The Bible does not treat natural explanation and divine intervention as mutually exclusive. Rather, it often blends these two kinds of explanations, portraying God as sovereign over nature and free to use His laws to accomplish His purposes.

Historic moments in the conversation about beginnings

Adventists and creation go together like jam and bread, but things were not always this way.

Does the Big Bang Theory integrate directly with the biblical cosmogony? Should individual Christians feel intellectually obligated to adopt and defend the Big Bang Theory? Article published on Perspective Digest, v.24/4.

The denial of miracles is a recent phenomenon based on how modernity has chosen to understand the workings of nature and what is possible in it. Belief in a personal God (theism), however, argues that through God’s actions, an event that is naturally impossible can be transformed into a real historical event. This article was originally published in Perspective Digest, v. 24/2.

Ancient Near Eastern views should be considered part of the history of the idea of evolution. The biblical Creation account, in describing the divine actions through which God actually brought the cosmos into existence, was likely deconstructing the alternative theories or speculations of origins available in the Ancient Near East. Consequently, the biblical narrative can be used as well to deconstruct contemporary cosmogonies and evolution. This article was originally published on Perspective Digest, v.24/3.

Why are we trying to find extraterrestrial intelligence, using our intelligence, while at the same time precluding the possibility that an intelligence was involved in the origin of our world?

How can some people be so certain about evolution, while others, with the same certainty, deny it? Part of the answer can, in broad terms, be boiled down to the difference between what is seen and what is not seen. More specifically, and in the context of evolution itself, this disparity arises from the difference between microevolution and macroevolution. What are these two concepts, and how does the difference between them help explain much of the controversy surrounding the theory of evolution? This article was published on the August 2019 issue of Signs of the Times.

A living being is more than the collection of the multitude of organic components of which it is made.

October 31, 2017 marked 500 years since Martin Luther strode through the crisp autumn air of Wittenberg’s streets, making his way toward the Castle Church. Clutched in his hand were nails, a hammer and a revolutionary document.

With the scientific knowledge we currently have of nature, is it still reasonable to believe in miracles?

In a world drowning in information, there is an even stronger search for ultimate truth. It seems the information age expects each of us to sort out misleading advertisements, internet “facts”, and professionally perpetrated misinformation in our own attempts to determine what is true.

Published in Jiří Moskala, ed., Meeting with God on the Mountains: Essays in Honor of Richard M. Davidson (Berrien Springs, MI: Old Testament Department, Seventh-day Adventist Theological Society, Andrews University, 2016), 683-718.

In 1813, French geologist Alexandre Brongniart published a paper on the mineralogical classification of rocks where he introduced the new name “ophiolite” for a suite of dark rocks rich in the mineral serpentine. The name was coined from the Greek words for “snake” and “rock,” which seemed fitting, given the smooth dark green appearance of ophiolites, vaguely reminiscent of snake-skin.

This point cannot be overestimated. Galileo wasn’t fighting against the Bible, but against an interpretation of the Bible dominated by the prevailing scientific dogma, which for centuries had been Aristotelianism.

There is no simple clear definition of what life is. This is appropriate as life is a wonderful, complex, beautiful, enigmatic phenomenon that defies any effort to over-simplify it. Still, most people have no difficulty recognizing living things and differentiating them from non-living things.

The scientific method uses inductive reasoning to generate theories that explain data. Deductive reasoning is used to generate testable hypotheses that must be true if a theory is true. When the hypothesis is tested, it may fit well with the new data generated, thus supporting the theory (but not proving it true). If the hypothesis is inconsistent with data, then the theory is inconsistent with data…

There are still some rules that we have to follow if we are to do any science, including biology. The first is that empirical data is the authoritative test of all ideas in science.

Biology is the scientific study of life. But what is “science?” And what is “life?” Most of us use these words all the time and have a general idea of what we mean by them, however, it is common for scientists themselves to not have a clear understanding of what science is and this is not as surprising as it sounds. Philosophers of science struggle to define their own area of study, with different…

Suppose we consider science to be a game. What are the rules of the game, and what difference would this approach make? Published in Origins, n.. 64.