Jëan Ross: Good morning, friends, we'd like to welcome all of you again to "Sabbath School Study Hour," coming to you here from the Amazing Facts offices in Sacramento, California. We'd like to welcome our online members and our other church members that are joining us that can't actually meet with us in person because of this virus. We'd also like to welcome those joining us across the country and around the world on social media. Well, before we get to our lesson, Pastor Doug, let's start with a word of prayer. Dear Father, we thank You again that we have this opportunity to open up Your Word and study a very important subject, talking about Genesis and the beginning, creation. Father, we ask Your blessing. Be with us here, also those who are joining us around the country in Jesus's name, amen.
Doug Batchelor: Amen.
Jëan: Our lesson today continues in our study of, "How to Interpret the Scripture." Today, we're on lesson number nine, which is entitled, "Creation: Genesis as Foundation Part Two." Last week, we did part one, and this is sort of a build on that. And Pastor Doug, I like our free offer that we have, it's entitled "How Evolution Flunked the Science Test." And this, of course, is for anyone who would call and ask. The number is 866-788-3966, and you can ask for offer number 169. Or if you like, we can send you a digital copy of the book if you would text the code SH037 to the number 40544. You'll be able to read the book, "How Science Flunked the Science--" Sorry, "How Evolution Flunked the Science Test." Well, Pastor Doug, an important lesson today.
Doug: Yes sir, we're going to be talking again about the evidence you see in the Bible in Genesis in particular that the world was created. And actually, we've got Scriptures going all through the Bible. And we have a memory verse, and the memory verse is Psalm 19, verse 1, "The heavens declare the glory of God and the firmament shows His handiwork." So, we can see the glory of God in the things that He's made. Now, sometimes when you tell a person that you're a Christian and that you believe the Bible is literally, it seems like there's almost an attitude of pity that comes from people in the world. And I used to be this way because I used to be an evolutionist. I was not always a Christian, I was either agnostic or atheist, and I thought to myself, "Who in the world could believe these stories of Noah and the ark, and Adam and Eve, and the tower of Babel?" And I said, "These are obviously fairytales."
And it wasn't until I started reading the Bible for myself that I realized that it really is a cohesive truth. And then I started to evaluate the teaching of evolution, and I started realizing evolution takes a lot more faith to believe in than biblical creation. The idea that you could get all of this organization and design and interworking systems and symbiotic relationships by accident. And even as you listen to the evolutionists do their nature programs on television, when they talk about the millions and the billions of years, they talk about the magic of mother nature. So, they're ascribing supernatural to nature because they say, "You know, there is some kind of magical force. And isn't mother nature wonderful how she does these things?" And so, they clearly know there's some intelligence behind creation, but they refuse to believe the biblical account.
Jëan: You know, I'm reminded of watching one of those nature programs, Pastor Doug, and the commentator was talking about how miraculous it is that you can have life and how you have the DNA that is so central to life, and how the cells split and just the marvel of this, and all of the complex design involved in nature. And at the end of talking about this, he says, "And how amazing, it's almost impossible to believe that we are here, but here we are, so it must've happened." So, the whole idea of God is just pushed out of the minds because people are unwilling to acknowledge God. Because if you acknowledge God as the Creator, well, then also there is a responsibility that we have towards Him as our Creator.
Doug: Yeah, there really is an all out effort in much of modern science today to expunge anything that smacks of the religious or the supernatural in creation, even though it is so obvious all around us that something like that happened. But you know, it notes in the lesson that many of the greatest scientists in history were believers in God. And you got Gregor Mendel, who of course developed the theory of genetics. Arthur Compton, Isaac Newton, George Washington Carver, Blaise Pascal, Samuel Morse, the Wright Brothers, Michael Faraday, and I could go on and on talking about the great scientists and inventors, and they said, "Oh, absolutely there has to be a God."
And so, it's really not fair that much of the educational world today, they alienate or they push the outside or the fringe. Any scientist, they say, "We're not going to let you in our circle. You can't teach at our universities." If you say you believe in biblical creation, you're blackballed. And it's--there's an obvious effort on the part. And the sad thing is some of these institutions like Oxford and Yale and Harvard, they began as Christian institutions, but something happened along the way. With Darwin and "The Origin of Species," there was a shift. And with the French Revolution, they said, "We're in the age of reason now." Even though the French Revolution sort of turned into bloodshed and imploded, the idea age of reason now sort of took over.
Jëan: Right. Well, we do have questions that are coming in, and we want to remind you if you have a question related to creation or maybe what does the Bible say about origins, we'd be happy to take a look at that. And if you have a question, just type it there on Facebook in the comment section. Pastor Doug, we have Franklin, who's asking, "Was Eve created on the same day that Adam was created?"
Doug: Yes. Sometimes it confuses people because it talks about Adam being made in chapter 1. And then later, it goes back and it talks about the details of Eve's creation. God made all of His creatures in the first six days male and female. It talks about the Sabbath in Genesis chapter 2, but then it backs up and it explains in detail how God created Eve. Keep in mind that in much of the Bible, God begins with headlines, then He backs up and He gives the fine print. We do this in newspapers all the time. You give the big headline story, sometimes the headline will contain some of the main story, but then they back up and give you the details in the fine print. Headline, in the beginning God created the heavens and the earth. Details, you go through the first six days. Then it gives you more details of the sixth day, when God-- why God came about to make Eve. Says, you know, Adam named the animals.
