In Defense of Scripture

Below is a link to a learning solution using Microsoft Sway on the subject of defending Christian Scripture. If your apologetic method cannot defend Scripture, and certain features of Christian Scripture, then it will not be able to defend Christianity. And if an apologetic method cannot defend Christianity, it should be abandoned. These men who believe that Christianity can survive without the Bible are seriously mistaken. Time will show that such an apologetic method will bow to the idol of autonomous human reason.

Click below to walk through the tutorial.

In Defense of Scripture

Andy Stanley: Shepherd or Charlatan

Andy Stanley is at it again. Many people are up at arms over Stanley's latest comments concerning the fact that Christianity does not need the Bible. In fact, Stanley implies that there was a "pre-bible" version of Christianity. Stanley insists that Christianity is all about the resurrection of Jesus Christ, not the whole Bible. Stanley says that "the foundation of our faith is not the Bible. The foundation of our faith is something that happened in history." Does this comport with what the Scriptures say about the very household of God, the church? Well, let's take a look at the Scriptures and see what they say about Stanley's claim.

So then you are no longer strangers and aliens, but you are fellow citizens with the saints, and are of God’s household, having been built on the foundation of the apostles and prophets, Christ Jesus Himself being the corner stone, in whom the whole building, being fitted together, is growing into a holy temple in the Lord, in whom you also are being built together into a dwelling of God in the Spirit. Eph. 2:20

What exactly is "the foundation of the apostles and prophets?" Did Paul mean that the foundation of Christianity is actually men? Of course not! The apostles and prophets stand in the place of divine revelation, the divine message of the God's men. The foundation of the church is not the men, but rather, what the men were: apostles and prophets. Apostles and prophets are sent by God with a message from God. It is that message, the message that has at its center the person and work of Christ, that is the foundation of the church, of Christianity. 

Is the resurrection enough to serve as the foundation of Christianity? Andy Stanley implies that the resurrection of Christ is all the message we need. The foundation of Christianity is the resurrection of Jesus Christ. If that is actually the case, why do we have so much more than the message of the resurrection in NT Scripture? Certainly the resurrection of Jesus Christ is a necessary component of the gospel, but the resurrection alone is not sufficient to serve as the foundation of the church. To say that the gospel and the foundation of the Christianity is the resurrection of Jesus Christ is incredibly reductionistic. The gospel does not reduce to "Jesus rose from the dead." Christianity cannot be summed up by saying "Jesus rose from the dead." One thing is for sure, the NT writers thought there was more to the gospel, more to Christ's message, more to the missions of Christianity than resurrection because they talked about a lot more than that. 

The really big problem for Stanley is that he claims that Christianity's foundation rests on an event in history and then he dismisses the very source of that event, attempting to divorce the historical event from the historical record. Yes, it is true that Jesus would have still risen from the dead even if we never had a Bible to read about. But we would have no way of knowing about it then would we. Nor would Stanley. It is difficult to take Stanley serious on this subject because he view seems to be remarkably incoherent. Stanley says he believes in a literal Adam and Eve, but not because the Bible says so, but because Jesus seems to have believed in a literal Adam and Eve. Now, if that doesn't cause you to do the biggest palm slap ever, nothing will. And what book tells us that Jesus believed in a literal Adam and Eve, Mr. Stanley? Oh, yes, it is called the Bible. So you do in fact believe in a literal Adam and Eve because the Bible says so. In fact, you also believe that Jesus rose from the dead because the Bible says it happened. Folks, you can't make this stuff up. On one hand, it is very sad, and on the other hand, it is priceless. 

So, why does Andy Stanley want to say that some things in the Bible should not be believed, like the age of the earth, Noah, the Exodus, and so forth while saying that other things ought to be believed even though their source is the same Bible? I think I understand what Stanley is trying to do. You can hear it in his final plea.

