Beginnings!
In The Beginning!- Part 1
Reading: Genesis 1v1-2
When you start reading the Book of Genesis,…it gives you the beginnings of God’s work here on earth.
It also tells us of the beginnings of the Doctrine of God,…something that was completely different to the religion of the pagan nations which existed during the time of Moses.
It is also tells us about the beginnings of the doctrine of creation which was something completely different to the methodological (pagan) creation stories during the time Moses was writing this.
It also tells us about the beginnings of the doctrine of man,…and it tells us that we were wonderfully and magnificently made by an awesome God.
It also tells us of the beginnings of the doctrine of salvation,…because it there in the Garden of Eden that God begins to save His people,…its there where the first animal was killed to make a covering for Adam and Eve,…its there that the first blood sacrifice was made to cover man’s sinfulness.
In other words,…what we know about God and creation and ourselves, about salvation,...- it all begins in Genesis.
Its here in Genesis that the theological pillars are erected and upon which everything else in the Bible rests.
Genesis even refers to Jesus the Messiah who would save the world from its sin.
…so the importance of Genesis can hardly be overstated,…for here it all begins.
Its here where we read about how God calls Abraham from the country of Iraq to the promised land.
Its here we read about God’s covenant with Abraham, Isaac, Jacob and Joseph in Egypt.
Its here where God puts into action a plan to save the people He had created,…because their sinfulness had separated them from God.
Its here where God declares war on sin and satan.
Now,…just some background information as well.
Its widely accepted that Genesis 1-11 covers primeval history,…in other words,…the early history of the Earth,…and then chapters 12-50 cover the patriarchal history,...in other words,…the history of Israel’s founding Fathers.
…and the primeval history covers five different stories of man’s sin.
…and each story covers four major themes,...namely sin,…then God announcing the penalty for that sin,…then God bringing His grace into the situation to ease the misery of sin,…and then God punishing sin.
…and here’s where we learn about God’s amazing grace,…because in every story there is a tremendous increase of sin resulting in punishment,…but there’s always more grace,…more grace.
For example,…Adam and Eve sinned,…but because of God’s grace He withholds the death penalty.
Cain is banished from his family,…but because of God’s grace,…He puts a mark of protection on him.
The flood comes,…but God graciously preserves the human race through Noah.
…and God’s grace continues to increase during the history of the Fathers of Israel.
Abraham received God’s gracious promise,...that through him all the peoples of the world will be blessed.
…and despite the sins of the Fathers of the nation of Israel,…God’s promise stands.
In other words,…God’s grace is poured out again and again,…and more and more,…as His people sin more and more!
…and so Genesis is about God’s grace.
…and God describes for us in the New Testament what He has done for us and is still doing for us in Romans 5v20, “God’s law was given so that all people could see how sinful they were. But as people sinned more and more, God’s wonderful kindness [grace] became more abundant.” (NLT).
…and you know what it tells me about God?,…that as I continue to sin,…God continues to breathe His grace into my life!
May I then say,…this is the soul-medicine we need in our lives,…that as I continue to sin,…God continues to breathe His grace into my life,…day after day after day!
It was grace from the beginning,…and it will always be grace.
Question is, “Have you experienced His grace in your life as yet?”
Listen to what God says about that in Ephesians 2v8-9, “For it is by grace you have been saved, through faith – and this not from yourselves, it is the gift of God – not by works, so that no one can boast” (NIV).
“Aren’t you glad about that?”
“Shouldn’t we be more thankful for God’s grace in our lives?”
Genesis also speaks of God’s faithfulness over and over again in the lives of the Fathers of the nation of Israel.
God even remains faithful to the people of the promise thousands of years later,…even though the people’s sinfulness become a threat to the fulfillment of that promise.
…and you know what that means?,…that God remains faithful to His own promises even though sin itself threatens to derail His plans.
This is the way God has always been,…and this is the way He still is today.
Listen to How God explains that for us in 2 Timothy 2v13, “If we are unfaithful, he [God] remains faithful, for he cannot deny himself.” (NLT).
