Genesis 1 English Standard Version (ESV) LISTEN: https://www.biblegateway.com/audio/mclean/esv/Gen.1 The Creation of the World 1 In the beginning, God created the heavens and the earth. 2 The earth was without form and void, and darkness was over the face of the deep. And the Spirit of God was hovering over the face of the waters. 3 And God said, “Let there be light,” and there was light. 4 And God saw that the light was good. And God separated the light from the darkness. 5 God called the light Day, and the darkness he called Night. And there was evening and there was morning, the first day. 6 And God said, “Let there be an expanse in the midst of the waters, and let it separate the waters from the waters.” 7 And God made the expanse and separated the waters that were under the expanse from the waters that were above the expanse. And it was so. 8 And God called the expanse Heaven. And there was evening and there was morning, the second day. 9 And God said, “Let the waters under the heavens be gathered together into one place, and let the dry land appear.” And it was so. 10 God called the dry land Earth, and the waters that were gathered together he called Seas. And God saw that it was good. 11 And God said, “Let the earth sprout vegetation, plants yielding seed, and fruit trees bearing fruit in which is their seed, each according to its kind, on the earth.” And it was so. 12 The earth brought forth vegetation, plants yielding seed according to their own kinds, and trees bearing fruit in which is their seed, each according to its kind. And God saw that it was good. 13 And there was evening and there was morning, the third day. 14 And God said, “Let there be lights in the expanse of the heavens to separate the day from the night. And let them be for signs and for seasons, and for days and years, 15 and let them be lights in the expanse of the heavens to give light upon the earth.” And it was so. 16 And God made the two great lights—the greater light to rule the day and the lesser light to rule the night—and the stars. 17 And God set them in the expanse of the heavens to give light on the earth, 18 to rule over the day and over the night, and to separate the light from the darkness. And God saw that it was good. 19 And there was evening and there was morning, the fourth day. 20 And God said, “Let the waters swarm with swarms of living creatures, and let birds fly above the earth across the expanse of the heavens.” 21 So God created the great sea creatures and every living creature that moves, with which the waters swarm, according to their kinds, and every winged bird according to its kind. And God saw that it was good. 22 And God blessed them, saying, “Be fruitful and multiply and fill the waters in the seas, and let birds multiply on the earth.” 23 And there was evening and there was morning, the fifth day. 24 And God said, “Let the earth bring forth living creatures according to their kinds—livestock and creeping things and beasts of the earth according to their kinds.” And it was so. 25 And God made the beasts of the earth according to their kinds and the livestock according to their kinds, and everything that creeps on the ground according to its kind. And God saw that it was good. 26 Then God said, “Let us make man in our image, after our likeness. And let them have dominion over the fish of the sea and over the birds of the heavens and over the livestock and over all the earth and over every creeping thing that creeps on the earth.” 27 So God created man in his own image, in the image of God he created him; male and female he created them. 28 And God blessed them. And God said to them, “Be fruitful and multiply and fill the earth and subdue it, and have dominion over the fish of the sea and over the birds of the heavens and over every living thing that moves on the earth.” 29 And God said, “Behold, I have given you every plant yielding seed that is on the face of all the earth, and every tree with seed in its fruit. You shall have them for food. 30 And to every beast of the earth and to every bird of the heavens and to everything that creeps on the earth, everything that has the breath of life, I have given every green plant for food.” And it was so. 31 And God saw everything that he had made, and behold, it was very good. And there was evening and there was morning, the sixth day. I've decided now to make a trip back to the beginning--literally--as we study Genesis, the book of beginnings. In this book we will study the beginning of creation, the origin of man and sin, the beginning of the family and of government, the beginning of nations, and the beginning of God's promise of redemption. What God begins in Genesis, He will bring to fulfillment in Revelation. One thing we will not see here is an origin story for God, because He is not an invented or created being, but has always been and will always be. We will see in the book of Exodus that the covenant name that He gives to His people is "I AM" (this will be very important when we get to the gospel of John). God is always existent one that is anything and everything that we will ever need. Not in a "name it and claim it" way, but God's nature is to be everything that He is and to be 100% of that 100% of the time without ceasing to be any of the other things that He also is. In the passage today we will see Him as Elohim--the Creator God that is singular, yet plural. Pay attention to the tenses as God speaks to Himself in plural form, yet acts in a singular form. Last, but not least, while this may appear "poetic" in nature, this is no poem or "story" and it is not fair to call it a Bible story. This is God's own account of Creation that He gives to man. God was the only eyewitness and gives this to man in a historical narrative format that would be easily passed down in an oral "story telling" format because He commands each generations to pass the truth onto the next generation. The entire book of Genesis is actually outlined in this way as a historical narrative that focuses in on one main character at a time and is separated by genealogies to let us know when we are transitioning to a new part of the story and to give a synopsis of all that God has been doing in His story up to that point. Each name has a story to it, but overall, it is a story of God's continued faithfulness to man even when man has been unfaithful to God.
