Jesus and Genesis #2

You cannot go one step toward denying Genesis before you are immediately met with the authority of Christ saying, What do you think you're doing? Because Jesus constantly treats Genesis as a straightforward record of fact.

We're glad you've joined us on The Truth Pulpit with Don Green, founding pastor of Truth Community Church in Cincinnati, Ohio. Hi again, I'm Bill Wright, and today Don continues our series, You Can Trust Genesis, with part two of a message titled Jesus and Genesis. Last time Don traced the lines of authority for the book of Genesis, starting with the authority of Jesus, who authenticated the Old Testament. Today, our teacher will get down to the specifics of Genesis itself. We'll see from a survey of gospel verses how Jesus sees this first book of the Bible, and in turn how we should see it. So open your Bible as we join Don Green now in The Truth Pulpit. Jesus and Genesis.

Now we're going to go through this really quickly. First of all, we see that Jesus affirmed the Genesis account of creation that is found in the first two chapters of Genesis. Go to the Gospel of Mark chapter 10, beginning in verse 6. But from the beginning of creation, God made them male and female. For this reason, a man shall leave his father and mother, and the two shall become one flesh.

So they are no longer two, but one flesh. Jesus looks back, points to the creation account in the first two chapters of Genesis, and says, This is what happened. And he builds theology for his day and for all future days based on the factual historical accuracy and reality of what was recorded in Genesis 1 and 2. Jesus affirmed the creation in Genesis 1 and 2. You can only get to the scientific objections to creation.

You can only get to worldly scientific theories of evolution or theistic evolution or things like that. You can only get to those by stepping over Jesus and ignoring what he says. And for the biblical Christian submitted to the lordship of Christ in his mind as well as in his conduct, that is unthinkable.

Can't go there. Now, Jesus affirmed the history of Adam's son Abel, which we read about in Genesis chapter 4. Look at the Gospel of Luke chapter 11. You remember that Cain killed his brother Abel in Genesis chapter 4.

So the chaos of murder and sin in society had an early root. Jesus said in Luke chapter 11 verse 49, For this reason also the wisdom of God said, I will send to them prophets and apostles, and some of them they will kill and some they will persecute, so that the blood of all the prophets, shed since the foundation of the world, may be charged against this generation. Here it is, from the blood of Abel to the blood of Zechariah. The blood of Abel, Genesis chapter 4 verse 8. Jesus quotes that, alludes to that, refers to that as a factual historical occurrence in time and space, which lays the ground for the judgment on the generation that stood before him. Beloved, he affirmed the teaching of Genesis chapter 4 about the murder of Abel.

You go on. Matthew 24 verse 37, Jesus says, The coming of the Son of Man will be just like the days of Noah. For as in those days before the flood, they were eating and drinking, marrying and giving in marriage, until the day that Noah entered the ark, and they did not understand until the flood came and took them all away, so will the coming of the Son of Man be. Jesus is speaking about his future coming. He grounds its reality. He grounds what it will be like in the day of his second coming, on what the nature of the world was like in the days of Noah, in the days of the flood, in the days of the ark.

Beloved, don't miss it. The reality of his future coming, he premises on the reality of the past, described and recorded for us in full historical accuracy in Genesis 6 through 9. That's powerful. For the Christian submitted to the lordship of Christ, that is conclusive. The flood happened because it's recorded in Genesis.

Go still further. Jesus affirmed the history of Abraham, which begins at the end of chapter 11 in Genesis. Look at the Gospel of John chapter 8. John chapter 8 in verse 56, Jesus speaking to hostile Jews says, Your father Abraham rejoiced to see my day, and he saw it and was glad. And so the Jews said to him, You are not yet 50 years old, and have you seen Abraham? Jesus said to them, Truly, truly, I say to you, before Abraham was born, I am. Abraham was born. Jesus refers to Abraham as a literal historical figure, and even premises in a manner of speaking, asserts his deity, asserts his essence in relationship to his pre-existence to Abraham.

Abraham was real, and the deity of Christ is real. Jesus affirmed the story of Sodom and Gomorrah found in Genesis 18 and 19. You can see this in Matthew 11. We'll look at Luke chapter 17 for the sake of time, beginning in verse 28. Luke 17 verse 28. It was the same as happened in the days of Lot.

They were eating, they were drinking, they were buying, they were selling, they were planting, they were building. But on the day that Lot went out from Sodom, it rained fire and brimstone from heaven and destroyed them all. Jesus looks at that singular day of judgment and says that is what really happened, and again, premises his future coming based on that past event. Verse 30, it will be just the same.

