Dale Partridge - An Introduction to Genesis

00:00:00.000 Well, if you are new here, we planted this church on the book of Romans, and by God's

00:00:12.140 grace I was able to deliver 124 sermons on the book of Romans, from chapter 1 all the

00:00:20.520 way through 16, and today marks the beginning of a new book.

00:00:25.860 Now, we are not going to be going through Genesis 1 through 50,

00:00:30.660 but we will be spending about six months going through the book of Genesis.

00:00:35.540 And I expect that you will understand the vital importance of having a theology around Genesis as we get through it today.

00:00:45.880 Now, I'm not adopted, but I know several friends, even a few pastors who are.

00:00:51.600 and they've shared with me how difficult it can truly be to not have a connection

00:00:57.820 with their parents or with their family lineage. There's something deeply grounding about

00:01:05.080 understanding your history, about understanding where you came from. For the past few years,

00:01:11.520 I've been tracing my own family roots. In fact, I've used a handful of websites and I've got our

00:01:16.540 family back to the 1600s over in Europe. And learning about my ancestors has been really

00:01:24.140 eye-opening for our family and for me personally. It explains where our family came from. It

00:01:29.820 explains how we got to America. It explains the type of culture that our family was

00:01:34.860 forged in. And it's been very helpful and just fascinating as a man, as I'm trying to hand down

00:01:43.760 some of that lineage to my children. Now, the book of Genesis offers us something even greater

00:01:50.500 than that. It offers us not just a glimpse into our family origin, but to the origin of humanity.

00:01:57.880 It is probably answering the most important questions that exist on earth. The book of

00:02:03.920 Genesis is really, well, I'll say this. I realized during my study of Genesis that

00:02:13.600 most of life's difficult questions, not all, but the vast majority of life's difficult questions

00:02:24.020 and the confusion that is so prevalent in our world can be traced back to a misunderstanding

00:02:30.400 or an ignorance of the content of the book of Genesis. It is that vital. The Puritan pastor,

00:02:38.520 Stephen Charnook, once said, he that mishappriends his origin will misapply the remedy for his pain.

00:02:48.020 In other words, you cannot have a remedy without identity. It's very difficult to understand the

00:02:56.200 remedy without having some form of identity. You need to understand where you are in order to fix

00:03:02.660 where you might want to be. And what I mean by that is that true understanding comes by looking

00:03:13.700 back to our beginnings. There is something deeply powerful that we will see there today. Now, this

00:03:19.940 is not just some sort of human idea. Hey, let's go back and check out our roots. Let's try to figure

00:03:24.500 out what's happened in the last hundred years. Again, in America, we have kind of a shallow view

00:03:29.680 here because we're only a couple hundred years old. When you go to Europe, you have more lineages

00:03:34.640 that can be traced back even to the 1200s or the 1100s. You go back into Jewish culture and you 0.90

00:03:41.760 have cultures that can pull you back even into the first century. It's pretty amazing. But the 0.99

00:03:46.540 prophet Isaiah exhorted God's people and he said in Isaiah 51, one through two, he says, this is

00:03:51.860 the Lord speaking through Isaiah says, look to the rock from which you were hewn and to the quarry

00:03:58.760 which you were dug. Look to Abraham, your father, and to Sarah who bore you. So again, it's this

00:04:05.180 reminder to look back. Where did you come from? Identity is very important in the Christian life.

00:04:15.060 Now, even the title of Genesis, it points us in this direction. The Hebrew word for Genesis,

00:04:21.100 just translates to in the beginning.

00:04:24.740 The Hebrew word literally means in the beginning.

00:04:28.020 That's what you would see in Hebrew.

00:04:29.960 It's Bereshith.

00:04:30.900 And the English word Genesis,

00:04:32.960 it comes to us by way of the Septuagint.

00:04:35.460 The Septuagint is the Greek translation

00:04:39.260 of the Old Testament scriptures.

00:04:42.300 And then you get the Latin Vulgate

00:04:44.500 and you get the word Genesis,

00:04:46.980 which just again means origin.

00:04:49.080 It's just the beginnings.

00:04:50.660 That's what that means.

00:04:52.580 So Genesis really is the book of beginnings.

00:04:55.780 It's the beginning of the cosmos.

00:04:57.740 It's the beginning of humanity.

00:05:00.080 It's the beginning of covenants with God.

00:05:02.420 It's the beginning of marriage.

00:05:03.940 It's the beginning of sin.

00:05:05.380 It's the beginning of redemption.

00:05:06.900 It's the beginning of the church's origin.

00:05:08.720 It's the beginning of all of these vital things.

00:05:12.120 what's beautiful about it is it unfolds kind of like a genealogy we're going to see this as we go

00:05:24.760 through it over the coming months but it moves through history as like the history of heaven and

00:05:30.600 earth the history of adam and eve the history of noah and then it starts working through shem and

00:05:37.040 Terah and then Abraham and then Isaac and Ishmael and Jacob and Esau and Joseph. And it ends the

00:05:43.440 book with this beautiful story of Joseph transferring or pushing these people into

00:05:50.080 Egypt, which obviously goes into the Exodus narrative. Now, Genesis is the first of five

00:05:57.680 books in what's called the Pentateuch. Now, the Pentateuch is just a Latin word that we have for

00:06:04.620 the five scrolls. It's got some, obviously some Hebrew origins and the way that it was actually

00:06:10.180 said, but Genesis sets the stage for all that follows between Exodus and Deuteronomy. So you

00:06:17.260 have these five books and Genesis sets the stage to understand Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers, and

00:06:23.760 Deuteronomy. You cannot read that nor the rest of the Bible without understanding the context

00:06:29.400 of Genesis. Now, one thing that's really important to know is that the Pentateuch is unique in that

00:06:38.680 every book ends where the next one begins. And so it really is a historical narrative

00:06:46.340 that flows into the other. So it essentially, at the end of Genesis, it leaves off and begins in

00:06:54.040 the start of Exodus around the same time frame. And so it's really to be read as one narrative.

