GENESIS (PART 2 - PATTERNS OF LIFE)

Transcription

1 GENESIS (PART 2 - PATTERNS OF LIFE) The false conflict between science and the Bible Pepperdine Professor As one seminary professor who is a scientist also has written, the sad reality is that the obvious intellectual and technical triumphs of science tend to mesmerize us into uncritical acceptance of whatever cloaks itself in the name of science.

2 By the same token, many well-meaning Christians in the name of biblical fidelity uncritically dismiss current scientific thought instead of engaging it with intellectual integrity. Ecclesiastes 3:11 11 He has made everything beautiful in its time. Also, he has put eternity into man's heart, yet so that he cannot find out what God has done from the beginning to the end. My goal today is to offer you a view of Genesis that doesn t restrict you uncritically, a view that doesn t go beyond the written text, a view that offers you freedom to engage all truth as God s truth while upholding the absolute authority of Scripture and a view that displays Genesis chapter 1 is ultimately about the gospel of Jesus Christ. But before we begin this examination of Genesis chapter one, let me ask you something if you happen to be a Christian, Do you know everything? I hope you answered, No. There are other problems if you did not. So, if you do not know everything, then clearly you can be right about some things (such as the gospel) and wrong about others, such as the age of the earth. Are all youngearth creationists Reformed in their doctrine? No. Then clearly you can be right about some things and wrong about others, even as a Christian who holds the highest view of the Bible s authority. I will argue that a Christian view of the world is one of the reasons we even have scientific thought. Genesis 8:22 22 While the earth remains, seedtime and harvest, cold and heat, summer and winter, day and night, shall not cease. What does this verse reveal to us about how the world works? It reveals that there are patterns to life. This is what makes science possible, the searching out of the patterns found in the world. Christianity makes science possible. What do I mean by that? Polytheism never propelled scientific thinking because the belief in multiple gods doesn t lead to an ordered universe, but a chaotic one.

3 Hinduism never propelled scientific thinking because the Hindu doesn t want to offend the spirits by disturbing nature. Buddhists don t engage in scientific thinking because Buddhism is about emptying the mind. Christianity itself is responsible for scientific thinking. This is what propels science. This is why scientists do not give up their search for new discoveries. Because they expect to find patterns in the universe. They expect to find a rational order to our world and the universe. Gravity is a law of the universe. We know that gravity exists. We don t know why gravity exists. Science and scientists should be more humble, because there is so much we do not know. And every new discovery changes the discoveries we ve already made. All that to say, we are not dismissive of science because all science deals with is discovering God s universe. Some things to keep in mind in understanding Genesis chapter 1: This is written to a people already living into this reality of one God and the seven day week with the Sabbath being holy. Authorship Time conscious lives We want things done quickly these days. The CEO of Dominos said, We don t sell pizza. We sell delivery. Have you tasted their delivery? How was the pizza? I ate it so fast I didn t notice. Way to savor the moment. Shampoos are now combining the shampoo and conditioner. Are we this pressed for time? When will my toothbrush already have toothpaste on it? Can t someone create underwear that disintegrates? When we have to choose between two lines at the grocery store we keep track of the person who would have been us if we had chosen the other line to see if we win the

4 race. Did we make the right decision by picking this line? In ancient Israel time wasn t measured by the unforgiving tick of the clock. Exodus 20: Remember the Sabbath day, to keep it holy. 9 Six days you shall labor, and do all your work, 10 but the seventh day is a Sabbath to the Lord your God. On it you shall not do any work, you, or your son, or your daughter, your male servant, or your female servant, or your livestock, or the sojourner who is within your gates. 11 For in six days the Lord made heaven and earth, the sea, and all that is in them, and rested on the seventh day. Therefore the Lord blessed the Sabbath day and made it holy. Genesis chapter 1 (entire) - chapter 2:1-3 The framework or pattern of the seven day week The prominent place given to the earth in God s plan. Genesis chapter 1:20-25 Genesis was not written with technical language. It was written in a way that any ordinary person down through the ages could observe the same things about the sky above and the ground beneath and how animals can be grouped. But notice it s not a technical grouping, such as mammals. They are observational grouping, such as animals that fly and animals that creep. Genesis could have been written in technical language. It could have been written with technical scientific language about discoveries that we won t make for another 1,000 years, but how would we even react to that? It wouldn t make any sense to us now and we d dismiss it as gobbledygook. Does God rest the same way we do? God rested on the seventh day. God of course doesn t need rest the way we do, so this clearly doesn t mean that God took a nap. It means He ceased initial creation. Once He created the sun, moon and stars, He doesn t need to create them again. He can rest from creating them. Once He created the man and the woman, He didn t need to recreated them. He rested from creating them. Now He still providentially guides and sustains humanity through the reproductive process that He created, but He has rested (ceased) from His initial creation. So, His Sabbath rest is an eternal one. Our

5 rest is not. We have to cease from our work continually, not just once. Hebrews 4:3-4 3 For we who have believed enter that rest, as he has said, This is the difference between analogy and allegory. Allegory deals with symbolism to present an idea or a truth. Analogy compares to concrete things to each other in an obvious way. This is like that. In the first chapter of Genesis we see God laboring, creating. How does God create in Genesis? He speaks things into existence. God creates ex nihilo, meaning out of nothing. This is not the way we create, because we are not identical to God. We are analogous to God, meaning we imitate Him. The point being again that our Sabbath rest is not identical to His rest. We are analogous to God, not identical. Our rest is not eternal. God s rest from His works is eternal. He created the heavens and the earth. There s no need to do that again. He said, It is finished. Now what is all this contrast and distinction leading up to? The creation of the man and the woman who are distinct, who are contrasted. I think it s the only way to engage with current scientific thought with intellectual integrity. This is the Scripture says that we were created in the image of God, in His likeness. That means were are analogous to God, not identical to God. We are like Him. We are not Him. He is Creator. We can be creative. His speech brings things into existence. Our speech can bring hope and healing or even discouragement and death. He is sovereign over all things. We have dominion over the earth. He only had to rest from His works once. We have to rest from our works every day. We are like Him, but not identical to Him. To be like is to be analogous to. So, if our work and our words and our rest are not identical, but analogous, then why do we suddenly switch gears when it comes to His days? Can t our days be

6 analogous to His days? Our days are like His days, but our days are not His days? This view of Genesis 1 still takes the text literally. Do I mean something different by work when I say God works? No, but clearly His work is different than ours as everything about Him is other than we are, including His days. Why overstate the case when it doesn t make a difference when it comes to the gospel? Whether God made the heavens and the earth in six 24 hour days or whether He made everything in 6 seconds or 6 billion years changing nothing theologically speaking. 3 For we who have believed enter that rest, as he has said, As I swore in my wrath, They shall not enter my rest, although his works were finished from the foundation of the world. 4 For he has somewhere spoken of the seventh day in this way: And God rested on the seventh day from all his works. Our lives have patterns too. You re born, you live, you love, you work, you cease from working, you die. There s a pattern to life. There s also a pattern to the Christian life. The Holy Spirit convicts us of sin and judgement and righteousness. There is a pattern between separations that are complementary (light from darkness, water from land, day from night, man from woman) and separations that are destructive. In our sin and rebellion there is a separation toward disorder (man and woman from God, man and woman from each other, man from the soil, both from the garden). Hebrews 4:3-4