Yeah, it happened:

1 And the Pharisees and Sadducees came, and to test him they asked him to show them a sign from heaven. 2 He answered them, “When it is evening, you say, ‘It will be fair weather, for the sky is red.’ 3 And in the morning, ‘It will be stormy today, for the sky is red and threatening.’ You know how to interpret the appearance of the sky, but you cannot interpret the signs of the times. 4 An evil and adulterous generation seeks for a sign, but no sign will be given to it except the sign of Jonah.” So he left them and departed.  (Matthew 16-ish)

Jesus found it pretty inconsistent that the Pharisees and Sadducees had some understanding of how the natural world works, but couldn’t apply that same logic and analysis to their understanding of the place they were at on the scriptural calendar.   In other words:  knowing how to interpret the natural world – what today we would consider scientific observation – should be a parallel to and HELP, not hinder, our ability to understand the scriptures and spiritual things.

Some of the early church fathers (most notably Augustine) understood other scriptures AND from the world around them that Genesis was not a literal account of the creation of the world – and they did not have modern science – not the theory of evolution, nor genetics, nor biology, nor archaeology, nor carbon dating, to make this suggestion to them.   Now that we do have all these things, it is not wrong to allow them to influence us away from particular scientifically-untenable interpretations of Genesis – as well as to note that scripture itself contains clues that it is able to be and often should be read non-literally.   (More on that in future posts.)

physics-140901_640“You know how to read the human genome, you know how to date human remains, you know how to use nuclear energy and therefore understand radiometric dating, and travel in outer space, yet you cannot perceive that Genesis is not literal history?”

Ok, it’s not a verse, but, there is some rationale for the paraphrase, methinks.

Other useful reading:
Reading Scripture in Light of Modern Science (from ICAST)

http://www.reasons.org/articles/coming-to-grips-with-the-early-church-fathers-perspective-on-genesis-part-1-of-5

http://biologos.org/common-questions/biblical-interpretation/early-interpretations-of-genesis