The Answers in Genesis and Apologetics Organization, the word apologetics comes from the Greek word apologia, which in 1 Peter 315 has translated answer, always be prepared to give an answer, to give an apologetic, a logical reason to defend the faith. We equip people with answers to defend the Christian faith against the attacks of our day. And one of the sad things that I see is that most Christians today can't defend the Christian faith against the attacks of our day. Most Christians don't know how to answer skeptical questions and I'm going to show you why that's important to be able to do so today. 2007 we opened the Creation Museum, it's in the Northern Kentucky area, just in the greatest Cincinnati area actually, we're within a one-day drive of two-thirds of the population. How many of you may have been to the Creation Museum? Hmm. Okay, how many of you have been to Disneyland or Universal Studios? Okay, I see a problem here, all right? The Creation Museum is every bit as good as Disneyland or Universal Studios in regard to the quality of the exhibits and what we do, it's an incredible place and you can spend two days there because most people do, but the difference between us and Disneyland and Universal Studios is we tell the truth and we preach the Gospel, so it's a lot of difference. But we have animatronic dinosaurs, animatronic people, we have live animal displays, planetarium taken into outer space and really all from a biblical perspective, a special effects theater and also life-size exhibits where we walk you through the Bible, that's what it is, it's a whole walk through the Bible, it makes the Bible come real, answering the skeptical questions of this age, we even have animatronic Muth Muthuselah that'll give you a great message. We walk you into a section of Noah's Ark as well and you can even touch a screen and ask Noah questions and he'll answer you. We have a Dragon Legends exhibit and all sorts of other exhibits, a world-class insectarium, world-class collection of insects that are displayed like I've never seen displayed in any other facility and an animatronic, Dr. Arthur Podd, the very latest animatronics as he teaches lessons to you, we just opened a $1.5 million Allosaurus exhibit, we were given one of the best Allosaurus fossils ever found and it is one, it is the best Allosaurus fossil skull ever found and so we just opened that and the atheists are really upset that we've got that incredible fossil. We have lots of other fossils on display there too and then we have the beautiful gardens and case because I know we're in Southern California so that green stuff is grass and trees and the stuff in the middle there, that's water, now that's another example of water right there, it actually is liquid and it flows and we also have a petting zoo with also unique hybrid animals and the biggest and best zipline course in the Midwest, 23 ziplines, 12 sky bridges, two super ziplines, a whole challenge course, biblical echo tour signs and it brings a lot of non-Christians in as well as others, it's an incredible family facility so you're all coming now right? We're going to come out to the Creation Museum and if you come next year, in the first six months of next year, we're actually our next project which is 40 minutes away from the Creation Museum, we have 800 acres actually, one of the busiest interstates in America, Interstate 75 and we're building a life-size Noah's Ark out of wood with a whole walkthrough series of exhibits and the wood actually goes up next year between January and July and we have a hundred Amish people who are doing that, putting the wood up because they built the biggest timber frame building in America and this is going to be now the biggest timber frame building in America so all the infrastructure gets done the rest of this year but if you come to the Creation Museum you'll be able to go down and actually see the Ark under construction, be once in a lifetime opportunity, I mean how many other times in history could you ever see Noah building the Ark? So this is your opportunity, then you're going to come back in 2016 when it's open and then you just have to come back every year after that. Okay so it's actually what we do at the Creation Museum and this is what I want to talk to you about today which is very important, we actually walk people through the Bible, why do we do this? Why even build a Creation Museum? Why a Ministry of Answers and Genesis? Well we walk people through what we call the Seven Seas of History, this is really an outline of the Bible from Genesis to Revelation. Creation, creation in six days, the creation of Adam and Eve, the kinds of animals and plants, corruption, the entrance of sin and death, catastrophe, the flood of Noah's day, confusion, the terror of Babel, if you stop right there you realize what the Bible is revealing to us, what God is revealing to us is the history in anthropology, the history in biology, the history in geology, the history in astronomy to help us understand this whole universe, who we are, where we came from, what it's all about, why things are the way they are today and then presents the gospel based in that history. But we live in an age called a scientific age and we have people today telling us, oh science is showing you can't trust this history here, this history is not true. Even many Christians say you can believe in evolution millions of years, it doesn't matter, who cares about Genesis as long as you trust in Jesus. But do you realize something? The message of Jesus, the message of the cross, the message of the gospel depends on that history being true. I mean if we're not descendants of one man, if there wasn't a literal Adam and Eve, tell me where you came from. If Adam didn't sin, then what is sin? Then why are we sinners? Where did we get that from? What does it mean that Jesus is the last Adam? If death wasn't the penalty for sin, why does Adam get the blame for that in the New Testament? By one man sin in the world and death by sin. You see that history there is very, very important and the devil knows that. The devil knows if you can get generations to doubt that history, they won't believe the rest of the Bible. And of course, if that history is not true, then marriage can be anything you want to make it to mean, which would suit many people in today's world, as you know, including the President of the United States. You know, 1 Peter 3.15 says, always be ready to give answers. And what I wanted to show you is, we can talk for hours. In fact, next week, we're going to talk for hours, all of our speakers, and giving all sorts of answers to equip you to defend your faith. But I just wanted to give you just a little summary of these. Every topic I cover here, we can spend hours on. I'm just going to spend a couple of minutes on each just to give you sort of an inkling, the way we can use science to defend the Christian faith, to confirm the Bible's history. You know, if you start through those seven C's, the first C was creation, creation. Is there any evidence that God created? Actually, I want to show you evidence from biochemistry. When you look at DNA, DNA is that molecule of heredity that makes up our genes, make up our chromosomes. You know, the two scientists who discovered DNA back in 1953 were atheists. You know what they said? We've shown that there's no God because life is just build on the molecules, just chemistry. That's all it is. Well, just chemistry. Actually, we've now found out DNA is not just chemistry. You know what DNA is? It's like books of information. All the instructions that build you or build an elephant or build a dog or a cat or whatever, incredible amount of information. You know how much information is in the DNA of all the different living things in this world? Zillions of bits of information, incredible amount of information. Oh, by the way, all that information that's in those books, like DNA, it has to be read by a language. Oh, you know what? DNA actually has the information to make the language that reads a DNA, that makes the language that reads a DNA. If you don't, if it's not all there, it's not going to work. And here's the interesting thing. Scientists now have been able to show some things very clearly. Dr. Werner Gitt is an information scientist from Germany. Here's what he found. There is no natural law through which matter can give rise to information. You're going to believe in evolution. You believe matter somehow gave rise to information for life. Wait a minute. We've never seen matter produce one bit of information, let alone the zillions of bits of information that we have out there. Not only that, he found as an information scientist, code systems, a language always comes from an intelligence. You can't get a language system just from matter by itself and intelligence is responsible. You know what DNA really cries out in the beginning God created. That's why the Bible says, if you don't believe in God, you are without excuse. Isn't it exciting to be a Christian? Wow, three people. Three people were excited that time. That's great.  You're ready for your afternoon nap. Okay, let me give you another example. Let's see if we can excite you more. Hey, in Genesis one, the Bible says that God made kinds of animals and plants after they're kind. You know the secularists attacked the Bible and they say, see, the Bible's wrong. You know, you can't trust the Bible as a science book because look, you've got biology wrong here. It says animals can't change and we see animals change. We see different species of fish. We see different species of dogs. Wait a minute, the Bible doesn't say animals can't change.  God made kinds after they're kind. And if you think about it very carefully as our scientists have done, you know, in the classification system, kingdom farm class order, family, genus species, do you realize something? The word kind in most instances we believe is at the family level of classification, not species, not genus, which is important to understand because the secularist mock those of us who believe in Noah's Ark saying he couldn't fit all the species of animals on board. The Bible doesn't say that Noah took all the species of animals on board. It says he took two of each kind of land animal, kind of land animal. Now we would say that there's only one kind of dog and it's called dog, by the way. They have different species of dogs but there's only one family of dogs. There's only one family of cats but you have different species of cats. You see what we see out in the world, they're based on the Bible, here's what we would say. There's a creation orchard. There's all these trees, a tree that represents a dog kind, a tree that represents the finch kind or the elephant kind. And because of all the genetic information God put in there, you can have different species of dogs but dogs remain dogs. You can have different species of finches but finches remain finches. That's exactly what you see, that God created all the information to start with for each of these kinds. Now of course if you believe in evolution, somehow matter produced information, which we've never seen it happen, matter produced a language system which is impossible and somehow over millions of years matter produced all this new information to produce all these different kinds, that's not what you see. In fact, when you look at this, this is a religion, this is a belief to explain life