25-0928sc - Detailed Summary

The teacher begins by referencing previous studies from the truth project and engagement project, emphasizing the concept of competing truth claims. He explains that world philosophies present claims about truth, but they are not necessarily the truth itself. When people discuss "their truth" or "your truth," they are actually referring to their own truth claims without realizing it. Drawing from the truth project, he defines truth as that which conforms to reality, distinguishing it from mere perceptions or claims about what reality is.

The discussion continues on the existence of competing truth claims alongside an objective, absolute truth. The teacher presents his key thesis: as Christians, believers are called to anchor their faith in the historical reality of Genesis chapters 1 through 11, mirroring how Jesus and the apostles used it to ground their doctrinal and moral teachings for the church. He notes that this aligns with the second half of chapter 1 from Steve’s material, which they will partially cover due to time constraints. A central point is that Jesus and the apostles regarded Genesis as literal and historical, so Christians must uphold the Bible’s clear account without altering it to fit secular philosophies. A literal interpretation of Genesis 1-11 provides the complete truth about creation and human origins, resisting modern challenges like evolutionary theory and extended geological timescales. He contrasts this with naturalists, who by definition exclude the supernatural (which Christians call the spiritual), acknowledging only the natural realm while ignoring the spiritual one.

Naturalists, upon whose views evolution and geological timescales are based, deliberately exclude the spiritual realm and do not acknowledge it. Even if evidence points to it, as described in Romans 1:18, which states there is plain evidence of God’s existence, they ignore it because they only accept natural, empirical evidence. Regarding the supernatural, the teacher mentions Peter’s point but first references God’s view through the Hebrew writer, who describes Moses as a faithful steward of God’s house, while Jesus is its builder. This leads into an argument for intelligent design, as stated in Hebrews: every house is built by someone, and 2,000 years ago, this illustrated recognition of design in nature.

God provides clues for arguments through such scriptures. Peter addresses skeptics who reject God and claim that everything continues as it has from the beginning, embodying uniformitarianism, a concept that gained prominence in the 1800s and underpins modern timescales. Peter warns that these skeptics willfully forget key events: the world came into being by God’s word, and it was destroyed by a flood. These events are rejected because they are seen as supernatural or spiritual, outside the natural realm.

The rejection of these supernatural elements is precisely what Peter predicted: they willfully forget and exclude anything beyond the natural.

By rejecting the spiritual, naturalists approach nature like a "faith only" argument, which distorts understanding. For instance, viewing scriptures through a "faith only" lens misses the necessity of repentance for the remission of sins, as taught in John, and overlooks that repentance and baptism are linked for remission, as in John’s preaching of baptism of repentance. Similarly, examining origins solely through nature leads to missing crucial information and wrong conclusions, much like the "faith only" error.

Rejecting spiritual evidence results in erroneous conclusions like long periods of time and evolution. However, if a spiritual realm and God exist, naturalists lack complete information. While science excels in observing and describing current phenomena with mathematical precision—such as gravity—and making accurate decisions based on that today, it falls short in other areas.

Science cannot observe events from long ago because those events no longer exist, placing them outside empirical evidence. Adopting a nature-only view, as Peter implies with "willfully forget," leads to incorrect conclusions about the past. This explains how Genesis can be accurate despite modern scientific claims, which rely on evidence from today but not from ancient times, as the past is beyond science’s empirical scope. The teacher ties this back to the truth project, where God’s metanarrative encompasses recorded history from the beginning through Christ and beyond, providing a worldview that Christians should adopt. Since God cannot lie and His word is true, this is the real worldview that should frame beliefs, decisions, and actions, as people act on what they believe is truly real.

On Wednesday nights, they are studying the engagement project to learn how to engage neighbors with a Christian worldview. In Steve’s class, they are covering "The Scheme of Redemption" by Edward C. Wharton, specifically chapter 1 titled "Genesis: Historical or Myth." All this highlights a ongoing war in the world today—a clash of worldviews with competing truth claims.

As learned in the truth project, phrases like "I am my truth" or "you have your truth" are really truth claims. Society is bombarded with these, requiring discernment from a real source of truth, as in Hebrews 5:14, where mature believers train their senses to distinguish good from evil through practice. Dr. Del Tackett in the engagement project discusses the second epoch of God’s metanarrative—the fall of man—noting that competing truth claims are ancient, dating back to the garden with the war between truth and lies. In Genesis 2:17, God commands not to eat from the tree or die, but Satan challenges this with a competing claim. What happened in the Garden of Eden, often seen as a story, mirrors today’s societal attacks.

