How Should We Interpret the Creation Account — Tim Conway

Genesis 1 and the Fear of Adding Human Systems

Genesis 1, my sermon to you meets us right where we are, though maybe it doesn't feel like it in the first few minutes. I think you'll see as we wrap the sermon up. Genesis 1, verse 1, in the beginning God created the heavens and the earth.

Next year, I will be 30 years old in the Lord. Somewhere in these 29 years, the Lord called me to preach His Word. That calling was distinct. And I remember one of the greatest convictions that I felt was this utter fear of standing before God's people and setting forth systems, even reform systems or traditions or opinions, convictions of men.

And actually, the one time I especially felt gripped was when I was contemplating talking to the church about the Lord's Day slash Christian Sabbath. And I had listened, and I had read dissertation, and I had looked at the preachers, and I had looked, and all these men were saying all these things.

But I recognized when I came to the Word of God, and I asked, what does Scripture say? I was gripped. As long as God gives me the grace, I'm going to seek to stand up before God's people and show God's people what God's Word says.

And I'm in the same place when it comes to Genesis 1 -1 through 2 -4. And to be faithful, to interpret God's Word, is what I want to strive for. Interpreting God's Word has to do with hermeneutics. Hermeneutics is the science of Bible interpretation.

And so when you're confronted by Scripture, you consider things like, am I dealing with an analogy or an allegory or a parable? Is there typology here? Shadows? What's the genre of Scripture? Is this a historical narrative or is this the Song of Solomon?

Is this a psalm? Is this revelation? What am I dealing with here? Who's the author? How does the author speak? How does he use words? How does he use concepts? Comparing Scripture with Scripture. Examining the context.

Examining clear portions of Scripture before you try to deal with very difficult portions of Scripture. See, these are hermeneutical principles. But do you know one of the most, maybe it seems basic, but I think one of the principles that struck me as the foundational hermeneutic is simply this.

When you read Scripture, ask yourself this question. What is it saying? What does it sound like it's saying? Start by putting the most basic, the most apparent, the most obvious meaning on Scripture. Do you know Scripture does say that we have a God who...

Scripture says it's the glory of God to conceal a matter. Have you ever read that in the Proverbs? There's a reality that God has buried things in here that even after 30 years of searching, I'm just now finding.

Yeah, there's a place in Scripture where we need to dig and pray and examine and pray and examine. There are hidden things. Undoubtedly there are. But you know what's interesting? You ever notice how many times the Lord Jesus Himself said, Have you never read?

I mean, they came to Him and they were asking about divorce. And one of the places He refers to is right back here in Genesis 1. And He says, have you never read that in the beginning God created the male and female?

Did you never read that? In other words, you know what Jesus is saying to them? Well, you can never figure Scripture out because there's so many hidden meanings. No, He was implying by that statement, if you guys just would have gone back there and read Genesis 1 .27, you'd know the answer to the question.

Haven't you read? And that's not the only place He says that. He says that on repeated accounts. The Lord expected people to read Scripture and be able to understand it. Anybody know what the perspicuity of Scripture means?

Clear. Yeah, does God like to hide things? Yes. Yes, and there are hidden things. But we do recognize that this is one of the characteristics of Scripture. There is a basic clarity to it. There is the assumption that this is not written in some strange code that you have to go through and find the number sequence or something to really figure out what it means.

Listen, there are keys. There are places in Scripture where say, John the Baptist must first come and Jesus says, well, if God eyes to see it, you know, this guy John the Baptist was, did I say that right?

Elijah must first come. And that was John the Baptist. I mean, are there parables in Scripture? Yes, there are those things. But even there, the basic understanding is that when we handle Scripture, we ought to be able to understand it.

Reading Genesis 1 as a Straightforward Creation Account

And here's the thing. Listen, you're all going to go through this with me. And this is my question to you. We are going to read Genesis 1 .1 -2 .4 right now. We're going to all read it together. And I simply want you to ask yourself this question.

Are there millions and millions and billions of years in this passage? Cloaked? Hidden? Secretive? Are there strange gaps? I mean, is there... I just want you to ask the question. Just the most basic, literal meaning of what you read here.

