Welcome to Connect with Skip Heitzig. We're glad you've joined us for today's program. If you do, you'll also receive Skip's weekly devotional email to inspire you with God's Word each week. So sign up today at ConnectWithSkip.com.
That's ConnectWithSkip.com. Now, let's get into today's teaching from Pastor Skip Heitzig. Let's turn in our Bibles tonight to Genesis chapter 1.
Boy, it feels good to say that. Genesis chapter 1. According to Guinness Book of World Records, the Bible is the best-selling and most widely distributed book in all of the world. Since 1815, according to Guinness, the Bible has sold and different ones have distributed 2.5 billion copies. It has been translated into 2,233 dialects.
So it's everywhere. A significant book. And it is this significant book that we study tonight and every time we gather together. If you were to tally up all of the verses in the Bible, you would discover there's 31,173 verses. About 23,000 in the Old Testament and about 8,000 in the New Testament.
If you were simply to read those verses from Genesis to Revelation, you could cover the entire Bible. Reading at what we call pulpit speed, just reading it out loud, you'd cover it in 71 hours. Now, it's going to take us longer than 71 hours. We're not going to obviously go longer than the set hour that we have for tonight. We're going to end on time.
Trust me on that. Or relatively close to being on time. No, we'll end on time. We have other commitments we have to keep. But it's going to take us way longer than 71 hours. It's going to take us several weeks.
And since we want to study and compare, turn and get the text that we read elicited, it's going to take us quite some time. We're only doing one chapter tonight. Now, we'll speed up our pace in certain portions of the Bible. We'll do two, three, four, five chapters. When we get to lots of genealogies, we'll just kind of notice some of the highlights.
Instead of trying to wrestle through all of the names, we'll speed through those sections more quickly. But the idea is to read it and to feed on it, to study it. I have several Bibles and I've kept them for years.
And the reason I have several is because they get worn out. And so when I teach, I will find one of the Bibles that doesn't have a page coming out of Genesis. And I'll use that because I have a Bible. It's all good, but the book of Ephesians has fallen out. And then another Bible where Ephesians is intact, but several of the chapters of Acts have fallen out.
And that's OK. It's not that you want to become Bible abusers. You just want to become Bible users. Like Charles Spurgeon used to say, a Bible that is falling apart usually belongs to somebody who isn't.
So read it, use it. And we'll be doing that in these studies and comparing, as I said, scripture with scripture. Now we're looking tonight and every time we read the Bible at pure revelation. There's two basic types of revelation. There is general revelation and there is special revelation.
Genesis has both. God communicates to mankind generally through the created world around us. But then we read that God spoke and God said. And when God speaks and God said, that's special revelation.
Both are highlighted in this book. Both are celebrated, I think perhaps best in Psalm 19. The psalmist begins by talking about general revelation. The heavens declare the glory of God.
The firmament shows his handiwork. Day after day, they utter their speech. Night after night, they reveal knowledge. There is no voice. There is no language where their speech is not heard.
Their line has gone throughout all of the earth. That's general revelation. God speaks through the created world.
But there's something much better, much more secure, much more direct, much more informative. And that is special revelation. And that's the Bible.
The same Psalm, Psalm 19 as it goes down says, the law of the Lord is perfect, converting the soul. The testimonies of the Lord are sure, making wise the simple. More to be desired are they than gold.
Yea, than much fine gold. So as we study through the lens of special revelation tonight, the creation of the heavens and the earth. We'll study general revelation through the lens of special revelation.
Just understand that God gives us both and both are talked about here. Now in the Bible, we have a sweep from eternity past. In the beginning, God created the heavens and the earth. Genesis 1, 1 to eternity future. New heavens, new earth, new Jerusalem. Revelation 21 talks about that.
So it gives us the full sweep. But it would help if you understand that there's one main subject. And that's one person. And that is Messiah, the Lord Jesus Christ. He is the one person that the Bible highlights more than anything else.