It is no secret that a number of people have left evangelicalism because of the offense of many things found in Scripture. The God of the OT is offensive, judgmental, unloving. The miracles of both testaments are just too hard to believe. The moral standards of Scripture are antiquated and outdated. But the history of evangelicals reveals that they have insisted that their membership take God's word at face value. The idea that the earth is only around 6-7 thousand years old is arcane. The global flood is embarrassing to many. A literal Adam and Eve is absurd. The idea of an eternal hell is over the top. That homosexuals cannot love and marry is hateful. On and on the list goes. Stanley wants these people to reconsider Christ because their view of Scripture and of Christianity was wrong. You can be a Christian without taking the Bible at face value. There is a Christianity that is a pre-bible version, the original Christianity. You can believe things that Jesus said without saying you believe something just because the Bible said it. Somehow,  Jesus saying it and the Bible saying it are not the same thing.

The second reason Stanley is doing this is not because he wants to defend Christianity. No one who says that Christianity can be separated from the Bible is interested in defending Christianity. Let's be serious. Stanley wants to defend his empire. The pressures of the culture are weighing on all of us. Abortion, homosexual marriage, gender dysphoria, and other issues are placing more and more pressure on Christianity to conform to the culture or else. If Stanley can reduce the gospel and Christianity to the resurrection, then perhaps this will free people up to affirm what Jesus says without supposed having to take the Bible seriously everywhere it speaks. This way, we don't quite sound so foolish, you know, like those people who say they believe homosexuality is a sin because the Bible says so. There are so many things wrong with what Stanley is saying and I haven't even scratched the surface. I wanted to point out the "why" Stanley is saying what he is saying more than interact with what he actually said. Stanley wants to stop the bleeding of people leaving Christianity. The best way to do that is to remove those elements of Christianity that offend unbelieving hearts. This way, unbelievers can be Christians too. And this way, Stanley gets to keep his megachurch with its thousands of members. That is really what this is all about folks. 

Making (Mis)Use of the Bible

The Bible has a lot of things to say about a lot of different subjects. The sacred book has something to say about how every thing we see around us all began, and one day, how it will all end. And the Bible has a lot to say about a bunch of things that happened and should happen in between the beginning and the end of all things as we know it. And since the Bible has so much to say about so many things, it isn’t surprising to see so many people use the Bible to do and say so many things themselves. People sure do put the Bible to work to do a lot. And the sad reality is that a lot people treat the Bible, especially in our culture, as if it is there to do their bidding, to fight their war, to improve their life, to propel them to loftier places, and much more. For many Christians, the Bible isn’t a book that is there to shape their life, but instead, they shape the Bible in such a way as to make it seem that God has spoken on matters for them specifically that God has indeed not had anything at all to say.

The study of Scripture is a spiritual act. It is a spiritual discipline. There is nothing that is more important to the Christian than Scripture. Scripture informs us, cleanses us, renovates our minds, renews our hearts, transforms our lives! Scripture tells us who Jesus is. Scripture brings us the gospel. Scripture brings us life! Eternal life! Scripture ensures that we will never be deceived. How? Scripture is the truth. So long as we have the truth, we can never be deceived. Is it any wonder that Scripture is at the very core of the non-Christian attacks against the Christian movement? The record of the OT is used to indict the kind of God it portraits, and therefore, undermines itself according to the opponents of Christ. Every Christian must know the Scripture, must know it’s history, must know something about its transmission, must surely know its content, and must know how to let Scripture defend itself. I cannot think of anything more important in the life of the Christian than Scripture. We know nothing about the Christian faith, the Christ who redeems, the Spirit who fills us apart from Scripture.

John MacArthur tells us, “if you are one of those who questions whether truth is really important, please don’t call your belief system Christianity, because that is not what it is.” [The Truth War] Jesus said that God’s Word is truth. For the truth believer there is very little as important as studying God’s Word seriously. [The Hermeneutical Spiral] Calvin said, “At any rate, there is no doubt that firm certainty of doctrine was engraved in their hearts, so that they were convinced and understood that what they had learned proceeded from God. For by His Word, God rendered faith unambiguous forever, a faith that should be superior to all opinion.” [Institutes] Michael Kruger in his excellent work Canon Revisited writes, “What is needed, then, is a canonical model that does not ground the New Testament canon in an external authority, but seeks to ground the canon in the only place it could be grounded, its own authority.” [Canon Revisited] Clearly, the Bible has a place of prominence in the life of the Christian. And with the recent trends in certain cultures, especially Europe and America, it should be obvious to any intelligent Christian that a proper understanding and use of Scripture is as important today as it was in the time of the Apostles. So much for the great downgrade of the significance of theology, the languages, and doctrine in our churches. Any discerning Christian ought to be able to figure out that God was serious when He spoke to us in Scripture. And if we are serious about God, about our relationship with Christ, we will take more than just a passing interest in what God has to say.

