ADAM: THE FIRST AND THE LAST
Responding to Modern Attacks on Adam and
Christ
By Simon Turpin
DayOne.139 pages. £7.
ISBN 978 1 846 256 080
If you want to get good sales for a book on creation, you should produce a scientifically-biased, well-illustrated book! Such material is to be welcomed in the fight against the false teaching on evolution. It is strange that evangelicals seem to fight shy of books with a theological approach, yet that is surely where our foundation lies.
Simon Turpin has tackled the biblical approach in his book and has provided a good resource. As the title suggests, he is looking at the biblical evidence for the reality of Adam and the implications for the ministry and teaching of our Lord Jesus, the Last Adam.
Evolution found wanting
Inevitably Simon has researched the writings of theistic evolutionists and found them wanting. Chapter 2 is a thorough look at this. Non-specialists would probably find this and the section on Genesis 2.5-8 hard-going, but it contains a lot of useful nuggets of information.
Chapter 4 is very important. It shows the importance of Genesis 3 in our understanding of the Fall. It also exposes how far a lot of evangelicalism has drifted from the biblical teaching of the Fall and its consequences.
Chapter 5 demonstrates the contrast between the biblical account of creation and the oft-quoted Near Eastern texts. It is amazing how evangelicals fall into this trap, assuming that the biblical account is merely an improvement on the unbiblical myths!
Dr Jeanson, a genetics specialist, makes a contribution in Chapter 6. It is not an easy section for the non-scientist to grapple with, though it is important.
Of great importance is the second half of the book, which emphasises and illustrates the importance of this subject to our doctrines of sin, salvation and Christology. I found these last chapters very helpful and they should be standard reading! Of course, as has been demonstrated elsewhere, our whole body of doctrine is based on these early chapters of the Bible.
All Bible teachers should read this book before teaching on the Genesis record and I would encourage all Christians to read this important work.
