Museum Of Earth History Expansion
Museum Of Earth History Expansion
MOEH Expansion Goal: $80,000
Update
Around three decades ago, Dr. G. Thomas Sharp had a revelation regarding teaching dinosaurs and their connection with God’s Word – bring a real, legitimate dinosaur fossil museum to the local church. Instead of building a museum that presented a Biblical worldview to which people must travel, bring the museum to the community! Let it be an outreach for the local church and an encouragement to God’s people to stand firmly on God’s Word! The only problem: how do you do that?!?!
Through the invaluable help of family, friends, and faithful supporters, the idea became a reality, and the message of Dr. Sharp and Creation Truth Foundation began to spread across the country, accompanied by the mobile Museum of Earth History (MOEH). Dr. Sharp would often refer to the dinosaur fossils as “God’s Gospel lizards” because they served to open doors to people who might never have entered a church building but might come to see dinosaurs, at which time they would hear not only interesting facts about dinosaurs and the Bible, but the Gospel message of Jesus Christ. And that mission continues today.
As Creation Truth Foundation presses on through its 35th year, the ministry continues to grow. The requests for programs have done nothing but increase, meaning there has been and still is a need to conduct multiple programs at one time. This is accomplished with multiple speakers, but there is one problem – we can only have fossils in one place.
It has been our desire for years to be able to have dinosaur programs with fossils in two different locations at the same time. Because of how quickly the schedule fills up, having two fossil trailers would allow churches to schedule us sooner instead of having to wait one or more years. Additionally, if the fossils are on one side of the country but a church would like to have us on the other side of the country, we would not have to delay multiple weeks for the fossils to return home and be sent out again. Rather, a separate trailer with fossils could go ahead and take off. Thus, the ministry has been praying for some time for the addition of a second trailer with fossils to become reality.
By the gracious provision of our Lord and His people, and just in time for CTF to celebrate its 35th anniversary,
2024 is the year this prayer becomes reality!
Starting with our 2023 end-of-year goal of $20,000 for a new trailer, God’s people have gotten us off to a tremendous start! $41,265 was raised, a trailer meeting our needs to transport fossils has been ordered, and it is in production as we write this.
Secondly, the fossils to put in the new trailer have been brought to our warehouse, where we have been working to construct and modify their travel crates. This is the most time-consuming and difficult part of the MOEH Expansion Project. Each crate must be customized for the specific fossils it will transport. This requires a great deal of planning, fabricating, and modifying to get things just right so the fossils will not only fit, but also be protected during transportation. There are no blueprints for such an endeavor, and as our ministry president Matt Miles is fond of saying, “This is something they don’t teach you in Bible college.”
However, one crate has not only been completed, but a new large marine fossil made its first trip to the ICR Discovery Center for their Dinosaur Week! [see below]
Thirdly, now we need a ¾-ton truck to pull the new trailer (i.e., 250 or 2500 truck). The extra $18,000 received for the end-of-year goal is being used for the crate constructions, and whatever is left over will go toward the purchase of a truck. Including the truck, the total projected cost to complete the MOEH Expansion Project is $80,000, of which $41,265 has been received.
As always, we covet your prayers not only for this endeavor, but for the effectiveness of the Gospel-centered message CTF is taking across the country. Please pray for the safety of our travels, for hearts to be impacted, and for lives to be saved and changed to the glory of our Creator and the furtherance of His Kingdom.
Our newest exhibit for our mobile museum Dolichorhynchops bonneri on display last week at the ICR Discovery Center in Dallas, TX.