00:07:00.940 Now, the scope of Genesis is absolutely massive. It's massive. It spans nearly 2,400 years.

00:07:11.080 Now, I'm going to give you some perspective here. So 2,400 years from Adam to Joseph,

00:07:18.660 from chapter 1 to chapter 50. Now, this is incredible because Exodus, Leviticus,

00:07:28.200 Numbers, and Deuteronomy only span 120 years. Okay, so to give you a little bit of context,

00:07:34.220 so you go, wow, okay, 2,400 years and then 120 years. And really, it's only talking about 40

00:07:39.720 years. It's just 120 just because Moses' lifespan is 120 years old. Now, what this tells us is that

00:07:47.860 Genesis is foundational for the rest of Israel's story and the rest of the biblical narrative.

00:07:56.000 And so, again, we're not Baptists, so we're not going to be thinking, or we're not dispensationalists,

00:08:02.420 we're thinking in the way that the early church has not started at Pentecost. The early church

00:08:08.260 has started in Genesis chapter 4, when you see Adam and Eve start praying to the Lord in faith.

00:08:17.160 And so we believe that the Old Testament saints are saved by grace through faith in Christ.

00:08:23.320 That they are looking forward to the Christ to come.

00:08:27.980 While we are looking backward to the Christ who came, that we are looking at those Old Testament saints.

00:08:33.740 You know, we have Adam and then we have Abraham and Noah and all of these people are part of the church.

00:08:39.900 Now we, as American Christians, as Gentiles, which is the Greek word for nations,

00:08:45.620 we have been grafted in to that true Israel, the Israel that actually had faith. So the truth is, 0.58

00:08:52.280 when this talks about Israel's story, if you trace it back, this actually is your story.

00:08:57.260 How did the church begin? Well, it began here, and we're going to learn about that over the coming

00:09:04.320 months. And so we have, again, we have, give you a little bit of a timeline here. We have 2,000

00:09:12.660 years or so that pass from Adam to Abraham, another 300 years from Abraham to Joseph,

00:09:21.980 another 300 years from Joseph to Moses. That gives you a little bit of a timeline.

00:09:27.460 And so from Adam to Joseph, you have again about 23, 2400 years, give or take. Now from Joseph

00:09:34.960 to today, you have about 3,800 years. And what that tells us is that the timeline of humanity's

00:09:46.260 existence is around 6,100 years. That's what we see here. And what that means is that this one

00:09:56.920 book right here is about 40% of all human history. Okay. Half of your Bible, almost half of your

00:10:07.320 Bible is right here. Half of biblical history. The other 60% is right here. It's an amazing reality

00:10:15.360 when you realize how much content and how much time is pushed in to Genesis, the first book of

00:10:24.440 the Bible. So to ignore Genesis is to lose the key of who you are. You cannot read the Bible

00:10:32.520 properly without understanding the book of Genesis. Now, by God's grace, we know the apostles

00:10:38.040 pull in Genesis. We know Jesus pulls in Genesis so that if you might stumble upon Romans or John,

00:10:45.600 yes, could you be saved? Certainly. But the reality is if you want to have a systematic theology,

00:10:50.140 You want to understand how the Bible works, the redemption of man.

00:10:53.840 You cannot do so without understanding Genesis all the way to Revelation.

00:11:00.160 Now, as for the authorship, the historic view is a Mosaic authorship.

00:11:05.920 It means that we believe that Moses authored the Pentateuch.

00:11:09.340 This is the position of Calvin and Luther and the Puritans. 0.88

00:11:12.280 More modern folks might be R.C. Sproul and Martin Lloyd-Jones.

00:11:15.260 but it was Moses that wrote the book of Genesis and we have two categories which is called

00:11:22.460 essential or substantial mosaic authorship now why do we have that well because the end of

00:11:31.520 Deuteronomy chapter 34 records Moses's death and you go well who the heck wrote that who wrote

00:11:38.240 about Moses well if he wrote Moses's death did he write anything else in the Pentateuch no the

00:11:45.160 reality is, is that the vast majority of the Pentateuch is written by Moses. And I'm going

00:11:50.860 to give you a few reasons to understand this. Throughout the Pentateuch, we repeatedly see

00:11:57.640 God speaking directly to Moses. Deuteronomy actually opens up with the words in Deuteronomy

00:12:06.340 1.1. These are the words that Moses spoke to all Israel. And so we start to see this highly

00:12:13.700 integrated Mosaic authorship. Now, it's more obvious that Moses wrote Exodus and Leviticus

00:12:21.400 and Numbers and Deuteronomy. It's pretty clear. But what about Genesis? Because Genesis doesn't

00:12:26.840 actually give us explicitly who authored that particular book. Now, as I told you before,

00:12:34.020 these are a narrative that weave together. In fact, at the very end of Genesis and the beginning

00:12:42.360 of Exodus, it was actually originally delivered as one unit. It was actually divided by one

00:12:49.760 conjunction in Hebrew, the word and or of, and that word right there is shows that it's just

00:12:57.700 one narrative. So if we have Exodus as a Mosaic authorship, then we can rightly assume that we

00:13:05.180 have Genesis as a Mosaic authorship because they are originally together. In fact, they flow

00:13:10.780 together, you can even do it without breaking sentence. But we have done that to put them in

00:13:17.080 different books canonically. Now, the original, well, I'll say this, the rest of Scripture also

00:13:27.860 affirms Moses's authorship. We see this in Joshua, as he constantly calls it, you know, the law of

00:13:36.180 Moses. The New Testament has the same conviction. Jesus says, if you believed Moses, you would

00:13:42.380 believe me, for he wrote about me. So there you start to get some powerful biblical theological

00:13:49.900 or systematic affirmation of Mosaic authorship. Mark 12, 26, Jesus refers to the book of Exodus,

00:13:57.920 And he calls it the book of Moses.

