i. is the bible true? is science true? what do we mean by...

I. Is the Bible true? Is Science true? What do we mean by that?

Goal: a) inoculate you against attacks b) Missionary activity: need to understand

the culture of science, Wycliff Translators, Jacob Bucholz to deaf community, secular

scientists or HS science teachers. Topic: Origins/ creation account in Gen 1,2/

Science and Faith Us: Bob Prud’homme

([email protected]) Bob Kaita ([email protected])

Science and Faith 1: Bible and Science

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mailto:[email protected]

mailto:[email protected]

Outline Four sessions: 1) Is the Bible true? Is Science true? 2)Is the earth 6000 yrs old or 14 billion years

old? What do we make of fine tuning (anthropic principle)?

3) How did life begin? 4) What about evolution?

Ask questions or email questions Slides will be available with references on

the church web site. Science and Faith 1: Bible and

Science 2

Full disclosure First, both Bob and I believe the Bible is true and authoritative. This is not about showing that the Bible is not right, it is about understanding what “right” means as we read Genesis. We are going to avoid certain words: inerrant, infallible, literal

“My conscience is subject to the Word of God” Martin Luther (JIP p.41)

References: JI Packer Fundamentalism and the Word of God (JIP) FF Bruce The New Testament Documents, Are They Reliable (FFB) John McKay The Clockwork Image


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Views of the Bible? (JIP p.47-50) a. Evangelical: “Its basic principle is that the teaching of the

written Scriptures is the Word which God spoke and speaks to His Church, and is finally authoritative for faith and life.”

b) Traditionalist: “This view does not question that the Bible is God-given and therefore authoritative; but it insists that Scripture is neither sufficient nor perspicuous, neither self-contained nor self-interpreting , as an account of God’s revelation. …tradition, which is also God-given and therefore authoritative, supplies what is lacking in Scripture; it augments its contents and declares it meaning.”

c) Modern liberalism: “God was with it authors. They were inspired to write, and what they wrote is inspiring to read. But their inspiration was not of such a kind as to guarantee the full truth of their writings, or to make them all the work of God. Like all human products, scripture is uneven. …The essential Biblical message … must be divorced from its obsolete trapping, reformulated in the light of modern knowledge and re-stated in terms drawn from the thought-world of today. Reason and conscience must judge Scripture and tradition.”

Science and Faith 1: Bible and

Science 4

To know how to interpret the Bible we should ask what it claims for itself

Cookbooks, phone books and murder mysteries. Above all, you must understand that no prophecy of Scripture

came about by the prophet’s own interpretation of things. For prophecy never had its origin in the human will, but prophets, though human, spoke from God as they were carried along by the Holy Spirit. 2 Peter 1:20-21 (NIV)

“….from infancy you have known the Holy Scriptures, which

are able to make you wise for salvation through faith in Christ Jesus. All Scripture is God-breathed and is useful for teaching, rebuking, correcting and training in righteousness, so that the servant of God may be thoroughly equipped for every good work. 2 Timothy 3:15–17 (NIV)


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Other views of the purpose of Genesis

"Having listened to all these divergent opinions (interpretations of Genesis 1) and weighed them, I do not wish to bandy words, for that serves no purpose except to ruin those who listen. The law is an excellent thing for building us up provided we use it lawfully, because its object is to promote the charity which springs from a pure heart, a good conscience and unfeigned faith (1 Timothy 1:4,5–8)” Augustine (Confessions XII.18.27)


6 Augustine's (354-430 AD)

Other views of the purpose of Genesis “The Bible is not a book of

science. The Bible is a book of Redemption,..I believe that God created man, and whether it came by an evolutionary process and at a certain point He took this person or being and made him a living soul or not, does not change the fact that God did create man.” Billy Graham http://evanevodialogue.blogspot.com/2007/09/billy-graham-on-evolution.html


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Ex. 1 Objection: You can’t believe the Bible (NT) is true because it was so many years after Jesus’ death before the NT was written. JC crucified 30 AD Letters to churches first: Gal 48 AD, Thes 50 AD, Eph 60 AD Then codifying oral tradition in gospels: Matt 70+-90 AD; Mark 64-65 AD; Luke 80-85 AD; Jn 90-100 AD People still around who were witnesses We have written fragments of Eph from 130 AD from Egypt. It had circulated from Ephesus in that time. Compare this to secular documents. In college I read Thucydides Peloponnesian Wars. There was never an indication we shouldn’t accept it as “true” or “accurate”. It was written in 460-400 BC. The oldest document is from 900 AD. Caesar's Gallic War 58-50 BC, earliest document is 900 AD.


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Sir Frederic Kenyon (FFB p.15)

“The interval then between the dates of original composition and the earliest extant evidence becomes so small as to be in fact negligible, and the last foundation for any douby that the Scriptures have come down to us substantially as they were written has now been removed. Both the authenticity and the general integrity of the books of the New Testament may be regarded as finally established.”


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Ex. 2 Objection: You can’t believe the Bible because we can’t be sure what Jesus said was recorded correctly.

Monte Python The Life of Brian


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Ex. 3. Objection: You can’t believe the Bible because it clearly has internal contradictions (e.g. chronology in synoptic gospels).


