Jamin Bradley

Many Christians are insistent that God created the world exactly as described in Genesis 1 and that if you question this, you’re not saved. But this argument is inconsistent, for no one actually holds to the creation story as it’s written—everyone adds some level of science to its account. Ancient people had a mythological understanding of the world, and Genesis 1 describes our planet as an air pocket in the middle of an ocean. They believed that God split the ocean in half, stretched it into the sky, and then installed a dome-like ceiling to stop the waters from caving back in on us. From the Bible’s perspective, the world was flat—and if you went all the way to the ends of the ocean, you’d crash into the bottom of this dome.

As scientific-minded moderns, we know that the ancient flat earth perspective is an entirely inaccurate understanding of the cosmos. Christians who hold to Genesis 1 happening exactly as it’s written agree with this, which is why the debate falls apart from the beginning. Ultimately, they don’t want you to agree with the creation story as it is, but they want you to agree to the creation story with their scientific disclaimers. This conversation is further complicated when you recognize that there are different creation stories in the Bible. Genesis 1 and 2 have different creation orders. Furthermore, Psalms 74 and 89 show the world being created as God destroys monsters, a creation motif that other ancient cultures often used.

We have spent a lot of energy arguing this debate over the years, which is sad because ancient creation stories have so much to offer us regarding theology and identity. We have missed many of the main points of the opening pages of the Bible because of this.

God is the author of science, and we don’t need to be afraid of it. Christian evolutionists (such as myself) claim that though God could create the world via supernatural means, the evidence seems to say that he did so in more of a scientific way. This is not incompatible with a proper understanding of how to read the Bible.