without God and here's how the evolutionists con you all. They say, oh look, you can see different changes in finches, you can see changes in dogs, given enough time, all those changes add up to one kind changing into another. No, those changes are only within boundaries. And in fact, I can show you how this happens. Now you can go to a lot more detail, this is just a big picture perspective. We have all these different species of dogs, okay, but they all belong to the one dog family. Now we don't know how many dogs God made originally. Usain made two dogs and they got married had kids and they got married had kids and they got married had kids and then we end up with lots of dogs. Okay, so here we are with lots of dogs. Now how do you get dingos and wolves and coyotes? Well, if you understand there's an incredible amount of genetic variability in the dog kind or in the cat kind or in the elephant kind, incredible amount. Now the Bible says two of each kind went on Noah's Ark, not two of each species, two of each kind, which means in most instances two of each family. But you know our scientists have been researching how many kinds are there and the way they do this, for instance, and we've got papers on our website where they're doing this for our Ark project, they'll look at a particular kind like dogs and they'll be able to document this dog bred with this one and this one with this one and this one with this one and somewhere in the world this one bred with this one and this one with this one. This one doesn't breed with this one but you can still connect them all the way back so they would say they're all the one kind. You get the idea? And so they've actually projected right now it looks like there's going to be less than 1,000 actual animal kinds. Most animals aren't that big. Just over 2,000 animals on Noah's Ark there was tons of room on that Ark. When anyone mocks at you and says Noah couldn't fit all the animal on the Ark you just need to say, wait a minute, let's look at this carefully and you can show them that accusation is not true. Two dogs come off the Ark and they start to increase in numbers again but you know what's going to happen? They're not going to stay together. Eventually they split up go to different places and you end up with different combinations of genes just like each of you is a different combination to your parents but all the information came from your parents because there's incredible genetic variability in the humankind as there is in the dog kind, the cat kind, the elephant kind and over time as they get isolated from each other some survive better than others that's called natural selection or adaptation which has nothing to do with evolution you'll end up with different species of dogs. And you know what the evolutionists say?  People here in the Creation Museum we show these dog skills they're different species of dogs. Now evolutionists today wouldn't use dogs as an example of evolution because we've been able to see many of those species breed in the last few hundred years but they use this as evidence for evolution when Darwin went to the Galapagos island and because it was Darwin that's why they use these these finches that he collected had big beaks and little beaks and medium-sized beaks and different species of finches by the way they're still finches and what were they finches and what will they be finches is that evolution that's finches but because Darwin collected them this is used as the classic example for evolution in textbooks just for interest how many of you remember this from school that Darwin's finches we use yeah but people do you realize something there's actually more there's actually more where did I go wrong way that time there's more variability in those dog skulls than there are in those beaks and finches and yet they wouldn't use the dog skulls because we've done so much work on dogs and we know how many of them came about in the last couple hundred years because we didn't see this finch species form ah this is evolution and given enough time said Darwin when you look at these beaks eventually this is evidence of this tree but it's not it's only evidence of variation within the finch kind if you get the idea and you see that has nothing to do with evolution actually what's called natural selection and adaptation when you understand it is the opposite of evolution I can't believe it's taught as evidence for evolution in the textbooks but it is our students are being brainwashed into believing something that's not true now we go on to the second C corruption the bible reveals that to us that the world is a fallen world that we live in and in fact sin and death entered the world that was once perfect and you know this is an important topic to answer to death for a number of reasons first of all everyone in this room unless the Lord comes back first is going to face death because we're humans because we're descendants of Adam and Eve that's why Richard Dawkins that famous atheist is going to face death everyone will because we're humans you know one of the questions in today's world you'll hear it all the time whenever there's a tragedy in particular like a 9-11 or a tsunami hits Indonesia or whatever how can you believe in loving God with all the death and suffering in the world where's your loving God God must be unjust look at all the people suffering today look at those children dying over there in Africa God must be unjust by the way whenever a non-christ says God's unjust ask them how they determine what's just and what's unjust because how can a Christian do that I had an atheist once say to me your God must be unjust I said you're an atheist you can't accuse anybody of being unjust because you can't you think about it because they don't have an absolute basis for their standards just their opinion you got to point out the inconsistency by the way in their logic but you see the issue of death is an important one too because there are billions of dead things buried in rock layers laid down by water all over the earth did you know that most of the fossil record some of those layers of the Grand Canyon actually exist across the continental US and in other continents around the world you realize how massive they are you realize how far they extend incredible most people don't know that but you know they're full of dead things wait a minute we're told that these layers will lay down millions of years before man there are many Christians that believe the fossil layers will lay down millions years before man but if if the fossil layers will lay down millions years before man then Christians have a major problem in fact it undermines the gospel undermines the word of God let me show you why Adam you can eat of all the trees there's one tree you're not to eat of because if you do you'll surely die it was a test of obedience God didn't make Adam to be a puppet to force him to love him he wanted him to love him because he chose to so he gave him a choice and Adam rebelled against God Adam disobeyed God that's called sin that's where sin came from that's the origin of sin and death is a consequence in fact the first death I believe was in the garden when God killed animals and made clothes for Adam and Eve out of animal skins now why did God do that well actually at the creation museum one of my favorite exhibits is because it points to Jesus is this one we call it the sacrifice scene the first blood sacrifices are covering for their sin a picture of what was to come in Jesus Christ the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world you see when God killed animals and clothed Adam and Eve it was setting up the sacrificial system that you know the Israelites sacrificed animals over and over and over again for recognizing their sin and coming before a holy God but it was also pointing to the fact that one day the Messiah would come in fact you know the first time the gospel is preached in the Bible where's the first time the gospel is preached it's Genesis 3 15 I'll put enmity between you and the woman your seed, her seed you shall bruise your head you shall bruise his heel that's the message of Jesus we understand that now the message of Jesus preached right there in Genesis by the way if Genesis is not true if it's just mythology it's just a story that's not really true it's not history as many even Christian leaders will tell you then so was the gospel not true because the gospel is preached right there in Genesis in fact when God killed animals and clothed animals it's the origin of clothing I notice you are all wearing clothes which is good by the way because we live in a fallen world animals don't wear clothes why do we wear clothes because we're all animals we're made in the image of God and we have a conscience and sin distorts nakedness and God knows that sin has caused a problem and so he made clothes for Adam and Eve but at the same time it was a reminder that God was going to provide a way to take away their sin you see Hebrews 9 tells us without the shedding of blood there's no remission no forgiveness of sin why the shedding of blood because the life of the flesh is in the blood we're told blood represents life you see Adam we bowled against God and because Adam and because we're descendants of Adam what he did we did he sinned we sinned we come from Adam and therefore death is a consequence now his body will die but because we're made in the image of God we have a soul we're different to the animals they're not made in the image of God our soul is going to live forever but we'd be separated from God forever but God had a plan from eternity his plan was to step into history in the person of Jesus Christ the God man to become our relative related to us because we all go back to Adam we're all one big family we're all related to each other whether you like it or not by the way and we all go back to Adam and Eve he stepped into history to be Jesus Christ the God man to die and across be raised from the dead offers a free gift to salvation you see Hebrews tells us the blood of bulls and goats can't take away our sin we're not an animal so an animal can't take away our sin that was just pointing to the one who would come to take away our sin and we don't sacrifice animals today why? because the Bible says Jesus Christ died once and for all he is the ultimate sacrifice now I say that to you for this reason if you believe in millions of years as many Christians do then the millions of years came from the belief that the fossils were laid down millions of years before man that means there was bloodshed millions of years before man but if without the shedding of blood there's no remission of sins so if before man sinned you had the shedding of blood what has the shedding of blood got to do with the remission of sins? you just destroyed the whole basis of the atonement not only that in the fossil record supposedly millions of years before man you have lots of examples of animals eating each other bones in their stomachs you know the Bible says originally Adam and Eve ate fruit and the animals were vegetarian because there wasn't any death in the world the Bible calls death an enemy one day death will be thrown into the lake of fire there was no death originally we weren't even told we could eat meat until after the flood when God said just as I gave you the plants now I give you everything by the way that's why you can eat a hotdog because it is everything