If you look at a tree, you must be at a distance far enough from the tree to see the entire tree. That is if you truly want to understand what a tree really is. A close-up study is then needed to add to the information you have already discovered by your observation. I believe the reason many creation or evolution writings focus on minute details regarding the origin of the universe instead of looking at the "big picture", is that they are not really looking for the truth. They are instead trying to sell you a particular idea based on one or more of these minuscule pieces of information. I also believe this is why they demand that everyone believe what they're tell us, even though they disprove their own theories on a monthly or yearly basis.
What are our choices?
#1. God created the universe.
#2. There is no God, and the universe just appeared, and all life came
into existence from inorganic materials.
That's not a lot of choices. The first problem encountered in this problem, is where did the original material come from? Did it always exist? So, many people have a problem with the idea that God has always existed, but they can accept the idea that hydrogen gas has always existed. That's a bit weird, but OK. So, how did this hydrogen gas turn into other materials? And all by itself?
Obviously it didn't.
How did inorganic materials turn into a life form? Even with our extensive scientific procedures, and vast knowledge, we can't even do this on the most basic level.
So don't get all caught up in the argument that this animal must have evolved from that one instead of that other one. It doesn't really matter because ALL animals must have come from a rock, that is IF you DECIDE to believe the evolutionary model as a valid explanation of the origin of the universe.
It's extremely difficult, or down right impossible to engage an evolutionist in a macro argument regarding the origins of the universe, because they always try to bog down the discussion with micro details as to which animal or plant succeeded which other animal or plant. How did these plants and animals come from a rock? Well, you just lost them!
So, if you are more apt to believe that hydrogen has always existed, and it changed into a rock, and the rock turned into plants and animals, then you probably won't get much out of reading this article. If you have a problem with the idea that hydrogen has always existed and it turned into a giraffe and your aunt Bessy, then you might get a kick out of this article.
Check out what the Bible says about the origin of the universe
Genesis 1:1
1 In the beginning God created
the heavens and the earth.
I think the first four words of this one verse are some of the most incredible words in the entire Bible, and one of the most powerful statements ever spoken by man. God existed before anything was created. God is not a created being, but eternal. God had no beginning and He has no ending. That hurts my brain to think about. God is the creator of all things.
Gen 1:2 Now the earth was
formless
and empty, darkness was over the surface of the deep, and the Spirit of
God was hovering over the waters.
This verse can also read, “Now the earth “became” formless and empty, darkness was over the surface of the deep, and the Spirit of God was hovering over the waters.
Gen 1:3 And God said, “Let there be light,” and there was light.
Young’s literal translation of this verse states this as 3and God saith, ‘Let light be;’ and light is. I think that’s pretty much to the point. We are reading the story of creation in this book we call the Bible. We also call this book “God’s Word.”
God created everything in the universe with His word. The book of John tells us that Jesus is the “Word”. It also tells that God created everything that exists through Jesus.
John 1:1-14 says-
John 1:1 In the beginning was
the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.
John 1:2 He was with God in the beginning.
John 1:3 Through him all things were made; without him nothing was made that has been made.
John 1:4 In him was life, and that life was the light of men.
John 1:5 The light shines in the darkness, but the darkness has not understood£ it.
John 1:6 There came a man who was sent from God; his name was John.
John 1:7 He came as a witness to testify concerning that light, so that through him all men might believe.
John 1:8 He himself was not the light; he came only as a witness to the light.
John 1:9 The true light that gives light to every man was coming into the world.£
John 1:10 He was in the world, and though the world was made through him, the world did not recognize him.
John 1:11 He came to that which was his own, but his own did not receive him.
John 1:12 Yet to all who received him, to those who believed in his name, he gave the right to become children of God-
John 1:13 children born not of natural descent,£ nor of human decision or a husband’s will, but born of God.
John 1:14 The Word became flesh and made his dwelling among us. We have seen his glory, the glory of the One and Only, who came from the Father, full of grace and truth.
Why do people struggle with the idea that God created everything? There are several reasons, but mainly because if people admit that God exists, then they also understand that we, as created beings have a responsibility to respond to the creator that created us. If God created everything through His son Jesus, then we also have a responsibility to respond to Jesus. NOW! You have problems! One time I heard a college student respond with the idea that God might have a creator. He offered this concept as an excuse as to why he didn’t feel compelled to respond to God. He was “waiting to respond to the being that created God”. If there were to be a being that created God, his new excuse would be to wait for the creator of this new being. I guess an excuse is just an excuse. The fact is that the universe, everything we can see and everything we can’t see was created through Jesus Christ. Our responsibility is to respond to our creator. Period.
