One of the more informative podcasts I listen to regularly is Issues Etc.  Recently, they interviewed Joel Heck, who’s written a very inexpensive book entitled In the Beginning, God: Creation from God’s Perspective, which examines the questions surrounding the historicity and interpretation of Genesis.

I was impressed with his answers, and learned some new reasons why Genesis should be interpreted as history, not metaphor, and that Chapter 2 should be seen, not as a recapitulation, but as a detailed examination of the 6th day (the creation of man). His explanation of why the verbs in Chapter 2 should be interpreted as past tense (God “had planted”, not God “planted”) easily clears up the ‘problems’ with chronologies. Download the mp3 here.