Good morning. How are you all doing today? Excellent. I'm doing very well, thank you
so much. We always like to start our service by welcoming anybody that is here
in our sanctuary for the first time or if you're watching online for the first
time, welcome. We're so glad you're here to worship with us at Hosanna. I am
Pastor Nathan and this morning we're gonna continue our look back to the
beginning of our universe and everything that exists in it. You know last week we
flew through the first half of the first verse in Genesis and today we're gonna
make it all the way to verse 2 so buckle your seat belts, alright? You know in the
first half of verse 1 of Genesis it says in the beginning God and we learned that
God, what that teaches us is that God was, God is. God has existed before our
universe existed and everything in it. We learned that the Bible teaches us that
God is eternal. It uses phrases like God is from everlasting to everlasting,
meaning back into eternity past all the way into eternity future. God is and will
always be. God has always existed and all of that puts him outside of everything
in this universe. It means that he's not subject to the laws of our universe, the
the forces that exist in our universe because he created our universe
including time and that's where we get the idea that God is timeless. God is the
uncaused cause of everything that exists and we looked at how that's a comfort to
us as believers. You know if we can believe and come to that place where
we're settled in our spirit and our heart that God has always existed and
God created everything that exists in this universe and everything that exists
on this earth, he created you and me. If we can believe that and settle that in
our hearts well then it's really easy to believe everything else his word says to
us and everything that his word promises to us because he is God Almighty. And so
it makes it easy for us to trust and to believe and to have faith in him in each
moment of every day because man if he created everything what can't he do
right? But there's a lot of pushback to the biblical creation narrative today
and there has been since the very beginning. There's objections to the
biblical narrative, there's speculations and theories and today we're gonna deal
with some of those addressing the possibility of some of those theories
that people have about what Genesis 1 & 2 has to say about creation. We're also
gonna deal with the scriptural dismissal of some of them and just really look at
what scripture says that kind of dismisses some of the ideas but really
the idea today and my prayer for all of us is that we don't miss the application
to our lives. That we don't miss the application to our lives that comes
from what God did in the beginning. Let's pray. Father we love you. God we're so
thankful for who you are and what you've done. Lord we stand at awe at your
majesty. We stand it in awe at just your glory. God our minds can't wrap around
the concept of you existing beyond time, before time. The very idea that you're
the one who started the clock of the universe. But God your word teaches us
that. And Lord what kind of God would you be if you were limited by time, space and
matter and Lord you're you're almighty. And Lord that is what we rest our hope on.
That is what we rest our trust on. That is what causes us to be able to read every
promise you've given us in your word and to put faith and to trust those things
for our life, our being and how we are and who we are. And so God continue to
encourage us Lord as we study through Genesis this first book in your word God.
That we continue to learn and be encouraged and even challenged if need
be about the reality of what your word says about creation. What your word says
about how everything came to be which ultimately comes down to Lord the
question of how we came to be and who we are and why we are here. What is the
purpose Lord? It all started in the beginning God and Lord we're blessed to
be able to hear from you today. But God first we want to worship you as we do
Lord because you are worthy. You are the creator. You are God Almighty. You are
omnipotent. You are omniscient. You know all things. God who else could we put our
trust in but you. So Lord we praise your name. We glorify you. Be blessed Lord and
speak to us today. It's in Jesus name we pray. Amen. We are in Genesis chapter 1
verse 1 and as I mentioned in the intro you know the the first verse of Genesis
really gives us a short abridged summary of creation. It's really the ultimate
bird's-eye view that is then detailed starting with verse 2 and then getting
into verse 3 through the end of chapter 1 where we see a very detailed
description of not the universe's creation that's just all summed up in
verse 1 but the creation that takes place here on earth but the important
part to understand about the beginning of Genesis here is the Bible just very
simply and very straightforwardly declares the world did not create itself.
The world did not come about by chance. The world did not evolve from some gases
that absolutely just you know floated around indefinitely and then one day
accidentally collided and accidentally combined in the right accidental way to
accidentally make life and you know in an accident after accident after
accident. That's not what the Bible declares. It wasn't some accidental
coincidence of natural causes. What the Bible says in verse 1 of Genesis is in
the beginning God created the heavens and the earth. That is a foundational
truth that we rest our faith on. We believe that as Christians that God
created everything he is deity. He is omnipotent. He is omnipresent. He is above
and outside all things. He's God right? That's kind of what defines God. The
characteristics of gods that man makes up is they always seem to be limited by
things man is limited by right? You look into the different pantheons of Greece
and ancient cultures and stuff and what you see is is these supposedly God
creatures, God people having the same jealous squabbles that humans have and
the same fights and the same they're just they're just stronger
representations of who man thinks he is but the Bible the word of God just tells
us God is God. God is God. It teaches us that God is the ultimate being. He is the
ultimate being that exists independently of time space and matter but it's
important to understand what that means. It means that the universe is not God.
