1. God is creator. There is no unassailable proof of this statement. The Bible, itself, does not attempt to prove it. It just starts out by saying that God created. (Genesis 1:1. For on-line scripture, consult the Bible Gateway, Crosswalk, or the Blue Letter Bible) It doesn’t say how, or why, or when, just who. The Bible, itself, says that the best evidence that God is creator is our faith (Hebrews 11:3). The Bible further points out that the principal agent in creation was God the Son (John 1:1-5, Colossians 1:16-17). One term for a person who accepts the principle of divine creation by an intelligent being is supernaturalist. A person who does not accept this is sometimes called a naturalist, or materialist. Such a person doesn’t believe that there was a who involved in creation. (The Wikipedia has articles on Supernatural, Philosophical Naturalism, and Methodological Naturalism. Merriam-Webster Online  has entries on supernaturalism, naturalism, and materialism. Volume 49:3 of Perspectives on Science and Christian Faith, published by the American Scientific Affiliation, has articles on methodological naturalism) Before leaving this principle, I should say that, although I do not believe that it can be proved, I don’t believe it can be disproved, either.

Christians have several (some would say many) views about the timing, and other details, of how things began. However, the most fundamental truth is that God created.

2. God sustains the natural world. Colossians 1:16-17 and Hebrews 1:3 indicate that God not only created, but that Christ is presently involved in holding things together, including your body and the monitor or the paper you are reading this on. Do we understand this? No, and we aren't capable of understanding it. God is omnipotent and omniscient. We aren’t.

3. Humans have some responsibility for the natural world around them. God’s creation, as it was in the beginning, was “very good.” (Genesis 1). Humans were put in charge of it (Genesis 1:26, 28). Since the Fall, there have been problems with the natural world, but scripture teaches that it is still important to God, (Psalm 24:1, Psalm 50:10-11, for example) so it should be to us, as well. The Bible tells us that the Israelites were supposed to take care of their land by letting it lie fallow every seventh year (Leviticus 25:4-7), and that their failure to obey this command was one reason for the Babylonian captivity (II Chronicles 36:21). Proverbs 12:10 says that a righteous man cares for the needs of his animal. Stewardship, a concept familiar in Bible times, is a word commonly used to describe the responsibility of humans to care for the land and the living things that belong to God, who created them.

Biblical stewardship partly furthers human self-interest. If we mess up the world, where else are we going to live? However, Scripture doesn't indicate that the only reason God created other living things was to benefit humans. Creation was called good as it was, not good as a tool for humans. Psalm 104:24-5 speaks of the marvelous diversity of creation. Perhaps God made all of these types of living things for His own sake, as an artist rejoices in her creative ability. Humans have never yet seen many of the organisms that are alive on earth today, let alone found uses for them. They are still important, because God made them.

4. God is revealed to us through nature. Psalm 19:1 and Romans 1:20 say that we can learn something of what God is, and how God works, through a study of nature. In other words, through science. Some of the greatest scientists of all time, like Isaac Newton, have believed this. Science is not God’s only, or main, means of revelation. (Others include the Bible, our consciences, the Holy Spirit in our lives, and, most importantly, the incarnation of Jesus Christ.) But it is one means. Properly understood, scientific findings and scripture do not conflict. However, humans don't completely understand either scientific or scriptural revelation, and anyone who makes either claim should be regarded with a great deal of skepticism.

As an example of the application of this principle, studies in, say, human fossil ancestry, do not disprove scripture. (The field of human fossil ancestry is a very controversial one, in a strictly scientific sense.) Nor does the Bible rules out the possibility that humans have not always looked like they do today.

5. God is a God of order. The Bible begins with a portrayal of God’s orderliness in creation. (There is controversy over how literally to take the description of the creation days in Genesis. Literal or not, the description describes order and sequence.) The Ten Commandments, the covenants established with Abraham, and with the Israelites, and God’s promise, in Genesis 8:22, after Noah’s flood, declare that God is a God of order. Some historians of science, including some non-Christian ones, have written that, without the Judeo-Christian concept of God as a God of order, the development of science would have been impossible. (There were other influences, including Greek and Arab thought, in the development of science.) Technological developments seem to have been harnessed early in China, but science doesn’t seem to have developed there as a discipline, perhaps because this sense of order wasn’t part of the prevailing world-view there at that time.

One of the foundation principles of science is that phenomena are repeatable. Scientists assume that, for example, the freezing point of water has not varied with time, and that it will not change suddenly in the future. This order and repeatability makes it possible to check scientific results. An experiment done in Nairobi should be repeatable in Beijing, and, if it was important enough, will be repeated by other scientists in other locations. Another foundation principle is that observations of the physical world are usually describable by principles and laws, and that the simpler these principles and laws, the more likely they are to describe the world as it really is. Newton’s law of universal gravitation, Einstein’s e = mc2, and Mendel’s laws of independent assortment are examples.

The principles given in the previous paragraph are scientific, not theological, but they are compatible with a belief in a God of order and pattern.

to my page on what scripture says about technology

to my page on theories of origins

to my page on the age of the earth

to my page on Christians and care of the environment

This work is licensed under a Creative Commons License. The purpose of this is NOT to prevent use by others, but to prevent other users from restricting free use. I claim no ownership of materials in the above material which are quotations from other sources.

First uploaded on October 16, 2004. This is the version of April 6, 2005