Monthly Archives: April 2017

Attack on Genesis

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How can something come from nothing? That’s what a recent cosmology theory purports to explain. The scriptures present a different story:

In the beginning, God created the heavens and the earth. Genesis 1:1 English Standard Version (ESV)

And this explanation isn’t confined to the first three chapters of Genesis but is found throughout the scriptures. If it is false, then all of scripture can be reckoned as false as well. And there are significant consequences if the scriptures aren’t true.

In an October 10, 2012 Ligonier blog post titled: “In the Beginning God,” which is an excerpt taken from the book God’s Love, R. C. Sproul discusses the Genesis account:

When Genesis speaks of a beginning, it is referring to the advent of the universe in time and space. It is not positing a beginning to God but a beginning to the creative work of God…Genesis merely asserts that the universe had a beginning…We declare with Scripture that God is eternal…Does His eternality mean that He is somehow outside of time, that He is timeless? Or does His eternality mean that He exists in an endless dimension of time?

[Whichever way] we answer this question; we conclude that God Himself never had a beginning. He exists infinitely with respect to space and eternally with respect to time. His existence has neither a starting point nor an ending point. The dimensions of His existence are from everlasting to everlasting. This means that He always has been and always will be.

Sproul then touches on a topic we covered last week:

Because God Himself had no beginning, He was already there in the beginning. He antedates the created order. When we affirm that God is eternal, we are also saying that He possesses the attribute of aseity, or self-existence. This means that God eternally has existed of Himself and in Himself. He is not a contingent being. He did not derive from some other source. He is not dependent on any power outside Himself to exist…He is not an effect of some antecedent cause. In a word, He is not a creature. No creature has the power of being in and of itself. All creatures are contingent, derived, and dependent. This is the essence of their creatureliness.

And, as we discussed last week, all that we perceive in the world would not exist without their First Cause, God All Mighty. Sproul examines this consequence as he concludes:

Thinkers hostile to theism have sought every means imaginable to provide a rational alternative to the notion of an eternal, self-existent deity. Some have argued for an eternal universe, though with great difficulty. Usually the temporal beginning of the universe is granted, but with a reluctance to assign its cause to an eternal, self-existent being.

The usual alternative is some sort of self-creation, which, in whatever form it takes, falls into irrationality and absurdity. To assert the self-creation of anything is to leap into the abyss of the absurd because for something to create itself, it would have had to exist before it existed to do the job. It would have had to be and not be at the same time and in the same relationship.

…If there ever was a time when absolutely nothing existed, all there could possibly be now is nothing. Even that statement is problematic because there can never be nothing; if nothing ever was, then it would be something and not nothing.

The attack upon the Genesis account doesn’t stop at nothing, though. There is too much at stake. Another avenue is the reconciliation of the apparent age of the universe with the days of creation described in Genesis’s first two chapters. The church has been on the ropes over this one for decades if not longer.

CMB Timeline

Timeline of the Universe, circa 2006, NASA/WMAP Science Team, in the public domain in the United States

We’ve previously examined why the earth appears so old. Dorothy Leigh Sayers, in her book Letters to a Diminished Church: Passionate Arguments for the Relevance of Christian Doctrine, offers an intriguing explanation for Genesis, chapters 1-3:

…God had, at some moment or other, created the universe complete with all the vestiges of an imaginary past…Extravagant…if one thinks of God as a [scientist]…but, if one thinks of Him as working in the same sort of way as a creative artist, then [it seems] the most natural thing in the world.

Albert Mohler, in his sermon: “Why Does the Universe Look So Old?” says, “because the Creator made it whole,” that is, fully developed, and it “bares testimony to the effects of sin and testimony to the judgment of God.” This last point merits development.

Usually, some will object, how can fossils have been created in the first six days, which God pronounced very good, since these fossils represent the deaths of many creatures? The answer is that death entered through the curse (Genesis 3; Romans 5:12) sometime after the seventh day, a day of rest. Further, the Apostle Paul comments on Genesis 3 when he says:

For the creation waits with eager longing for the revealing of the sons of God. For the creation was subjected to futility, not willingly, but because of him who subjected it, in hope that the creation itself will be set free from its bondage to corruption and obtain the freedom of the glory of the children of God. Romans 8:19-21 (ESV)

Clearly, God’s curse on humanity materially affected all creation, including the earth itself, with corruption. For self-consistency, that corruption naturally must include dead creatures.

