Without question, this is the great mystery of our faith: Christ was revealed in a human body and vindicated by the Spirit. (I Timothy 3:16a NLT)

The incarnate Christ will always be a mystery. The Bible is not a science textbook.  It reveals God to us, yet, authentic faith and pure science are never contradictory.

The great commentator Matthew Henry once wrote, “Christianity is a mystery that could not have been discovered by reason or the light of nature, because it is beyond reason, though not contrary to it.”  Faith in God’s revelation to man, the Bible, reveals God to us.  Science does not explain God to us, but it does confirm his existence.  In the early part of the church-age, Christianity and science worked together to reveal the truth.  What happened?  The church has to take at least part of the responsibility for the split.  The church started to make scientific observations based on what they believed the Bible said, such as the Earth is the center of the universe. 

The Bible was never intended to be scientific in nature. The Bible was written in poetic language as we view things from the earth.  The sun does not move around the planet as it appears, but vice versa. Science picked up on this and has mostly written off religion ever since.  The estrangement has only become wider and wider.

Scripture, improperly interpreted is not a good science teacher, nor is science a great theologian, yet if both are correctly exercised, they can be complementary and not contradictory. If we as Christians would speak to the unbelieving scientific world a little more by reason, maybe they would be a bit more open to hearing about the mystery of Christ.

I worked for seventeen years as a missionary with Youth With A Mission.  My missionary work has taken me to Mexico, Canada, Chile, Argentina, Bolivia, Spain, and Ukraine.  I hold a Masters of Education in curriculum and instruction from Virginia Commonwealth University.  [email protected]