You might have grown up believing that God created everything. That made you feel safe and secure. But then your whole world was turned upside down when you heard that science has disproved God. You watched a YouTube video that chastised your childhood faith, and so you question the story of Creation. And now you don’t really know what do believe about the origin of everything.
So where does that leave most of us? Well, if we don’t know how we got here, then we don’t what we were made for. If we don’t know what we were made for, then we don’t know what were supposed to do with our lives. So many of us are anxiously and aimlessly running through life, hoping to find something meaningful worth our life’s devotion. Others have adopted the motto, “If it feels good, do it.” But nothing feels good any more. Pain and suffering inevitably flood our lives, and we don’t seem to have anything solid to stand on.
But what if we could take another look at the different origin stories from around the world? What if we could figure out how we actually got here? Then we would know what we were made for and where we are going. Then life, even in the face of all its pain and suffering, might have meaning again. That is what we hope to accomplish in this upcoming series.
9/9/2018 Origins Genesis 1 Origin of Life, beauty, and purpose
How did we get here? What was the origin of life? Was is an act of violence like the Babylonians thought? If that’s true, then let’s live out that violence. Was it a random fluke like the Darwinians believe? If that’s true, then let’s live out a life of random, pointless survival. Was is a beautiful creative work from a loving Creator? If that’s so, then let’s live out a live of creative beauty by loving one another as we worship our Creator.
9/16/2018 Origins Genesis 2 Origin Marriage and family
To many people “God is dead.” So, over the past few decades we have experimented with every kind of idea of sexuality, marriage, and family. Can we really say that marriages and families are flourishing in our new world? Let’s go back to the very beginning where marriage and family was invented. Then we might just know how it could look in this beautiful, yet broken world.
9/23/2018 Origins Genesis 3 Origin of Evil and Hope
We know there is so much beauty and good in the world. But also, there is so much evil and wickedness. Why is that? The Bible says that humans were created good. And the good life had God in the center and humans reflecting his goodness. But the first humans tried to turn the tables, putting themselves in the center. Their act of disobedience threw off the whole universe, bringing sin, suffering, and death into out good world. But right away God promised a plan to rescue and redeem all that was broken. That rescue mission was so big it took the rest of the Bible to reveal.
9/30/2018 Origins Genesis 4 Origin of violence
Adam and Eve’s first children inherited a fallen world with lots of problems. And they had a decision to make. Will I try and fix the problems in my life, or will I blame, destroy, and punish everyone else for my problems? Cain’s answer to that question gave birth to the origin of violence. Before we are tempted to carry out an act of violence, we have the same questions to answer? What will we do?
10/7/2018 Origins Genesis 6-9 Origin of our current world and environment
God says he created the world with order and beauty. But something big happened to this world. It’s filled with compressed fossils, tall pointy mountains, and raging chaotic waters. What cataclysmic event led to such a unique world? And is our environment on the brink of more disaster?
10/14/2018 Origins Genesis 10-11 Origin of civilizations and nations
Why is there such diversity between nations and cultures? And what makes one nation and people rise up in order to destroy its neighbors? How did we become so diverse? And why do we continue to point our missiles at each other? If we got to the origin of civilizations and culture, we might just begin to set a few things right.