A Catastrophic Missing Link Problem
Bodie Hodge, M.Sc., B.Sc., PEI
Biblical Authority Ministries, September 15, 2025 (Donate)
The news is full of alleged missing links between dinosaurs and birds like Archaeopteryx or Sinosauropteryx; or between man and ape-like creatures such as Lucy (australopithecine afarensis). Any time I read of a claimed transition between one kind of something to another kind of something, I love to see what sedimentary rock layer it was found in.
Most of the time, secular reports give an “age”, not a rock layer. An “age” is an interpretation of a rock layer—keep that in mind. An age is not a measured quantity but an interpreted one.
And how is it interpreted? It is interpreted by the secular side in light of millions of years being an absolute fact that cannot be questioned. So, sometimes you have to do some searching to find out what rock layer the fossil find was found in.
Sometimes you can do some “reverse engineering” and take the age and back translate it to what rock layer it was found in. For example, if someone says the fossil was “73 million years old”, then this would be Cretaceous rock. See the chart below so you can reverse engineer these alleged ages to a rock layer.
Duration of Time for Rock Layers by Secular Dating; Illustration in original publication
These rock layers are real layers; it is the assignment of time to them that is rather questionable and arbitrary in the secular worldview. The majority of rock layers that contain fossils are sedimentary rock layers from the Flood of Noah’s day about 4,350 years ago (by adding up genealogies from the Flood to Christ it is about 2,350 years and Christ lived about 2,000 years ago). Of course, there are rock layers that have formed since the Flood, with local floods, volcanoes, and so on. But most of the layers in question formed in the Flood.
Now why is this important? It obviously deals with the time issue in regards to the rock layers. But it is more than that. When some says they found a missing link in the rock layers, it is typically sitting in Flood rock or post-Flood rock. See the chart below.[1]
Rock layers in light of Noah’s Flood; Illustration in original publication
For example, Archaeopteryx and Sinosauropteryx, are found in rock layers associated with the Flood. So how old are they? They are about 4,350 years old.
Dinosaurs are also found in rock layers from the Flood, putting them around 4,350 years old too. Did one turn into the other during the Flood? Not at all. They were fleeing from, and finally buried and fossilized in, the same Flood. In other words, they coexisted and died at the same time.
Besides, birds (made on Day 5) were created before dinosaurs (made on Day 6, being land animals). So, birds were around prior to dinosaurs and did not need to evolve from dinosaurs.
This is like someone arguing that the laptop computer evolved into the first airplane. This is clearly fallacious since airplanes were already around prior to laptop computers!
Furthermore, consider that Lucy and other australopithecines are found in rock layers often associated with post-Flood rock (e.g., volcanic layers as animals and people spread out after the Flood). How could Lucy, or any other post-Flood ape-like creature be the ancestor to humans (or a close relation to the ancestor of humans) when humans, like Adam through Noah, already existed?
As Christians, we need to start thinking biblically. Alleged
missing link fossils are found in rock layers that were from the Flood or
afterwards, which is well after people and animals in question already
existed.
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Bodie Hodge, Ken Ham's son in law, has been an apologist since 1998 helping out in various churches and running an apologetics website. He spent 21 years working at Answers in Genesis as a speaker, writer, and researcher as well as a founding news anchor for Answers News. He was also head of the Oversight Council.
Bodie launched Biblical Authority Ministries in 2015 as a personal website and it was organized officially in 2025 as a 501(c)(3). He has spoken on multiple continents and hosts of US states in churches, colleges, and universities. He is married with four children.
Originally at Answers in Genesis; Edited; Republished by permission.
[1] I
understand that creationists debate over the exact placement of the post-Flood
boundary being at or near the K/T
boundary (lower) to the higher end of Tertiary sediments (upper), but this
graph is for the purpose of relaying the idea of the fossiliferous rock layers
being primarily a result of the Flood and
post-Flood events, of which, both sides should agree.
