The Day The Word Became Flesh, a review of a paper by Clifton Emahiser
Note, January 28th, 2021: The version of these notes edited after the presentation evidently did not save properly, and have now been corrected. The original document has just been replaced, 12:35 PM EST. - WRF
After many discussions this past week in the Christogenea forums and chats, I thought that perhaps it is an appropriate time to present:
The Day The Word Became Flesh, a review of a paper by Clifton Emahiser
Countless men have attempted to understand the Genesis account of Creation, which begins with a statement that “God created the heaven and the earth”, and then the first actual utterance ascribed to God is “Let there be light”, before it goes on to describe His actual creation of the heaven and preparation of the earth for habitation. Several verses after the proclamation “let there be light”, we see the sun, moon and stars were created, which are the only sources of light perceived by man, other than earthly sources such as fire or man-made light. Therefore, from the Genesis account alone, we cannot know what that light of Genesis 1:3 is, where God had said “let there be light”, and where He first distinguished day and night, even before the sun, moon and stars were created.
But these are certainly not contradictions in the Genesis account, and in spite of the fact that many fundamentalists of the past have insisted that the Creation account is absolutely literal and even “scientific”, it should rather be apparent to Christians that the events of Creation were explained in a manner by which the full meaning and truth of at least some of its statements would not become apparent until the revelation of the Gospel of Christ. Neither is the Creation account complete, as it does not describe the creation of things which are not regularly manifest on the earth, such as wicked spirits or angels, whether they be good or evil. As it is expressed in Matthew chapter 13, since Christ came to reveal things kept secret from the foundation of the world, the entire account of creation was certainly not included in Genesis, or things could not have been kept secret.