And someone thinks, "How can he name all the millions of species and categories of animals in one day? That would take more than a day." I'm sure he just named the main categories of them. And he noticed that the bull had the cow and the goose had the-- is it the gander? And the rooster had his chicken, and something was missing in his life. And God wanted him to notice that vacuum so that he would be especially excited when He filled it. But that was still all on the sixth day.
Jëan: All right, well, then one of the question that people raise when they talk about creationists, they say, "Well, you know, they believe myths as far as origin." And they quote, for example and say, 'Don't you believe the earth is flat? Doesn't the Bible teach flat earth?'" And then they might even quote a verse in Revelation chapter 1, verse-- or Revelation chapter 7, verse 1 that talks about the four angels holding the four winds of the earth. They say, "There you go, four corners of the earth. Would the earth be flat?"
Doug: Well, we even use this kind of phraseology today. I think Jesus used the same wording in Matthew 24 talking about the Second Coming, how his angels would go to collect the redeemed. Says, "He'll send his angels with the sound of a trumpet. They will gather together His elect from the four winds, from one end of heaven to the other." The four winds being-- and it mentions the four winds also in Revelation 7. It's just talking about four corners of the earth. We use that language today. We'll say, you know, "Somebody went to the four corners of the earth." Well, we don't believe earth has corners. We use a lot of metaphors when we talk about the world, that doesn't mean that we take them literally. In the Bible, it says, "When the sun went down," and you got an example here. Oh, I forget where I put it. It talks about the sun going down, but we don't believe that the sun goes down or the sun rises, we know the earth is turning.
We might say that, you know, we feel something in our heart. Well, we may not really feel it in the pump, you're feeling it in your mind, but we use these metaphors. God says, "Write My Word in your heart." David said, "What have these sheep done? Don't punish these sheep." He's talking about the people. Well, David knew it's a metaphor for people. Everyone reading it knows it, so yeah, the Bible used common metaphors, it doesn't mean that they scientifically believed that the earth had four square, you know, big flat piece of land with four squares on it.
Jëan: Well, of course, when it talks about the four winds of heaven, we're not talking about four corners of a flat earth. Rather we're talking about the four points of the compass. And of course, they were aware of that, north, south, east, and west. And that's four divisions of the earth. You can say, "I'm going to the east, or the west, the north, or the south." And so, when the Bible speaks of the four winds or the four corners, it's really just talking about the four points of the compass, and it's talking about it being universal. You know, it's interesting in Daniel, you read about a wind that strove upon the great sea, and these four creatures came up. Well, these creatures, these beasts represent nations, the winds striving on the great sea. These four winds represent the four points of the compass. So, there are some symbolism that we find in the Bible, and we need to study it and understand it as to what it means, this symbolic application.
Doug: Even when you talk about the four winds, there's supernatural wisdom there. The Bible says, "God will separate us from our sins as far as the east is from the west." Well, they must've known that the earth revolves east to west, and there is no end to east and west. And the Bible talks about the king of the north and the king of the south. There is a place where they have their thrones. There's an end to the North Pole, there's an end to the South Pole. God did not say, "I'm going to separate your sins as far as the north is from the south," because that would've had a limit. But God said, "I'm separating your sins as far as the east is to the west." You can go east forever and ever and never get to east. But if you go north, you will eventually get to the North Pole. And if you take another step, you start hitting south. So, even in the Bible, it makes a distinction between north and south and east and west that we recognize in the rotation of the earth.
Jëan: Now, if you ask a Bible scholar, "What was the oldest book that we have in the Bible?" you know, we think Genesis, but there could be a book that was written by Moses, we believe, but was actually older than the book of Genesis, possibly the book of Job. And it is interesting in the book of Job, we do find some statements that is made that show us that there is far more to an understanding of the earth than is credited to people living back in those days.
Doug: Yeah, you've got a couple of examples. You can look, for instance, in Job chapter 26, verse 10, "He drew a circle on the horizon on the face of the waters." I've been to sea many times, I've been way out in the middle of the ocean, and you can see, especially if you have a high crow's nest, you can see the circle of the earth. And they noticed that when tall ships were sailing away, it seemed like they were shrinking as they went around the curvature. If you had good eyes, you could spot that on a clear day, on a flat sea. And now there are people, and I don't want to be unkind, but there are people who you would normally think are normal, educated people, amazingly enough even today that believe the earth is flat. And I don't want to be unkind, but it is not, it is round. And I've been up in my dad's Learjet years ago. The Learjet flies higher than a typical commercial jet. And when you're at 45,000 feet, you can see, clearly see the curve of the earth. It is not a big conspiracy of NASA and all the governments and pilots of the world to try to keep people in darkness about the earth being flat. I don't know what the advantage would be. But the earth is round.
You can also read in Job 26:7, "He stretches out the earth over empty space. He hangs it upon nothing." Well, all of the ancient myths said, "Well, the earth is on the back of the tortoise or it's on the shoulders of Atlas." And they had all these myths that the earth was sitting on something, but the Bible says, "The earth is hung upon nothing." It's out in space, and they looked up just as they saw the planets hanging upon nothing. And then you can also read in Isaiah chapter 40, verse 22, "Who sits above the circle of the earth," speaking of God. "And its inhabitants are like grasshoppers who stretches out the heavens like a curtain, and spreads them out like a tent to dwell in." There's some more metaphors. But they did use the metaphor of a circle.
