Then the LORD God said, "It is not good for the man to be alone. I will make a helper who is like him." Genesis 2:18
This verse speaks to me and is the beginning of next weeks sermon! Rebecca and Cason went to Greenwood yesterday and I stayed here in Edgefield. So, I got some work done and went Mountain biking. Well, after about 10 miles, I was zooming downhill at about 16 mph, when I came to an abrupt stop as I hit a tree. Don't ask what happened, because if I knew, I would have not hit the tree! My wrist hurts, my shoulder does not feel great, but my bike is really jacked up. Both rims are way out of true and I and the bike will need a tune up before I can ride again. Thank God for the nice man who picked me up and drove me the six miles back to the trail head as I was not looking forward to the long walk. So, not good for me to be alone!
The age of the earth and questions about dinosaurs are very common. There is a broad difference between 10,000 years and 14 Billion years. It is very common in some conservative circles to make the age of the earth a divisive issue. If some one believes in an old earth they are liberals and heretics, but this should not be the case. Plainly stated Moses and God are not concerned about telling when the earth was created, but they are very concerned with conveying copious amounts of information about whom that Creator is. I personally am open minded and critical of both positions and I am still seeking God's guidance on the matter.
So, in hopes of finding more information on the subject, I read and am rereading A Biblical Case for an Old Earth by David Snoke. Snoke spends some time with the scientific arguments for an old earth, which he summarizes quite well. These include arguments from starlight, from magnetic domains on the ocean floor, and from other phenomena on Earth showing the passage of time. He also spends some time showing how flood geology will not account for the geological layers we observe. I liked this book quite a bit, and it challenged many of my assumptions about creation, sin and death. The crux of his Biblical argument is that very good creation of Genesis contained both positive, helpful, parts, and dark, dangerous parts. He argues this by explaining the place of the "sea" and "sea monsters" in Hebrew biblical thought which is neglected by most and crucial to understanding Genesis.
He also deals very nicely with the "appearance of age" theory (that God created the earth with the appearance of age). He agress that God created Adam miraculously with a 30-year-old body. That would make sense because in order to exist, Adam had to exist at some stage of physical maturity. But, he argues that it does not seem plausible that God would create the universe with the appearance of huge numbers of specific prehistoric events, from supernovae down to the life and death of individual animals.
The best part of this book was that Snoke attempts to make a Biblical case. I am fairly ignorant when it comes to science, but competent when it comes to Scriptures. I found most of his exegesis refreshing and seemingly accurate. He is PCA and very conservative. He completely denies evolution, holds to a literal Adam & Eve. This is a worthwhile read, but it takes time to consume and digest his ideas, which are new to me. I appreciated the headache the book gave me, and the book gave me much food for thought.
Share each other’s burdens, and in this way obey the law of Christ.
Galatians 6:2
On Friday, September 5th Cherril Turner took a little jump out a trailer and severely broke her leg. It required surgery, and it is going to require 3 to 4 months of no weight being placed on it. Not an easy task for one person or even for her and Chris, her husband, to handle. Getting out of the house and trying to carry someone who has a majorly broken leg down steps is not easy for anyone involved. But, Chris and Cherril are part of the body of Christ. You see Paul tells us in the above verse, that when one part of the body is hurting, we all hurt. We must all do our part to try and help alleviate that burden. This is a beautiful design God has for the world, but is sadly seldom followed. Well, it was followed on last Friday Night as the Brotherhood here at Antioch went over to Chris and Cherril's house built them a wheelchair ramp. It only took a few hours of time because everyone did their part and worked great together. I love seeing the church do what it is meant to do! Please be in prayer for Cherril and Chris, her leg is healing and Chris is a decent nurse from what I hear!
A big part of being Pastor of Antioch Baptist Church is visitation. This to me just means getting to hang out with people. Sometimes it is sick people at home or in the hospital. Other times it is seniors who just love to see my son Cason more than me (that is probably true for all people though). It may be ball games or dance performances for kids in the church. But, I get to see people, who for the most part look forward to seeing you. I get to be blessing to them, and they almost always are a blessing to me in return. I was told by a wise pastor, "If you are going to be a shepherd, you better smell like your sheep." Great advice! Now, I once new a pastor who named his boat "Visitation" so when people called the church the secretary would tell them "the pastor is out on visitation." Now, I don't have a boat, but I do love getting the privilege to be apart of some many wonderful people's lives here at Antioch.
Proud To The Pastor Of Antioch Baptist Church! Pastor Phillip
They told me when I was young that girls were made of sugar, spice, and everything nice. This seemed right to me back then and still does today. I was also told told that boys were made of spiders, snails and puppy dog tails (the puppy dog tail part sill is pretty freaky to tell a small child) . But, I have been studying Genesis 2:4-17 for Sunday Morning sermon and came across what we are supposedly made out of.
