OceanSide church of Christ

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THE BIBLE AND SCIENCE

 

Lake Forest VBS

7-12-16

Victor M. Eskew

 

INTRODUCTION

 

A.     T – F    The Bible is inspired of God.

 

1.       II Timothy 3:16

 

All Scripture is given by inspiration of God…

 

2.       What does this mean? (I Cor. 2:9-13, John 7:16; Matt. 10:27, Mark 13:11; II Thess. 2:15)

 

But was it is written, Eye hath not seen, nor ear heard, neither have entered into the heart of man, the things which the Lord hath prepared for them that love him.  But God hath revealed them unto us by his Spirit:  for the Spirit searcheth all things, yea, the deep things of God.  For what man knoweth the things of a man, save the spirit of man which is in him?  Even so the things of God knoweth no man, but the Spirit of God.  Now we have received, not the spirit of the world, but the Spirit which is of God; that we might know the things that are freely given to us of God.  Which things also we speak, not in the words which man’s wisdom teacheth, but which the Holy Ghost teacheth comparing spiritual things with spiritual.

 

B.     If the Bible is the inspired Word of the living God, a God of all knowledge and all wisdom, then there would not be one error found in the pages of the Bible.

 

C.     What is the Bible’s purpose?  The Bible is designed to save the souls of lost men and women (Ps. 19:7; Rom. 1:16-17; I Tim. 4:16; Tit. 2:11-12).

 

D.    What the Bible is not.

1.       The Bible is not a history book, although it records historical events.

2.       The Bible is not a geography book, although it makes geographical statements.

3.       The Bible is not a literature book, although it contains some of greatest literature ever written.

4.       NOTE:  Even though the Bible is not a history book a geography book, or a literature book, if it is inspired of God, then it is accurate in all of these things.

 

E.      The Bible is not a science book, but whenever it mentions any type of scientific information it is accurate.

 

I.             STATEMENTS FROM THE LESSON

 

A.     Moses penned the most advanced flawless medical prescriptions that had ever been recorded.

 

B.     The modern-day reader would not want to be a patient in an ancient Egyptians clinic!

 

C.     But to the Europeans in the middle-nineteenth century, germs were virtually a foreign concept.  They never had seen a germ, much less predict its destructive potential.

 

D.    In light of the fact that the entire OT contains medical practices that would still be useful in third world countries, with a hint of error to a single prescription.

 

II.           THE BACKGROUND OF THEE BIBLE WRITERS

 

A.     Abraham

1.       He was raised in Ur, a land of idol worshipers (Josh. 24:2).

2.       He was a herdsman (Gen. 13:2).

 

B.     Moses

1.       He was well trained in “all the wisdom of the Egyptians” (Acts 7:22).

2.       A herdsman (Exo. 2:16, 21, 3:1).

 

C.     David

1.       A shepherd lad (I Sam. 16:11).

2.       A musician (I Sam. 16:27)

3.       A military man (I Sam. 18:5)

4.       A king (II Sam. 2:7).

 

D.    NOTE:  Note one of these men, other than Moses, would have had any training in the field of medicine.

1.       Note, however, “The Egyptians were renown in the ancient world for their progress in the field of medicine” (22).

2.       Egypt was the medical center of the ancient world.

3.       The Medo-Persian kings kept certain Egyptian doctors on their staffs because they had a reputation for the highest eminence in their profession.

 

III.         MEDICAL PRACTICES OF OLD

 

A.     Medical prescriptions of the Egyptians.

1.       Splinters in the flesh:  a remedy consisting of worm blood, mole and donkey dung (NOTE:  Many patients with a splinter died of lockjaw).

2.       Skin diseases:  A hog’s tooth, cat’s dung, dog dung, aau-of-samu-oil, berries-of-the-xet-plant, pound and apply as poultice.

3.       They used opium, squill (the bulb of a sea onion), and other vegetable substances, but also excrement and urine (Ex., the urine of a faithful wife was effective in the treatment of sore eyes).

4.       They also believed in the idea of “good and laudable pus,” that is, infection itself in the treatment of wounds. 

 

B.     Vienna, Austria (1847)

1.       18% of the pregnant women who checked into the medical ward never checked out.  That is 1 in 6.

2.       One of the doctors, Ignaz Semmelweis, did all he could do to curb the carnage.

a.       Turned women on their sides

b.      He thought that the bell the priest rang late at night might be scaring the women.

3.       “Each day the students would perform autopsies on the dead mothers.  Then they would rinse their hands in a bowl of bloody water, wipe them off on a common, shared towel, and immediately begin internal examinations of the still-living women” (24).

4.       Remember:  “But to Europeans in the middle-nineteenth-century, germs were virtually a foreign concept.

5.       Eventually, Semmelweis had everyone in his ward to wash his or her hands thoroughly in a chlorine solution after every examination.  The death rate fell from 18% to 1% in three months.

 

IV.         THE BIBLE

 

A.     Purification after touching the dead (Num. 19:11-12)

 

He that toucheth the dead body of any man shall be unclean seven days.  He shall purify himself with it on the third day, and on the seventh day he shall be clean:  but if he purify not himself the third day, then the seventh day he shall not be clean.

 

1.       Notice the emphasis on purification.

2.       Question:  How did this herdsman know about purification?  Remember, he was trained in “all the wisdom of the Egyptians.”

 

B.     Circumcision

1.       We now know the benefits of circumcision.

a.       It lessens one’s change of getting certain diseases and infections.  Urinary infections are 10 to 10 times higher in uncircumcised men.

b.      Eliminates the chances of penile cancer.

2.       The eighth day is the best day for circumcision to be carried out.

a.       The book, Holt Pediatrics, first written in 1896 and revised until the year 1953, is a master compilation of ‘modern’ medicine of its day.  It notes that the secret to successful circumcision involves the level of prothrombin in the body.

b.      Levels

1)       Day 1:  90%

2)       Days 2-3:  drops to 35%

3)       Day 8:  110% (20% higher than on day one and more than at any other time in the child’s life.

c.       Prothrombin keeps the body from hemorrhaging.

3.       Question:  Could Abraham (a primitive, desert-dwelling nomad) have known this?

a.       To know it would have involved careful examination of thousands of circumcisions.

b.      Abraham was childless for many years of his life.

 

C.     The wonders of the physical body (Ps. 139:14)

 

I will praise thee; for I am fearfully and wonderfully made:  marvelous are thy works; and that my soul knoweth right well.

 

1.       What did David know about the intricacies of the human body?

2.       David was not a surgeon, a neurologist, a research scientist.  He only observed what the body could to with his human eyes.  That was enough to impress him.

3.       Now the things we know is unbelievable.

a.       There are 11 or 12 major systems in the body

b.      There are very intricate body parts:  the eye, the ear, the heart

4.       Since David lived, we have learned just how wonderful and marvelous the body is.

 

CONCLUSION

 

A.     There is only one way to account for the scientific accuracy of the Bible.  God was revealing these things to these men.

 

B.     The Bible contains medical information that is far ahead of its time.  “The most reasonable cause of this is that the Bible is inspired by God” (21).

 

C.     For further study, one can read the book, None of These Diseases, by S.I. McMillen and David Stern.