Jëan: You know, I find that verse interesting. Isaiah 40, verse 22 specifically says, "The circle of the earth." You know, I had an experience, Pastor Doug. There is a gentleman that we played racquetball with, and he's a Muslim. And I was talking to him, I asked him if he's ever studied the Bible before. He said no. He asked me if I ever studied the Koran, I said no. He said, "Well, I'll tell you what. If you study the Koran with me for half an hour, then we'll study the Bible together for half an hour." I said, "Okay, that's fair." So, in our Bible study, we'd get together, and we'd take a look at different passages in the Koran, and then we look at passage in the Bible. And I said, "Well, one of the things we need to do is establish the trustworthiness of the Scriptures. Is there enough internal evidence in the Koran to prove that it is trustworthy?"
And I spoke about prophecy in the Bible, and so on. He said, "Oh yeah, you can trust the Koran." I said, "Why is that?" He says, "Well, here it is." And he found a verse that says in the Koran that the earth is shaped like an egg. And he says, "Well, back when the Koran was written, people didn't know that the earth was round." Well, I couldn't help but turn to this verse in Isaiah chapter 40, verse 22, where it says, "He sits above the circle of the earth." And I asked him, "Does the earth look more like an egg or does it look more like a circle?" He smiled and said, "Well, I guess it is more of a circle." And I said, "Well, you find this verse in Isaiah long before the Koran was ever written." So, if you look at the evidence in the Word of God, it helps to establish its inspiration. Something very practical, another one that we have in Job chapter 28, verse 25, he talks about the wind having weight. And of course, that's something that it's new to science relatively speaking. People back 1,000, 2,000 years ago didn't understand the significance of the weight of the air.
Doug: I don't think it was until the 18th or 19th century that they discovered that, you know, air pressure, that weight actually-- wind actually has or air has weight to it. And yet it says here that way back in the book of Job, probably the oldest book in the Bible, the winds had weight. So, throughout the Bible, you can see that there are metaphors. Jesus says, for instance, in Matthew 15, "For out of the heart proceed evil thoughts, murders, adulteries, fornications, theft out of the heart."
He's talking about the mind, doesn't come out of the pump. And they knew that in the Bible because they knew if he got hit on the head, you didn't think clearly, you didn't think with your pump, you thought with your brain. But it still says, "Hide thy Word in your heart." And then it says, "As a man thinketh in his heart." And so, just because the Bible uses metaphors, it's a very scientific book. Look at all the sanitation laws. You know, the way they brought many of the plagues, ancient pandemics to a halt is by following the sanitation laws. And I don't think we talked about this last week, but when they had the 1918 and 1919 Spanish Flu during the part of the time that it went through Europe, they discovered a lot of the Jewish communities were not infected because they were practicing the laws of sanitation and contagion that are found in Leviticus. So, it's still a good scientific book.
Jëan: All right, Pastor Doug, we're getting a lot of questions coming in from Facebook, and this is a good question. It says, "How did people spread all across the world after the tower of Babel?"
Doug: Well, when you read in Genesis chapter 11, it tells us that all the world was of one language and one people, and they were defying the command of God to go and scatter, and be fruitful, and fill the earth. They thought, "Well, we need to stick together." And probably some of the leaders thought, "We'll have more power if we have more people who can serve us." And so, they were defying the command of God. They also did not trust God would not destroy the world with a flood.
So, they were building this tower, Tower of Babel for the glory of man. And God confused their languages, they could not communicate, and the work descended in strife and bloodshed. And those that could communicate kind of broke off in different bands, and they began to scatter and spread out as God has told them. And they went to the different corners of the earth. You know, one of the reasons we believe the Bible is true is actually linguistics. Because those who study the languages of the world can track the migration of man around the planet through languages. There are clearly similarities between the languages of the Native American Indians with one another, and the DNA connects them with Mongolia, and they find links in the language with the people of Mongolia. And you just wrap around the world and this is true in Africa, the different African tribes maybe with the exception of the bushmen, they have their similarities in their pronunciation and their languages. And the same thing, Denmark, Sweden, Norway, they can sort of understand each other. So, they track the migration of languages around the world and they can also prove that we all came from common ancestors.
Jëan: Another question that we have, "When were the dinosaurs on the earth, and what about the ice age?"
Doug: All right, well, dinosaurs is a word, "thunder lizards" that we talk about. They were large reptiles and that are extinct, and we have large reptiles today. You know, there's certain iguanas and there's Komodo dragons and--but everything was much bigger before the flood. They not only had reptiles that were enormous and things probably lived longer. Humans lived longer, why would we not think the animals lived much longer back then? The oxygen levels in the environment was much better and everything lived longer. They had--they got skeletons of beaver that are 13 feet tall. How would you like to run into a 13-foot tall beaver? They got these giant sloth skeletons. Again, they're like 9 or 13 feet tall. The mastodons and the wooly mammoths, much bigger than the elephants today. And so mammals, reptiles, they were all much bigger.
After the environment changed, many of them just did not grow. Many of them were rendered extinct. You can read there, it says, "Nimrod was a mighty hunter." Mighty hunters don't hunt mice. He probably went after some of these big creatures, and they rendered them extinct through hunting them all done, making a reputation. So, after the flood, some of the bigger dinosaurs or those who would be a threat, they didn't have a chance to live as long and get as big, and they died, and the big ones died off in the flood.
Jëan: What about the ice age? When did that occur?
Doug: Well, there's a lot of changes in the environment shortly after the flood. I mean, you can even read where it says, "God made a mighty wind to blow." And then the Bible talks about in the days of Peleg, the earth was divided. We don't know if that means the earth was separated by the tribes or there was still tectonic shifting happening at that time and volcanoes. And I think that a lot of changes were happening after the flood. Probably the ice age came shortly after that. And it did not last thousands of years, it all happened rather quickly.