I want you to tell me. Are there billions of years hidden in this passage? So let's read. In the beginning, God created the heavens and the earth. Okay. The earth was without form and void. Now, I'll tell you this.

The Jews, the Hebrew language doesn't have a word for universe. When the Hebrew wanted to express the entire universe, this is the language they used. The heavens and the earth. That's how you sum the whole thing up.

You'll never find universe here in the Old Testament. This is the Hebrew concept of everything. The whole physical creation around us. The earth was without form and void. And I like this. In the Hebrew, it's tohu and bohu.

It's just a nice... The earth was tohu and bohu. Without form and void. Darkness was over the face of the deep. It's like the whole planet. It's without this form. It's covered by water. The deep. The Spirit of God was hovering over the face of the waters.

So that's what it looked like when God first created it. And God said, let there be light. And it sprang into being. There was light. He didn't say let there be a sun. At this point in time, you have the earth.

And you have without form and void. And you have light. That's what Scripture says. Light. And there was light. And God saw that the light was good. And God separated the light from the darkness. Now you watch what just happened.

You have this planet. This earth. It's covered by the deep. And poof! There's light. And then poof! It's now half the earth is light and half the earth is dark. He separated it. And God called the light day and the darkness He called night.

And there was evening and there was morning the first day. Evening and morning. You know, that's backwards to our Western mind. Spurgeon didn't write a book called Evening and Morning, did he? Morning and Evening.

But you know, if you ask our young folks who went and evangelized in the Jewish community here in San Antonio, they went on a Friday. And they went in the afternoon. And you know what they found? They found the people were preparing for the Sabbath day.

Guess when the Sabbath day starts? 6 p .m. In Scripture it does. I can show you. It's from evening to evening. And that's how they observe it. Because that is the Hebrew day. So we think a little bit differently.

We're more Roman Greek minded in many things. But this is the Hebrew day. God called the light day and the darkness He called night. And there was evening and there was morning the first day. And God said, let there be an expanse or a firmament in the midst of the waters and let it separate the waters from the waters.

Now this isn't land in the midst of the ocean that covered the earth. This is God separating water from water with an expanse. Basically, the expanse or the firmament is a way to describe heaven. We have the first heaven.

We can look at this that's right here above us where the birds fly. We can talk about the second heaven maybe out there where the stars are. We can talk about the third heaven where God's throne is. But there's an expanse.

This is the first heaven apparently in the midst of the waters. And let it separate the waters from the waters. And God made the expanse and separated. Notice this. This is a separation of waters under and waters above.

Separated the waters that were under the expanse. What are the waters under the expanse? Well, obviously the ocean. From the waters that were above the expanse. Well, okay, what's this? If it turns out it's the clouds, you can't argue with that.

I mean, they're up there and there's this expanse between and the clouds are there and the clouds are water. You can't argue with that. Now there is a theory that there is a canopy of water out there.

Some of the theories say well, that was out there until the time of the flood and all the water came out of there and that's where the flood waters came from. At least some of them. Anyway, what we see is on the second day, God made the expanse and separated the waters that were under the expanse from the waters that were above the expanse and it was so.

And God called the expanse heaven. So you see that. It's the heaven or it's the sky. And so was there a pre-flood canopy out there? Perhaps. But we do know that the clouds are separating. There is a separation between the clouds above and the oceans underneath.

We know that reality. And there was evening and there was morning the second day. And God said, let the waters under the heavens be gathered together into one place and let the dry land appear. So in day 2 and day 3, what you have is the water being separated and moved around and you've got the expanse between and on this third day, the earth, the dry land.

Let the waters under the heavens be gathered together into one place and let the dry land appear. And it was so. God called the dry land earth. And the waters that were gathered together He called seas.

And God saw that it was good. And God said, let the earth sprout vegetation. Plants yielding seeds. Notice that. Let the earth sprout vegetation. And it's like this stuff sprouted up. I know that Answers in Genesis I think them in cooperation with Living Waters, they've created a video of the creation and they basically show the trees just instantaneously rising up and plants coming up.