and so the origin of a hotdog is in Genesis just so that you know right there but you see our diet changed because sin changed everything you know what else is in the fossil record did you know in the fossil record it said to be millions of years before man there's evidence of diseases like brain tumors, cancer, arthritis see at the end of the creation when God made Adam at the end of the sixth day he said everything he made was very good everything was very good if you have cancer and brain tumors before that time then God's calling cancer very good it's calling brain tumors very good people you can't have death, bloodshed, diseases before sin not only that in the fossil record there are fossil thorns said to be hundreds of millions of years old the Bible says clearly thorns came after the curse the fossil record if you take God's word as written that fossil record could not have been laid down millions of years before sin these two things cannot be true at the same time death millions of years before man death after sin which means when you're looking at layers like the Grand Canyon wait a minute those layers with fossils had to be formed after man sin is there anything in the Bible that could explain how you could get billions of dead things buried in rock layers laid down by water all over the earth? of course God tells us there was the catastrophe of Noah's flood when God judged the world with a flood because of the wickedness of man by the way if there really was a global flood you'd expect to find billions of dead things buried in rock layers laid down by water all over the earth and what do we find? billions of dead things buried in rock layers laid down by water all over the earth that's one of the reasons why it answers in Genesis to help people understand for instance when Mount St. Helen's erupted on May 18th, 1980 many people don't realize this but hundreds of feet of sedimentary layers were laid down that layer in the middle is 30 feet thick consists of thousands of individual layers like that and it took three hours to be formed there were canyons carved through even hard rock by mud flows in a matter of days, months and a few years you know people often say to me but wait a minute there's not enough water to cover the earth how could you have a global flood? I mean you look at the Himalayas there's not enough water to cover all those how do you know the Himalayas existed before the flood? how do you know that? see if you level out the mountains and the ocean basins there's enough water now to cover to a depth of two miles there's plenty of water how did God end the flood? Psalm 104 seems to indicate He raised up the mountains and sank the ocean basins and the water poured off into the ocean basins by the way the secularists believe exactly the same that mountains were raised up and ocean basins sank it's just they make it take millions of years we don't believe it took millions of years we think it happened catastrophically in fact you know what you've got on the Himalayas? you've got marine fossils on the top of the Himalayas how'd they get there? it makes sense they were laid down during the flood then when the mountains were raised up now that's why you have marine fossils on the top of the Himalayas and by the way you can actually see where this raising up of mountains has occurred for instance give you an example close to home let's go to the Grand Canyon the Grand Canyon cuts through the Chaya Bab Plateau the whole area is raised up and when you go to the place where it was raised up you can see where the Tepit sandstone was bent interestingly evolutionists tell us that that sandstone was laid down over millions of years then millions of years of heat and pressure bent it upwards but if that's so it would be broken but it's not broken it was bent it was bent while it was soft not only that millions of years of heat and pressure would turn into metamorphic rock and there's no evidence of that there either whatever happened happened quickly when it was soft in fact here's what makes much more sense that area was raised up and when it was raised up it formed a dam because today you see where there is evidence of massive lakes behind the Grand Canyon and there were waters from the flood rains after the flood the sediment was still soft the dam breaks and the water then carves out the Grand Canyon you know when you go downstream from the Grand Canyon you find massive surge deposits that's where the sediment was deposited most people don't know about these things in fact you know what happens in America they pass legislation to protect the teaching of evolution of millions of years and to protect your children even hearing about the problems or hearing about evidences that contradict evolution of millions of years because the state is basically imposing the religion of atheism on generations of students there was about time we woke up to that I know there's some Christian teachers as missionaries in the public education system but you can't deny the fact that by and large they throw God out the Bible out prayer out creation out and now they tell students in their textbooks you can explain the whole of life by natural processes do you know what that means when they say that you're not explaining things by natural processes means do you know what naturalism is it's atheism your tax dollars are being used to impose the religion of atheism on generations of kids and people we wonder why two-thirds of young people are leaving the church in America by the time they reach college age because God's word comes under attack I had a young man just after the last service who's still there and said to me I go to school and he said it's such an evil place and Christianity is under attack so much and he said it's so difficult and he's just so thankful for the answers that we provide to be able to defend the Christian faith let's go on and look at the next one confusion the tower of Babel and you know if the Bible's true we all descend it's about a manoeuvre which means there's only one biological race Darwin was wrong when he talked about races in fact there are people today who still talk about races do you know the secular scientists know there's only one race they do there's only one race there aren't any different races in fact when the human genome project back in the year 2000 released to the world that they had mapped the human genome across the world and what did they say for instance in the New York Times they had put together a draft in the entire sequence of the human genome and unanimously declared there is only one race the human race wow what a revelation who would have ever thought of that hey you know what if we had believed God's word why wouldn't we as God's people have been out there saying that all along saying hey we're all descendants of Adam and Eve there's only one race why wouldn't we have been saying that you know what we're so intimidated by the world we're intimidated by the evolutionists and you see even when I say that there are people today who will say well wait a minute how can there be only one race I mean you've got different colors of people you've got white people black people aren't there four basic colors no there's only one color in fact the secular world know this too even the National Geographic had a big article on this back in 2002 I think it was showing that everyone has the same skin color do you know everyone in this room has the same skin color you have a pigment called melanin it's a brown pigment you can have a lot of it you can have a little of it it's not matter what color you are it's what shade you are see people look at me and say well you're a white person I do not want to be a white person because let me show you this is white and so I don't want to look like that right now okay in fact I couldn't speak to you if I was a white person do you realize that every one of you is the same color it's a pigment called melanin now there's a few other pigments but melanin is the main pigment it's a brown pigment so we're all brown all right and you need that pigment actually people often say you live and hear them when the Fox News talking about well colored people wait a minute everyone is a colored person if you're not a colored person you got problems okay I want you to understand that everyone is a colored person and by the way this also means something else too when people say what do you think about interracial marriage there's no such thing biologically as interracial marriage because we're all one race the interracial marriage the bible talks against is the spiritual interracial marriage when the godly people marry ungodly people that's the interracial marriage the bible speaks against and see there are about 50 genes or more for skin for the amount of skin pigment you have but let's just take these four genes here member capital letters meaning dominant genes little letters recessive genes it makes sense that god put all the variability for genes for for skin shade in Adam and Eve and so Adam and Eve would have been middle brown it makes sense the majority of the world's population are so those that got all big A's and big B's would have dark skin those little A's and little B's light skin that's why and you can see in California here now when you have middle brown couples they can have children that are darker than the parents children that are lighter than the parents very easy to understand and then because of the tower of Babel you end up with some groups that only have all big A's and big B's some that only have little A's and little B's some only produce dark skin some only produce light skin very easy to understand by the way why is it that we have flood legends and cultures all over the world that all sound like Noah's flood or sound like the record in the bible have elements that are similar because they passed it down from Noah changed it but the real records in the bible it all attests to the truth of God's word you see those first four C's concerning creation corruption catastrophe confusion hey gods reveal this to us it makes sense of the fossils it makes sense of the people groups around the world it makes sense of who we are the fact there's only only one race makes sense of why the evidence hope just cries out in the beginning God created and by the way if that history is true then the gospel that's based in that history is true but we have generations being led astray being told that history is not true and people if that history is not true then it also means that every christian doctrine is not true for instance do you realize that every single biblical doctrine of theologies based in Genesis 1 to 11 every single one you think about it why did Jesus die on a cross? Genesis 1 to 11 why are we sinners? Genesis 1 to 11 why do we die? Genesis 1 to 11 what is marriage? man to woman why? Genesis 1 to 11 why do we wear clothes? Genesis 1 to 11 why is Jesus called the last atom? Genesis 1 to 11 why do we have a seven day week? Genesis 1 to 11 why do we need a new heavens and a new earth? Genesis 1 to 11 do you think Genesis 1 to 11 is important? it is it's the foundational history for the whole of the rest of the bible by the way if you've been influenced by the world to believe an evolution of millions of years and you've reinterpreted Genesis or told your kids it doesn't matter you've done two things two things number one you've undermined the history