00:14:01.300 John 7, 22, he says, Moses gave you circumcision.

00:14:06.800 Well, circumcision was delivered where?

00:14:08.800 In Genesis.

00:14:10.400 And so again, you start to patch this together and you get the mosaic of why scholars have landed firmly on Mosaic authorship.

00:14:22.360 Genesis is 50 chapters long.

00:14:25.740 It's a long book.

00:14:26.580 and it naturally divides into two sections.

00:14:30.940 Chapters 1 through 11 and chapters 12 through 50.

00:14:34.320 That's really the breakdown of this book.

00:14:37.840 Chapters 1 through 11 tell the stories of the beginnings.

00:14:40.820 It's the beginnings of creation

00:14:42.020 and it's the beginnings of the fall and the flood 0.54

00:14:44.620 and the scattering of the nations.

00:14:47.320 This is called primeval history.

00:14:50.320 If you go to a scholar, they might call it antediluvian history.

00:14:55.200 It means before the flood.

00:14:58.220 Deluvian is deluge. 0.98

00:15:01.080 Deluge is the idea we have for the flood.

00:15:03.840 And so you'd antediluvian is prior to the flood.

00:15:06.940 What was life like prior to the flood of Noah?

00:15:11.240 And that's really what we're dealing with in chapters 1 through 11.

00:15:17.460 In chapter 10, it's worth noting.

00:15:20.780 10, 24, 11, 16 through 26

00:15:25.100 we see Abraham's fifth great grandfather

00:15:28.820 his name is Eber

00:15:31.240 and we know that

00:15:35.720 it shows that Abraham is a descendant of Eber

00:15:38.460 and in Genesis 14, 13

00:15:43.160 the term is used to call Abraham

00:15:47.100 and mean he's a descendant of Eber

00:15:51.180 Now, why is this important? Let me get here.

00:15:53.680 The word itself means one that's from beyond.

00:15:57.260 Likely beyond the Euphrates, likely beyond the river.

00:16:00.940 He is one from over there, is essentially what his name means.

00:16:05.200 He's crossing over from Mesopotamia into Canaan.

00:16:11.360 That's really what we start to see when we study that.

00:16:13.880 But Eber is important because it's where we get the name Hebrews.

00:16:19.180 It's where we get the name Hebrews.

00:16:21.580 It's why they are identified as Hebrews.

00:16:25.220 Again, which are a people that are set apart and they are called from beyond, called from beyond the river.

00:16:32.080 That is really that historic route to help us understand some of our origins.

00:16:37.100 Again, imagine being Hebrew and understanding a little bit of that history.

00:16:40.060 Oh, that's helpful.

00:16:42.340 That's helpful.

00:16:43.420 And again, I always say we are often, we need to realize that we are true Israelites.

00:16:47.980 We are spiritual Israelites.

00:16:49.360 We are those that are truly the sons and daughters of Abraham.

00:16:54.240 I always sing the little Sunday school song.

00:16:56.760 Father Abraham had many sons.

00:16:58.920 Many sons had Father Abraham.

00:17:01.300 Right?

00:17:01.640 We sing that.

00:17:02.820 I am one of them and so are you.

00:17:05.140 Okay, that is true.

00:17:07.120 Now, how are we sons and daughters of Abraham?

00:17:11.120 Because we are sons and daughters by faith.

00:17:15.340 We are by faith.

00:17:17.780 The children, the true children of Abraham.

00:17:20.080 So we are, in a sense, true Israelites.

00:17:27.040 Now, chapters 12 through 50, they shift to focus.

00:17:31.440 They shift to this kind of antediluvian, moving in to the focus of God's covenant people.

00:17:37.120 And it's the patriarchs.

00:17:38.200 It's Abraham, and it's Isaac, and it's Jacob.

00:17:41.600 That is the main narrative.

00:17:43.540 And then it shifts into Jacob's son, Joseph.

00:17:47.780 Ultimately, if you could break it down like this, the first section explains why the world needs redemption.

00:17:54.900 It's really chapters 1 through 11.

00:17:57.120 Why does it need redemption?

00:17:59.320 And chapters 12 through 50 show us how God will bring that redemption through his chosen people.

00:18:08.260 That's how you break it up at kind of a macro level for the book of Genesis.

00:18:13.840 Now, if I wanted to summarize the central themes of Genesis and I had to break them down into like five themes.

00:18:24.120 These are the categories that I break down and I'm going to give you a little bit of a introduction to each one of them.

00:18:29.800 Five of them would be creation, covenant, fall, redemption and sovereignty.

00:18:41.120 Those are the macro themes that we see in Genesis.

00:18:45.960 And you need to have those kind of at the foundation to read Genesis properly.

00:18:52.280 And so my plan over the coming six months to eight months is to really expand as we walk through a variety of these passages of Scripture and expand on these themes.

00:19:05.120 But today I'm just going to give you an introduction to each one of those themes that might be helpful.

00:19:09.900 And I think the last one will be the most helpful, as it is very practical for us.

00:19:15.660 But let's talk about creation.

00:19:18.480 Number one.

00:19:22.160 Many pagan cultures and religious, different religions,

00:19:27.520 they have a variety of what they call ancient creation myths.

00:19:33.800 You can find them all over the place.

