InterVarsity’s Emerging Scholars Blog recently posted two reviews of Abraham Kuyper’s Wisdom and Wonder: Common Grace in Science and Art, one from Dan Jesse, the other from David Carlson.
Carlson nicely summarizes some of the book’s key implications for the life of the believer:
One does not need to do Christian science or Christian art to be a faithful Christian in those domains. One needs to do good science or good art. Yet, science and art are powerful tools that come without a clear moral compass or centering integration. A believer ought to do art or science in a way that is truly integrated by means of Special Grace.
Jesse focuses a bit more on Kuyper’s discussion of science, concluding that rejecting science “would be a rejection of God”:
What we need to judge, Kuyper concludes, is whether or not science has its starting point with the spirit of the world or with the Spirit of God. The former will always lead us to destruction and the latter towards greater knowledge of our Creator.
When it is all said and done, Kuyper leaves us with a framework to judge science from. We are not to reject science, as that would be a rejection of God. We should not discount science, as it can inform our world. We should not try to proof-text science, and make sure that it conforms with a literal view of scripture, as this would be doing both scripture and science a disservice. Kuyper’s section on science…seems to be calling out to us today. It is issuing forth a call that needs to be heeded by the church. We need to embrace and embody science.
For more, see Wisdom & Wonder: Common Grace in Science & Art.
Also, look for Part 1 of Volume 1 of Kuyper’s Common Grace, coming soon from Christian’s Library Press.