Yet, many Christians seem to be almost entirely uninterested in respecting the Scripture’s message and record, willing to take the Bible as a tool to defend their own attitudes, philosophies, and behaviors. Prov. 29:18 is one example. The KJV renders this text, “Where there is no vision the people perish.” More than a few Christians have used this verse to support the idea that we have to “cast a vision” for the mission of our local church, various ministries, and even your own personal career. A text actually means, as the NASB tenders it, “Where there is no vision, the people are unrestrained.” The idea is where there is no “prophetic word” immorality dominates, and this to the destruction of people’s souls. In other words, where God’s Word is not proclaimed to the community, there is little to no moral restraint. Yet we use it to support our own modern motivational talks. Such recklessness should produce embarrassment and shame.

Sadly, some Christians are far more interested in having God speak to them outside of Scripture than they are in attempting to understand what God is speaking to them in Scripture. These Christians have no clue that God does not speak to men outside of Scripture. This is why Scripture is called the Word of God. If you want to know God’s will for your life, read the Bible with as much energy as you can muster and pray for enlightenment. If we want to know what God wants our church involved in, we can know that by reading Scripture. Other Christians just want to use the Bible for their owner personal agendas, whatever they might be. Perhaps I want to feel better about myself, be a better parent, excel at work and so forth. All these modern, psychological approaches to Scripture rest on a faulty presupposition that the Bible was given to me so that I could use it to become a better me according to what I think a better me is. Scripture was given to make us holy, to shape us into the image of Christ, to transform and renovate our minds so that we have the mind of Christ.

Scripture is the standard by which all men will be measured. Scripture informs us of our sin, our guilt, and our condemnation. For this reason, men want to destroy it, to rip it to shreds, to reduce its credibility. They do not want Scripture to be accurate when it condemns their adultery, their homosexuality, their treachery, their lies, their greed, their idolatry, and their murderous ways. So they attack it on every level and those attacks are relentless. But Scripture also brings glad tidings of good news. Through Jesus Christ, and through Him alone, there is light, life, and eternal peace. Scripture alone brings the knowledge by which we know the truth light, the true life, the true Redeemer of the world.

If you know nothing else, know Scripture. If you can talk about nothing else, be able to talk about Scripture. If your apologetic is weak anywhere, let it be weak anywhere else but in defending Scripture. The entire Christian walk centers around the Jesus Christ who reveals Himself in Scripture. Ignorance of Scripture equals ignorance of Christ!

The Possibility and Implications of Distorting Divine Scripture

If the history of Christianity demonstrates anything it demonstrates that the phenomenon of twisting the divine revelation that has historically come to be known as Christian Scripture, is a very real possibility. For the true Christian, nothing is more important than a right understanding of the divine revelation. Yet, over the centuries, the historical evidence is irrefutable. Wrong interpretations of Scripture are possible.

Vern Poythress notes, “In the course of that long history, Christians have committed plenty of horrendous sins and made ghastly mistakes that discredit the faith. Moreover, those antagonistic to the God of the Bible have, over a period of several centuries, produced a whole marketplace of culturally fashionable stratagems for evading God. Some are incredibly sophisticated and awesomely complex. They include ways of immunizing ourselves from the Bible and its message. So we have plenty of ways to hide our spiritual nakedness.” [Poythress, God Centered Biblical Interpretation]

The use of words is intended to do something. The motive that leads to the human behavior of communicating resides within the communicator. E.D. Hirsch Jr. says, “There is no magic land of meaning outside human consciousness. Whenever meaning is connected to words, a person is making the connection, and the particular meanings he lends to them are never the only legitimate ones under the norms and conventions of his language.” [Hirsch, Jr. Validity In Interpretation] In the case of Scripture, which itself has a secondary as well as a primary author, the intended meaning is located in the human author as the secondary author and God, the Holy Spirit, who is the primary author. There is no other literary work that parallels the Christian Scriptures. For this reason, interpreting the text of Scripture is unlike other interpretive enterprises. It demands skills that no other text demands.