00:19:35.480 But what sets apart the Bible's narrative of creation from the rest of these pagan religions narrative of creation is number one, is that the Genesis account is monotheistic.

00:19:52.460 It's one God who has sovereign power.

00:19:57.300 It's not a bunch of gods warring together and they brought humanity into their chaos.

00:20:04.480 But it's one God who takes chaos and he brings it into order.

00:20:10.200 It is completely opposite of the other narratives that are out there.

00:20:14.660 now more than that this one god imposes a moral state in fact he says that after he makes all

00:20:24.780 that he has made he says and declares that it is good which is a very important point to remember

00:20:32.820 number two the genesis narrative carries extremely strong archaeological support

00:20:42.560 extremely strong archaeological support it reinforces the reliability that what you're

00:20:50.880 reading in genesis aligns with reality from the flood accounts to the ancient customs of the

00:20:57.160 geographic names of history uh ancient evidence consistently aligns with the biblical record in

00:21:02.380 fact there are two groups of archaeologists one that uses the bible and that those that don't

00:21:07.180 and and you you must use the scriptures if you want to get back to a particular time

00:21:12.080 in history. Now, within Christianity, there are four common views of creation.

00:21:17.760 Four common views of creation. Now, each of them unify around the essentials. All of them

00:21:23.880 believe that God created all things out of nothing, that creation is good, that humanity

00:21:29.640 is uniquely made in God's image, and that the earth or that humanity is approximately 6,000

00:21:36.420 years old. All of them agree on all of these points. Generally speaking, there are some fringe

00:21:41.580 views that we will talk about at another time. The difference lies in these four views on how

00:21:50.580 to interpret the days of creation, how to interpret the days of creation. So there's

00:21:56.780 really four views, and I'm going to just fire through them pretty quick. Number one is young

00:22:01.500 earth creationism, and that seeks to declare that there is essentially six literal days

00:22:09.300 and an earth that's about six to seven thousand years old the second view is old earth creationism

00:22:17.580 which is uh it interprets the days as ages and those ages could be any number of length of years

00:22:27.060 or millennia and it makes the age of the earth much older the analogical view of days is the

00:22:36.160 third view, and that view is that days are not 24-hour days, but they refer to the scripture

00:22:44.000 that to the Lord, a day is a thousand years, and a thousand years is a day, and essentially

00:22:49.960 those days may be, it's kind of similar to the ages view, but slightly different.

00:22:56.680 And number four, historical creationism, and this has actually been pretty popular the

00:23:01.460 last hundred years john piper actually holds this view genesis 1 1 describes the creation

00:23:07.700 of the universe the creation of the universe in genesis 1 1 and there's kind of a break right

00:23:13.980 there and the six days describe god preparing the land of humanity and so this allows again

00:23:21.720 for a large gap between the creation of the universe and the the 24-hour days of preparation

00:23:27.740 And so those are the common views that we see throughout most of Christianity and Christendom.

00:23:36.800 Again, there are fringe views, but roughly, I would say 95% of Christianity throughout time

00:23:43.120 has fallen within one of those four views or maybe slight variations thereof.

00:23:49.720 Now, personally, I hold to a young earth view.

00:23:52.600 Now, I will make some caveats and some clarity on that.

00:23:57.740 believing that essentially this is this is the the view that i hold while we have a young earth

00:24:03.860 i believe the lord created new matter with the appearance of age with the appearance of age

00:24:13.160 um for example and here's my part of my logic adam was created not as a he was created new

00:24:26.060 yet matured. He was created new yet with the appearance of age. He was not an infant when he

00:24:34.100 was created. He was brand new, but probably 30 years old. And so there's a sense where that

00:24:41.920 philosophy or that view translates into creation. God created brand new trees that if you cut them

00:24:49.740 open would say, oh, this tree is 250 years old. And so it is a new earth with the appearance

00:24:58.540 of age. And so if you grabbed a brand new rock and you cut it open and you tried to do

00:25:08.140 whatever particular scientific method to determine its age, what would it say? Well,

00:25:14.140 it's brand new, yet it has the appearance of age. And so the more important issue I'll say is this

00:25:22.940 around creation. This is the most important. It's not the earth's age. It's the age of humanity.

00:25:31.200 The age of humanity is the most important discussion around Genesis chapter one. Because

00:25:37.080 if we take the genealogies of scripture, genealogies are wonderful because they allow you to do math.

00:25:44.140 They allow you to do math.

00:25:46.200 If you take the genealogies of Scripture at face value,

00:25:49.520 history cannot exceed approximately 7,000 years.

00:25:53.960 It's somewhere between 6,000 and 7,000 years,

00:25:56.180 depending on who you're talking to.

00:25:57.680 But if you believe the genealogies of Scripture,

00:26:01.080 you end up with a human existence

00:26:03.780 of approximately 6,000 to 7,000 years.

00:26:07.320 In other words, the question of Earth's age is secondary.

00:26:12.460 It's secondary.

00:26:14.140 And honestly, I don't really care.

00:26:17.080 I don't care.

00:26:18.700 It's really inconsequential to the vast majority of Christian theology.

00:26:25.860 Now, if you're in with one of those views, those four views, again, there are fringe views.

00:26:30.560 There's evolutionary views.

00:26:31.480 There's all types of stuff that we need to talk about in another sermon.

00:26:34.380 But what truly matters is the biblical testimony to the relatively recent creation and existence of humanity.

00:26:40.400 Why is it so important?

00:26:41.580 because it fights against the atheistic idea of evolution.

00:26:47.080 It fights against the atheistic idea of evolution.

00:26:52.080 Wow, I wish I could keep talking, but I'm going to move on to number two, which is covenant.