And it seems they sprang forward. They came out. And every indication is that this happened in a day. This happened during the third day. Let the earth sprout vegetation. Plants yielding seed. Notice.

Let the earth sprout vegetation. Let it sprout. Not just create seeds to throw around on the ground, but God is creating plants that yield seeds and fruit trees that bear fruit in which is their seed, each according to its kind on the earth.

And it was so. The earth brought forth vegetation when? The third day. The earth brought forth vegetation. Plants yielding seed according to their own kinds. Trees bearing fruit in which is their seed, each according to its kind.

And God saw that it was good. And there was evening. And there was morning. The third day. And God said, let there be lights in the expanse. This is really problematic for a lot of the theories that people bombard Genesis 1 with.

The fourth day before we get the sun and the moon and the stars. And God said, let there be lights in the expanse of the heavens to separate the day from the night. And let them be for signs and for seasons and for days and years.

Now you know what's interesting? You know what's not in there? And for weeks. Because there's no astronomical observation to be made that dictates a week. Months? Where's a month come from? The moon. Where's the day come from?

The sun. Where's the year come from? Yeah, the earth going all the way around the sun one time. So basically, you don't have a week here. You know why you don't have a week? Because there's nothing to look at out there.

There's no astronomical body to look at that dictates the week. Where does the week come from? Right here. It's the one time observation, basic time observation, that's based on God's creating in six days and resting the seventh.

And you know the number seven has very unique significance throughout Scripture. Especially when you get to the book of Revelation. In other places as well. It's God's number. It's a number that nature doesn't dictate to us.

God Himself dictates to us. Notice, on this fourth day, verse 15,. And let them be lights in the expanse of the heavens to give light upon the earth. And it was so. And God made the two great lights, the greater light to rule the day and the lesser light to rule the night and the stars.

And God set them in the expanse of the heavens. Now this is interesting too, because now we get an expanse or a firmament again. But I believe there's various heavens that can be identified. That's the reality with the word expanse.

God set the sun and the moon and the stars in the expanse of the heavens to give light on the earth, to rule over the day and over the night and to separate the light from the darkness and God saw that it was good.

And there was evening and there was morning the fourth day. And God said let the water swarm with swarms of living creatures. Not just let's put eggs there. God is developing this world mature. Let birds fly.

Not just let's make an egg. Let's make flying birds above the earth across the expanse of the heavens. So God created the great sea creatures and every living creature that moves with which the waters swarm according to their kinds and every winged bird according to its kind and God saw that it was good.

And God blessed them saying, be fruitful and multiply. Well, who's He saying being fruitful and multiply to? Obviously, full-grown animals, sea creatures and birds that are capable of being fruitful and multiplying.

God is developing. Just like with man. How old was Adam on the seventh day? A day old. How old did he look? Did he look like a day old baby? Like the garrows have a day old baby. Is that what he looked like?

That's not what Eve looked like. He's creating a full-grown, mature earth here. Verse 21,. So God created the great sea creatures and every living creature that moves with which the waters swarm according to their kinds 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. And there was evening and there was morning the fifth day. And God said, let the earth bring forth living creatures according to their kinds.

Livestock and creeping things and beasts of the earth according to their kinds and it was so. And God made the beasts of the earth according to their kinds and the livestock according to their kinds and everything that creeps on the ground according to its kind and God saw that it was good.

Humanity in the Image of God and the Entrance of Death

Then God said, let us make man or Adam in our image after our likeness and let them have dominion over the fish of the sea and over the birds of the heavens and over the livestock and over 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. And God blessed them and God said to them, Be fruitful and multiply. Again, He made them with apparent age.

He made them mature. He made Adam and Eve ready to bear fruit. To have children. Be fruitful and multiply and fill the earth and subdue it and have dominion over the fish of the sea and over the birds of the heavens and over every living thing that moves on the earth.

And God said, Behold, I have given you every plant yielding seed. Now here's one thing that you need to recognize. It is very consistent with Scripture. You'll recognize that the whole creation groans when that curse came in.