In Mark 7:13, Jesus accused the religious of His day of invalidating the word of God by means of their tradition. The Greek word translated invalidated is ἀκυρόω (akuroo). Louw-Nida classifies this word in the semantic domain of power, or force. It is defined as to refuse to recognize the force or power of something—‘to invalidate the authority of, to reject, to disregard.’ Jesus is accusing the religious of his day of handling Scripture in such a way as to challenge its authority, its power, and its force.

Paul writes to a young Timothy and provides explicit instruction regarding the Scriptures, saying, If anyone advocates a different doctrine and does not agree with sound words, those of our Lord Jesus Christ, and with the doctrine conforming to godliness, he is conceited and understands nothing. (1 Tim. 6:3-4a) Paul in numerous places just like this, emphatically points out the possibility of error concerning the Scriptures. Here, he warns against teaching anything that is different from what should be taught. Hence, the possibility of teaching something that should not be taught exists. I realize that to many of you, this much seems obvious. I have a purpose in stating what is plainly obvious and soon enough you will see what it is. I hope that the detractors are following the line of reasoning I am putting forth.

Peter also made this point very clearly, writing, and regard the patience of our Lord as salvation; just as also our beloved brother Paul, according to the wisdom given him, wrote to you, as also in all his letters, speaking in them of these things, in which are some things hard to understand, which the untaught and unstable distort, as they do also the rest of the Scriptures, to their own destruction. (2 Peter 3:15-16) The Greek word strebloo means to distort the meaning of something in communicating to others. It belongs to the semantic domain of ‘interpret, mean, explain.’ Clearly, Peter thought that there were some who were misinterpreting Paul and not only this, they were destroying themselves because of they mishandled Paul and the rest of the Scripture.

In conclusion then, we have clear and incontrovertible evidence that it is possible to distort the sacred Scriptures. In so doing, we are not merely distorting the intended meaning of finite men, but rather, of holy men who were moved by the Holy Spirit. In essence, to distort the Scriptures is to take words out of or put words in God’s mouth that he has or has not spoken. Since God’s word has perlocutionary intent, whatever effect God intended by the speech act, we nullify. Indeed, to misinterpret Scripture is to fight against God.

We must now come to the place where we attempt to understand the implications of the possibility of distorting Scripture. Since we are warned time and again by Jesus, Paul, Peter, Jude, and John as well as other NT writers not to distort Scripture, we can infer that it is possible to rightly interpret Scripture. The only logically possible way for one not to distort Scripture is for them to interpret it correctly. Additionally, if it is possible to rightly interpret Scripture, then it is possible to ascertain the intention of the human and divine authors of Scripture. That seems rather obvious at this point. After all, imagine if we applied to our normal every day conversation, some of the standards we apply to interpreting Scripture. Communication would be impossible and so too would any hope of progress in any meaningful sense of the word progress.

What we are seeking when we interpret Scripture is the true meaning intended by the authors of Scripture. After all, only if something has a true meaning can one distort it. If proposition A has no truth-value, then it is impossible to distort proposition A. If distortion is possible, then truth-value must, by definition of distortion, exist. In other words, truth is the logical necessity for distortion. The existence of true meaning then is the necessary condition for distortion. Without truth-value, distortion could not exist. Philosophically speaking, the existence of truth and error says nothing about the possibility of knowledge. However, at this point we must point out what seems obvious to even the casual reader of Scripture and that is that Scripture assumes that knowledge is possible by the very fact that it commands that we must avoid distortion. We would say it like this: if distortion, then truth. Distortion occurs, therefore truth. No truth, therefore, no distortion. If distortion, then truth, and if truth, then knowledge. Therefore, if distortion, then knowledge. To put it in biblical terms, if Scripture can be distorted, then it must be true. And if it is true and it can be distorted, then it must be knowable. If distortion exists, then knowledge is possible. Otherwise, it would be impossible to know distortion exists if knowledge were not possible.  