Genesis states God made the world in six days, but Satan counters with billions of years. God created male and female, but society claims multiple genders, including invented terms like non-gender and pan-gender found online. These are competing truth claims, just as with Eve: God said eating the fruit brings death, but Satan said it would not and promised a benefit—becoming like God. This echoes modern psychology’s emphasis on self-fulfillment, removing shackles to achieve it.

Del Tackett notes that humanity chose poorly then and often does today. Satan is the father of lies and a murderer from the beginning (John 8:44), with offspring who do his will. As Christians, believers must accept the Bible without compromise, avoiding inventions to fit worldly philosophies, or risk diluting God’s Word to irrelevance. Chapter 1 of Steve’s class links Genesis as history to redemptive Christianity: redemption requires Adam, Eve, and sin’s introduction; without that, mythology undermines the need for redemption. Edward C. Wharton questions how Christians should view Genesis 1-11—as history or Hebrew mythology—and whether it matters as long as Jesus is Lord. This addresses arguments like "Is it a salvation issue?" for difficult biblical parts. Wharton answers by showing how views of Genesis affect the Bible’s redemptive message and humanity’s need for Christ as Savior. Steve’s notes are online, so the teacher skips reviewing them and picks up from page six of chapter one notes, specifically the New Testament affirmation of Genesis. Jesus and apostles treated it as history, e.g., Jesus on Adam and Eve in Matthew, Paul on Adam in Romans. The teachings of Jesus and apostles are rooted in Genesis’s historical accounts, based on Jesus’s trustworthiness and the New Testament’s divine inspiration. A key question: Can we rely on Christ and apostles for accurate conclusions from Genesis, given their foundational role? The resurrection validates Christ’s claims and apostolic authority. For Christians, trust in Christ and apostles is inseparable from understanding Genesis; accepting Christ as Lord means embracing His view of scripture, including Genesis. Under "Jesus and Genesis," Jesus affirmed Genesis’s authority in endorsing the Old Testament, as in Luke 24:44-47, where He says His words fulfill what is written in the law of Moses (including Genesis), prophets, and Psalms. He opened minds to understand scriptures, noting Christ’s suffering, resurrection, and proclamation of repentance for forgiveness of sins to all nations from Jerusalem—highlighting repentance alongside faith for remission. References to John 5:39 and John 10:35 follow.

Jesus taught that the scriptures, including Genesis, prophetically pointed to the salvation accomplished through his death and resurrection. He specifically referenced the account of Noah and the flood in Matthew 24:37-39, stating that the coming of the Son of Man would be like the days of Noah, where people were eating, drinking, marrying, and giving in marriage until Noah entered the ark, and they did not understand until the flood came and took them all away. Jesus treated Noah as a historical figure, not a myth or made-up story. He referred to the ark as a literal seaworthy vessel and the flood as a global event that swept everyone away. Critics attack the flood’s existence, but some suggest a form of liberalism where Jesus accommodated mythological elements in Genesis to convey spiritual truths. This view is untenable for two reasons: first, it assumes Jesus saw Genesis as mythical, but neither his words nor Moses' support this, as Jesus treated Genesis events as historical realities, making the myth appeal unfounded; second, Moses grounds the flood in historical context as God’s judgment on pervasive sin in Genesis 6:1-17.

Moses presents the flood as a well-known event, using it as a chronological reference for subsequent events in Genesis 10:32 and 11:10, tying it to a historical framework connecting preceding and following events. Both Moses and Jesus view the flood as a real event serving as a signpost for historical timelines, not mythology. For Christians, dismissing Genesis as mythology undermines the historical foundation of Jesus' teachings. This dismissal would include the six days of creation, the flood, long lifespans, genealogies, and the Tower of Babel—all labeled mythology by critics. If dismissed as mere teaching tools, it erodes the basis for Jesus' moral conclusions on marriage. When Pharisees questioned divorce, Jesus grounded his answer in Genesis, citing Matthew 19:4-5: God created them male and female from the beginning, and for this reason, a man leaves his parents to join his wife, becoming one flesh. Jesus cites Genesis 1:27 on male and female creation, then quotes Genesis 2:24, attributing it to God, endorsing the one-flesh marriage principle, known as the law of marriage where it began. Jesus regards these as historically reliable, as shown in his conclusions in Matthew 19:6: they are no longer two but one flesh, so what God joins, no man should separate. These "so" and "therefore" statements reflect reasoning from Genesis' historical reality—God’s design unites man and woman permanently. If based on mythology, the moral argument on marriage and divorce loses validity. When Pharisees noted Moses permitted divorce certificates (Matthew 19:7), Jesus replied it was due to hardness of heart, but from the beginning it was not so (Matthew 19:8), emphasizing God’s original design in Genesis 1:27 and 2:24 excluded divorce, contrasting divine intent with human sin’s deviation.

