“We find no vestige of a beginning, no prospect of an end.” —J. Hutton
“‘All things continue as they were from the beginning of creation’” (2 Peter 3:4, NKJV).*
piritual applications drawn from the book of nature enrich the message of many biblical writings. I was very intrigued, however, to find a good exposition of a long-standing geological controversy in the second letter of Peter.
Opposite Philosophies
Between the end of the eighteenth and the beginning of the nineteenth centuries, at the dawn of modern geology, two different schools of thought held opposing views on the nature of change as related to the history of the earth. On the one hand, uniformitarians such as James Hutton and Charles Lyell contended that both the laws of nature and the processes shaping the earth had stayed constant through time. They also contended that the intensity and speed of geological forces (such as erosion and volcanism) and the overall conditions of the earth likewise had remained invariant.
On the other hand, catastrophists believed that events of uncommon magnitude and with extreme repercussions had punctuated the past history of the earth. Some of these catastrophist scholars, such as William Buckland or the so-called scriptural geologists, were even comfortable explaining these events as the result of supernatural intervention.1
Uniformitarianism became, however, the predominant paradigm in geology, and catastrophism had to wait until the second half of the twentieth century before regaining some respectability in scientific circles. The partial swing ?of the pendulum was triggered by seemingly outrageous ideas, which were initially met with widespread skepticism. The geologist Harlen Bretz, for instance, had to wait 40 years before his theory (that the variegated landscape of the Channeled Scablands of the Columbia plateau was carved by a sudden megaflood) became widely accepted.2
Spiritual Applications
Peter predicted that in the last days scoffers would make use of uniformitarian arguments to deny the reliability of the promise of Jesus’ second coming. “Where is the promise of His coming? For since the fathers fell asleep, all things continue as they were from the beginning of creation” (2 Peter 3:4). Against this reasoning, Peter pointed to the evidence of God’s supernatural and sudden intervention at Creation, during the Flood, and for the yet-to-come fire of judgment day.
When it comes to spiritual matters, Seventh-day Adventists are catastrophists by definition. It is written in our name, our history, our religious DNA. Our vision is centered on the expectation of a nonuniformitarian event involving a supernatural manifestation of God’s power. For this reason, we, like the recipients of Peter’s letter, experience a sense of uneasiness when confronted by the ordinariness of life. Our existential landscape is shaped by relatively common circumstances, life events of lesser significance, and routine actions with predictable outcomes. Even the more dramatic peaks of our lives, such as the loss of a loved one, conform to a pattern that we encounter in scores of other members of the human family. Years go by, and our bold, youthful certainty to be part of the privileged people that will witness alive the ?second coming of Jesus progressively mutates into a hidden desire, and is finally set aside in the hands of “God’s will.”
Why do we experience this tension between our deepest expectation and the reality of everyday life? The answer probably lies in the notion of time. We are immersed in the time dimension. But as Peter reminds us, we should “not forget . . . that with the Lord one day is as a thousand years, and a thousand years as one day” (verse 8). For us, one day is orders of magnitude shorter than a thousand years, and time and rates are ultimately what distinguish uniformity from catastrophe.
The Balance
As counterintuitive as it may seem, I believe we should feel blessed by the reality of this inner tension. In finding a balance between two apparently contrasting concepts, we could be accomplishing the task God intended for us, because both are important aspects of our spiritual health.
Uniformity is the gym of life, the space where we work out and grow in the repetition of habitual behaviors. Catastrophe is too instantaneous to allow for growth; it comes “as a thief in the night.” It is in uniformity that we can build our house on solid foundations, put our talents to good use, know the truth and be freed by it, feed the hungry and give drink to the thirsty, buy oil for our lamps, and fight the good fight.
On the other hand, catastrophe is the focal point on our horizon, the element that gives meaning and directionality to our journey. It’s like the summit for the mountain hiker, the goal toward which all efforts are focused. Nevertheless, as any real trekker knows, the sense of accomplishment in reaching the peak is proportionate to the amount of sweat effused to get there. Being on the top of Mount Everest would not be so thrilling if that spot hadn’t been reached through a succession of thousands of single incremental steps.
And so it is that the mysterious ways of God are revealed again. He is a God who “by no means clear[s] the guilty” (Ex. 34:7), but is ready to forgive my sins; who is an omnipotent sovereign, but is willing to wash my feet; who was in the beginning, but became flesh and dwelt among us. In the union of two apparently irreconcilable attitudes, God finds a way to render me a better Adventist who grows daily “in the grace and knowledge of our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ” (2 Peter 3:18), while directing my view toward “new heavens and a new earth in which righteousness dwells” (verse 13).
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*All Bible texts quoted in this article are from the New King James Version. Copyright © 1979, 1980, 1982 by Thomas Nelson, Inc. Used by permission. All rights reserved.
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1See chapter 3 of Richard Hugget, Catastrophism: Systems of Earth History (London: Edward Arnold, 1990).
2J. Harlen Bretz, “The Channeled Scabland of the Columbia Plateau,” Journal of Geology, v. 31 (1923), pp. 617-649; J. Harlen Bretz, “Introduction,” ed. V. R. Baker and D. Nummedal, The Channeled Scabland (Washington, D.C.: National Aeronautics and Space Administration, 1978), pp. 1, 2.
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