Genesis 1:4
Gen 1:4 God saw that the light
was good, and he separated the light from the darkness.
Gen 1:5 God called the light “day,” and the darkness he called “night.” And there was evening, and there was morning-the first day.
Gen 1:6 And God said, “Let there be an expanse between the waters to separate water from water.”
Gen 1:7 So God made the expanse and separated the water under the expanse from the water above it. And it was so.
Gen 1:8 God called the expanse “sky.” And there was evening, and there was morning-the second day.
Gen 1:9 And God said, “Let the water under the sky be gathered to one place, and let dry ground appear.” And it was so.
Gen 1:10 God called the dry ground “land,” and the gathered waters he called “seas.” And God saw that it was good.
Gen 1:11 Then God said, “Let the land produce vegetation: seed-bearing plants and trees on the land that bear fruit with seed in it, according to their various kinds.” And it was so.
Gen 1:12 The land produced vegetation: plants bearing seed according to their kinds and trees bearing fruit with seed in it according to their kinds. And God saw that it was good.
Gen 1:13 And there was evening, and there was morning-the third day.
Gen 1:14 And God said, “Let there be lights in the expanse of the sky to separate the day from the night, and let them serve as signs to mark seasons and days and years,
Gen 1:15 and let them be lights in the expanse of the sky to give light on the earth.” And it was so.
Gen 1:16 God made two great lights-the greater light to govern the day and the lesser light to govern the night. He also made the stars.
Gen 1:17 God set them in the expanse of the sky to give light on the earth,
Gen 1:18 to govern the day and the night, and to separate light from darkness. And God saw that it was good.
Gen 1:19 And there was evening, and there was morning-the fourth day.
Gen 1:20 And God said, “Let the water teem with living creatures, and let birds fly above the earth across the expanse of the sky.”
Gen 1:21 So God created the great creatures of the sea and every living and moving thing with which the water teems, according to their kinds, and every winged bird according to its kind. And God saw that it was good.
Gen 1:22 God blessed them and said, “Be fruitful and increase in number and fill the water in the seas, and let the birds increase on the earth.”
Gen 1:23 And there was evening, and there was morning-the fifth day.
Gen 1:24 And God said, “Let the land produce living creatures according to their kinds: livestock, creatures that move along the ground, and wild animals, each according to its kind.” And it was so.
Gen 1:25 God made the wild animals according to their kinds, the livestock according to their kinds, and all the creatures that move along the ground according to their kinds. And God saw that it was good.
Gen 1:26 Then God said, “Let us make man in our image, in our likeness, and let them rule over the fish of the sea and the birds of the air, over the livestock, over all the earth, and over all the creatures that move along the ground.”
Gen 1:27 So God created man in his own image, in the image of God he created him; male and female he created them.
Gen 1:28 God blessed them and said to them, “Be fruitful and increase in number; fill the earth and subdue it. Rule over the fish of the sea and the birds of the air and over every living creature that moves on the ground.”
Gen 1:29 Then God said, “I give you every seed-bearing plant on the face of the whole earth and every tree that has fruit with seed in it. They will be yours for food.
Gen 1:30 And to all the beasts of the earth and all the birds of the air and all the creatures that move on the ground-everything that has the breath of life in it-I give every green plant for food.” And it was so.
Gen 1:31 God saw all that he had made, and it was very good. And there was evening, and there was morning-the sixth day.
I’ve had several different views of creation during my lifetime. I’ve had these different views mainly because I believed what different people told me. If they sounded like they knew what they were talking about, I tended to believe them.
Without exception, I found holes in what each person told me about creation. I’ve had 45 years now to think about how I got here, and how everything around me also got here. I’ve listened to a lot of creationists and I’ve listened to a lot of evolutionists and I really can’t say that I agree with most of the people that have tried to explain creation to me.
