“In the beginning,” Genesis declares, “God created the heavens and the earth.” In contrast with other origin accounts, Genesis presents a sovereign God whose speech creates a good, beautiful, and ordered world.

But how does Genesis, this “primitive” text, relate to the claims of modern science? Is Genesis to be read as divinely revealed science eons ahead of its time? Is it, alternatively, limited to the religious realm, disinterested in the claims of physical reality and primarily concerned with godliness? Or, do Genesis and modern scientific evidence share overlapping claims to authority, and if so, how are we to understand the apparent conflicts?

All sorts of modern, evangelical concerns exude within these tightly compact questions: belief in God, the authority of Scripture, suspicion of science and the secular world. More basic to Christian life and thought, we simply want to hear God’s word rightly and respond to him faithfully. Beginning with the beginning, the first year of the Creation Project looks carefully at Genesis and its claims about the origin, order, and purpose of creation.

Fall Semester

Kevin Vanhoozer (Scripture & Ministry), “Shining Light on Literality: From the Literal Interpretation of Genesis to the Doctrine of Literal Six-day Creation: A Dogmatic Account (and Critique)” | Learn More

Mickey Mattox (Scripture & Ministry), “What Human Eyes Could See: Martin Luther’s Natural Theology” | Learn More

Todd Beall, Tremper Longman, and John Oswalt (Trinity Symposium), “History, Science, Poetry, or What? Understanding the Genre(s) of Genesis 1 – 3” | Learn More

George Marsden (Edwards & the Church), “Jonathan Edwards and the Scientific Revolution” | Learn More

Spring Semester

Sandra Richter (Scripture & Ministry), “The Servant, the Idol, & the Image of God: Isaiah’s Conversation with the Creation Account” | Learn More

William Barrick, Peter Leithart, and Richard Hess (Trinity Symposium), “And the Genealogies Begat Controversies: History and Theology in the Biblical Genealogies” | Learn More

Reiner Smolinski, (Trinity Symposium), “The Queen of Science and the Handmaiden to Theology: Cotton Mather and Jonathan Edwards on Natural Philosophy and Noah’s Flood” | Learn More

Michael Allen (Scripture & Ministry), “Into the Family of God: Creation, Covenant, and the Genesis of Life with God” | Learn More

In the Works

John Collins and TBD (Trinity Debate), “Genesis, Biblical Authority, and the Age of the Earth”

Kevin Vanhoozer and Peter Leithart (Trinity Symposium), “On the Future of Protestantism”

* To learn about new events or changes in the schedule throughout the year, follow henrycenter.org or subscribe to the e-newsletter.