Q. One of things I most appreciate about your book is that you take seriously the historical substance of the text of Genesis (and other Biblical texts) without compromising on the science. Science, in the first place was practiced all the way back to Galileo, Copernicus, Newton etc. by Christians. It is thus hard to understand to some degree the animus about science in general among many devout Christians, even to the point of rejecting helpful vaccines during a pandemic. It’s tragic. Do you think groups like BioLogos and others are helping remedy this problem in the Christian church? I frankly don’t find the Ark Encounter folks, or some of the Answer in Genesis folks all that helpful. Their apologetics, both anti-evolution and young earth thinking neither comport with what the Bible actually speaks to and speaks about, nor does it comport with science as practiced by many devout Christians. As you have noted, you can’t deduce the age of the earth or even of humanity from genealogies that are clearly partial, segmented, and deliberately selective, even the one in Mt. 1 is that way.
A. Most of us, it seems, want to find ways to understand Scripture faithfully alongside mainstream science. It really does look like the earth is old, and that humans and the great apes share ancestors. With care and courage, the Church needs to reckon these realities of how God created the world. Answers in Genesis presents an alternate version of science, one that most scientists reject. For all their fervor, they will never have the credibility of mainstream science. BioLogos is an organization that has done a lot of good. They certainly endeavor to encourage a better relationship with mainstream science. But real dialogue has been difficult for them. I had hoped they would transparently correct their mistakes, perhaps even apologize. Unfortunately, this is not going to happen. In this way, they have done real damage too. Going forward, it will be difficult for many Christians to trust them. Assessing the relative impact of the good and bad is difficult.
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