2. BIBLICAL CREATIONISM
BY DR. EARL PARVIN
June 2, 2019
LESSON TWO: GOD ESTABLISHED TIME POWERPOINT: TIME
GEOLOGY
I. OUTLINE
A. Gen. 1:1 “In the BEGINNING GOD,”
B. Displays God’s ETERNALITY [as well as HIMSELF], HIS TIMELESSNESS
C. GOD created/established TIME for time did not exist in God’s ETERNITY
D. MEN OF SCIENCE OBSERVE: DEDUCE BY EVOLUTIONARY FAITH
E. CONCLUSION THROUGH CREATION FAITH
II. LESSON
A. “IN THE BEGINNING GOD” is a simple yet profound statement of fact. All we know at this point in ‘our TIME’ frame is that only God [Elohim], the TIMELESS ONE, already exists from the declarative statement of Gen. 1:1. Thus, TIME has its beginning [rashith = first]
1) First note that God exists. No proof is given. He is accepted by Faith. The Bible declares it. We believe it, by Faith. No proof needed, it is obvious. It is the Christian’s Worldview… which stands in stark contrast to the World’s ‘No God’.
2) Second note: we shall illustrate that each of God’s creative acts, displays one or more of HIS ‘invisible qualities’… of HIS DIVINE NATURE … by the things that were CREATED. Had He not revealed HIMSELF, we could not have known HIM, for HE is beyond our imagination. Paul expressed it this way:, “For since the CREATION OF THE WORLD God’s INVISIBLE QUALITIES—his eternal power and divine nature—have been clearly seen, being understood from WHAT HAS BEEN MADE [Ro1:20]… by the CREATOR” [V.25]. Isaiah proclaims, “God has no form” [toar = outline] [Is 53:2]
3) Third note: Jesus Christ, God’s Son is instrumental in Creation. Amazing, John starts out with: “IN THE BEGINNING, [as in Gen. 1:1] was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was GOD. He was with God IN THE BEGINNING. Through Him all things were made; without Him nothing was made that has been made” [Jn 1:3,10;Ro 11:36; Heb 1:2]. Then Paul says, “He is the image of the invisible God, the first born over all creation. For by Him all things were created:” [Col 1:15-16; “…through whom [Son] He created the U.” Heb 1:2]. We further note, that in Christ we can LITERALLY SEE God, “express image” [3]. Christ is the INCARNATION of God. The Crowning revelation of HIS Invisible Qualities.
4) The Creator became a Babe in the manger. Lk 1:31-2 [step dad = carpenter]
5) Not only does God exist, He is the ONLY GOD [Is. 45:5,6] “I am the Lord, there is NO OTHER, apart from ME there is no God…NONE BESIDE ME”.
6) Research reveals that in America [at least] there are a declining number of folks who did believe that God exists [82%] and now it is [74%]. Tragically, they will discover too late, that HE IS! It seems that the younger generation finds the formal church does not meet their ‘felt needs’; therefore, they are pursuing a more independent view of spirituality. [Self-centeredness]
7) Elohim is HIS Generic Title. “The ONE who is out front, leading”. It signifies His creative and sustaining power, [see Heb 1:3]. It is used 2555 x]. It is a plural noun but used with a singular verb. It signifies Majesty & Singularity which encapsulates His TRIUNE NATURE: existing as 1. Father, 2. Son [Jn.1:2 Christ was with God in beginning] & 3. Holy Spirit [Acts 7:55 Stephen, full of H.S.]. All coequal, coexistent. [G.1:26 “our likeness”]. The term ‘GODHEAD’ may express this concept better. [see:KJV Acts 17:29; Ro 1:20; Col 2:9; I Th. 1: all 10 verses, very clear]
8) When Moses was sent by Elohim to Israel, He asked HIM for HIS NAME to give the Israelites. God’s answer was “I AM” which is the verb ‘to be’, first person singular = I AM. In every language, that is the very beginning of everything. The SELF EXISTENT ONE.
9) Jehovah [YAHWA] is His proper name. Used 5500 X. It signifies God’s primacy , the ”I Am” of His Divine Character [Ex 3:14]. The Jews would not utter HIS NAME, it was too SACRED… they substituted Adonai = Master. “This is my name by which I am to be remembered from generation to generation. [3:15]. [Tetragramaton ].