00:26:56.440 Okay, so we talked about creation, and now we're going to talk about covenant.

00:27:01.400 Okay, in Genesis, it becomes clear that God deals with humanity through covenants. 0.94

00:27:08.920 you cannot understand the Christian life

00:27:12.940 if you don't understand covenant.

00:27:17.240 Now the word covenant is not explicitly used in the Garden of Eden

00:27:20.920 but we know that actually Adam entered into some sort of a covenant.

00:27:24.880 We call it a covenant of works. And how do we know that? Well because Hosea

00:27:28.580 chapter 6 verse 7 it says, it says, but like Adam

00:27:32.240 they transgressed the covenant.

00:27:36.180 there they dealt faithlessly with me end quote so as we work through genesis you have to understand

00:27:44.880 and i will point them out we will see the origin and structures of the covenant of grace

00:27:50.740 which we'll talk about in a minute as well as what i call covenant renewals

00:27:55.860 that you see with noah and abraham and isaac and jacob and then eventually moving on you know

00:28:03.780 through the judges and into david and then obviously into judah and into christ

00:28:08.040 and so this will essentially set the stage for the rest of scriptures number three

00:28:17.140 is the fall the fall if you don't understand the fall you won't understand the gospel

00:28:24.300 according to genesis god created everything and everything he created was good and

00:28:33.020 including man who was created in his image and man was good now as we know god gave adam

00:28:44.100 a singular command he didn't actually give it to adam and eve he gave it to adam alone

00:28:48.100 he gave this command to adam that he was not to eat from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil

00:28:54.240 for if he did the penalty would be death death now you must listen to what i'm about to say

00:29:04.340 because this is so important for your theology death in the bible is separation according to

00:29:12.220 scripture death is separation physical death is the separation of your body from your soul

00:29:18.340 In fact, we see this in Ecclesiastes 12.7, which describes the body returning to the dust and the soul returning to the Lord who gave it.

00:29:28.320 Physical death is the separation of your body from your soul.

00:29:32.960 But there is two deaths according to Scripture.

00:29:36.420 In fact, Revelation talks about the second death.

00:29:39.860 The second death is the separation of your soul from God.

00:29:45.080 the separation of your soul from God and so if you are alive it means that your body and your

00:29:54.160 soul so I'll say your body and your soul are together and your soul is connected to its life

00:30:00.480 source which is Christ but when you are separated from Christ this is why you are born dead this is

00:30:11.200 why you are born dead and you need to be what is called born again. You need to be made

00:30:17.660 alive. You need a spiritual resurrection because you are dead. You are born spiritually separated 0.98

00:30:26.020 from the Lord and you must be united to him. Isaiah 59 2 explains, actually I'm not going

00:30:39.200 to cite that passage i'm going to do ezekiel 18 20 it says the soul that sins against me shall

00:30:44.000 surely die and this is very important because the entire bible is based around the concept of death

00:30:52.080 and life death and life if you just think about jesus's words just for a minute how many times

00:30:59.700 he talked about life it's about death and it's about life that's what the bible is about

00:31:05.500 But, as we know, the serpent deceived Eve.

00:31:11.940 The serpent deceived Eve.

00:31:15.060 But Adam, who was the covenant head of humanity, he is the seed and root of humanity.

00:31:22.300 He's the representative of humanity.

00:31:25.840 Adam sinned willfully.

00:31:29.300 Adam was not deceived.

00:31:31.140 It was Eve who was deceived, as it says in the New Testament as well.

00:31:34.080 When Adam sinned, because he is the representative of humanity, he is the root.

00:31:38.660 Even Eve came from Adam.

00:31:40.600 Everybody comes from Adam.

00:31:43.560 In fact, it is so important to understand this because it is why it was so vital that Jesus didn't come from Adam.

00:31:52.020 Jesus came from the Holy Spirit to a virgin, not of the seed of Adam.

00:31:59.180 But he was born of a different seed, of the seed of the Holy Spirit.

00:32:03.620 He was a new humanity, a new Adam.

00:32:11.140 But when Adam sinned, he plunged not only himself into death,

00:32:17.080 but everybody that was born of him, which is including everyone in this room.

00:32:23.420 All of us died.

00:32:25.360 Imagine if a seed was broken.

00:32:29.080 Every branch, every leaf, every piece of bark that came from that seed

00:32:33.560 would also be broken and that is exactly what happened when adam fell you fell when adam fell

00:32:40.760 i fell when adam died you died and it's why romans 5 12 says therefore just as sin came into the world

00:32:50.020 through one man adam and death through sin and so death spread to all men because all sinned

00:32:58.500 And I would add, in Adam.

00:33:00.760 We all sinned in Adam.

00:33:02.360 In fact, you were there, genetically.

00:33:07.100 You were there, genetically, in Adam.

00:33:10.460 When Adam sinned, your genetics were there.

00:33:14.580 Because all people came from Adam and Eve, and we were there.

00:33:20.860 Now, we saw in the garden, immediately after they sinned, what happened?

00:33:28.500 what happened after they sinned well they died you go but but they still lived they they they

00:33:35.800 lived actually for hundreds of years no they actually began to age they began to return to

00:33:43.480 the dust in fact uh genesis uh 319 god says until you return to the ground

00:33:50.580 Before that, there was no returning to the ground.

00:33:55.460 Now you have sinned and the clock has begun.

00:33:59.660 You are now aging.

00:34:02.540 And you will return to dust.

00:34:06.300 And what's the second death?

00:34:08.680 Well, we saw the second death.

00:34:10.280 What happened to Adam and Eve?

00:34:11.560 If you look to the cover of your liturgy, you will see it.