I have tried to imagine the first signs of life according to the
evolutionary
theories and they don’t do a thing for me. Let’s assume that you can
actually
get past the math involved. The chance of life occurring spontaneously,
just one single living organism, is about 1 in
1000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000
000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000
0000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000 or a 1 with 185
zero’s
after it. This is your tax dollars at work. A group of scientists
decided
to study the possibility of there being life in outer space, and before
they invested a lot of money in this project, they decided to see if
there
was even the possibility of life in outer space. These were
secular
scientists. They decided that the chance of life was so remote that it
wasn’t worth the billions of dollars it would take to do the study and
they abandoned it. This was in the 70’s. They have recently started
this
science study anyway. They don’t have any more reason to believe that
there
is life in space, but there has been so much public pressure to do the
research that they’re doing it anyway.
So, if you have an extremely remote chance of life starting spontaneously, and you actually have one single cell of life, what does it eat? Where does it live? This is assuming that there is a breathable atmosphere, and that there is water. There would have to be available food. There would also have to be an acceptable temperature. There would have to be light. This single form of life could be a plant. But plants live in soil, and soil is decomposed organic material, or in other words, the plant needs to live in the materials left behind by previous plants. Thus, no plant.
If this primitive life was not a plant, but animal instead, this life form would need to eat either plant life or animal life to survive. There is no other life. In other words, this primitive life needs materials from other life forms that already exist, but there are no other life forms. Do you see the problem?
This is an unexplainable cycle of deniability that evolutionists can’t get around.
Let’s be extremely generous today, and give all of this to the evolutionists. We’ll give them light that is not too extreme, and not too dim, by placing earth just the right distance from the sun. We’ll throw in gravity for free. Now, we’ll give them a breathable atmosphere, and we’ll give them water too. Not just a vapor encircling the earth, but actual usable liquid water. We’ll throw the moon in as a bonus, so that the earth’s water can have a tide, and create its own climate, which we’ll start for them for free too. Now, we’ll place fertilizer on the planet and pre-moisten it for them too. All for free. We’ll then create several forms of life, and interlace their survival through mutual dependence. So, with all of this, the evolutionists should be able to have a great survival chance shouldn’t they? No. How does a plant know how to grow? How do these primitive life forms create eyes, ears, circulatory systems? How is it that they have biochemical, and biomechanical defense mechanisms already in place? If no intelligent being created them, and they all just spontaneously erupted from the soil, how did these systems occur, and how did the nervous system learn to control these systems? There must be an intelligence behind an intelligent design. In other words, there must be a designer behind the design. Even today with all of our technology, we can change the things we find on the planet, but we can not “create” anything.
I believe that Adam was created as a man as compared to being created as a child. I believe that trees were born with rings in their fiber. That is, that Adam was created at a certain age, and that trees were created with age already existing within their being. I believe that birds were created old enough to fly, and that sand was created already existing in the form of sand. Evolutionists would tell you that it took millions of years to create sand from rocks being slowly ground away by the action of weather and the ocean. The ocean requires sand to function in a life supporting manner. Each fish has a particular diet, and requires that diet exist before it appears or it will die. Each plant requires that there be light, warmth, moisture, and soil to exist before it appears or it will die. You can’t have one single form of life appear without all the other forms being there already, or it couldn’t survive.
I believe that the earth is a huge bio-machine created by God as a testimony of His existence. The earth had to be created already operating. There is no way for one form of life to start, and then another, and then another, because the first form of life requires that there already be life in order for it to survive.
Evolutionists would love to have you believe that every serious scientist believes in evolution and that they think the story of creation in the Bible is silly. I’ve had debates with people that absolutely insist that there are no “serious” scientists that believe in creation, and that there have never been. Their view point is that the belief in creation is left over from previous “unenlightened” generations. These same people would have you believe that no “intelligent” person could possibly believe in Biblical creation. Can this be true? It seems that these people have decided that no intelligent being created the universe, and since that is a fact, that nobody with any level of intelligence could believe that there is an intelligent being behind the design of the universe. But currently over 40% of all scientists believe in God. Evolutionists would also have you believe that all science is in direct opposition to the Bible.
These famous scientists and artists were Christians too.