That is the theme of all of scripture. One person and two events. Event number one, Jesus' first coming. Event number two, Jesus' second coming. At event number one, Jesus came into the world to take care of sin, to die on the cross, to pay for the sins of the world.
The second time Jesus comes, he will come to reign over those who have been cleansed of their sin. That is the theme of all of the scripture. But the Bible is also divided in sections. As you can see, there's an Old Testament and there's a New Testament. But let me suggest five sections with that one theme or that one person or that one subject.
And here's five divisions for you. Preparation is number one. That's the whole Old Testament. It's all in preparation, prophetic of, anticipating Jesus' coming. Section number two, manifestation. Those are the four gospels. The life of Jesus is highlighted, spoken about, discussed, celebrated.
Section number three, propagation. That's the book of Acts. The message of Jesus manifested in the gospels is now taken through Jerusalem, Judea, Samaria, into the ends of the earth by the apostles. Fourth section, information. Those are the epistles of Paul, John, Peter, and others.
They fill in the gaps. They tell the story for the church. And then the fifth division is consummation. And that's the last book of the Bible, the book of Revelation. It talks about how God will fulfill his plan throughout all of the ages. And that which was in the beginning will have its end and God will have a new creation, new heaven, new earth.
So those are the five sections. Now we're dealing with the Old Testament and we will be for some time. In the Old Testament, there are four categories.
Are you with me so far? Four categories of special revelation. Now, if we were Jewish, I would tell you there are three categories, the law, the prophets, and the writings. And you'll see that distinction even written in the Bible. But we have come in the Western world to divide the Old Testament into four categories of literature.
Number one, the law. Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers, Deuteronomy. First, five books of Moses or the Pentateuch.
Number two, history. Beginning with Joshua, Judges, all the way to the Book of Esther is the second division that is the historical books of the Old Testament. The third category or division is poetry, or you could say wisdom literature.
From the Book of Job all the way through the Song of Solomon, it is written in that Hebrew meter, Hebrew parallelism. And those are the books of poetry or wisdom literature. And the fourth division is prophecy, beginning with Isaiah and ending with the last of the 12 minor prophets, the Book of Malachi. And you have the 39 books of the Old Testament with those four categories.
We are at the ground level tonight. We are in the foundational book. I suggest you really won't understand anything else in the Bible until you understand Genesis.
And I can prove that by simply pointing to this fact. The Book of Genesis is quoted 200 plus times in the New Testament, more than any other biblical book. It is foundational. It tells us everything, the origin of the universe, the origin of man, the origin of sin and the fall of man, the origin of marriage, the origin of human government, the origin of the nation of Israel through whom the Messiah would come. It tells us all of those original beginning things. It is foundational and thus it is quoted much in the rest of the Bible.
You're listening to Connect with Skip Heitzig. Before we return to Skip's teaching, misunderstandings about Jesus abound. Some see him as a prophet, others as a moral teacher and still others as just a myth or mere historical figure. But the Bible tells a different story about who Jesus is. We want to help you know the real Jesus of the Bible by sending you Skip Heitzig's nine message CD series, Who Is This Jesus? In this eye-opening series, Pastor Skip addresses common misconceptions about Jesus, clarifying both Jesus's humanity and his divinity to equip you to confidently answer questions about who Jesus really is. We'll send you the Who Is This Jesus series as well as Skip's booklet for new believers titled Life Change as thanks for your gift of $50 or more to reach more people with God's love through Connect with Skip Heitzig.
Go to connectwithskip.com slash offer or call 800-922-1888 and request your copy when you give. Now let's get back to Skip for more of today's teaching. Genesis covers 2,500 years of human history.
I'm going to say at least maybe more. There is some controversy as to when the beginning was, how long ago that was, but it covers at least 2,500 years of history, let's say from the fall of man in the early chapters to the death of Joseph. If you were to divide this book up, there's a number of ways you could do it. I'll give you the two easiest ways that I know.
