As most of you are aware, this Sunday we will begin our series on the book of Genesis.  Though we haven't mapped it all out, we anticipate that it will take the bulk of 2009 for us to get through the book and cover all the themes, storylines, and theological truths that we believe God intends to show us in this first book of the Bible.

We also know that the book of Genesis can lead to many questions, and various theological perspectives can be found among those who love the Bible in answer to these sometimes tricky questions.  As you think through the stories of creation, the fall, the flood, etc, what are some of the questions that are most on your mind?  We hope to incorporate answers where we can to some of the pressing questions that may be on your hearts and minds as you've read through, or as your children have studied in home school or Christian school (or even secular college) about many of the things in here. We want to hear from you!  read more »

Thanks so much for the enthusiastic response to the beginning of our Genesis series! I've already begun receiving questions, some of which I will answer here today, and we look forward to receiving more from you as the questions come to your minds.  read more »

Following up on the message about the creation account in Genesis 1, as anticipated there have been many questions and comments, and so I will plan to make several blog attempts at responding to them.  Someone asked me what the goal was on Sunday in presenting the Framework position as our view on how to read the 7 creation days in Genesis 1.  The primary goal was simply to preach God’s Word faithfully as I’ve come to understand it.  That’s my primary task from the pulpit – to communicate God’s Word regardless of how others may respond.  A second goal was not primarily to persuade those who may come with a different perspective on the 7 days, but rather that those who have differing positions would be able to recognize that there is biblical validity in the other positions, and that this would not be a source of division.    read more »

Well... Here goes my first blog entry...

First I want to thank Kirk for all his hard work to educate and inform us through this medium.  I am so grateful for his study and scholarship and how hard he thinks about Scripture in order to serve the church.  I appreciated your post as well Tito and look forward to future contributions...

I also want to thank those of you who read this blog.  We hope it has served you, and would want to convey our respect to you for your desire to learn, which your participation in this format represents.

And one final commendation... We have been so blessed by all the discussion on our series through the book of Genesis.  Your commitment as a church to grasping the word of God has been so inspiring and invigorating.  Your questions have been excellent and we encourage you to keep asking them...

To that end, I want to try to answer some of them...  read more »

As promised, I wanted to provide a few more thoughts on why I hold to the Framework view, partly in response to questions I’ve received, and partly because of other clarifying thoughts that I hope will be helpful.

Two of the strengths of the 24 hour, 7 day view of the Genesis account are as follows:

1.    It seems to be the most straightforward reading of the passage, particularly with the use of the word “day”, and the phrase “there was evening and morning, the ___ day.”  That would make it appear that the most natural reading of this text is to take it as normal 24 hour days.
2.    The fourth commandment in Exodus 20 says that we are to observe the Sabbath because in 6 days God created the heavens and the earth and rested on the 7th day, and therefore establishes that those 6 days were more than just literary devices.  read more »