More Than Meets the Eye (ePub)

Misunderstandings of biblical creation texts have resulted from a lack of appreciation of the cultural context of the inspired writers. Views of nature have changed greatly over history. At the time of ancient Israel, people gazed up to the star-studded firmament that separated the "waters above" from the "waters below" and the land. Land was bounded by sea which merged with the "waters above" at the horizon.

The universe was close and intimate. Pagan peoples believed gods occupied this realm and accounted for much of observed cause and effect. Biblical writers also viewed nature in this context. However, they were distinctly monotheistic writing of a supreme God who made and gave meaning to everything.

God chose a covenant relationship with a select people. This relationship was based on belief in God (faith). Fast-forward through many twists and turns of intellectual history, and we come to the modern scientific age. We picture our home as a spherical planet rotating once a day and orbiting the sun yearly. We gaze out at a vast space seeing distant suns (the stars) and enormous collections of stars (galaxies). Light travels at a known speed; thus, astronomers peer back to times billions of years in the past. We need to avoid concordism, conflating modern views with the biblical text. The concordism error has occurred throughout church history up to the present.

The book addresses this as well as some discoveries of modern science that were unknown to ancient people. Such discoveries give us good reason to bow in awe before the Creator. Even though mankind's views of nature have greatly changed with time, the message of the Bible is the same. We come to God through faith as did Abraham who saw "more than meets the eye."