What We Believe About God Series

Many years ago (2006) at another church (Hulen St. Baptist) where I was attending, I volunteered to help corral, I mean teach a group of 1st-5th graders on a Wednesday night. It just so happened that the kids were learning about the book of Genesis and had learned the previous week about Adam and Eve. So, not being their usual teacher, I asked them what they had learned. And I wrote it down so I wouldn't forget it. It was very eye-opening. I hope this helps you understand.

They said first of all, God made Adam out of dust (right on target so far) but then God realized that Adam couldn't have babies (I don't know that I would have put it that way, but okay). So, God took a rib out of Adam and gave it to Eve (another interesting way of phrasing it). Then He took a rib from Eve and gave it to somebody else. Then they had a lot of babies, one of whom was Abraham Lincoln.

You know, they started off pretty well but something got lost there at the end. Maybe they were using a different translation than I am. I don't know. But I hear grown adults' theories about God and creation and I'm just about as confused. I did some research. (I Googled it.) And I found this NASA website that explains to kids how the universe got started. Let me read just a short paragraph or two. Remember, this is from NASA, the smartest people on the planet.

When the universe began, it was just hot, tiny particles mixed with light and energy. It was nothing like what we see now. As everything expanded and took up more space, it cooled down. The tiny particles grouped together. They formed atoms. Then those atoms grouped together. Over lots of time, atoms came together to form stars and galaxies.

The first stars created bigger atoms and groups of atoms. That led to more stars being born. At the same time, galaxies were crashing and grouping together. As new stars were being born and dying, then things like asteroids, comets, planets, and black holes formed! How long did all of this take? Well, we now know that the universe is 13,800,000,000 years old--that's 13.8 billion. That is a very long time. That's pretty much how the universe began. (What Is the Big Bang? | NASA Space Place -- NASA Science for Kids)

You know, I think I like the one about Abraham Lincoln better. It is closer to the truth at least. At least it starts with the Bible. We learned last week about why we believe the Bible and we take all our theology or study of God and thoughts about God from the Bible. We know the Bible is true. But I hear ya! Todd, that was NASA. They fly people to the moon. How could they be wrong about how the moon was created?

Well, Romans 3:4 has the answer to that. It says, "Let God be true, and every man a liar." Yes, NASA is lying when they say the universe started with hot, little particles. Hey, NASA, where did the hot, little particles come from? They can't answer that. Or, rather, they don't want to answer that because to answer that kind of question would lead one to conclude that there is a Creator. And if there is a Creator then He will have rules and purpose and if there are rules and purpose then we would have to obey those rules and live for that purpose and who wants to do that?

H.E. Fosdick said, "The existence of God means that we are living in a moral order, and in a moral order we can no more sin and get away with it than we can break all physical laws and escape the penalty." I think Atheists and Agnostics are not usually stupid people. They are stubborn people. They don't want to believe because if they believed in God then they would know that ultimately, to live a life worth living, you have to obey God. And they want to do whatever they want, not what God wants.

So, what do you believe about God? It's a big question, isn't it? It's a huge question. Every other thing in the world hinges on what you believe about God. We are continuing our look at what we believe. This is the second in our series. Last week, as I said, we looked at a few of the reasons we know the Bible is true and so we go to the Bible for all the other things in this series. Imagine that, right? I'm gonna preach out of the Bible.

I have a buddy that jokingly asks me all the time, "So, you still preaching out of that same book?" Yep. Still there. And today I want to go to the very beginning. Turn all the way left in your Bibles to the very first verse. Genesis 1:1. Everybody knows this verse. You know what it says but, like all of Genesis, this first verse is shallow enough that a baby can swim in it but deep enough to drown an elephant. (That's not my saying. I don't know who said it but I remember it.)