Some years ago, at a public seminar, one of the participants asked me, "Don't you find it difficult to reconcile your Christian faith with your profession as a biologist?" My unhesitant and somewhat simplistic answer was, "Not at all. I find it difficult to imagine that anyone who has had the opportunity to observe an embryo developing under a microscope would not be compelled by what he saw to acknowledge the existence and omnipotence of a Creator God."
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In the years since then, I have been reminded of that short interchange many times, particularly as I began to focus greater attention on what current research has to tell us about our world and how it came into being. First, however, I had to deal with what I view as the bad choice of terms my questioner used to characterize the nature of the interface between science and religion. The term he used was "reconcile." In fact, that's how most people tend to describe attempts to explain apparent differences between the teachings of biblical revelation and the revelations of scientific inquiry. They see it as a matter of trying to fit together two concepts that are, by definition, opposing propositions.
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I don't see it that way. There is no conflict--nor can there ever be conflict--between what God has revealed to us in his Word and what he has revealed to us in his created order. Thus, my goal is not to explain away one or the other of these two sources, but rather to show how they complement one another, each telling us a different part of the same story.
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For some, however, it is disturbing to see creation itself identified as a source of divine revelation, equal in value with the written Word. This I consider to be an unwarranted concern. It is not a denial of biblical truth to suggest that God expects us to discover the details of his work by allowing nature itself to inform us. In fact, in The Bible, the apostle Paul, writing to the church in Rome, clearly identifies nature as a means of revelation and admonishes his readers to use it as such.
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"...since what may be known about God is plain to them, because God has made it plain to them. For since the creation of the world God's invisible qualities--his eternal power and divine nature--have been clearly seen, being understood from all that has been made, so that men are without excuse."...(Rom. 1:19-20, NIV). |
What Paul is telling us in this passage is that we don't need written instructions--only an appreciation of the marvels of the world around us and some simple common sense--to recognize the hand of God in the creation, and to bow before "his eternal power and divine nature." In saying this, I don't believe that Paul was in any way attempting to constrict the importance of the written Word as a source of revelation. I do believe he wanted his readers to understand that nature itself is a powerful and enduring source of divine revelation.
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Thus, when scientists like me inquire of creation itself how it came to be, we can consider ourselves to be every bit as much students of God's revelation as any biblical scholar. In fact, such inquiries allow us to build a perspective of The Creator that is in many ways more comprehensive than is possible from a study of biblical revelation alone. And, because both Word and Nature were provided to reveal the same Creator, there can be ultimately no contradictions between the instructions of these two different means of revelation. They simply provide different insights into "the eternal power and divine nature" of their common source. The Word identifies God as the creator of "all that has been made" and confirms his desire for an ongoing relationship with his creation. Nature identifies some of the possible mechanisms by which the creation came into being and, in so doing, provides substance to the metaphors that make some biblical revelations more difficult to comprehend.
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A fundamental tenet of Christian belief is the concept that biblical revelation is without error. For many people, even among those of us who profess such a belief, the affirmation of an error-free Bible requires some level of qualification. That is, in making such a confession, we do not find it necessary to adhere to a "literal" interpretation of all the words of scripture. Most of us feel comfortable in the belief that some biblical revelation can be considered--without compromising biblical truth--metaphors intended to simplify for the reader the actual events described. Scriptural truth, for us, lies in the revelation behind the metaphors.
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There is no question that, as emerging evidence from scientific inquiry provides an ever more compelling picture of how our world came to be, some time-honored interpretations of the biblical account require a critical review. It is my hope that a chronicle of my personal journey through the issues involved will be useful to others for whom these issues are often sources of confusion and discord.
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My first task in this journey was to satisfy myself that I understood the fundamental purposes of biblical revelation. I have often heard it said by others who struggle with these issues that they know what is not one of those purposes. "The Bible," we hear them say, "is not a textbook of natural history." Although certainly true, I do not find this kind of reverse argument particularly useful. More useful for me is a definition I was offered many years ago by a fellow Christian and fellow scientist. By his definition, The Bible has three fundamental purposes: 1) to show humanity its sin; 2) to show humanity its salvation; and 3) to give glory to God. Since that time, my own efforts to interpret scripture for personal direction have been guided by this definition. For the purposes of this chronicle, the third of these will be the primary one that drives my arguments, although the other two will inevitably enter into the discussion. To help you understand the thrust of these arguments, I first need to explain what informs my personal efforts to comprehend the magnificence of The Creator.
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Every believer has a personal concept of God--a set of attributes that define for each of us the nature of the entity to whom we pray and to whom we ascribe responsibility for the creation of the universe and control over it. These concepts are based, to a large extent, on personal experience. Much of my own experience in life has been involved in observing nature. Thus, I see God through the eyes of the natural scientist. For me, nature is more than simply a field for research. In it I find the unique opportunity to appreciate the character of the God who created it. This is the perspective you will find expressed in the model of beginnings that I offer in the following pages.
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Before you undertake those pages, however, I need to make sure you understand the philosophical perspective you will encounter there. First, be aware that this treatise was not written to be a polemic. That is, my intention in writing it was not to convince my readers that they should necessarily subscribe to all the arguments I will be presenting. Rather, it is my hope that these arguments will provide some basis for further discussion of the issues involved.
My primary contention is that these issues currently serve as sources of discord whenever deliberations occur at the interface between science and religion. My hope is that the interpretations and models I am presenting here will both demonstrate that it is possible to carry on those deliberations without discord and provide a place for them to start.
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