The physical makeup of the human body is 58 lbs. oxygen, 50 qts. Water, 2 ounces salt, 31 lbs. calcium, 24lbs. carbon, Some chlorine, phosphorus, fat, iron, sulfur and glycerin.
He then noted that having the ingredients alone is not enough. Instructions are needed. But, even if we had the instructions the complexity of the details of such an undertaking would make it impossible for one human being to make another human being. He said that
A mere piece of skin the size of a postage stamp requires three million cells; a yard of blood vessels, four yards of nerves; one hundred sweat glands, fifteen oil glands, and twenty-five nerve endings.
Dr. Mayo of the Mayo Clinic has a humorous way of putting it.
He said, "you would need enough potassium for one shot of a toy pistol, enough fat for seven bars of soap, enough iron for one large nail, enough sulfur to delouse a dog, enough lime to whitewash a chicken coop, enough magnesia for one dose of medicine, and enough phosphorous for a few boxes of matches. The total amount of all these items would not fill more than a couple of grocery sacks.
I also found this more scientific and detailed breakdown as well.
Oxygen
65%
Sulfur
0.3
Carbon
18.5
Sodium
0.2
Hydrogen
9.5
Chlorine
0.2
Nitrogen
3.2
Magnesium
0.1
Calcium
1.5
Iodine
0.1
Phosphorous
1.0
Iron
0.1
Potassium
0.4
Everything else
0.1
“Everything else” is aluminum, boron, chromium, cobalt, copper, fluorine, manganese, molydenum, selenium, silicon, tin, vanadium, and zinc.
See, my point is that we are not worth much with God. Jesus said in John 15:5 "apart from me you can do nothing!" But, with Jesus says in John 10:10 "I have come that you may have life and life abundantly!"
Glad that our lives are more than chemical processes, Pastor Phillip
I was brought to literal tears today as I watched Hannity and Colmes on my DVR. They interviewed Gianna Jessen. She was born as the result of a failed saline abortion at 7 1/2 months (Some pro-abortion people have claimed she is lying, but the birth record is posted here as well). She was found by the nurse dying and taken to a hospital and was saved. But, if Obama had his way, she would have had to be killed by the attending physcian (if you can call an abortion practioner that) all in the name of a woman's right to chose to kill her own baby. This is unthinkable, please pray for our nation during this election. The top video is an ad for Jill's website and the bottom video is the actual interview from Hannity and Colmes. Also check out her website bornalivetruth.com and for infomation you can seewww.jillstanek.com.
Make sure that you head over to the Antioch Baptist Church website to see and read about our youth in article written by the Mission Lab at New Orleans Baptist Theological Seminary. You will also get to see pictures of our very own Paige Eubanks and Lisa Turner hard at work. I wonder why was there no picture of any of the guys who went hard at work? I don't know, but you can ask them if you come out the dinner Wednesday evening at 6:30 and hear about their trip and all of the missions activities here at Antioch Baptist Church. I hope to see everyone there!
In studying Genesis 2:4-24 this morning, I was using a great resource by the name of "Recovering Biblical Manhood & Womanhood." It is very broad and solidly Biblical in its scope. You can check it out for free online here. Another wonderful website to check out if you are interested in knowing Biblical roles and understanding of men, women, and the family is Evangelical Feminism and Biblical Truth. The website sounds boring, but this answers 100 of the top questions concerning gender in the church and home. I hope you are excited about the book of Genesis and being praying for an awesome Sunday morning at Antioch Baptist Church!
Got A Stack Of Genesis Commentaries Three Feet High To Study Before Sunday, Pastor Phillip
Here are some great pictures of Cason. Rebecca and I do not take enough pictures of him. We just love playing with him so much, we forget about the camera.
I love buying Bibles and I just got a new one in the mail last week. It is the New Living Translation Study Bible. The New Living Translation is a good reading translation and the Editorial & Study Note Contributors were very impressive scholars, so I bought it. You can check it out for free online free for 30 days here. I have been impressed, they have as their goal to goal to help scripture to speak for it's self and not bring in theological or denominational bias. Of course I have not read the whole thing, but I have the Book of Zephaniah in it, as well as Philippians and have been impressed. The Introductions to the books are some of the most concise and helpful I have ever read. This study Bible is big, Cason picked it up and said "Heaby!" But, it would a nice aid to anyone with their everyday reading of Scripture. I am going to pass along a more detail review of the review from B. Stan Mccullars, Jr..
Introduction to the NLT Study Bible In the Introduction, there is a NLT Study Bible Features Guide. There is also a six page Master Timeline which covers the historical period from creation to approximately AD 330. The timeline is quite detailed and gives an overview of what was happening during the periods covered by books of the Bible. Not only does it list the Kings of Israel and Judah, but it also covers the kings of Assyria, Babylonia, Media-Persia and Rome.
