Jesus Did Say Something About It

There is a certain deception floating around, which I have heard and read numerous times. The deception is that Jesus Christ never said anything to controvert homosexuality or gay marriage. But when Jesus discussed the sanctity of marriage, He clearly defined it as intended to be a union between a man and a woman. He said, "But from the beginning of creation, God 'made them male and female.' 'For this reason a man shall leave his father and mother and be joined to his wife'" (Mark 10:6-7). 

I've also heard numerous people defend the "alternative lifestyle" by saying that when the Bible was written, the word "homosexual" did not exist. True as that may be, the concept to which the word refers did exists. People have been having same-sex relations at least since the period when Sodom and Gomorrah were in existence, approximately four thousand years ago. Just because a particular word was not in existence at a particular time does not mean that the concept or practice did not exist under a different name or terminology.

And Christ's apostle, Paul, was clearly describing same-sex relations in his letter to the Roman church, where he identified that behavior as one of many crimes against Divinity; for which the judgement of God is going to be poured out upon the world. He wrote, "For this reason God gave them up to vile passions. For even their women exchanged the natural use for what is against nature. Likewise also the men, leaving the natural use of the woman, burned in their lust for one another, men with men committing what is shameful, and receiving in themselves the penalty of their error which was due" (Romans 1:26-27).

I've also heard of the claim that Adam and Eve were not the only humans that God created in the beginning; and that He may have created other couples that were not heterosexual. However this deception is exposed by the statement that I have already quoted from Jesus Christ, that "from the beginning of creation, God 'made them male and female', 'for this reason a man shall leave his father and mother and be joined to his wife'" (Mark 10:6-7). Here, Jesus acknowledges no other arrangement. 

There is no indication anywhere in the Scriptures that God created others than just Adam, Eve, and their posterity. "And Adam called his wife's name Eve, because she was the mother of all living" (Genesis 3:20). All human beings are descended from Adam and Eve. "Where" one may ask "did the sons of Adam find wives then?" The answer is that they married the daughters of Adam. 

That may seem shocking, since, over two thousand years later, the Law of Moses banned incest. But in the pre-Flood era, the human genome would have had much fewer defects that could potentially become dominant in human offspring. In the pre-Fallen world, before sin, disease, and death entered the world, (Romans 5:12) there were no defects at all in the human genome. It is because of the increase of defects, caused by the brokenness of nature due to sin, (Romans 8:21-22) that anyone seeking a spouse must look beyond their close relatives. 

Now I think most if not all of us have heard the claim that homosexuals are born that way and can't help it. But whether or not that is true makes no difference. God's word lets us know that we are all born with a fallen, sinful nature which we have inherited from our first ancestors, Adam and Eve. Different people may have different weaknesses, but all moral/spiritual weaknesses stem from the same fallen, sinful nature. There is nothing whatsoever unique about homosexuality. It is a sin, and it is no better, and no worse, than idolatry, adultery, fornication, lying, or any other sin. 

All of us are fallen, our nature is broken. And it is true that we can't  help it. That is why we need to receive salvation by grace through faith in Jesus Christ who gave Himself on the cross for our sin; and who has risen from the dead to provide everlasting life to all who trust in Him. By His death and resurrection, Christ has made it possible for us to receive redemption, forgiveness of sin (Colossians 1:13-14). By faith in Him, we receive the Holy Spirit who then lives in us, and is helping us, making us become perfect in His righteousness. We can not be saved from our sin unless we trust in Him.

If God Let Everyone Into Heaven

If God were to let everyone into Heaven, it would become just like it is here on earth. It wouldn't be Heaven anymore. Heaven would become a broken world, ruined with sin; just like this world we live in today, filled with broken families, divided communities, and warring nations. 

Heaven would become like this world filled with all kinds of malice, corruption, selfishness, hatred toward God, hatred toward the righteous. There would continually be conflict among people, and inside of people. It would be like this world filled with crime, violence, poverty, and excess. It would become like this world filled with all manner of ungodly people, corrupters, liars, thieves, murderers, and abusers of women and children. 

