TPW 37 So the Evening and Morning Were the First Three Zillion Years

And this is a guy who believes that everything is billions and millions of years old. He recognizes that even if you try to squeeze 20 or 25 missing generations between every single name in every genealogy in the Old Testament you're still not going to get anywhere near millions of years.

The Days of Creation and the Age of the Earth

Therefore, if you believe that the universe is millions or billions of years old, the only place to put those millions or billions of years is into the days of creation. Pastor Patrick Hines here at Gridwell Heights Presbyterian Church in Kingsport, Tennessee.

It's freezing cold today and it actually snowed a little bit last night, which is kind of surprising, but the temperature has fallen out. My whole family's sick, except me. I feel fine, but my voice is still kind of shot, but I've got a soldier on today.

I've got to finish my sermon for Sunday morning and God is good, my sins are forgiven, and I'm just so very thankful to be alive and to be a Christian and to know the Lord Jesus sits on his throne and that all is well between me and God.

Today we're going to talk about creation in six days. This is also part of the Genesis series I've been posting, and many people would probably look at this sermon throughout most of church history and think, why in the world would such a sermon even be needed?

What could be more obvious than that the days of Genesis are actually 24-hour days, and yet that is actually a minority position today, strangely enough, because of the rise of evolution and all the compromise that's gone on for a couple hundred years now, actually a little more than a couple hundred years.

But I hope that you will listen carefully to this and that you can equip yourself and your friends and your children to stand upon the authority of the Word of God and to refute and to reject the compromised positions on the meaning of the days of Genesis chapter 1, and I hope that you find this edifying.

Genesis 1 as Eyewitness History and the Need for This Sermon

Let us ask God together to bless our minds with understanding of his Word. Let's pray, please. Heavenly Father, we would ask you now in Christ's name to help us to understand what you have revealed to us in Genesis chapter 1 and in those first 11 chapters of the book of Genesis, where you have given us an eyewitness account, an infallible and authoritative and clear and straightforward understanding of the foundational history of the universe, of mankind, and of the earth.

Help us to see it and to understand it clearly. We ask in Jesus' name. Amen. If you'll take your Bibles and turn to Genesis chapter 1 and verse 1, Genesis chapter 1 verse 1, and I will read the whole first chapter of Genesis, Genesis chapter 1.

This is God's Word. 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.

Then God said, Let there be light, and there was light. And God saw the light that it was good, and God divided the light from the darkness. God called the light day, and the darkness he called night.

So the evening and the morning were the first day. Then God said, Let there be a firmament in the midst of the waters, and let it divide the waters from the waters. Thus God made the firmament and divided the waters which were under the firmament from the waters which are above the firmament, which were above the firmament.

And it was so. And God called the firmament heaven. So the evening and the morning were the second day. Then God said, Let the waters under the heavens be gathered together into one place, and let the dry land appear.

And it was so. And God called the dry land earth, and the gathering together of the waters he called seas. And God saw that it was good. Then God said, Let the earth bring forth grass, the herb that yields seed, and the fruit tree that yields fruit, according to its kind, whose seed is in itself on the earth.

And it was so. And the earth brought forth grass, the herb that yields seed, according to its kind, and the tree that yields fruit, whose seed is in itself according to its kind. And God saw that it was good.

So the evening and the morning were the third day. Then God said, Let there be lights in the firmament of the heavens to divide the day from the night, and let them be for signs and seasons and for days and years.

And let them be for lights in the firmament of the heavens to give light on the earth. And it was so. Then God made two great lights, the greater light to rule the day and the lesser light to rule the night.

He made the stars also. God set them in the firmament of the heavens to give light on the earth, and to rule over the day and over the night, and to divide the light from the darkness. And God saw that it was good.

So the evening and the morning were the fourth day. Then God said, Let the waters abound with an abundance of living creatures, and let birds fly above the earth across the face of the firmament of the heavens.

