1689 2nd LBCF Chap 4

Okay, we're beginning today on chapter 4. The title of this chapter is Of Creation, and so we're going to look at what the scripture says about the topic of creation. And again, looking at paragraph 1, just want to remind you, to keep reminding you, that the first paragraph sets the tone, you know, it's like a subsequent paragraphs expand upon it.

So here's what our confession says concern of creation. In the beginning, it pleased God the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit for the manifestation of the glory of His eternal power, wisdom, and goodness, to create or make the world and all things therein, whether visible or invisible, in the space of six days, and all very good.

Pretty basic, pretty basic statement on creation. What is it that we believe? Obviously, from this first paragraph, you can see that we definitely are six-day creationists. We believe that God used the span of 24-hour days, and that's what He created.

We understand that there are there are Christians who believe differently than this, but this is one of the distinctives of being a Reformed Baptist. In the space of six days, notice it doesn't make a statement concerning whether this is a young or old earth.

We do take the position that it is a young earth, you know, that, you know, within the span, depending on which chronology you look at, between six and ten thousand years, somewhere in that space. But we don't view people who hold two slightly different views as being heretical on this.

Obviously, this statement does not, and it absolutely precludes, Darwinism or evolution. That's not allowable under the terms of our confession. So, and again, what is the purpose for it? The purpose for the creation is the glory of God, to manifest His power, wisdom, and goodness, okay, and that everything is included.

There was nothing that, and God did create things ex nihilo, out of nothing. Any questions on that? Again, it's a pretty basic statement. It's not complicated, but it definitely does set us apart from any of those who hold for the day-age theory or any of those other things, okay?

All right, and again, there's some of the scripture proofs that would support that paragraph of the confession. Paragraph two says this, After God had made all other creatures, He created man, male and female, with reasonable and immortal souls, rendering them fit unto the life to God for which they were created, being made after the image of God, in knowledge, righteousness, true holiness, having the law of God written in their hearts, and power to fulfill it, and yet under the possibility of transgressing, being left to the liberty of their own will, which was subject to change, okay?

This is an important paragraph for a couple of reasons. One, it certainly sets forth that man was a different creation than the rest, all right? Man is the crown of God's creation. He did create us to rule and reign over this world.

We are not intruders into this world, as some of the liberal and the environmentalists would indicate, that we need to leave nature alone. No, God has created us to rule over the creation and to take care of it, all right?

But the most important part of this chapter, and this paragraph in particular, is that man was created in a state of innocence, all right? And he was created with free will. And this is one of those things that we need to understand, because sometimes people on both sides of the debate get it wrong.

Those who are not Calvinistic in their thinking say, oh, you Calvinists, you don't believe in free will. You know, you believe that we were made like robots or automatons, et cetera, and we believe in free will.

And then some people on the other side, on the Calvinistic side, say man has no free will whatsoever, and they misunderstand that man was created with free will, but it was something that was lost, okay?

And that's what the last half of that says. We had God put the law written on our hearts and the power to fulfill it. Had Adam and Eve not sinned, and again, I hate to use those hypotheticals, because they can lead to error, but had they fulfilled it, they would have inherited eternal life.

Paragraph two, man was created with the law written on his heart, the power to fulfill it, yet here's where free will comes in. Man did have the will to either choose to follow God or choose to transgress his law.

And obviously, we know that from the scriptures that man did, in fact, transgress the law of God, and that is where his will became in bondage to sin. And that's the area that we need to stress when we're putting forth the doctrines of grace, is that man still has a will of his own.

He can make choices where he is in bondage, is he is in bondage to sin and cannot choose God. He will not and he cannot. All right? Any questions on this particular paragraph concerning creation? Okay.

And again, there are some scripture proofs for your further study, should you choose. Paragraph three, besides the law written in their hearts, they received a command not to eat of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, which while they kept were happy in their communion with God and had dominion over the creatures.

Again, this just accentuates the fact that man is different from all of the rest of creation. Scientists today will say, oh, man is just a higher life form, but, you know, the same as the rest of the animals and et cetera.

But we are told to have dominion over the rest of the animals. The transgression came in when they disobeyed the command of God not to eat of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. And that is also where we lost full dominion.

When God created things, he put man to as his vice regent, so to speak, over the world. And when he sinned, oh, up until that point, the earth was to cooperate. God made the earth to cooperate with man.

All right. So that if Adam and Eve planted a garden, if they planted corn, corn would grow. They didn't have to worry about weeds coming up, et cetera. All right. But since the fall, now the earth rebels against man's dominion.

And to the point that if you get to someone like me, you don't want to have any plants, live plants around me, I can kill artificial plants. All right. But I just, I am not a gardener. All right. I'm amazed at people when they put stuff in, you know, then it grows.

But that is one of the things, even the best gardeners today, they have to weed, they have to work hard to get the crops to grow. And that's just a symptom of the curse that God placed on the earth questions.

So there's a covenant of works. Yes, absolutely. God entered into a covenant of works as long as Adam and Eve obeyed the terms of the covenant that they, they remained in fellowship with him. And the day they broke it, it was, um, they suffered the penalty, obviously penalty ultimately being eternal death.

All right. But it suffered physical death, covenantal death as well. Okay. And there are some scripture proofs there as well. That's the end of this chapter.