If God let everyone into Heaven, it would not be Heaven anymore. And so God has a standard. He Himself is the Absolute Standard; the Absolute Decider of what is good. And He is perfect. He is holy. Sin can not dwell in His presence. Sin can not be allowed in Heaven (read Psalms 15 and 24). That is why God, in the middle of speaking through the prophet Ezekiel, against the king of Tyre, began describing Lucifer in the following way: 

"You were the seal of perfection,

Full of wisdom and perfect in beauty.

You were in Eden, the garden of God...

You were the anointed cherub who covers;

I established you;

You were on the holy mountain of God;

You walked back and forth in the midst of fiery stones

You were perfect in your ways from the day you were created,

Till iniquity (wickedness) was found in you...

You became filled with violence within, and you sinned;

Therefore I cast you as a profane thing out of the mountain of God;

And I destroyed you, O covering cherub,

From the midst of the fiery stones

Your heart was lifted up (self-exalted, prideful, arrogant) because of your beauty;

You corrupted your wisdom for the sake of your splendor

I cast you to the ground,

I laid you before kings,

That they might gaze at you.

You defiled your sanctuaries

By the multitude of your iniquities...

Therefore I brought fire from your midst;

It devoured you,

And I turned you to ashes upon the earth

In the sight of all who saw you" (Ezekiel 28:12-18).

The prophet Isaiah used the same poetic devise. He spoke by the Holy Spirit against the king of Babylon (Isaiah 14:3-11). But in verse 12 it becomes evident that the rebellion and fall of Lucifer is being described. So there is a parallel between the wicked kings and Satan. God wrote these poems to the kings of Babylon and Tyre because those kings were committing the same sin that Satan first committed long before them; the sin of pride, attempting to put himself in place of God. And that is what every sinner does who rejects God's standard of what is good and tries to make their own. They are little satans, rebelling against God. 

And those who are willing to defy God's standard of right and wrong in order to have their own way, need not leap far to also defy the sanctity of human life and personal dignity in order to have their own way. That is what abortion does. It defies the sanctity of human life and dignity in order for the unloving to have their own way. It is infanticide. Everyone who participates in an abortion is a murderer. Everyone who defends abortion, defends murder. And all sin defies the sanctity of human life and dignity because God is the original, eternal first cause or source of all life and love and dignity; and sin separates us from God. Those who begin by rejecting God, will end by devaluing every last thing that is right and good in the sight of God. 

God's holiness emanates from His love. God is love. And that is precisely the reason why He is holy. All real, true love is holy because sin corrupts. Sin is corruption. Sin alienates. Sin ruins. Sin kills. "For the wages of sin is death, but the gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord" (Romans 6:23). Holiness excludes sin. All real, true love is holy. And therefore, only what is holy can abide in Heaven.

But here's the rub; "all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God" (Romans 3:23). "There is not a just man on earth who does good and does not sin" (Ecclesiastes 7:20). And so, by the Absolute Standard, none of us are good.

"As it is written:

There is none righteous, no, not one;

There is none who understands;

There is none who seeks after God.

They have all turned aside;

They have together become unprofitable;

There is none who does good, no, not one" (Romans 3:10-12).

And so, on a hill called Calvary, aka Golgotha (The Place of the Skull), just outside of Jerusalem, the Son of God showed another expression of His love for us. There, God in mortal human form, laid down His life on the cross, receiving to Himself the wages of our sin. And then He rose victorious over death. He did this so that, having paid for our sin, He could give us the free gift of salvation and eternal life. 

He has made it possible for us to be reconciled with Him (2 Corinthians 5:20-21). Everyone who places their trust in Christ is reconciled to God. His Spirit lives in us now. We are no longer little satans. We are now little christs (the word "Christian" literally means "little christ"). And by His Holy Spirit, we are growing to be more like Him in all righteousness (read 1 John 3:1-10, and also Colossians 3:1-17).We are being made holy so that we can be with our Friend, Savior, and Everlasting Father forever in Heaven.

You will not enter Heaven unless you willingly, consciously trust in Jesus Christ to be your one and only Redeemer, to take away your fallen, sinful nature; to reconcile you to God. "For there is one God and one Mediator between God and men, the Man Christ Jesus." (1 Timothy 2:5). And the heavenly Father will give you the Holy Spirit to live in you; teaching you righteousness and making you holy and  from the inside out. Will you trust Him today?