So God created great sea creatures and every living thing that moves, with which the waters abounded according to their kind, and every winged bird according to its kind. And God saw that it was good.

And God blessed them, saying, Be fruitful and multiply, and fill the waters in the seas, and let birds multiply on the earth. So the evening and the morning were the fifth day. Then God said, Let the earth bring forth the living creature according to its kind, cattle and creeping thing, and beasts of the earth, each according to its kind.

And it was so. And God made the beasts of the earth according to its kind, cattle according to its kind, and everything that creeps on the earth according to its kind. And God saw that it was good. Then God said, Let us make man in our image according to our likeness.

Let them have dominion over the fish of the sea, and over the birds of the air, and over the cattle, over all the earth, and over every creeping thing that creeps on the earth. So God created man in his own image.

In the image of God, he created him. Male and female, he created them. Then God blessed them, and God said to them, Be fruitful and multiply, fill the earth, and subdue it. Have dominion over the fish of the sea, over the birds, over the air, and over every living thing that moves on the earth.

And God said, See, I have given you every herb that yields seed, which is on the face of the earth, and every tree whose fruit yields seed. To you it shall be for food. Also to every beast of the earth, to every bird of the air, and to everything that creeps on the earth in which there is life, I have given every green herb for food, and it was so.

Then God saw everything that he had made, and indeed it was very good. So the evening and the morning were the sixth day. May God bless the reading of his infallible word. I've given you an outline there in your bulletin of this morning's sermon.

There's an evening sermon outline on there as well. And this morning we will look at, first and foremost, why a sermon like this is necessary. A sermon about creation in six days. It seems to be one of the most obvious things that the passage teaches.

But why is it important that we emphasize it in our day? That's the first point this morning. The second point this morning's sermon on your outline is the meaning of day in Genesis chapter one. The Hebrew word yom.

What does that mean? It's translated as day in Genesis chapter one. What does it mean? Thirdly, Genesis and the evangelization of America. Why standing firmly upon Genesis chapters 1 through 11 is foundational to recovering America, to evangelizing this culture.

We have to stand upon the foundational history that is given to us in Genesis chapters 1 through 11. But if you want to look at your outline there, first by way of introduction, why this sermon? This morning's sermon will focus on the length of time God took to create the universe and everything in it.

What the Hebrew word for day, yom, means and why a firm stance upon Genesis is vital to recovering American culture and evangelizing this culture that we live in. We will cover how one, why, how one interprets the meaning of the word day in Genesis 1 is vital to our understanding of history and of biblical authority.

I preach this sermon recognizing fully that it would have been completely unnecessary for the vast majority of church history. I'm preaching a sermon which, if you could take every Christian person that existed from the death of the Apostles for the first 18 centuries of New Testament church histories and brought them into this room, they would leave scratching their heads wondering, why would you even preach a sermon like this?

Why would it even be necessary? The reason most Christians for the first 18 centuries after Christ would not understand why this message would need to be preached is simple. The vast majority of commentators, ministers, and Bible scholars throughout church history have understood exactly what is meant in this passage by the Hebrew word yom, which is translated day.

But all of that has changed in the last 200 years. Suddenly we are now faced with what is called the day-age interpretation of the word day. Interpreting each day of Genesis chapter 1 to refer to very long periods of time, millions and in some cases billions of years each.

We're also faced with another interpretation, the interpretation I was taught in seminary, the framework hypothesis, which asserts that the text is more poetic and figurative and thus is not to be considered a historical narrative.

There's also the gap theory, the idea which says that there is a massive gap of time between Genesis 1 -1 and Genesis 1 -2, a gap of millions or maybe billions of years that just happens to be part of the text.

But central to the argument is the proper interpretation of the word day, the Hebrew word yom. Why the emphasis upon that word? Why is that such a stumbling block? Why do I have a book in my library that's 300 pages long about the meaning of the word day in Genesis chapter 1?

