Rough notes from John MacArthur’s plenary session this morning —
Two years ago started Shepherd’s Conference with “Why Every Self-Respecting Calvinist needs to be a dispensationalist.”
This year, “Why every self-respecting Calvinist, evangelical, Christian must be a 6-day Creationist” — the theology of creation.
It used to be that whatever the Bible taught trumped all other categories and ideas. It was the King. The Bible is reality and truth. It is the way things really are and the way things really happened, including creation.
The Bible does not take a back seat to getting things right scientifically.
- Whoever created the universe understands it. He understands how it works — perfectly and accurately. He is not waiting for scientific advances to comprehend it and be informed about how it works.
- Whoever is intelligent and powerful enough to design the universe is also intelligent enough to author a book that accurately describes it. It is logical, consistent and understandable.
- If the Creator wrote a book then we would know about creation. (If He didn’t write it, then we wouldn’t know about it.)
- When we come to the revelation given to us by the creator, we will get an accurate record of the creation. You can’t possibly misunderstand Genesis 1. It opens with a simple, clear, and unmistakable statement — God created the heavens and the earth.
Five categories into which everything fits — time, force, action, space, matter — “In the beginning (time) God (force) created (action) the heavens and the earth.”
1. Fidelity — trust in the Scripture. Either you believe what Scripture says or you don’t.
Get past the idea that you need any kind of scientific information to bring to an understanding of creation and the Bible. There is no scientific explanation for creation. Creation science can prove that evolution didn’t happen, but it can’t tell us what did happen. (It’s never been observed, verified, or repeated.) So all that creation scientists can do is show that evolution has not happened and cannot happen. But that tells you nothing about creation.
But I promise you this, it did not happen by any laws of science — it is a massive miracle.
That’s why we are regularly told in Scripture — God created. There is one historical record of what happened — Genesis 1 & 2, with no evidence anywhere in Scripture of any evolutionary process.
Examples:
- What if you met Lazarus after the resurrection? what kinds of questions would you ask him? You could interview and ask questions about his life before and after, etc…, but it would tell you nothing about how he came to life, because it was a supernatural miracle.
- What if you took the meal away from one of the 5000 fed by Christ — analyze the fish and bread and interview the participants, and ask them about the food, etc., but it would not tell you how it came into existence.
- The only way to understand creation is to understand it as a massive miracle and the only way to understand it is in the pages of Scripture.
- Creation has nothing to do with science — it is a miracle. Natural law played no role in creation.
All that is left for the reader is either to believe or not. Fidelity.
Couldn’t God have used evolution? It is irrelevant. But if you need an answer, No! Evolution required death and there was no death.
If Genesis 1 is wrong, then your problems have just begun; there are then 66 books with potential errors! E.g., Job 38:1ff. All the way through chapter 42. “I know You can do all things…” Keep your mouth shut and accept what God says. He is the creator, lawgiver, and Judge. Evolution is the latest means fallen sinners have devised to remove the innate knowledge of God (Romans 1). By embracing evolution, sinners have attempted to avoid the judgment of God. It is a rejection of Biblical revelation.
Scripture, not science, is the test of everything. To determine someone’s fidelity to the Word of God, ask them what they believe about Genesis 1. If they reject it, ask them where they start believing???!!! Fidelity to Scripture is the issue.
Those of us who uphold inerrancy cannot equivocate on creation.
2. Simplicity —
Other accounts of creation — John 1; Colossians 1; Dt. 4:32 — all Biblical Scriptures affirm the simplicity of creation.
- Ps. 104 — He does it. Cf. v. 24 — “you have made them all.” Cf. v. 32.
- Ps. 148 — cf. v. 5 — if you deny the creation account, you diminish praise
- Is. 40:28; 42:5-8 — God’s creative power in salvation is related to His power in creation
- Mk. 10:6; Eph. 3:9;
- Rev. 4:11; 10:6; 14:6-7 — God’s worship is tied to Him as creator
- 165 passages in Genesis quoted in the NT, and 200 alluded to — all clear and concise statements about the integrity of creation.
Edward Young (Westminster Sem.) — some say that Gen. 1-2 is poetry and myth, attempting to remove the problems of the creation account; but this is no answer to the problem. Better to just deny your belief in Gen. 1-2 than to suggest it is poetic.
3. Priority — it is essential and not secondary and arbitrary.
Why did God make man? What is the divine priority for creation? God does nothing without purpose. He designs from the end, back. Creation must have an ultimate purpose. He is doing and achieving something. There is something to which everything is moving.
“Providence subordinates everything to the greater purpose.” (Edwards) History will end, but only when God achieves His great and final goal.
Cf. Is. 46:9-11 — from the beginning, He already had ordained how it would end. “I have planned it; I will do it.”
What is the grand design? Redemption. To gather a bride for His Son. When the last name is gathered, it’s over. All creation is a part of His grand scheme of redemption. The work of redemption and salvation is His purpose for creation. Cf. Eph. 3:8-11.
- 1 Cor. 15:22 — in Adam all die; in Christ, all made alive
- Romans 5:18 — one man Adam — tamper with Genesis and you tamper with the doctrine of salvation that rests in Christ.
- 1 Cor. 15:45 — first Adam given life; second
- 1 Cor. 15:22
- Rev. 2:7; Rev. 22
- 1 Cor. 15:47
- 1 Cor. 15:48-49
- 1 Cor. 15:38ff — resurrection bodies
All these are passages that draw salvation parallels from creation. Cf. Edwards.
2 Cor. 4 —
- Just as God created instantaneous light (v. 6), so He creates instantaneous spiritual light.
- In creation everything began as darkness until God brought light; the same is true in the hearts of men. The miracle of spiritual light is analogous to the miracle of physical light.
- Neither is a process, but a divine miracle.
In Genesis 1, there are six days of darkness and light — Edwards suggests it is a picture of the life of the believer caught in darkness and light.
The culmination of creation is “It is very good.” So the believer moves to heavenly rest and Sabbath where all is light. All that is in creation, by analogy.
Adam was made in one place and put in paradise. So a believer is created here (2 Cor. 4), and placed in heavenly paradise (and hope).
We’re not only messing with the beginning, but now also with the ending — the un-creation — Cf. 2 Peter 3:10, 12. Are you getting tired of the “greening” of evangelicalism. God cursed the creation — Gen. 3. People do not understand the theology of creation and what God has done to it as a result of sin. What He sets us out to do is to recover the beauty of it that is below the curse. You have to use the sweat of your brow to keep it from killing you, but if you subdue it, look at what it provides for you.
How can Christian leaders jump on the bandwagon of the evolutionists?
Cf. scientist at Cal Tech — Michelen lecture series — global warming is consensus with a political agenda without a scientific fact. “Skepticism is the soul of true science.” The scientist must be a skeptic.
What is all this about? It’s political and financial agendas — class warfare and envy. The poor suffer the most and are not helped when we focus on these kinds of issues.
Step on the grass, kill a deer and drill for oil. Now. (And you can fill in whatever else you want.) Man is not the enemy of creation; it is given to him to use for God’s purposes. Creation is not fragile; it is upheld by the power of God (Col. 1).
Cf. Gen. 8:22 — relax — as long as creation exists, the days and seasons will not cease!
We can use and extract everything we can out of this planet until the day the Lord brings it to its end. He made it and He sustains it.
Words of Grace 