that's foundational to the gospel and all doctrines but number two you've undermined the authority of the word itself see I meet so many Christians who say who cares about Genesis? the most important thing is to tell people that Jesus rose from the dead excuse me where did you get the idea Jesus rose from the dead? where did that come from? well the bible oh you want me to take this as a written here I see do you believe in the virgin birth too? well yeah how do you know that? oh the bible do you believe the Israelites crossed the Jordan river and the Red Seers miracles? well yeah where did you get that from? oh the bible oh well the bible also says God created in six days and man made from dust woman from his side and death came out to sin there's a global flood oh no you can't believe that why not? oh because of what the scientists are saying in the millions of years in evolution people when you have said that to your children and you've let people think that what you've said is oh you can believe this part of the bible doesn't matter about this you can use man's ideas out here to reinterpret this you've unlocked a door that causes them to start to doubt that you can trust any of the bible and it puts them on that slippery slide of unbelief we're losing two-thirds of our young people from the church they're walking away from the church in America and America is heading the way of England two-thirds of young people say they don't believe in God in England church attendance in England is down from 60 percent to 5 percent people of America is on that same path right now 4,000 churches a year closing their doors in America and look at the collapse of Christian morality hey if you want to see the collapse of the Christian world view look in California and see what's been happening here and then all the emphasis on gay marriage and transgenders and bathrooms that you know you don't separate out from male and female anymore you realize what's going on because God's word has come under credible attack hey just consider the marriage for a moment you know when Jesus was asked about marriage do you know what he said I paraphrase it for you here's what Jesus really was saying here what is wrong with you people haven't you even read and believed the book of Genesis that's what he's really saying you think about it have you not read that he made them at the beginning male and female where was that Genesis 1 verse 27 and said for this course you know man lived his father mother and clean mother and his wife and they'll be one flesh where was that from Genesis 2 24 the account that God made Adam from dust he looked at the animal saw none were like him so God put him to sleep and from his side made a woman the whole doctrine of marriage based on the fact you're one flesh because a woman came from the man you believe in evolution as many Christian leaders will tell you and Christian professors will tell you you can believe in evolution then the woman came from an ape woman the man from an ape man you've just destroyed marriage you see marriage is to be a man and a woman why because God made a man and a woman and you know I know President Obama is out there pushing in a big way gay marriage across this nation I got a message for President Obama you are absolutely wrong how do I know that because God invented marriage you did not and that's really the answer for him by the way if Genesis is not true marriage is whatever you want to make it to be but if Genesis is true if the history is true marriage is one man and one woman because God is the one that ordained marriage in fact the family is the first and most fundamental of all human institutions which God ordained in scripture and by the way the whole primary focus of the family family is to produce godly offspring Malachi 2 15 who will then produce godly offspring he'll produce godly offspring sadly we've handed generations of our kids over to the world and said you teach them we'll just tell them about Jesus and we wonder why we're losing them well you know as I said not just marriage but all of our doctrines are founded in Genesis see Psalm 113 says if the foundations are destroyed what can the righteous do if you take a barn that had a foundation like this one this foundation collapsed and the barn came down and that collapsing structure to me represents the collapsing moral structure we see in our nation in our whole western world why do we see moral relativism pervading the culture you know what the book of judges says when they had no king to tell them what to do they all did what was right in there oh and eyes you think that applies to America today yes because what's happened we've thrown out the king we've thrown out the absolute authority of the word of God and God's word has come under an incredible attack and in this day and age that attack has been particularly focused on the first books of the Bible the first part of the Bible Genesis the first chapters I should say of the book of Genesis see 2nd Corinthians 113 God has a warning for us God says this through Paul I want to warn you that the devil is going to use the same method on you as you did on Eve to get you to position of not believing the things of God what was the method the devil used on Eve will you go back and find out did God really say stop right there for a moment the first attack was on the word of God that attack has never let up since Genesis 3 you know what God is warning us the devil is going out to attack the word of God to get you to doubt the word of God so that that doubt will lead to unbelief and by the way what else did he say there in Genesis you will become like God you know what the battle has been ever since the beginning a battle between God's word and man's word see there aren't hundreds of religions in the world there's only two there's only two religions God's word man's word the battle has always been a battle between God's word and man's word you know as I said look the devil knows if he was to get out there and say to you hey Jesus Christ did not bodily rise from the dead you would see it as an attack on the gospel but when somebody says God didn't create in six days and you can believe in evolution and you can believe in millions of years people say that's not an attack on the gospel and I say oh yes it is it's a much more powerful attack it's a much more subtle attack because it's an attack on the word from which the gospel comes and Satan's clever if you just work over time slowly and you get generations to eventually give up the word then you'll have won the culture that's exactly what's going on and we've let it happen people we basically handed generations of our kids over to the world you teach them your views you teach them your views of origins that's okay we'll just tell them about Jesus and the undermining of the authority of the word has been happening and now we wonder why we're losing the culture I believe it's God's people who are at fault I believe the church is at fault you know what's happening in America is a reflection of the state of the church because by and large most Christian leaders will not stand on God's word in Genesis they have compromised with the pagan religion of this age of our evolution of millions of years and we've lost generations to the world and we wonder why we got a problem you see I believe that the teaching of evolution big bang millions of years is what I call the Genesis 3 attack of today it permeates the world it permeates the church teaching generations that you know the Bible can't be true you evolved many Christians have said you can believe in evolution doesn't matter you know we wrote a book back in 2007 called or 2009 actually called already gone I encourage every one of you to read that we had America's research group go out and find these two-thirds that leave the church and ask them why and you know what they found out they found out they start to doubt the Bible at a young age 40% doubting the Bible by the end of middle school another 45% by the end of high school something's causing them to doubt a young age what is it the majority of kids from church homes 90 to 95% go to public schools and the teaching of evolution of millions of years and particularly with pastors and Sunday school teachers and others telling them you can believe what the world teaches about millions of years doesn't matter was a big issue to them in regard to why they doubted the word of God and that doubt led to unbelief not only that you'll notice today many young people in our churches of the younger generation will say well why can't you have gay marriage surely if two people love each other that's okay it doesn't matter whether they're two men or two women people think about this when you have allowed generations of our kids in our churches to start outside the Bible with man's ideas of evolution of millions years and reinterpret Genesis don't be surprised when they start outside the Bible with man's ideas of marriage and reinterpret marriage that's what's gone on and we found out from this research that by and large what's happened is you know we tend to do in our churches and homes we tend to teach Bible stories Jonah and the Great Fish feeding of the 5000 Paul's Missionary Journey Jesus on the Cross Adam and Eve and you might say what's wrong with that don't you believe those well number one we've got to stop using the word story today you you actually know why the word story today what does it come to mean in our modern vernacular when you hear the word story fairy tale fable and yet we say kids let's have a Bible story come to church have a Bible story let's have a Bible story people because of the changing of the of the meaning of the word story we now need to talk about record of historical account of emphasize the Bible is a book of history because it's being attacked and being claimed to be just a book of mythology not only that most of the kids go to public schools where by and large people you can't deny it I know there are some missionaries in the system and you need our prayers but you can't die most kids from church homes do not survive the public education system they don't most of them are walking away from the church they're being trained in atheism that's what it is they're being imposed the secular religion of atheism on them and we wonder why that we're losing them because you think about it what's happening in our churches and homes by and large we're not answering the skeptical questions of the age you know as I travel around the world I get asked the same questions wherever I go in this age you believe the Bible but science disproves the Bible this is a scientific age Noah couldn't get the animals on the ark where did Cain get his wife what about the millions of years doesn't carbon-14 disprove the Bible dinosaurs lived millions of years ago what you're saying about the Bible can't be true we came from eight men evolution's true how many of you have heard those questions yeah you've heard those questions you know why because that's the Genesis 3 attack of our day and you know what many of us say well I don't know the answers I don't know what to do with dinosaurs well it doesn't matter well you can believe what you're taught at school Jolly that's okay as long as you trust in Jesus but you know what's happening underneath it all confidence in regard to the word of God is being eroded that doubt that's what's happening you see you