More Science

My last blog was an eye opener to the fact that a little blog in small town Missouri actually reaches the world when the right topic is presented. I was challenged (rightfully so) by some other bloggers in other states this past week because of my presentation of science in the Bible. I am very thankful for the respectful way the disagreements were presented and I admit they did get my attention. The criticism was based primarily on the fact that I got my "science" information from a book compiled by Ray Comfort and Kirk Cameron. These two authors are by no means scientists themselves and I apologize for not making this clear. They do not hold any degrees relevant to science that I know of. As far as I can tell, they never meant to suggest that they were the scientists behind the information in their book (and neither did I). The reason I chose to use their book in my discussion is that they took the time to compile the arguments, quotes, bible verses, studies, history, etc. that would have taken me forever to compile if I set out to do so. I do not believe they "made up" anything that is written in their book so I do not think it is necessary to require that they be scientists to compile scientific information.

The other criticisms I received was the that I said in essence it is unintelligent to just repeat what someone else says about a topic with out looking into it yourself. I challenged people to at least take a look at the bible in response to the science that is mentioned in it before dismissing it. My critics were right to turn that back on me by asking whether or not I have looked into evolution before dismissing it. Their challenge has caused me to reflect and admit that other than high school biology classes and some Christian books and videos on the topic, I have not seriously attempted a collegiate level study of evolution. That is probably more than the evolutionists have ventured into the bible however. Anyway, I have been reading quite a bit lately on it and I have been sure to not just read the Christian material. It was quite interesting to learn that there are non-christian scientists who disagree with the theory of evolution, since we usually hear that it is only Christian creationists who disagree with evolution. I am going to include the links to an argument for and against evolution that I found by people obviously more qualified to talk about it than me, and let you make up your own minds.

As far as the information my church is studying right now, we are not trying to pretend we have all the answers on this or any other scientific topic, we just found it interesting that a book (the bible) that was written thousands of years ago could include scientific facts centuries before they were "discovered" by modern scientists. In my mind that points to divine inspiration. Example: How could biblical writers describe the Earth as a sphere that hangs in space on nothing, in an age when there were no space travel or telescopes, etc. and when scientific and philosophical thought at that time was that the Earth was flat and it was sitting on the back of a large animal?

One more criticism I want to address is this: In response to the comments I received last week, I turned off the leave comment ability of this blog. This was not a good move because it appeared I was running from my critics; in reality, I was just making sure a lot of distasteful comments did not appear on our church site. In fairness however, my fear was unfounded, because all the emails and comments I did receive were very respectful and worthy of answering. As a pastor I must be willing to stand by my thoughts and writings and double check my facts and sources for integrity. (Thank you Vinny for your comment and challenge)

Anyway, here are the links I found that lay out a decent statement and rebuttal for evolution. http://www.talkorigins.org/faqs/faq-misconceptions.html and http://www.trueorigin.org/isakrbtl.asp