Participants:
Series Code: TCR
Program Code: TCR180012A
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00:30 Welcome to The Creator Revealed.
00:32 My name is Tim Standish, and I'm a scientist. 00:36 One of the major questions 00:40 that get raised with me on a regular basis is, 00:46 how can you be a scientist and believe the Bible. 00:50 What's going on there 00:52 and that is what we are going to examine a little bit 00:56 in this particular episode of The Creator Revealed. 01:00 Well, I'm Shelley Quinn, 01:02 and we're so glad that you're joining us, 01:05 and it is wonderful to be with someone 01:08 who have so much education 01:11 and experience in science and yet, 01:14 who is a Bible believing six-day creationist. 01:19 So we look forward to this episode. 01:24 Sometimes I respond to that question with... 01:29 Well, why wouldn't I believe the Bible? 01:32 The Bible is a book about reality 01:34 and as a scientist, 01:35 hey, reality that's what I'm interested in. 01:39 You know, I just wanna comment on that 01:41 'cause so many people 01:42 don't see the reality of it all but there is... 01:46 You know, when you look at the internal evidence 01:50 as far as the cohesiveness of the story 01:53 when you look at the external evidence, 01:56 when you look at the Dead Sea Scrolls, 01:59 when you look what the archaeologists 02:02 are uncovering that continually prove 02:05 there's so much that proves that, that the Bible is real. 02:09 Well, yes, you know, the Bible presents itself 02:14 as a book about reality, and a record of history. 02:17 You know, when we talk about the creation account 02:21 that's given there, it is laid out 02:24 just like the rest of the history 02:26 in the Bible. 02:28 And as you pointed out, 02:29 the science of archaeology has certainly 02:33 presented us with pretty amazing evidence. 02:38 That history is very, very reliable. 02:43 And there's more than that, 02:46 this history that's given in Scripture is... 02:51 It is hopeful history, 02:53 it's not history 02:56 that you wouldn't want to believe, 02:58 it's not gloom and doom or something, 03:00 it's not saying, we're all going to die 03:02 and that'll be the end 03:03 or anything like that. 03:05 There is this beautiful history that's laid out, 03:07 the past, the present, and the future that's there. 03:11 But it's not a kind of airy-fairy 03:14 theological book really, 03:17 even though we tend to think about it that way. 03:20 No, it's about the facts, 03:21 it's about what people saw happen, 03:23 it's a record of God's action throughout history, 03:28 you can certainly think about it that way. 03:29 And by the way, 03:31 I would certainly be happy 03:33 to believe other historical sources. 03:36 For example, if I went to Egypt, 03:38 and there was a pyramid with something that said, 03:40 I the Pharaoh, who built this, did these great things. 03:43 I tend to believe that, 03:45 well, why would I treat the Bible 03:47 as a less reliable historical resource 03:50 than some Pharaoh bragging about himself? 03:53 Well, let's launch into this, 03:54 and I want to start to illustrate this point 03:57 with 1 John 1:1-3. 04:00 Let's just look at what's being said here 04:02 by the Apostle John. 04:03 He says, "That which was from the beginning, 04:06 which we have heard, 04:08 which we have seen with our eyes, 04:10 which we have looked upon with our hands, 04:13 sorry, looked upon and our hands have handled, 04:16 concerning the Word of life- the life was manifested, 04:20 and we have seen, and bear witness, 04:22 and declare to you that eternal life 04:25 which was with the Father and was manifested to us, 04:29 that which we have seen and heard we declare to you, 04:34 that you also may have fellowship with us, 04:36 and truly our fellowship is with the Father 04:40 and with His Son Jesus Christ." 04:43 Eyewitness account. Eyewitness account. 04:45 Science is about empirical evidence 04:48 or empirical data, 04:49 stuff that has been observed with our senses 04:52 what we have seen, what we have heard, 04:55 science is built off that foundation. 04:59 The Bible is built off exactly the same foundation. 