Just the same as it happened in the day of Sodom, on that day yet to come for us even now on that day that the Son of Man is revealed. Jesus affirmed the rest of Genesis. Genesis 22 through 50 in a very broad way. Look at Luke chapter 13 verse 28. In that place there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth when you see Abraham and Isaac and Jacob, the three primary patriarchs of Israel recorded in Genesis. Jesus refers to them in a global, comprehensive way. When you see them and all the prophets in the kingdom of God but yourselves being thrown out, Jesus says Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob will be in the kingdom of God.

And so saying that, stating it in the indicative, the future indicative, they will be there, he affirms their reality. And where do we know about their reality? We know it from the testimony of Genesis in those broad chapters. From chapter 22 and Abraham going back to chapter 11 all the way through chapter 50. Now, beloved, that's a brief survey.

And here's what I want you to see about what we just covered ever so quickly. The cumulative weight of these many references from Genesis is conclusive for understanding the perspective that Jesus had toward the book of Genesis. From creation through Jacob, just in this brief survey that we've seen.

You see, in every instance he affirms it without qualification, without embarrassment, without diminishment. Today's critic might be able to step around one or two of these boulders in his effort to discredit the book of Genesis and evade the force of Jesus' teaching on its historicity. But when you take them in combination, when you take them all together, these individual boulders turn into an avalanche that fall upon the critic. It is an avalanche that buries his unbelief, that demolishes his effort to undermine Genesis while still somehow holding to the authority of Christ.

You cannot have it both ways. If you want to reject Genesis, you must understand that you are rejecting Christ at the same time because they go together. Jesus has put all of his teaching authority, all of his deity, all of his assertions of truth, and put the full weight of his authority behind the teaching of all of Genesis in his ministry. And so you cannot go one step toward denying Genesis before you are immediately met with the authority of Christ saying, what do you think you're doing? Because Jesus constantly treats Genesis as straightforward record of fact. You cannot isolate Genesis from the authority of Christ. And so as you deal with different scientific theories, different biblical theories, beloved, have the wisdom, have the discernment, have the perspective to realize that you cannot let today's critic put blinders on so that you're only looking at the very narrow thing that they want you to see.

Take off the blinders and see the full perspective. What is the full context of the flood? Well, it's the book of Genesis, the Pentateuch, the Old Testament, all of the Bible.

And then you ask the determinative question for yourself. As a believer, you say, what does Christ say? Christ says Genesis is true. Christ says the flood is true. I'll believe Christ over all else. And so from the primary principle of the authority of Christ, we derive the necessary corollary of the authority of Genesis and we follow that and we see the authority of the account of the flood and we realize that there is this great harmony of testimony, the harmony of the testimony of Scripture, in harmony with the things that we saw from the geologic record. And we step back in the midst of an unbelieving world and we say, praise God.

God has saved me. God has given me a new mind. Contrary to the world, I have the real truth. Premise not on my opinion, not on what I think, but based on something outside of me, something that is true if I had never existed, the authority of Christ giving testimony to the authority of his word in general and in details, including about the flood.

And our minds are anchored in truth. Is it possible that Jesus was mistaken? Was he limited in knowledge? Was he unaware of what he did not know?

No, that's not possible. Such an assertion, such a postulate, is not consistent with the deity of Christ or his own claim of authority. Jesus said in Matthew 24, verse 35, he said, heaven and earth will pass away, but my words will not pass away. There is an enduring, abiding authority to what I say. They will never be truly contradicted. The authority of what I say, Christ said, stands forever. It's not possible that he was mistaken.

And you know what else along that same vein? Such a thought would have been unthinkable to his disciples, those who were closest to him. The Apostle John in his gospel said that Jesus himself knew what was in man, an assertion of his omniscience, John chapter 2, verse 25. After the resurrection, Peter said to Christ, he said, Lord, you know all things. Those who knew him best, even on a human level, recognize divine omniscience in him, in a way perfectly consistent with what Christ said about himself that his words would not pass away. You know what else? The resurrection of Christ validates everything that he said.

This is supernatural. The resurrection of Christ is the imprimatur on the truthfulness of everything that he taught, a supernatural vindication of the man, Christ Jesus, and everything that that man taught, vindicated by his resurrection. Christ made no mistakes. There were no errors in his thought out upon the suggestion.

And secondly, sometimes people will say this. We'll state it in a question form. Did Jesus accommodate his teaching to his audience? Did he accommodate what he taught to conform to the prevailing beliefs of his audience in his day?

The idea is this. Did Jesus pretend to agree with his audience because they believed Genesis, even though Jesus himself knew better. And so he didn't want to come in and overturn the apple cart and just overwhelm them with too much information. So he accommodated their mistaken belief about the historical accuracy of Genesis in order to somehow accomplish a greater purpose, to bring them along slowly, you might say.

The idea that Christ did this to avoid unsettling his hearers and that maybe over the process of time, he could gradually bring them from their mistaken beliefs to the truth. Could that explain this? Could that explain the avalanche that's falling down on unbelief of all of these references in Genesis?

