No Rivalry in Reality: Why Science and Christianity Are Not Enemies
The popular narrative that science and Christianity are at war is a fiction—one kept alive more by ideological presuppositions than by historical evidence or philosophical coherence. In truth, the Christian worldview uniquely provides the metaphysical foundation, intellectual justification, and moral framework that makes scientific inquiry not only possible but profoundly meaningful.
Scripture proclaims that “The earth is the Lord’s and the fullness thereof” (Ps. 24:1), which means all domains of truth—including physics, biology, and astronomy—fall under God’s sovereign rule. For the Christian, the pursuit of science is not an act of rebellion but of reverent investigation, a form of intellectual worship offered to the Creator of all.
Theological Architecture of Scientific Inquiry
Long before modern empiricism emerged, the Christian worldview had already laid the groundwork for science by affirming the world’s orderliness and intelligibility. God is not an abstract force or a deistic absentee. He is the triune Creator, who brought all things into being by His Word (Gen. 1; John 1:3) and who continues to sustain them by His providence (Col. 1:17; Heb. 1:3).
John Calvin affirmed that creation itself is “a sort of mirror in which we can contemplate God,” noting that the world is “full of innumerable evidences of God’s power, wisdom, and goodness.”¹ Calvin saw no conflict between scientific observation and divine revelation. Instead, he emphasized that properly interpreted, nature leads one to awe and reverence for its Maker.
This view continued with later theologians such as Herman Bavinck, who insisted that “God’s revelation in nature and in Scripture are not contradictory, for God is the Author of both.”² In this framework, scientific endeavor becomes a form of “thinking God’s thoughts after Him,” as Kepler famously said.³ The cosmos reflects a rational order because it proceeds from a rational, personal God.
Sovereignty and the Laws of Nature
What modern science often describes as “natural laws” are, in truth, the regular and faithful operations of divine providence. The world is not governed by impersonal mechanisms but by the personal and covenantal faithfulness of God. This is what allows science to be a stable discipline: not because nature is autonomous, but because it is upheld by the One who “does not change like shifting shadows” (James 1:17).
As R.C. Sproul put it, “If there is one single molecule in this universe running around loose, totally free of God’s sovereignty, then we have no guarantee that a single promise of God will ever be fulfilled.”⁴ This applies just as fully to atoms and planetary systems as it does to history and salvation.
Scientific regularity, therefore, is not a brute fact—it is the observable footprint of God’s covenantal order. The cause-and-effect predictability that science depends on exists precisely because God governs creation with consistency and purpose.
The Image of God and the Intellectual Mandate
Science assumes that human beings can observe, understand, and interpret the world in a meaningful way. But why should this be so?
Scripture answers: we are created in the image of God (Gen. 1:26–28). This imago Dei includes rationality, creativity, and the capacity to know truth. According to Cornelius Van Til, fallen man suppresses the truth in unrighteousness (Rom. 1:18), yet even in rebellion, he cannot escape the image in which he was made.⁵ The unbeliever may use reason, but he cannot justify it apart from God.
Alvin Plantinga sharpens this critique in epistemological terms, arguing that naturalistic evolution is self-defeating: if our minds are simply survival machines shaped by blind processes, there’s no reason to trust them for discovering truth.⁶ In contrast, the Christian knows that reason is a gift of God, and thus, the scientific enterprise is not only justified—it is accountable to divine authority.
When Conflict Arises: Interpreting Nature and Scripture
Much of the supposed tension between science and Christianity arises from errors in interpretation—either of nature or of Scripture. Christians affirm that God has given us two “books”: the book of nature (general revelation) and the book of Scripture (special revelation). Because God is the Author of both, they cannot truly contradict.
The conflict, then, is not between facts but between worldviews. As Herman Bavinck wrote, “There is no war between faith and science as such; the war is between belief in a personal God and belief in a self-sufficient cosmos.”⁷
This is vividly illustrated in the Galileo affair, often misrepresented as a triumph of science over dogma. In truth, the conflict was fueled more by ecclesiastical politics and premature interpretation than by true theological opposition to empirical observation.⁸
The Scientist’s Dilemma: Jastrow’s “Bad Dream”
A telling admission comes from agnostic astrophysicist Robert Jastrow. In reflecting on the theological implications of Big Bang cosmology, he wrote:
“For the scientist who has lived by his faith in the power of reason, the story ends like a bad dream. He has scaled the mountains of ignorance; he is about to conquer the highest peak; and as he pulls himself over the final rock, he is greeted by a band of theologians who have been sitting there for centuries.”⁹
Jastrow’s remark, though tongue-in-cheek, captures the reality: scientific inquiry, when honest, leads not away from God but toward the threshold of theology. The further we delve into the fabric of the universe, the more clearly we see the fingerprints of divine design.
Science as Worship: All Truth Is God’s Truth
Christian theology asserts that truth is unified in God. There is not one kind of truth for faith and another for science. All truth belongs to the One who is Truth (John 14:6). As such, science rightly pursued becomes a form of worship.
Psalm 111:2 declares, “Great are the works of the Lord, studied by all who delight in them.” Scientific inquiry, then, is not secular. It is sacred. It is a calling to study the works of God with rigor, humility, and praise.
As Abraham Kuyper so beautifully said, “There is not a square inch in the whole domain of our human existence over which Christ, who is Sovereign over all, does not cry, ‘Mine!’”¹⁰ That includes the laboratory, the observatory, and the lecture hall.
Conclusion: No Rivalry in Reality
The divide between science and Christianity is not real. It is a phantom born of philosophical naturalism and historical misunderstanding. True science and true theology both flow from the same Source, and both are directed to the same end: the glory of God.
Christians need not fear what honest science will discover. Indeed, we should celebrate every advance in knowledge that reveals more of God's majesty. For in the end, whether through microscope or telescope, all creation sings: “The heavens declare the glory of God” (Ps. 19:1).
Footnotes
John Calvin, Institutes of the Christian Religion, trans. Henry Beveridge (Peabody: Hendrickson, 2008), 1.5.1.
Herman Bavinck, Reformed Dogmatics, vol. 1, ed. John Bolt, trans. John Vriend (Grand Rapids: Baker Academic, 2003), 311.
Johannes Kepler, The Secret of the Universe (New York: Abaris Books, 1981), 93.
R.C. Sproul, Chosen by God (Wheaton: Tyndale House, 1986), 26.
Cornelius Van Til, The Defense of the Faith (Phillipsburg, NJ: P&R Publishing, 2008), 98–99.
Alvin Plantinga, Where the Conflict Really Lies: Science, Religion, and Naturalism (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2011), 311.
Herman Bavinck, Reformed Dogmatics, vol. 1, 310.
Ronald L. Numbers, Galileo Goes to Jail and Other Myths About Science and Religion (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 2009), 2–3.
Robert Jastrow, God and the Astronomers, 2nd ed. (New York: W.W. Norton, 1992), 116.
Abraham Kuyper, Lectures on Calvinism (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1931), 488.