10) FURTHER, WE KNOW THAT GOD IS ETERNAL [Gen 21:33; Du 33:27 “Eternal God”] and has no TIME constraints, because He was before TIME was created. Therefore, God created TIME
11) Paul wrote to Timothy, “This grace was given us in Christ Jesus, BEFORE THE BEGINNING OF TIME...” [II T. 1:9]. He also wrote to
a) Titus, “…God who does not lie, promised BEFORE THE BEGINNING
OF TIME.” [Titus 1:2].
b) Then, he also wrote to the Corinthians, “… God destined for our glory
BEFORE TIME BEGAN.” [I Cor. 2:7].
c) David said to Israel, “the Lord God from everlasting to everlasting” [I Ch. 16:39; 29:10; Ps. 106:48].
d) Habakkuk exclaimed, “O Lord are you not from everlasting? [Hab 1:12].
e) John said: “In the beginning was Word,.. was God… in the beginning” [1:1]
B. CREATING TIME DISPLAYS GOD’S ETERNALITY OR TIMELESSNESS
C. GOD CREATED TIME, for this is not part of HIS being, but HIS CREATION would be created with TIME already built in. [ie: mature, with age].
1) The rest of the Creative Acts are designated by DAYs [yom = space of time] Evening & morning:1:5,8,13,19, 23,31 = 24 hour days;
Ex 20:11; 31:17; 24:16 clearly state 6 days God created heavens & earth
NOTE: This clearly indicates a young Earth of 6,000 years versus the Evolutionary concept of an ‘Old Earth’ concept of 4.6 billion years.
2) Peter said, “…everything goes on as it has from the beginning of creation.” [II P.3:4]. Mark also says, “at the beginning of creation God made them…” [10:6]
3) Peter further exclaims, “…With the Lord, a day is like a thousand years and a thousand years like a day.” [II P 3:8 also Ps 90:4]
4) The Psalmist declared, “Teach us to number our days, that we may gain a heart of wisdom”. Further, he said, “Show me, Lord, my life’s end and the number of my days; let me know how fleeting my life is [39:4, La 4:18]. Job opined, “A person’s days are determined; you have decreed the number of his months and have set limits he cannot exceed [14:5].
5) THE COSMOS DISPLAYS TIME as a basic characteristic of an orderly universe. Time is a point at which something happens. In our study it indicates when God created the cosmos, TIME began. The Psalmist said, “…when you brought forth the earth and the world…from everlasting” [Ps 90:2].
a) Webster defines TIME as: “an interval between two points on a continuum”.
b) The U.S. Naval Observatory maintains a Master Clock for keeping exact Time
c)Travelers make use of Time as measured from a point = GMT or
Greenwich, [England], Mean Time as Global Mean Time Standard.
6) In cosmology TIME is usually joined with Space in a Spacetime Continuum, which is a Mathematical Model which postulates Time as a ‘Fourth Dimension” of space.
7) God knew that everything that He would next create, would be in some way Time oriented. We will note that TIME is needed to ‘mark off’ days and nights in 24 hr blocks [v.5], or ‘marking’ of seasons [v.14]. Our lives are ‘marked’ by TIME as expressed in [Ec. 3:1-8].
8) New Years Eve, thousands gather in TIME Square to bring in the New Year. They shout out the minutes as the ball falls, ending the old year.
There is a time for everything, and a season for every activity under the heavens:
2 a
time to be born and a time to die,
a
time to plant and a time to uproot,
3 a time to kill and a time to heal,
a
time to tear down and a time to build,
4 a time to weep and a time to laugh,
a
time to mourn and a time to dance,
5 a time to scatter stones and a time to gather them,
a
time to embrace and a time to refrain from embracing,
6 a time to search and a time to give up,
a
time to keep and a time to throw away,
7 a time to tear and a time to mend,
a
time to be silent and a time to speak,
8 a time to love and a time to hate,
a
time for war and a time for peace.