Jëan: Okay, now something else interesting is, you can study different cultures around the world. And just like you mentioned, there's a similarity in language. A lot of the cultures have a similarity in origins or creation. So, you look at some of the stories that are out there, there are some similarities even with the biblical account that we read in Genesis with some of these legends or these pagan ideas as to how we got to the earth.
Doug: Yeah, and what the skeptics like to say is Moses was just picking up some of the local legends and modified them, or they changed for Hebrews and they put them in there. But while there are similarities, for example, you got Adam and Eve, and Eve eats the forbidden tree, and all this evil comes into the world. Well, the Greeks had the story of Pandora's box. I think I got some different excerpts of these. In Pandora's box, you've got the first woman made from clay, that's not quite right according to the Bible. The gods gave her a box or jar, told her not to open it. Well, it was the fruit. And the tree you should not eat from. Pandora was trying to tame her curiosity, but in the end, she could not hold herself anymore. She opened the box and all of the illness, hardship that the gods had hidden in the box started coming out.
Well, when we disobeyed, the devil moved into the world. It's a very different story. The sophistication and the spirituality and the reality of God's version makes a lot more sense. The Greeks had a flood story. And when Zeus, the king of the gods, resolved to destroy all humanity by a flood, Deucalion constructed an ark, which according to one version he and his wife rode out the flood and landed on Mount Parnassus according to the flood story found first in the Roman poet Ovid's "Metamorphoses" book one. And then they offered a sacrifice. You've got man and woman survive, the gods are angry, they offer sacrifice. Well, it's similar to the story of Noah. Then you got Plato writing about Atlantis, where you've got these super people. Well, before the flood, they were bigger, stronger, they live longer, they had probably more they could do. They lived in a paradise, but--and they were once noble and moral people, as Adam and Eve and the children of Seth. But when they began to intermarry with Cain, the whole world became corrupt.
This is similar to the story of Plato. And the gods became angry because the people were morally bankrupt. And as a punishment, there was a great cataclysm and they were swallowed up in the ocean. You get your flood story there. One of the more interesting ancient myths that sounds very biblical is the Hawaiian's version, it stayed pretty close to the true. There was this man named Nui instead of Noah, who built an ark, he built a big boat, and he escaped the great flood. And he landed his vessel on top of Mauna Kea on the Big Island. Nui mistakenly thought that he had-- was on the moon and he made sacrifices to it. Kane the creator god descended on the earth in a rainbow and explained Nui's mistake. So, you got the sacrifice, the rainbow, the boat, the flood, the name.
Jëan: The mountain.
Doug: And the mountain, yeah. It's all very interesting that many of these-- and the American Indians, I used to work on the reservation, very similar story about the gods were angry with the wickedness of man, washed the world with the flood, and so--and then, even the Mesopotamians, they had the epic of Gilgamesh, their version of it. But you know, it's a lot more bizarre, less believable than the Bible version.
Jëan: All right, so we do find a number of stories in different cultures, myths, but the more accurate or the most accurate description of what happened is found in Genesis.
Doug: Yeah.
Jëan: It is inspired counsel. It is clear, it is biblical, it makes sense, it fits in. A question that's coming, Pastor Doug, is does the Bible mention anything about dinosaurs? And if so, where?
Doug: Well, the closest thing I think we can get to is, you've got--well, there's verses about the behemoth. And then you've got the leviathan. And leviathan seems like a great dragon. And some believe it's a metaphor for the devil. I'm inclined to believe that in Job, I think leviathan's a metaphor for the devil. But they probably did recognize they were great dragons. Something else that's interesting, Pastor Ross, is we know from the fossil record there were some of these enormous flying reptiles. And one of them, and I can't remember the name of this, a pterodactyl or paradactyl, but it was as big as a Cessna 182. It was huge, I mean its wingspan. And it was a flying dragon. They had like tails and all in-- around the world in all the cultures, they've got these histories of flying dragons. And so, it's probably because some of the people did live contemporaneously with flying reptiles.
Jëan: You know, we do have a verse that you mention here about behemoth, and I found it in Job, Job chapter 40, verse 15. It says, "Look now at behemoth, which I made along with you. He eats grass like an ox. See now his strength is in his hips and his power is his stomach muscles." Verse 17 is interesting, it says, "He moves his tail like a cedar. The sinew of his thighs are tightly knit, his bones are like beams of bronze." He talks about how that he lives amongst the reeds down by the marshy area. Here we have a description of this massive animal, some might think, well, maybe this is a description of an elephant. But of course, the elephant doesn't have a tale like a cedar.
Doug: This sounds like a brontosaurus or something that would-- vegetarian in the swamp. Jëan: That's right. So, it is interesting, we do have that reference in Job chapter 40, verse 15. And as we mentioned before, Job's probably one of the oldest books written by Moses, but the story took place a long time even before Moses. Doug: And we got to keep in mind that Job, he may have lived at the time when Shem was still alive, who had lived before the flood. And so, or at least one generation away, they had firsthand accounts of what some of these great prehistoric creatures looked like.
Jëan: Now, the next section in the lesson talks about Genesis versus paganism. And it is interesting in Genesis chapter 1, verse 14, where it talks about God creating the sun and the moon. It doesn't specifically say the sun and the moon. Could there be a reason for that? Was that something that was worshipped by the Egyptians? Doug: Well, that's interesting, yeah, absolutely. It tells us that God made the lights in the heaven, a greater light and a lesser light. And God was very clear, He said, "When you're tempted to look to the sun and the moon and say, 'You are our gods,'" that that would be a sin.