The Dehumanizing Power of Sin

In chapters five - seven of his autobiography, Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass, Douglass wrote about the time he became the slave of Mr. and Mrs. Auld of Baltimore, Md. When he first came to that house, Sophia Auld was a very kind and tenderhearted woman. Douglass wrote that she treated him "as she supposed one human being ought to treat another".

He describes her in chapter five as having a "face beaming with kindly emotion". She began to teach Douglass to read and write. Over time, however, Douglass describes how slave-holding proved to have a dehumanizing effect on her. She became even more cruel than her husband. So Douglass showed how slavery not only dehumanizes those kept as slaves, but also slave-holders.

My reason for bring this up is that it is an illustration not only of the dehumanizing effects of slavery, but the dehumanizing effect of all sin. This is why the villain in C.S. Lewis' Perelandra is referred to as "the un-man". This is also consistent with the words of Jesus: "Most assuredly, I say to you, whoever commits sin is a slave of sin...Therefore if the Son makes you free, you shall be free indeed" (John 8:34-36).

Humanity was originally created by, and in the image of our holy, righteous God who is love. This is why we, as human beings, even have a concept of love. But then humanity fell into sin and became corrupt. All of us are born with a fallen, corrupted, sinful nature; inherited from our first parents, Adam and Eve. And so sin and death came into the world though one man (Romans 5:12, 1 Corinthians 15:21-22).

But sin would quickly prove to strip humanity of more than just immortality. Within only one generation, the first son, Cain, murdered his brother, Abel. But it didn't stop there. As the inhabitants of the earth grew in number, they also grew in wickedness. Turning away from the heavenly Father who lovingly created us in His own image, the people of the earth made their own gods in their own fallen image. And so they made idols in the image of created things rather than worship and love and obey God who is love, and who created all the universe (Romans 1:18-24).

For approximately one and a half thousand years, human nature did not change. The earth was filled with idolatry, violence, and every kind of evil. But one man, Noah, along with his family, was saved by grace (Genesis 6:1-8). At that time God justly sent a Flood to cover the whole earth. Many of the geological features that are observed today were formed by that Flood. But He warned Noah to build a 500 ft. long, 75 ft. wide, 45 ft. high Ark to preserve himself and his family, along with two of every "kind" (not species) of animal.

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A species is a sub-set of the original created "kinds". There is diversity within the created kinds; but, as suggested by the findings of Reginald Punnett, one kind can never give rise to a completely new kind. The feline kind can never give rise to a bird kind, and the canine kind can never give rise to a reptilian kind; and so forth. And as I have already noted in this post, the human kind was created uniquely in the image of God. 

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So Noah did as God commanded him. And the rain fell for forty days, and all the fountains of the deep were broken open. The waters covered the earth for about a year and then receded. Noah and his wife; his three sons and their wives, came off the Ark and started life over again.

In time, (within approximately half a thousand years) humanity increased again in number, and quickly turned away from the one true God to worship man-made idols. And disobeying a simple command to spread out and populate all the earth, they decided to build a great Tower that was supposed to reach into the heavens. So God confounded their language and scattered them (Genesis 11:1-9).

But human nature did not changed. The Sumerians and the Egyptians; the Incas and the Mayans, built their idolatrous, pagan kingdoms. And God spoke to Abraham the Chaldean. He gave Abraham a son, Isaac, through whom the nation of Israel was born by the will of God. Israel, like the rest of fallen humanity repeatedly showed a propensity toward disobeying God. And like the gentile nations, they even committed idolatry, ritualistic prostitution, and human sacrifices.

And approximately two thousand years after the Tower of Babel, the Creator of all things came into the world as a human being, taking on human form, though without sin. He lived a life that demonstrated His perfect love for His creation. But His own creation rejected, persecuted, arrested, and crucified Him (John 1:1-14). This is the natural expression of fallen humanity's vile depravity, because sin is enmity with God (Romans 8:7).

And in the last two thousand years since then, human nature still has not changed. Wars, violence, and theft go on and on and on in every generation. Meanwhile students are taught that the natural universe, which operates according to orderly laws, was not made by an orderly Creator and sovereign Lawgiver, but arose accidentally from random, unguided processes. That is not a rational worldview. That's just the madness of fallen, corrupt, sinful humans.

Divorce, adultery, and promiscuity are prevalent. Families are turbulent and broken. And many people grow up angry, rebellious, without godly council, and full of angst. Truth and virtue become objects of ridicule. Greed, lust, pride, and self indulgence are major motivators of a humanity that is sick and dying of its own wickedness.