God is not the universe and that is one of the ideas that people have and some
people even the church have today that that the universe is is God and we're
all a part of him and no he's separate from his creation. He transcends his
creation because he created it. He is not limited by time for he's eternal. That's
what 1st Timothy 1 17 tells us. He's not limited by space or distance or matter
because he's omnipresent. That means he's everywhere simultaneously. That's
what Psalms chapter 139 verses 7 through 12 teaches us and so he's God and we
dealt with that at length last week and so I'm not going to belabor that point
because what I want to move on to here is what the rest of verse 1 tells us
that in the beginning God created. He created and that word in the Hebrew
language is bara. It's a very specific and special word because it means to
create out of nothing. That's what this word refers to. Interestingly enough this
word bara is only used of God in all of Scripture. You never see anybody but God
bara creating. Only God truly creates and what that indicates to us is that God
did not create the universe out of himself. He didn't create the
universe or the world out of him. It's not a part of him. He's separate
from creation. He created the universe and the world out of nothing and that's
an important thing for us to understand because we as humans we can be
creative right? We're pretty creative. We look around what people do in our
culture and art and music and structures and buildings and stuff and yeah we we
we're pretty creative but we can't create out of nothing. No human can create out
of nothing. Matter of fact we don't create. Humans don't create anything nor
can we create anything in the true sense of the word. What we do instead is we
form. We fashion things. We synthesize things. We assemble things. The point of
that is that we require materials of some sort in order to build something.
That the creating we do as humans only comes from existing material and that
and that applies across the board. You know you go music right? Mankind creates
music. Well you need an instrument or a vocal cord. You need breath. You need
something to create music. You don't create it out of nothing. Poetry. Man
creates poetry. Well you need language. You need voice. You need mediums to put
it together to become the thing we called poetry and then of course
buildings you know and structures require concrete and wood and building
materials and even our forming of life between man and woman when they come
together. It requires the sperm from the man and the egg from the woman and that
comes together and that creates life. But again there was materials required in
order for that to happen but God is under no such constraints. That doesn't
apply to God and this could be really hard for us to understand I think to
wrap our mind around because most of us if we in our education in our science
classes or some of you that that actually went into physics and stuff you
know we've learned things in our life like the first law of thermodynamics
right? Does anybody know what that is? First law of thermodynamics right? Most of
us don't know and that was always one of the classes where I went why do I need
to know this unless I'm going to be a physicist right? Okay but I'm going to
share it with you. First law of thermodynamics matter and energy cannot
be created or destroyed. Now in science when something is called a law that
means we know that we know for a fact this is true. That's what a scientific
law is right? Things don't become a scientific law unless it's been tested
and proven and and so when we say law what we mean is we know this is true
based upon study and mathematics and all this stuff right? So matter and energy
cannot be created or destroyed it can only be converted. It can only be
converted say from like a solid to a liquid or from gas to plasma and back
and forth right? Essentially telling us that we know atoms the the building
blocks of everything they we can't create them they can't be created from
nothing that all the atoms in the universe that exist exist. Now we could
split the atom right to great destructive force and that's that's
nuclear bombs and things of that nature but matter cannot be created from
nothing. It cannot be completely destroyed incidentally either it just
converts from one form to another. Now we know that to be true
scientifically so the idea here is that when we look at our understanding of the
universe and the laws of physics doesn't apply to God. That's what the word is
telling us. God created everything from nothing. Nothing. He didn't assemble
previously existing materials. He didn't get any help. The word tells us what he
said is he spoke and then it happened. Now we call that in our literature and
our folklore wishes right? The stories of the genie in the bottle and give me a
wish and money and fame or whatever just comes from nothing right? And and but
God isn't a genie. God doesn't grant wishes in that sense and when he created
it functioned very much like our understanding of that. It just came from
nothing and it's really difficult for us to really wrap our head around that
because it's not natural to us. It's not how our natural universe functions. It's
not how we understand our natural universe and yeah it's not natural. It's
super natural attributed to God. Now this assertion by Moses as he's writing here
when he's basically asserting nothing existed before God spoken into existence
it was an attack on the polytheism and the pantheism of Egypt which Israel had
just escaped. It's commonly understood that that Genesis was written while
Israel was wandering in the wilderness. That's that's pretty much the idea and so
that idea is that Israel had been set free from Egypt. They had crossed the
Red Sea. They were in the wilderness. They were in Egypt for 400 years
surrounded by all the the many gods and the god of this and the god of the river
and the god of the wheat and the god of the animals and the god of the sky and
the god of the sun and and they were set free from this after 400 years and so
Moses is now writing this to to answer their questions. Where did we really come
from? Where did the universe really come from? If that is false what is the truth?
Now we're gonna deal with that more as we go through the six days of creation
because each one of those six days of creation specifically refutes one of the
Egyptian beliefs about the creation of everything and the gods there and it
also then refutes all of it down through the ages but today this idea that
nothing existed before God spoke it into existence really answers the challenge
or or comes against the ideas of what is called modern materialism and modern
naturalism. The philosophy of materialism in our in our current culture is that
physical matter is the only reality. That that physical stuff is the only reality.
