Evolution Convolution

Evolution.
Quite a concept. In my biology class, I am taking my first class ever in which the teacher is an explicit believer in the process of evolution. My entire life I've been in private Christian school, but I was lucky enough to have open-minded teachers in high school that recognized the importance of understanding evolution. After all, how can you defend your belief in Creationism if you don't understand other worldviews?

From what I’ve said, you might think I am against evolution – I'm not at all, actually. There are two kinds of evolution - micro and macro. Micro is, as it suggests, small, and happens within a population. For example - in a specific environment, such as the rainforest, butterflies might benefit more from having a brown color instead of bright yellow. If a random mutation occurs within a butterfly's gene that makes him oddly browner and thus more hidden to predators, he is more likely to survive and reproduce. Over time that species may become more and more brown until they are visually unrecognizable from the original butterfly. It helps the species to survive! If species' environment changes and they cannot adapt to it, they will most likely die out. There is really no denying this type of evolution – it can be directly observed all around us!
Macroevolution is, as it suggests, large; it involves speciation, or the change from one species to completely new species, such as apes evolving into human beings and fish evolving into land-dwelling reptiles.

I do believe wholeheartedly in the validity of microevolution. The adaptation of species is undeniable - finches on the Galapagos Islands were found with wide, thick beaks, unlike the conventional small beaks of finches used to eat small seeds. The Galapagos Island finches had evolved and adapted to be able to crack the hard shells of the seeds found on the Islands, aiding  their survival in those conditions. Another example is bacteria evolving resistance to antibiotics, or snakes evolving resistance to their prey’s toxic skin secretions. The list goes on. Species have to have the ability to adapt and change, because Earth’s environment is incredibly dynamic.

In none of the examples of microevolution that I gave is a species observed changing into a completely different species. A finch is still a finch; E. Coli is still E. Coli. I do not believe in the validity of macroevolution.
In my biology class, I've noticed that my teacher lumps micro and macro together without saying so. In lab, we are growing E. Coli bacteria in a dish full of antibiotics, and observing how the bacteria that have a random immunity to the antibiotic are the ones that live, producing many bacteria that are immune. Sounds like microevolution, right?
What I cannot comprehend is why all this support for microevolution constitutes as support for macroevolution. My biggest problem with macro: If macroevolution were to be supported, there would be thousands of fossils to support it; fossils from millions of years of macroevolution. So, where are all the fossils?
Scientists would consider my statement on the lack of fossil evidence to be a "misconception" - that there are transitional fossils that have been found. An example is the fossil Tiktaalik, a fish-like creature with hind legs. They consider this to be the missing link between fish and land-dwelling animals.
I don’t believe that one transitional fossil for each gap supports the theory. If we found thousands of these fossils with the progressive growth of legs, then there would be something to consider! I had a very intelligent atheist friend explain that the reason for the lack of fossils is because it takes very specific conditions to form fossils, so they don’t occur very often. However, considering the vastness of the macroevolution claim, there would still be many fossils showing the distinct evolution of species. Think of how many fossils you find just by sifting through rocks in your backyard! Out of the entire earth, there must be plenty of places that would form fossils. However, the fossil record is still under progress. If you think about it, we really haven't dug very deep into Earth at all. Who knows what we'll find?

Taking Biology in college has opened up my eyes to a huge issue. Before, I always stuck with the traditional Christian rejection of evolution because I didn’t really know what evolution was – it’s not apes evolving into humans, or life arising from prehistoric mud; it does happen, and it is crucial to the survival of living organisms. If we couldn’t adapt to our ever-changing climates, we wouldn’t be alive much longer!

Just my thoughts for the week. :)

"So God created man in His own image, in the image of God He created him; male and female He created them. God blessed them and said to them, 'Be fruitful and increase in number; fill the earth, and subdue it...'"
-Genesis 1:27-28