The introduction also includes a list of NLT Study Bible Contributors. I'm no scholar and my library is limited, but several names managed to catch my eye: Daniel Block, Tremper Longman III, John Oswalt, Grant Osborne, Robert Stein, Mark Strauss, Douglas Moo, Sean Harrison and Philip Comfort.
Book and Section Introductions The book introductions cover the usual Setting, Summary, Authorship, Setting and Date information to be found in most Study Bibles. There are several features of the Book Introductions which stood out to me as special. Each book introduction includes a map showing the geographic region covered in the book. There is a timeline for each book.
As in most Study Bibles, there is an Outline. The NLT Study Bible takes the Outline a step or two further than most in that it is a running outline. I have found this to be a very helpful feature. To quote from the Features Guide:
"Each book includes an outline with up to three levels of headings. In the introduction, we provide the first level of the outline to give the reader an overview. The full outline is embedded in the NLT text as running headings."
The Book Introductions also include a Further Reading section which has book recommendations for further study. In skimming the recommendations from several introductions, the books seem to be solid. I even own several of them so of course I like the lists.
In addition to the Book Introductions, there are Section Introductions. These include:
Old Testament The Pentateuch Historical Books Books of Poetry and Wisdom Books of the Prophets New Testament The Four Gospels Letters of Paul Paul's Letters to Timothy and Titus
There are also other informative articles of an introductory or chronological nature throughout, including:
Archaeology and Sources for OT Background Abraham to Joshua Time of the Judges Israel's Monarch Israel's Exile and Return Life of Jesus Harmony of the Four Gospels Apostolic Age Time After the Apostles
Miscellaneous Features in the Text Scattered throughout the text are numerous helpful features including additional maps, genealogies, additional timelines, various charts and illustrations. You have to really try hard to get lost in this Study Bible. They keep everything pretty close at hand.
I have found the notes to be surprisingly relevant to the text. I say "surprisingly" because in other Study Bibles it seems that a rather large percentage of notes seem to be more filler than helpful. The notes in this Bible have been more consistently helpful to me personally.
Theme Notes and Person Profiles Throughout the text there are notes regarding important themes and people. For instance, looking in the Gospel According to John there are numerous notes and profiles including:
The Word John the Baptist Miraculous Signs Nicodemus Believing Living Water The Jewish Leaders That gets me through chapter 5.
Cross-References I have found the cross-references to be more useful than that of most other Bibles. The references appear to be more consistently related to the idea of the verse rather than an individual word which is what was claimed in the introduction. Using them I have found it to be true. Parallel passages are clearly marked with parallel lines(//). Verses in the New Testament which are quotes of the Old Testament are marked with an asterisk (*).
Word Study System Located within the cross-reference column are references to the Hebrew and Greek dictionaries in the back of the Study Bible. They are referenced to the Strong's Concordance numbers. The dictionaries include 100 Hebrew words and 100 Greek words. I wish there were more words included but I also want to be able to carry the NLT Study Bible without throwing out my back if you know what I mean. I would consider the words included to be rather significant, relatively speaking. The definitions are fairly broad in scope and at the end of each definition are a list of Biblical references where the words can be found. This has been a favorite, and helpful, feature of mine.
Subject Index Following the Hebrew/Greek dictionaries in the back of the back there is a very comprehensive Subject Index which takes up 142 pages, slightly less than the TNIV Study Bible's Topics Index and Notes Index combined.
Dictionary / Concordance The Dictionary/Concordance may be another favorite. Not only is it a concordance but it actually does contain definitions of many of the words, words from the KJV are so marked to aid someone (wisely) transitioning to the NLT, and brief biographical sketches of people.
Maps In addition to the maps in the Introductions and in the text, there is a good collection of maps at the end of the Study Bible. There is no index included. However, given the other maps mentioned having an index in the back might be overkill. While I appreciate the inclusion of the extra maps in the back, I find myself using the Introduction and in text maps far more frequently as I find them much more convenient.
Concluding Remarks Overall, I have found the NLT Study Bible to be an exceptional work. Beyond overall, each individual part of the work has truly impressed me. Perhaps I'm biased. When it was first announced and the features were listed on the NLT Study Bible website it seemed to me that someone had been reading my mind as to what features I had always wanted. It's almost like we were made for each other.
I give the NLT Study Bible my most enthusiastic endorsement and gladly recommend it to all.
Buy more Bibles, but most importantly read your Bible everyday! Love it, enjoy it, wear them out! Got to get ready to Go Preach, Pastor Phillip
Also, I will be getting the ESV Study Bible on October 15 as well!