Nothing exists outside of what is physical. Now because we can see atoms
and we could see leptons and we could see quarks and all that so they go that's
that's physical it's really there so nothing exists outside of that and
scientists who subscribe to this materialism kind of philosophy said that
even thoughts and feelings and in the mind in our will all of that can be
explained by natural phenomena right where it ultimately comes down to the
thoughts you have it's just some electrical impulse in the brain and then
naturalism says all phenomena just everything that happens and can happen
and will happen it could all just simply be explained in terms of natural causes
and and and natural laws so that's kind of the idea that that drives the
secular ideas in the scientific communities about creation that we can't
ascribe it to any supernatural cause because that doesn't exist it has to be
ascribed to something natural. In 1903 there was a scientist named Herbert
Spencer who was an agnostic and mostly an atheist in that sense you know he was
like there might be something out there but you know probably not but he said in
1903 that everything that is knowable everything that is knowable every fact
every law every does everything that is knowable can be categorized into five
categories and he categorized all of this from the perspective that there's
no God God can't exist right he was actually the guy that is credited with
coming up to the coming up with the term survival of the fittest after reading
Charles Darwin's origin of the species right so this is what he said everything
that could be known and that ever will be known can fall under the category of
time force action space or matter which is basically that the only explanations
for anything that we can know and ever will know can fall under natural causes
and effects now I don't know if anybody ever said this to him but I find it
really funny because if you read Genesis 1 1 that's what he just described in the
beginning time God the force not Star Wars force just the force created the
action the heavens space and the earth matter so he's everything that is
knowable and I'm like well I kind of agree with you sir in the beginning God
created the heavens and the earth now despite the fact that we've had the Word
of God and we have this here scientists still come along and they go wow look at
what we discovered and in we have verses like Hebrews 11 3 right it says this by
faith we understand that the universe was created by the Word of God so that
what is seen was made from things that are not visible we've had that for a
long time and yet one day scientists came up and they went we discovered
atoms we can't see them but they make up everything Wow and we're like yeah we
knew that this whole time now could we prove it we you know that that came
along but faith is what the substance of things not seen God said I believe it
that's a core of Christian faith right just because I don't understand it
doesn't mean it couldn't have happened I mean am I that arrogant to reduce the
power of Almighty God to the limitations of my mind that's the height of arrogance
and so we believe by faith and what scientists keep discovering is oh yeah
the Bible was right oh yeah Bible is right and so when it comes to the
creation of the universe in the secular explanations based upon naturalistic
presuppositions they always end up in the same exact place how was the first
natural cause caused right one of the prevailing theories that started about a
hundred years ago is the Big Bang Theory many of us heard of this many of us
learned this in school and the Big Bang Theory simply says you know billions of
billions of years ago a tiny tiny something very scientific right a tiny
something exploded and everything that exists in the universe came from this
explosion and as science marches on and studies things and and they keep moving
forward and learning more about the expanse of the universe and the
tininess of atoms and subatomic particles they keep end up keep
discovering problems with the Big Bang Theory which has been the bedrock of
scientific understanding for a while one of the problems that they've discovered
is is well you know we we know that matter and energy cannot be created or
destroyed it we also know it can't come from nothing well what did the Big Bang
Big Bang out of nothing well that violates what you call a law if the Big
Bang was true based upon current understanding of gravity and how gravity
works the scientists are now saying that the Big Bang would have never expanded
if gravity works the way we now understand gravity works formation of
planets and stars and galaxies as we look around and in north our modern
telescopes and stuff we see order order order over and over and over again not
the random scattering that happens when something explodes and then the Big Bang
Theory says that in this initial explosion of everything and I'm trying
to keep this real simple to not get into a boring science class here and not that
I even understand it all but when the Big Bang exploded that was energy that
was converted into matter and so scientists say that that when energy is
converted into matter what you have is both positively charged matter and
negatively charged matter we call that matter and antimatter right you guys
ever heard those terms so they go if the Big Bang happened and there was just
energy that was suddenly converted into all the physical matter that exists in
the universe there should be an equal amount of antimatter right guess what
they can't find antimatter they're like it's supposed to be there but there's
none and then you get into a whole bunch of other stuff that is just is
interesting if you if you're wanting to look into it but one of the modern
things they're saying now because all of the math and discoveries keep saying
that the Big Bang is not true is one of the things scientists used to say is that
before the Big Bang there was no time right because we understand that time is
is a is a dimension of the physics of our universe right we understand that
mathematically that that time is a dimension of physics and they go so
before the Big Bang time couldn't have existed and now they're going well we
keep discovering that that things are pointing to the fact that things started
out of nothing right and so now they're trying to say well maybe maybe there was
something before the Big Bang and they're calling it guess what the
multiverse right stop reading comic books scientists right but but they're
they're now saying that that there was a multiverse and in this multiverse
universes are just constantly being created right and we're gonna get into a
little bit the the the almost almost radically impossible odds that a
universe manifested randomly by accident to exist like ours they go well in the
multiverse there was an infinite amount of universes being created so there's a
chance that one happened to be ours that created life and then yet they're going
back to but this science and this math and this it doesn't support that and
again let's say okay there is a multiverse what created that where did
