Dr. Jerry Bergman, PhD

A few weeks ago, I preached at both the Sunday School and the Sunday worship service at Solid Rock Community Church in West Unity, Ohio. I was at the church about three years ago and noted one striking change: The attendance doubled from about 150 to 320. As I am very interested in church growth, I asked several people “What was your secret?” The answer they gave was the lead pastor, Robert Rodríguez, who I was told, goes well beyond the call of duty in his community outreach activities, working with local schools and other churches.

The now-infamous Scopes ‘Evolution’ Trial took place in Dayton, Tennessee, to challenge the law that prohibited teaching human evolution as fact in public schools. The trial occurred in the summer of 1925 in Dayton, Tennessee.  Apart from Jesus’s trial before Pilate, the Scopes ‘Monkey Trial’ is probably the best-known legal confrontation in history. The law was supported by famous Christian attorney William Jennings Bryan and opposed by the famous agnostic ACLU attorney Clarence Darrow.

I was told this recently by the pastor. One of the elders at his church wanted me to do a creation sermon. To decide if this topic was appropriate, the elders and the pastor had a meeting. The pastor explained his view, which was as follows:

The fact is, the theory of evolution is not a theory, but a proven fact which is supported by the universal scientific consensus.  Except for a few ignorant creationists, every scientist on Earth accepts the fact of evolution, including the evolution of humans from our common ape ancestor.

One major  interest of mine is to understand why some churches are strong, growing, and, in other words, have a successful ministry. A few months ago, I taught Sunday school at the Christian Fellowship Church in Holland, Ohio. As my GPS directed me to the church on Pilliod Road, I was sure I put in the wrong address. I was in a residential part of the city with several large, stately houses when the GPS announced, “You have now arrived at your destination.”

If you attended public government schools like I did, you learned the Inquisition involved sadistic priests who brutally interrogated people accused of religious heresy. As the interrogation progressed, it was claimed, a ratchet mechanism was used to slowly increase the strain on the prisoner's shoulders, hips, knees, and elbows, causing excruciating pain. After victims were tortured, they were then burned at the stake for rejecting some minor doctrinal point.

For good reasons it is a rare textbook today that openly teaches racism, but it was very commonly taught in the past. The first major scientist to openly teach racism was Charles Darwin. His racist worldview is even evident in the title of his most famous book, The Origin of Species by Means of Natural Selection or the Preservation of Favored Races in the Struggle for Life. Darwin’s 1871 book, The Descent of Man, Chapter Seven titled, “On the Races of Man” contains forty pages that covers in detail his racist conclusions about humans.

Of the over one billion pet dogs in the world, the United States owns 65.1 million. On my one-block-long street in Montpelier at last count there were 14 dogs. Dogs are the most popular pet in every nation of the world that have pets. China has 54.29 million dogs, Russia, 12 million, France, 8.8 million, Italy, 7.5 million, and Poland, 7.5 million.

To illustrate the diversity of life, Dr. Stephen Law, in his popular textbook Real Big Questions, states:

“In our forests, jungles, deserts, and oceans, there is an extraordinary range of living things—from enormous blue whales to tiny jewel like insects. But where did  all of these different species come from?”

Then Law lists one possibility that explains where all life came from:

What will your children be taught in public school this Fall? A popular textbook by Stephen Law, titled “Real Big Questions,” begins by asking the student, “Have you ever wondered:  Where did everything come from? Did someone design the universe?” Then Law answered:

I joined the American Scientific Affiliation (ASA) in 1970 and for the next 40 years became very involved. The ASA is a Christian organization of scientists interested in associating with like-minded persons. As I became more involved I began attending their annual meetings held at various Christian colleges. I also published 27 articles in their peer-reviewed scientific journal Perspectives. On April 30, 1983, I was honored by being elected a fellow of ASA.