9) TIME can also be a problem for some Christians with reference to God’s Days of Creation. Were those ‘days’ [yom] literal 24 hour days? Or did they represent long ‘period’s of time’ as in the DAY AGE THEORY [1823], to ACCOMMODATE for the long periods of time, demanded by the Evolutionist’s Faith creating the ‘longest week ever’. [NOTE: The Jehovah’s Witnesses teach these days were 7,000 yrs each; therefore, creation week was 72,000 yrs]. Another suggestion is to put ages between the days of creation. It is so much easier to recognize by Faith that God could create things WITH ‘AGE’. Certainly He created trees with fruit on them and adult chickens which could lay eggs. God really doesn’t need man’s help in seeking to rationalize how things came to be. He created in 7 literal days, and if He wanted, with age. But Science has not proven all the ‘age’ the Evolutionist’s Faith demands.
10) Another postulate of those not committed to the literal 24 hr days of creation is the GAP THEORY [1804]. This considers a GAP between Gen. 1:1 and v. 2., of perhaps thousands of years. The concept is there was an original creation, then a destruction of the cosmos and recreation. Isaiah 24:1 is a supposed proof text… “the Lord made earth empty…waste…” Makes room for a hypothetical race of pre-Adomites? Multiple Gaps = between the ‘days’.
11) THEISTIC EVOLUTION [1975] is another effort to add years to the Genesis account. God is credited with creating the original elements, [the Fact of Creation] but then evolution proceeds to operate to bring everything into line with the old earth postulate [the Method of Creation].
12) PROGRESSIVE CREATION [Day Age update] postulates that God intervened at times during long periods of time. They suggest that God gave us Two Books: the Bible + the Book of Nature. This draws on the concept of “Special Revelation = the Bible, and “General Revelation” = as found in ‘…what has been made’ [Ro 1:19-20]. Note: there is One Book, the Bible by which we can see God’s workmanship in nature. Accommodationists have no limit to their arsenal of options from which to draw.
13) [LITERARY] OR FRAMEWORK HYPOTHESIS [1924] proposes Two Triads [of three days + Three Kingdoms [Creation, Creature & Creator]. It is an ALLEGORY or POETRY, accommodating the Evolutionist’s Faith time frame.
14) INTELLIGENT DESIGN based on the idea of General Revelation of natural causes, versus Special Revelation. No Creator is mentioned… any god will do!
15) These popular suggestions, all accommodate the Evolutionists
D. MEN OF SCIENCE STRUGGLE to define Time, although the word ‘time’ is compounded hundreds of times to express something: time of day, time to play, time flies…, time to eat, time management, or don’t be late.
1) Men have devised many methods to indicate the passage of time: the hour glass, the sundial, clocks.
2) The calendar to record events to happen
3) Athletes must compete against time
4) Music is very time related
5) One’s heart beat is checked against time
6) The computer is completely dependent upon a time chip
7) To determine an exact ‘second’ science turns to Celsium-133, the atomic clock, assuming perfect, synchronous oscillation eternally
8) Time is thought to be universal everywhere the same, BUT
9) Scientists struggle to explain what is called TIME DIALATION observed in space travel. It seems that at super high speeds, approaching the speed of light, time seems to slow down or speed up, and not be linear.
Time goes only in one direction… there is no return.
10) There is the proposed ‘Time Space Continuum’ in which time becomes the Fourth Dimension of Space. [we discuss this later]
11) In science, the concept of time seems to be a work in progress for they now want to talk about ‘Quantized Time’ & subatomic time reversal?
12) TIME TRAVEL has always been a tantalizing dream, especially of science fiction. It seems that scientists now believe it is potentially possible, but only forward. You cannot come back! However, we have not developed the technology whereby one can travel forward. Reality is, one would need to approach the speed of light [660 million mph] to do so. Physicists have accelerated particles to nearly the speed of light. Remember… no return! Because Time travels in only one direction, it is unidirectional in its nature.
