Sermon Notes

Dave Schmelzer, the scholar-preacher who leads the Greater Boston Vineyard in Cambridge, Mass., has a recent sermon entitled 'Does Serious Science Help or Hurt My Serious Faith?" Unfortunately, in the two days since I downloaded the sermon their main website has been entirely re-vamped and it seems their podcast isn't quite up to speed yet. I'll link to it when its back up.

Essentially, Schmelzer poses the question of whether the perceived conflict between science and faith has any meat to it. Using quotes from scientists such as Richard Dawkins, Francis Collins, Stephen Hawking, and other scientists from his own congregation, he makes two conclusions. One is that science actually draws us toward faith and suggests that Scripture actually promotes scientific investigation through passages such as Psalm 19.

On the other hand, as one of his interviewees points out, science and faith do come into conflict when they compete for the same historical story. The question for the faithful then becomes, how do I remain faithful to the authority of scripture and tradition while also being faithful to what science is revealing? The tension isn't always easy to resolve and in my opinion the church has always done a bad job resolving it.

Schmelzer concludes with some vague suggestions about how evolution and biblical authority do not conflict, pointing out that one of the fathers of American Christian fundamentalism, B. B. Warfield, believed Darwinian evolution to be correct. He also includes what could be interpreted as a slight jab at Intelligent Design, though those words are never mentioned. Rather, he simply quotes Proverbs 19:2: "It is not good to have zeal without knowledge."