…and so God’s faithfulness is nothing new,…because it all started in Genesis.
…and part of God’s faithfulness toward us,…is that He promises to forgive us our sins if we confess it to Him.
Question is, “Have you experienced God’s great faithfulness in His forgiveness?”
Listen what God says He will do for you if you confess your sins in 1 John1v8, “if we confess our sins to him, he is faithful and just to forgive us and to cleanse us from every wrong.” (NLT).
…and what about God’s view in regard to you and me, His creation?
Well,…Genesis affirms our sinfulness,…- we cannot deny it.
We are all sinful beings,…and even the best of us are helpless and hopeless sinners!
,…yes,...no-one derives God’s saving grace!...and God even confirms this in
Romans 3v10-12, “No one is good—not even one. No one has real understanding; no one is seeking God. All have turned away from God; all have gone wrong. No one does good, not even one.” (NLT).
That kind of blows our bubble,…doesn’t it?
In other words,…no matter how good you think you are,…no matter how good I think I am,…you and I were never the one’s seeking God in the first place.
It was God who looked for us in our sinful state from the beginning.
It was God’s grace that brought us closer to Himself.
…and then we couldn’t even come to God without faith in Him.
…and Moses made it clear that even Abraham was saved by faith.
Listen to what Moses says of Abraham how he was made right before God in Genesis 15v6, “And Abram believed the LORD, and the LORD declared him righteous because of his faith.” (NLT).
…and that’s where it all started for us.
Here’s what God says about Abraham in Romans 4v11, “So Abraham is the spiritual father of those who have faith…. They [us] are made right with God by faith.” (NLT).
In other words,…there is only one way you and I can come to God and be made blameless of all of our sins.
Its called the Genesis way,…- by faith!
There has never been another way,…and there will never be another way in the future.
It’s always been the Genesis way,…- by faith!
“So who wrote Genesis?”,…well the Bible itself declares that Moses was the author of the first five books of the Old Testament.
Even Jesus Himself declared that Moses was the author of Genesis in John 5v46.
…and so it seems that Moses wrote Genesis about the late 1500 B.C. at the time or just following the Exodus from Egypt when Israel wandered in the desert for forty years.
…and so God met with Moses giving him the first five books of the Old Testament.
…and here’s something you have to take careful notice of as we continue into the book of Genesis.
Its in this context that Israel had just escaped the oppressive false gods of Egypt’s temples and pyramids with its solar and lunar gods,…that God gives Moses the words to write.
We must understand,…that while living in the land of Egypt for 400 years,…the people of God had been exposed to the many pagan mythological gods, which was in exact contradiction to the one and only God they were serving.
We must understand that the Egyptians taught of a collection of many gods,…and these gods had many love affairs with other gods which of course produced many more gods,…and some of God’s people had surrendered their lives to these false gods of Egypt.
So Moses took them on,…and in these first few lines of Genesis,…God would forever establish a true understanding about Himself, the universe and humanity.
In other words,…Moses would begin with a radical view of God that He was one God over all things in the universe.
…and its interesting to note that Moses does not mention all the other religious views of the world,…but he simply answers them through deliberate words,…silencing them once and for all.
…and he says in verses 1-2, “In the beginning God [Elohim opens with the initial act of the creation of the cosmos] created the heavens and the earth. The earth was empty, a formless mass cloaked in darkness. And the Spirit of God was hovering over its surface.” (NLT).
…and watch the emphasis here: First God, then the universe and then the earth!
That’s very significant to remember: First God, then the universe and then the earth!
…so what should we take careful notice of?…
1. Recognize That Everything Revolves Around God And No-One Else.
You must take notice of the fact that the name used for God here is “Elohim”,…and this name dominates the whole chapter.
In fact the name Elohim is used 35 times in the first chapter so that it catches your eye immediately.
In other words,…this entire chapter and the entire book is about God from first to last,…and to read it any other way is to misread it!
…and even right here in he beginning,…Genesis talks about the Son of God as the beginning and end of history.
