WHERE MOSES GOT THE GENESIS ACCOUNT?
Gen. 11:10-27
INTRODUCTION
A. HUMOR
1. A preacher had to get his teeth pulled and the dentist fitted him with dentures. The first Sunday afterward, he preached 10 minutes. The second, he preached 20 minutes and the third, he preached 1½ hours!
2. Some members of the congregation asked about the different amounts of time. The preacher said, "The first Sunday my gums were so sore I could barely talk. The second Sunday, my dentures were causing medium pain. The third Sunday, I grabbed my wife's dentures and could not stop talking."
B. THE IMPORTANCE OF EYEWITNESSES
1. Most of my life channel 13 in Houston Texas has had a nightly news broadcast called “Eyewitness News.”
2. An eyewitness is “a person who actually sees some act, occurrence, or thing and can give a firsthand account of it.” It means “to view with one's own eyes.” Many times there are no eyewitnesses to important events.
3. Eyewitnesses are required, both in the Bible and in civil courtrooms, to establish the facts and to prove the criminality of persons for their actions.
C. THESIS
1. Tonight we’re looking at the verification of the Bible, specifically, how the Genesis account is actually the record of eyewitnesses. The liberal, destructive critics of the Bible have conveniently overlooked this astounding fact.
2. Let’s look at the details of how Shem was a link to both the preflood world and the events that followed, and how he passed those details to his descendants. The title of this message is “Where Moses Got the Genesis Account?”
I. THE BIBLE IS AN EYEWITNESS DOCUMENT
A. THERE WERE EYEWITNESSES TO JESUS
The Apostles called themselves witnesses of Christ, especially of His resurrection. “For we have not followed cunningly devised fables when we made known unto you the power and coming of our Lord Jesus Christ, but were eyewitnesses of His majesty” 2 Peter 1:16. “...eyewitnesses and servants of the word” Luke 1:2.
B. THE N.T. MANUSCRIPTS ARE EYEWITNESSES
1. Carsten Theide, in his book, “Eyewitness to Jesus” told that 7 manuscripts of the N.T. were penned during the lifetimes of the Apostles (P64, 7Q5, 7Q4, P67, P4, P46, and P1).
2. Theide, a world renowned papyrologist, discovered special marks that only occurred in the first century, making these documents eyewitness accounts of the life of Jesus and the early Church.
C. EYEWITNESSES OF THE GENESIS ACCOUNT OF CREATION
1. Where did Abraham’s descendants get the details of the Genesis account? Of course, God revealed them to Moses, but another unrecognized source were the eye-witnesses themselves who lived until the time of Abraham.
2. CONTEMPORARIES. By studying the timelines, we see Adam lived until Noah’s father Lamech was 56 years old. Noah’s son Shem, who had been on the Ark, lived during 150 years of Abraham’s life. Also, they lived in the same area.
3. NEIGHBORS. Abraham was Shem’s grandchild of the 9th generation. Noah’s father touched Adam and Noah’s son touched Abraham. Quite a connection.
4. RELATIVES. They were all family and went to the same family reunions. Abraham could talk to Shem about the Genesis creation narrative, the story of Adam and Eve, Cain and Abel, and the Tower of Babel. Shem could describe how the waters fell and came out of the earth; of how the animals came by themselves. Of how much food stuffs they stored in the ark and how they made their way down Mt. Ararat. And about the first rainbow. Wow!
II. PRE & POST-FLOOD CIVILIZATION
https://www.conformingtojesus.com/images/webpages/chronology_chart_from_adam_to_abraham.jpg
A. NOAH’S/SHEM’S AGES AFTER THE FLOOD
Read Gen. 11:10-27. Shem lived 600 years (he was 100 years old when the flood came).
Noah’s Age....When Shem was...
600...............100 years old, Arphaxad was born
635...............135 years old, Shelah was born
665...............165 years old, Eber was born
699...............199 years old, Peleg was born
729...............229 years old, Reu was born
761...............261 years old, Serug was born
791...............291 years old, Nahor was born
820...............320 years old, Terah was born
890...............390 years old, Abram was born
Noah Died at 950, 60 yrs after Abram born
.....................490 years old, Isaac was born
.....................550 years old, Jacob was born
Shem lived for 50 years after Jacob was born. So Noah & Shem were alive when Abram was born and Noah’s father, Lamech, was alive when Adam was still alive!
B. WHERE DID PREFLOOD PEOPLE LIVE?
1. Genesis 2:14 says the Garden of Eden was between the Tigris & Euphrates Rivers. Archeologists have long placed the origin of humans in the Fertile Crescent, i.e., lower Mesopotamia.
2. Archeologist Juris Zarins (Smithsonian 18:2 (1987): 132) believes the location of the Garden of Eden was in lower Mesopotamia, near the convergence of the Tigris, Euphrates, Karun, and the Wadi Batin.
3. When Adam, Eve, and their family were expelled from the Garden, they probably lived nearby, in the Fertile Crescent of lower Mesopotamia.
4. HUMOR. I’ve told the joke that one Adam & son Seth were walking and saw the beautiful Garden of Eden. Seth said, “Wow! What’s that?” Adam answered, “That’s where we used to live before your mother ate us out of house & home!”