Matter of fact, even Job said that it would be a sin to look to the celestial elements and pray to them. And then he goes on to say that if I should kiss my own hand and worship myself, we should be worshipping God and not-- it's worshipping the creation instead of the Creator is idolatry. And so, God avoids that in Genesis deliberately. Jëan: And then we also have accounts given in Genesis, Genesis chapter 2, verse 7, it says, "God formed man out of the dust of the ground," because breathed into him the breath of life, man became a living being. It's interesting when you look at the elements that going to a human body, it's the same elements that we find in the earth.
Doug: Yeah, it's kind of humbling to consider that if you boil us down to our chemical components, we're not worth much more than a bag of fertilizer because that's what we all turn into when we die. And you get a little bit of water and salt and potassium and just earth. And so, it's really a humble beginning.
Jëan: Now, Billy's asking a question that's come in, he says, "You know, it seems as though the Bible supports slavery." He says he has a hard time answering this question when people challenge him about the trustworthiness of the Bible. "Does the Bible support slavery? And if so, how do we explain that today?"
Doug: If you want to know what God's original plan is, you look at the garden of Eden. God did not have slavery in the garden of Eden. Slavery, like divorce and like death of animals, all came as a result of sin. These were never part of God's perfect plan. And it is true God made laws to protect the slaves. God made laws to protect a family where there were multiple wives. It's not because it was His plan, it's because men were often all killed off in battle, and the only way a woman could get married and have children is if they had polygamy. And God had laws about if you're going to eat meat, eat the clean meat. It was never God's plan for man to kill animals and eat them. So, he made these laws because of the hardness of our heart. But clearly it's not God's plan for one person to own another person.
Jëan: And of course, we see examples of that even in the New Testament, where Jesus mentioned it's because of the hardness of your hearts that God allowed these things. And of course, if you look at the rules given in the Old Testament with reference to somebody that owns a slave, there were opportunities for the slave to go free if he chooses, depending upon where he's from. And there was certain rules as to how you were to treat the slaves. So, it was quite different than the pagan nations that were surrounding Israel at the time.
Doug: Yeah, absolutely. And part of the Sabbath command, you needed to let your slave rest.
Jëan: Right, even on the Sabbath. Well, that brings us to the subject of marriage then. Of course, we read in Genesis chapter 2, verse 18, talks about--it says, "God said it is not good that man should be alone." It's verse 18, "I'll make a helper comparable to him." When you talk about marriage, Pastor Doug, other than the biblical account that we find in Genesis, how does evolution support the idea of why there is male and female, not just men and woman, but you look at all animal life and even plant life, you've got male and female.
Doug: You know, there are certain conundrums that evolutionists, honest ones, will admit that they cannot solve. They cannot find a scenario in the scheme of evolution that would necessitate the evolution, that would explain how creatures would evolve with two separate genders that could not procreate without an act of cooperation and affection. And then they say, "Well, but it's much more beneficial for the mixture of genes to do this." You don't need separate genders. Why not have like, you know, snails or I forget what they call it where you got one gender, it could be either one. Every snail is hermaphroditic, or whatever they call it. Yeah, earthworm, why aren't all creatures like that? They could still exchange their genes. But you know, it's a mystery.
There's so many mysteries in nature when you think about it. And what a mystery that, I mean, woman, you know, God made His creation in order of complexity. First He makes the basic elements, you know, and the water and the land, and then the vegetation, and then the more complex animals. You've got the birds and the fish, and then He makes man. And the most complex of all, He makes woman as the final part of creation. And not too many will disagree with that, the complexity of woman. But to think about a woman's body has got several processes that a man's body just does not have. You know, men do not lactate, we do not ovulate, we do not gestate and give birth. And it is such a miracle that these distinctions in the body are so unique. And God explains that they were made to be separate, unique creatures, and they are that from birth in the garden of Eden, that was His plan.
Jëan: Now, somebody's asking a question about this, she says, "If both marriage and the Sabbath were created before sin, why is it in Matthew 22, verse 30, Jesus seems to indicate that there won't be marriage in heaven?"
Doug: Well, God tells us that-- Well, we are ultimately married to the Lord. In Genesis, the Bible ends with our coming to a marriage supper. It's interesting, Jesus's ministry begins with first miracle at a marriage feast. Then you get to Revelation and we're all invited to the marriage supper of the Lamb. So, we are married to the Lord. And the Bible says, "Husbands, love your wife as Christ loves the church." But one of the principle purposes for marriage, God said, "Go forth, be fruitful." And King James says replenish. The more accurate word is fill the earth. Replenish leaves people with the idea that it was filled once and it has to be refilled. And so, the earth is going to be populated with the redeemed. And God did not intend for people to indefinitely through eternity continue to. You'd have a big old family. And this is why the Mormons, they believe there's marriage in heaven, and that you're going to continue needing to make new worlds to house all the kids that you have. But some people think, "I don't know, how am I going to be happy in heaven if there's no marriage? Or does that mean that my wife and I get to heaven and we get our divorce papers from God?" You want to live with your spouse through eternity and you love each other, you'll be free to do that.
Jëan: Well, we know that in heaven, the Bible says we shall know, even as we are now known, so there'll still be family relations. And like you said, if you spend your whole life bonding with someone here on this earth and you're married, you know, wouldn't you be able to enjoy and both saved, wouldn't you be able to enjoy heaven and eternity with your spouse?
Doug: Yeah, absolutely. I'm going to enjoy going around heaven with Karen and looking things over. But one of the words in Jesus's statement that people misunderstand, it's He says, "There will be no marriage." The word "marriage" there, it's the act, the verb of marrying. There'll be no new marriages. Now, when David gets to heaven, I don't know who he'll be married to, or Solomon even more confusing, but Adam will probably still be married to Eve.