that come from here's the answer God created the heavens and the earth that's
the answer now heavens and earth is a is a way in the Hebrew language it's a it's
a phrase ology that basically means the entire universe right it's everything so
when he says heavens there the the phrase heavens is referring to outs
everything outside of the earth right everything outside of our planet earth
and this is what a famous secular scientist Stephen Hawking said in his
book a brief history of time he said our galaxy just the Milky Way galaxy is an
average-sized spiral galaxy that looks to other galaxies like a swirl in a
pastry roll and that it is over 100,000 light-years across that is 600 trillion
miles okay he says we now know that our galaxy is only one of some hundred
thousand million galaxies that could be seen using our modern telescopes each
galaxy itself containing some hundred thousand million stars pretty big common
scientific understanding says that the average distance between each one of
these galaxies these hundred million thousand infinite galaxies the distance
between them is about 300 million light-years right yet they're going what's
in that space well we think it's supposed to be this but they can't find
it the more scientists study the universe the more they discover that the
conditions in our universe appear to have been extremely fine-tuned to
support life or another way to put that intentionally designed our universe is a
just right universe again Stephen Hawking definitely not a creationist this
is what he said the universe and the laws of physics seem to have been
specifically designed for us if any of about 40 physical qualities had more
than slightly different values life as we know it could not exist in the
universe either atoms would not be stable or they wouldn't combine into
molecules or the stars wouldn't form the heavier elements or the universe itself
would just simply collapse before life can develop and so on and I'm like yeah
bro you're right it was specifically designed for us the universe is a just
right universe right if the gravitational force of the universe was
was larger stars would be too hot and they'd burn out too fast and unevenly
distribute heat in the universe and life couldn't exist according to the math and
all of that if the gravitational force were smaller stars would remain so cool
that nuclear fusion would never ignite and there would be no heat and light in
the universe the universe has a just right speed of light if the speed of
light were larger stars would send out too much light and we would be blinded
because the light would just bombard us to the point of burning out our eyes but
if it was smaller stars wouldn't send out enough light at all and we would have
no idea there was anything up there in space the universe has a just right
average distance between stars right if the distance between stars was larger
the heavy element density would be too thin for rocky planets to form every
planet in the universe would be a gas planet but if the stars were closer
together the heat or planetary orbits would become destabilized because of the
gravitational pull from other stars so if the star nearest to our Sun was closer
all of our planets would get wonky and there would be no proper orbits the
water molecule the polarity of a water molecule look how specific this is if
the polarity of the water molecule was slightly different the heat of fusion
and vaporization would be too great for life to exist anywhere if the
polarization of a water molecule was smaller the heat and fusion of
vaporization would be too small for life to exist anywhere it's exactly right for
water to exist and we all know that we need water to to live right it's kind of
like how God created us Donald Prince who works at the Princeton Institute for
Advanced Science he calculated the odds based upon these 40 things that Stephen
Hawking was talking about he calculated the odds of a universe randomly forming
with all of these things in perfect precision to operate and the odds were
one in 10 billion to the hundred and twenty fourth power now just to give you
a reference point all right when a number surpasses one in ten to the
fiftieth power not ten billion one in ten to the fiftieth power when odds get
to that point the probability of it happening is so small that they call it
mathematically impossible right what are the odds of something happen one in ten
to the fiftieth power people go it's mathematically impossible okay so the
universe one in ten billion to the hundred and twenty fourth power and yet
people go yeah it's just it's it's it's ridiculous the conclusion is that there's
really no chance that a universe like ours that's perfectly suited for us would
happen apart from an intelligent designer putting things in place exactly
as they need to be the Bible says this Psalms 19 1 the heavens declare the
glory of God and the expanse proclaims the work of his hands right that's
referring to the complexity of the universe as itself evidence of an
intelligent designer it's just too precise and too complex to be by random
chance Isaiah chapter 40 verse 25 it says to whom will you compare me or who
is my equal asked the Holy One look up and see who created these things he
brings out the stars by number and he calls them all by name because of the
great power because of his great power and strength not one of them is missing
so there's exactly as many stars out there that God wanted to be out there
and that includes the hundred thousand million stars that occupy the hundred
thousand million galaxies that exist in our universe wow our God is creative
and all you got to do is look up into the night sky and you see the glory the
strength the majesty of a creator who ordered all of this now when it comes to
the earth he created right he said he did the heavens and the earth intentional
design is not hard to see in creation either you know the other day I was at
home and we were watching this video of this guy who has a YouTube channel where
he restores watches right and you know people send him in these really old
old watches and he takes them apart right and it's just like oops if you've
ever seen someone take apart a watch like an old classic you know wind-up
watch it's insanely complicated like multiple gears with the perfect amount
of teeth that are perfectly set apart with this piece holding it down here and
this and it's just so precise and I'm watching this video and I'm like how
would anybody ever go that accidentally happened right and they go you know like
one day there was a you know a molecule and an atom and it connected with
another atom and made a molecule and then those molecules generated together
and created elements and then those elements kept going accidentally
colliding and then one day there was a metal and then yeah and then the metal
formed and then one day it accidentally formed into a gear with the precise
amount of teeth but there's multiple different size gears that accidentally
formed and then this perfectly piece of metal to hold this gear down into because