know here's teaching apologetics the public schools the PBS channel the learning channel even places like Universal Studios and and Disney World Disneyland yeah because they teach evolution of millions of years and so you know what's happening out there here's the evidence for millions of years here's the evidence you came from an eight man here's the evidence the Bible is not true here's the evidence that never was a global flood here's the evidence you you're just evolved by evolution you're just an animal here's the evidence that you know you can't trust the Bible's accounting Genesis what are we doing in our homes and churches let's have a story tell them about Jesus and we wonder why we're losing the culture and by the way we're losing the culture I know for instance you know the homeschool movement has been developed to try to overcome some of this but you know what we're even going to lose our freedoms there the way this culture is going and people you have to I'm challenging us today I'm challenging us who is training your kids is it the world or is it us because parents you're responsible who have we given our kids to to train you know we need to be teaching them how to defend their faith we need to be teaching them answers yes we teach them God's word but we also need to get them ready for the Genesis three attacks of our day you know the Bible says we're soldiers in a battle and it says put on the whole armor of God have you put on that armor with your kids have you given them the sword of the spirit train them how to use it put on the helmet of salvation the breastplate of righteousness the shoes shod with the gospel of peace have we done that have we been training them and equipping them have we got them ready for the battle or do we just send them out there and let the world train them to be their soldiers you know as I said there's been a battle since the beginning it's between two religions two world views between God's word and man's word and it's really between two world views one of moral absolutes one of moral relativism think about it if God's word is true marriage is a man and a woman if God's word is the absolute authority abortion is wrong because killing a human being in a mother's womb that's murder that's what it is by the way you know how many children have been killed in their mother's womb since row versus wade in 1973 55 million in America alone and we look at Hitler and say how terrible and I mean it was terrible what he did at the Holocaust people the Holocaust in America makes what Hitler did pale in comparison God's not going to stand by by the way do you know if you read Romans 1 what's a sign that God is turning a culture over to judgment the wrath of God because of a culture that rejects him as creator as God what's a sign that he's turning a culture over to judgment and withdrawing the restraining influence of the Holy Spirit homosexual behavior gay marriage God is judging this nation and you know what I believe he's judging the church because we're losing generations from the church you look at the minor prophets when people compromise God's word I will forget your children you're going to lose your children you know we see the collapse of Christian morality and increasing moral relativism because there's been a change foundationally from God's word to man's word and let me let me finish it up here with this here's the foundation of God's word structure Christianity the gospel doctrines come out of that man's word secular humanism moral relativism see the world has been attacking God's word the devil's been attacking God's word ever since Genesis 3 and this day and age there's a focused attack on Genesis and you know what much of the church has succumbed to it and said we don't need Genesis doesn't matter we'll just keep the rest most of our Christian college professors compromise with evolution and the point is if you don't have the whole foundation the structural collapse and you know what we do as Christians we look out there and we say oh look at the problems in the culture abortion gay marriage don't get me wrong we need to stand against those evils but people gay marriage is not the problem in this nation abortion is not the problem in this nation gay marriage and abortion are the symptoms of the problem you see we spent millions of dollars trying to change the culture in regard to these issues and it hasn't worked you know why it hasn't worked the bible doesn't say go on into all the world and change the culture it says go on to all the world and preach the gospel and to make disciples and you see it's interesting I had those two verses here and I look at the back of this church and I say go on to all the world and preach the gospel and it says you are the salt of the earth yes as a man thinks in his heart so is he what does the bible say you ought to be salt it says have salt in yourselves but if the salt's contaminated it's good for nothing here's the point we are to be out there we're to be putting salt in our kids as under contaminated as possible they can't be the salt of the earth till they have salt but we're allowing generations of them to have contaminated salt and then they can't influence the world not for good if we raise up people who are filled with salt and we go out there then we affect the world you've got senators and congressmen who build their thinking on God's word that determines how they vote you know when you look at the fact that that the whole legislation in regard to hobby lobby that just in the senate they introduced a bill to try to overrule what the supreme court did there which would be overruling religious freedom in this nation people you know the sad thing that bill only lost by a few votes and the leader of the the democrats Harry Reid deliberately voted against it so that he can then have the ability to introduce it again later on when they hopefully they're thinking that they can convince some of these other people to vote for it so that it'll restrict religious freedom in this nation people it's absolutely incredible what's happening in this nation but I still believe it's the church's fault you see we have handed generations of kids over to the world and said you can train them the way you want imagine if we were to stand on the authority of the word of God and raise up generations generations of kids who know what they believe know why they believe what they do are filled with salt that's not contaminated can answer the skeptical questions of this age know how to deal with the Genesis three attacks you would change the world you would change California well that's the introduction if you um and that's all that is that is just an introduction I encourage you to get on our website get get resourced I I hate I don't like to come in and just do something like that and people say well wait a minute wait a minute you only just covered a couple of things and what do you do do about dinosaurs and I need more answers about this or about the dating methods or about carbon dating or I want to be able to get these to my kids I I I want to know them myself and so what we do we resource you we you can get our website thousands of articles encourage you to go there and we have a kid's website we have a technical journal website we also brought what I call the cream of the crop of our apologetics resources out here we just bought what you know selected just a small number because I'm only here for for the morning and this is the cream of the cream of the crop and we give them to you at highly discounted prices as you can see just to help you my book the lie evolution really is the textbook of our ministry what I did this morning in much more detail to really call the church to account in regard to this issue and to challenge you as Christians about taking a stand on God's word starting in Genesis and the death issue and all the rest of it already gone I encourage every mom and dad and teenager to read that why we're losing kids from the church what's happening the influences on them I've had many Christian leaders tell me it's revolutionized how they're actually teaching their Sunday schools and young people the six day issue on the age of the earth has done more to cause generations of people in our churches to compromise God's word in the same in our Christian colleges and seminaries so that book is very important those three books are like the three textbooks of our ministry then how do you know the Bible's true you're going to get asked all sorts of questions well who wrote the Bible didn't men just write it how do you know it's true how do you know it's a word of God we need to know how to answer them and these four books we know the top 120 questions you're going to get asked about these issues because over the past 35 years we've traveled around the world we know what you're going to get asked what about carbon dating what about dinosaurs what about the days of creation how to know get the animals on the ark well how do you how do you explain light from the further start how do you how do you deal with all these issues we've got the top 120 questions with detailed answers I encourage everyone who can is a good reader certainly teenager up even 10, 11 year old you study those four books you will have answers to most of the questions you're going to hear out there and it'll really help you in fact I had some parents come to me at the end of the last session I really need my kids to have answers and what's the best collection of answers because they don't have these answers I don't have them I don't know how to teach them these answers dinosaurs are used more than anything to probably convince kids that the Bible is not true and to convince them a million years in evolution this is an incredible book on dinosaurs for middle school upwards even adults Noah's flood very important event in history because the evidence for the flood is what's used today for millions of years and Noah's flood was also a message of salvation as Noah and his family went through a door to be saved we need to go through a door Jesus said I am the door books for little kids we're losing kids at a young age even little rhyme books like this we've seen so many young kids commit their lives to the Lord kindergarten preschool grade one two but it teaches them the Bible's real history I don't know how many of you saw the Bill Nye debate when I debated Bill Nye recently but there's four DVDs there of the whole debate the 14 million people have now seen that around the world it's had an incredible impact and you can get this part of our U choose program out there and then six of my main talks done up as 12 30 minute programs with the curriculum it's an award-winning program we highly discount them out in the field but that gives you a lot more teaching of the things I covered this morning will give you a lot more of the details there's like a whole course on that and then a special witnessing book for you begin when I was a high school teacher in Australia people would come in and hand out the New Testament to the students and I would always grown a little because the New Testament didn't have Genesis 1 to 11 to give the foundational history for the gospel and to counteract the wrong cosmology they were taught so we put together this witnessing book Genesis 1 to 11 the history that's foundational to the gospel Exodus 20 the law the schoolmaster to bring us to Christ the book of John