Course Descriptions

The following courses are offered through Reasons Institute:

Fall Courses

Creation vs. Evolution – Open for Enrollment – August 2023

Start Date: August 28, 2023
Length: 8 weeks
Lecturers: Fazale “Fuz” Rana and Hugh Ross
Online Instructor: Rick Gerhardt

Course Description: Many Christians wonder how to answer commonly cited evidence for evolution. This 8-week course helps students learn how to use RTB’s testable creation model approach to challenge the evolutionary paradigm. Students are equipped to share these evidences in their evangelistic efforts.

Topics:

  • Origins of life
  • Fossil record
  • Soulish animals
  • Common descent vs. common design
  • Hominids and Neanderthals
  • Adam and Eve

Audience: High school students, Christian homeschool parents, pastors and missionaries interested in apologetics, college students who need college credit, and anyone who wants to improve their witnessing efforts

Registration options for this course:

  • Audit to learn alongside the certificate students, without the assignments.
  • Enroll to pursue a certificate in science apologetics.
  • Earn undergraduate college credit through Northern California Bible College.

Bookstore: Purchase materials for this course.

Astronomy and Design – Open for Enrollment – August 2023

Start date: August 28, 2023
Length: 8 weeks
Lecturers: Hugh Ross and Jeff Zweerink
Online Instructor: Dan Bakken

Course Description: This 8-week online course explores introductory concepts related to the biblical and scientific data about the origin and design of the universe. A practical emphasis is placed on using insights from astronomy and physics for apologetics and evangelism. 

Topics:

  • Big bang cosmology
  • Design and the anthropic principle
  • Evidence for the age of the universe
  • Astronomical influences on the fossil record

Audience: Primarily students with a limited background in science, but those with advanced degrees in physics and astronomy will also find this course of interest

Registration options for this course:

  • Audit to learn alongside the certificate students, without the assignments.
  • Enroll to pursue a certificate in science apologetics.
  • Earn undergraduate college credit through Northern California Bible College.

Bookstore: Purchase materials for this course.

Advanced Seminar on the Origin of Life – Open for Enrollment – August 2023

Start date: August 28, 2023
Length: 15 weeks
Lecturer: Fazale “Fuz” Rana

Course Description: Did life evolve through natural processes from an ancient primordial soup? What does the evidence say? This 15-week graduate seminar explores the integration of the latest scientific research with the biblical account for the origin of life. Although many sides of the origin-of-life issue are covered in this course, the lecturer holds to an old-earth creation position and does not believe the scientific record supports biological evolution.

Topics:

  • Survey of prominent scientific models: old-earth creation, theistic evolution, and secular evolution
  • Trends in origin-of-life research
  • Defining life
  • RNA world hypothesis
  • Bottom-up approach
  • Top-down approach
  • Biochemical design

Audience: Graduate-level students and anyone who wants to improve their witnessing efforts

Prerequisites: Certificate students will find it helpful to have previously taken: Creation and the Bible; or Creation vs. Evolution. Some parts of this course contain semi-technical discussions of issues related to chemistry and biochemistry. A college-level understanding of chemistry is helpful but not required.

Registration options for this course:

  • Audit to learn alongside the certificate students, without the assignments.
  • Enroll to pursue a certificate in science apologetics.
  • Earn undergraduate college credit through Northern California Bible College.
  • Earn graduate credit through Biola University.

Bookstore: Purchase materials for this course.

Critical Thinking Skills – Open for Enrollment – October 2023

Start Date: October 16, 2023
Length: 8 weeks
Lecturers: Kenneth Samples and J. P. Moreland
Online Instructor: Kenneth Samples

Course Description: In this intensive 8-week course, philosopher-theologian and RTB senior research scholar Kenneth Samples and philosopher-theologian J. P. Moreland teach what it means to love God with all our mind. Effectively addressing the many arguments skeptics present is an ongoing challenge for Christians. This course deals with the various aspects of deductive, inductive, and abductive reasoning as they are applied to different forms of argumentation. Different methods for testing arguments and truth claims are evaluated for validity, cogency, and strength. Students learn to assess how arguments break down, how to recognize and categorize fallacies, and how to recognize when areas of logic are violated.

Audience: High school and up

Registration options for this course:

  • Audit to learn alongside the certificate students, without the assignments.
  • Enroll to pursue a certificate in science apologetics.
  • Earn undergraduate college credit through Northern California Bible College.

Bookstore: Purchase materials for this course.

Biblical Archaeology – Open for Enrollment – October 2023

Start Date: October 16, 2023
Length: 8 weeks
Lecturers: John Bloom
Online Instructor: Samuel Svensson

Course Description: In this intensive 8-week course, professor of physics and ancient Near Eastern studies and RTB visiting scholar John Bloom teaches how context amplifies the biblical text. This course surveys the methods and results of archaeology as applied to sites and topics of biblical significance. It also considers the interpretive challenges and apologetic uses of archaeology. Students will gain an appreciation of the Bible in context of the historical, social, cultural, political, religious, and economic backgrounds of the ancient Near East.

Audience: High school and up

Registration options for this course:

  • Audit to learn alongside the certificate students, without the assignments.
  • Enroll to pursue a certificate in science apologetics.

Bookstore: Purchase materials for this course.

Spring Courses

Creation and the Bible

Start Date: January 15, 2024
Length: 8 weeks
Lecturers: RTB Scholar Team
Online Instructor: 

Course Description: This 8-week online course encourages students to form an integrated interpretation of general and special revelation as it pertains to the doctrine of creation. Theological and scientific questions concerning the age of the earth are also considered. Students are equipped to share this information with their Christian and non-Christian friends and family.