…and here’s something to really take notice of.
As Evangelical Christians we affirm that we believe in the Triune God,…Father Son and Holy Spirit.
Now I know some people might say there’s never really enough evidence for this Theological concept in the Bible.
…but look at what it talks about here,…right at the beginning of time.
The first three Hebrew words used here in Genesis 1v1 goes like this, Bereshith bara Elohim.
…and here’s the significance of those three Hebrew words: The way its written in the Hebrew means that the name used for God, (Elohim),…is written in the plural form,…and the verb “created” (bara) is in the singular form,…so that God (plural), created (singular).
“Isn’t that significant?”
…and so we have a description of God in Deuteronomy 6v4 that says that God is a unity, “Hear, O Israel! The LORD is our God, the LORD alone.” (NLT)…and then we have passages in the Bible that teach that God is also three persons in 2 Corinthians 13v13, “May the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ, the love of God, and the fellowship of the Holy Spirit be with you all.” (NLT).
It also tells us that all three of these persons were there and active in creation.
First here in Genesis 1 it tells us that God and the Spirit were there.
Then in John 1v1-3,10 it tells us that God and Son were there,…and there are many other such passages in the Bible.
In other words,…when you look at this passage in Genesis 1,…you discover that all three persons,…the Father, Son and Holy Spirit were there.
…and here’s what I want you to pick up this morning.
Notice that God created everything in the “beginning”,…not some time in eternity!
Listen to what is said about God in Psalm 90v2, “Before the mountains were created, before you made the earth and the world, you are God, without beginning or end.” (NLT).
In other words,…God has always been the great “I am”.
…and here’s where we part with evolutionists.
The Bible is clear that God created everything out of nothing!
An Old Testament scholar Gerhard Von Rad makes the comment,…that the word “create” contains the idea that God created the earth “effortlessly”,…since it is never connected with any material that was there before the universe was created.
In other words,…the specific Hebrew word used here “to create”,…speaks of creating something out of nothing,…not that something was reshaped out of something else.
That’s significant to know!
Listen to how God explains that for us in Hebrews 11v3, “By faith we understand that the entire universe was formed at God’s command, that what we now see did not come from anything that can be seen.” (NLT).
…and here’s why I believe Moses says that nothing existed before God spoke it into existence.
He was attacking all the other false religious systems from which his people had just escaped!
…and in the same manner,…he’s attacking the belief that everything we see today has come about because of Evolution,…that the heavens and the earth were created out of something that was already there before God was there.
It fights the idea of agnostic Carl Sagan who said, “In many cultures it is customary to answer that God created the universe out of nothing. But this is mere temporizing. If we wish courageously to pursue the question, we must, of course ask next where God comes from?
…and if we decide this to be unanswerable, why not save a step and conclude that the universe has always existed?”
In other words,…he’s saying that all matter is God!…and its exactly this view that has dominated the sciences for the last 100 years.
…and why do these people have this view?,…because I believe they are afraid that a Divine Foot might get into the door of their evolution theory!
It’s been the creed of all the followers of Darwin who first spoke of this evolution theory,…this theory that’s taught to our kids in our school system today.
In other words,…its Darwin and his evolution theory who gives us a creation story where God is absent and where everything was created through natural processes.
Yet God is bigger than that!
That’s why its so important that we teach our kids the right things,…because what we have here are two opposing world views,…one based on God as the alone creator of everything,…and the other is that things are made by themselves,…that there is no divine intervention,…and that God has not revealed to us knowledge about the past.
In other words,…evolutionists believe that nothing gave rise to something at an alleged Big Bang explosion.
Evolutionists also believe that non-living matter gave rise to life,…that single celled organisms gave life to many-celled organisms,…that invertebrates gave life to vertebrates,…that ape-like creatures gave life to intelligence and morality,…and that man’s yearnings gave life to religions.
In other words,…evolution teaches an anti-Biblical religion.
…so parents need to take note,…that although our constitution says that schools cannot be bias toward any kind of religion,…the teaching of evolution to our kids as fact,…is exactly that.