the life of Christ the book of Romans the gospel in detail last two chapters a revelation New Heavens New Earth summarize the Bible in the middle of all that and then have 10 of the most asked questions today with short answers to show we can defend our faith and what does it mean to be a Christian what does it mean to be saved and we let you have that for a special price and I know that I'm not sure there's many of those left out there after the first two services and let there be a lesson to you to get here earlier so and then the last thing the answers magazine it's the leading Christian creation apologetics magazine in the world is one of the biggest Christian magazines in America it's won many awards it's an incredible publication to help you get connected keep up to date defend your faith has a mini magazine for kids in the middle and if you subscribe you we give you a free DVD for each year subscribe hey I want to remind you you know what we're doing you realize I love the chronological approach to Bible teaching by the way you know what I say to people I like to present the gospel the way God does it in the Bible by starting at the beginning you know one of the problems in many ways we've lost our beginning and we go out there preaching the message of the cross but to a culture that no longer understands the beginning or even believes the book from which it comes what a difference it makes when you get out there and start witnessing for the Lord Jesus Christ showing people you've got answers you can defend your faith pointing them to the fact the history in the Bible is true understanding faith comes by hearing hearing by the word and pointing them to the gospel of Jesus Christ that comes from that history wow what a difference you can make I urge you to go out there and do that


I think new vets are really embarrassed about discussing costs. They find it hard to discuss and especially because they're probably coming from university where they've either had no income or very low income and they're suddenly having to tell clients that there are a thousand dollar bills or multiple thousands of dollar bills coming along. I find new graduates are really embarrassed about it and it makes them nervous and I think unfortunately that affects everything they do in the consulting room because they're nervous to discuss the costs. The clients then see them as nervous about the treatment and so they lose confidence in the new graduate whereas if the new graduate was comfortable discussing costs they know the medicine so they're going to be good at that and it means they're going to give a much better impression to the client. What's important is you know how to use the system that you're using so that the practice management system so that you can work out firstly for a client what they are expecting to spend on this. If you change any of those costs or you don't work it out accurately then you're missing fees and that the client's not going to want you to ring them up and say sorry I'd forgot to charge you this two days later you have to be able to tell them well before they make their decision exactly what it's going to cost. If you haven't told a client beforehand that you're going to be doing a procedure or you're going to be running a test you're really not in you're on shaky ground when you then try to come to charge them later on and most clients are going to get upset about that. One of the things I drill into all of our vets is that the client's got to get the same experience and they've got to have their socks knocked off and part of that is knowing exactly what's going on knowing what the risks are to their pet and also knowing how much they're going to spend in practice. We're really tough on our guys we use the system so the computer system and we make them work out an accurate estimate because you can't do it off the top of your head if I do it off the top of my head I'm guaranteed to be $150 under what it's actually going to cost whereas if you're using the computer system to work it out then you can be confident and I just tell them they're not allowed to discount there's no reason for it and so they just need to work it out accurately and then there are no surprises. Clients are happy for you to tell them this is how much we're going to spend over the next five days and then if this doesn't go right then that's how much we're going to spend that's the information they want and it's going to give them more confidence in you as well. Just like I was saying before vets need to new graduates need to fake it until they make it you've got to be confident in the consult room or else they're not going to have any confidence in your medical skills even though you're really great at them. A really common one we get called about is how much does a dental cost and a dental can cost a client anywhere from $350 to $1,500 and there's no way from a client's description of their pet's mouth can you work that out accurately but every day I have nurses or vets who give an approximate estimate over the phone for a dental procedure the dog is guaranteed to come in with sewer mouth and need $1,500 worth of extractions and they've been told it'll only be $500 that means the client's going to be really unhappy with the practice they're going to go and tell 10 people that the practice overcharged them after promising that it was going to be one price even though you told them look it could be between this much and this much clients only ever remember the lowest number you tell them and that's really important when giving estimates they're only going to remember the lowest number you've got to always make sure you're showing them that full range.


given us. There's amazing grace, extravagant grace that he's given us. Something that we did not deserve, but he just poured out on us. So we are ever grateful for that. So we don't have to be apologetic about receiving grace, right? We don't have to... You can come with confidence, like we see in the book of Hebrews, Hebrews chapter 4. We see that, let us draw near with confidence. Let us draw near in faith and to receive grace and mercy. So every time it's about grace, we don't have to hold back. We don't have to be apologetic. We don't have to beat ourselves down because grace is given freely, right? So we can come with confidence. We can come with rejoicing in our hearts. We can come boldly to the presence of God and thank him for the grace and receive even more grace and mercy for living off this day. Right? So let's thank him. Father, we thank you for the grace that you made so freely available for each one of us. We thank you for the grace, Lord. And Lord, everyone as your word declares, Lord, enable us to stand firm, stand strong, be firmly established in this grace. Lord, enable us to understand about grace. Lord, enable us to understand the freedom that we have because of your grace. And Lord, we pray that we will continue our life, our walk will be, Lord, in that grace that you've given us, Lord. And we thank you that we have access to this grace by faith and not by our own deeds or not by our own works. We have the access to, we are recipients of this grace because of our faith in you, Lord. We believe and we receive. And so, God, we thank you. Thank you for all the works of your grace, Lord, the works of righteousness that we have received, justification, testification, and sanctification, everything that we receive because of your grace. We thank you. We thank you, Master. And Lord, we, this morning, each one of us, we come boldly to your throne of grace. We thank you that you are enthroned in grace. And Lord, we thank you. None of our works, none of our performance can ever match, Lord, match up, Lord, to receive this grace, Lord. We thank you that it's given freely. And so, Lord, we as believers, Lord, we joyfully receive it. We gratefully, with grateful hearts, we receive this grace. We thank you. We thank you for lifting us up. We thank you for, Lord, placing us where we are. We thank you, Lord, that you, Lord, watch over us with grace-filled eyes, Lord. You don't look at with condemnation-filled eyes, God. Look at us, God. You look at us with grace-filled eyes and we thank you. We thank you. We bless your name. We bless your name. Hallelujah. Let the grace of God just wash over you today. Right now, you know, just receive the grace of God. Let the grace of God just wash over each of us this morning. Just receive it in a greater measure, even greater measure and say, Lord, I thank you. I thank you for your grace. I thank you for your abundant grace. I receive your abundant grace. I receive your amazing grace. Let your grace wash over me. Let your grace, Lord, break away every bondage, every thought of legalism, Lord. Let it, let it just break away. Let it break away every false assumption of, Lord, of anything that we can do by works. Let it break away, Lord. Hallelujah. We thank you. We thank you. We bless your name, Lord. We are ever so dependent on your grace, Master. We thank you. We give you all the praise at this time. We give you all the glory in Jesus' matchless name. We pray. Amen. Amen. Hallelujah. Amen. Thank you. Thank you, Jesus. Yeah, we just thank the Lord for the grace of God. If not for his grace, where would we be? Amen. Yeah. Okay. So, we've been, oh, I see a new student success. Welcome to the class. I think this is your first class for Galatians. Right. So, we'll get started and yeah. So, I hope you got the notes. Download the notes from the Classwork section. I'll upload just to re-trade a few things. We will have a quiz after each of these episodes. So, once we finish Galatians, we'll have a quiz and all of these, so we'll have about five quizzes for this course and the total of that will be total up for the finals course, for this course. Okay. So, that's how the evaluation assessment is. Okay. Okay. Let's turn to, I think last class we stopped with Galatians chapter two. Right? We reached the end of Galatians chapter two and we stopped there. So, just to re-trade, Paul writes about his apostleship and he, when he's writing to the Galatians, he marvels. He's stunned.  There's no way compared to the gospel that we preached and he says, you know, even if we preach some other gospel or if we are an angel, a messenger from heaven also preaches any other gospel, let them be accursed and he says, let them be accursed and meaning, let them be marked for destruction and so on. It's a very strong word, let them be separated from the life of God, let them be accursed. So, and then we go on to see why does he say that because the other gospel that they preached, that the people, that the false brethren preached, drew them away from the grace of God. They were, it was drawing them back to what they were actually earlier held by, which was the works of law and so he was, he had very strong words, he said, you know, let them be accursed and then he talks about his own life, you know, about my former conduct. This is all in chapter one. So, you know, my former behavior, my conduct, that I was very zealous for the ways of my forefathers, you know, he also says that he progressed so much in Judaism, much further than all the others. So, he talks about that and then how he, after he believed in Jesus, what happened after that, right? So, and the fact that this gospel that he was preaching, this gospel of grace, it came by revelation, you know, no man taught him, right? He had this encounter on the road to Damascus and he had a revelation of who Jesus was and immediately he started preaching. The gospel he started preaching about Jesus from the scripture showing that he is the Messiah and the synagogues everywhere. So, he says, after three years he went to Jerusalem, stayed with Peter for a couple of weeks.  