00:34:15.880 Adam and Eve

00:34:18.000 are expelled

00:34:19.800 out of the garden

00:34:21.460 out of the presence of the Lord

00:34:24.800 they walked in union

00:34:26.960 with God and they are no

00:34:28.920 longer permitted 0.73

00:34:30.140 in the presence of the Lord

00:34:32.640 their bodies

00:34:35.100 began to separate from their souls

00:34:36.920 and their souls

00:34:38.520 were separated from the Lord

00:34:40.720 it. Without understanding the fall, you can't understand anything. You certainly can't understand

00:34:51.400 the gospel. The fall is about death, and the gospel is about life. And that's why Paul declares,

00:34:59.980 he says things like this, the righteous shall live by faith.

00:35:04.340 it's why jesus says i came that they might have life and have it abundantly

00:35:12.460 for god so loves the world that he gave his only begotten son that

00:35:16.820 whoever believes in him shall you know shall not die but have everlasting life

00:35:21.580 life first corinthians 15 22 says for as in adam all die so also in christ shall all me be made

00:35:32.620 alive this is the whole narrative it's death and life that's what we're dealing with here

00:35:41.800 all of these passages in the new testament that are speaking of life

00:35:49.260 they're calling back to genesis chapter 1 2 and 3 it's it's all one story

00:35:55.440 it's the idea that death came through adam and the greater life that only comes through christ

00:36:04.480 what's your greatest need to find life how do you find life to be found righteous how are you to be

00:36:13.700 found righteous you need an alien righteousness not of your own how do you receive that by faith

00:36:20.520 in Christ. This leads us to the fourth and vital claim of Genesis, which is redemption. Redemption.

00:36:31.920 So we got creation, we have covenant, we have fall, and now we're talking about redemption.

00:36:39.180 So right after the fall in Genesis 3, God pronounces consequences on the serpent, on Eve,

00:36:44.560 on Adam, and on the land. You see that right there in Genesis chapter 3. But in verse 15,

00:36:50.520 kind of within this curse that he's giving to the serpent

00:36:53.780 comes this vital promise.

00:36:58.520 You actually want to turn to Genesis chapter 3, verse 15.

00:37:04.280 Genesis chapter 3, verse 15.

00:37:06.860 I'll wait for you guys to get there.

00:37:07.900 Genesis chapter 3, verse 15.

00:37:20.520 it's in the middle, it's right here in the middle

00:37:25.300 of this curse to the serpent. 1.00

00:37:29.160 He says, and I will bring enmity between you and the woman

00:37:32.360 and between your seed and her seed. 0.98

00:37:34.060 He shall bruise your head and you shall bruise him on the heel.

00:37:42.760 What this tells us is that God declares that there will be some sort of battle

00:37:46.420 that runs throughout history.

00:37:49.060 There's going to be some battle that we should expect.

00:37:52.980 That those who belong to God are going to have enmity with those who belong to the serpent.

00:37:59.720 There's going to be some sort of war that's happening here. 0.56

00:38:03.080 In fact, this is actually why Jesus would say things like to the Pharisees,

00:38:06.860 you brood of vipers.

00:38:08.100 You know what a brood is, right? 1.00

00:38:08.960 It's just a bunch of baby snakes.

00:38:11.440 It's the children of snakes.

00:38:12.880 What does he say? 0.99

00:38:13.300 You are the children of your father, the devil, the serpent.

00:38:18.660 Do you think Jesus is making things up right now?

00:38:22.320 No, he's taking in connection the fact of Genesis 3.15

00:38:26.140 and he's saying, you are part of them.

00:38:30.800 And I am the serpent crusher.

00:38:36.980 All of this from Genesis to Revelation is deeply connected.

00:38:42.060 And so God goes further.

00:38:43.840 He promises that the woman's seed, the fruit of her womb,

00:38:48.660 The fruit of her womb will one day crush the serpent's head and even as the serpent strikes his heel. 0.86

00:38:59.120 It's a mortal wound versus a fleshly wound.

00:39:02.600 It's basically the theological interpretation there.

00:39:07.420 What this means is that there is hope of a future victory over the enemy who just deceived and killed Adam and Eve.

00:39:15.060 in fact if you read through we'll go through this at some point but right after they have

00:39:23.060 Cain and they have Abel and and then Cain kills Abel then they have Seth and and and Eve is is

00:39:28.760 waiting she's hoping that this next baby is going to be this promised serpent crusher that's going

00:39:33.940 to bring them back into the garden and it's actually the very first prayer in Genesis chapter

00:39:39.120 four is a prayer crying out to the Lord asking when when is this deliverer going to come

00:39:48.220 they have faith and they're asking when are you going to come and fulfill that promise that you

00:39:53.120 gave me is it this baby is it the next baby oh it's many babies away

00:39:58.740 but all of history is anticipating the birth of this child

00:40:06.720 it's why we celebrate christmas to remember the massive anticipation that was built up

00:40:15.800 for thousands of years waiting for god to fulfill the promise here in genesis 3 15 now genesis 3 15

00:40:25.640 is what's called the protovangelium and it's a latin word for first gospel it's the very first

00:40:31.960 time you see the gospel the framework of it at least it's in its embryonic state right here and

00:40:37.960 the first couple chapters and so right here you have god created everything good including man

00:40:44.180 in his image man's sins brings death into the world god promises deliverance victory over the

00:40:50.760 one who brought death and hope of life restored all right there genesis chapter 3 boom it's amazing

00:40:58.440 And when you understand that, now you can start reading Exodus and Leviticus and Numbers with fresh eyes.

00:41:08.620 You can start anticipating what's happening in the rest of the scriptures.

00:41:14.300 It also answers humanity's deepest questions.

00:41:17.360 Where do we come from?

