In the church that Kendall and I grew up in, it was said that the Bible is inspired by God and the only perfect rule for faith, doctrine, and conduct. Both of us still hold to this high view of scripture. We are both practicing Christians, highly involved in our local churches, and historically we have belonged to churches that have borne the term “evangelical” in their name. We are seeking to raise our children in the faith, to teach them the Bible, and to help them know about God’s love for them. I just want to make that clear at the beginning, because if you spend much time on this site you will find that we disagree with some of the things these same churches once taught us.

A big part of what we talk about on this site is the relationship between science and faith. One of the big questions that has motivated me (Tyler) over the last decade is, “How can I read the Bible faithfully in our modern world?” The question is especially interesting to me because I believe that the Bible is true, and I have seen through my study that science gives an accurate description of many facets of our world, and our universe. In my search for truth I have learned that the fullest truth is never found in the extremes. It lies in the tension between them. Extremes tend to distort and obscure as much as they clarify and reveal. It has been said that the heresies arise from elevating one truth above another. For that reason I, and we, believe that when talking about God’s creation, the fullest truths are found by holding in tension the truths of the Bible and the truths of science. 

The hard part is not recognizing that there is truth in both the Bible and in science; nearly every modern person accepts the basic view of the universe which science has offered us. We believe in a spherical earth that orbits a massive burning ball of gas 93 million miles away. We believe in numerous other galaxies that are incomprehensibly far away. We believe in the basic rules of physics and chemistry that allow our vehicles to safely and reliably get us where we are going. We believe these things by faith. Most of us have not performed the measurements that prove that the earth circles the sun. By our own observations we would think that the sun circles the earth, as the ancients did. But over time better observations have proved otherwise. We take the basic structure of the world we live in by faith. Faith, not in the Bible, but in science. So in that sense we all believe in science.

That is the crux of the matter. As Christians we believe the Bible is inspired and true, and as modern humans we believe in the basic methodology and verdicts of science. The problems come when these two truths conflict, or when they seem to conflict. At this point people often make a choice to accept one truth at the expense of the other. One person will reject the biblical truth they’ve learned for the scientific truth they’ve studied, while another will reject the scientific truth and hold tightly to the biblical truth. We believe that both of these extremes err. 

God is the author of biblical truths and scientific truths. We do well to hold these in tension as best as we can. We neither worship nature--or the materialistic philosophy behind much modern science, nor do we worship the Bible--or a view of the Bible that makes its words semi-magical. We worship the God who stands behind both. We recognize that whatever truth we find in the Bible or in science is ultimately derived from the Truth that is God. We believe that the Bible is an adequate, but not exhaustive, revelation of God. And we believe that God created this universe in such a way that reveals His glory. 

To put it succinctly: We seek to read the Bible deeply and faithfully. And we seek to understand what we learn through science in light of the story that the Bible is telling. This is the tension we are continually wrestling with and the tension we invite you into.