Carl Friedrich Gauss Blaise
Pascal
Isaac Newton Johan Sebastian Bach
Copernicus
Kepler
Faraday Gregor
Mendel
Blaise Pascal
LeMaitre James Clerk
Maxwell
Van Gogh Rembrandt
T.S. Eliot Samuel Taylor
Coleridge
Vivaldi
Handel
Dvorak
Mendelssohn
Tolstoy Doestoevsky
(Great Scientists Who Were Also Creationists by Timothy R. Stout)
Many of the major fields of science were founded by Christians. This
information was taken from the book Men of Science, Men of God by Henry
M.
Morris, Ph.D.
1. Johann Kepler (1571-1630) was the founder of physical astronomy. Kepler wrote “Since we astronomers are priests of the highest God in regard to the book of nature, it befits us to be thoughtful, not of the glory of our minds, but rather, above all else, of the glory of God.
2. Robert Boyle (1627-1691) is credited with being the father of modern chemistry. He also was active in financially supporting the spread of Christianity through missions and Bible translations.
3. Blaise Pascal (1623-1662) was one of the greatest early
mathematicians,
laid the foundations for hydrostatics, hydrodynamics, differential
calculus,
and the theory of probability. To him is attributed the famous Wager of
Pascal, paraphrased as follows: “How can anyone lose who chooses to be
a Christian? If, when he dies, there turns out to be no God and his
faith
was in vain, he has lost nothing—in fact, has been happier in life than
his
nonbelieving friends. If, however, there is a God and a heaven and
hell, then he has gained heaven and his skeptical friends will have
lost
everything in hell!”
4. John Ray (1627-1705) was the father of English natural history, considered the greatest zoologist and botanist of his day. He also wrote a book, “The wisdom of God Manifested In The Works of Creation.”
5. Nicolaus Steno (1631-1686) was the father of Stratigraphy. He believed that fossils were laid down in the strata as a result of the flood of Noah. He also wrote many theological works and late in his life took up religious orders.
6. William Petty (1623-1687) helped found the science of statistics and the modern study of economics. He was an active defender of the Christian faith and wrote many papers sharing evidence of God’s design in nature.
7. Isaac Newton (1642-1727) invented calculus, discovered the law of gravity and the three laws of motion, anticipated the law of energy conservation, developed the particle theory of light propagation, and invented the reflecting telescope. He firmly believed in Jesus Christ as his Savior and the Bible as God’s word, and wrote many books on these topics.
8. Carolus Linnaeus (1707-1778) was the father of biological taxonomy. His system of classification is still in use today. One of his main goals in systematizing the varieties of living creatures was an attempt to delineate the original Genesis “kinds.” He firmly believed in the Genesis account as literal history.
9. Michael Faraday (1791-1867) was one of the greatest physicists of all time, developed foundational concepts in electricity and magnetism, invented the electrical generator, and made many contributions to the field of chemistry. He was active in the various ministries of his church, both private and public, and had an abiding faith in the Bible and in prayer.
10. Georges Cuvier (1769-1832) was the founder of the science of comparative anatomy and one of the chief architects of paleontology as a separate scientific discipline. He was a firm creationist, participating in some of the important creation/evolution debates of his time.
11. Charles Babbage (1792-1871) was the founder of computer science. He developed information storage and retrieval systems, and used punched cards for instruction sets and data sets in automated industrial controls. He was also a Christian with strong convictions and wrote an important book defending the Bible and miracles.
12. John Dalton (1766-1844) was the father of atomic theory, which revolutionized chemistry. He was an orthodox, Bible-believing Christian.
13. Matthew Maury (1806-1873) was the founder of oceanography. He believed that when Psalm 8:8 in the Bible talked about “paths in the seas,” that there must therefore be paths in the seas. He dedicated his life to charting the winds and currents of the Atlantic and was able to confirm that the sea did indeed have paths, just as spoken of in the Bible.
14. James Simpson (1811-1879) discovered chloroform and laid the foundation for anesthesiology. He said his motivation to perform the research leading to this discovery was a fascination in the book of Genesis with Adam’s deep sleep during the time in which Eve was fashioned from his side. He said his biggest discovery was finding Jesus Christ as Savior.
15. James Joule (1818-1889) discovered the mechanical equivalent of heat, laying the foundation for the field of thermodynamics. Joule also had a strong Christian faith.
16. Louis Agassiz (1807-1873) was the father of glacial geology and
a great paleontologist. He believed in God and in His special creation
of every kind of organism. When Darwin’s Origin began to gain favor,
Agassiz
spoke out strongly against it.