And though many people know that these things are wrong, they still do not turn to be reconciled with the one true God who created all things; and who revealed Himself to humanity through His prophets and His Son, Jesus Christ. God's word is widely mocked and ridiculed; and disobeyed by everyone. No one is without sin (Romans 3:23).

Those who desire to live godly in Christ are also despised and mocked; even executed in many parts of the world. And that blood-shed will probably eventually spread to the West as well. Infanticide is widely defended and proudly advocated in the name of "women's rights"! Human life is devalued and discarded in the name of "human rights"!

And marriage is desecrated in the name of "equality"; even though Jesus Himself, when asked a question about marriage, said "But from the beginning of creation, God 'made them male and female'" (Mark 10:6). And even many of those who claim to be in Christ are willing to distort His word to accommodate sin. Yes, even in the Church there are those who, in many ways, outright defy what is good and right in the sight of God.

But through all of this, God's nature has never changed. He remains our holy, just, and righteous God. And He will rightfully pour out His righteous judgment on the unrepentant, who reject the absolute truth of His word and cling to their own filth.

But He also remains God who is love. And there is no limit to the mercy and grace that He will continually display toward those who, in reverent faith, turn to Him for forgiveness. He has made salvation available to all who are willing to be saved by His grace through faith in His Son Jesus Christ alone, who died on the cross for our sin (Romans 3:23-24, 5:1-2, & 6:23).

God's purpose was fulfilled despite (even by way of) humanity's obstinacy. As God revealed to the prophet Daniel about five hundred years beforehand: "Messiah shall be cut off, but not for Himself" (Daniel 9:26). It was for our sin that Jesus died.

And at the time it seemed to everyone that He had accomplished nothing. But He was accomplishing a salvation that nobody else's efforts ever could. He who had no sin, took our sin upon Himself; so that those who trust in Him, having no righteousness of our own, may take His righteousness upon ourselves. "Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation; old things have passed away; behold, all things have become new" (2 Corinthians 5:17).

But for those who reject this salvation, THERE IS. NO. OTHER. "For there is one God and one Mediator between God and men, the Man Christ Jesus" (1 Timothy 2:5; also see Hebrews 2:2-4, & 10:26-27).

Madhouse

Last week I posted about the exorcism at the Gadarenes. And I wrote that post with an awareness a common misconception that modern people tend to have about our ancient fathers. Evolutionary dogma would suggest that in ancient times, our forefathers were simply not intelligent enough to understand natural phenomena such as lightening, rain, or even mental illness. 

And so the idea is that ancient people attributed all mental disorders to evil spirits possessing the mad. And then, with the advent of modern science, it is thought, people moved away from the notion of demonic possession to embrace the more sophisticated knowledge of mental disease. 

But this is not the actual scenario. It didn't happen like that. Even in Old Testament times, our forefathers knew that there was a such thing as insanity, without always attributing it to demonic possession. 

Before David son of Jesse became king over Israel, he was on the run for King Saul, who knew that David was chosen by God to replace him as king. To escape the inordinate wrath of Saul, David fled to a neighboring city-state called Gath. But the servants of Achish king of Gath knew who David was, and thought to have him in trouble with Achish. 

So we are informed that our Old Testament protagonist, David "was very much afraid of Achish king of Gath. So he changed his behavior before them, pretended madness in their hands, scratched on the doors of the gate, and let his saliva fall down on his beard. Then Achish said to his servants, 'Look, you see this man is insane. Why have you brought him to me? Have I need of madmen that you have brought this fellow to play the madman in my presence? Shall this fellow come into my house?'". So they let David go (1 Samuel 21:12-15).

Another Old Testament hero, the prophet Jeremiah, indicted pagan worshipers of being "insane with their idols" (Jeremiah 50:38). In other words, they were made crazy by their worship of false gods. They worshiped idols which they had made in the image of created things (Romans 1:18-32), as opposed to the true, living God who is love, (1 John 4:8) and who created all the universe and everything in it, (Genesis 1:1, John 1:1-1-3, Hebrews 1:1-2). He created humanity in His own image, (Genesis 1:26-27) before the Fall, for the purpose of love (Matthew 22:27-40).