Therefore, if the Genesis account is true, how should we then respond?

W. Robert Godfrey: God’s Design for Creation, YouTube, Mar 2, 2016 , Ligonier Ministries

Aseity – God’s Self-Existence

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Why is there something rather than nothing? This is a popular question that is usually answered sophically. A better answer involves aseity, or God’s self-existence. The proof text in scripture for His self-existence is:

God said to Moses, “I am who I am.” And he said, “Say this to the people of Israel: ‘I am has sent me to you.’” Exodus 3:14 English Standard Version (ESV)

Theologian, author, and pastor R. C. Sproul says the following concerning the concept of aseity and its alternative:

Aseity is the view that God is entirely self-sufficient and not dependent or contingent upon anything else. In other words, He is the eternal, independent, and personal cause of the universe.

Some thinkers appeal to self-creation to account for reality while denying God’s existence. As self-creation is illogical, others attack the concept of causality itself. An appeal to the philosophy of David Hume is often made to prove that uncaused effects do exist.

…[However,] Hume did not deny that causes exist, he just believed we cannot determine what they are. The law of causality still holds true: “Every effect must have a cause.”

For anything to exist, an uncaused something, or someone, must exist. It is not an uncaused effect that must exist, for there can be no such thing. Self-creation, an uncaused effect, may be an illogical contradiction, but a self-existent, “uncaused cause” is not.

This “uncaused cause” must have the power of being within itself—it must exist in and of itself. This cause must be eternal, for that which does not exist cannot later bring itself into existence. Moreover, this cause must be personal for an impersonal one could not create personal beings. Only a personal, self-existent God can answer the question: “Why is there something rather than nothing?”

American-Dutch Reformed theologian, Louis Berkhof, in his work Systematic Theology, says the following about God’s self-existence:

…The answer to the question, whether the Absolute of philosophy can be identified with the God of theology, depends on the conception one has of the Absolute.

…When the Absolute is defined as the First Cause of all existing things, or as the ultimate ground of all reality, or as the one self-existent Being, [the Absolute] can be considered as identical with the God of theology. He is the Infinite One, who does not exist in any necessary relations, because He is self-sufficient, but at the same time can freely enter into various relations with His creation as a whole and with His creatures. While [God’s] incommunicable attributes emphasize the absolute Being of God, [His] communicable attributes stress the fact that He enters into various relations with His creatures.

…As the self-existent God, He is not only independent in Himself, but also causes everything to depend on Him. This self-existence of God finds expression in the name Jehovah. It is only as the self-existent and independent One that God can give the assurance that He will remain eternally the same in relation to His people.

Additional indications of it are found in the assertion in John 5:26, “For as the Father hath life in Himself, even so gave He to the Son also to have life in Himself”; in the declaration that He is independent of all things and that all things exist only through Him, Ps. 94:8 ff.; Isa. 40:18 ff.; Acts 7:25; and in statements implying that He is independent in His thought, Rom. 11:33-34, and in His will, Dan. 4:35; Rom. 9:19; Eph. 1:5; Rev. 4:11. in His power, Ps. 115:3, and in His counsel, Ps. 33:11.

Thus, with Sproul, we conclude:

…Only a self-existent, personal God for whom non-existence is impossible can adequately explain the design, causality, and personality evident in the universe.

In other words, God’s aseity explains why there is something rather than nothing.

R.C. Sproul: Before the Beginning: The Aseity of God, YouTube, Ligonier Ministries, This message is from Ligonier’s 2004 National Conference, A Portrait of God

In Whom We Have Our Being – Part 2

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Last week we discussed Oprah’s favorite verse again. We saw how God’s animating power causes all His creation ‘to live, move, and have its being.’ It is His self-existence that gives us existence. Were He to withdraw His spirit from us, we would all return to dust.

The context for Oprah’s verse is:

And he made from one man every nation of mankind to live on all the face of the earth, having determined allotted periods and the boundaries of their dwelling place, that they should seek God, and perhaps feel their way toward him and find him. Yet he is actually not far from each one of us, for

“‘In him we live and move and have our being’;

as even some of your own poets have said,

“‘For we are indeed his offspring.’