it all has to fit in this little thing and all just oops accidentally happened
and yet that's exactly what people believe happened in creation when they
look at the when they look at the complexity of life you know look around
the earth and you'll find many many many life forms that are far more complex
than a wristwatch and in we've all been through it in science class but from a
creationist point of view you know you look at the complexity of the human eye
and the human nervous system and our cardiovascular system and our
reproductive capability in the skeletal system and the muscular system and all
this together and there's volumes and volumes and volumes and volumes and
years and years and years of classes and study for people to to learn all this
stuff it's so complex and then on top of that you just have the complexity of
ecosystems right like if there was no plants on earth guess what there would be
no oxygen but if there was no humans breathing out co2 there would be no
plants which one evolved first they depend on each other and you have these
types of things where one system depends on another system and the question is
always well if you're gonna say things evolved one piece at a time which piece
evolved first but when you say it was God that's where most people scoff oh I
can't be God it can't be supernatural and the modern mind believes that that
like things like evolution that's a it's a closed case it's a done deal right you
talked to people today and they just evolution is of course true right it's
of course true and it can't even be argued and if you do try to argue the
evolution you're just an idiotic fundamentalist right and you know and
they say everybody knows and you know it's a fact and it's it's not it's not
a fact now when it comes to debating you know that type of thing you got to be
careful because you know there's there's you got to define terms right micro
evolution which is small-scale changes within a population of organisms yeah
that exists right there's a bunch of different types of dogs but guess what
they're all dogs right that's micro evolution just small changes of things
but but they're still the same species but scientific evidence does not support
what they call macro evolution right macro evolution is that an unguided
process of natural selection and random mutations is what accounts for the
complexity of life it's the idea of a fish becoming a bird no evidence they've
never discovered evidence it's just a postulation in fact one scientist said
this the evolutionary theory is still as it was in Darwin's time a highly
speculative hypothesis entirely without direct factual support now there's
circumstantial stuff that kind of looks like but direct factional support none
exists and when Darwin wrote his book the origin of species he knew the
greatest problem with his theory was the fossil record right like if things
evolved over time the fossil record should show this and and it doesn't and
it didn't in his time and there's these huge gaps in the fossil record and
there's no transitional fossils but he said this he's on record saying ah time
will vindicate me we just haven't discovered enough stuff to discover the
proof of my theory well it's been over 150 years since Darwin wrote his book
and one curator of the Field Museum of Natural History in Chicago said this we
are now over 120 plus years after Darwin and the knowledge of the fossil record
has been greatly expanded we now have a quarter of a million fossil species but
the situation hasn't changed much there are now even fewer examples of possible
evolutionary transition than we thought we had in Darwin's time right the more
they discover the more their theories go out the window how about we move on to
verse 2 all right now the earth was formless and empty darkness covered the
surface of the watery depths and the Spirit of God was hovering over the
surface of the waters and so now we're coming from that snapshot the whole
universe the span of creation and the majesty and the size of it we're coming
down to to earth level here because really what this book this Bible is
about is not let's give you a scientific treatise on how a hundred million
thousand galaxies exist it's it's the point of this book is God and you that's
the point of this right so one verse the universe now we come down to earth and
it says it's formless and empty in the Hebrew language it's kind of a melodic
term it's tohu wa bohu tohu wa bohu that's formless and empty right the idea
of this phrase is that that the earth here in verse 2 it says was unfinished
in shape and uninhabited by creatures incidentally that's the exact opposite
of where it will end up after six days of creation now there are some and I
said earlier I just want to deal with some of the theories people have about
some of this stuff there are some people that see a historical gap between
Genesis verse 1 1 chapter 1 verse 1 and verse 2 it's this idea they call it a
gap theory right and it really is is an idea that that that people came up with
to account for the fact that when we look at the geological strata of the
earth and we're looking at rocks and stuff they're really old right and and
so they're like gosh you know it's it's really older than what the biblical
account says and so people go maybe there's this gap and the idea is that
in verse 1 God created the heavens and the earth in perfect complete beauty
right the earth was fully formed everything was perfect and beautiful and
and Isaiah chapter 45 tends to support this because in Isaiah 45 it tells us
that God did not create the earth to be a wasteland or in other translations it
says he didn't create it in vain so people read Isaiah 45 and they go God
didn't create the earth formless and empty right but then before verse 2
happened there was something that happened that caused the earth to become
formless and empty and dark and reason people point to this is when it says now
the earth was formless and empty that word was can be translated became right
the Hebrew word can also mean became so some people read it and go now the earth
became formless and empty so it was created perfect and then it became
something else now the something that happened is typically attributed to the
fall of Satan that the universe was created and it was God and his angels
right and then we know that Satan fell you go into Isaiah 14 and all these
other places he said I will be like God and God's like no you're not and then he
was cast down to the earth and then when he was cast down to the earth that's
when the earth was was made formless and empty and kind of became you know dark
and all this stuff because darkness is often associated and connected to Satan
one of the other reasons people think that is that word formless can also be
translated ruined so verse 2 would say now the earth became ruined and empty
right and so the idea is that what we have in verse 2 through the rest of the
chapter is God remaking the earth in a sense taking it away from Satan
recreating it to give it to mankind as a gift for them to inhabit it now there is