Here's the answer, please listen to it carefully. Everybody recognizes, both young earth creationists and people who believe in millions and billions of years, everybody recognizes this. There is no way that Adam lived millions or billions of years ago.

Even Hugh Ross, who is a proponent of old earth, a man who believes that the universe is billions of years old, that the earth is billions of years old, he himself said in the debate that I listened to this past week that the longest period of time ago that Adam may have existed is a hundred thousand years.

And this is a guy who believes that everything is billions and millions of years old. He recognizes that even if you tried to squeeze 20 or 25 missing generations between every single name in every genealogy in the Old Testament, you're still not going to get anywhere near millions of years.

Therefore, if you believe that the universe is millions or billions of years old, the only place to put those millions or billions of years is into the days of creation. That's your only option. And therefore, we have the day age interpretation.

We have the framework hypothesis. We have the gap theory. And it's very important that we recognize that what has driven these alternate interpretations of seeing the days of Genesis chapter 1 as being not 24-hour days with mornings and evenings the way we would normally experience them.

The thing that has driven that has not been the text of Genesis 1. It is not the exegesis of the text. It is not the lexicography of the terms. It is not what the words say in their phrases and in their context.

It is outside information. It is men in white lab coats with elbow patches and pipes sticking out of their mouths. It is Christians being intimidated by that and wanting to have a place at the table to have human respectability rather than to stand upon the authority of Scripture.

This interpretation, this old earth perspective, has sadly come to dominate the professing Christian world to the point that it's very, very hard to find churches, presbyteries, or denominations that will take a hard stance on it.

In fact, I was shocked to find out that there was a presbytery in the PCA that actually had this as a requirement for ordination. I couldn't believe that. When you all published that on your website a couple years ago when I first noticed this, I had to wipe my eyes.

Really? There's a presbytery that says you have to believe this to get ordained by them. I thought that was fantastic. Praise God for this presbytery. What a blessing. I dare say it is becoming more and more difficult to find anyone who will take the stance that the Word of God demands we take to find pastors, churches, denominations, seminary, or Bible college professors who are committed to the straightforward reading of Genesis chapter 1.

As I said, I was taught the framework hypothesis when I was in seminary, that Genesis chapter 1 is poetry, that it's a literary figure of speech, and therefore we need not concern ourselves with questions about astronomy or the age of the earth.

Those are all completely irrelevant. It could be millions or billions of years or it could be six days. My friends, the problem with that is this. Everybody can read Genesis 1 through 11 and they know exactly what it says.

They know we're compromising. They know that we're coming up with alternate interpretations. They know we're not standing on what it clearly says. The rest of the world can see it clearly, even while the church is capitulating to it.

The irony of this situation, the sadness of it, is this. Christians who are born again by God's Spirit and have been persuaded by the supernatural work of the Spirit in their hearts that every word of the Bible is infallibly true and everything that it says and teaches.

We are the only people on earth who can answer questions about the age of the earth. We're the only ones that can. We're the only ones that can answer questions about the origin of man, the origin of species, the origin of the solar system, the origin of Earth's geology, the origin of different people groups, the origin of marriage, the origin of human languages, etc.

And yet so often Christians seem more interested in public respectability and having a place at the table among unbelievers rather than standing upon biblical truth. But people will mock us if we believe what the Bible says.

I remember reading in seminary a framework hypothesis proponent said, and I remember the quotation, anyone who would teach the young earth position and believe that God created in six literal days does, quote, a deplorable disservice to the gospel of Christ and the kingdom of God, end quote.

People will mock us if we take this position. What about the established facts of science? I'd like to remind us that just a few hundred years ago most of the civilized world didn't even realize the earth was round yet and that the earth traveled around the Sun and not vice versa.

There are incredible limits to what we know and what most think they know about the universe. The so-called findings and conclusions of science are constantly changing and are always determined, please hear me, are always determined by the assumptions that scientists bring to the observable facts.