Before the curse, before the fall, there was no eating animals. Animals didn't eat animals and man didn't eat animals. You know why? There was no death. God blessed them. 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 of the heavens, over every living thing that moves on the earth. And God said, Behold, I have given you every plant yielding seed that is on the face of all the earth and every tree with seed in its fruit.

You shall have them for food and to every beast of the earth and every bird of the heavens and everything that creeps on the earth, everything that has breath of life, I have given every green plant for food and it was so.

Animals did not eat animals. This is very problematic for theistic evolution. Where does the fossil record come from? Oh, millions and millions and billions. But wait a second, nothing died then. We weren't under a curse.

You have real problems. Verse 31, God saw everything that He had made and behold, it was very good. And there was evening and there was morning the sixth day. Thus, the heavens and the earth were finished and all the host of them.

And on the seventh day, God finished His work that He had done and He rested on the seventh day from all His work that He had done. So God blessed the seventh day and made it holy because on it, God rested from all His work that He had done in creation.

These are the generations of the heavens and the earth when they were created in the day that the Lord God made the earth and the heavens. So God has spoken here. And my question to you again is this, what does it sound like that is saying?

Does it sound like that's saying God created it all in six literal days and on the seventh day He rested? God has spoken here. But you know, there are many voices speaking today. There are many people shouting and screaming that the universe took millions and billions of years to get to where it is now.

And this thought has captivated the world. It's everywhere. So suppose the earth is young. It's preposterous. You can't be taken seriously. It's anti-science. It's anti-academic. Even Christians, many Christians who take the Bible seriously.

You know what's happening? They're busy coming up and inventing theories in order to accomplish one thing. You know what it is? It's to somehow develop a theory to find millions and millions and billions of years in Genesis 1.

There is the gap theory. There is the day-age theory. There is theistic evolution. There is the gap-day theory. Progressive creation. The framework hypothesis. The cosmic time theory. And I don't know if I'm going to say anything more about those other than to say this.

All those theories. For one, I would ask, why so many? Because none of them is overly convincing. So everybody's trying to come up with a new one. Well, there's more. That's not exhaustive, but those are some of the more well-known ones.

Know this. Every one of these theories has one thing in common. Each is an attempt to find millions or billions of years somewhere in Genesis 1. But I come back to this. Be honest with Scripture. What does it sound like it's saying?

The Age of the Earth and the Crisis of Confidence in Scripture

Let me give you some statistics. I think David and Della and family, you guys went to Answers in Genesis, right? You saw the ark. Did you go to the museum? Okay, so they've been there. I have not been there.

I would like to make that journey one day. I want to see a life-size ark, honestly. Answers in Genesis has put forth these statistics. You may find them interesting. I do. 56 of Papa's generation go to church.

44 of my mother's generation go to church. 32 of Jeff's. He's in a different one from me. He called me a young whippersnapper the other day or something. But 32 Jeff's age. 27 my age. I'm right there at the beginning of generation X.

It starts at 1965 and I just slipped in. I think it goes all the way to 80. But millennials, basically those from 1980, 18 attend church. So, what you're watching is from Papa's age, 56%, down to 18%.

What's happening? Scripture talks about there may be a great falling away before the end. What's happening in America? Just listen to this, because the statistics go further. Notice what they found. Of millennials who grew up in the church, 61 leave the church by the time they hit college age.

Why? The common answer? Evolution. We heard millions of years. This is what they recognize. We hear millions of years taught in high school, elementary school, middle school, high school, but not only that.

You know what else they're saying? And we heard it taught by many preachers. And you know why it's such a battle for their faith? Because they're being honest. The preacher says, well, it's okay to think this took millions of years.

But you know what the problem is? These millennials read Genesis 1 and guess what they think they're hearing it say? That it was all done in seven days. See, that is the problem. It sounds like it is saying something, and anybody that wants to take it seriously...

You know what? Richard Dawkins says, these sophisticated theologians who want to try to find evolution in here, he says they're deluded. He says these creationists that are holding to what I am going to espouse, he said they're the ones, he said they're right.

He's saying these other guys that are trying to find this there, they're deluded. Now you see, he thinks he's goddess then. Because he thinks that there's such irrefutable evidence for evolution he calls it.

