Does The Gospel Rest on Direct Creation?

[Greg]

@AllenWitmerMiller

In my previous post I failed to rebut this rather surprising claim:

Greg:

God as the direct Creator is the foundation upon which all other Christian theology including the gospel rests!

No. Not at all. Putting aside for the moment that most would argue that the risen Jesus Christ is the foundation upon which the Gospel rests, I must emphasize this fact:

The Bible provides few details about “direct creating” versus “indirect creating”.

Greg, do you think God directly creates each human? Or did God create the material universe and the laws of physics and chemistry which led to the processes of biology such that human males and females together produce each new human being?

Does God create each rainstorm directly ?

Have you considered that God is so omniscient and omnipotent that he could have “directly created” the Big Bang (and thereby all laws of physics with it) so that everything else we observe in his creation naturally arose from it? That would make every atom, every rock, every heavenly body, and every living thing an “indirect” creation of God, wouldn’t it? Would that be a heretical thought under your viewpoint? (Could it be that you limit God and have a deity concept which is far too small?)

I would say that God is both a “direct” and “indirect” Creator—if indeed such a distinction is even all that important. In any case, whether God is solely a “direct Creator” (and never an indirect one) is NOT “the foundation upon which all other Christian theology including the gospel rests!”

I will admit, however, that your view would have fit in extremely well in ancient times when many people assumed that each and every lightning bolt was a “direct creation” of God, and usually also with some sort of judgment purpose (or at least an expression of his anger about something humans had done.)

I don’t believe for a moment that distinctions of direct versus indirect creation are at all the foundation upon which the Gospel of Jesus Christ rests. Indeed, I find the claim quite disturbing—though I nevertheless have said so peacefully. I am also quite willing to be “tolerant” towards your opinion being expressed here on this forum, even though I consider it unscriptural.

You are right that Jesus is the centerpiece of the gospel. But Jesus is also the centerpiece before man existed too. My point in declaring that the creation account is the foundation upon which the gospel is to be made sense of is this: without the fall of man and the introduction of sin, the gospel cannot be truly comprehended in its value. And in Colossians, paul speaks of Christ as our Creator. With this, the heinousness of sin against a Holy God can only be forgiven by a sacrifice of enough worth to bring justice before this Holy God because He is just that great. Therefore, the sacrifice necessary was Himself who, according to Paul is Jesus Christ “through whom and for whom everything is made.” The gift of the gospel is not a free ticket to heaven. The gift is God Himself who was worthy before man was in the scene.

I challenge you to review the mormon interpretation of early Genesis. Their gospel is not Christian so interestingly their interpretation of Genesis is just downright aweful thus conforming to their false gospel. Check for yourself.

The gospel is NOT a psychological excercise for evolving good people to their better selves. The gospel is about Jesus (who created us in the first place) recreating people who are spiritually dead in sin into life THE INSTANT THEY CHOOSE TO LOOK TO THE CROSS FOR THE FORGIVENESS OF SIN AND GIVING KING JESUS RIGHTFUL PLACE AS LORD. In the beginning God the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit created kinds, including man instantly. Adam sinned and the Better Adam (Jesus) gives man a new beginning instantly the moment we place our faith in Him! That is goodnews.

They say that if you are looking for a perfect church and you find one, if you join that church you will ruin it! I have made a muck of things in so much of my life even as a believer. Just as there is no perfect church, so there are no perfect parachurches. Groups like Answers in Genesis included. I know quite a few individuals from AIG and they are superbly intelligent, serious about the gospel and Christian tbeology and perhaps some of the most caring people i know. Has AIG done everything right? No. None of us are perfect. But i believe that they have resources worthy of being given attention which many closely tethered to the mainstream are just not willing to listen to. I just read this article for example which seems to offer seeds of doubt about the ancient earth evolutionary claims…i have a hunch that when we arrive through those pearly gates, some of us might be really surprised who was more in line with how God did things and maybe, just maybe guys like Dr. Kurt Wise and even the young earth guys at AIG are amongst the approved crowd…here is a link to an interesting article by one of my favorite young earth scientists on the planet:

“One year of Replacing Darwin: What have we learned?”