As I preach through Genesis on Wednesday night, I can’t help but think about its evangelistic impact. I also consider its apologetic impact on our culture. As I look around our city and our country, I am reminded this is not the same country. It is different from the one my grandfather grew up in that is for sure. My grandfather was born in 1929. More people of that generation actually went to church somewhere….or at least Sunday School. Most people were familiar with the Bible. They had heard of Genesis. They knew something of creation, Adam and Eve, and Noah and the Ark. They also knew about the tower of Babel, Moses and the Ten Commandments. Jesus on the Cross and the empty tomb were known. Even if people weren’t saved, many homes had a Bible.
That is not the case any more. Entire generations of people in this country have never been to church. They have never opened a Bible. They have never heard the gospel.
They are no better off spiritually than the tribes of the remotest villages of the deepest jungles…no better off than the Athenians on Mars Hill that Paul encountered in Acts 17. Notice his approach as he preached the gospel that day going all the way back to the beginning:
Acts 17:22–32 (LSB)
22 So Paul stood in the midst of the Areopagus and said, “Men of Athens, I observe that you are very religious in all respects.
23 “For while I was passing through and examining the objects of your worship, I also found an altar with this inscription, ‘TO AN UNKNOWN GOD.’ Therefore what you worship in ignorance, this I proclaim to you.
24 “The God who made the world and all things in it, since He is Lord of heaven and earth, does not dwell in temples made with hands;
25 nor is He served by human hands, as though He needed anything, since He Himself gives to all people life and breath and all things;
26 and He made from one man every nation of mankind to inhabit all the face of the earth, having determined their appointed times and the boundaries of their habitation,
27 that they would seek God, if perhaps they might grope for Him and find Him, though He is not far from each one of us;
28 for in Him we live and move and exist, as even some of your own poets have said, ‘For we also are His offspring.’
29 “Being then the offspring of God, we ought not to suppose that the Divine Nature is like gold or silver or stone, an image formed by the craft and thought of man.
30 “Therefore having overlooked the times of ignorance, God is now commanding men that everyone everywhere should repent,
31 because He has fixed a day in which He will judge the world in righteousness through a Man whom He determined, having furnished proof to all by raising Him from the dead.”
32 Now when they heard about the resurrection of the dead, some began to sneer, but others said, “We shall hear you again concerning this.”
Genesis was important for those Greeks that day. So it is for our neighbors.
Those who heard Paul needed to hear the gospel. So do the people of our country.
Yes, there is a great need to spread the gospel. Do not assume your countrymen have ever opened a Bible. They may not have ever been to church as you tell them of Jesus and His death, burial, and resurrection. Do not assume people know what you are talking about. Take them back to the beginning, much like Paul did. They need that, just like the Greeks did. Take them from Genesis to the Gospel, from the first Adam to the Last Adam, from the bad news (the fall) to the good news (Jesus).
And remember, the results belong to God:
“Now when they heard about the resurrection of the dead, some began to sneer, but others said, “We shall hear you again concerning this.” In this way, Paul went out of their midst. But some men joined him and believed, among whom also were Dionysius the Areopagite and a woman named Damaris and others with them.” (Acts 17:32–34, LSB)