THE FOURTH DAY, By Howard J. Van Till. Grand Rapids, William B. Eerdmans, 1986, 286 pages, paperbound. Reviewed by Lester DeKoster.

The Fourth Day is an exercise in short-changing the Bible—and in covering up the biblical accounts which contradict the fraud.

This book proclaims that the whole cosmos began with a “big bang” occurring fifteen billion years ago.

This book declares that cosmic history from the “bang” to the present follows a pattern of evolutionary development: “Cosmic history is like a magnificent tapestry woven from different strands of temporal development to form the intricately designed pattern of cosmic evolution. Spatial evolution, galactic evolution, elemental evolution, stellar evolution, planetary evolution, and biological evolution are coherently integrated and intertwining processes that serve as the individual threads in the tapestry: the dynamic order of patterned development marks the whole of cosmic history” (p. 254).

The author is even led to compose his own version of Psalm 19 to extol his evolutionary theories: “With David, for example, we sing ‘The heavens declare the glory of God, the vault of heaven proclaims his handiwork’ (Ps. 19:1), but, I suspect that few of us have sung, ‘The expanding universe declares the glory of God, and cosmic evolution proclaims his handiwork.’”

(Interruption to say that no doubt this “suspicion” is correct. It’s a version of Psalm 19 that has not even occurred, yet, to a Psalter Hymnal revision committee—but who knows?]

Back to the text: “The sentiment, however, is precisely the same. Employing concepts and vocabulary appropriate to our respective cultures, both we and the psalmist are praising God as the –sovereign Creator by whose design all things function as they do and by whose purposeful decision all things have come to be as they are. As David was responsible for giving praise to God for all the divine works of which he had knowledge, so we are called to return praise to our Creator-Redeemer for all of his activities, even for that which we have discovered by scientific investigation of his Creation—even for cosmic evolution” (p. 253).

It appears that sincere enquirers who, in good faith, write to ask if evolution is espoused on the Calvin Campus have a right to answers more forthright than some that have appeared.

This book further proposes a strategy for getting these theories taught in the Christian schools. And finally, this book purports to merge its evolutionary theories with the teaching of Scripture into what is called the “creationomic perspective”—by evading the biblical accounts of creation, all the while paying excessive lip service to taking the Bible “seriously.”

This “synthesis” of the words of natural scientists and the Word of God is promoted through the use of various hermeneutical devices designed to make the Bible “say” what the author wants to hear. And he dismisses parts of the sacred text as “incidental” and other parts as “not revelation at all” with an indifference to the Word matched only by his arrogance.

In fact Professor Van Till takes neither natural science nor the Bible nearly “seriously” enough, or better perhaps, not honestly enough. And because this is so, he foolishly divorces God from immediate and active involvement in His world, and recklessly proposes that evolutionary theories be intruded upon Christian school curricula. This makes his book not a voice but only an echo—at a time when Christian education needs most of all a strong and courageous enunciation of total commitment to the divine Word upon which alone it can prosper. If ever a true synthesis is to be forged between biblical and natural scientific perspectives, at the expense of neither, this book does not show the way.

Let it be plainly said that in this reviewer’s judgment, this book is so flagrantly and deceptively at odds with the Bible that if it be allowed to stand as representative of teaching on the Calvin Campus, the Board of Trustees has reason to wonder what claim it has left on the trust of its constituency.

R.B. – A PROPHET IN THE LAND, by Edward Heerema. Published by Paideia Press, St. Catherines, Ontario, Canada, 1986, 223 pp., paper, Review by the editor.

This is an extraordinary little book. The photograph ori the covers, the copyright page informs us, shows its subject, Rienk Bouke Kuiper, “descending muleback in the Grand Canyon in 1923.” The account by his son-in-law, acquaints us with one of the most colorful and extraordinarily influential characters in our churches’ history. His career spanned the enormous gap from Dutch beginnings in a family deeply committed to the early secession and later Abraham Kuyper reformation in the Reformed churches in the Netherlands, to the developments and problems of that Biblical faith in the Reformed and Presbyterian churches of our own time. The biographer has selected and outlined in brief, clear and interesting chapters, the family history, the move to the United States, the early language struggles and education of the children well beyond the provincial limits that characterized most of the immigrants.

Equipped with the names “Rienk Bouke,” it is not surprising that the gifted student became sometimes “Robert” and later widely known as “R.B.” Becoming an unusually able and popular preacher, he served a number of prominent. churches in the Christian Reformed denomination. His university education and his prominent positions early confronted him with one of the most serious problems and threats to the Biblical faith in the rise of “higher criticism.” In his case the conflict came in a peculiarly complicated, intimate and painful form, because Professor Ralph Janssen, who became the center of a seminary controversy about such views, was his brother-in-law. The book’s account of this affair is illuminating.

R.B. served for a time as pastor of a Reformed Church in Kalamazoo which sought his kind of vigorous Reformed preaching, but, repelled by the denominational laxity regarding the Reformed confessions, soon returned to a Christian Reformed charge.

The book details his work as president of Calvin College, his long-time service as professor and faculty chairman of Westminster Theological Seminary, and his transfer to and influential role in the Orthodox Presbyterian Church until retirement. After retirement he was persuaded to become the president of Calvin Theological Seminary after the controversy which devastated its faculty. Of special interest to us was his early and enthusiastic part in many contributions to the Reformed Fellowship and its paper, then called Torch and Trumpet.

Heerema’s account makes fascinating and easy reading. Brief, spiced with personal detail, it sheds light on many of the developments in our churches and communities in these years of change. Especially in the increasing confusion of our time, R.B.’s staunch and militant commitment to the Bible and its Lord, his broad personal and evangelically ecumenical sympathies and down-to-earth common sense, his suggestions about proper preaching and service of the gospel, and. many other expressions of his Christian convictions may be helpful as well as interesting to many readers. Early free from narrow provincialisms of the immigrant communities, he tried to show (and still shows) how we should be Biblically Reformed. This book has continuing historical and practical value far beyond many bigger, more imposing volumes. The Lord enjoins us to “Remember your leaders, who spoke the word of God to you. Consider the outcome of their way of life and imitate their faith. Jesus Christ is the same yesterday and today and forever” (Heb. 13:7,8). A tribute is due to Rev. E. Heerema who has retrieved this valuable life story and made it available in this book. Thanks to the Paideia Press, we can offer it to our readers for a price of $3.00 postpaid, if it is ordered with a subscription to the Outlook (new or renewal).