Alfred Lord Tennyson wrote a poem called In Memoriam A.H.H. which reveals the tension between what Scripture says about God and what nature seems to reveal. The poem is famous for the statement that although Scripture says God is love, nature is “red in tooth and claw.”

Tennyson wants to know how we can get Scripture and Nature to agree on what God is like.

In Canto 54 he states that he is like a baby trying to find the truth, but all he can do is cry out wordlessly. How do you speak to God or to Nature if you are not sure either is listening?

So runs my dream, but what am I?
An infant crying in the night
An infant crying for the light
And with no language but a cry.

In Canto 56, Tennyson states that what he sees in Nature is not love and peace, but blood and death. Nature seems to scream against the teachings of Scripture that God is love.

Who trusted God was love indeed
And love Creation’s final law
Tho’ Nature, red in tooth and claw
With ravine, shriek’d against his creed.

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Below is a brief summary of my class notes from Seminary on Special Revelation. Remember, in theology, all revelation comes from God in two broad forms, General Revelation and Special Revelation.

Special Revelation Defined

Special Revelation is the acts of God whereby He makes Himself and His truth known at specific times and to specific people.

Special Revelation comes in various forms.

Personal Experience

Some people have visions, see dreams, receive visits from angels, or hear an inner voice. There are numerous examples of this in Scripture, and it still happens to some people today. But these are “personal” since they rarely happen to groups of people.

Miracles

Miracles can reveal the nature, presence, and power of God. There have been three major periods of miracles in history, during the ministry of Moses, the ministry of Elijah, and the ministry of Jesus and the Early Church.
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Over the last several posts, I neglected to review and summarize my seminary class notes, which is supposed to be a part of this series on theology. When I first introduced “Divine Revelation” last week, I forgot to open my notes and look at them until today.

So here is a summary of the class notes on General Revelation. Tomorrow I will post the class notes on Special Revelation.

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General Revelation is accessible and available to all. It comes from God in various forms:

The World of Nature

It can tell us about the existence of God, including His power, greatness, supremacy, wisdom, and goodness (cf. Psa 19:1-4; Rom 1:18-28).

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When science and scripture disagree, there are three options: We can reject science, reject Scripture, or find a way to fit the two together.

I am of the third opinion, but with some qualifications.

Scripture and Nature

First, despite my post yesterday, we must recognize that the debate is not exactly between Scripture and Science. Scripture is raw data, but science is not. Science is the interpretation of the raw data that is found in nature. The real comparisons are between Scripture and Nature. The interpretation of the data of Scripture leads to theology, and the interpretation of data of Nature leads to Science.

So we can never really say that Science contradicts Scripture. It doesn’t. Nature and Scripture cannot disagree, because both are simply the pools of data from which Science and Theology come. When Science and theology are at odds, it is only because one or the other has misinterpreted and misunderstood the data.

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