May I share an honest confession? I was initially hesitant to participate in this project because of my role as president of a Christian university. At Trevecca Nazarene University, we are willing to ask hard questions and converse with a maturing generation. However, I know that many people have already discovered all the answers they are willing to consider on issues of creation and science. They prefer not to be confused with other facts. Sadly, a conversation will not be possible, and their decision about a college for their sons and daughters may be the way they protest my involvement. I find that administrators have to think about safety for the institution as well as courage for the kingdom of God. I don't like the choices these realities give me.
But with the release of my book, A Charitable Discourse: Talking About the Things That Divide Us1, I have discovered a hunger for intelligent, informed, respectful, Wesleyan dialogue on divisive issues. It is time for the church to discuss the elephant in the middle of the creation dialogue—evolution. The bulk of our Christian scholars/scientists are in a different camp than the bulk of our laity, and the battleground will most likely be the minds of our youth. If there is a widening gap between Christian universities and local church pews, how will the church deal with the potential divide?
Let me begin with some declarations. I am not a scientist and do not seek to write as a scientist. I have no scientific capacity to defend evolution. I do not know how old the earth is. I cannot explain instantaneous creation out of nothing, nor can I walk you through the intricacies of evolutionary development. But I am a biblical scholar and a Wesleyan theologian and will write toward a position that may allow holy conversation to occur between people who occupy pews and those who sit in university classrooms.
As I have listened, I have heard a fear emerge about the interpretation of the Genesis account of creation. The reasoning claims, "If we give in here and say it is a poem or a story or a myth, what's to say the virgin birth or resurrection won't be next? And if this part of the Bible is fiction, how do we know that other parts aren't as well? We must defend the Bible." It's as if the creation account of Gen. 1 is where conservative Christians have determined to make a Custer's last stand.
Recently, I came across an excellent book by John H. Walton, professor of Old Testament at Wheaton College. His interpretation of the creation narrative is carefully articulated in The Lost World of Genesis One: Ancient Cosmology and the Origins Debate. Walton expresses an understanding of Genesis that has captivated me for years.2
He suggests that Gen. 1 is the account of God coming to dwell in his creation with his creatures. While the pagan stories of creation seem to imply that creation exists for the gods and humans are meant to placate the gods, our story is quite different. God moves in a way to cause creation to function for the sake of his creatures. The biblical account narrates the activity of God on behalf of his creatures rather than forcing the creatures to appease their creator or suffer the consequences.
The major contribution of Walton is his insistence that this text, Gen. 1, is not about the creation of the material universe but rather about God making the world function for his purposes. The text is in keeping with the dominant strain of theology throughout Scripture—God has come to dwell among us. Could it be that Gen. 1 is not a story about the creation of the material world but about God making the world he created into his dwelling place?
Sadly, we have determined that Gen. 1 is the factual story of the creation of the world. We have taken our scientific theories to it and have superimposed them on it, looking for proof of the correct theory. We wish to prove that God created the world, not some random forces of chaos. But the people to whom the text is written could not have imagined a world that God did not create. They did not need to be convinced that God created the world. It was already assumed. What they did not understand was how God had come to dwell among them as a people for his purposes in the world. The story of Abraham and his family will flesh out how the God of the universe intends to do that.
So while we believe God to be the Creator of all things, Gen. 1 is not necessarily the story of material creation. When we force scientific creation theories on Gen. 1, we are asking the text to answer a question that is not being asked. Genesis 1 is not about the time periods over which the material universe came into existence but about a time when God created a functioning world, ordered according to his purposes, and came to take his Sabbath rest in the cosmic temple of creation. This train of thought is heard throughout the Bible:
Thus says the LORD: Heaven is my throne and the earth is my footstool; what is the house that you would build for me, and what is my resting place? All these things my hand has made, and so all these things are mine, says the LORD. But this is the one to whom I will look, to the humble and contrite in spirit, who trembles at my word (Isa. 66:1-2, NRSV).
"Viewing Genesis 1 as an account of functional origins of the cosmos as temple does not in any way suggest or imply that God was uninvolved in material origins—it only contends that Genesis 1 is not that story."3 We have plenty of Scripture that does declare God the Creator of all: Col. 1:16-17, Heb. 1:2, Ps. 100. If we allow a scientific debate to interpret Gen. 1, we have given modern science more weight than the human author of the text and the community to whom it was written. Biblical scholars across the centuries have seen the biblical story as a rich and complex text with many interpretations. Putting modern scientific ideas into this ancient story distorts the meaning of the text, which is clearly about God's faithful and caring relation to the world, not the details of how that world came to be.
Another concern is the development of a much-too-small doctrine of creation. The doctrine of creation must not be narrowed to a beginning. God continues to create because creation is rooted in God's future purposes. If Gen. 1 is to be read literally, I prefer to read it as the story of God interacting with his already-in-existence, chaotic, death-bound, disordered creation—which may have been materially existing for billions of years in some form—and bringing order out of chaos for the sake of dwelling with his people. In this reading, Adam and Eve are historical beings, whose names are part of a Hebrew genealogy, who experience God as their Creator, but even more so, who now understand their role within creation. They are privileged to function as obedient creatures of God, subduing and ruling creation as his partners. One does not have to explain how the material world came to be to understand how the text works to tell the community this story.
Or, in other words, Gen. 1 takes no position on the age of the earth or the method by which it came into existence. Thus, we need not pass a faith verdict on young-earth, old-earth, evolution, or any other theory of the origin of the material universe. We can enter the world of science with our eyes open wide. When science offers substantial evidence of a process or pattern in the universe, we simply thank God that his ways are becoming clearer to us than before. Christians have no fear of scientific discoveries of the origins of the universe. Our belief is not rooted in the how, because Scripture has not chosen to reveal the how. Our faith is rooted in the reality and experience of the God who came to dwell, who has a purpose to redeem and restore all of his creation, and who stubbornly continues to create that future until Rev. 21 is realized—a new Jerusalem come down, all things made new, death forever done, and God's dwelling with his people forever. Interestingly, the last chapters of the Revelation picture the temple made by God in which the Lamb is its light, and all creation celebrates.
So how does the Christian enter the conversation with science? We are free to discover. But when science crosses the line of exploration and observation and begins to suggest that there is no meaning or function intended in creation, we have a problem. Science cannot fathom the mind and purpose of God in creation. There is no evidentiary way for this to be proved. When theories of evolution go beyond how species evolved to the purpose behind this evolution, they have entered a realm that is not science. They have become either philosophers or theologians. Our faith interprets the findings of science as the activity of a loving God.
What we learn from science need not shake our faith in God. Our line of defense is not a scientific model for Gen. 1 but confidence in the Creator God, who has a loving purpose for his creation, and intends to dwell with his creatures and redeem us. The greatest act of creation is yet to come—God making all things new.
1 The following is an excerpt from A Charitable Discourse: Talking About the Things that Divide Us: Kansas City, Beacon Hill Press 2010. My experience with this book and its readers convinces me that the time is right for the discussion on evolution.
2 John H. Walton, The Lost World of Genesis One: Ancient Cosmology and the Origins Debate (Downers Grove, IL: IVP Academic, 2009).
3 Walton, p. 96.
