The Last Word

During my days of pastoral ministry I often heard husbands jokingly say, "I always get the last word. And it's 'Yes, Dear.'"

In researching Romans 3 for our Tuesday Bible study I came across this item of interest from the Bible.org website.

“Charles Darwin died in April 1882. He wished to be buried in his beloved village, but the sentiment of educated men demanded a place in Westminster Abbey beside Isaac Newton. As his coffin entered the vast building, the choir sang an anthem composed for the occasion. It’s text, from the book of Proverbs, may stand as the most fitting testimony to Darwin’s greatness: ‘Happy is the man that findeth wisdom, and getteth understanding. She is more precious than rubies, and all the things that thou canst desire are not to be compared to her.’”

So wrote Stephen Jay Gould, the eminent Harvard paleontologist, professor of geology, and ardent evolutionist in Discover magazine in 1982.

Darwin was not buried in Westminster Abbey because he was a staunch defender of the faith. While he was not a friend of the church, neither was he an atheist. Continues Gould, “He probably retained a belief in some kind of personal God—but he did not grant his deity a directly and continuously intervening role in the evolutionary process.”

Darwin was, however, buried at Westminster because of the profound contribution he made to science. Again, quoting Gould, “Educated men demanded” he be laid there.
All this is not to name Darwin as the lone culprit responsible for the crisis of faith precipitated by evolutionary science. It is merely an illustration full of ironies and one grand truth. It is ironic that his final tribute was a scriptural anthem. Likewise ironic is that his final wishes were not honored and he was buried within the church. Even the choice of Scripture in the anthem is ironic: Proverbs, and the pursuit of wisdom.

The Grand Truth, however, is that Scripture and God have the last word. Darwin’s burial inadvertently acknowledges that faith has the last say over men and their ideas.”

This is perhaps the central truth of Romans 3:1-8: “Let God be proven true!” Let God have the last word! (www.bible.org)

My nickel's worth: God will have the last word. All of us will face Him after this life. To some He will say, "Well done, good and faithful servant. Enter into your rest." Others will hear the words, "Depart from me. I never knew you." What you hear Him say is up to you.