E. CONCLUSION…Our Eternal, Timeless God first ‘created’ or ‘established’ Time [what else could ‘In the Beginning’ mean?], to begin His Creative Week. Perhaps it would be better to say that “He established TIME, or Time BEGAN. Regardless, HIS TIMING is impeccable for He is the perfection of order. Most events reference the orderliness of the planets. But the Seven Day Week does not. God established it. One day, Time will end as we know it. [Dnl 8:19]
I note that God FIRST created TIME which is the first of seven fundamental qualities of physics. Each is measurable. They are:TIME [second], length [meter], mass [kilogram], electrical current [ampere], thermo-dynamic temperature [Kelvin], amount of substance [mole] and luminous intensity [candela]. All of which are the building blocks for making a universe containing a habitable earth for you and me, His crowning achievement.
NOTE: The first requirement for creating that ‘crowning achievement’, “man” would be to create TIME. Why? Because everything in the human body runs on a TIME TABLE! From the moment of conception when a SINGLE CELL begins to divide to become multiple trillions of diverse cells, of 200 different Kinds, in numerous organs, each HAD TO HAPPEN in its perfect timing and order of execution. All throughout a lifetime, each cell has its own circadian internal CLOCK to keep the systems, on time. The study of this part of science is called, ‘chronobiology’ = the timing of biological activity on the molecular level. The body has a master clock located in the hypothalamus to direct the clock genes throughout the body, to be on schedule. [See article: “A Time for Everything”, by Dr. Jeffry Tomkins, pp 65-9, {AM.com 9-10/ 2018}]
It is noteworthy that Time is measured by many kinds of “clocks”: DNA, Geological, fossils, molecular, evolutionary, Empirical facts, Lunar clock, circadian or cellular.
In the meantime, “God has made everything beautiful in its time. He has also set eternity in the hearts of men; yet they cannot fathom what God has done from beginning to end” [Eccl 3:11].
NOTE: the decision before the house is this: there are two Models or Origins from which to choose. The faulty argument that the Bible is not Science and Evolution is Science will not stand because Both are based on FAITH. That is, no one was around to record any historical Scientific Evidence. Therefore, the Truth is Evolution is based on Faith… for there is no historical, reproducible Science involved in origins. But operating with the Evolutionary Worldview, all ‘scientific research’ is skewed.
Now, if it is insisted that Creation Faith is tantamount to Religion, may we refer to Evolution as tantamount to IDOLATRY? Consider Paul’s comment: “…they neither glorified him as God nor gave thanks to him, but their thinking became futile and their foolish hearts were darkened. 22 Although they claimed to be wise, they became fools 23 and exchanged the glory of the immortal God for… [Natural causes]” {Ro. 1:21-23} which ironically is a creation of God = Natural Law.
So which will it be: Evolutionary Faith or Creation Faith? That is the question.
The struggle goes on even as conveyed in the National Geographic Magazine which opines that Evolution is the accepted Cosmology. In Time Magazine, they quoted from Greg Griffin’s book, Population Wars, with the headline: “Survival of the Fittest is a Sham”. Then they quoted: “It is an oversimplification of evolutionary science [?]… we are not simply individuals who have won some evolutionary competition…” [Sept. 2015]. Lottery anyone? I for one opt for Creation Faith.
DEEPTIME.COM = Jame Brightmore has created an Interactive Graphic, which has the face of a clock on which ‘secular geologic time’ can be superimposed.
PBS on their site ‘Deep Time’ opines, “The story of life is told by its ‘ghosts’ [i.e. geology]. Only 1 in 1000 species survive, but this is the springboard to new life” the evolutionists say. Deep Time.Com indicates that it is related to Secular Geologic Time of Evolution’s 4.5 billion yrs for mankind to evolve. They indicate that there is no beginning or end for the evolving U. [Even though they speak of 13.8 by to BB.]
Perhaps the most deceptive promoter of Theistic Evolution is the John Templeton Foundation. John was a Presbyterian elder who decided to use his billions to “finance humility”?, by financing “scientific revelations… for revitalizing religion”. He said, “science [evolution?], not religion is where we can truly UNDERSTAND GOD”. He found in Dr. Collins, of the Genome Project, the plausible promoter through his book [The Language of God] and the ‘BioLogos Think Tank’ which espouses “evolutionary creation, recognizing God as creator of life over billions of years”. The most devastating target of Templeton money is SEMINARIES, which desperately need money. [AM – May – June 2017, pp 72-77]
Ken Ham publishes a list of institutions which still teach a Young Earth or Creationism.