What exactly do we mean when we say that a particular proposition contains truth-value? When I say that meaning has been or can be distorted, I am referring to something very specific. But is the reference to some correspondence theory or truth? Do I mean the proposition does not correspond to the reality that is there? Or, do I mean that the proposition does not cohere within a particular system? Perhaps I mean that the proposition just doesn’t work. It isn’t practical to hold it as true. This points us up to the need for a Christian theory of truth. With each major theory of truth, there is almost always some element of truth-value. On the other hand, each theory in and of itself falls short of the mark. Saying that something corresponds with reality only begs the question of how reality is being defined. To say that something coheres only creates questions around the system that it coheres within. And to say that it works begs the question of what one means by “works.”

Where then is truth anchored and what is the Christian theory of truth? Truth itself is anchored in the mind of the self-contained ontological Triune God of Scripture. Truth exists in the mind of God. To distort truth is to misrepresent the very thought of God. How can we know God’s thoughts? This is an epistemological question. Hence, the epistemic claim that distortion is possible is supported by my strong modal claim that truth resides in the mind of God. From this we see that God is the necessary precondition for the possibility of distorting the Scriptures. If God were the necessary precondition for the possibility of distorting the Scriptures, then we would follow that claim with the claim that sin is the sufficient condition for distorting the Scriptures.

What does all this mean? For more than a few weeks now, I have been dealing with two men who seem to want to overthrow historic Christian orthodoxy while at the same time employing techniques that would lead one to believe that the interpretive process is so fluid that just about any understanding of the text is acceptable. I should say, for some reason, any understanding of the text that falls outside the historic one is acceptable. The gay Christian issue has been our most contentious subject, as it seems to be the burning issue for the moment.

There are numerous and sophisticated methods open for modern man in order for him to distort the meaning of Scripture. The necessary existence of truth in the mind of God and the presence of sin in the heart of man provide both the necessary and sufficient condition for such distortion. On the other hand, if distortion is possible, and the accurate interpretation of Scripture is possible, then not just any method or any interpretation will do. This means that interpreting Scripture is indeed a serious matter. If Scripture is God speaking, God revealing what is in His mind regarding a particular issue, then misrepresenting God’s communication to us is naturally a serious matter.

Finally, I should say a quick word about figurative language and how it is used in Scripture. For some reason, men like Dan Trabue think the employment of figurative language means that we cannot take those texts literally where it is employed. That understanding is patently false. One example used was the view that Gen. 6:5 is figurative language because here the human heart is described as having intents and thoughts and that these intentions and thoughts were continually evil. To claim that the use of the word heart is figurative here would be anachronistic. The Hebrew use of the word lb is not normally employed to mean the physical organ itself. Instead, the ancient Hebrew thought of the heart as the essential person, mind, will, and emotion. For our purposes, we may classify this use as somewhat figurative but not as cleanly as some would like. And it is not clear that Moses would have actually thought that he was using figurative language when he wrote of the account. Additionally, the literal meaning of the text remains unchanged. The essence of the individuals at this time continually engaged in evil. They had altogether abandoned all moral behavior.

Dan has also attempted to interpret the Scripture’s teaching on original sin as non-literal language, claiming that babies are not born sinners. According to Dan, this is figurative language. What kind of figurative language is it? Dan does not tell us. But if we use Scripture as a whole to interpret Scripture individually, we understand that we are all born into sin, with sin natures, from the very beginning captive to sin. Paul says that we are all by nature children of wrath. (Eph. 2:3) The entire NT employs the use of the term “born again” to describe what every individual must experience in order to enter the Kingdom of God. The reason that we must be born from above is because our birth from below is into sin. Hence, that children are born sinners, that they do not become sinners along the way is clear. Dan’s views on this front are the views of the heresy known as ancient Pelagianism: A heresy that Augustine identified and debunked 1600 years ago.           

In summary, I claim that because truth necessarily exists in the mind of God that distortion of Scripture is a real possibility. And because distortion is a real possibility, accurately handling the Word of Truth is also a real possibility. Paul issues this very command. All this to say that how Christians view and interpret Scripture is to a very large degree indicative of the genuineness of their claim to faith in Christ. Because of this, the subject of interpreting Scripture is one in which every Christian will have to become more competent. The level of hermeneutical acumen within Christianity must change if we are to be good soldiers carrying on a good campaign doing our part to proclaim and defend revealed truth.