Evil-lution. Yeah, the Brits say it right. But see, he thinks he's goddess. It's like you can't argue it. But he says at least the creationists have it right. These guys that are trying to toe the line between both, he says they're deluded.

You can't do that. And he recognizes that. And you know what? The millennials recognize that too. Listen to what else. He said of millennials who leave church, most heard the preacher teach that it's okay to believe in billions of years, which caused them to doubt the Bible.

Of millennials still in the church that haven't left, when asked what, if anything, causes them to ever doubt the Bible the most, answer, the age of the earth, is by far the biggest issue. Same millennials, when asked if they have had their Christianity challenged and said yes, they were asked at what point.

Two points were about even. The age of the earth and why bad things happen. I tell you, these young people are being honest and see, they recognize it. And you know what? This is the very thing Andy Stanley sees and he's trying to come up with an answer for.

He recognizes people are bailing out because scientific evidence, so-called science, is supposedly undermining this account. And what happens is, you see, too many people recognize the reality of this.

You start having the dominoes fall and click, click, click, click, they go right down the line until you start taking out the New Testament. You see, you get guys like Andy Stanley who come along and say, we've got to unhitch this, so that when those dominoes fall, they don't take out the New Testament too.

So we've got to unhitch the Old Testament. We've got to basically say, okay, it's myth. We all recognize that. That's not the way you defend it because people aren't buying it. You want to encourage people's faith.

What we want to do is we want to defend this book in its entirety. And that's where the problem is. The reality is this, if millennials were looking at this account and saying, oh yeah, I see billions of years in here, well, guess what?

When they go into their college course and the professor stands up and he says, this has all taken billions of years, what are they going to say? Well, they're going to say, yeah, my faith is consistent with what you're teaching.

We've seen that all along right here in Genesis. But they don't see it. That's why it is such a challenge to their faith. So, back to hermeneutics. Somebody's going to come along and suggest, hey, day doesn't mean a literal 24-hour day.

It's really billions of years. Now again, day four, problematic. You've got billions of years. Each of these is an age. Each of these is very problematic. What, you get the sun? This doesn't work. But listen to me.

Hermeneutics. One of the things we want to do in hermeneutics is we want to study word meanings. We want to look at the word meanings in the original. We want to cross-reference where those words are used in different places.

We want to get an idea. We want to get a feel. So, how do we interpret what day means? Okay, day in the Hebrew, many of you know it's the Hebrew word yom. Now, the interesting thing about and a helpful thing to recognize is the Hebrew word for day, yom, and our English word day, they are basically used identically in both languages.

What I mean is they both have several meanings. If I say, in Papa's day, what do I mean? In his time. In Papa's day, big band music was the thing. And he's nodding because he loves that. Jazz, right? By Papa's day, I'm probably using it that way.

I mean, back when he was in the military, back when he was in high school, back when he was a young man. He still feels young. If I said to my children, I've seen some scary people out in this field over here lately.

I said, if you're ever going to go out there, go out there in the day, not at night. Now, how did I use the word right then? I'm using it, yeah, when it's light. Opposite of night. And if I said, seven days from now, Javier's going to be here.

I mean, how did I just use it there? 24-hour periods. And see, context basically dictates to you how I'm using it. That's the way. We recognize it holds different meanings. And you know one of the interesting things is that right here in Genesis 1 .1 -2 .4, it's used all these ways.

Did you notice that while we were going through it? Let me show you. V. 5, God called the light day and the darkness He called night. Now how is day being used there? The light. Not 24 hours. Not back in somebody's time.

It's being used of day over against night. Look at v. 14. God said, let there be lights in the expanse of the heavens to separate the day from the night. Again, we've got day as opposed to night. Let them be for signs, seasons, and for days.

Now there, it's a 24-hour day. That means that basically you have these great lights that are being given to separate days. And we know that the sun is that which establishes a full day for us just like a full year is established for us.

In Genesis 1 .16, God made the two great lights. The greater light to rule the day. The lesser light to rule the night. Again, day there is the time of day that's light. Genesis 1 .17, God set them in the expanse of the heavens to give light on earth to rule over the day and over the night.