Let's dig into the first chapter of Genesis now. As we have already discussed, "In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth." This says so much in just this one verse and I encourage everyone to memorize it and understand it as there is a reason that God chooses for His story to start here. First, the existence of God is not argued, reasoned, tested, or something that we try to prove. It is stated as a fact (technically an axiom). It is an underlying principle by which all other truth that we are about to learn will be built upon (see my previous blog on axioms and presuppositions if you are unsure of what an axiom is: http://www.danielwestfall.com/blog/the-issue-of-axioms-and-undefined-terms). Like any good story, God is going to tell us what He's going to tell us (an introduction and/or thesis statement), then He's going to tell us (the body), and then He's going to tell us what He told us (a conclusion). This statement of "In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth" is the introductory statement and could even be through of as a thesis statement regarding what God is out to tell us in this story. This verse specifically tells us that God made two special "containers" if you will--the earth and the heavens. We are told in verse 2 that the earth was in darkness and without form (no land masses--just covered in water), but that even in the darkness, the Spirit of God was active and present and hovering or brooding over the waters. This is a reminder to us that God is not a physical form contained to one place, but that God was and always will be spirit and will be in all places and will be at work even when we don't see it. Then a voice speaks out of the darkness, "Let there be light." God didn't have to define what light was, nor did He need to create a sun or other stars to create light (we'll see that on day 4). He just spoke and it was there. Light shone forth out of the darkness....most likely the light that we associate with the glory of God. In this act God established time as we see that He called the light "day" and the darkness "nigh" and that there was evening and there was morning, the first day. Not only do I believe this was for the sake of telling time, but I believe God has this event on display for everyone and everything that existed at that time to see. It is possible and reasonable to think that the angels were made somewhere in verse 1 when God created the heavens and the earth but that their story is not told here because this is specifically the story given to man, but that God didn't want the angels to miss seeing what He was about to do as they would be His witnesses to this special creation and the entire relationship that was to come out of it with the earth and man in particular (more to come on that as we progress). We will point back to We will again come back to John 1 and see how John ties the origins of Jesus back to this event in history--Jesus is the prexistant one, the Word that spoke all things into existence, and the Light of the World that shows us the darkness that we live in and guides us in the way we should go. On day 2, God made two more containers that He would fill...the sky and the sea. All God has to do is speak and give something its name and it is and that is its identity and its purpose. The same goes for us. We too are containers that God has made in His new creation that He will fill with the good things that He is going to do in us. On day 3, God makes another container--land and He uses the land to set boundaries for the seas and the waters collect together into bodies of water that we call oceans or seas. Notice in each day God is creating something new, but it is an act not only of creating, but of separating. God is establishing boundaries and defining terms for us. There is day and night, sky and sea, earth and ocean. Also notice that after each day God stops and declares that which He has made "good" (without fault or blemish). It is a perfect reflection of Him and His nature and is bringing glory and honor to Him as it was designed to do. We also see here that God created every tree and seed-bearing plant that would later be good for food for the animals and mankind and would be part of the natural resources needed to support life and be a home for all the wild animals of the field and the forest. These too would be filled with God's creation when we get to day 6. This is the first half of the story. In the first 3 days of creation we see that God has made the heavens and the earth, day and night, sky and sea, and separated the land from the waters. These are all about to be filled during the second half of the story which works in parallel with the first, not simply as a memory device, but because God is a God who works in cycles, though He works in new and more amazing ways each and every time. So, while we see the same God about the same way if creation, we now see Him about the work of filling the containers that He has created. On day four, we see God filling the container we would call "outer space" (called "the heavens" here as the Jews did not differentiate the atmosphere from that which was outside of the atmosphere other than to talk about sky as the 1st heaven, space as the 2nd heaven, and the what we call "heaven," the throne room of God, as the 3rd heaven. We'll see the apostle Paul use this language in His epistles to talk about a man being caught up to the third heaven. God fills space with stars and planets, and moons, and comets, and other sorts of stellar and interstellar objects. Galaxies full of lights that are there for the purpose to mark times and seasons, but one star would be unlike all the rest--the sun. It would be there to govern the day and to give light and to help sustain life and to give its energy to this planet, and one moon would be special is it was there to reflect the glory of the sun and to govern the night and to shine forth in the darkness and its glory would in some ways be even more beautiful to gaze at because the sun was too powerful to look upon and would be blinding (like the presence of God Himself), but the reflection of God in His people and in His creation was a thing of beauty. Lights uncountable that exist to tell us times and seasons and to remind us of the majesty of a God that spoke all of them into existence and yet the delicate care that God gave to place the sun and the moon in exactly the right spots to control our seasons, our day/night cycle and our tides. Even the other planets that God placed in the universe were there not only to help us know the seasons, but to protect us as scientists tell us that it is odd for gas giants to be seen as the outer planets of a solar system, but these planets as well as our moon help collect all the meteors and comets that would threaten our life here on the planet. God's design is deliberate and Romans one tells us that only a fool looks at the design of creation and says in his heart, "There is no God." On day five we see God filling the sky and the sea with all kinds of birds and insects and sea life from plankton and algae to all kinds of fish and even whales and other mammals. The order of creation does not to be one of complexity like the story of evolution where some