Jëan: Right. Well, that brings our next section in our lesson, it's talking about creation in time. Now, this is one of the things that people look at Bible-believing Christians and say, "How can you believe that the earth is only 6,000 years old? Where do we find 6,000 year old earth in the Bible? How do we know that the Bible speaks of the earth being about 6,000 years?"
Doug: Well, when you talk about the earth being 6,000 years old, it may have been floating around in our solar system or our corner of the Milky Way for a long time in its chaotic void shape, you know? That, I think that's unclear. It is clear that He organized things in a special way. And when God says on the fourth day He made the stars and the greater lights and the lesser lights, that may be the greater lights and lesser lights of our Milky Way galaxy, which would be about 200 billion blazing suns. Doesn't mean that all the flickering lights that you see out there, many of them galaxies, were created six days-- 6,000 years ago.
But when you start looking at the dates that God gives in the Bible, and we'll get in our next section more to chronology, but the dates that are given in the Bible, they are six literal days, 24 hours, successive periods. And then it tells us the ages of Adam, and Seth, and Enos, on through Enoch, through Noah, and Abraham. And you've got a chronology. And you can do some rough math, and there's some gaps here and there like with the sons of Noah, doesn't say how old they were. Were all they triplets? It just kind of gives--you know, I think it says he lived 600 years, and that's Shem, Ham, and Japheth. Well, was it all that year? Did he--I mean, so there's some gaps here and there, but they're not big ones. And so, when you just add up the chronology, we've got an age for the earth, or at least for the time of Adam that goes back about 6,000 years.
Jëan: You know, maybe I want to just add to that, there are people that are trying to calculate the exact age of the earth. And one of the things you got to bear in mind is when you start doing that, adding up all the different ages of the patriarchs, the Bible doesn't tell you the year and the month or even the day that they had their son. It'll say in the 60th year or so and so's life, he had his son. Well, you got 12 months there, you don't have the beginning of that 60th year or maybe it's near the end. So, there is an area that we don't know. And if you add up all those bits, we don't know what that is. Roughly 6,000 years, but we can't nail down a specific day and say, "All right, today, the earth is 6,000 years old."
Doug: That's important this day and age because some people are trying to use that to pick a date for the Second Coming.
Jëan: Right.
Doug: And you need to be careful about that. I was going to say something else now.
Jëan: Well, let me ask you this, you mentioned about creating time, or at least seemingly time. When God created the garden of Eden and He created the tree of life, one of the questions is, did He create tiny little shrubs that it's still growing to giant trees, or were these full-grown trees? When He made the animals, were they tiny little, you know, bear cubs, or did He make big grizzly bears?
Doug: Yeah, that was really what I was going to say and I forgot about, is that when we're talking about the age of the earth, some people say, "Well, when they date the rocks, they come out to billions of years." And they say, "When they date the stars," we know the speed of light is a constant, 186,000 miles per second roughly. And they say, "These calculus tells us these galaxies and suns are billions of miles of lightyears away. That means that they could never have been created 6,000 years ago or their light would never have-- wouldn't even be reaching us yet."
Well, we forget that the belly button factor. And what I mean by that is that when God made Adam, did he have a belly button? Why would he need one? God made Adam full-grown. He made trees. When you cut down a tree in the garden of Eden, did it have rings in it? There are rings typically, dendrochronology, you use it for dating the-- you know, one ring roughly per year, a season. Well, seasons were different in the garden of Eden, but they probably had rings. And so, man was made from the factory with prewired knowledge. Adam knew how to walk and talk, bears were full grown. The garden of Eden was not full of puppies and kitties. They all came later. And they were full-grown creatures. God made the world with maybe some built-in age. He made the world with the light already enroute so we'd enjoy it. And so, people forget that God can create, He's powerful. He can create things with some evidence of time built in.
Jëan: And I think that's important to remember, God created Adam and Eve with the ability to communicate right away. They didn't have to learn the language. And God created everything they needed to have a wonderful life, which required, like you say, creating certain things more advanced in time. A little baby's born now, they can't speak, they don't understand. So, Adam and Eve were created, I don't know, the perfect age, whatever that might be.
Doug: Sixty-three.
Jëan: Yeah, whatever that age might be. All right, so we have a question that's coming from Benjamin, he's 11 years old. It's a good question, he says, "Joseph, you know, kept God's commandments, but when Joseph was in Egypt, how did he keep the Sabbath?" We're not even sure if he did keep the Sabbath in Egypt. At least, you know, that's what Benjamin's asking.
Doug: Well, you know, it seems that Joseph was aware of the commandments. He certainly was not willing to break the commandment about idolatry. Even the ancient Egyptians we believe did have a day of rest. Whether they kept the day of the sun, the first day, some-- I think in Hislop's book on Babylon, it says, "The Babylonians got Sunday worship from the Egyptians. I don't know that. So, they still believed in giving their servants a day of rest. And I don't find it hard to believe that if Joseph was a faithful servant if he said, "Can I please have this day to worship my God?" they may have honored that. We don't know, so let's not assume that he disobeyed.
Jëan: Right. And you know, if you look at the account given in Genesis, at least during the time that he was with Potiphar before the situation occurred with Potiphar's wife, he was a very trusted servant, even to the point where Potiphar didn't know how much he had. Everything was taken care of by Joseph. So, I'm sure Potiphar recognized Joseph as being faithful. And if Joseph had asked, "I'd like to take this day off," quite possible he received that. Okay, well, another reason why we have chronology in the Bible, and this is probably one of the important reasons not only to give us time, but it also guides us in the fulfillment of a promise of a Messiah, of a Savior that would come. And I think that's a big part of what chronology is, especially if you start going into the New Testament, and you begin to see some of the chronology found in Matthew and in Luke chapter 3.