Defending Adam

As some of you already know, we have had an on-going discussion with Dan Trabue and his pal, who remains anonymous, regarding the historicity of Adam, the nature of Scripture, the justice of God, etc. I have decided to pull one final post together on this subject before moving on to other issues. Dan insists that Adam is fictional, belonging to the genre of myth. It has been my position that Dan has a hidden motive for why Adam must be myth as opposed to history. In our discussions with Dan he has rejected the reliability of Luke, the binding nature of Scripture, the supernatural source of Scripture, divine judgment, and has defended gay Christianity. The profile of Dan at this point seems clear and it is this profile that I have said motivates and drives Dan’s interpretation of Scripture more than any other factor. The truth is that each of us come to Scripture with the same challenge and it is only with the help of the Holy Spirit that we can place our prejudices aside and allow Scripture to do its work on our heart as opposed to us imposing the sin in our heart on the text.

Before I dive into this final summary regarding a defense of the historic Adam, I should say a few things about the issue of theological or philosophical hermeneutics. No one comes to the Scripture with a philosophically neutral attitude. I have made this point with Dan Trabue repeatedly. A person already has adopted or embraced a view of the nature of Scripture and its contents before opening its pages. It is abundantly evidence that most modern approaches to Scripture are not themselves the result of biblical faith. Rather, they employ methods that are themselves principles of the autonomous man.

To put it very bluntly, the popular approach to the text is to read it on one’s own terms, as a product of human ingenuity. This modern critical approach creates a massive ditch between human reason and biblical faith. Additionally, it places human reason in a position of superiority over faith. Either one’s understanding of the nature of Scripture is informed by Scripture, which is the position of faith, or it is informed by human reason, which is the position of modern critical approaches to the Bible. 

My approach to Scripture is that Scripture has its origin in the mind of God, that it is divine revelation designed specifically to inform us of the God who is our great King, Creator, and Redeemer; that Scripture is clear on the main points of the revelation it expresses, that Scripture is self-attesting, binding, our final authority, and that all truth claims must be subject to the truth revealed therein. In short, Scripture is a divine artifact. Scripture is unique and not comparable to any other literary work that has ever existed in the history of man. That position is a faith position. I arrived at that position, like every other regenerate Christian arrives at it: through faith in Christ. In other words, once faith is removed from our approach to Scripture, and in its place a naturalistic approach from human reason is adopted, one can take just about any view of the text they wish. Moreover, it is impossible to demonstrate that Scripture is supernatural revelation by means of rational argumentation and historical evidence. The conclusion that the Bible is the Word of God from Genesis to Revelation is something that only the work of God in regeneration can produce. And so it does. Now, with that in mind, lets provide a Christian defense of the historic Adam.

Contrary to some schools of thought, Genesis 1-2 does not belong to the genre of ancient Hebrew poetry. The text follows the structure of ancient Hebrew narrative. In the interest of space I will point to the ten sections headed by the toledoth as evidence. We read in Gen. 2:4, “This is the account (toledoth) of the heavens and the earth. The author intends to provide the reader with a true account for how the heavens and the earth came to exist. This same language is used in Gen. 5:1 when we read about Adam’s genealogy, which takes us from Adam to Noah. In the context of that actual genealogy, we read that it was “In the day when God created man, He made him in the likeness of God. It seems that Moses may have been correcting some false ideas about how it all got started from the very beginning. We see the use of this toledoth in repeated in Gen. 6:9; 10:1; 11:10, 27; 25:12, 19; 36:1 and 37:2. All these sections deal with actual persons living in actual places at specific times. Adam and his offspring are listed alongside the rest of the individuals. The conclusion anyone should reach is that the writer portrayed Adam as historical because he included him alongside the rest of these historical figures.

In addition to this evidence, we must also not overlook the first gospel, given in Gen. 3:15. The promise to send a deliverer that would crush the head of Satan was not bound up in myth. It is far more reasonable to conclude that since Jesus Christ was the real seed that really crushed the head of Satan that the promise was historical top to bottom. Since the Christ event took place in time and space, we must conclude that the promise of Christ took place in time and space. If one is going to classify Adam as myth, they must classify the entire book of Genesis as myth.