Could that be possible? No. No, that can't possibly be true. Jesus Christ claimed authority for everything that he said. My words will not pass away.

My words will not be found to be untrue. Read, read the Gospels. Read how Jesus interacted with the Pharisees, for example.

In Matthew 23 alone, he calls them fools, blind guides, hypocrites, and serpents. Are those the words of a man who is trying to accommodate himself to the unbelief of his audience, to the mistaken means of their thinking? No. No.

No. Christ was the preeminent man of courage and came from heaven and directly contradicted mistaken false traditions when he found them. He didn't confirm people in their unbelief by tricking them and saying to them things that he knew wasn't true. What kind of Christ is that? Where do you get that picture of Jesus out of the Gospels? Besides, look at Mark chapter 8 and this will be the last text that we go to.

Mark chapter 8. Christ never hesitated to confront unbelief. You remember when Peter took Jesus aside and started to rebuke him after Jesus said he was going to be crucified, killed and rise again on the third day? Peter took him aside, Mark chapter 8 verse 32, began to rebuke him. I don't know what was going through Peter's mind right then.

I've got an idea. I'll correct the Lord in what he says. Yeah, that's your first pope.

I would look someplace else. It's enough for us to see Jesus' willingness to directly confront the mistaken assumptions and words of his audience. In verse 33, turning around and seeing his disciples, he rebuked Peter and said, Get behind me, Satan, for you are not setting your mind on God's interests but man's.

He had no problems rebuking and confronting unbelief when it occurred to him, when it was manifested in his presence. So you see, the problem here with the critics' view of Genesis and the way that they tried to evade the force of Jesus and Genesis, the problem is not that Jesus was mistaken. The problem is not that Jesus was deceptive in his teaching.

The error and the deception are with entirely the critics of Scripture. And that brings us to a point of moral choice. This consideration of Jesus and Genesis then leaves us, leaves you, leaves the world with a moral choice to make in response to him. Jesus insisted on it. Look at verse 34 of Mark 8. He summoned the crowd with his disciples. So this is a mixed group, believing, unbelieving, representative of all the world. He summoned the crowd with his disciples and said to them, if anyone, therefore this applies across all time, across all cultures, across male, across female, across old, young, intelligent, less educated.

It crosses every conceivable social and geographic line, every chronological barrier. Everyone is brought under the sound of this demand from Christ. If anyone wishes to come after me, he must deny himself and take up his cross and follow me. For whoever wishes to save his life will lose it, but whoever loses his life for my sake and the gospels will save it. For what does it profit a man to gain the whole world and forfeit his soul? For what will a man give in exchange for his soul?

Look at it here. For whoever is ashamed of me and my words in this adulterous and sinful generation, the Son of Man will also be ashamed of him when he comes in the glory of his Father with the holy angels. The authority of Christ, the authority of the Old Testament, the authority of Genesis. And Christ says, if you're ashamed of my words, I'll be ashamed of you and the judgment. You don't want to be there, do you? Do you believe Christ and his Word? Beloved, if so, I tell you on the authority of Scripture, your hope is well founded.

Your belief is true no matter how many waves of PhDs come against you. If you question Christ, if you question his Word, I call you to repent of your sin against him, to repent of that unbelief, and to bring your heart, soul, and mind, to bring all of your being into submission to the Lordship of Christ, to trust him alone for your salvation, and that mind that he has given to you, to hand it over to be used in the service of this great Lord. And beloved, the consequences of your response to that demand of Christ will echo throughout all of eternity, for better or for the worse of your soul. As Pastor Don Green has asserted today on the Truth Pulpit, you can't claim to accept the Lordship of Jesus Christ and then proceed to contradict his sure word. Well, it follows that the apostles of our Lord would reaffirm Christ's teaching on the subject, and we'll see that on our next broadcast as we continue our series, You Can Trust Genesis. Keep studying with us here on the Truth Pulpit. But right now, here's Don with some exciting ministry news. Well, my friend, it's always meaningful for me to be able to preach God's Word to God's people and to share it with you here on the radio.

Recently, I completed a series that is one of my all-time favorites. It's called The Bible and Roman Catholicism. It was several messages designed to test Catholic teaching by what Scripture says. We'd like to share a copy of that with you, a full, complete CD album of 10 messages.

Just go to our website and request it, or you'll find the downloads. We just want you to have this material at no cost as our gift and ministry to you. Thanks, Don. And friend, as Don mentioned, visit us at thetruthpulpit.com to learn more. And while you're there, you can also find other great resources like free CDs of Don's teaching. That's all at thetruthpulpit.com. I'm Bill Wright, and we'll see you next time on The Truth Pulpit.