17. Gregory Mendel (1822-1884) was the father of genetics. He had
strong
religious convictions and chose the life of a monk. He was a
creationist
and rejected Darwins’s ideas, even though he was familiar with them.
18. Louis Pasteur (1822-1895) was the father of bacteriology. He established the germ theory of disease. His persistent objections to the theory of spontaneous generation and to Darwinism made him unpopular with the scientific establishment of his day. He was a Christian with extremely strong religious convictions.
19. William Thompson, Lord Kelvin (1824-1907) is considered one of
the
all-time great physicists. He established thermodynamics on a formal
scientific
basis, providing a precise statement of the first and second laws of
thermodynamics.
Lord Kelvin was a strong Christian, opposing both Lyellian
uniformitarianism
and Darwinian evolution. In 1903, shortly before his death, he made the
unequivocal statement that, “With regard to the origin of life,
science... positively affirms creative power.”
20. Joseph Lister (1827-1912) founded antiseptic surgical methods. Lister’s contributions have probably led to more lives being saved through modern medicine than the contributions of any one else except Pasteur. Like Pasteur, Lister was also a Christian and wrote, “I am a believer in the fundamental doctrines of Christianity.”
21. Joseph Clerk Maxwell (1831-1879) developed a comprehensive theoretical and mathematical framework for electromagnetic field theory. Einstein called Maxwell’s contributions “the most profound and most fruitful that physics has experienced since the time of Newton.” Maxwell rejected the theory of evolution and wrote that God’s command to man to subdue the earth, found in the first chapter of the book of Genesis in the Bible, provided the personal motivation to him for pursuing his scientific work. He acknowledged a personal faith in Jesus Christ as Lord and Savior.
22. Bernhard Riemann (1826-1866) developed the concept of non-Euclidian geometry, which was used by Einstein in his development of the theory of relativity. Riemann was also a Christian and had hoped to go into the ministry until he got sidetracked by his interest in mathematics. He apparently made several efforts to prove the validity of the book of Genesis using mathematical principles.
23. Joseph Henry Gilbert (1817-1901) was a chemist who developed the use of nitrogen and superphosphate fertilizers for farm crops and co-developed the world’s first agricultural experimental station. He thus laid the foundations for the advances in agricultural science which have provided the means for farmers to feed the large populations in the world today. Gilbert is yet another scientist with a strong faith and demonstrated this by signing the Scientist’s Declaration, in which he affirmed his faith in the Bible as the Word of God and expressed his disbelief in and opposition to Darwin’s theories.
24. Thomas Anderson (1819-1874) was one of the initial workers in the field of organic chemistry, discovering pyridine and other organic bases. Like Gilbert, he also signed the Scientist’s Declaration, in which he affirmed his faith in the scientific accuracy of the Bible and the validity of the Christian faith.
25. William Mitchell Ramsay (1851-1939) was among the greatest of all archeologists. He acquired “liberal” theological beliefs during his days as a university student. However, as he began to make various archaeological discoveries in Asia Minor, he began to see that archaeology confirmed the accuracy of the Bible and as a result he became converted to Christianity.
26. John Ambrose Fleming (1849-1945) was the inventor of the Fleming valve which provided the foundation for subsequent advances in electronics. He studied under Maxwell, was a consultant to Thomas Edison, and also for Marconi. He also had very strong Christian beliefs and acted on those beliefs by helping found an organization called the “Evolution Protest Movement.” He wrote a major book against the theory of evolution.
27. Werner Von Braun (1912-1977) was the father of space science. He wrote, .”..the vast mysteries of the universe should only confirm our belief in the certainty of its Creator. I find it as difficult to understand a scientist who does not acknowledge the presence of a superior rationality behind the existence of the universe as it is to comprehend a theologian who would deny the advances of science.”
28. Albert Einstein (1879-1955), formulator of the theory of relativity, which is one of the single greatest intellectual accomplishments in the history of man. Einstein was Jewish and thus did not follow in the Christian tradition of Newton or Faraday. He did not believe in a personal God, such as is revealed even in the Jewish Bible. Yet, he was overwhelmed by the order and organization of the universe and believed this demonstrated that there was a Creator.