Doug: Yeah, I remember when I first was reading Luke chapter 3, and it started with a chronology of Jesus. Now in Luke, Luke is tracing in the chronology of Jesus through Mary's father-in-law. I should say Joseph's father-in-law through Mary. Matthew traces it through Joseph's family. And Luke being a physician, he knew that the genetic connection with Jesus was through Mary, and so he wanted to trace it that way. But it goes all the way from Jesus back to Adam, and it is so moving when it says Jesus, and this is Luke 3:23, "Jesus Himself began His ministry being about 30 years of age, being as was supposed the son of Joseph, the son of Heli, the son of Matthat, the son of Levi, the son of Melchi, the son of Janna, the son of Joseph, the son of Mattathiah, the son of Amos, the son of Nahum, the son of Esli, the son of Naggai, the son of Maath, the son of Mattathiah, the son of Semei, the son of Joseph, the son of Judah." And I'm going to verse 38 now, "The son of Enos, the son of Seth, the son of Adam, the son of God."
Now, so one of the important things about the genealogy is it's connecting Jesus all the way with God. It connects us with God. We did not evolve from ancestors that were dragging their knuckles around on the ground. We're connected directly with God. Something else, and even the time that we keep, Pastor Ross, you know, we can look up in the stars and we can see there's astronomical reasons for all of the ancient civilizations to have a calendar with roughly 365, 360 days in the year because that's how long it takes for the earth to go around the sun, cycle of the seasons. We can see why they would have a month with approximately 27 days, 30 days. It's a lunar cycle dictates the months, that's where we get the word "month," from moon. And we can see a day would have 24 hours because that's how long it takes to rotate. But the whole world keeps a seven day week. Where in the sun, moon, and stars do you get a seven day week? Only place you can trace the seven day week is to the Bible. And yet, the whole world recognizes the seven day week.
Jëan: And I think even in some of the languages of the world, there is a reference to the Sabbath, for example, in Spanish, the seventh day of the week. We call it in English Saturday, but in Spanish Sabado.
Doug: Russian, Subbota. And about 145 languages of the world, the word for the seventh day or Saturday is Sabbath because we all sprang from the same origins.
Jëan: Our last section that we have in our lesson is, "How did Jesus and New Testament writers feel about the creation account that we find in Genesis? Did they recognize it as being trustworthy?"
Doug: Yeah, there's--and this is one of the reasons that you really can't say, "I believe the Bible," and not believe biblical creation because you have to continually apologize for the New Testament writers that said that they believed in creation. And just a couple of examples. First of all, you can't believe Jesus. Jesus says in Matthew chapter 19, verse 4 and 5, "And He answered them and said, 'Have you not read that He that made them in the beginning made them male and female?'" So, He points back, says that man and woman were made in the image of God, fiat creation. "'For this reason, a man will leave his father and mother, be joined his wife, the two become one flesh.'" He's quoting the first two chapters of Genesis here.
And then in Luke chapter 11, verse 51, Christ is talking about the judgement that was going to come upon the unbelievers that were rejecting Jesus. And He said, "From the blood of Abel to the blood of Zechariah, who perished between the altar and the temple, yes, I say it shall be required of this generation." And Jesus is referring back to Cain, who killed Abel as not a fictitious story, said it's a real story. And the reason He says it's a real story, He said that God has made a note of it, and the judgement for that evil deed is going to come upon that generation. So, why would God bring judgement for a fairytale on a generation? He looks upon what happened to Abel as real.
Jëan: And then you got Paul, we have it recorded in Acts chapter 14, verse 15 where Paul speaks about God creating the heavens, the earth, the sea, and all things in them. And actually, he was speaking to Pagans there, and he's talking about God being the one who created all things. And of course, he had the account Genesis chapter 1.
Doug: Yeah, and he's going against-- Paul knew what the pagans believed. Raised in Tarsus and he knew they had all kinds of bizarre accounts. The Pagans were also aware of the Jewish belief in one God who spoke everything into existence, and so he's not shocking them by that statement. And you can read Jude verse 11, Jëan.
Jëan: Yes, Jude chapter-- verse 11, Jude 1, it says, "Woe to them, for they have gone after the way of Cain and have run greedily in the error of Balaam for profit, and perished in rebellion of Korah.'" So, there we have Cain, Balaam, Korah, these are Old Testament characters that we read about.
Doug: Yeah, and of course, Cain back there in the garden of Eden, chapter 4 of Genesis. And then even if you jump to Revelations chapter 22, it tells us, "In the middle of its street on either side of the river was the tree of life that bore 12 fruits each year, each yielding its fruit every month. And the leaves of the tree were for the healing of the nations." By the way, that's similar to the last chapters of Ezekiel, where it says there's this tree of life or trees of life, and their leaves are for medicine. And--but the tree of life, the truth about that goes all the way back to the garden of Eden. And not only in Revelation chapter 22, but I think Revelation 2 also, he mentions the tree of life.
Jëan: Now, of course, we want to remind those who are joining us about our free offer that we have for today, this is just a great little book, it's called, "How Evolution Flunked the Science Test." And we'll be happy to send this to anyone who calls and asks. The number is 866-788-3966 and just ask for offer number 169. We'll get it in the mail and send it right out to you. Or if you like, you can get a digital download of the book, just text the code SH037 to the number 40544, and you'll be able to get a digital download of the book, "How Evolution Flunked the Science Test."
