Part 1—Genesis Is History, Not Mystery

Christians have no problem recognizing that there is something drastically wrong with society today. In fact, with the sheer level of moral degradation, lack of justice, anti-God sentiment, and (in particular) anti-Christian sentiment in culture, merely mentioning all the challenges we face seems like beating a dead horse.

Most believers want to know what to do about it, not simply rehash and get frustrated over what they already know. However, the challenge is that you can’t fix something unless you first know the problem.

Doing the Diagnostic

Think of it this way: When you take your car to your mechanic for repair and try to explain that it is making a “chugga-chugga” sound (while he looks back at you with that slightly bored stare, nodding at you slowly), he doesn’t start by ordering a piece to replace the “chugga-chugga” part for your car.

If he’s competent, he’ll likely begin a systematic troubleshooting exercise starting with an analysis of the symptoms your vehicle is exhibiting—in relation to how it should be operating under ideal circumstances—to attempt to determine the root cause of your problem.

And he’ll do this so he won’t apply band-aid solutions to a much bigger issue (because we’ve likely all had the mechanic that “fixed” your car three times, but it still doesn’t run right). You can fix as many smaller problems as you’d like, but without getting to the core issue that started it all, you won’t ever be able to fix the real problem.

Similarly, perhaps Christians (especially pastors and leaders) should be doing the same thing. We should try to diagnose the cultural breakdowns we observe because although many Christians appear to be busy performing various activities that may help to some degree, few cannot tell you the foundational causes of society’s underlying problems and don’t know how to fix the real problem.

Problems That Aren’t the Real Problem

Many believe we need to fight a moral battle and perhaps attempt to influence our governments politically to reinstate a more biblically based system of laws, values, and cultural norms like those we had in the past.

Others recognize that this tactic is simply skirmishing from a symptomatic standpoint (because even if you change the laws today, they could just be reversed tomorrow) and believe we need to fight at a deeper, more foundational level.

So, they champion more of an ideological or big-picture approach to battling our cultural climate by attempting to promote Christian theology (particularly Christ’s teachings) and (like Canadian conservative speaker Jordan Peterson) all of the positive effects Christianity has had on society in the past to motivate people toward a more Christian vision of the future.

If the history contained in Scripture isn’t true, then neither are the majority of its teachings.

And this, of course, is very admirable to a degree and closer to dealing with the actual cause of the malady fueling the cultural collapse we find ourselves in.

However, many believers fail to understand that the battle for the legitimacy of God’s moral laws, Christ’s teachings, and all our Christian doctrines (including the gospel itself) hinges on a battle surrounding the Bible’s historicity. If the history contained in Scripture isn’t true, then neither are the majority of its teachings.

The Epicenter of the Christian Faith

And what do I mean by that? Well, let’s take the central teaching of the Bible—Christ’s sacrifice on the cross of Calvary—without which the Christian faith would be meaningless.

Jesus’ supernatural, miraculous birth (having no earthly father but being the result of the Holy Spirit), his death on the cross at Golgotha, and his resurrection three days later are all necessary historical events for Christ to be the perfect sacrifice for sin and to make salvation through faith possible.

The Messiah needed to be our kinsman redeemer, fully man and fully God, the perfect, sinless sacrificial lamb without blemish; he was the only person able to fulfill God’s law to stand in our place, shedding his blood and atoning for our transgressions, as the propitiator for the sins of the world.

It would be hard to imagine a true convert to Christianity that would disagree with any of the above because the Bible records real historical events as truth to derive the theological meaning and consequences. We can point to specific verses in the Bible that plainly show this is what the Bible teaches:

“Now the birth of Jesus Christ took place in this way. When his mother Mary had been betrothed to Joseph, before they came together she was found to be with child from the Holy Spirit” (Matthew 1:18).

“‘Do not think that I have come to abolish the Law or the Prophets; I have not come to abolish them but to fulfill them’” (Matthew 5:17).

“The next day he saw Jesus coming toward him, and said, ‘Behold, the Lamb of God, who takes away the sin of the world!’” (John: 1:29).

“If anyone does sin, we have an advocate with the Father, Jesus Christ the righteous. He is the propitiation for our sins, and not for ours only but also for the sins of the whole world” (1 John 2:1–2).

“But now the righteousness of God has been manifested apart from the law . . . the righteousness of God through faith in Jesus Christ for all who believe. . . . for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God, and are justified by his grace as a gift, through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus, whom God put forward as a propitiation by his blood, to be received by faith” (Romans 3:21–25).

