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Commentary on "Revelation"
Day 2: Sunday, April 26, 2009
Overview
“For since the creation of the world His invisible attributes, His eternal power and divine nature, have been clearly seen, being understood through what has been made, so that they are without excuse” (Romans 1:20 NASB).
Problems
As presented here, the argument for natural revelation is described as a conflict between intelligent design and evolution. It is a necessary precursor to E.G. White being a “continuing and authoritative source of truth which provide for the church comfort, guidance, instruction, and correction.”
The problem is that Paul was not arguing that a non-believer can be brought to saving faith in Jesus Christ solely through the study of nature. His argument is that, although nature could have pointed an unbeliever to the concept of God, “they became fools, and exchanged the glory of the incorruptible God for an image in the form of corruptible man and of birds and four-footed animals and crawling creatures” (Romans 1:22b-23 NASB). In short, they created gods in their own image. “Therefore God gave them over in the lusts of their hearts to impurity…” (Romans 1:24a NASB).
Nature can point the questioning unbeliever to something or someone outside of themselves, but only a believer will see the true God revealed in nature. Therefore, nature cannot be depended upon as a true revelation of God. Its message is totally dependent on the person’s point of view – lost people naturally begin to worship nature either by superstition or by science; saved people see a Creator behind nature and understand that Jesus is the Creator (John 1:3).
Summary
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