Facts do not speak for themselves. Facts are always interpreted by the worldview of the one observing them. Let me give you an illustration of this. Let's say you take an evolutionist, an atheist, someone who believes the earth is millions or billions of years old and they're standing on the edge of the Grand Canyon next to a Christian who is committed to biblical creationism, the biblical narrative about the flood of Noah's time, and who believes that the earth is young and believes that God created in six literal days.

The atheist looks at the Grand Canyon and says, wow, look at what a little bit of water and a whole bunch of time accomplished. And the Christian looks at the exact same fact and says, wow, look at what a whole bunch of water and a little bit of time accomplished.

The very same facts, radically different interpretations. What determines the interpretation is the foundation upon which you stand. If you stand upon the Bible, what is the Grand Canyon? The Noahic flood did that in a short period of time.

If you believe that there's never been a catastrophe in Earth's past and everything is continued on exactly the way it does today, yeah, you would say a little bit of water over millions and millions of years did that.

What determines what the facts mean is your worldview, your starting point. And as Christians, what is our worldview and our starting point is the Bible, Scripture, Genesis chapter 1 verse 1 that God created in six literal days.

In a book that I have in my library, which I highly recommend, the Genesis Debate book. In fact, the guy that spoke at the officers conference over there, he co-authored the section on six 24-hour days with Ligon Duncan in that book.

So I got to meet him yesterday at Presbytery. I walked up to him and said, are you the David W. Hall that wrote part of the chapter? He said, yes, I am. I said, well, good, I'm going to be quoting you tomorrow.

He said, glad you found it helpful. Excellent book, the Genesis Debate book. In the opening chapter of that book, which is the six 24-hour day interpretation, giving their perspective, it's the three major views interacting with each other.

The six 24-hour days, the day age theory, which is Hugh Ross and Gleason Archer, and then Lee Irons and another guy does the framework hypothesis. They all three make their presentation and they all three interact with each other.

It's a very, very useful book. Ligon Duncan and David W. Hall wrote this in their introductory statement, quote, objective historians, theologians, and interpreters should admit that the debate over the creation days and their nature and length is strictly recent.

While one may find in the record of historical theology, a small smattering of Orthodox theologians who approach the days of Genesis as something other than normal days, he will not find detailed debate over this matter until the 16th century and will seldom find debates between Orthodox divines arguing for and against the days as long ages until the 19th century.

What are we to make of this undeniable fact? Simply this, the historic Christian tradition, which is rooted in a cumulative history of interpretation, has viewed these days mainly as normal days because it has viewed the Genesis account as historical.

No significant debate existed on the matter before the 19th century because the plainest and most straightforward reading of the text has no sustained challengers, end quote. This didn't become something you had to write a 300-page book to describe until a couple hundred years ago, until the 19th century, until geologists started proposing older ages for the earth.

And another book, just the last book recommendation I'll make to you is Terry Mortensen, who works for answers in Genesis, and if you'd like the details in this I can let you borrow mine or you can, I can give you the details, wrote his doctoral dissertation on the history of the interpretation of Genesis, paralleling it to the history of geology.

And what that book shows without any question is that these other interpretations came into existence because of geology, not because of the biblical text. It is as plain as the noonday sun to anyone who's willing to see it, anyone that's willing to read it.

The Meaning of Yom in Genesis 1 and the Fourth Commandment

Moving on to point number two in this morning's sermon, the meaning of day in Genesis chapter 1. Let's look down into the text now. The meaning of the word day, the repetitious formula that we see used six different times in Genesis chapter 1.

There was evening and morning followed by a number, followed by the word day. Look at Genesis chapter 1 verse 5. God called the light day and the darkness he called night, so the evening in the morning were the first day.

Now look at verse 8. And God called the firmament heaven, so the evening and the morning or the second day. Verse 13, so the evening in the morning were the third day. Verse 19, so the evening in the morning were the fourth day.