some biblical interpret biblical support for an interpretation such as this
pastor Gary about five years ago did a study that you could still find on
YouTube where he goes into detail on this type of stuff you go to our YouTube
channel and it's a study called Genesis has a gap so if you're interested to dig
deeper in that I encourage you to do that he did a great job explaining the
foundations in the gap theory and like I said some use the gap theory to account
for the the age of the earth the geological strata and the fossils and
carbon dating and they go all these things earth has to be billions and
billions and billions of years old and so maybe it is billions of year old and
there was a gap then there was a reforming and then we have our modern
history but even within that there's variations of ideas because some people
go well yeah the fossil record seems to be billions and billions of years old so
maybe God created the earth with animals and animals existed and died and that's
where we get the fossil record and then later on God created mankind the problem
with that is that the Bible tells us death didn't exist in creation until the
fall some people say oh in this gap there's a pre-ademic race right there was
a race of humans that Satan ruled over on earth and in the you know so Adam and
Eve weren't the first ones right you guys ever heard of Lilith right in the
in Jewish Jewish histories there was this woman Lilith who was Adams first
wife and that didn't work out and so God had to make a new one right really
strange stuff people come up with but Jeremiah chapter 4 verses 23 through 25
refutes the idea that there was any humans in existence before Adam and Eve
and so like I said the the idea of trying to use a gap theory to say why
the fossils are old there was no death there was no death until Adam and Eve
fell so that really kind of refutes that but you know I will say that that the
gap theory idea it is a plausible way to account for the apparent age of the
geological evidence right not the fossils but the geological evidence but
then again you know those who oppose the idea of a gap theory say God could have
just made the earth already aged and people go well that's dumb didn't he
make Adam as a full adult fully aged fully capable of thought and speech yes
he did so can God make an earth that looks aged for whatever reason in his
wisdom he chose to do that it's not beyond him it's not beyond him to do
that and so other opponents you know they'll to the gap theory will say you
know you when you look at the geological time scales and the fossil ages and all
that stuff it's all dependent on highly big assumptions right you know the way
they date the fossils as they go well what strata of rock is the fossil found
in and then they go well how old is the rock and they go well what fossil was
found in it you see the circular reasoning there well this fossil was
found in layer 8 so it must be a billion years old well how do we know layer 8 is
a billion years old well because that fossil was found in it that's that's how
they date these things you're like that's silly that's what's carbon dating
they go carbon dating we use that to prove things are billions of years old
look it up carbon dating is really only accurate to 70 80 thousand years right
is the way the math works in the carbon dating and then again that whole thing
is based on an assumption without getting into all the details they go well
there was carbon in the atmosphere and when people breathe they get carbon in
their system and blah blah blah blah blah blah blah but the whole thing is
based upon well we're gonna assume there was this much carbon at this time and
then from that they start dating things well what if you're wrong what if your
assumptions wrong then your whole dating process is wrong anyways okay don't want
to get into all that stuff so what they end up with is when it says the earth is
without form and void opponents to the gap theory just simply say it's an
expression of the progress during day one that God was just starting with the
earth that way as he gets into the six days of creation and so the truth is this
and I'll just say it this way there's no irreconcilable theological
contradictions between Christianity and believing that the earth is old or
believing that the earth is young there's there's no contradictions and in
the basis of this is we really don't know for sure either way right kind of
like Revelation right remember the arguments about Oh pre tribulation
rapture mid tribulation rapture post tribulation rapture well we're gonna
look at what the scripture says but we don't know and we'll find out when we
get there well as the Bible says as God said to Job where were you when I formed
the earth none of us were there and it doesn't really affect the theology of
God and man and sin and salvation so I spent all this time talking about
something that I'm really saying don't argue about it because we don't know and
then Paul in his writings he said to the church don't argue or cause dissension
in the body over things that aren't detailed by God in his word so yeah we
can suggest things we could talk and it's pretty interesting to to evaluate
some of this but but not to the point of division okay so God created the heavens
and the earth and it says the earth's surface was covered by darkness the
verse there or the word there just means a place without light that's what
darkness means a place without light and so it's it's emphasizing the the void
emptiness of the earth at this point that nothing was there Psalm 139 12 says
this though even the darkness is not dark to you the night shines like the
day and darkness are light darkness and light are alike to you speaking of God
so even though there was darkness there God was there and he could see clear he
saw the state of the earth he saw everything and then he's gonna do
something about it and it says in and under that darkness that the earth was
covered by the watery depths the indication there is that the entire
surface of the planet was just water at this point okay like a primeval ocean
and one famous commentator Umberto Casuto said just as the potter when he
wishes to fashion a beautiful vessel takes first of all a lump of clay and
places it upon the wheel in order to mold it according to his wishes so the
creator first prepared for himself the raw material with a view to giving it
life afterwards through order and life it is this terrestrial state that is
called the Tohu Wabohu right however above the primeval chaos and the
darkness and all this kind of foreboding thing we have unspeakable beauty
floating there it tells us that the Spirit of God hovered over the waters so
here at this moment universe is there the earth is being created and the
Spirit of God is there and it says it's hovering it's a very beautiful word that
that word hovering is a picture of a mama bird fluttering over her nest you
ever seen that you know they just kind of flutter and hover and they're
watching over the the baby birds you know and and that's the idea that the
that the Holy Spirit was fluttering like a nurturing bird over the dark formless
