Concluding Thoughts

I have finally pulled together and published the Evangelicals, Evolution, and the Church series Ebook. You can find it up on Scribd along with all the other series that have been published on this blog . Thanks to Doug, Dennis, Terry, Jim, Phil, Keith, Murray, and Allan for their excellent contributions to the evolution-faith dialogue in the Evangelical community.

I should apologize for more-or-less dropping out of sight half way through this series. Ironically, given the subject of the series, I was invited to join our local church board just as this series was beginning. A month later I was asked to lead our Transition Team. The duties involved in planning the transition of leadership from our pastor of 23 years (a key leader within the Evangelical wing of the Anglican community in Canada) to a dynamic new pastor from Melbourne, Australia meant that something in my schedule had to give. And blogging was it.

This isn’t my first blogging hiatus. Almost exactly 2 years ago, I posted that I was taking a break. And one of the points I made then, is even truer today:

Although the science-faith discussion will always be of great interest and of some importance to me, I can’t say that it is a huge priority in my life right now; it is probably not even the most important aspect for my current faith journey.

While this statement was true 2 years ago, and is true again, for a very short, tense time this fall it became a huge personal priority as I thought my views on evolution would get me into the same hot water as Doug and Terry. Fortunately, the incident was resolved quickly and satisfactorily as the problem was primarily one of perception and misunderstanding. Today, I am excited, humbled, and feeling so fortunate to help lead a local community that is passionate about furthering God’s kingdom in a multicultural, multifaith, thoroughly secular city filled with people who desperately need to hear the gospel.

So, this hiatus is likely to be permanent. The existing content will still be available, but is unlikely to be updated. For those that want to continue to interact with me on issues of science and faith, feel free to contact me by email at steven.dale.martin at gmail dot com. (And if you haven’t done so already, please peruse / read the Evangelical Dialogue on Evolution Ebook as that may contain some initial food-for-thought). However, my suggestion for those who want to continue the dialogue (if you don’t know about these resources already), is to follow either the Biologos blog Science and the Sacred or RJS’s Musings on Science and Theology. Both of these communities have great ongoing conversations. (Note: To actually view and/or participate in comments on Musings on Science and Theology, you will need to do so on Jesus Creed where each post is cross-posted).

I'll conclude with the same words that ended my 2008 sign-off:

In conclusion, I’d like to say that I believe the Christian story as revealed in God’s creation (through science, including the science of biological evolution) and his word (scripture) is a coherent story, a story that is satisfying both spiritually and intellectually. It is a story worth repeating, but more importantly, a story to live by.