Topics:

  • Survey of the biblical material related to creation
  • General and special revelation
  • Christian views of Genesis 1: young-earth creationism, old-earth creationism, and theistic evolutionism
  • Radiometric dating techniques
  • Global flood theory
  • Death before the fall

Audience: High school students, Christian homeschool parents, pastors and missionaries interested in apologetics, college students who need college credit, and anyone who wants to improve their witnessing efforts.

Registration options for this course:

Bookstore: Purchase materials for this course.

Advanced Seminar on Astronomy and Design

Start Date: January 15, 2024
Length: 8 weeks
Lecturers: Hugh Ross and Jeff Zweerink
Online Instructors: 

Course Description: This 8-week online course explores advanced topics related to the biblical and scientific data about the design of the universe. A practical emphasis is placed on using insights from astronomy and physics for apologetics and evangelism.

Topics:

  • Particle physics
  • Exoplanets
  • Multiverse theory
  • String theory

Prerequisite: Astronomy and Design

Audience: Primarily students with a limited background in science, but those with advanced degrees in physics and astronomy will also find this course of interest.

Registration options for this course:

  • Audit to learn alongside the certificate students, without the assignments.
  • Enroll to pursue a certificate in science apologetics.
  • Earn undergraduate college credit through Northern California Bible College.

Bookstore: Purchase materials for this course.

World Religions and Science

Start Date: March 11, 2024 
Length: 8 weeks
Lecturers: Kenneth Samples and J. P. Moreland
Online Instructor: 

Course Description: Philosopher-theologian and RTB senior research scholar Kenneth Samples lays out the foundational beliefs of the world’s major religions and then explores the ways proponents of these religions use modern science to justify their particular worldviews.

Topics:

  • Christianity and science
  • Judaism and the work of Gerald Schroeder
  • Islam and the work of Maurice Bucaille
  • Latter-Day Saints and the Book of Mormon
  • Eastern mysticism and quantum physics

Audience: Graduate-level students and anyone who wants to improve their witnessing efforts.

Registration options for this course:

Bookstore: Purchase materials for this course. 

Advanced Seminar on Human Origins

Start Date: January 15, 2024
Length: 15 weeks
Lecturer: Dr. Fazale “Fuz” Rana
Online Instructor: 

Course Description: Did humans evolve from an ancient apelike ancestor? What does the evidence say? This 15-week graduate seminar explores the integration of the biblical account of humanity’s origin with the scientific record. The most prominent biblical and scientific models for human origins are surveyed, including young-earth creationism, old-earth creationism, theistic evolutionism, and secular evolutionism. 

Topics:

  • Survey of prominent scientific models: young-earth creationism, old-earth creationism, theistic evolutionism, and secular evolutionism
  • Fossil record
  • Genetic data
  • Paleo archaeological data
  • Hominids (“Lucy,” Homo habilis, etc.)
  • Neanderthals
  • Adam and Eve

Audience: Graduate-level students and anyone who wants to improve their witnessing efforts

Prerequisites: Creation and the Bible and Creation vs. Evolution. Some knowledge of chemistry or genetics will be helpful but isn’t required.

Registration options for this course:

  • Audit to learn alongside the certificate students, without the assignments.
  • Enroll to pursue a certificate in science apologetics.
  • Earn undergraduate college credit through Northern California Bible College.
  • Earn graduate credit through Biola University.

Bookstore: Purchase materials for this course.

Evangelism in a Scientific Context

Start Date: March 11, 2024
Length: 8 weeks
Lecturers: RTB Scholar Team
Online Instructor: 

Course Description: This course explores evangelistic strategies to reach analytically minded people, especially scientists, with the gospel of Jesus Christ. In other words, you will learn how to take the apologetics arguments you’ve learned in other RI courses and apply them to real life conversations and ministry. The readings and writing assignments focus on cultivating your understanding of this particular group of people—what it means to communicate with them through an evidential approach to faith. The class will practice the principles of communicating with “gentleness, respect, and a clear conscience” (1 Peter 3:15–16). In seeking to understand and appreciate how to communicate with scientists, skeptics, and atheists, we will cultivate love and empathy, both of which are essential to interacting in a global context. 

Prerequisites: Creation and the Bible and one of the following: Astronomy and Design or Creation vs. Evolution

Audience: College-level students and anyone who wants to improve their witnessing efforts

Registration options for this course:

Bookstore: Purchase materials for this course.

Advanced Seminar on Biochemical Design

Start Date: January 15, 2024
Length: 15 weeks
Lecturer: Dr. Fazale “Fuz” Rana
Online Instructor: 

Course Description: This 15-week course examines how the latest advances in biochemistry, molecular biology, synthetic biology, and origin-of-life research support the Christian faith. Dr. Fazale Rana helps students summarize as well as compare and contrast competing perspectives related to research in these fields. Course readings include books by Dr. Rana and other leading scholars in biochemistry and DNA research.

Prerequisite: Creation vs. Evolution, unless granted special permission by the dean of online learning

Audience: Students who have completed college-level chemistry or biochemistry will have an easier time understanding the course material, but all are welcome.

Registration options for this course:

  • Audit, learn alongside the certificate students but without the assignments.
  • Certificate level in science apologetics.
  • Earn undergraduate Christian college credit through Northern California Bible College.

Bookstore: Purchase materials for this course.