The article of mine to which I have referred actually began its life as an
evening service message for the church that I planted in Spokane, Washington.
It came about 2 months into a series I was doing on doctrine. In it I presented
the standard Young Earth view and the Day-Age view, and explained (as simply as
I could) why I didn't find the arguments for either to be particularly
compelling (the arguments against day-age is basically linguistic, the arguments
against young-earth are more complex, but include respect for scientific
disciplines and rejection of the claim that this is the only true-to-the-Bible
approach [it helps that some prominent people in my denomination's heritage were
not young earthers, e.g. Charles Hodge, Francis Schaeffer]).
I expected more friction than I actually encountered. I suppose several things
helped: (1) I think I had won the trust of the people, in terms of commitment to
the Bible; (2) we usually allowed time for questions after the Sun pm message,
& that night's questions were lively; (3) I didn't do what some do &
anathematise those who disagree; (4) many people are willing to see science
more positively, if a reasonable presentation of an alternative is available.
A friend of mine is a science teacher at a new Christian high school (he
insisted that he would not teach a young earth, & the sponsoring pastor is right
behind him) & presents Bible & science lectures at a number of churches. I'll
try to get him to talk about his experience, & I'll see if he has any ideas on
"good" science materials for young people, too. I have recently got a used copy
of Jim Brooks, _Origins of life_ (Lion, 1985); does anyone have an opinion on
it?
Jack Collins