So, Christianity is not simply based on myth or some interesting stories; it is based on real events of which Jesus’ life, death, and resurrection are at the epicenter. And yet, the cross of Christ does not stand alone in history because the whole purpose of Jesus’ mission was based on the reality of very specific historical events revealed in the book of Genesis.

Truth Is All or Nothing

For example, if we were to ask why there is sin in the world in the first place, we would find a clear answer in the New Testament that points to the Old Testament. Scripture clearly states:

“Sin came into the world through one man, and death through sin, and so death spread to all men because all sinned” (Romans 5:12).

That answer contains historical information regarding events that can be traced back to the book of beginnings: Genesis. The “one man” mentioned here that sinned and death came into the world because of him is the first man, Adam:

“For as by a man came death, by a man has come also the resurrection of the dead. For as in Adam all die, so also in Christ shall all be made alive” (1 Corinthians 15:21–22).

And we also get additional historical information about this “one man” (Adam) and his wife (Eve)—they are where the entire world population (that has ever been, or ever will be) comes from, as we read in Acts 17:26 and Genesis 3:20, respectively.

“And he made from one man every nation of mankind to live on all the face of the earth” (Acts 17:26).

“The man called his wife’s name Eve, because she was the mother of all living” (Genesis 3:20).

And where did our first parents come from?

“Then the Lord God formed the man of dust from the ground and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life, and the man became a living creature. And the Lord God planted a garden in Eden, in the east, and there he put the man whom he had formed” (Genesis 2:7–8).

“Then the Lord God said, ‘It is not good that the man should be alone; I will make him a helper fit for him’” (Genesis 2:18).

So, taking Genesis (and all the other scriptural accounts that reference it) as clearly written, there was a real Adam—our first father, so to speak—to whom we are all related. There was a real, historical garden of Eden and a real event where Adam transgressed God’s law (the fall), and we were all in Adam when he fell, which is why we sin.

When viewed in its totality, the historicity of the Bible is a consistent, coherent narrative from beginning to end.

There was a real curse as a punishment for Adam’s sin, which is why although there is beauty in the world, there is also death and suffering. And when Christ returns at the consummation of all things, he will restore the creation fully to its “very good” state. When viewed in its totality, the historicity of the Bible is a consistent, coherent narrative from beginning to end.

Challenges from an Alternate History

Of course, as soon as a Christian declares they believe in Genesis as true history in any public forum, it will typically unleash a torrent of mockery and dismissal (often from both inside and outside the church), which will be accompanied by a barrage of skeptical questions such as (but certainly not limited to) the following:

Haven’t scientists proven that the earth is billions of years old? Where did Cain get his wife? Can’t Christians believe in evolution? How do dinosaurs fit with the Bible? Don't radiometric and carbon dating prove the earth is very old? How did Noah get all the animals on the ark? Wasn’t there a gap between the first two verses in Genesis? Where did all the different “races” of people come from? Isn’t a day like a thousand years, so the days of creation must be long periods? How do you explain the ape-men? Are the days of creation ordinary days?

And, of course, all of these questions aren’t derived from a plain reading of the Genesis text at face value. Instead, they are due to the conflicts created by comparing the well-promoted and popularized alternative secular history—the story of evolution (which includes six stages: cosmological, geological, chemical, biological, human evolution, and heat death)—which is in complete contradiction to the plain reading of Genesis 1–11 (and the other related verses in Scripture).

Obvious Contradictions

For example, instead of God creating individual kinds of living things to reproduce according to their kinds, the story of evolution states that kinds of living things morph into completely different kinds over millions of years.

The story of evolution demands a billions-of-years historical narrative, while Genesis (and the corresponding chronologies in Scripture) clearly teaches an earth approximately 6,000 years old. These ideas are why the story of evolution says dinosaurs died out 65 million years ago and evolved into birds, whereas the Bible states that God created various individual animals like birds and dinosaurs instantaneously.

Also, the story of evolution says there was a big bang where stars evolved first, and the earth was formed afterward, whereas the Bible says the earth was created on day 1 of creation week and the sun later on day 4. The story of evolution says that man was not created fully formed but evolved from ape-like ancestors. The story of evolution says that rock layers were formed over millions of years, whereas the Bible says there was a global flood which would explain those layers forming rapidly.