Being then God’s offspring, we ought not to think that the divine being is like gold or silver or stone, an image formed by the art and imagination of man. Acts 17:26-29 English Standard Version (ESV)

Calvin has much to say about verses 26 through 29. Here’s a condensation (if you can believe it!) He starts by saying that those, meant to know the One God, splintered from one another and created gods in their own likeness:

And he has made of one blood. …Paul [appeals to] the nature of God that men must be very careful to know God, because they [are] created for the same end, and born for that purpose; for [God] briefly assigns to them this cause of life: to seek God.

…In sum, he meant to teach that the order of nature was broken, when religion was pulled in pieces among them, and that this diversity, which is among them, is a testimony that godliness is quite overthrown, because they are fallen away from God the Father of all, upon whom all kindred depends.

Calvin states that, despite their rebellion, God still provides light and life for His creation according to His will:

To dwell upon the face of the earth. …[Paul] says not that the times were only foreseen [by God], but that they were appointed and set in such order as pleased him best. And when [Paul says] God had appointed from the beginning those things which he had ordained before, [he means] that [God] executes by the power of his Spirit those things which he has decreed in his counsel…

…For though men, by raging upon earth, …seem to assault heaven, that they may overthrow God’s providence, yet they are enforced, whether they will [to do so] or not, rather to establish the same. Therefore, let us know that the world is so turned over [in] diverse tumults, [through and by which] God…brings all things to the end which he has appointed.

This last paragraph has bearing for every age, and particularly for our own. This calls for patient endurance.

Then, Calvin points out the goodness of God and the unreasonableness of mans’ position:

That they might seek God. …Surely, nothing is more absurd, than that men should be ignorant of their Author, who are [endowed] with understanding principally [to seek God].

And we must especially note the goodness of God, in that he does so familiarly insinuate himself, that even the blind may grope after him. For which cause the blindness of men is more shameful and intolerable, who, in so [obvious] and [palpable a display], are touched with no feeling of God’s presence.

…Though they shut their eyes, yet may they grope after him…Their ignorance and [lack of understanding] is mixed with such [contrariness], that being void of right judgment, they pass over without [discerning] all such signs of God’s glory as appear manifestly both in heaven and earth…(Romans 1:20.)

Further, Calvin calls out man’s indifference as monstrous, in light of God’s availability to us:

Though he be not far from every one of us. [So he might discuss] the [contrariness] of men [further], [Paul] says that God is not to be sought through many [twists and turns], neither need we make any long journey to find him; because every man shall find him in himself, if…he will take any heed. By which experience we are convicted that our dullness is not without fault, which we [inherited from] Adam.

For though no corner of the world [is] void of the testimony of God’s glory, yet we need not go [outside] ourselves to lay hold upon him. For he affects and moves every one of us inwardly with his power in such [a way], that our [insensibility] is [grotesque], in that in feeling him we feel him not…

While correctly emphasizing God’s separateness from creation, Calvin dissects how it is that we dwell in Him:

For in him. …God himself separates himself from all creatures by this word Jehovah, that we may know that, in speaking properly, he is alone, and that we have our being in him, inasmuch as by his Spirit he keeps us in life, and upholds us…

…All those who know not God know not [that] they have God present with them not only in the excellent gifts of the mind, but in their very essence [or that, since] it belongs to God alone to be [(i.e., I Am)], all other things [including we ourselves] have their being in him.

…God did not create the world [and] afterward depart from his work; but [the world, which He created from nothing,] stands by his power [moment-by-moment], and that the same God is the governor thereof who was the Creator. We must well think upon this continual comforting and strengthening, that we may remember God every minute.

Carefully, Calvin delineates in what way all men may be considered sons:

Certain of your poets. …Paul [cites a confession of that knowledge which is naturally engraven in men’s minds], though it were corrupt with men’s fables, that men are the [creation] of God…This is that which the Scripture teaches, that we are created after the image and similitude of God, (Genesis 1:27.)

The same Scripture teaches…that we [are] made the sons of God by faith and free adoption when we are engrafted into the body of Christ, and being regenerate by the Spirit, we begin to be new creatures, (Galatians 3:26.)…

…[Because the image of God is almost blotted out in men,] this name, [Sons], is [rightly] restrained to the faithful, who having the Spirit of adoption given them, resemble their heavenly Father in the light of reason, in righteousness, and [in] holiness.

Finally, Calvin shows us men’s folly in depicting God with man-made images.

