest crocodiles from the Nile can get up to 20 feet long.

Are Dinosaurs mentioned in the Bible?

The Behemoth

Yes, However, you will not find the word dinosaur in any Bible concordance. Since the word dinosaur did not exist until 1842 when Richard Owen created that word. Let me turn to scripture where I see evidence of dinosaurs in the scriptures. Looking at one of the oldest books in the Bible besides Genesis we find in the book of Job what I believe are dinosaurs. With what we know now if we were alongside Job at this time in history, we would define these animals as dinosaurs. In chapter 40 of Job, God is speaking to Job. “Look now at the behemoth, which I made along with you; He eats grass like an ox. See now, his strength is in his hips, And his power is in his stomach muscles. He moves his tail like a cedar; The sinews of his thighs are tightly knit. His bones are like beams of bronze, His ribs like bars of iron” (Job 40:15–18 NKJV). In this description of the Behemoth, it is a beast that is nothing like anything living now. Many liberal Bible commentators will say this animal is a hippopotamus. If you take the description literally you cannot say that. How can you read this and think of a hippopotamus? Look at the tail of a hippopotamus. Does it have a tail like a cedar tree? The tail of a hippo looks like a tree twig. You can’t look at these verses that describe the Behemoth and call it a hippopotamus unless you look at the Bible as myth or an allegorical tale. The Behemoth was a real creature. The Bible is not a book of fantasy.

The Behemoth was a type of sauropod dinosaur. A sauropod is known as being the largest land animal that ever lived with a very long neck and tail. Sauropod dinosaurs consisted of several hundreds of various species. These dinosaurs were herbivorous or what we would call plant eating dinosaurs. In Job 40:15 God said, “…He eats grass like an ox.” A few reptiles today are herbivorous like iguanas and tortoises.  Examples of various species of these large sauropod dinosaurs would include: Camarasaurus, Brachiosaurus, Diplodocus, Apatosaurus, and you may have heard of the Brontosaurus. To conclude, I am very dogmatic that the Behemoth is a type of sauropod dinosaur.

The Brontosaurus Conspiracy

When I was a child, the Brontosaurus was my favorite dinosaur. I used to watch the cartoon, The Flintstones. In that cartoon they referred to the Brontosaurus. Fred Flintstone even talked about eating “Brontosaurus steaks.” The Brontosaurus was named and discovered by Othniel Charles Marsh in 1879. The skeleton he found did not have a skull. He found a sauropod skull about 4 miles away that he thought belonged to the animal. It was found later that the sauropod skull that he found was a Camarasaurus skull. Paleontologists at that time agreed that the Brontosaurus did not exist and should have been identified as an Apatosaurus. However, the name Brontosaurus was used for many years. I guess, non-paleontologist dinosaur lovers like myself liked the name. However, in 2015, paleontologists decided to reclassify this sauropod as a separate genius. These scientists discovered that this original skeleton that Mr. Marsh found was both smaller and slenderer than the Apatosaurus and had a narrower neck and different vertebrae.  So, now our beloved Brontosaurus is back. Remember the Sinclair dinosaur. The photo that I used for this article I photographed at a Sinclair gas station somewhere in the state of Colorado.  In Photoshop I took out a fence and some antennas in the background of the photo and did some color grading of the image to give it a sepia look. It took a lot of the green out and made the image look more like a natural prehistoric image.

The Leviathan

In chapter 41 of Job, we see a lengthy description of Leviathan. To understand this creature more, I suggest you read the entire chapter. If this description is literal, we see a description of a monster that is nothing that we know of on earth today. I am not completely sold on what the Leviathan is. At the time of the dinosaurs there lived many large, scary, and ferocious marine reptiles. These were great sea monsters. Two of the largest marine reptiles were the Mosasaurus which could get as long as 39 feet and the Kronosaurus which could get up to 36 feet. They all had large dagger-like teeth like crocodiles. Also, crocodiles would be in competition with these marine reptiles.

Today the largest salt-water crocodile grows up to 23 feet. Crocodiles lived alongside the dinosaurs and got to be as long as 40 feet such as the Deinosuchus which was a type of crocodile.  Crocodiles are great swimmers. Today they are the deadliest reptiles living today. More aggressive and ferocious than alligators. The only crocodiles that live in the United States live along-side alligators in the Everglades in Florida. Alligators live in several states in the southeastern United States. Alligators have U-shaped snouts and the crocodile has a V-shaped snout. When a Crocodile closes his jaws, you can see both upper and lower teeth. Only the upper teeth are visible in an alligator when he closes his jaws. Crocodiles are lighter in color than alligators. Alligators are darker close to black. Alligators prefer fresh water while crocodiles prefer salt water. Why were reptiles so large at this time in history? It wasn’t only the dinosaurs and other reptiles. All living things were larger at that time. Plants and insects were even larger. It was due to a high level of oxygen in the atmosphere at that time. Fossils of dragon flies have been found with up to 20-inch wing spans. 

Let’s look more at the description of the Leviathan in Job. God is having a dialog with Job. In 41:18 God mentions that Leviathan sneezes. Crocodiles sneeze. The big mystery about the Leviathan comes in verses 19–21. “Out of his mouth go burning lights; Sparks of fire shoot out. Smoke goes out of his nostrils, As from a boiling pot and burning rushes. His breath kindles coals, And a flame goes out of his mouth” (Job 41:19–21 NKJV). We have many legends of fire-breathing dragons. God is telling Job that the Leviathan can shoot fire out of his mouth. How are we to take this statement? Here is a commentary from Dr. Henry M. Morris from his The New Defender’s Study Bible regarding Job 41:21. “a flame. Whatever the leviathan was, it was not a crocodile! Many of the dragon legends indicate that they could breathe fire, and there are indications that at least certain dinosaurs may have been able to produce and expel combustible gasses which, upon coming in contact with oxygen, could have ignited.¹

We do not have any fossil evidence of any animal spitting fire out of its mouth. However, maybe someday we might discover such evidence. I still believe scripture is accurate. As I mentioned in a couple of paragraphs ago there was a high level of oxygen in the atmosphere. This high level of oxygen could possibly make some chemicals more flammable. Oxygen supports combustion. Let me give you an example of an insect living today that has a chemical defense. The Bombardier Beetle when threatened sprays a liquid mixture that was heated in its abdomen at the boiling point of 100°C. Two chemicals in its abdomen which are hydrogen Peroxide and hydroquinone are joined together in a combustion chamber with a catalyst to increase the rate of the chemical reaction resulting in a  detonation of the chemicals in a jet stream of hot acid at the temperature of boiling water to be spayed over its attacker. If this chemical mixture was introduced to a high oxygen environment, I believe it could be flammable. If there are any chemists out there, I would like to see your comments on my thoughts. My last word on the Leviathan is I don’t know what the creature is and I don’t want to speculate. God has the final answer.

Written by Lonnie Paulson

Evidence that GOD Created Dinosaurs: End Notes

1)      Dr. Henry M. Morris. The New Defender’s Study Bible; World Publishing, Inc. Nashville, TN 37214 (1995) p 824.