things were too complex and had to come after the things that were simple, but instead a story of God making something and the filling it with the things that were to accomplish the purpose that He had designed for it. We then see a command repeated several time in the book of Genesis and is part of the larger story that God is telling, "Be fruitful and multiply." This is one of the main purposes of all live and is one of the things that helps us define that which is living from that which is non-living. Living things are reproductive in nature whereas non-living things are not reproductive in nature, they simply exist. God is living and is in a sense here using creation to be "reproductive" (we'll specifically see this on day 6), but we also are to allow nature and specifically man to be reproductive and God's people--the Church--are also given this command to be reproductive as we just studied in the book of Matthew, chapter 28. On day six, we see the culmination of creation as God fills the land fauna of all sorts Everything from bugs to reptiles and mammals. Even protozoans and bacteria are probably included here. God filled the complete earth but once again, God draws limits and makes something unique--His very special part of creation. Up to this point God has simply spoken everything into existence, but God says to Himself, "Let us make man in Our image, after our image (our nature)." If that is a living thing trying to be reproductive, I don't know what is. So God made both man and woman (we'll see this story spelled out in more detail in Chapter 2 since it's so important) and gave mankind the responsibility to be stewards over all of creation, specifically every living thing that had the breath of life in it, man would be held accountable for, And God declared His creation to be "very good" (literally "good good" in the original language) and this was the the 6th and final day of creation. We know that God rested on the 7th day, but we won't see this until the introduction in chapter 2 where there is a brief retelling of the story focusing in specifically on Adam and Eve, but God uses day 7 where He rested as an introduction and contrast the all the work that He did in days 1-6. We too are to take time to rest. It is the order of things as God created it and it is the fourth commandment. Now, let's address one or two elephants in the room that I've tried to address in part as they came up, but I will tell you now things that this narrative is not telling us: 1) There is no gap in the story--we cannot insert millions and billions or even trillions of years. Exodus will be very clear later that this is a single calendar week. The days are intentionally numbered for us as days 1 through 6 and we are told "there was evening and there was morning." (the Jewish day started at twilight because of this). That's the entire day. 2) There is no death in this story--We will see the death and destruction of the world that comes through sin in chapters 3-9. This is the story of creation. 3) There is no pre-existent matter or energy. This is not a story of theistic evolution where God uses pre-existing material and energy in some kind of "Big Bang" where He brings chaos into order and molds it into His design. God simply speaks and creates out of nothing other than His Word. 4) Man is not just another animal. This is one of the clear lines that is drawn in creation. While we may be similar because we share a common Creator, We were designed in a unique way with a unique purpose and given characteristics and traits that no other living or non-living thing shares with us. We have an eternal nature to us and we desire a relationship with God and desire to create and maintain order because we are made in the nature of God. We have a will, not just an instinct. We are truly artistic and creative and appreciate beauty in ways that other creatures do not. We philosophize and reason and talk about what we believe to be true and what the nature of truth is and if it is knowable. We search for answers to who God is and if He is knowable, and we search for answers about life after death and we desire to procreate and create a legacy for ourselves and desire to have eternal life and to spend en eternity with God in peace. 5) This is not mythology, it is history. I'm not trying to say that it's science that we put in a test tube--we can't go back and test any story of origins that way, but we can test to see if it is consistent with the order and design that we see in the universe today through our study of science and it is. We clearly see delineations between Earth and everywhere else in the universe, we see delineations between stellar and terrestrial, we see delineations between plants and animals, between sky and sea, and between land animals and aquatic life, but most of all we see delineations between creation and Creator. Even the laws of biology that "life comes from life" are obeyed here as a living God existed and made all living things with special care to make man and woman in His image. Other mythologies serve to make gods in the image of man that have the same faults as we do, but God created man in His image. In the image of God He created them. Male and female He created them. This is fact, not fiction. Why so much time on this? As I said, the entire story starts here, and this tells us much about who God is and His nature and His plan for the universe and specifically for mankind. Man wants to change this story because they want a different kind of God...a God without rules or boundaries and a God that is not Creator, as that would give Him authority over all He created, but one in which God was either non-existent or simply a participant in the story but not the director and author of the story. We want a God who we are bigger than and we can contain--not the kind of God who speaks universes into being or fills all of heaven and earth with His presence and glory and has a brilliance more powerful than the sun that we can neither approach nor gaze upon. We want a God just like us, yet when God did come to us in human form in the person of Jesus Christ, He was rejected. We are just about to celebrate this with Good Friday and Easter. He was not the kind of God we wanted or the kind of Savior that they were looking for. They again wanted a God that would do what they wanted when they wanted it the way that they wanted it. Sin as we will see in chapter 3 of Genesis is all about us trying to play God and be the ones in control and to write our own story, make our own identity and purpose and make our own rules. Everything we study in the Bible will come down to if we believe the historical accuracy of these words and all the other words that follow, but especially these words. There is not "God said it, I believe it, that settles it here." God said it and that settles it...whether you choose to believe it or not is what will make you wise or a fool in the eyes of God.
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Daniel WestfallI will mostly use this space for recording my "journal" from my daily devotions as I hope to encourage others to read the Bible along with me and to leave a legacy for others. Archives
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