05:05 People say that Bible isn't a book of science. 05:07 Well, why isn't it? 05:08 It's about empirical observation 05:11 and certainly that is true 05:12 when it comes to the case of the situation 05:15 with Jesus Christ and the resurrection and so on. 05:17 I've highlighted these different words 05:21 on the screen here, 05:23 all these words that have to do with our empirical senses. 05:29 Yeah, John is really into this. 05:31 I, John saw things here, in the Revelation, 05:35 that's the Bible. 05:37 Now, 05:39 I want to point out 05:40 that not all belief systems are like this, 05:44 and I want to be careful about it. 05:46 This is not to put other belief systems down. 05:50 I'm just saying, 05:51 other belief systems are built off 05:53 a different understanding of reality. 05:56 So I want to give you this example, 06:00 from the Hindu faith, 06:02 this is in one of the important books 06:06 for Hindus that says, 06:08 "Just as the world 06:10 and its creation 06:12 are mere appearances, 06:16 a moment and an epoch 06:18 are also imaginary, not real." 06:22 You see in this particular view of things, 06:25 what we take in through our senses 06:26 is an illusion. 06:28 But in the Christian faith, we say no, no, no. 06:32 What we take in through our senses 06:35 is a reliable. 06:39 That's reliable information about the world 06:43 in which we live. 06:44 Very, very different things. 06:46 Can you see 06:47 why it is that science 06:52 was built off 06:54 this kind of foundational understanding 06:57 that Christians have. 06:59 I don't want to say that because people were Christians, 07:01 they became scientists. 07:03 But certainly Christianity provides that 07:06 metaphysical foundation 07:09 that is necessary to do science. 07:10 An intangible evidence. 07:13 Yeah. Evidences. 07:14 So here's an example, 07:15 Francis Bacon 07:17 is one of the founders of modern science 07:20 and he wrote this, he said, 07:21 "To conclude, therefore, let no man 07:25 out of weak conceit of sobriety, 07:28 or an ill-applied moderation, 07:31 think or maintain, that a man can search too far 07:34 or be too well studied in the book of God's word, 07:38 or in the book of God's works, 07:43 divinity or philosophy, 07:46 but rather let man endeavor 07:49 an endless progress or proficience in both." 07:53 Amen! 07:55 No, this is old English, isn't it? 07:56 Yeah. 07:58 Francis Bacon lived hundreds of years ago, 07:59 but he laid out this philosophical foundation 08:03 that sort of moved in the direction then 08:05 of the way we understand science today. 08:08 You can see, he is not discounting the Bible, 08:13 or the creation, the nature itself. 08:17 He's saying, hey, these things go together in some way 08:20 and we can understand that we should do. 08:22 Oh! Kepler, 08:25 one of the fathers of modern astronomy. 08:29 He was a priest. 08:32 He was a priest, basically. 08:34 I believe he was Catholic. Okay. 08:38 And so he wrote, 08:41 "These laws are within the grasp 08:43 of the human mind, 08:45 God wanted us to recognize them 08:47 by creating us after his own image 08:50 so that we could share his own thoughts." 08:53 So as he was 08:55 sort of understanding these things, 08:58 figuring out all these mathematical relationships 09:00 that describe what was going on in the heavens. 09:04 He's certainly not saying 09:05 and there is no God, or anything like that, 09:07 or making up arbitrary rules about, 09:10 well, we can't bring God into things. 09:12 The opposite is true. 09:13 It was his understanding of God 09:16 that prompted him to move in that direction. 09:18 He didn't think, oh, this is all just an illusion. 09:20 So I need to be thinking about other things, 09:22 other things are more important. 09:24 He's saying no, this is important, 09:25 let's understand it, 09:27 it tells us something about God. 09:28 In fact, he even goes on and says, 09:30 we astronomers are priests of the highest God 09:33 in regard to the book of nature. 09:35 Good quote. 09:36 Yeah. 09:38 These founders of modern science 09:41 were building off their Christian understanding. 09:44 Why would I not do the same thing today? 