C. NOAH’S ARK LANDED ON MT. ARARAT
1. Noah’s Flood deposited the ark on the Mountains of Ararat, in Turkey. But is that where the new civilization began to grow (at 16,000 feet?) No! They migrated right back to their former land of origin in southern Mesopotamia! It’s 651 miles from Mt. Ararat (Agri) to Baghdad, Iraq – all downhill. We can assume they went back to the same region as the Garden of Eden because Genesis 10:10 says the new centers of civilization, after the Flood, were in Babylon, in southern Mesopotamia.
2. The headwaters of the Tigris & Euphrates Rivers flow down from the Mountains of Ararat, so that all Noah and his family had to do was follow the rivers downstream and they’d end up back in Mesopotamia. Noah and his family had 7 clean animals of each kind, including horses, donkeys, & oxen, which they could use to transport their belongings back to the fertile crescent. Undoubtedly, they herded their sheep, goats, and cattle along with them. Ur of the Chaldees, WHERE ABRAM LIVED, was also in southern Mesopotamia. Abram himself was a 9th generation grandson of Shem, so it was likely the two had met.
III. THE WORD OF GOD IS SURE
This verifies that the Bible accounts are much more than vague traditions passed down through the foggy ages of time, but that Abraham most likely heard the details from eye-witnesses or from people who actually met eyewitnesses of the events themselves!
A. YOU CAN HAVE FAITH IN THE BIBLE
1. Jesus said the smallest dot (jot) and the least stroke (tittle) would not be lost but it would ALL COME TRUE! (Matt. 5:37).
2. Jesus referred to Scripture as God speaking. He habitually used it in His personal life. He upheld the story of the Creation of Adam & Eve, their fall into sin, the writings of Moses, the histories, the Prophets, and the Psalms (Luke 24:44). The Apostles spoke of the O.T. as a divine document (2 Tim. 3:16-17; 2 Pet. 1:20-21).
3. Jesus said, “Heaven and earth will pass away, but my words will never pass away” Matt. 24:35. Ps. 111:7 says, “...all His commands are sure.”
B. GOD’S WORD HAS NEVER FAILED
1. The Roman Caesars tried to eradicate it, but couldn’t. The atheist Voltaire said that within 100 years Christianity would cease to exist. Instead, his house was bought by the Geneva Bible Society and used to publish & distribute Bibles [Geisler and Nix, A General Introduction to the Bible, 1986, pp. 123, 124].
2. The Communists gathered Bibles and burned them. Hitler burned Bibles and declared he would write his own.
3. Nations have risen and fallen, but the Word of God lives on! Emperors, Kings and Dictators have attempted to stamp it out, but the Word of God lives on!
4. Many philosophers and educators have mocked the Bible, but today they are dead and the Word of God lives on!
C. THERE IS NO FORCE POWERFUL ENOUGH TO STOP IT
1. Moses was opposed by the magicians, but the Word fell on them too. The sorcerer Balaam tried to curse Israel, but God turned his curses into blessings!
2. ILLUS.: GOD’S ENDURING WORD
a. At the beginning of WW2, aerial bombings flattened much of Warsaw, Poland. Cement blocks, ruptured plumbing, and shards of glass lay strewn across the great city.
b. In the downtown area, however, most of one damaged building still stubbornly stood. It was the Polish headquarters for the British and Foreign Bible Society.
c. Still legible on a surviving wall were the words: “Heaven and earth will pass away, but My words will never pass away” Mt. 24:35.
CONCLUSION
A. ILLUSTRATION: THE SCRAP OF PAPER
1. The small piece of paper was hardly worth bending over to pick up. Yet the young father retrieved it and what he read changed his life. He was a devout Hindu living in India.
2. But the scrap of paper presented a new concept: it told him that he was a sinner and needed a Savior. He decided to put his faith in Jesus Christ who freely forgives all who will ask. The tract was one tiny seed with far-reaching effects.
3. The man became a preacher of Jesus to unreached areas of India. Two of his sons became missionaries, taking the good news about Jesus to new towns. As a result, 22 new churches have been started and thousands have heard of freedom in Christ. “Just a piece of paper?” Not if it has the Gospel on it! [Daily Bread, Feb. 23, 2000]
B. THE CALL
1. How many of you need something from God? Something physical? Something for a person you love? Do you need some kind of intervention? Healing? Help with a situation?
2. I’m glad we are NOT left without hope: there is a God who hears ALL prayer. He answers those who pray with faith. Let’s claim the Word of God and stand on it to claim what God has promised us!
3. PRAYER
ADDENDUM
1. Human origins discoveries confirm that Mesopotamia was the center of human beginnings. For decades anthropologists have placed human origins in lower East Africa, which would be contrary to a Fertile Crescent origin. New findings locate the earliest Homo Sapiens (300,000 years old) in Morocco (“Ancient Fossils from Morocco Mess Up Modern Human Origins,” June 8, 2017). The Dali Skull, found in China, pushes back Homo Erectus to 260,000 years ago. (Skull Found in China Could Re-write ‘Out of Africa’ Theory of Human Evolution,” (Independent, 11-20-17, Andrew Griffin)).
2. It’s not an accident that the Fertile Crescent lies near the midpoint between China, Morocco, and lower East Africa (Tanzania). I believe that the theories on origins will one day float back to the Iraq area, where the Garden of Eden was once located.