So, many if not most of the major branches of science were founded by Bible-believing Christians. As a physicist I also find it intriguing that the five greatest physicists in history—Newton, Faraday, Thompson, Maxwell, and Einstein—were each outspoken in their belief that the universe was placed here by a Creator. Furthermore, four of the five were staunch Christians with firm convictions that the Bible is the authoritative Word of God.
http://www.innercite.com/~tstout/cs/pog_a.shtml
So much for the idea that no intelligent person believes in creation! What about the theory of evolution as forwarded by Charles Darwin? Many evolutionists claim that the universe just started by itself, and life simply occurred through a series of accidents without any intervention of a superior being? They would love to tell you that Charles Darwin also came up with this one. But did he? Many evolutionists would tell you that Darwinism tells us that we are left with a choice between chance and creation. Darwin himself, though originally inclined to call in the aid of a creator (Origin of Species, 6th edition, 429), regretted afterward, that he “had truckled to public opinion and used the pentateuchal term, by which he really meant appearance by some wholly unknown process” (Life and Letters, III, 18). International Standard Bible Encyclopedia, Anthropology V, Evolutionary theory as to Origin of man. How many other scientists fall to public pressure for fear of destroying their professional reputation?
Creationists and evolutionists have the same evidence available to them. Where the difference occurs is HOW this evidence is evaluated. Both evolutionists and creationists evaluate the available evidence according to their own bias. That is, their preexisting beliefs regarding the beginnings of the universe. Let’s look at what the Bible has to say about creation in other places than Genesis?
Paul uses the creation of man and woman in his argument (1 Tim 2:13, 14) for the subordination of woman mentioned (Gen 2:7-25). This argument is a very similar one to that in 1 Cor 11:8, 9. The apostle states that “Adam was not beguiled,” simply based on the text in Genesis to which he refers (Gen 3:13), in which Eve, not Adam, says, “The serpent beguiled me.” Jude 1:14 says “And Enoch, the seventh from Adam” (Gen 5). There are many many times where the Bible quotes passages from Genesis. Note Paul’s argument mentioned above. It has been argued that the story of creation is nothing more a myth. I recently became involved in a debate in our local daily newspaper with a man named Lars. It is Lar’s opinion that Judaism, Islam, and Christianity are nothing more than myths and that all three of these myths are based on the previous myth of the “Sky god” developed from Greek Mythology. It didn’t seem to bother Lars that his history was out of order, or that both Judaism and Christianity are based on history. He simply made a choice to believe a book written by a man that explained that man’s opinion of the world’s religions rather than believing the Bible. That is his bias. I simply made a choice to believe what the Bible says about creation.
Paul uses the passage in Genesis as the basis for a logical
argument.
If Genesis were merely a myth, Paul certainly would have sought a more
logical source for information to use. We have just read that the
entire universe was created through Jesus. We also read that Jesus
existed
before the creation of the universe. The mention of creation occurs in
the New Testament 24 times.
Jesus mentions several times.
Matt 13:34-35
Jesus spoke all these things
to the crowd in parables; he did not say anything to them
without using a parable. So
was fulfilled what was spoken through the prophet:
“I will open my mouth
in parables, I will utter things hidden since the creation of the
world.”
Matt 25:34 “Then the King
will
say to those on his right, ‘Come, you who are blessed by
my Father; take your
inheritance,
the kingdom prepared for you since the creation of
the world.
Mark 10
1 Jesus then left that place
and went into the region of Judea and across the Jordan. Again crowds
of
people came to him, and as was his custom, he taught them.
2 Some Pharisees came and
tested
him by asking, “Is it lawful for a man to divorce his wife?”
3 “What did Moses command
you?”
he replied.
4 They said, “Moses permitted a man to write a certificate of divorce and send her away.”
5 “It was because your hearts were hard that Moses wrote you this law,” Jesus replied.
6 “But at the beginning of creation God ‘made them male and female.’
7 ‘For this reason a man will leave his father and mother and be united to his wife,
8 and the two will become one flesh.’ So they are no longer two, but one.
