http://davoted.blogspot.com/2011/08/in-beginning.html

When the decision was made to do Genesis this fall I was a little bummed. After all how many times do you need to study creation? I already knew what God created and when, what else is there to learn? But as usual, God spoke and reality set in – There is always something to learn in scripture no matter how many times you study it. I found that we/I are so familiar with the first verses of Genesis that we don’t give them the attention they deserve. So with that said I am going to share some thoughts from Genesis 1:1-5.

In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth. – Genesis 1:1

In the beginning God ….  

The name for God here is Elohim – “el” means mighty, strong; the “im” ending is a plural ending, but has a singular verb. God (plural) created. So what? You may ask. The trinity (God, Son and Holy Spirit) was present at creation!  Holy Spirit (Genesis 1:2)  Jesus – John 1:1-4, 14-18; Heb 1:1-3; Col1:15-17, Rev 4:11

• Created

Without getting into the technicalities of the Hebrew, this means God created out of nothing.  NO ONE but God has ever created something out of nothing. Think about that, anything you or  anyone else ever created used something that was first created by God!

This means EVERYTHING that exists is under God’s sovereign control because He created it.

As believers we accept that by “faith” and don’t need science to prove it!

By faith we understand that the worlds were prepared by the word of God, so that what is seen was not made out of things which are visible. – Hebrews 11:3  

Those who aren’t believers have to try to prove/disprove because they don’t have the faith to simply believe.

No one can refute this simple statement. Not the one who says there is no God, nor the one who claims we can’t know God, nor the one who claims there are many gods and not all the others who claim that there is no God. They may not believe it but they can’t refute truth.

Then God said, “Let there be light”; and there was light. God saw that the light was good; and God separated the light from the darkness. God called the light day and the darkness He called night. And there was evening and there was morning, one day. – Genesis1:3-5

• Spoke — > Light into darkness.

The very first thing God did was separate light from darkness and He has been doing it ever since! Isn’t that amazing? From the beginning there was either light or darkness – no grey! Knowing that the principle of separation was all part of the plan you have to ask yourself “Am I living in the light or in the darkness?” That’s a sobering question.

The light is characteristic of the presence of God at creation. Is it possible that the light at creation was manifested with the first word?

Light with no source how interesting is that?!  This light source was temporary (or was it?) – it was to function only until Day 4 when the sun, moon and stars were created. However when the earth passes away they won’t be needed any more, it seems this same light source would be functional again.

And there will no longer be any night; and they will not have need of the light of a lamp nor the light of the sun, because the Lord God will illumine them; and they will reign forever and ever. – Revelation 22:5

For six days God spoke into existence everything that was needed in the heavens and on the earth according to His plan and purpose. The order of creation shows how He provided for each element before it was created: A place to live, time and seasons and food to eat. He created all living creatures: birds, fish, cattle, creeping things and beasts of the earth – all after their own kind. Man was His grand finale!  Made in His image, to rule over the fish, birds cattle and over all the earth and all that was on it. A job to do from the very beginning! But it doesn’t stop there, God created him; male and female. God blessed them and said “be fruitful and multiply, and fill the earth, and subdue it; and rule over every living thing that lives on the earth.” We will look a little closer at this in the next post.

God’s spoken words brought everything into existence. Do you realize the power in God’s words to create out of nothing? If we totally understood how powerful they were we would: study His words more, live more intentionally, trust God more and rest more.

• Called — > The light day and the darkness night

In doing so God defined a “day” as evening & morning. This is literally the beginning of time.

To call or name something – gives one authority/sovereignty over, to own something. It means that everything that exists must be under God’s control.  The creation must be under subjection to the Creator.  Here, God is the one who “owns” the day and the One who defined specifically what a day was, evening and morning. That sounds like a 24 hour day to me.

• Saw –> The light was good

This shows that God was satisfied with what He created. It was good for the purposes it was intended to serve.

If you pay attention to the verbs: created, spoke, called and saw you see how personally involved God was in creation. How cool is that?

Genesis lays the foundations for our knowledge of God and our understanding of His purpose.

As we bring this first part to an end don’t miss the importance of knowing that God is our Creator and therefore our Lord. The “Shema” (Deuteronomy 6:4), the classical Jewish statement of faith, “Hear O Israel the Lord Our God, The Lord is One” is the basis of belief in God as ruler and creator of the universe. It is the statement of faith and a statement of loyalty to the Creator under all circumstances.

You won’t want to miss part 2! If you are not presently subscribed you can do so now by going to the right hand margin and clicking on your delivery mode of choice and you will receive new blogs when they are posted.

If this post has sparked any thoughts, evoked questions or simply made you go “hmmmm” I would love to hear from you. Let’s get a discussion going!