The Bible is certainly not a scientific textbook. The purpose of the Bible is not to present the laws by which our universe operates. However, when the Bible does make a naturalistic observation one can depend upon the scientific accuracy of the observation. True science and the Bible are always in perfect agreement. True science may often contradict false religion. False science (i.e. evolutionary science) may often contradict the truth, but true science will never contradict natural observations made in the Bible.

The renowned nineteenth century scientist, Herbert Spencer stated that there are five fundamentals of science: time, force, action, space and matter. What Spencer did not realize was that he was simply repeating a scientific principle laid down by Moses some 3500 years earlier. Moses wrote, “In the beginning (time) God (force) created (action) the heavens (space) and the earth (matter).” (Genesis 1:1).

From the very first verse in the Bible it is evident that science and the Bible agree. Life must come from life (the Law of Biogenesis). Experiments conducted by Francesco Redi (1688), Lazarro Spallanzani (1799), Louis Pasteur (1860) and Rudolph Virchow (1858) laid down the foundation upon which this unalterable law was established (Thompson, 1981, np). The Bible’s explanation for life on this planet is consistent with this law. The first two chapters of the book of Genesis state that God (life) created all living things-Life came from life! Evolutionary “science” contradicts the Law of Biogenesis by suggesting that life came from non-living matter.

Evidence from the field of Astronomy which supports the Bible’s claim of inspiration. Job stated that God hung the earth upon nothing (Job 26:7). All ancient cultures believed aside from the ancient Israelites believed that the earth was supported. Some believed that the earth was supported by four elephants. Others said the earth sat upon the back of a turtle. The ancient Greeks and Romans believed the earth was perched on the soldiers of a giant man (Atlas). Why did Job, contrary to popular thought in his day, believe that nothing supported the earth? There was no scientific method that Job could have used to determine that the earth hung upon nothing. The only explanation is that the Creator told Job that the world was suspended without support. Isaiah wrote, God sits upon the “circle of the earth.” (Isaiah 40:22). Isaiah lived 2200 years before the notion that the earth was round became accepted by the mainstream scientific community. In fact, the Catholic Church (who obviously did not read study their Bible carefully) persecuted those who suggested that the world was anything other than flat. In 1492, when Christopher Columbus set off for the New World most believed that he would simply sail off the edge of the earth. How did Isaiah know that the earth was a sphere? The only way Isaiah could have known this was if he had received direct knowledge from someone who could have observed the world from space. His knowledge had to come from God. The psalmist wrote concerning the sun, “his going forth is from the end of the heaven, and his circuit unto the ends of it…” (Psalm 19:5,6). At one time people used this passage in an attempt to discredit the Bible by trying by suggesting that the psalmist was teaching geocentrenricism. It has now been discovered that the sun does indeed have its own orbit in which it travels at about 600,000 miles per hour. Its orbit is so large that it would take 200 million years to complete (Thompson, 1981, np). How would one, not equipped with today’s powerful telescopes, know this unless what he wrote came from the very One who created the sun?

There is evidence from the field of oceanography that supports the Bible’s claim of inspiration. Solomon said, “All the rivers run into the sea, yet the sea is not full; unto the place whither the rivers go, thither they go again.” (Ecclesiastes 1:7). Solomon was suggesting that the same water that flows in a river and dumps into the sea will once again return to the river from whence it came. He was speaking of he hydrologic cycle which men did not recognize until 2,000 years after Solomon made this statement. For example, the Mississippi River pours approximately 600,000 gallon of water per second in the Gulf of Mexico. The water from the gulf evaporates into clouds which then blow over the land and drop the water back into the Mississippi (Thompson, 1981, np). How else could Solomon have known about the hydrologic cycle if he did not receive Divine inspiration? In Psalm 8:8, David speaks of the “paths of the sea.” In the 19th century a man was read Psalm 8:8 while on his sick bed. That man was Matthew Fountain Maury. After hearing the passage read, Maury determined to find the paths in the sea of which David spoke. He discovered that the oceans were circulation as the result of interaction between the wind and the water which cause currents that flowed from continent to continent. These currents have become shipping lanes. In the U.S. Navel Academy text, “Matthew Fountain Maury, Pathfinder of the Seas,” it describes how Maury simply “took God at His word” (Thompson, 1981, np). How could David have known about the “paths in the sea” 3,000 years before they were discovered by modern scientific means? David had to have had inspired knowledge from the one who created the paths in the sea.

Only a few of the many remarkable accurate scientific statements found in the Bible have been mentioned. These statements prove, beyond a shadow of a doubt, that the writers of the Bible received special, miraculous knowledge concerning the world around them. There is no possible that these ancient writers could have known these scientific truths unless a Divine Being revealed to them. One must conclude that the Bible is the divine revelation from God and that it contains God’s ambition for man.

                                                                                                                                                - Brett Rutherford

References

Thompson, Bert. The History of Evolutionary Thought (Star Bible and Tract Corp, Fort Worth, TX, 1981)