9 Therefore what God has joined together, let man not separate.”
Here we have a statement where Jesus attributes Genesis to Moses. The belief that Moses was the author (through the hand of God) had been without question throughout the ages, until Masius in 1574 and Spinoza in 1670, and then Anton Van Dale in 1696 claimed that Ezra, the priest-prophet of the restoration was the composer of parts of Genesis. The Bible tells us that Moses was the author, and yet human writers still insist on questioning the validity of the Bible’s own words. We read that Jesus existed before creation, and that everything in creation was created through Jesus. Jesus speaks authoritatively about Genesis, and with extreme reason. If there was any misunderstanding regarding the validity of the account of creation, or of the general understanding as to whether the Genesis account of creation was correct, Jesus did not address it here or anywhere we know of. So we must assume that Jesus would have corrected any current wrong thinking about the creation account written of in Genesis, as He did with several corrections He made concerning the beliefs of the Jews. He did not. It is ridiculous now, for so-called scholars to assume they understand either the scriptures or the details of creation better than Jesus. The claim of many “experts” today to have a superior knowledge of these two subjects is a demonstration of blinding arrogance at the highest degree.
John 17
1 After Jesus said this, he
looked
toward heaven and prayed:
“Father, the time has come.
Glorify your Son, that your Son may glorify you.
2 For you granted him authority over all people that he might give eternal life to all those you have given him.
3 Now this is eternal life: that they may know you, the only true God, and Jesus Christ, whom you have sent.
4 I have brought you glory on earth by completing the work you gave me to do.
5 And now, Father, glorify me in your presence with the glory I had with you before the world began.
6 “I have revealed you to those whom you gave me out of the world. They were yours; you gave them to me and they have obeyed your word.
7 Now they know that everything you have given me comes from you.
8 For I gave them the words you gave me and they accepted them. They knew with certainty that I came from you, and they believed that you sent me.
9 I pray for them. I am not praying for the world, but for those you have given me, for they are yours.
10 All I have is yours, and all you have is mine. And glory has come to me through them.
11 I will remain in the world no longer, but they are still in the world, and I am coming to you. Holy Father, protect them by the power of your name—the name you gave me—so that they may be one as we are one.
12 While I was with them, I protected them and kept them safe by that name you gave me. None has been lost except the one doomed to destruction so that Scripture would be fulfilled.
13 “I am coming to you now, but I say these things while I am still in the world, so that they may have the full measure of my joy within them.
14 I have given them your word and the world has hated them, for they are not of the world any more than I am of the world.
15 My prayer is not that you take them out of the world but that you protect them from the evil one.
16 They are not of the world, even as I am not of it.
17 Sanctify them by the truth; your word is truth.
18 As you sent me into the world, I have sent them into the world.
19 For them I sanctify myself, that they too may be truly sanctified.
20 “My prayer is not for them alone. I pray also for those who will believe in me through their message,
21 that all of them may be one, Father, just as you are in me and I am in you. May they also be in us so that the world may believe that you have sent me.
22 I have given them the glory that you gave me, that they may be one as we are one:
23 I in them and you in me. May they be brought to complete unity to let the world know that you sent me and have loved them even as you have loved me.
24 “Father, I want those you have given me to be with me where I am, and to see my glory, the glory you have given me because you loved me before the creation of the world.
25 “Righteous Father, though the world does not know you, I know you, and they know that you have sent me.
26 I have made you known to them, and will continue to make you known in order that the love you have for me may be in them and that I myself may be in them.”
Verse 5 again shows the claim of Jesus to have existed before creation.
Romans 1:
8 First, I thank my God through Jesus Christ for all of you, because your faith is being reported all over the world.
9 God, whom I serve with my whole heart in preaching the gospel of his Son, is my witness how constantly I remember you
10 in my prayers at all times; and I pray that now at last by God’s will the way may be opened for me to come to you.
11 I long to see you so that I may impart to you some spiritual gift to make you strong—
12 that is, that you and I may be mutually encouraged by each other’s faith.
13 I do not want you to be unaware, brothers, that I planned many times to come to you (but have been prevented from doing so until now) in order that I might have a harvest among you, just as I have had among the other Gentiles.
14 I am obligated both to Greeks and non-Greeks, both to the wise and the foolish.
15 That is why I am so eager to preach the gospel also to you who are at Rome.
16 I am not ashamed of the gospel, because it is the power of God for the salvation of everyone who believes: first for the Jew, then for the Gentile.
17 For in the gospel a righteousness from God is revealed, a righteousness that is by faith from first to last, just as it is written: “The righteous will live by faith.”