The prophet Hosea also brought charge against the unfaithful people of Israel, saying that the unfaithful prophets and spiritual people had become insane as a result of their sin and their halfhearted approach to God. They thought they could worship God and idols both. And so their minds were darkened with the madness of their sin (Hosea 9:7).

We were made by, and in the image of God who is love. And His first and greatest commandment is to love the Lord our God with all our heart, all our soul, and with all our mind (Matthew 22:37, emphasis added). Refusal to do so will prove to be a detriment to the mind that despises God. 

But as the prophet Isaiah spoke by the Holy Spirit, "You will keep him in perfect peace, whose mind is stayed on You, because he trusts in You" (Isaiah 26:3). And I know from experience that my peace of mind is at its fullest when I am faithful to honor God with my mind.

Today we live among a generation that thinks with its mind that it doesn't need God. This generation thinks that the orderly universe, operating in accordance with orderly laws, did not come from an orderly Creator and Lawgiver, but from random, unguided processes. That's insane! That is not a rational worldview.

And with its mind, this same generation thinks it should be legal to murder unborn children. Just as the ancient pagans sacrificed their children to idols, so this generation is willing to sacrifice its children to the gods of convenience and self-gratification. They also have in mind to redefine marriage, which is not a man-made institution, but comes from God. And as Jesus Himself said when He was asked about marriage, "But from the beginning of creation 'God made them male and female'" (Mark 10:6).

This generation continues in the trend of the previous ones, the rejection of God and His Christ, and the continual devaluing of the things which God values. The sanctity of human life, marriage, and freedom to worship and honor our heavenly Father and His Son Jesus Christ are devalued and despised more and more as time goes on.

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"Then His fame went throughout all Syria; and they brought to Him all sick people who were afflicted with various diseases and torments, and those who were demon-possessed, epileptics, and paralytics; and He healed them" (Matthew 4:24).

We do indeed live in a broken, fallen world. And as it is noted in Matthew 4:24, there are many different kinds of conditions and illnesses; including, but not limited to demonic possession. And though full restoration of all things will not come until the end of this current, broken world, Jesus has the power to heal all ailments.

I have quoted this statement from Philip Yancey before, but I like it. He said: "Some see miracles as improbable suspensions of the laws of the physical universe. As signs, though, they serve just the opposite function. Death, decay, entropy, and destruction are the true suspensions of God's laws; miracles are the early glimpses of restoration".

And not only does Jesus have the power to cast out demons and heal physical, and mental conditions; He also has the power to heal the spiritual condition of sin in a repentant human being. As the Scriptures tell: 

"...When Jesus saw their faith, He said to the paralytic, 'Son, be of good cheer; your sins are forgiven you...But that you may know that the Son of Man has power on earth to forgive sins...Arise, take up your bed, and go to your house'. And he arose and departed to his house...Therefore, having been justified by faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ, through whom also we have access by faith into this grace in which we stand, and rejoice in hope of the glory of God...giving thanks to the Father who has qualified us to be partakers of the inheritance of the saints in the light. He has delivered us from the power of darkness and conveyed us into the kingdom of the Son of His love, in whom we have redemption through His blood, the forgiveness of sins" (Matthew 9:1-7, Romans 5:1-2, Colossians 1:12-14).

The Wives of Cain and Seth

"Where did Cain and Seth find their wives?" This is a question that is sometimes asked concerning the book of Genesis. (Seth was born to Adam and Eve after Cain murdered Abel). 

It seems distasteful to think that the sons of Adam and Eve were married to the daughters of Adam and Eve. Yet the Scriptures teach very clearly that all humanity is descended from one man and one woman - Adam and Eve (Acts 17:26, Genesis 3:20).

There is a reason why it was acceptable in those early times for the sons and daughters of Adam and Eve to marry. Contrary to evolutionary dogma, God created human beings in perfection. And in the earliest days of human history, the human gene pool was in a more pristine condition. 

The reason that marriage between close relatives is unacceptable in our time is because the human genome has degenerated since the creation and fall of humanity. In our time, if close relatives marry and reproduce together, there is a greater risk of mutated genes gaining dominance in their offspring. These genetic mutations then result in physical and mental birth defects.

