Creations Proclamation

Creations Proclamation

2014-02-23

Acts 17:23-25

English Standard Version (ESV)

²³ For as I passed along and observed the objects of your worship, I found also an altar with this inscription, ‘To the unknown god.’ What therefore you worship as unknown, this I proclaim to you. ²⁴ The God who made the world and everything in it, being Lord of heaven and earth, does not live in temples made by man, ²⁵ nor is he served by human hands, as though he needed anything, since he himself gives to all mankind life and breath and everything.

This addresses the precedent/pattern on how to preach the Gospel to the Biblically illiterate.

·      Paul understood the philosophical positions of his audience & was willing/able to dialogue with their frame of reference before leading them to his.

·      Witnessing: passion alone is not enough. Work with what you know, but keep learning

Paul’s (probably best) starting point of the Gospel to the Biblically illiterate: Creation.

·      Epicureans: believed in the eternity of matter & if gods existed they were above human events.

o   Stoics: were pantheists who believed everything is a part of God, or is composed of God.

·      Greeks had many different creation theories including a form of evolution=Nothing new.

o   The message of a single supreme being who created and who rules over all that exists was foreign to Greeks. Act 17:24, Gen 1:1, Col 1:16, Heb. 3:3-4, Rom 1:19-20

God’s very creation bears the testimony of His existence & His attributes.

·      God's existence is not a provable scientific experiment or a mathematical equation but it is still rational & logical in our cause-and-effect world.   

·                  We live in an immensely complex and orderly universe which clearly exhibits evidence of design not random chance.

§  Design requires a designer, building/builder, program/programmer.

·      Cosmological argument: says everything has a cause but must be an uncaused 1^st cause

o   Explosion of nothing can’t create everything.

·      Reason should send men from the greatest effect (universe) to 1^st cause--God.

o   Natural revelation is insufficient to save. It serves to draw men to seek/find God.

Creation by evolution is evil because it cuts off the reason that leads to God.

·      There are many arguments against evolution: 2^nd law of thermodynamics.

o   No transitional fossils (changes in kind: macro-evolution)

§  Called "gaps" in the fossil record.

o   I'm not going to debate…Bill Nye & Ken Ham just did that.

·      Generally, the problem is not in the reasoning/explanation/info but rather in the rebellion of the heart.

o   God is not hiding from men; men are hiding/running from God. Rom 1:18-23

§  Sinful men do not want accountability to their Creator, rightful ruler.

If people don’t reject God directly then they construct God & a religion to their own liking.

·      This god is impotent and subservient, with a man-centered religion where God needs man to feel good & to accomplish His will.   Act 17:25, Mark 10:45

o   God does not NEED anything from mortals and He is the source of all things.

·      Jesus Christ came not because he needed anything from us, but because we needed him.

o   We were rebels, captives to sin, and destined for righteous judgment, in need of a Savior.

§  Gospel is not "help-wanted" but "help available". No boasting. 

Ultimately, man’s origin is matter of faith in either infinite God or finite man.

·      Man’s theory of evolution says you are a cosmic accident.

·      or faith in a Divine Creator who uniquely, perfectly & intimately created you. Heb. 11:6; John 20:29 & 17:3, 1 Cor. 6:20, Ps 139:13-14

A great God who is knowable & will reveal Himself to you so you may know Him & through that knowledge, glorify Him.