Verse 23, so the evening in the morning were the fifth day. And verse 31, then God saw everything that he made and indeed it was all very good, so the evening and the morning were the sixth day. You see the pattern there?

Evening, morning, numeral, day. Evening, morning, number, day. Evening, morning, number, day. What is that describing? Evening, morning, number, day. That's what it's describing. Okay? Successive days.

The first day, a second day, third day, fourth day, fifth day, sixth day. Remember the fourth commandment, the Sabbath commandment? Listen to how that's worded. Let me read it to you from Exodus 20. Remember the Sabbath day to keep it holy.

Six days you shall labor and do all your work. But the seventh day is the Sabbath of the Lord your God. In it you shall do no work. You nor your son, nor your daughter, nor your male servant, nor your female servant, nor your cattle, nor your stranger who is within your gates.

For in six days the Lord made the heavens and the earth, the sea and all that is in them, and rested the seventh day. Therefore the Lord blessed the Sabbath day and hallowed it. That's why we have the six million year work week.

No, we have the six day work week. Why? Because God created in six days. Just as God created in six days and rested the seventh, we work for six days and rest the seventh. There is no reason to think that any Jewish person who stood and heard the law read by Moses or by Ezra or by anyone would have thought that the word day in verse 8 means something different than it does in verse 11.

That the days of creation in Genesis 1 would be something different from the days that are mentioned in the fourth commandment. That is a question I would love to have asked some of the professors. Are you seriously telling me that this incredibly complicated poetic literary framework, figurative interpretation, that that's actually what was going on in the minds of Jewish people when they heard this read?

That they didn't think that these were normal days? That they would have thought the fourth commandment, yeah, they're literary, it's poetry over here but over here it's literal history. That's asking too much.

That's asking too much to believe. When God makes a revelation to man, it is a revelation. It is a making known of something to us that we can read and understand, not an obscuring of that. The term yom for day is used 2 ,301 times in the Old Testament.

It's one of the first words that we learned in Yisrael Hebrew. It had a little flash card that had the word yom on it. You learn all those words that occur thousands of times because when you see them you can recognize them and be happy that you recognize one of the words in the text.

2 ,301 times that word is used. And the thing is, the lexicons for Hebrew that are used to translate the Old Testament, almost all of them cite Genesis 1 -5 as an example of a quote day of 24 hours. That entry in the lexicon cites Genesis 1 because the lexicographers themselves, the guys that put together those lexicons, can see this is an example of a 24 hour day.

Evening, morning, number, day. Evening, morning, number, day. So I have the question, why is this the only place in the 2 ,301 usages of day where its meaning is so hotly debated and questioned? Why aren't there study committees being formed to figure out how long Jonah was in the belly of the great fish?

It says in Jonah 1 -17 that he was in there for three days and three nights. Does that mean 3 billion years? Maybe. Should we have books written to discuss that issue? How about Joshua and the armies of Israel?

They marched for seven days around Jericho. Does that mean 7 ,000 years or 7 million years? Nobody questions the meaning of the word Yom anywhere else it's used. This is the only place it's questioned.

And it wasn't questioned for the first 18 centuries of church history. And my friends, what does that tell you? There's no reason to question it. No reason to. I'd like to suggest to you the real problem.

The real problem is that men, even though they say they're sincere, even though I know they think they're trying to do apologetics and they're trying to defend the faith, what they're doing is adding to the word of God.

They're adding to the word of God, plain and simple. Proverbs 30, verses 5 and 6 says, every word of God is pure. He is a shield to those who put their trust in him. Do not add to his words lest he rebuke you and you be found a liar.

One of the statements that the day age interpretation in the Genesis debate book makes, they describe their method of going at Genesis chapter one of these words. I want you to listen carefully. When I read this book years ago, I actually wrote in the margin next to this paragraph, they're showing their cards.