Barnabas takes him and also Titus is there and then he talks about a specific instance where he goes and meets with these apostles and none of them compelled Titus, who was actually a Greek, a person of Greek origin, none of them, he was not Jew. So, they didn't compel him to be circumcised. So, all this to say that, you know, the apostles were not really teaching a gospel of, you know, law and works and to be circumcised and to keep the law of Moses and all the traditions, the other apostles were also not doing that. So, he's just building up that case. He says, and then we met and he spoke and, you know, they didn't compel Titus to be circumcised. So, then he says, well, it happened because of false brethren. All this entire teaching of law and works for someone to be saved with law and works, in addition to believing in the Lord Jesus to be saved with law and works, this came in because of the false brethren. So, however, he had to correct Peter when he was in Antioch. So, he says that when Peter was there in Antioch, I had to confront him. I had to withstand him. I withstood him. He says, this is in chapter 2 because Peter would separate himself along with the Jewish people when other, there was other groups of Jewish people came from the Apostle James. So, he would separate himself and then when they were not there, he would spend time with them or fellowship with them or eat with them. So, he says this is not right. So, he confronted him, corrected him and so on. So, the last few verses, so, relations 2 verse 20, I think you're very familiar verse, he says, I have been crucified with Christ. So, it is no longer I who live but Christ lives with me and the life which I now live in the flesh, I live by faith in the Son of God who loved me and gave himself for me. So, and then again the verse before that, it was 18 and 19. So, he says, if I build again those things which I destroyed. So, what happened is when you and I when we came to Christ, we died to ourselves. We died to the law. We died to sin. So, these were things we died to or there was an end to all that. So, Paul says, if I build again those things which I destroyed, then I make myself a transgressor. I make myself a person who is going back to transgression or great sin. So, through the law, I through the law died to the law. Now, that's a important statement that through the law because the law actually confined everyone. You know, the law said that this is the standard and none of us are capable of keeping the standards. Therefore, we are condemned in the eyes of God. So, that's what the law you know declared that this is this is the standard. This is the standard of God. None of you are capable of keeping it. Therefore, you are sinful and therefore, you are condemned. So, it says, in Christ, however, I died to the law because I have been crucified with Christ. This old man crucified with Christ. So, in the sense, I died to that. I died to all that expectation of the law or the standards of the law. I died to that. Now, I am a new creation set free from sin set free from the expectation of the law. And that's why he says in verse 20, I live by faith in the Son of God who loved me and gave himself for me. Verse 21, I do not set aside the grace of God for if righteousness comes through the law, if this whole thing of righteousness, the fact that I've been made right with God, the fact that all my sins have been taken away, if that righteousness comes through the law, then the death of Christ on the cross is emptiness. It's a waste. It's in vain.  So, he's asking the Galatians to, you know, open their eyes and see the truth.  Why are you believing in all these things instead of grace, instead of continuing in grace? Because if you're not continuing in grace, then actually what you're saying is that the death of Jesus, the death of Jesus, sacrificial death of Jesus on the cross is actually, is in vain. You're saying that, well, his work of salvation, it doesn't amount to anything. That is exactly what you're saying. You're not really saying it, but in your actions, you are actually proclaiming that. You're saying that Christ died in vain. So, let's look at chapter 3. I'm just going to share the notes here. Okay, chapter 3. Let's read a few verses, probably from verses 1 to 9.  This only I want to learn from you. Did you receive the Spirit by the works of the law or by the hearing of faith?  Are you now being made perfect by the flesh? Have you suffered so many things in vain if indeed it was in vain? Therefore, he who supplies the Spirit to you and works miracles among you, does he do it by the works of the law or by the hearing of faith? Just as Abraham believed God and it was accounted to him for righteousness, therefore know that only those who are of faith are sons of Abraham. And the scripture foreseeing that God would justify the Gentiles by faith, preach the gospel to Abraham beforehand saying, in you all the nations shall be blessed. So then, those who are of faith are blessed with believing Abraham. Okay, verse 1, chapter 3. O foolish Galatians, who has bewitched you? Okay, so again, very strong words, it literally calls them fools because they have turned their eyes away from the grace of God, from Christ. So he uses that word. How can you be so unintelligent? How can you be so unwise and not understanding? O foolish Galatians. And he says, who has bewitched you? Meaning who has actually put a spell on you? It's like when it comes to the powers of darkness and it's about manipulation. When it comes to powers of darkness, they manipulate in order to control, in order to bring someone under the control. So that is all about bewitching and putting a spell and so on. So he's asking the question, who has bewitched you? Who has actually put a spell on you? Who has put a charm or something on you? Who has done this? That you should not obey the truth. And before your eyes, Christ was clearly portrayed among you as crucified. So he says that with all the proof, with all the evidence, the Lord Jesus was clearly portrayed or depicted. It was like a picture that was painted, a portrait.  So who is controlling you? Who has put the spell on you that you should not obey the truth? So that's something that he says. Verse 2, this only I want to learn from you. Now here's the question, this only I want to learn from you. Did you receive the spirit by the works of the law or by the hearing of faith? Verse 3, are you so foolish having begun in the spirit? Are you now being made perfect by the flesh? So Paul, like in every other church or his ministry, we read when we studied the Corinthians epistles, we saw that Paul would preach the gospel, teach the believers, ground them in the Word of God, expose them to the power of the Holy Spirit. In Corinthians we read that he says, I came not that you might put your faith in the wisdom of man, but your faith should be in the power of God. So he clearly shared the gospel, gave them reasons for the gospel and also exposed them to the power and the experience of the Holy Spirit, the anointing of the Holy Spirit, the gifts of the Holy Spirit and everything. So they had experienced firsthand the gifts of the Spirit, the anointing of the Holy Spirit. So they were well acquainted, they had the fellowship of the Holy Spirit. So here's this question, he says, did you receive the Spirit? How did you receive the Spirit? Was it by faith? Was it by simple faith in the baptizer, who's Jesus? Or was it by the works of the law that you kept three or four things? And then because of which you achieved this baptism of the Holy Spirit, you received the work of the Spirit. Was it because you kept these things, you did not do these things, you did these things? Was it because of that? Obviously the answer is, and it's a rhetoric question. So it's a rhetorical, so obviously the response to that is by faith, they all knew that. Then so verse three says, are you so foolish having started in the flesh? I'm sorry, have you started in the Spirit? You started your walk in the Spirit. You received the work of the Spirit. You know about the leading of the Spirit, you know the gifts of the Spirit. Now you started.  Are you coming to maturity? And the word that he uses there, which means accomplishing something or being complete, are you coming to that place by your own flesh? So you started in the Spirit. Are you so foolish that having started in the Spirit, having begun in the Spirit, that you are being made perfect by the flesh? So we asked them those two questions. So just to make the Galatian believers think about what they were doing, just to make them think deeply about what they were believing in. It seemed right. It seemed nice to them to do these things, to keep up these things and say, okay, now I've achieved this. I've prayed for such a long time. I've kept these things. I kept these laws. I've become circumcised in my flesh and all these things. It seemed like medals or badges of honor, something achieved in the flesh. But Paul is saying, you started in the Spirit. Now do you want to come to a place of completion in the flesh? How can you even think like that? And the other question is, how did you receive the Spirit? The most important thing. You came born again and you experienced the anointing of the Holy Spirit. That's what is implied. How did you receive the Spirit?  How did you receive? Was it by the works of the law? And they would have thought and said, thought to themselves and realized, no. And the third thing, the third question that he asked is, have you suffered so many things in vain? Or are you suffering? Is it futile? If indeed it was in vain. So the question is that, as believers, this is obviously a, mainly a gentile congregation, believers, gentile believers.  So his question is, you've suffered so many things for the sake of your faith. You've suffered so many things. And why did you suffer? Because you did not want to do those things, the things of the law and so on. You wanted to follow the way, which is the way of the Lord. And you kind of did not want to do the other things. But have you suffered that in vain? So what did you believe in? Like if you had believed in the works, if you had believed in keeping to the law, then there would be no suffering. Like everyone would be happy. You would not be persecuted. So have you suffered those things in vain, if it indeed was in vain? Then verse five, therefore he who supplies the Spirit to you and works miracles among you, does he do it by the works of the law or by the hearing of faith? Yes, the other question. He who supplies the Spirit and who, he who pose out his Spirit upon you and works miracles among you. So this was a church just like the Corinthian church, just like any other church, any other church, which was established by Paul. So you see that in his ministry that Paul would go preach the gospel, teach the believers, establish them in the Word and the Spirit, establish them, establish people in the, lay those foundations, establish them in the Word and also lead them to an encounter with God himself, with a person of the Holy Spirit. So they would experience the power of the Holy Spirit and the power of the Holy Spirit manifesting himself, the power of the Spirit of God manifesting himself in miracles and signs and wonders and the other gifts. So Paul is asking that yet another question.  