earth in preparation of day one what's also interesting is the word spirit
there in the Hebrew so Spirit of God that word spirit in in the Hebrew
language can also mean breath right we were seeing it in worship earlier it's
your breath in my lungs right it's it's the very power of God the animating
force of God if you will as it says in the in the Gospels where he breathed on
the disciples receive ye the Holy Spirit and so it's God's creative breath we see
here hovering over the water about to speak light and life into reality and we
see that in Psalms chapter 33 verse 6 where it says the heavens were made by
the word of the Lord and all the stars by the breath of his mouth he gathers
the water of the sea into a heap and he puts the depths into storehouses let the
whole earth fear the Lord let all the inhabitants of the world stand in awe
of him for he spoke and it came into being he commanded and it came into
existence now next time we get together we're gonna go through the six days of
creation as they're detailed here in Revelation or Revelation Genesis chapter
one and all of it starts as the Spirit of God is hovering there and we talked
about last week how all three God the Father God the Son God the Spirit are
all a part of creation here as God as one speaks light into existence speaks
light into the darkness that existed there and so but I want to close this
with application right because a lot of this is like okay possibilities and
science stuff and hey that's cool okay but what do we walk away with this type
of stuff to apply to our lives right this isn't a Bible college class this
is church right we come here to study God's Word that we would leave and be
able to live God's Word right and so Paul the Apostle kind of made application
of this creation narratives in 2nd Corinthians chapter 4 verse 6 he said
for God who said let light shine out of darkness who shone in our hearts to give
the light of knowledge of God's glory in the face of Jesus Christ so it's the God
who said light let light shine out of the darkness has shone in our hearts
you know without God and this is the application without God in our lives if
you're here this morning you don't know God you have never accepted God received
God is is your personal Lord and Savior if you're watching online and you don't
know God right maybe you're evaluating maybe someone brought you here I don't
know what it is maybe you know God you call yourself a Christian but you're in
a period of struggle and doubting right without God we have to understand that
we're in the darkness of sin our hearts are the darkness of sin and the Bible
describes that darkness as empty and desolate that word formless that is also
translated to ruined that is our lives without God that we are desolate we are
ruined we are empty and the reality of today is that the Spirit of God is still
hovering he is still fluttering over this world like a dove looking for where
he could land desiring to land on any life that would receive him in John
chapter 16 verse 8 it told us that the work of the Spirit here in this world
it says when he comes he will convict the world about sin righteousness and
judgment and if you're here today listening to this this study or watching
it later and you're convicted right now that the truth of who God is and that
God created everything and that all these ideas of man-centered naturalistic
creation stuff you're going yeah none of that makes sense and God is convicting
your heart of sin that you're a sinner he's convicting your heart of
righteousness the word goes on to say it's the righteousness of Christ that
he led a perfect sinless life and you haven't and he's convicting you of
judgment to come that's the work of the Holy Spirit in the world today and just
like the dove that Noah sent out when he was on the ark and the rains had stopped
and the water was beginning to recede from the watery flood of judgment that
covered the entire earth that dove it tells us in Noah's story flew out and
was looking for a place to land and the question the application is will you let
God land in your heart today your life might be a formless ball of darkness and
sin yet God hasn't departed from you he's fluttering in front of you saying
hey listen yeah you've sinned but yeah I came to this earth my name is Jesus
Christ I died on the cross for you receive me and you'll avoid the
judgment to come on sin God is saying that to you today he's looking for that
place and the question for you is will you become a new creation today will you
be born again out of the darkness and the formlessness the emptiness of life
will you let the Lord into your life and be forgiven of all sin past present and
future God wants to redeem and to restore your your broken life that's what
he does he wants to forgive you he wants to take your empty life and fill it with
purpose and reason and joy and peace he wants you to know that he is here right
now hovering before you the very breath of God saying I love you I created you
and although you've sinned I want to forgive you I want to restore you I want
to change you all you have to do is believe in me and the moment any person
takes that step to say God I believe in you God says in that person's life let
there be light you know John chapter 1 verses 1 through 5 it says in the
beginning was the word and the word was with God and the word was God he was God
in the beginning all things were created through him and apart from him not one
thing was created that has been created in him was life and that life was the
light of men that light shines in the darkness and yet the darkness did not
overcome it Jesus Christ the word of God God himself it says the creator of
everything is the light of this world he is the light of our lives and when you
respond to him when you receive him when you say God I believe Jesus I believe
you are God I believe you died I believe your sacrifice pays for all my sin I
receive that be my Lord be my Savior when you do that and put your faith in
him the darkness no longer overcomes you when you put your faith in him the power
of sin and death is defeated forever and instead of emptiness and formlessness
and desolation you're gonna find grace you're gonna find mercy and you're
gonna find forgiveness and the truth of what Paul said in second Corinthians 5
17 will apply to your life where it says therefore if anyone is in Christ he is a
new creation the old has passed away and see the new has come that's the
application of Genesis 1 & 2 into your life today as we're gonna see through
the account of creation God creates beauty God creates life God restores
everything we need he creates man and he sees man needs woman and he creates
woman and it was perfect but we messed it up we messed it up by sinning and
then everything else we have in the Bible is all about what God did about
that he died for you he died for your sins that you could be saved that's what
all this is about as though God is speaking you today I encourage you to
listen to him receive him respond to him because if God created the heavens and