Quote, we build our day age interpretation upon the conviction that we can trust God's revelation as truth in both the words of the Bible and the works of creation, including the entire physical universe.

This conviction presupposes that truth is knowable, consistent, and although sometimes paradoxical, never contradictory. Our day age interpretation treats the creation days literally as six sequential long periods of time.

And here's the key sentence. Integrating biblical and scientific data, we assert that the physical creation events reported in Genesis appear in correct sequence and in scientifically defensible terms.

And the quote, the great error in thinking here that leads to remarkable confusion is this viewing the Bible and our observations of the created order as being on the same level in terms of a revelation from God.

My friends, they are not. So when you hear proponents of this position saying God has given us two books, I've heard him say exactly like this. God has given us two books of revelation, the revelation that is found in creation and the Bible.

That's an error. Has God revealed himself in creation? Yes, he has. He has revealed primarily two things to us. Number one, he exists and is powerful. Secondly, we're accountable to him. But what do men do with the revelation that God has made of himself in creation?

According to Romans chapter one, we suppress that truth. The revelation that God has made of himself in creation is distorted by sin and the two are not equal. The revelation God makes in creation and the revelation he makes in scripture are not on par with one another.

The revelation God makes of himself in the Bible is up here and everything else is down here. And we must interpret the revelation God has made in creation through the higher revelation of scripture. That is one of the most foundational points, and it really is the great error that leads to these other interpretations.

The revelation God makes of himself in creation is so distorted by human simpleness that we become idolaters, according to Romans chapter one, and end up worshipping the created order itself. But once a person is born again, someone might respond to this, but once a person is born again, they understand nature correctly now because they're no longer suppressing the truth.

They're now a child of God. But the response to that is this. The revelation God makes of himself in creation has two purposes, as I said, that God exists and is powerful and that we are accountable to him.

He will judge us. Romans one and two lays that out very carefully. But the revelation that God makes of himself in creation, please hear me. It does not reveal to us the same thing scripture does. And brothers and sisters, this is why catechism is so important.

One of the reasons the mainline denomination completely lost its way is it stopped catechizing its young people. They stopped teaching that Westernist or shorter catechism to the youth, and they grew up.

They didn't have the categories in their mind. They didn't know the doctrinal truths they needed to stand upon. Think about those first three questions. What is man's chief end? What is the chief purpose for which we exist?

Man's chief end is to glorify God and to enjoy him forever. Next question. What rule has God given to direct us how we may glorify and enjoy him? The word of God, which is contained in the scriptures of the old and new testament, is the only rule to direct us how we may glorify and enjoy him.

And then what do the scriptures principally teach? The scriptures principally teach what man is to believe concerning God and what duty God requires of man. What man is to believe concerning God is not revealed in creation, and what our duty is is not revealed in creation.

What we're supposed to believe concerning God and what our duty is is revealed in scripture. We cannot put the revelation God has made in creation on par with the revelation he has made in scripture. The one is the interpreter of the other.

We can't try to integrate them. The one general revelation is corrected by scripture because scripture is God breathed. It is the voice of God. It is his word. It is infallible. It is inspired. So what man is to believe concerning God and what duty God requires of man is revealed to us in scripture because as our catechism summarizes the biblical teaching, the Bible is the only rule to direct us.

The only rule to direct us how we may glorify and enjoy him. Another thing that needs to be pointed out here about that statement saying that we try to integrate the findings of science with the findings that we have in scripture is this.

One of scripture's primary functions in the life of a believer is that of correction. Remember what Paul told Timothy about that in 2 Timothy 3, 16? All scripture is given by inspiration of God and is profitable for doctrine, for reproof, for correction, for instruction in righteousness that the man of God may be complete, thoroughly equipped for every good work.

Question, do the scriptures ever say that about the general revelation God makes in creation? That God's book that he's given us, what they call the day age proponents say God's given us two books, the book of general revelation and the book of scripture, and we integrate the two.

