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What the Bible says about Creation, Revelation from
(From Forerunner Commentary)

Genesis 6:5-6

At this time in the world, we have not reached the specific level of violent conduct before the Flood, but we are moving toward it. This increasingly perilous condition stands as an indictment against all of us because we have all contributed to this menacing situation. How? It is partly motivated by our collective lack of knowledge, understanding, desire, and/or will to seek God's righteousness and pursue it as the Bible commands us to do.

Many secular-minded people severely question even God's very existence, but God counters those challenges with a stern judgment of His own. Romans 1:18-20 declares that humanity is without excuse because God has made His existence known to mankind. As it is impossible for God to lie, it is a statement of fact: The proofs of His existence and overall governance are available in the observation of creation. Yet, we see no groundswell of people searching for those spiritual truths.

Can today's humanity change and practice a culture of morality superior to what we see in the world? Probably, because even this nation's history shows an America with a much higher level of moral conduct among the general population. Within its histories of the Israelite peoples, the Bible shows a few instances of such a thing occurring.

However, the overall chances of reformation are slim because the Bible pointedly shows us that as long as man's self-centered, anti-God nature remains driven by its resident carnality, nothing will ever change! Romans 8:7 dogmatically states that man's carnal mind, the mind he develops from birth, is antagonistic to God. It is not subject to God by nature.

It has been this way since Adam and Eve. They sinned, bringing the sentence of death upon themselves almost immediately after spending time in the presence of their Creator and being instructed by Him personally. This reality is evidence of how persuasive the anti-God nature we take on at birth is. That one of their children murdered the other proves that the same nature passes on to us, their children.

Immorality has almost always been the dominant way of life for mankind. The early chapters of Genesis show violence continued growing until God Himself put a stop to it by bringing the Flood on humanity. He wiped humanity out entirely except for one family of eight.

With the reality of the conditions we are living through and the availability of the Bible as a resource, we are challenged to choose. God took this same approach toward ancient Israel, and His challenge remains in His Word to this day—to choose life (Deuteronomy 30:15-20).

Since Jesus Christ walked the earth, history shows that no nation has had such full and easy access to the Word of God as America. Who then do we choose to believe, God or men? Even though God is not challenging the entire nation to choose now as He did Israel at that time in their history, the challenge remains for the individual citizen. If an individual sincerely desires to better his conduct before God and not follow the crowds eagerly throwing themselves into the pit reserved for those who do not want to please Him, he or she can choose life.

The potential violent destruction because of America's immoral conduct deserves serious consideration and positive response. Does our conduct follow the American pattern, or does it reflect Jesus Christ's teaching? Those two ways of life are not similar in character. The choices are obvious. We have little excuse not to choose life.

John W. Ritenbaugh
Why Hebrews Was Written (Part Six)

Psalm 19:1-4

David personifies aspects of God's creation, especially things that appear in the heavens. The reason for this is because all of us, before conversion, have had some concept of God. For some of us religious folk, that concept was very fervently, sincerely believed and practiced. But for most of us, the concept of God was vague, maybe even agnostic, doubting. For others, their concept of God was atheistic, that there is no God. Whatever the case, for most, their concept of God is drawn from the creation. David is illustrating this here.

God's creation gives people a picture or an idea that God exists. They may be attracted by the beauty or the vastness they see in what God made, or it may be a combination of factors for their belief. David is showing that creation possesses its own eloquence. In the combination of its vastness, power, beauty, simplicity within complexity, etc., a person begins to think that there is more to life than himself, more than merely living out a span of time and then dying.

John W. Ritenbaugh
Unleavened Bread and Pentecost

Psalm 19:1

Imagine David out in the fields one night, tending his flock, looking up at the starry mass in the sky, seeing the shadowy outlines of the hills in the distance and the moon reflecting the light of the sun, and considering what an awesome Mind it took to create all these things.

John W. Ritenbaugh
Psalm 23 (Part One)

Romans 1:18-19

God reveals to mankind what can be known about Him: Himself and His creative power by displaying the marvels of the creation.

David C. Grabbe
What Evolution Really Means

Romans 1:19-21

The tension between God's keeping a secret and sharing it with others mirrors another basic dichotomy, His presence and His absence. God's presence (or His messengers') is revelatory, while His absence perpetuates the “mystery of godliness,” which the apostle Paul speaks about in I Timothy 3:16.

This same apostle pointedly tells us one of the ways God reveals Himself. Anglican clergyman J.B. Phillips captures the spirit of Paul's comments nicely:

Now the holy anger of God is disclosed from Heaven against the godlessness and evil of those men who render truth dumb and impotent by their wickedness. It is not that they do not know the truth about God; indeed he has made it quite plain to them. For since the beginning of the world the invisible attributes of God, e.g. his eternal power and deity, have been plainly discernible through things which he has made and which are commonly seen and known, thus leaving these men without a rag of excuse. They knew all the time that there is a God, yet they refused to acknowledge him as such, or to thank him for what he is or does. Thus they became fatuous in their argumentations, and plunged their silly minds still further into the dark. (Romans 1:19-21, The New Testament in Modern English)

One of the design-characteristics of God's creation is its ability to reveal the power and divinity of its Creator. It does that so clearly, Paul emphasizes, that mankind has no excuse whatsoever to deny His existence. Whether these wicked individuals instruct about astronomy in an Ivy League university's lecture hall or write a book about theology, their arguments, Paul says, are fatuous—mindless and silly.

Charles Whitaker
Clouds (Part One): A Really Special Cloud

Romans 1:20

Even without the Spirit of God, without God having fully revealed Himself to a person, it is still possible for him to recognize that a creation demands the existence of a Creator. He can see that an intelligent Designer is necessary rather than the natural world coming into existence by sheer chance. Thus, God says that they are without excuse because they can understand the things that can be known about Him, if they choose to accept it.

David C. Grabbe
What Evolution Really Means


 




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