Again, day and night, day and night. We keep seeing that to separate the light from the darkness. So you have light and darkness. Day and night. We see obviously how it's being used. Now look in Genesis 2 .4.

Now we see it used the third way. These are the generations of the heavens and the earth when they were created. In the day. That would be at the time. The time that the Lord God made the earth and the heavens.

The reality is we see He just got done saying it was all done in six days, and now He uses day in the singular. He doesn't say in the days, which we would take to mean 24-hour days, but in the day. At the time.

In the time. That brings up the other nine times the Hebrew word yom is used here. Notice 1 .5. There was evening. There was morning. The first day. Okay, how is it being used there? That's the huge question.

How is it being used there? Notice v. 8. The second day. V. 13. The third day. V. 19. The fourth day. V. 23. The fifth day. V. 31. The sixth day. Genesis 2 .2. The seventh day. 2 .3. The seventh day. I mean, when does day actually mean day?

Does it mean millions and billions of years? I mean, even when we say back in Papa's time, do I likely mean billions of years? I mean, when do we ever use it that way? Somebody could say, well, back in the dinosaurs' time.

Yeah, I guess so, but that's only because you bought in to the so-called scientific... I mean, the reality is... Do you know what the reality is? You do the research. They have found human footprints in dinosaur footprints.

They have now found tissue in the fossils of dinosaurs. Blood cells. They can't be millions of years old. They have found human manufactured goods as inside coal. All we have to do is open our eyes. But here's the question.

What does it mean in all these cases? Yom is found 2 ,304 times in the Old Testament. At least according to my Bible works program. And you know what's interesting? I've never heard anybody debate what day means anywhere else in the Old Testament outside of Genesis.

Have you? There's no debate. I mean, when it says that the rain fell for 40 days during the time of the flood, does anybody say, well, I think that's 40 ages? I think that's millions of years? No, no, nobody says that.

When they marched around Jericho for seven days, does anybody say, well, that's a really long time. No, nobody doubts that. Three days in the belly of the whale, Jonah. Nobody's thinking that that means something different than a literal day.

But when it comes to Genesis 1 -1, we can't be certain if a day is a day. And I would ask, is that really because there's all sorts of linguistic markers and grammatical indicators that point to this not being an actual literal 24-hour day?

Or is it because Christians are buckling to pressures from outside the Bible? Now, what does it sound like it's saying? These days have evenings and mornings. You say, well, yeah, that does make it sound like it's perhaps a 24-hour day.

But maybe you didn't know this. When you leave Genesis 1, every single place in the rest of the Old Testament where a day is referred to that has either a morning or an evening, it is always a 24-hour day and there's no exception at all.

Let me tell you another thing. Every single place outside of Genesis 1 where a day is given a number, like until the first day or from the eighth day onward, or the 27th day of the ninth year, every single place in the Old Testament outside of Genesis 1 where a day is given a number, every single time, it is a literal 24-hour day.

Now, I would say that is a great key to unlocking Genesis 1 because you know what God has done? He's not only given the six days of creation a number, He's also identified each of them as having a morning and an evening.

I mean, if you're looking for hermeneutical, if you're looking for a proper Bible interpretive method, and you're going to say the exception to those rules is found in Genesis, I would say prove it. The burden of proof is on you because that is a faulty hermeneutic to approach Scripture that way.

Faulty. In fact, I went through and found every single passage in the Old Testament outside of Genesis 1 where a day is called by number and is said to have a morning or an evening. Listen to these verses.

Exodus 19 .16 On the morning of the third day. See, what I'm asking you this, is there any possibility that these are figurative of long ages? Or is this a literal 24-hour day? On the morning of the third day there were thunders and lightnings and thick cloud on the mountain and a very loud trumpet blast.

Judges 19 .5 On the fourth day, they arose early in the morning and he prepared to go. But the girl's father said to his son-in-law, and there's that account, on the fifth day he arose early in the morning to depart.

And the girl's father said, strengthen your heart and wait until the day declines. Exodus 12 .18 In the first month, from the fourteenth day of the month at evening, you shall eat unleavened bread until the twenty-first day of the month at evening.