We live in a broken world in which genes are susceptible to corruption. According to evolutionary dogma it has always been that way. But in truth, God created a perfect world in the beginning. Genetic mutations were not as significant in the earliest centuries of human history. And there were zero mutations in the genome prior to the Fall.

Even as late as the time of Abraham there was an acceptance of marriage between close relatives. Sarah was Abraham's wife, but she was also his half sister (Genesis 20:12). And Isaac was married to Rebekah, his cousin. Jacob too, was married to his cousins, Leah and Rachel. 

It should be noted, as an aside, that God merely tolerated polygamous unions like that of Jacob to Leah and Rachel in the past. "But from the beginning of creation" marriage was intended by God to be a lifelong, monogamous union between a man and a woman (see Jesus' words in Mark 10:5-9). 

By the time of Christ, polygamy had become antiquated in Israel. And in this Messianic age, God "commands all men everywhere to repent" (Acts 17:30-31).

It was not until Moses' time that marriage between close relatives was abolished by God. One of the six hundred and some laws of Moses is a ban on close relatives being married (Leviticus 18:6-18). So it is quite unacceptable in the eyes of God, due to the corruption of the human genome, for close relatives to marry anymore.

For these reasons, and because marriage between close relatives has become unnecessary due to the increase in the human population; it also has become socially unacceptable, weird, and gross for close relatives to marry.

Dark Sayings? Dark Sayings. History! (Context and Consequence).

Introduction

Many people wrongly claim that the history recorded in Genesis (and especially the earliest history) is allegorical, and never actually happened. The reasons for such a claim are ideas that are not extrapolated from the Scriptures but are read into, or forced onto the Scriptures from outside.

There is the evolutionary worldview for example. Evolutionary doctrine is not science. It involve the use of patently atheistic assumptions about the past to interpret scientific data in the present. And then there is postmodern philosophy which asserts that there is no absolute truth, but that individuals can make up their own truth. Postmodern philosophy is really neo-paganism. But God's word remains the Truth (John 17:17, 14:6).

The aim of this entry is to show from the context of the Scriptures that the Genesis narrative is historical, and that an allegorical interpretation of Genesis is theologically destructive. Interpreting the Scriptures with the Scriptures, we can see clearly that they are God's word, and that their contextual integrity confirms the historicity of Genesis.

Dark Sayings?

Remember that Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers, and Deuteronomy are the Five Books of Moses. This Pentateuch ("Five Books") was written by Moses under the direction of God.

In Numbers chapter 12, we read about how Moses' brother and sister criticized him for marrying an Ethiopian woman. It is not clear why Aaron and Miriam objected to the marriage. The possibilities are another subject for another time. In any case, Aaron and Miriam went so far as to question Moses' authority as a prophet on account of his marriage to the Ethiopian woman.

God Himself answered Aaron and Miriam's criticism. Verse 6 reads:

"Then He said, 'Hear now My words: If there is a prophet among you, I, the LORD,  make Myself know to him in a vision; I speak to him in a dream.'"

And here it is, verse 7:

"Not so with My servant Moses; He is faithful in all My house. I speak with him face to face, even plainly, and not in dark sayings; and he sees the form of the LORD. Why then were you not afraid to speak against My servant Moses" (emphasis added).

So here God is saying that He spoke plainly to Moses and not in dark sayings. And in this context the word "dark" means "cryptic" or "mysterious". So don't worry, I'm not going to get all Poe on you now.

Dark Sayings.

Several centuries after the time of Moses, the psalmist Asaph prophesied of the coming Messiah, writing:

 "I will open my mouth in a parable; I will utter dark sayings of old" (Psalms 78:2).

Jesus fulfilled this prophecy by using parables to illustrate His message about the kingdom of God. 

The verse also seems to be referring back to itself. Jesus frequently quoted poetic prophecies like this one, saying that His ministry was the fulfillment of the Scriptures. He read Isaiah 49:8-9 aloud when He began to teach and preach at a synagogue in Nazareth, and told the congregation that the prophecy had just been fulfilled in their hearing. (Luke 4:18-22)

The prophecy that was given through Asaph is similar to the prophecy that God would use strange language to communicate His message, since people wouldn't listen, but disobeyed when He spoke plainly through Moses (Isaiah 28:11-12). The apostle Paul highlights the fulfillment of this prophecy in 1 Corinthians 14:21.

