Genesis is the first book of the Bible. It also is the first of the "Book of Moses/Book of the Law/Penteteuch" Which is one book for the original Hebrews...but comprises the books of Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers, and Deuteronomy. The author is Moses and the events described all took place before Moses was even born. Likely, he compiled the information from written and oral history, under the inspiration of the Holy Spirit, with two primary purposes: Etiology (a story that explains why things are as they are), and historical narrative (a story that explains how things came to pass as they have).
In Gen 1.1 we see that in the beginning, before there was anything that was created, God already was. He preexists everything. He is not a created being. He has always existed. This makes Judaism and Christianity somewhat unique among world religions.
God created the world which was formless and void (Gen 1:2) and His Spirit hovered over the face of it. God then SPOKE everything into being that came into being. This occurs in six "movements" which are set off in the original language by markers or literary devices. They look like this: God declares/speaks, it happens, He declares it good, evening and morning passes and the day ends. This occurs six times. The first three are the creation of the world, and the last three are the populating of the world.
On the first day, God created light which separated light from darkness. (Gen 1:3-5). Day 2, God created the atmosphere which separated the heavens from the earth (Gen 1:6-8). Day 3, God separated land from sea and brough vegetation...setting in motion the process of plant growth and reproduction (Gen 1:9-13). This creation now is an appropriate environment for the living things that God would populate it with. Day 4, God placed the stars and moon in the sky (Gen 1:14-19). He set them in such a way that man would be able to use them to track time and days and seasons (all of which are necessary since Farmer's Almanacs and Blackberry PDAs had not yet been invented.) By the way, this act on day 4 corresponds with God's creation on day 1...a patter that repeats on Day 5 and 6 as well.
On day 5, God created birds and fish to populate the seas and live on the land (Gen 1:20-23). He then blessed them that they would multiply and fill the earth. Part of the blessing of God was the ability to reproduce after one's own kind (which will be an important element later in Genesis).
On day 6, God created animals (beasts of the field) (Gen 1:24-25). He also created mankind (male and female) in His image (Gen 1:26-27). He gave man as the superintendents/caretakers/ masters over all creation to rule over the animals. (So, when your friends tell you that you are but a highly evolved animal...you can know that you are as you are to fulfill a CREATED Purpose of ruling over creation.) God created male and female. God also blessed them and directed them (as before) to be fruitful and multiply and fill the earth. God pronounced day 6 to be very good.
Day 7 Gen 2:1-3, was a day of rest. It was not that God was tired...but served as part of His created order of things. God desires that we too experience a Sabbath rest in our week. Many of my stressed out friends...have no rest cycle in their lives. They work (or think about it) 7 days a week. (I am guilty too at times).
In these verses about Creation we see that everything that is...has a specific purpose and a sense of order to it. You and I and the world we live in are not products of some cosmic collision which evolved from chaos in the Universe. God set everything into motion. Another observation I would make is how it seemed good enough to Moses and his audinece to simply accept that God exists and pre-existed all things. He brought order to chaos, purposeful creation, and set things up so that there would be a self-sustaining ecology at play. He thought of everything. He even created mankind and gave them the responsibility to oversee/subdue/take dominion over the creation as creatures made in the Image of God. No one in Moses' audience needed to find the "how" of creation to believe in God. They had already accepted that God existed and had no point of beginning. It was not a stretch for them to trust in the fact that He could speak everything into being. (Are we so smart that we cannot simply trust that God is and can do what He says...without some explanation that conforms to the rules of science that we established?) Maybe we should learn to just accept by faith that God is bigger than we can explain...and learn to be OK with that.
Proverbs 22:1 is the takeaway today. I pondered on this verse a little while. I am not sure when it would occur that one would have to choose between a "good name" and "wealth." I can think of a couple of incidents in my life...but not many. Once, I left a store with an item I had not paid for accidentally. When I realized it, I took it back and waited in line to pay for it.The cashier thought I was weird. Once, I was offered a business opportunity running a gambling establishment. I could make 3 times my current salary by having a building full of video poker machines...but I would have to do so by making money off of people too foolish to keep theirs. I think the thrust of the proverb lies in it's motivation. When faced with what makes you tick...what motivates you...what gives you peace at night...is it wealth, or a good name? Riches are vaporous (here today...gone tomorrow) but a man's reputation will follow him all of his life. What do you want to be known for?
Grace,
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4 comments:
Genesis is the foundation upon which the entire Bible rests. So much in Genesis foreshadows Christ and the rest of Scripture.
One thing I've read. God put the lights in the sky (sun, moon, stars) to give us a way to count time. From them we can derive days, months, seasons and years. Notice the one segment that is missing, there is no justification anywhere for a seven day week. Except in Genesis.
Well I do have to say I enjoy reading Genesis. When I was a girl, I would set out to read the bible through and so am pretty confrontable with Chapter 1 but a question does come to mind. In Life Group a while back we were discussing Heaven. What do you think of Heaven? God is, don't have any problem with this concept. We have to begin with something, it is silly to me that people can not just believe God is. But God lives in Heaven so when God created Heaven what do you think He was creating. A place for the Angels... when did He create them? Just something we briefly touched on but I wanted to know more.... how lucky for me that we are learning now. (BTW, thanks for your input yesterday) :)Still putting it all together but you definately helped.
Kamatu,
Thanks for the post. Were you driving at something on the 7 day week? Are you proposing a 5 day week? Wasn't sure where you were headed. If it was an AHA moment..that's cool. Just checkin :)
Amanda,
Heaven...I believe in it. I believe it is a literal place. I believe what makes it heaven is God's presence. It is described in several places but a lot of those are imagery that would have connected better for the original audience than for me. Not sure if "streets of gold" means an interstate system or a broad path. No cars in heaven I don't think...except maybe hybrids (grin). Anyway...Love to hear what you think. Maybe I will "think" it too.
Grace,
That was just a comment. ;)
It is just one of the interesting things that shows up in many cultures, the seven day week. Some variation, but it gets adopted quickly when the seven day week is used.
Since we are just at the beginning, I realized I couldn't start speaking at length about the foreshadowing in Genesis without getting ahead of your study.
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