Therefore, seeing that. …God cannot be figured or resembled by any graven image forasmuch as he would have his image [existing] in us. For the soul wherein the image of God is properly engraven cannot be painted; therefore, it is a thing more absurd to go about to paint God…

…Paul…inveighs against the common superstition of all the Gentiles, because they would worship God under bodily shapes…God is falsely and wickedly transfigured, and that his truth is turned into a lie [as] often as his Majesty is represented by any visible shape… (Romans 1:23.)

…But seeing that God far surpasses the capacity of our mind, whosoever attempts with his mind to comprehend him, [that person] deforms and disfigures his glory with a wicked and false imagination. Wherefore, it is wickedness to imagine anything of him according to our own sense.

God reaches out to us who are alienated from Him. Though we try to throw off His governance, yet He still rules. Created to know Him, we do not acknowledge His presence in heaven, earth, and even ourselves. His animating power gives us existence and life. We are wayward children; His image, engraven in our souls, is gravely marred, yet He still freely offers faith to us so we might become His sons and daughters. I urge you, if you haven’t yet, believe on the Lord Jesus Christ and be saved.

Time-Lapse: 7 Amazing Views of Earth from Space, July 26, 2016, National Geographic

In Whom We Have Our Being – Part 1

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We’ve discussed Oprah’s favorite verse before. Let’s look at this verse again. In context, we read:

And he made from one man every nation of mankind to live on all the face of the earth, having determined allotted periods and the boundaries of their dwelling place, that they should seek God, and perhaps feel their way toward him and find him. Yet he is actually not far from each one of us, for

“‘In him we live and move and have our being’;

as even some of your own poets have said,

“‘For we are indeed his offspring.’

Being then God’s offspring, we ought not to think that the divine being is like gold or silver or stone, an image formed by the art and imagination of man. Acts 17:26-29 English Standard Version (ESV)

From the website footnotes, the first quote is probably from Epimenides of Crete; the second quote is likely from Aratus’s poem “Phainomena.” To verses 27 and 28, Calvin says how conciliatory God is to us; He makes Himself findable:

That they might seek God. …It is man’s duty to seek God…God himself comes forth to meet us, and shows himself by such manifest tokens, that we can have no excuse for our ignorance.

Not only are the tokens He offers in the creation that surrounds us, but in the creation inside us:

Though he be not far from every one of us. …For though no corner of the world [is] void of the testimony of God’s glory, yet we need not go [outside] ourselves to lay hold upon him. For he affects and moves every one of us inwardly with his power in such [manner], that our [insensibleness] is [grotesque], in that in feeling him we feel him not…

Those apart from Christ are alienated, dead in trespasses and sins with no hope in the world. Yet, concerning even these (as we once were), Calvin says:

For in him. …God preserves, by the wonderful power and inspiration of his Spirit, those things which he has created [out] of nothing… [God did not create the world and afterward depart from his work; but the world continues to stand by his power moment by moment. The Creator of the world is its ever present governor.]

Paul said that [humans] need not seek far for God, whom they have [acting] within them [under his governance] …We have not only no life [except] in God, but [no] moving; [indeed, not even existence,] which is [lower in rank] to both [living and movement].

I say that life has the pre-eminence in men, because they have not only sense and motion as brute beasts have, but they [are endowed] with reason and understanding…So in John, when [he mentions the] creation of all things, [he adds separately and] not without cause, that life was the light of men, (John 1:4.)

…All those who [do not] know God [are ignorant that] they have God present with them not only in the excellent gifts of the mind, but in their very essence. [Since] it belongs to God alone to be [(i.e., He is the I am)], all other things have their being in him.

So, the self-existent God gives us physical life for one purpose: to know Him. He upholds the being of all things, including our own, by His power. We should, therefore, acknowledge Him. However, unless we receive by faith His justification of us by His unmerited favor, we are dead to Him.

Not only does His animating power envelop us, but our evil deeds surround us too; and He sees them all:

But they do not consider

    that I remember all their evil.

Now their deeds surround them;

    they are before my face.

Hosea 7:2 (ESV)

I urge you, then, to believe that His sacrifice of Himself for our sins declares you righteous. Then, you, along with the psalmist, can say with joy:

Even before a word is on my tongue,

    behold, O Lord, you know it altogether.

You hem me in, behind and before,

    and lay your hand upon me.

Such knowledge is too wonderful for me;

    it is high; I cannot attain it.

Psalm 139:4-6 (ESV)

We’ll examine the entire context (Acts 17:26-29) next week.

Watch a Breathtaking Time-Lapse of Grand Teton National Park, Aug 27, 2016, YouTube, National Geographic