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Synoptic Gospels Just one illustration: The story of the healing of the paralytic (Matthew 9:1–8; Mark 2:1–12; Luke 5:17–26), the call of Levi (Matthew 9:9–13; Mark 2:13–17; Luke 5:27–32), and the question about fasting (Matthew 9:14–17; Mark 2:18–22; Luke 5:33–39) follow back to back in all three Synoptics and so refer to the same events. Again, the stilling of the storm (Matthew 8:23–27; Mark 4:35–41; Luke 8:22–25) and the Gesarene demoniac (Matthew 8:28; Mark 5:1–20; Luke 8:26–39) follow back to back in all three Synoptics so that with the verbal parallels one can see that the same sequence of events is being referred to in each Gospel. But Matthew has these last two events before the three cited above, while Mark and Luke have them after these three events. It cannot be both ways. John Piper www.desiringgod.org/resource-library/articles/how-are-the-synoptics-without-error

I think this is one of the strongest evidences that the NT is from independent witnesses. It is not concocted in a conspiracy to deceive.

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I Wanna Go Back, Stories of the Philmont Rangers by Marty Tschetter Philmont Scout Association, pub. 2011

“Tom Strack, a Ranger who had a crew at Abreu, helped with the PhilSAR, and he remembers getting Russell to Abreau around 9 pm. Others remember other times. Missy Johnston remembers getting back to Abreu before dark. Mark Haenchen thinks it was around 11:30 pm or 12 midnight, but that might have been when everyone gathered in the dining hall at base camp.” (p.155)

Eyewitness Accounts

30 Again he said, “What shall we say the kingdom of God is like, or what parable shall we use to describe it? It is like a mustard seed, which is the smallest of all seeds on earth. Yet when planted, it grows and becomes the largest of all garden plants, with such big branches that the birds can perch in its shade.” Mark 4:30-32

Ex. 4. Objection: We can’t believe the Bible is true because it contains errors.

Science and Faith 1: Bible and Science 17

mustard seed: 1-2 mm poppy seed: less than 1 mm

orchid seed is smallest: 106 seeds/g

Science and Faith 1: Bible and Science 18

30 Again he said, “What shall we say the kingdom of God is like, or what parable shall we use to describe it? It is like a mustard seed, which is the smallest of all seeds on earth. Yet when planted, it grows and becomes the largest of all garden plants, with such big branches that the birds can perch in its shade.” Mark 4:30-32

Mustard Seed Poppy seed Orchid seed

NT and the OT reliability

• We have been talking about the trustworthiness of the NT.

• Jesus taught and believed the Old Testament was authoritative.

• “What think ye of the Old Testament?, resolves into the question, “what think ye of Christ?” And our answer to the first proclaims our answer to the second.” JIP p.59

God the author of life


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For you created my inmost being; you knit me together in my mother’s womb. Psalm 139:13

Ex. 5. What do we mean by the Bible being true versus Science being true?

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_5OvgQW6FG4 http://www.parents.com/videos/v/63983316/spe

rm-meets-egg-weeks-1-to-3-of-pregnancy.htm

Ex. 6 Donald McKay The Clockwork Image Do scientific explanations show there is no God?

Monsters Inc You Tube video

Science and Faith: What is Science?

Dr. Robert Kaita

- Richard Feynman

“Suppose that … nature is [like] a great chess game with millions of pieces in it … we are trying to discover the laws by which the pieces move. … [The job of scientists is] catching on to some of the rules.”

Richard Feynman won Nobel Prize “for [his] fundamental work in quantum electrodynamics, with deep-ploughing consequences for the physics of elementary particles.”

What is science? - From Latin “scientia” or “knowledge

What do scientists do?

We understand Feynman’s description because chess is a game with rules invented by somebody. Why are there “rules” in science? Who invented them? These are questions science cannot answer.

“The most incomprehensible thing about the world is that it is comprehensible.” - Albert Einstein

Christians know why because we believe that God made the universe that way. This means that He wants us to “know” – or do science – to learn about His creation. There is thus no conflict between science and faith. God wants us to have faith so we can do science.

Charles Townes won Nobel Prize for “for fundamental work in the field of quantum electronics, which has led to the construction of oscillators and amplifiers based on the maser-laser principle.”

“Faith is necessary for the scientist even to get started, and deep faith is necessary for him to carry out his tougher tasks. Why? Because he must have confidence that there is order in the universe and that the human mind - in fact his own mind - has a good chance of understanding this order.”

Science defined as our knowledge is also tentative. Example: Plasma physicists study ionized gases called plasmas.

We used to think that universe is 97% plasmas. We then found out that the universe is mostly “dark energy” and “dark matter.” Now plasmas physicists study 97% of 4.9% of universe!

What is not tentative is that God’s universe is “knowable.” This is very different from claiming that our knowledge is perfect.


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Readings JI Packer Fundamentalism and the Word of God (JIP) FF Bruce The New Testament Documents, Are They Reliable (FFB) Donald M. Mackay The Clockwork Image also Human Science and

Human Dignity (London Lectures in Contemporary Christianity) http://judaism.stackexchange.com/questions/7308/is-there-torah-

inerrancy (discussion of Jewish view of inspiration of OT) Inspiration, Authority, and Reliability of Scripture at

http://www.gci.org/ Revelation and Inspiration of Scripture, Dennis Bratcher,

http://www.crivoice.org/inerrant.html#Revelation

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http://judaism.stackexchange.com/questions/7308/is-there-torah-inerrancy

http://judaism.stackexchange.com/questions/7308/is-there-torah-inerrancy

http://www.gci.org/