Jesus' reasoning affirms Genesis' historical integrity, grounding marriage’s permanence in the creation account. Building on this literal interpretation—that God’s design unites man and woman as one, not to be separated—Jesus prohibits divorce except for sexual immorality (Matthew 19:9), declaring remarriage otherwise as adultery. This stringent moral teaching relies on the historical reality of Genesis 1:27 and 2:24, where God instituted marriage.

If Genesis were fiction, Jesus' authoritative stance on marriage’s permanence would be undermined, incompatible with modern skepticism denying scripture’s historical integrity. In John 8:44, during a confrontation with Jews intent on killing him, Jesus declares they are of their father the devil, who wants to do his desires; the devil was a murderer from the beginning, with no truth in him, speaking lies as his native language, the father of lies. Jesus affirms the devil initiated lying and murder from the beginning, referencing Genesis 2:17-18 (God’s command not to eat the tree or die) and Genesis 3:4 (devil’s deception "you shall not surely die"), leading to spiritual and physical death. "From the beginning" in John 8:44 parallels Matthew 19:4 and 8 on marriage origins, grounding teachings in Genesis' historical reality. Jesus believed in a historical, literal Genesis; viewing it as mythological undermines his trustworthiness. If mistaken about Genesis' accuracy, events, timing, and conclusions, his reliability on divine nature and redemptive mission is questioned, with profound implications for faith.

On the apostles and Genesis, their writings (Paul, Peter, John) treat Moses' account of man, woman, and marriage origins as historical truth. Dismissing Genesis as myth undermines its authority and doubts apostles' truthfulness and inspiration. Their letters reflect conviction that Genesis records actual events, grounding theological and moral conclusions.

In Romans' opening, Paul describes moral decay from rejecting God’s truth, stating three times God gave them over to sinful desires (Romans 1:24,26,28). He condemns homosexuality as perversion of God’s order in Genesis 1:27 (male and female creation), reflecting historical human origins. Dismissing Genesis as myth undermines Paul’s preaching foundation, relying on God’s design; accepting Paul as inspired requires affirming Genesis' historical authority. In Romans 5:12,14, Paul grounds universal condemnation and salvation in Genesis: through one man (Adam) sin entered, death through sin spread to all; death reigned from Adam to Moses, even over those not sinning like Adam, who is a type of Christ. Adam’s transgression in Genesis 3 introduced sin and death, establishing universal salvation need through Christ as antitype. Paul’s theology rests on Genesis' historical truth. In 1 Corinthians 15:22, "as in Adam all die, so in Christ all made alive," linking Adam’s sin consequences to redemption hope—if Adam mythological, hope is too, showing problem of mythologizing Genesis. In 2 Corinthians 5:14, "one died for all, therefore all died," reinforces spiritual death from Genesis fall. In 2 Corinthians 11:3, Paul warns of serpent deceiving Eve by craftiness, leading minds astray from Christ devotion, echoing John 8:44. Reference to Genesis 3:4 (lie defying Genesis 2:17) underscores historical event; devil’s lie caused spiritual death, establishing him as father of lies corrupting believers by distorting God’s word, including Christ’s nature, scripture inspiration, salvation necessity. Denying Genesis historicity undermines sin foundation and redemption need.

The teacher notes to read the rest of chapter 1 in the handout, but reads the concluding statement: based on Genesis' historical foundation in Jesus and apostles' teaching, Jesus and apostles (Peter, Paul, John) grounded doctrinal and moral teachings in Genesis 1-11’s historical reality. From Jesus' affirmations of creation and marriage to apostles' on sin and redemption, arguments rely on accuracy; denying historicity undermines reasoning, making conclusions void, questioning Jesus' authority and New Testament inspiration. In apologetics, tendency to prove Genesis 1 scientifically, but reason to believe is Jesus believed it and argued from it; if believe Jesus, believe Genesis, not fit world’s philosophies. Thesis: Genesis 1, God made earth, universe, spiritual and physical realms in six literal days. As mentioned, Peter explains world’s philosophy wrong because they willfully reject spiritual realm. If spiritual exists, natural man using only empirical evidence (observable physical) has half story, leading wrong conclusions—science addresses only observable, not spiritual, outside purview.

The teacher concludes that is what he has, and next week Steve will be here. Amen.