18 The wrath of God is being revealed from heaven against all the godlessness and wickedness of men who suppress the truth by their wickedness,
19 since what may be known about God is plain to them, because God has made it plain to them.
20 For since the creation of the world God’s invisible qualities—his eternal power and divine nature—have been clearly seen, being understood from what has been made, so that men are without excuse.
21 For although they knew God, they neither glorified him as God nor gave thanks to him, but their thinking became futile and their foolish hearts were darkened.
22 Although they claimed to be wise, they became fools 23 and exchanged the glory of the immortal God for images made to look like mortal man and birds and animals and reptiles.
24 Therefore God gave them over in the sinful desires of their hearts to sexual impurity for the degrading of their bodies with one another.
25 They exchanged the truth of God for a lie, and worshiped and served created things rather than the Creator—who is forever praised. Amen.
26 Because of this, God gave them over to shameful lusts. Even their women exchanged natural relations for unnatural ones.
27 In the same way the men also abandoned natural relations with women and were inflamed with lust for one another. Men committed indecent acts with other men, and received in themselves the due penalty for their perversion.
28 Furthermore, since they did not think it worthwhile to retain the knowledge of God, he gave them over to a depraved mind, to do what ought not to be done.
29 They have become filled with every kind of wickedness, evil, greed and depravity. They are full of envy, murder, strife, deceit and malice. They are gossips,
30 slanderers, God-haters, insolent, arrogant and boastful; they invent ways of doing evil; they disobey their parents;
31 they are senseless, faithless, heartless, ruthless.
32 Although they know God’s
righteous
decree that those who do such things deserve death, they not only
continue
to do these very things but also approve of those who
practice them.
These scriptures are a wealth of information. This passage states that God will take “wrath” against the “men who suppress the truth by their wickedness”, and that “what may be known about God is plain to them, because God has made it plain to them”. This writer goes on to say “For since the creation of the world God’s invisible qualities—his eternal power and divine nature—have been clearly seen, being understood from what has been made, so that men are without excuse.” This is an extremely powerful statement. Paul is telling us that God created the world in such a way that His attributes are “clearly” seen throughout His creation, and that men are “without excuse” if they can’t recognize the handiwork of God. All of nature is a testament to God’s power and intelligence. The idea some try to argue, that “nature proves a lack of a creator” is wrought with desperation and betrays a rebellious nature.
Ephesians 1
1 Paul, an apostle of Christ Jesus by the will of God, To the saints in Ephesus, the faithfull in Christ Jesus:
2 Grace and peace to you from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ.
3 Praise be to the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who has blessed us in the heavenly realms with every spiritual blessing in Christ.
4 For he chose us in him before the creation of the world to be holy and blameless in his sight. In love
5 he predestined us to be adopted as his sons through Jesus Christ, in accordance with his pleasure and will—
6 to the praise of his glorious grace, which he has freely given us in the One he loves.
7 In him we have redemption through his blood, the forgiveness of sins, in accordance with the riches of God’s grace
8 that he lavished on us with all wisdom and understanding.
9 And he made known to us the mystery of his will according to his good pleasure, which he purposed in Christ,
10 to be put into effect when the times will have reached their fulfillment—to bring all things in heaven and on earth together under one head, even Christ.
This passage is one of the most difficult passages in the Bible for my human brain to understand. God chose us before the creation. Or in other words, God knew before creation, what the outcome of creation would be. God knew those that would respond to the call of the Holy Spirit, and that would accept Him through the sacrifice of Jesus on the cross. I have a really difficult time predicting what will happen next Thursday. I wouldn’t actually feel very comfortable guessing what I’ll have for lunch. Yet God knew the outcome of every incident in history before it occurred. Ouch!! (I just felt several more brain cells burn out!) This is one of the mysteries in the Bible. We may understand that there is a God, and that creation proves the existence of God. But to actually understand who God is, is a supernatural accomplishment. We simply cannot fully understand who and what God is in a complete way in our current condition as mortal humans. We get glimpses of the nature of God by reading our Bibles, and through revelations by the Holy Spirit. Is it complete? No.
In our prayers for our daily bread, we should also ask for our daily
revelations about the true nature of God. Bread may fill our stomachs,
and water may quench our earthly thirst, but the true degree that our
spirits
yearn to commune with God can only be fulfilled through the Holy Spirit
through prayer.
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Franz Sigel Shroy