You could do what G. Campbell Morgan did, the prince of preachers who preached in London, England 80, 100 years ago. He divided Genesis up into three main divisions. Number one, generation, chapters one and two, generation God creates. Second section, chapters three through 11, degeneration. And then the last, chapters 12 through 50, regeneration. So generation, degeneration, and regeneration. So you have Genesis divided up into three sections.
Or you could make it even more simple and say that chapters one through 11 cover primeval history, chapters 12 through 50, patriarchal history, Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, and Joseph. Okay, that's enough said on the Bible and introduction to the book. Let's begin in the beginning. In the beginning, God created the heavens and the earth.
The earth was without form and void, and darkness was on the face of the deep, and the Spirit of God was hovering over the face of the waters. In the beginning, you can't go back any further than that. That's as far back as it's possible to go, in the beginning. The question is, when was in the beginning?
Well, depending on who you ask, you'll get a number of answers. Some, and I would say most evangelicals would believe in a young earth, no more than 10,000 years old, many of them will say. In fact, some of them will be very dogmatic and say it is 6,000 years old. They say this because they believe that the genealogies in the book of Genesis are closed genealogies.
That is, they are a complete genealogy. And as they go through and they extrapolate out the ages and the generations, they've come up with 6,000 to 10,000 years old. Now, others would disagree. Others would say the beginning of the universe is 2 billion, 5 billion, up to 20 billion years old.
Now, I have read a lot on the different ages that are postulated and the disagreements, and I notice that both groups are very animated and dogmatic, and they argue back and forth over this issue vehemently. And what comes to my mind is what God said to Job. At the end of the book of Job, God starts speaking after Job and his three friends had talked for a long time. And God says, who is this who darkens counsel by words without wisdom?
Prepare yourself like a man. I will question you and you will answer me. And here's the question. Where were you when I laid the foundations of the earth? Tell me if you have understanding.
You see the problem. None of the experts in how old the earth is were there. Only God was, so we can speculate and have fun doing it.
I just decided to get out of the speculation business. I don't know when the beginning was, but I know that in the beginning, God. In the beginning, God. And that's how the Bible begins.
It doesn't begin with philosophical arguments for the existence of God. It just says, in the beginning, God. It assumes his existence.
And he is the only one who can speak with real authority because he was the only one who was there. In the beginning, God created the heavens and the earth. Some people can't say, in the beginning, God. They eliminate God completely. In the beginning, they say it was space and gases.
Gases floating in space. But if you try to eliminate God, you have a problem. Where did the space come from?
Where did the gas come from? And you can go back and back and back into infinite regression, but you still haven't answered the question. Until you acknowledge there must be some first uncaused cause. In the beginning, God. Now why is it that people have sought to eliminate God from the beginning or from the universe? Well, Romans chapter 1 tells us. It says they did not wish to retain God in their minds, in their thinking.
Because as soon as you acknowledge there is a God who is responsible for all of this, and I live in a personal world made by a personal God, it means I am ultimately morally accountable. So it's more convenient to just say, well, in the beginning, gas is floating in space, and a big bang and explosion happened, instead of in the beginning, God. But this is the doorway to the Bible. You can't get to any other part of the Bible unless you go through Genesis chapter 1 verse 1, and it says, in the beginning, God created the heavens and the earth. Now if you just believe that, the rest of the Bible is going to be easy for you. Jonah and the whale, piece of cake compared to this.
I don't know scientifically how a man could survive. Okay, in the beginning, God created the heavens and the earth, that's a bigger trick. If you can get this verse down, Jonah and the whale, the floating axe head of Elijah, Jesus walking on the water, all of it, a piece of cake, a walk in the park, compared to this glorious, majestic first act, the first uncaused cause. God created the heavens and the earth. Back in 1903, a scientist by the name of Herbert Spencer categorized all that is knowable into five categories, that is, he said, and he was the one, by the way, who came up with some of those taxonomic phyla categories for biological life, but he said everything knowable can be placed in one of five categories.
