The Gospel— evidence for creation
by Paul Hampshire, M.Sc.
What Biblical evidence for creation can be presented to a Christian who doesn’t
accept Genesis?
Why, one might ask, would anyone look to the Gospel accounts and the New Testament
for evidence of Creation when the whole Creation account is documented in Genesis?
Unfortunately, even many Christians do not believe the Genesis account of Creation.
Neither are they willing to accept the world-wide Flood described in Genesis. These
people have had their religious beliefs strongly tainted by the theory of evolution.
In order to reconcile their religious beliefs with science they have accepted the
theory of ‘theistic evolution’. They believe evolution to be true, but
that it was directed by God.
Although their idea is not backed up by Scripture, theistic evolutionists do, to
their credit, believe in God. As Christians they believe in Jesus Christ and usually
admit that what He taught is truth. So what did Christ teach about Creation and
Noah’s Flood?
‘God made them’
From Mark’s Gospel,
chapter 10, we read of Jesus in Judea talking with the Pharisees. In a discussion
about divorce Jesus said, ‘But at the beginning of creation
God "made them male and female"’ (verse 6). The word
‘creation’ in this verse is all important,
and the words ‘beginning of creation’
can be paraphrased ‘beginning of things not previously existing’. Matter
and life forms were brought into being at the Creation. This event was never to
be repeated, and only God could do it. Evolution based theory does not agree. Jesus
also told us that God made man and woman, and He states this as a fact. Jesus did
not say ‘God caused to develop’, or ‘God assisted in the evolution
of’, He says that ‘God made them’.
What could be more emphatic?
Before the Flood
Jesus also taught about the Flood. In
Matthew 24 we read of Jesus preparing His disciples for His second coming.
In verse 37 we read, ‘As it was in the days of Noah
… ’; and in verse 38, ‘For in the days before
the flood … up to the day Noah entered the ark’. In these
and the following verse, Jesus described the Flood as ‘in
the days of Noah’, and ‘Noah entered the
ark’, and ‘the flood came and took them all
away’.
These are the essential elements of the Flood described in Genesis, and Jesus taught
them as truth. A similar passage appears in
Luke 17:26, 27.
One continuing theme in the New Testament concerns sin, with salvation through belief
in Jesus Christ. The writers of the New Testament letters refer back to Genesis
and Adam and Eve to explain how sin came into the world. In fact the whole account
of the creation of Adam and Eve, and the introduction of sin in the Garden of Eden,
can be found in the New Testament.
Scoffers
In his second letter, Peter tells us that scoffers in the last days will say that
‘ ... everything goes on as it has since the beginning
of creation’ (2
Peter 3:4). In Paul’s first epistle to the Corinthians we are
told that Adam was the first man. ‘So it is written “The
first man Adam became a living being”?; the last Adam, a life-giving
spirit’ (l
Corinthians 15:45), and that ‘Adam was formed first,
then Eve’ (1
Timothy 2: 13).
The only other reference to Eve in the New Testament occurs when Paul told the Christians
in Corinth he was concerned about their lapsing faith in Christ, ‘But
I am afraid that just as Eve was deceived by the serpent’s cunning, your minds
may somehow be led astray from your sincere and pure devotion to Christ’
(2
Corinthians 11:3). This is often the danger with theistic evolutionists—creationists
still love them and accept them as Christians, but must point out the dangers of
their minds being led astray.
Paul told Timothy that Eve was first deceived, ‘And Adam
was not the one deceived; it was the woman who was deceived and became a sinner’
(1
Timothy 2:14). However, we read in Romans that ‘sin
entered the world through one man’ (Romans
5:12). Paul then wrote about ‘Adam’s transgression’
and taught that through Adam’s sin all men will die in their sins, ‘For as in Adam all die, so in Christ all will be made alive’
(1
Corinthians 15:22). We also have evidence of Noah and the Flood in the New
Testament in Peter’s second epistle, ‘he did not
spare the ancient world when he brought the flood on the ungodly people, but protected
Noah, a preacher of righteousness, and seven others’ (2
Peter 2:5).
Teaching from Genesis
We can see from the above Scripture passages that the writers of the New Testament
letters firmly believed the Genesis account of Creation, which includes Adam and
Eve. They actually used the material from Genesis for teaching the Christians of
the first century. Indeed, Paul tells Timothy that, ‘All
Scripture is God-breathed and is useful for teaching, rebuking, correcting and training
in righteousness’ (2
Timothy 3:16). And we must remember that the use of the words ‘all
Scripture’, quoted above, does not refer exclusively to
the Old Testament, for Paul’s letters are put on a par with ‘the
rest of the Scriptures’ (2
Peter 3:16).
Just as many Christians today have become influenced by the philosophies of mankind,
so too had the Christians at Laodicea in the first century—so much so that
Jesus in His Revelation to John says, ‘To the angel of
the church in Laodicea write: These are the words of the Amen, the faithful and
true witness, the ruler of God’s creation’ (Revelation
3:14). Jesus Himself says He was there at the beginning of Creation.
How can Christians doubt His word by believing in evolution?
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