the earth and he did and everything he says is true including the fact that one
day he's gonna be done the timeline is gonna be done and he's gonna come and
judge the earth for its sin and if you don't know Jesus Christ is your Lord and
Savior you will fall under that judgment and it'll be an eternity paying the price
for your own sins but he offers you in exchange as paradise heaven perfection
forever with him in eternal glory simply by receiving what he did for you in a
moment we're gonna pray and if God is speaking to you and you need to receive
him I'm gonna give you an opportunity to respond to that I pray you do let's
pray father we're so grateful that you sent your son to die for our sins
and Lord we're so grateful that the Spirit of God is in this earth convicting
of sin and righteousness and judgment and God we know according to your word
that it says when we respond to what you did on the cross that you come and dwell
within us making us a new creation that just like the earth was this formless
empty dark shapeless just gosh just broken that Lord is we're gonna read you
made something beautiful perfect reflecting your glory out of all of it
and that's what you want to do in people's lives today Lord there are some
in here that that feel that they are dark that their life is darkness that
they're covered in darkness Lord maybe the sorrow of tears has made them feel
like they're drowning in an ocean of tears or maybe they feel empty and
without purpose but yet God you have spoken to them this morning as you
hover before them as the breath of God speaking to them of their need for you
so while we're praying right now with all heads bowed and eyes closed I just
want to give anybody in this room an opportunity to receive Jesus Christ as
your Lord and Savior you've probably been trying your own way for so long
resisting the fact that you know I need to get right with God and God is speaking
to you many different ways and he's spoken to you again today you need to
stop resisting him you need to stop denying him let him do the most
wonderful beautiful work you will ever experience let him save your soul let
him fill you with his spirit and change your heart and change your life forever
and change your eternity forever and so while we're praying with heads bowed and
eyes closed just where you're seated if you know that you need to receive Jesus
Christ this morning I just want you to raise your hand where you're seated so I
could see it and let me pray with you this morning to receive Christ God wants
to do a work in your life he wants to change everything for you and he will
there are so many people in this room that have experienced that change but it
takes the first step of faith to say God I will believe in you so anybody in this
room got to speak in you this morning just raise your hands I could pray with
you if you're watching online and God is speaking to your heart this morning
obviously I can't see you but if you just let us know in chat just say I want
to receive Jesus Christ this morning or you click the button there on church
online that says I want to receive Christ we will pray with you but I
encourage you even if you're online to pray this prayer right now if you know
you need Jesus Christ as your Lord and Savior anybody else in this room all
right let's pray father God I thank you for sending your son I know I've sinned
I know I've sinned against you I've sinned against others and I've tried to
ignore you I've tried to explain why I exist through evolution the Big Bang and
Lord but today you've spoken to me and you've shown me that those sciences
that I trust in Lord that try and make you not exist Lord are ultimately flawed
and so God instead of exercising logic instead of exercising what I think I
know without setting any of that aside God I choose to exercise faith I believe
in you I believe in who you are I believe Jesus that you are God that you
came to this earth 2,000 years ago that you died for me I believe that way back
in the beginning of time you were there as part of the the Godhead Lord that
you were the word in the beginning and that not one thing was created apart
from you and that includes me so I invite you into my life to be the light
of my life thank you for dying for my sin thank you for paying the penalty for my
wrongdoing thank you for giving me victory over the darkness teach me how
to live for you teach me how to be who you've created me to be and nothing
else thank you for loving me so much it's in Jesus name I pray amen now if
you prayed that prayer this morning even if you didn't raise your hand that's
okay it still counts you know you've you've joined the family of God and and
you've joined a body of people who believe in Jesus Christ for their
salvation and we want to help you just to grow in that and so if you prayed
today and if you prayed online today we have a little white envelope up here in
the front and out in the back and if you're online we can mail it to you it's
called a new believers packet it's just some some tools and resources to help
you start growing in this relationship with Jesus you know we want you to grow
we want you to know him more that's that's what this is all about this is
why we gather together this is why we serve together this is why we we
do what we do as Christians and so please come forward and get one or get
one on the way out today if you prayed that prayer if you're online let us know
in chat we will get it mailed out to you but for the rest of us you know there
are so many people around us every single day that are perishing
spiritually and you all have an opportunity you have an opportunity to
share the gospel with them you have an opportunity to invite them to church
take those opportunities you know we provide tracks and stuff for you guys
one of the ones we make it says God cares on the front it's just an
invitation to church a real simple thing to say hey I'd like to invite you to
church what are they gonna do throw it on the ground so what pick it up give to
someone else right we're just called to get the message out there and I just
encourage all of you that the Spirit of God would just just grow in your life
that the fires of passion for who Jesus is and and based upon what he's done in
your life saving you from hell would just drive us to let people know to
invite them here somewhere you know we got opportunities coming up like Harvest
Crusade man use these opportunities Calvary Downey is hosting a freedom
festival on July 4th we're gonna be getting more information about this
because we want to give these opportunities for you guys to get
people to the message so that they too would come to know Jesus Christ they
too would be saved amen we're gonna close in worship I pray God would bless
you guys richly that your lives would be just full of him that the spirit would
fill you to overflowing that you would know your giftings and your callings
that you can go out in the Spirit of God the Spirit of Christ the power of God
Almighty and tell other people about him so that their lives would be changed too
amen all right God bless you guys