Science and religion are often portrayed as in conflict. Some news that I regularly post to the Geoscience Research Institute website[1] emphasizes the problematic aspects and growing distrust of science. This article, however, highlights the blessings that can come from science and church communities cooperating together in studying God’s two books of nature and Scripture. Such study is loving the Lord with all the mind (cf. Mark 12:30).
Science Community
Historians have attributed modern science to a Judeo-Christian worldview.[2] Many of the founders of science were Christians seeking to understand God’s handiwork. Isaac Newton developed theories of light and universal gravitation and shared in inventing calculus. His purpose was to establish the existence of God, to combat atheism, and to challenge the mechanical explanation for the operation of the universe.
Michael Faraday developed an electric motor and invented the electrical transformer. He belonged to a small and despised group of Christians known as Sandemanians, who were careful to adhere to their literal understanding of the Bible. Other notable Christian scientists from history are Kepler the astronomer, Pascal the mathematician, Boyle the chemist, Steno the geologist, the biologists Linnaeus and Pasteur, and the physicists Kelvin and Maxwell. The Museum of the Bible gives more examples.[3]
Science and technology can be a blessing in almost every aspect of life: how our food is grown, prepared, and packaged; our communication via email, satellite, and smartphones. Transportation is rapid. Computers do our bookkeeping and word processing and can now even write our reports. Medical science discoveries have dramatically improved our health and length of life.
The Judeo-Christian worldview contributed to the development of modern science because of its picture of God. A personal God who is separate from nature means that nature can be studied without fear. A Creator of law and order results in nature following cause and effect relations. Because God created matter and pronounced it good, nature is worthy of our study. In summary, the Bible’s picture of God provided a cultural and philosophical framework that encouraged scientific inquiry.
Science and technology can be a blessing in almost every aspect of life.
Church Community
The Seventh-day Adventist Church encourages loving the Lord with all the mind.[4] It has set up the Faith and Science Council consisting of Bible scholars and scientists to support the study of God’s creation. My research group provides one example of the church’s support for such study. This research group of professors and students is based in the earth and biological sciences program and the Geoscience Research Institute on the campus of Loma Linda University. It studies granitic and volcanic rocks and associated geological processes and rates as described in a poster project for the June 2022 General Conference Session entitled “Geology Research Motivated by the Genesis Record.”[5]
The research group contributes to the scientific community by regularly publishing in peer-reviewed science journals, with the most prominent example being work led by Ana Martínez on Peruvian geology.[6] We believe what God says in the Bible about His creating and sustaining the universe, the world, life, humans, and time. We also see the explanatory power of plate tectonics, the geologic column, and radiometric dating. So how can we love God with all the mind?[7]
1. Learn from history: modern science developed in a Christian framework.
2. Know the issues: for instance, if God is all good and powerful, why is there evil?
3. Do good science: work toward a constructive model.
4. Study large-scale geology: worldwide and over all time.
5. Recognize human limits: evidence and reason are important, but more is needed.
6. Draw people to Jesus: not by condemning, but by offering something better.
My Facebook account documents the lives of our research group of scientists and followers of Jesus. Friends of this account recently gave me their own examples of how science and religion can be a blessing. Lars Justinen, an eminent Adventist artist, said, “Science shows us the artwork; religion shows us the Artist.” Blake Laing, physics professor at Southern Adventist University, said that “science, like religion, is an accountability community of people bound together by common disciplines.”
Results
For our research group, the result of loving the Lord with all the mind is summarized in the approach and message of our poster. We see the Sabbath as a memorial of God’s creative activity, so we put our hand over our mouth with Job when trying to fathom it all. We use The Desire of Ages as a guide to how Jesus would bless those with whom we interact in the science community, aiming to win people more than arguments. We offer a picture of a powerful God, beyond human explanation, and a good God, trustworthy in the face of evil.
[1] https://www.grisda.org/news
[2] Nancy R. Pearcey and Charles B. Thaxton, The Soul of Science: Christian Faith and Natural Philosophy (Wheaton, Ill.: Crossway Books, 1994).
[3] https://www.museumofthebible.org/exhibits/scripture-and-science
[4] Frank M. Hasel, “Virtuous Thinking,” Adventist Review, Jan. 5, 2018, https://adventistreview.org/magazine-article/virtuous-thinking/ ; based on Philip E. Dow, Virtuous Minds: Intellectual Character Development (Downers Grove, Ill.: IVP Academic, 2013).
[5] https://bclausen.net/GCposter/poster-small.pdf
[6] Ana María Martínez-Ardila et al., “A Synthesis of the Peruvian Coastal Batholith: An exploration of Temporal Histories, Causes of Compositional Diversity, and Tectonomagmatic Links in Arcs,” Lithos 456-457, no. 107298 (Nov. 1, 2023), https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0024493723002827.
[7] Ben Clausen, “Respecting God’s Word, God’s World, and People in God’s Image,” in Design and Catastrophe, ed. L. J. Gibson, R. Nalin, and H. M. Rasi (Berrien Springs, Mich.: Andrews University Press, 2021), pp. 180-183.