Time, force, action, space, matter. Now, I want to say congratulations, Herbert. That was really good. We applaud you, Herbert, wonderful that you could add to the scientific knowledge of the world. However, you just articulated, Herbert, Genesis 1-1. In the beginning, that's time. God, that's force.
Created, that's action. The heavens, that's space. And the earth, that's matter. And what we start discovering as we go through the book of Genesis is that it's very precise. And these scientists come along and go, wow, look what I just discovered.
Everybody goes, wow, give you a prize, dude, a Nobel Prize. And yet, I submit to you that the man or woman of faith is miles ahead of the man or woman of science. You see, it says in Hebrews chapter 4, or Hebrews chapter 11, by faith, we believe that the worlds were framed by the word of God so that the things which are seen were not made of things which are visible.
Did you hear that? He just made a statement of faith. By faith, we believe that everything in the material world is made up of materials you can't see. We call those atomic and subatomic particles. Somebody came along and discovered that all matter is broken up into these invisible particles and that's what everything's made out of. And they come along and they say, we just made a discovery.
And we go, we've always known that. The Bible tells us plainly that everything we can see wasn't made up of visible but invisible particles. So the person of faith will be further ahead than even the person of great science. So if you can combine science and faith, and I believe you can quite well, you can be pretty far ahead of the game. In the beginning, God created. I know that we've just barely covered one verse, and we'll speed it up as we go, but this is pretty foundational.
Something else. One of the things we discover, and I'm milking it for this reason, God doesn't tell us a lot about his creative process. He doesn't give us much information. If you were to count, there's only 630 words God uses to describe the origin of everything. This is an abridged version of creation. He spent far more time and space talking about Abraham, far more time and space talking about the tabernacle, just a few words speaking about creation. But the purpose of Genesis isn't a biology lesson. How many in Moses' day or Abraham's time would have understood it if it were? God and the author through the Holy Spirit has an agenda to show us briefly the origin of all things and then to take us quickly to the origin of the Hebrew nation through which genealogy would come the Savior of the world, the Messiah.
So the book has a definite agenda as it takes us through. So, in the beginning, God created the heavens and the earth. Okay.
This is where you lose most people. The modern mind today believes that evolution is such a done deal and such a closed case, it can't even be argued. And if it is argued, it's by idiotic fundamentals who happen to stupidly believe in the literal inspiration of the Bible, and I'm one of them. But they think it's such a done deal. Everybody knows. Try it.
Talk about this publicly with someone. Everybody knows, they will say, that evolution is a fact, it's a known fact, it's a done deal, it's a closed case. Not so fast. Some of the most brilliant minds in the scientific community would say, not so fast. It is not a closed case, it is not a done deal, it is still a theory and it is still speculative.
For example, molecular biologist Michael Denton said, and I quote, the evolutionary theory is still, as it was in Darwin's time, a highly speculative hypothesis entirely without direct factual support. Close quote. We're glad you joined us today. Before you go, remember that when you give $50 or more to help reach more people with the gospel through Connect with Skip Heitzig, we'll send you Pastor Skip's series, Who Is This Jesus? and his booklet, Life Change, to help you better understand both who Jesus is and why you can trust what the Bible says and who you are as a believer in Christ. To request your copy of these resources, call 800-922-1888.
That's 800-922-1888. Or visit connectwithskip.com slash offer. For more from Skip, be sure to check out the many resources available at connectwithskip.com slash store.
Come back next time for more verse-by-verse teaching of God's Word. Here on Connect with Skip Heitzig. Make a connection. Make a connection at the foot of the crossing. Cast your burdens on His Word. Make a connection. Connection. Connect with Skip Heitzig is a presentation of Connection Communications, connecting you to God's never changing truth in ever-changing times.