00:41:19.760 Why are we here?

00:41:21.300 Why do we die?

00:41:22.480 And how do I live?

00:41:24.360 How do I live?

00:41:25.140 this is this is again being dealt with very early on very early on so without understanding

00:41:33.100 genesis it's very difficult very difficult to understand the rest of life you will come up

00:41:41.640 with the wildest ideas if you don't have the anchoring of genesis number five and we'll close

00:41:50.720 right after this sovereignty sovereignty god's sovereignty it's so important it's so helpful

00:41:57.520 this will be so beneficial to you throughout genesis we see that god is is not just explicitly

00:42:04.900 sovereign he's implicitly sovereign you're going to see so many passages of scripture that just

00:42:10.760 communicate that god is controlling essentially everything you know ephesians uh chapter 1 verse

00:42:17.940 11 Paul is saying that

00:42:19.880 God works all things

00:42:21.860 all things together

00:42:23.940 according to the counsel of his will end quote

00:42:25.940 think about that for a second

00:42:28.140 was I

00:42:30.020 late today

00:42:31.620 because of a fluke

00:42:34.000 because of quote chance

00:42:36.140 no

00:42:36.940 God causes all things to work together

00:42:39.920 for good

00:42:40.420 God works

00:42:43.900 all things together according to the counsel of his

00:42:46.020 will everything

00:42:47.340 that happens in your life, God is working together

00:42:51.420 those outcomes. And how does that interact with our

00:42:55.420 free agency? And note that I did not say

00:42:59.380 free will, but our free agency? I don't know.

00:43:03.680 I'm going to ask the Lord right when I get there. Hey, how does

00:43:07.480 your sovereignty and man's responsibility work together? It's one of the great mysteries of Scripture.

00:43:11.480 but one thing that you learn about god in genesis and i think you'll appreciate this

00:43:18.980 is that god's ways are extremely counterintuitive to man's ways just totally opposite it's like

00:43:27.700 jesus going like hey you have to die to live you have to live if you try to live you're going to

00:43:31.480 die you're like what hey by the way the last is first the first is last the weak is strong the

00:43:36.000 strong is weak and up is down down is up and you're like wait a second i don't understand

00:43:40.160 god repeatedly overturns human expectations you're going to see this over and over in genesis

00:43:49.900 he does not save all but only chooses some huh there's no injustice there there's just justice

00:43:56.720 and mercy every one of us deserves death but for some reason god elects some he doesn't save all

00:44:01.880 No injustice, just justice and mercy.

00:44:07.660 He preserves one family unless the rest of the world perish in the flood.

00:44:13.260 He calls an obscure man to be an obscure man with no children to become the father of many nations.

00:44:21.820 You're like, okay, sounds amazing to me. 0.99

00:44:25.020 he grants children to barren women and people who are women that are way beyond years of child 0.89

00:44:32.680 bearing i know you're 85 we're gonna have a baby you know just constant stuff like this you're just

00:44:40.540 like whoa he blesses jacob despite his deception he makes the older serve the younger he turns a

00:44:49.640 slave into a king to lead his people into slavery you're like what is going on here

00:44:57.720 and again and again genesis genesis teaches us that god's sovereignty does not conform

00:45:06.380 to human expectation it just doesn't i really wish that it did there are many times that i'm

00:45:12.880 sitting there playing the guessing game of providence i know what you're doing god and

00:45:16.800 It's the exact opposite.

00:45:20.060 Isaiah 55, 8-9 says,

00:45:21.940 For my thoughts are not your thoughts, neither are your ways my ways, declares the Lord.

00:45:25.980 For as high as the heavens are above the earth, so are my ways higher than your ways,

00:45:29.660 and my thoughts higher than your thoughts, says the Lord.

00:45:33.640 I don't know how high it is up,

00:45:36.020 but that's how different my ways are from the Lord's ways.

00:45:40.180 It's vastly different.

00:45:43.140 And what does this tell us about God?

00:45:45.080 God delights to magnify his power in our weakness and in our foolishness.

00:45:56.360 He delights in doing that.

00:45:59.300 We know that because he keeps doing it.

00:46:02.860 But why?

00:46:04.280 Why does God do that?

00:46:06.960 You could read the book of Job and try to find the answer, but why?

00:46:10.040 why does scripture reveal this pattern of kind of ups and downs and turns and twists and

00:46:18.440 it seems so incredibly unpredictable to us

00:46:21.580 why would god create a garden only to expel men from it

00:46:27.420 why would he create humanity only to destroy it in the flood

00:46:33.920 why promise abraham descendants yet delay it for so many years and then right when he has the baby 0.83

00:46:39.160 go sacrifice that kid.

00:46:45.200 Why would Jacob labor for years and years

00:46:48.340 and not hit Rachel? 0.60

00:46:52.900 Why does Joseph have dreams

00:46:55.920 and then all of it just ends him into slavery?

00:46:58.400 Why do all these things happen?

00:47:00.620 I don't know about your life,

00:47:02.000 but my life can sound similar to that.

00:47:05.800 Why does God work this way?

00:47:07.240 Here's the heart of it.

00:47:09.160 Because fluctuating circumstances draws his people into deeper reliance upon him.

00:47:18.060 Fluctuating circumstances draws his people into deeper reliance upon him.

00:47:26.460 That is why your life is up and down and left and right and sideways and turns and it's unexpected and you cannot figure out why.

00:47:37.480 It's because God loves you, because fluctuating circumstances draws His people into deeper reliance upon Him.

00:47:48.740 Man rarely feels the need to rely on God in seasons of constant, predictable prosperity.

00:47:58.060 You know, you just don't, things are great.