Additional evidence that Adam was historical is located in 1 Chronicles 1. The author of this text provides a genealogy that begins with Adam and takes us all the way to David, Saul, and the people of Israel. The sheer volume of details spanning several chapters is more than staggering. It seems dishonest to adopt a contradictory opinion in light of the amount of evidence in this section of Scripture alone.

Job asks if he has covered his transgression like Adam? (31:33) Job was obviously familiar not only with Adam but with the details surrounding Adam’s sin. God, in His rebuke of Ephraim and Judah says that these have broken the covenant just like Adam had broken the covenant. (Hos. 6:7) If Adam was myth, so too was the covenant. But we know the covenant is real, historic, existing in time and space. Additionally in the New Testament we reference Luke’s tracing of Christ’s genealogy all the way from Christ back to Adam. (Lu. 3) Paul says that death reigned from Adam until Moses. (Rom. 5:14) The use of the Greek word mechri refers to a continuous extent of time up to a point. In order for Paul to employ this word, we meant conclude that he believed that Adam, like Moses, actually existed in time. Myths do not exist in time. Additionally, Jude describes the prophecy of Enoch, a man who lived in the seventh generation from Adam. Enoch, living seven generations from Adam indicates that Jude believed in a historical Adam.

Jesus Christ Himself gives us the clear indication that he believed in the historical account of Adam and Eve in the garden. Jesus’ view that divorce was not permissible under just any circumstances and that those who ignored those circumstances and remarried were committing adultery is grounded on His understanding of the historical creation account of Adam and Eve. We see this in Matt. 19:1-12. Jesus said that God created male and female from the beginning and that man would leave his father and mother and cleave to his wife. Jesus’ reference is clear: Adam and Eve. The ground for biblical marriage is anchored in the historical reality of our first parents, Adam and Eve.

It is here that I believe Dan and his anonymous friend find their philosophy threatened by Scripture and therefore, insist that Genesis is myth. Dan attends a gay church over in Kentucky. These secessionists have left the Christian Church because they do not like the Christian ethic. In particular, they do not like the sexual ethic expressed in traditional Christianity that condemns any and all sex outside of biblical marriage and that includes gay sex in all forms. As a result, Dan is highly motivated to find a loophole around the historical Adam. And so he does. All the evidence above is dismissed and replaced with this: Genesis sort of sounds like other myths in how the sentences are put together, so it must be myth too. That is the extent of the evidence offered up by Dan and his pal anonymous.

Christians have to realize the men are not argued into believing that the Bible is literally the very Word of God, given to us supernaturally through the prophets of God and the apostles of Christ and their very close associates. This belief is not a scientific belief. It is not a belief that is the product of unaided human reason. Men do not examine the claim that the Bible is the Word of God by use of autonomous human reason, scientific investigation, and historic and rational argumentation, only then to embrace it as it truly is. Men can only embrace the divine word, as it is by faith alone. This is not to say that there is no rational defense for Scripture. There most certainly is and I make that defense often. But the rational defense and argument for Scripture rests upon the presuppositions of Christian faith. If we are to argue for Scripture, then our argument must be faithful to Scripture. How clumsy it is to abandon Scripture in our attempt to argue for Scripture. But men do this more often than not. We do not only end with Scripture, but we also begin with Scripture. The only way to defend Scripture while being faithful to Scripture is to begin with Scripture, and to argue from Scripture, and to end with Scripture. Someone will ask what is our evidence for our belief about Scripture as if we must have something external to Scripture in order to get to our starting position on Scripture. This is a mistake. Our evidence for Scripture is Scripture. Our understanding of Scripture, or the nature of Scripture, is informed by Scripture through the work of the Holy Spirit. And this fact, that the Holy Spirit is necessary to understand the nature of Scripture, is highly offensive to the autonomous man. He (men like Dan) insists that our criteria for our view of Scripture not only come from someplace other than Scripture, but also that it find commendations from men like him. To this we say, “For the word of God is living and active and sharper than any two-edged sword, and piercing as far as the division of soul and spirit, of both joints and marrow, and able to judge the thoughts and intentions of the heart.” (Heb. 4:12)