09:46 These were great, 09:48 great thinkers, great men indeed. 09:51 Now, I want to contrast that 09:53 with this view that people think is modern. 09:55 And the example I'm going to use 09:57 is Jacques Monad, he is a... 09:59 Well, he is a Nobel Prize winner 10:01 and he wrote this, 10:03 "Chance alone is at the source of every innovation 10:08 of all creation in the biosphere." 10:11 So he's saying, it's not God, it's chance. 10:14 "Pure chance, absolutely free but blind, 10:19 at the very root 10:20 of the stupendous edifice of evolution: 10:25 this central concept of modern biology 10:28 is no longer one among other possible 10:32 or even conceivable hypotheses. 10:34 It is today the sole conceivable hypothesis." 10:39 And, you know, people look at that 10:40 and they say, well, that's modern science. 10:43 But it's not. It's ancient philosophy. 10:46 This is not new. 10:48 This is not what modern science grew out of. 10:51 In fact, we can go back and read Cicero, 10:54 this Roman author 10:56 before the time of Christ and Cicero 10:58 wrote a book called De Natura Deorum, 11:00 which means on the nature of the gods. 11:03 It's a dialogue 11:04 between different people with different beliefs 11:07 about the gods in the Pantheon 11:09 that were worshiped by Romans and others. 11:12 And he has here, 11:14 one of these philosophical views, 11:17 the Epicurean view, 11:19 and this is what the Epicurean philosopher says, 11:21 he says, "For he who taught us all the rest," 11:23 that's the guy named Epicurus, 11:25 "has also taught us 11:27 that the world was made by nature, 11:30 without needing an artificer to construct it, 11:33 and that the act of creation, which according to you 11:36 cannot be performed without divine skill, 11:39 is so easy, that nature will create, is creating 11:42 and has created worlds without number. 11:45 You on the contrary cannot see how nature can achieve all this 11:48 without the aid of some intelligence." 11:51 Can you see, go back 2000 years, 11:53 people were saying the same thing. 11:54 It wasn't because science compelled them to, 11:56 this is their philosophy. 11:58 Yes. Okay. 12:00 And you know, I have to say that 12:01 it seems to me that as we advance, 12:04 I would think that people would be changing their mind. 12:07 Because the more science 12:11 understands as they gain a greater understanding, 12:15 the more complicated 12:17 we see that things are, perhaps they didn't understood. 12:18 The more wonderful it is. 12:20 Yes, I mean, and you see 12:23 it had to be by intelligent design. 12:25 The Bible never points us away from the evidence, 12:28 never does that. 12:29 I love this text in Hebrews 12:1, 12:33 "Therefore we also 12:34 since we are surrounded by so great a cloud of witnesses, 12:39 let us lay aside every weight, 12:41 and the sin which also easily ensnares us, 12:44 and let us run with endurance the race 12:47 that is set before us." 12:49 This is a beautiful, beautiful thought. 12:52 We are not believing by blind faith. 12:57 The witnesses are out there. 12:59 We have the witness that's recorded in Scripture, 13:03 we have the witness in the creation 13:06 that testifies to this wonderful Creator, God, 13:11 who, amazingly enough, 13:13 loves us and cares about his wayward creation. 13:17 So what can we... 13:19 What's revealed about this? 13:21 Well, "The creator is revealed in the biblical worldview 13:25 that serves as the foundation of science. 13:28 His value of logic 13:30 is clear in the logical way by which nature works. 13:34 His value of our senses is clearly revealed 13:38 in the accuracy 13:39 with which we can gather empirical data." 13:44 He wants us to go out there and look at 13:47 and understand this creation, 13:51 and we can do it through scientific study. 13:55 Amen and amen. 13:57 And Romans 1:20 says that, "God's invisible attributes, 14:01 the things about God with which we cannot see 14:04 with our own my eyes 14:06 have been revealed in the things 14:09 that He has created." 14:10 So the Creator is revealed in His creation. 14:14 Please stay tuned, 14:15 we'll be back in just a moment with a special guest. |
Revised 2019-04-25