00:48:02.160 It's like, oh yeah, your prayer life disappeared, your Bible reading disappeared,

00:48:04.800 you're not going to church anymore because things are great.

00:48:07.480 In fact, it would be a great blessing to you to have fluctuating circumstances at this point.

00:48:15.160 In other words, God allows the lows so that we might look up.

00:48:21.000 And I can tell you as a man who has walked through a variety of trials, including severe sickness, for many years,

00:48:28.560 the closest I've ever been to the Lord is when I was the lowest in my life.

00:48:33.300 God allows the lows

00:48:38.940 so that we will look up

00:48:41.220 I actually remember

00:48:42.220 praying once

00:48:44.000 in the midst of me being very sick

00:48:48.400 and I actually saw

00:48:51.920 the value of being so ill

00:48:55.460 that I was

00:48:57.500 truly content

00:48:59.780 in being as sick as I was

00:49:02.580 because of how close I was to the Lord.

00:49:07.320 I'm not saying that that lasted for days.

00:49:09.400 It might have lasted for a few minutes.

00:49:11.340 But what I'm saying is that you could get a glimpse of you going,

00:49:14.380 there is value in this trial.

00:49:20.720 Psalm 119.71 says,

00:49:22.980 It is good for me that I was afflicted, that I might learn your statutes.

00:49:28.200 It is good for me that I was afflicted,

00:49:30.660 that I might learn your statutes.

00:49:35.880 God wants us to learn that life is best

00:49:39.300 when our circumstances are pressing us into Him.

00:49:45.380 That's hard.

00:49:48.920 Okay?

00:49:49.400 Especially if you're walking through something pretty heavy right now.

00:49:53.000 God wants us to learn

00:49:54.580 that life is best

00:49:58.080 when circumstances are pressing us into him.

00:50:08.000 So if you're asking yourself,

00:50:09.260 why the ups and downs, Lord?

00:50:10.940 Why do you keep bringing me to the cliff?

00:50:13.380 And right when I feel like I'm going to fall off the edge,

00:50:15.220 you're like, okay, I got you.

00:50:18.820 Why such suspense?

00:50:22.140 Why does it, when everything seems like

00:50:24.280 it's just not working. The transmission falls out of the bottom of the car. Why are all of

00:50:32.980 these circumstances here? It's because those circumstances help us know him, help us depend

00:50:46.100 on Him. It helps us

00:50:48.120 experience His strength

00:50:49.980 and our weakness.

00:50:53.840 We live in a world of self-everything.

00:50:55.980 Self-sacrifice,

00:50:58.080 self-reliance, self-esteem, 0.56

00:51:00.160 self-love, self-crap, 0.96

00:51:02.240 right? 0.98

00:51:04.840 God doesn't want any of that.

00:51:08.100 I don't want self-esteem. I want

00:51:10.000 God-esteem. I don't want

00:51:11.940 self-love. I want God-love.

00:51:14.360 I don't want self-confidence.

00:51:15.740 I want God confidence.

00:51:18.120 And I want to be weaned off of myself and onto Christ.

00:51:23.780 And fluctuating circumstances are fantastic at doing that.

00:51:30.980 But what this really means is that

00:51:33.100 those fluctuating circumstances,

00:51:36.420 what does it say about God?

00:51:37.840 It says that God wants us to know Him.

00:51:40.900 It says that God wants us to know Him.

00:51:44.140 And we have to know that we need him.

00:51:49.800 And I think that's what Genesis tells us.

00:51:52.840 We don't have a distant God.

00:51:55.800 We have a God who has relationship with us.

00:51:59.560 We don't have a malicious or cruel God.

00:52:01.720 We don't have a dull or indifferent God.

00:52:04.240 Instead, we have a God who is magnificent.

00:52:07.280 He's better and he's kinder and he's bigger and he's greater than we could ever imagine.

00:52:11.360 and I think this is what the foundation of Genesis

00:52:14.900 is about to reveal to us over the coming months

00:52:17.440 is that

00:52:21.620 God wants to be close to his people

00:52:25.180 and he produces circumstances that keeps his people close

00:52:28.580 and I think what really connects us with the New Testament

00:52:31.840 is that Jesus Christ

00:52:33.960 if you've seen me, you've seen the Father

00:52:36.760 Jesus Christ is the one

00:52:39.920 in the Trinity

00:52:41.360 who authored

00:52:44.120 these very stories in

00:52:45.600 Genesis

00:52:46.680 he's the one that authors

00:52:49.960 your story

00:52:50.600 he's the one that authors the story

00:52:54.100 of our church

00:52:54.740 and so to love the story of Genesis

00:52:58.020 is to love the story of Christ

00:52:59.720 it's this really beautiful

00:53:02.140 reality you go it's the same God

00:53:03.820 Jesus Christ is the same yesterday

00:53:05.920 today and forever

00:53:07.540 And so as we go through this book of Genesis, I want you to see the creation, the covenant, the fall, the redemption, and the sovereignty of God.

00:53:18.120 That we might appreciate what the Lord's done in his people who are our forefathers and foremothers in the faith.

00:53:27.680 Amen?

00:53:28.740 Amen. Let's pray.

00:53:29.940 Father, we thank you, Lord, for the blessing of your word.

00:53:33.020 Lord, that you have left us with truth and understanding.

00:53:37.240 Lord, that you have not left us without a guide, without clarity.

00:53:41.100 But Lord, you have given us your truth and your story and our origin here in the book of Genesis.

00:53:46.440 Lord, I pray a blessing on this congregation that we might understand it.

00:53:49.440 That you would help me be faithful as I teach it over the coming months.

00:53:52.880 We ask this in Jesus' name. Amen.

Dale Partridge - September 02, 2025

An Introduction to Genesis

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