Creation: What the Bible Says and What I Believe

The Bible is very clear in what it says regarding creation:

1. “Ah, Lord GOD! Behold, You have made the heavens and the earth by Your great power and Your outstretched arm!”
2. “And God said…and it was so…” (8x, more or less)
3. “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.”
4. “For it was Adam who was first created, and then Eve.”
5. “Just as through one man sin entered into the world, and death through sin, and so death spread to all men…”
6. “When He began His ministry, Jesus Himself was about thirty years of age…the son of Adam, the son of God.”
7. “…by the word of God…the earth was formed out of water and by water, through which the world at that time was destroyed, being flooded with water.”
8. “God saw all that He had made, and behold, it was very good.”

There can be no debate about this--the Bible says those things very clearly. The debate comes when we try to answer the question, “What does the Bible mean by what it says?”

To answer that question, let me first state that I believe that we should derive our understanding as directly from the Biblical text as possible. I will give some justification for that belief in a future post. Given that, then it is easy to specify what we should believe about God's work in creation:

1. God created everything; there was no spontaneous generation.
2. Creation was a miracle, vis-à-vis anti-supernaturalism.
3. Creation was a direct act of God; no evolutionary means.
4. Creation took six days.
5. The first man Adam was a real man.
6. Creation was recent (thousands of years).
7. Creation was followed by a global catastrophic flood.
8. Creation was perfect (no sin or death).