Doug: God bless you.
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Steve Johnson: I was heading south on Interstate 5. This commercial came on KFBK radio about a Revelation seminar by Amazing Facts. I began--my chest began to tighten up, I began sweating profusely. I had difficulty in breathing. There were this big rest area. And at this time, I pulled into there, I thought, "Well, maybe I'm having a heart attack." I got out of my truck, walked into the men's restroom there, and put cold water on my face, and then finally things subsided.
A week later, again I heard this Amazing Facts commercial come on the radio. In fact, the meetings were going to start that very night. And again, immediately I had these same symptoms. I thought, "You know, this isn't my heart. I have to go to that meeting." And as I was going down to Sacramento, I decided to park and go inside. Well, I got in and walked into the furthermost rear seat they had in the pew there. And this particular evangelist, his name was Kim Kjaer. It was like taking one layer off at a time of an onion. He laid it out so perfectly that we could all understand it. And I was really motivated, I couldn't believe it.
Well, I finished, I didn't miss a meeting. In fact, on the fifth night, they had an altar call, and my knees stood right up, and I walked forward, and I gave my heart to Jesus Christ. I've learned throughout this whole thing that when you-- when you leave the devil's territory, he gets pretty active in causing a lot of problems. Well, I had the evangelist come out and they had prayer with me about my business. I would find a sick business and make it well and then market it. I finally ended up with a business that I really enjoyed. It was one that was building equestrian centers. And they said to me, "Steve," he said, "you know, if you're going to really keep the Sabbath, you've got to shut your doors on the Sabbath." Well, I did.
And so, I sold the business to my brother. Took me 22 years to build that business, and he lost it in 33 months. My son, who was my business partner, I'd been giving him 10% of the business every year. He thought I'd just fallen off the bridge. My son didn't talk to me for five and a half years. And then a few other things happened. So, I had an ex-employee living in my guesthouse, he kind of watched after our place. And he said, "Steve," he said, "there's an Allied moving van backed up to your front door in your home." I said, "You're kidding." I said, "What do you mean?" He said, "They're moving everything out of your house into this truck, and your wife is out there supervising them."
And when I went home and opened the front door, my voice echoed in that house. There wasn't any furniture left anywhere. There was one bed left in the house. I knew my wife was upset because of my coming to this church, but I had no idea that she would move out like this. That was a total shock to me. It was some time there I locked myself in the bedroom and I began reading the Bible. I spent about a half a year just every night getting home and I would study. It allowed me to have a personal relationship with Jesus Christ. Well, to make a long story short, I met Crystal, and she was a godly woman. That was the Lord's doing, not mine. And He was just there to let me know that, "I'm with you all the way. Even though you're going to have some trials and you're going to have some hardships, I want you to know that I'll be with you." Because no matter what I do now, He is my leader. He's the leader of my marriage, He's the leader of everything in my life today.
That one meeting with the Amazing Facts seminar changed my entire life. And to this day, I'm still on fire for God, I'm still witnessing to my neighbors. My name is Steve Johnson, and it's because of you that Amazing Facts has changed my life.
Doug: Have you ever heard a mouse howl like a wolf? Well, what would you expect would happen when a creature changes its destiny from the hapless prey to mighty predator? From the outside, they look very much like just an oversized field mouse. Cute brown fur, white on the underbelly, nice little beady eyes. But that's where the similarities stop. Grasshopper mice are very unusual, making them the objects of great interest for animal researchers. These furry little creatures are found in the harsh deserts of North America. They're very territorial in nature, and they will monopolize and fend off 25 acres. They don't build their own homes, but sort of confiscate the burrows and the homes of other creatures. They're not called grasshopper mice because they hop around, but it's because they eat a lot of grasshoppers. In fact, scientists have discovered grasshopper mice are the only mice that are purely carnivorous.
They hunt much like cats or weasels, stalking their pray in a predatory fashion. And when they pounce, they are ferocious, sometimes even taking on snakes and scorpions and centipedes. When a grasshopper mouse gets into a fierce battle with a snake or a scorpion or centipede, they may be bit or stung several times. But what is amazing to researchers is they've noticed when they are bitten, they somehow shake it off because they convert the toxin in the venom to painkiller. I think you can understand why this information would be of special interest to scientists that are trying to discover new ways for people to deal with chronic pain. One of the most intriguing characteristics of these little creatures is when they're defending their territory or celebrating a victory over some adversary, they'll throw back their head and let out this earthshaking howl. It's a mousy howl, check it out. [mouse howling]
The grasshopper mouse is not the only member of creation that can survive encounters with venomous predators. In Luke 10:19, it says, "Behold, I will give you authority to trample on serpents and scorpions and over all the power of the enemy. Nothing will by any means hurt you." We don't have to be the biggest and the strongest to defeat our enemy and let out that victory roar. When God called David to be king, no human would have guessed that he had it in him. He was young and insignificant. From the outside, he looked like there was no greatness in him. But when God looked at his heart, He saw courage, humility, compassion, and love. David wasn't perfect and he made mistakes, but through God's power, he was able to conquer giants.
Friend, God does not intend that you live out the rest of your life cowering and trembling like a little field mouse. If God can take the grasshopper mouse and give him courage so that he fights snakes and scorpions and centipedes, if God can put in the heart of David the courage to fight giants like Goliath, then He can give you that same courage. The Scriptures say God has not given you the spirit of fear, but of power, love, and a sound mind. And you can have that peace in your heart when you invite the Prince of Peace in your heart. Why don't you do that right now?
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