Dr. Kurt Wise discusses the nature of science and authority of Scripture with Del.
DEL: Well Kurt, this is all amazing. All of that evidence points back to the history of Genesis and the flood. But you know and I know that there are a lot of people who just see the same evidence but they don’t get it. Why not?
KURT: It’s easy to understand why unbelievers don’t get it. 2 Peter tells us why. 2 Peter tells us they want to live in their sin and so they’re willingly ignorant of all of this because I think you have to be willingly. If you can see it. Not everyone can see it. It’s when it’s pointed out they can see it. But those people who can see it the reason they don’t get it is because they don’t want to get it. They’re willingly ignorant of it. The real question that you’re asking though is what about believers. What about those who would want this knowledge and want it to be true.
DEL: And that’s what’s frustrating isn’t it?
KURT: It is. It is frustrating. And part of that I think in this particular society or where we’re living I see far too much science worship in our society. It’s the way we even teach about what science is. You learn in school that science – a picture in my mind of a grade school that’s probably what 3rd or 4th grade. I’m picturing the page in the textbook and there’s a bold face word science and in parenthesis following it “derived from the Latin word sciento meaning knowledge”. Woo, knowledge. Truth. So from early age we’re taught in the school that science equals knowledge, equals truth. People, I talk to people all over the world, they associate science with something you can prove. You’d think proof and science could be used in the same sentence but it’s not true. You can’t prove anything in science. We can’t prove anything. We have some educated guesses called theories but you can never know for sure if the theory is actually true. You can’t check around every tree and every planet and every star and ever really know. So the real status of science, which is exciting to me, is you never really know. You keep discovering. You keep hoping you’re getting closer but you really don’t know for sure. But most people learn that science is proof, that whatever scientists say is proof. So I see Christians all over the world saying well if the scientist said it it must be true. I’ve got to believe it. And so they themselves close their minds, their hearts to what God has put into creation very evidently to teach us about himself and to confirm what he’s claimed in his Word.
DEL: So when you say worshipping science we essentially are turning away from the source of real truth and we’re substituting for that source of truth not only the creation around us as we see in Romans 1 and the word of God itself, and then we turn to science to be that source of truth. Is that what you’re saying?
KURT: That’s right. That’s dead on. We’ve got the God of truth who wrote, who inspired the word of God. It is the word of truth. It is the truth, the eye witness, the one who was there. It ought to be, it is in scripture it is to be our highest authority. It’s where we go first. In the Garden of Eden God said don’t eat of the tree. That should have done it. That should have been enough. But Eve used her observation and her brain and says well looks good, smells good, it’s got to be good tasting, it’s good for making we wise. So overrode the word of God and went with human reason. Got us into a lot of trouble. I mean we see thousands of years later Jesus is tempted by the same serpent, the same Satan and his response is to quote God’s word. Jesus has the ability and he created Satan, he can out think Satan. He could have the ability to out maneuver him intellectually but he doesn’t choose to do so. He simply quotes the word of God. That’s what we ought to be doing. That’s what believers ought to be doing. But for some reason we just don’t believe. We don’t trust God’s word. We trust human observation and reason and that’s what science is. All science is is human observation, human reason coming to conclusions based upon those things. We should be first, as it was supposed to be in the beginning as it will be in the end, trust the word. Trust God’s word. Then from there fill in the blanks, complete the understanding of God’s creation.
DEL: It seems Kurt that there is also another piece of that as well and that is that the believer who is indwelled by the spirit of God, the spirit of truth, that part of it is that the only side of the story they hear is the science side. And for a lot of them they’ve never heard the evidence like we see here and someone to talk to them about that. Do you think that maybe part of it as well?
KURT: Absolutely. We get in schools, we got public schools. They kicked the prayer out of the public schools. They kicked God out of the public schools. The Bible is out of the public schools. So what do you hear in the public schools? You hear supposedly secular things. In other words the science. That’s all you hear. If you go to the library and take our books they’re increasingly kicking the Christian books out of the library too. Internet full of, there’s much more available on there from unbelievers and from science. So there’s many people who never hear the truth. There’s a whole lot of pastors scared to death of this particular question. They don’t understand science or don’t mention it in the sermons. Sunday school teachers aren’t comfortable with it so it’s not shared there. So you could potentially grow up all of your life in the church, you’re a believer and never hear the truth.
DEL: It would be like in a trial where the jury only hears the prosecution’s case and they never get to hear from the defendants. Well the jury is going to make an obvious choice and that’s for the prosecution. So it seems like we, and I know this is your heart as well, that a part of this is we need to help the body of Christ see all of this evidence that we’ve been looking at.
KURT: Yeah. People need to hear it, need to see it. Just as people cannot come to know Christ without the word of God I think people can’t understand his creation without the truth of that creation being revealed to them. Not everybody is designed to be able to read rocks and read trees and read plants and animals and the universe, the stars and all that sort of thing. It’s got to be shown to most of them.
DEL: Well that’s your specialty though. That’s how God has made you. He’s given you that gift and talent to see those things. And I know that is part of the heart that you have is to help people see that.
KURT: And I love sharing it. Not that very many people like to hear but I love sharing it.
DEL: Well I guess that’s our task isn’t it, to do everything we can to help people see that evidence and to find that evidence if there is any more.
KURT: Oh there’s always more.