As for predictions about the future (in contrast to the positive understanding that Jesus will one day come back to rule in a very good world free of sin and death as it was in the beginning), the story of evolution would say that because all of the available energy in the universe is currently “winding down,” it will eventually reach the point of heat death (where there will be no more available energy) and the universe and everything in it will die.

And so, the contradictions go on and on . . .

And the reason why both Christians and non-believers are asking the same questions about the Bible is that both groups have been taught this alternative history (the six stages of the story of evolution), have accepted portions of it to certain degrees, and see the obvious conflict between it and what the Bible teaches quite easily.

Challenges from the Past = Challenges in the Present

We live in a real world with real facts that connect to real history. And when our children ask questions about the real world—questions like the ones mentioned previously concerning dinosaurs, fossils, Noah’s ark, Cain’s wife, and races—we need to show them that the Bible connects all this to reality. Because if the connection to real history is lost, then what does it ultimately mean to be saved? Saved from what? What must we be saved from if the Bible really can’t be trusted?

Why should marriage only be between a man and a woman if the true prototype for marriage wasn’t based on two real people? Why should humans be considered anything other than sophisticated animals or have inherent value if we weren’t specially created separate from them?

Why should the sanctity of a human life (whether in the womb or near the end of their life) be honored if we are simply evolved animals with no current value to society? Why shouldn’t there be an infinite number of genders if there are no created norms?

If Our History Is a Mystery, Then Our Message Is Messy

These are the logical questions that the world has lobbed towards the church over the last hundred years. And for the most part, the church did not stand firm on the authority of God’s Word and defend the history in the Bible as it relates to topics like biology, geology, astronomy, and anthropology, nor could they then answer the philosophical and moral dilemmas that naturally follow from attempting to blend New Testament teachings with this alternate false history.

For example, the most common philosophical objection to Christianity usually comes in some form of the question, “If God is so loving, why is there death and suffering in the world?” And Christians who attempt to reconcile long ages with Genesis almost always attempt to do so by saying the days in Genesis aren’t literal and that the rock layers we see around the world that represent these supposed long ages were laid down during the six (non-literal) days of creation.

However, that would mean the rock layers (including the record of death—fossils) were laid down before Adam’s sin. This would mean the world God created must have been full of death, suffering, disease, and misery before sin entered into the world. What, then, was the punishment for sin when Adam fell?

Under this scenario, Christians cannot explain the gospel rationally. For example, famous Darwin historian and Bible skeptic Peter Bowler easily demonstrated how this position fundamentally deconstructs the Christian worldview (because it introduces death and suffering existing prior to Adam’s sin) in this statement:

If Christians accept that humanity was the product of evolution—even assuming the process could be seen as an expression of the Creator’s will—then the whole idea of Original Sin would have to be reinterpreted.

Far from falling from an original state of grace in the Garden of Eden, we have risen gradually from our animal origins. And if there was no Sin from which we needed salvation, what was the purpose of Christ’s agony on the cross? Christ became merely the perfect man who showed us what we could all hope to become when evolution finished its upward course.1

Controlling the Past = Controlling the Present

Unfortunately, many Christians today (including scientists and laypersons) continue to conform their thinking to what the story of evolution teaches, wrongly assuming that the grand scope of history it touts is true and supported scientifically, while the plainly read truths presented in the Bible are not to be taken literally. And this, of course, cedes biblical authority and grants the upper hand to secular forces, who have used that to take control of Western society.

Indeed, it’s as the old saying goes: “he who controls the present controls the past, and he who controls the past controls the future.” Christians need to equip themselves and their families to stand up to this false history because secular humanists have control of the state-run school systems in the West and broadly teach that there is no need to believe in a Creator God because of the story of evolution. This is now the dominant force in progressive minds shaping our society.

Conclusion

To summarize our spiritual diagnostic: Christian morality is based on Christian theology, and Christian theology is based on true history

To summarize our spiritual diagnostic: Christian morality is based on Christian theology, and Christian theology is based on true history—real events that took place in a real, time-space continuum in which we exist. Therefore, biblical authority has been done away with by erasing Genesis as plainly written and replacing it with the false history of evolutionary long ages.

Ultimately, only by adhering to the true history in the Bible established in Genesis 1–11 (the seedbed of all Christian doctrines) will Christians be able to counter the false teachings, ideology, and immorality that emanates from modern society. And this is why understanding the backbone of biblical history laid out in the 7 C’s of History are so important to know, understand, and communicate effectively.

Tune in next week when we will gain more insight into the first “C” on our journey—Creation!