So the reason that Jesus told parables, and the reason the early church spoke in tongues, is because Moses wrote plainly, without story-telling, and the message was disobeyed. However, by paying attention to the context of any passage, one can determine with a fair level of ease when a parable is being told and when the text is narrating actual events.

It is also important to read each passage within the context of the whole Bible. As the saying goes, "Interpret Scripture with Scripture." An understanding of all the Scriptures will aid the student in understanding the various passages within the Scriptures. This way the student is able to objectively determine the author's intended meaning.

History! 

As it has been noted, the contextual character of the Bible makes it fairly easy to distinguish the historical narrative from poetic passages, parables, dreams, and visions.

Jesus Himself made it very clear that the narrative of Genesis is historical. And by His constant quoting from the Old Testament, and saying things like "The Scriptures must be fulfilled" (Matthew 26:52-56, Mark 14:46-49), He unmistakably confirmed the Scriptures as the authoritative word of God.

Why would the fulfillment of the Scriptures be so important unless they are God's word? The fulfillment of the Scriptures has always been of utmost important to the Son of God because they are His word. And He will always keep His word.

When His critics prodded Him with questions about marriage, He answered "But from the beginning of creation, God 'made them male and female'" (Mark 10:6). 

In Matthew 23:29-36, Jesus referred to all the righteous martyrs, "from the blood of righteous Abel to the blood of Zechariah, son of Berechiah" as belonging to the pages of history.

On another occasion Jesus made it unquestionably clear that Abraham was a real historical person. He said to His critics "Your father Abraham rejoiced to see My day, and he saw it and was glad" (John 8:56).

How could that be if Abraham was a made-up fictional character? Jesus' critics got it. And they said "You are not yet fifty years old, and You have seen Abraham?" (8:57). They understood that Abraham really lived, and that he lived much more than just fifty years before their own time.

Jesus answered them with a stunning declaration of His eternal existence. He said "Most assuredly, I say to you, before Abraham was, I AM" (8:58).

Here He is claiming to be equal with God! He is identifying  Himself as one and the same with Him who spoke to Moses from out of the burning bush and said "I AM that I AM... Thus you shall say to the children of Israel, 'I AM has sent me to you'" (Exodus 3:14). Indeed it was the preincarnate Son of God who spoke to Moses "face to face" (Numbers 12:7) and to Adam and Eve in the Garden of Eden.

When Jesus says "Before Abraham was, I AM" He is saying that Abraham had his place in time when he was living upon the earth, and that Jesus Himself always is from eternity to eternity! And He is saying that He saw Abraham when he lived upon the earth. It was the preincarnate Jesus Himself who visited Abraham and told him that he would be a father by his wife, Sarah. On that same visit He told Abraham about the impending doom that was to fall upon Sodom and Gomorrah (Genesis 18).

After His resurrection from the dead, Jesus appeared to some folks on the road to Emmaus. They were distraught over His crucifixion. And they didn't know it was Jesus who was talking to them because He had transfigured His appearance.

When they expressed their sadness and disappointment, Jesus said to them "Oh foolish ones, and slow of heart to believe in all that the prophets have spoken. Ought not the Christ to have suffered these things and to enter into His glory?" The text goes on, "And beginning at Moses and all the Prophets, He expounded to them in all the Scriptures the things concerning Him." (Luke 24:13-32 emphasis added). 

Conclusion: Theological Consequence

So from the context of Scripture, and on the authority of the Son of God Himself we have strong confirmation that these things really happened just as the Scriptures tell. And to deny the reality of these events has tremendous theological consequences. The entirety of biblical Christian theology is built upon the reality of these events.

In order to be a Christian, one must believe that Jesus is the Son of God, that His death on the cross paid for our sin, and that God the Father raised Him up bodily from the dead (Romans 10:8-10, 1 Corinthians 15, Hebrews 1:1-4).

Jesus' death on the cross for our sin, and His resurrection from the dead are entirely because of the events recorded in Genesis 1-3. There was no death or suffering of man or beast until sin entered the world by one man (Romans 5:12-21).

If theistic evolution were true, that would mean that there were millions of years of suffering and death before humans ever even existed to sin. God would be unjust, and Jesus' death on the cross would be meaningless. When a person denies the historicity of Genesis, that person is butchering Scripture and denying the authority of Jesus Christ!