Popular preacher and author, John MacArthur weighs in on the creation/evolution debate with The Battle for the Beginning.  In typical MacArthur fashion, the author takes an expository (verse-by-verse) look at a portion of Scripture.  In this particular book, MacArthur zooms in on the first three chapters of God's Word to reveal what it has to say.

     Those looking for scientific arguments for/against creation may be unsatisfied with this book.  Even though it does contain some scientific evidence, MacArthur chose to deal with the text itself, which makes sense from his pastoral point of view.  For the Christian, this should be enough.  If God's Word clearly teaches something then it is to be believed even if much of the secular world does not agree.  This is certainly the case with this topic, as MacArthur ably demonstrates. 

     Sadly, many Christians are basing their understanding of the past on the changing opinions of men instead of on God's unchanging Word.  However, as has been pointed out elsewhere (see The Problems with Other Views), any compromise with billions of years inevitably creates numerous doctrinal difficulties and destroys the foundation of the message of the cross.  In this book, MacArthur explains the Biblical text in the first three chapters of Genesis.  His conclusion: the Bible says that God created everything in a period of six literal days of approximately twenty-four hours each and all this occurred around 6,000 years ago.

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