Does the Bible itself ever tell us that the revelation God has given us in scripture equips us for every good work or that it corrects us of anything? No, it does not. The one is subordinate to the other.

Very, very important point. General revelation is not profitable for doctrine, for instruction, for reproof, for correction. It does not make us complete, and it does not thoroughly equip us for every good work.

That is unique to scripture. The great John Calvin saw this so clearly, and in book one of the Institutes of the Christian Religion, he gives this marvelous illustration of scripture. He calls scripture spectacles.

He describes man looking at the world around, looking at that book of general revelation that our eyes are dimmed and we can't see it. It's all blurry. Everything's messed up until God puts the biblical glasses upon our face.

And now, when we look at creation, now we can see what it really means. Now we can understand what it's all about. Once we have those spectacles on to see it, listen to Calvin's word. Words here. He says, let this admonition, no less grave and severe, restrain the wantonness that tickles many and drives them to wicked and hurtful speculations.

In short, let us remember that the invisible God, whose wisdom, power and righteousness are incomprehensible, sets before us Moses's history as a mirror in which his living likeness glows for just as eyes, when dimmed with age or weakness or by some defect, unless aided by spectacles, discern nothing directly.

So such as our feebleness, unless scripture guides us in seeking God, we are immediately confused. Man trying to understand the history of the world and what he sees around him without scripture will be immediately confused.

He is feeble and his eyes are dim. He cannot understand it correctly, which is why the person committed to biblical truth and biblical revelation looks at the Grand Canyon, the same fact that the atheist does looking at the Grand Canyon, and they have completely different interpretations of what that fact means.

Where are we committed or what Joshua said? As for me and my house, we will serve the Lord. Whose side are we on in these discussions and debates? Whose starting points will be our starting points? Moses, what God has said, Jesus believed in literal historical Adam.

Jesus believed in a literal historical Noah and his family and the flood and the ark and Jonah and everything else that God said in scripture. And there's no reason for us to have a different view of that history than Jesus had.

And again, that's why catechism is so important to get these categories in our minds so that we know what general revelation, general revelation is insufficient to give us the right knowledge of God is insufficient to show us the proper way of worshiping God and what it means to really know him, to know ourselves.

But scripture is the only rule that directions how to glorify and enjoy him. And scripture teaches us what man is to believe concerning God and what duty God requires of man. And nothing else teaches us that it's the Bible alone.

Compare this, what Calvin says and what this whole idea of the Bible as spectacles through which you see everything else in creation to what Ross and Archer said. They said, we build our day age interpretation upon the conviction that we can trust God's revelation as truth in both the words of the Bible and the works of creation, including the entire physical universe that needs to be rewarded.

We can trust God's revelation that he's made in creation through the lens of biblical revelation with that as its corrector, with that as its foundation. Then we can understand it. They are not on par with one another.

Yes, we can trust God's revelation as truth, but the verbal and unchanging revelation in scripture is to be the lens through which we seek to understand everything else. The revelation God makes in scripture leads to life and salvation.

Romans 10 17 faith comes by hearing and hearing by the word of God. The revelation God makes in nature, distorted in our minds as it is by sin, must be understood and interpreted in the light of and through the spectacles of the non sin distorted revelation God has made to man in the Bible.

I hope that that's clear to everyone. Thirdly, and finally this morning, just a topic that needs to be discussed quickly here is Genesis and the evangelization of America. If we as the people of God called by his name, set apart by the gospel and powered by his spirit and armed with the sword of the spirit, the word of God, the Bible, if we hope to win this nation to Christ, we must first recover the foundational history explained to us by God in the book of Genesis.

Why? The reason is simple. Genesis and the prevailing secular opinions differ across the board on everything they address. They are completely irreconcilable for another, and the two perspectives are so completely different that any attempt to reconcile them or to merge them what can only fail.