Arizona republican., 1908-06-22
TO INCREASE FAITH
AND DISPEL DOUBT
Geology and the Bible the Subject of
Rev. n. M. Campbei's Sermon Yes
terday at First Presbyterian Church.

Yesterday morning, June 21st, the
pastor, Rev. H. M. Campbell, preached
on the theme, Geology and the Bible"
using as text Genesis l. in the be-
ginning God created the heaven and
the EARTH Following is an abstract
from the sermon. ,
1.-The purpose of this sermon Is to
increase the faith of some and to dis
pei the doubts of others. There is far
too much of q tendency to feel that
there is conflict between science and
the word of the living God and that
science has the mastery. / am dis
posed to say that there is no conflict
between the established truths of
science and the Bible.
l;-There is such thing as science,
falsely so-called! Science is real
knowledge. There is a very great deal
that is passing for science that is very
far from being science in the true sense
of the word. Much that is passing for
science is mere presumption-guess
work. Let one demonstration of this
fact suffice. A few years ago it was
universally accepted as an unquestion-
able truth of science that our earth is
and has long been a cooling contract
ing mass. Here come the most emf
nent scientists of our day and say that
such theory is absolutely unscientif-
| ic
THE Bible does not profess to be a
book of science. Even should the word
of the living God present apparent
scientific Inconsistencies, that would
not imperil it's power. That a book
on mathematics may contain gram
matical errors does not prove that it is
not a good book -on mathematics. The
letter of a little child has no less of
love in it because of the mispelled
words and rhetorical errors in it. So,
If, in the Bible there are words that
do not harmonic with what we know
as scientific truth, they do not invali-
date the Bible. Had the Bible been
written in the scientific language of
the days of Moses, of our own day,
or. of the world two thousand years
from now, who could have understood
it? We cannot conceive of the Bible
being given us as a scientific writing.
God inspired Moses to write the open
ing chapters of Genesis in the simple
language that the people of that and
every age could understand.
IF the Bible is true and if science
is true, there can, in the end, be no
conflict Men today, instead of saying
sneeringly as they did a few years
ago: dig and bore in the solid earth
and you will find that He who made it
was mistaken as to its age are be-
ginning to think that He who founded
it knew more than they. The estimates
of scientists as to the probable age of
the world vary as much as those set
forth by Bible students. With the ad-
vance of geology, the opposition that
has seemed to exist between it and
Genesis has begun to disappear.
There is wonderful agreement be-
tween Genesis and geology. Science
does not try to tell whence all things
came. She begins to guess that the
time was when all things were not as
they are now. Where science does not
speak, Moses comes out boldly saying,
In the beginning God created literal
w. He made out of nothing Darwin
said, Life originally was breathed by
the Creator into a few forms or into
one
'sThe Bible and science agree on the
statement that there was light before
Time was when so-called scientists |
thought they had found a woful blum |
der on the part of Moses when he tells |
of light before the creation of the |
heavenly lights. Today science brings |
to light the remains of plants which she !
confidently affirms could not have |
grown in the light of our own sun.
Again the Bible and science agree |
as to the order of the appearance of !
the different forms of life on the EARTH |
They agree perfectly from the appear |
ance of the lowest forms of life on up !
the scale to man. The agreement is |
more than a mere general likeness; it |
is definite and any who will may fol-
low 1t through
Il feel quite sure in my own mind |
that we have allowed ourselves to DE |
led away by science. falsely so-called' |
If we know the author of the. Book, |
there will be little trouble in our be-
lieving it. He will help us to believe |
tho E(ank