And then secondly, he asked, did you receive, how did you receive the Spirit by the works of the law? And thirdly, he asked, you know, you've started in the Spirit, now do you want to be made perfect in the flesh? And fourthly, he asked about the suffering, you know, why did you suffer all these things? You took a stand, you wanted to follow Jesus, you took a stand. Now, was all that suffering in vain? You took a stand and you suffered because of your faith and not because of wanting to keep the law? Then he asked the question, now he who supplies a spirit and works miracles among you. So again, the fact that in the Galatian churches or the churches in Galatia, there was this mighty outpouring of the Spirit, there was this mighty ministry of the Holy Spirit, the work of the Holy Spirit, which was taking place. So he says, he who works miracles among you, you experience the supernatural signs and wonders, miracles. How does he do it? Was it because you kept the law? Was it because you were circumcised? Obviously, the answer is no, it is because you put your faith in him. Right? It is by the hearing of faith. So not by the works of the law. Okay. Verse 6, just as Abraham believed God and it was accounted to him for righteousness, therefore know that only those who are of faith are sons of Abraham. Okay, so he takes us back to Genesis here, Genesis 15, verse 6 and Genesis chapter 15, where maybe we can just go there and read that. Verse, Genesis 15 and I think it works. Verse 6. Right? So this is the conversation. The word of the Lord comes to Abraham. The Lord says, Abraham, I am your shield, your exceedingly great reward. And then Abraham says, Lord, you see I am going childless, you promised, but this is what it is. So therefore maybe one who was born in my household, that person will be my heir. That person is what you are referring to. Maybe not one who is born, physically born through Sarah. Maybe that is somebody who is born or who is somebody in the household. Then this is what God says. He specifies verse 4, this one shall not be your heir, but one who will come from your own body shall be your heir. Then he brought him outside, look now towards heaven and count the stars if you're able to number them and he said to them, said to him, so shall your descendants be. Okay, so this is what God says. He clarifies, he gives him the details and then he says, look up in the heaven, see the stars, your descendants will be like this. Okay, innumerable. Then it says in verse 6, and he believed in the Lord. Okay, now we need to understand that the law came much later. Okay, the law came much later. Now also in Galatians, Paul talks about what was the purpose of the law. Okay, he's talking about it much later, right. So the law came later.  Then the Lord also says, immediately when he says that Abraham believed in the Lord and he, that is God, accounted it to him for righteousness. Okay, so Abraham believed God and he was counted as righteousness. You know, he was counted as one who is righteous. Okay, so the Lord looked at him as one who is righteous and he reckoned that he imputed righteousness. So that is what we see there in Genesis 15 and verse 6. So here Paul refers to that and he says, just as Abraham, in Galatians 3 and verse 6, just as Abraham believed God and it was accounted to him for righteousness.  Just like how Abraham believed God and it was considered, it was accounted to him for righteousness. So also with you, he says, therefore, know that only those who are of the faith are the sons of Abraham.  Of course, physically, naturally, in the natural, there's this lineage of Abraham, but those who are the sons of Abraham are actually those who have put their faith in God. Those who have the same kind of faith where Abraham believed God and it was accounted to him for righteousness the same way even we believe in our Lord and Savior, we receive righteousness and therefore we are called sons of God and even sons of Abraham. So those who are of the faith. Verse 8, and the scripture foreseeing that God would justify the Gentiles by faith, preach the gospel to Abraham beforehand, saying, in you all the nations shall be blessed. In you all the nations shall be blessed. So we see that reference in Genesis 12. And I'm sure we've read that many times, Genesis 12 and verse 3.  In you all the families of the earth shall be blessed. So God pronounces blessing and he says, Abraham in you all the nations shall be blessed, all the families shall be blessed. So this is something that Paul is saying, God foreseeing that those who believe and those who have the same kind of faith as Abraham, you know, they will receive the blessing, the same kind of blessing that Abraham did. So in you, so it says that Abraham, the gospel was actually preached to Abraham. The scripture foreseeing that something like this would happen, the gospel was actually preached. The good news of believing in God was actually believing by faith. It was actually preached to Abraham. We don't know whether he received a revelation of the cross or not. But the fact is that God said that in you, it was partly a revelation, like in you all the nations shall be blessed. So referring to the kind of faith that he had and we receive righteousness. So years down, centuries down, millennials down, when we have the same kind of faith and put our faith and believe in what Christ did on the cross, we receive the same righteousness, what God brought about on Abraham, the same thing that we receive and enjoy also. So verse nine, those, so then those who are of faith are blessed with believing Abraham.  And through him, the law was given and he's talking, referring to the faith of Abraham here now, saying that he's going to talk about how the difference between the works of the law and so on. But he's talking about the faith of Abraham. He's saying, you know, Abraham believed God and therefore it was accounted to him for righteousness.  And so God prophesied, he gave a prophetic word saying in you all the nations, all the people groups, all the people shall be blessed. Let's look at verses, any doubts here, any questions here before we proceed to verses 10? Anything at all? Okay, so for us as believers, we just need to be careful about, let me just scroll, yeah, we just need to be careful about not going back to the law. No, no, we may not be going back to the law like how, you know, how these people did, like in terms of circumcision or keeping the some of the traditions or, you know, and things like that. But we could be actually, instead of living in grace or instead of teaching the grace of God, we could be unknowingly, you know, maybe upon ourselves, we might be saying, okay, you know, if I do this, this, we're not, I'm not talking about, you know, living a holy life or living a life of righteousness, you know, those are things that come because we are being made righteous, right? But maybe there are certain other things that we could, for example, you know, in our own minds, we might say, okay, if I, you know, if I need to read the Bible in a year, you know, I'm just being careful about, you know, saying this because, you know, it's good, you know, we need to read the word, we need to be in the word, it's the word of God which produces faith in us and which is the word of God which leads us to a relationship with the Lord Jesus.  So all that is true. But if we somehow make it a law, right, saying that if I don't do this or if I do this, only then I am pleasing in the eyes of God. Okay, and suppose we start teaching that, you know, we could teach that to people and say, you know, God is very displeased if you do not spend, let's say, two hours reading the word every day. Now reading the word two hours every day, it's good. It's a good discipline. We all need it. Maybe we should spend more time.  If you do not do this, then it becomes a law, which is what the false brethren had actually taught these churches, right? So, so that's the thing is going back to the law, we are going back to, so Aaron says, yeah, sometimes we do that, you know, it seems good. It seems good. And it is a good thing. But then there is a fine difference. We are not accepted because we do this. We are accepted in the beloved because of what Jesus did for us. And it was a work of grace, right? The work of grace would actually empower us to maybe spend more time in the word, maybe spend more time in prayer. And it's not that, it's not spending time in the word, spending time, more time in prayer, which actually, you know, makes us acceptable to Christ. It's not that.  So, so that's, so Paul is actually bringing from the Old Testament itself and showing them that it is by faith, right? Okay, so we'll take a break and we'll come back to verse 10, right? And we'll proceed from there. We'll take a break now.


New research suggests that for young patients who experience recurring dislocation of the kneecap, reconstructive surgery is an effective treatment option. Among 90 physically active patients undergoing surgery, nearly all were able to return to the court or field in just under nine months on average, with fewer than a handful reporting recurring instability. Lateral patellar instability is a common problem affecting patients aged 10 to 25. Rehab without surgery is the current standard of care for those undergoing patellar dislocation for the first time. But for repeat sufferers, the path to recovery is less clear. While there is some consensus on taking the surgical route for ligament reconstruction, recommendations on additional bony realignment are mixed. On top of the variety of anatomical criteria for making that decision, there's the possibility that adding such treatment to the surgical menu could increase the risk of complication. To provide some clarity, researchers from the hospital for special surgery in New York followed 90 patients with a history of patellar dislocation who underwent reconstruction of the medial patellophemeral ligament regardless of bony anatomy. Their results showed that patients improved significantly across nearly all patient reported outcomes measured. At one year after surgery, 96% of patients reported no recurrent instability and after two years, 100% reported no recurrence. Additionally, 90% of patients reported a return to sports at one year and 88% at two years with an average return time of 8.8 months. Only two patients reported partial or full re-dislocation. Notably, no patient underwent any bone restructuring suggesting that favorable outcomes with a less extensive procedure are possible. The research team cites a few limitations of their work. First, the results apply mostly to the short period following surgery. Although the team followed patients for up to four years after treatment, most of the outcomes reported were for the first two years of follow-up. Also, the study comes from a single high-volume surgeon with a special interest in the patellophemeral joint. The results therefore may not translate to all surgeons. Still, the results are encouraging. For the thousands of patients and doctors wading through various options, the team's findings could help illuminate the best path to recovery.