Genesis

The Genesis Flood is 50 years old today! The following article is reprinted with permission from the Baptist Bulletin July, 2010.

It is so important that we focus on God’s perspective concerning ultimate origins. Human theories, hypotheses, speculations and opinions come and go. But the God “who cannot lie” (NKJV,^* Tit. 1:2), who was there when the world began, has written a perfect book—the Bible—which He requires that we read and believe (Rom. 10:17).

The Message of Creation by David Wilkinson is a light commentary with ample contemporary application on the biblical theme of creation. Wilkinson is a competent theologian with a scientific background, making him well qualified to speak on the theme of creation. His pastoral experience shows through as he provides lengthy applications from the many biblical passages he discusses throughout the book. In his defense of the idea of a Creator, he also interacts with well known atheists (past and present) such as Carl Sagan and Richard Dawkins.

The book considers five aspects of the doctrine of creation through 20 passages of Scripture. Wilkinson is quick to point out in the preface that the book is not a systematic theology on the doctrine of creation, though the theologian in him might prefer to write such a book.

It is a kind of journey. Some will want to get to the destination quickly, but that is not what we shall do. We have twenty “villages” to visit on the way in pursuing the doctrine of creation and opening up its biblical themes. Their large number of passages and their diversity is testimony to how important this doctrine is within the biblical literature. (p. 11)

Read Part 1 and Part 2.

Read Part 1

Because the tradition of Christian orthodoxy has a legacy of interpreting Genesis as a historic narrative, the prevailing interpretation of Genesis 1:1-2:3 has been that it is a record of God’s creative activity in six, consecutive, literal days followed by a literal seventh day of rest.