Here’s what a man by the name of John Dunphy,…an evolutionist, a secular humanist said about excluding God from schools and society, “I am convinced that the battle for humankind’s future must be waged and won in the public school classroom by teachers who correctly perceive their role as the proselytizers of a new faith: a religion of humanity that recognizes and respects the spark of what theologians call divinity in every human being. These teachers must embody the same selfless dedication as the most rabid fundamentalist preachers, for they will be ministers of another sort, utilizing a classroom instead of a pulpit to convey humanist values in whatever subject they teach, regardless of the educational level – preschool day care or large state university. The classroom must and will become an arena of conflict between the old and new – the rotting corpse of Christianity, together with all its adjacent evils and misery, and the new faith of humanism…”. (The Humanist, 1983).
In other words,…even in our country today,…the school education system has become the most powerful ally of humanism and evolutionist.
Question is, “What can our Sunday school’s meeting for an hour once a week and teaching only a fraction of the children do to stem the tide of the five-day program of humanistic teaching?"
However,…a man by the name of Malcolm Muggeridge wrote, “I myself am convinced that the theory of evolution, especially to the extent to which it has been applied, will be one of the greatest jokes in the history books of the future.”
In other words,…there will come a day where people will say, “Wow,…the Bible was right. Creation could not happen without God!”.
…so in the beginning God was already existing from eternity to eternity.
In the beginning was God,…before there was as much as a material atom of the cosmos.
…and that should lead us to do the following two things…
2. Accept As Absolute Truth That God Alone Created The Universe.
Moses says in verse 1, “In the beginning God created the heavens…” (NLT).
…and as we’ve already seen,…Moses uses some very specialized words.
He uses the word “created” (bara).
Now here what’s so fascinating about this word as it used in the Bible.
In the Bible,…this word bara is only used of God creating,…and not of any human being creating anything.
This word is only used in the Bible with God creating.
In other words,…only God creates,…and here in Genesis 1 this word “created” is reserved only for the most crucial items in God’s plan: The universe, animal life and human life.
…and when the words “heavens and earth” are used here,…its describing for us the totality of the entire cosmos.
In other words,…there is nothing that God has not created!
…and here’s the majesty of God’s creating power.
We are living on earth,…but our earth is part of one of the hundred thousand millions of galaxies out there which can be seen,…not even speaking about those galaxies we can’t even see,…- and our galaxy is about 100 Million light years across,…which amounts to about
6 Hundred Trillion miles.
Our galaxy alone amounts to about some hundred million stars!
…and here’s what’s so mind-blowing about God’s creation power.
It is estimated that the distance between each of the hundred thousand million galaxies is about 3 Million light years!
…but it all had a beginning,…not a Big Band beginning, but a God beginning!
…and God created every speck of dust in all those galaxies of the universe.
He created every atom,…every little microscopic solar system,…every electron,…every neutron,…all of which have no measurable size.
…and here’s how the awesomeness and power of God is described for us in Isaiah 40v25-26, “To whom will you compare me? Who is my equal?” asks the Holy One. Look up into the heavens. Who created all the stars? He brings them out one after another, calling each by its name. And he counts them to see that none are lost or have strayed away.” (NLT). (Insert the video here).
…and here’s what so neat about all this.
As the people of God were traveling through the desert for 40 years,…at night-time they could see this awesomeness,…they could see this power of God in the sky,…and it all shouted out about a Creator who cared for His people.
“When last have you looked up into the night-sky and saw the power of God?”
“When last have you looked into the sky and saw a God who cares about you so much,…that he sent His co-creator Son Jesus Christ to this earth where we live,…to die in our place for our sin,…so that we could have a personal relationship with Him through faith in Him?”
“When last did you look up into the sky and saw a God so great,…that His grace made it possible for us to live in relationship with Him through faith in Him?”
3. Believe That God Alone Created The Earth We Live On.
The second half of Moses’ introduction brings us down to our earth.
Verse 2 says, “The earth was empty, a formless mass cloaked in darkness. And the Spirit of God was hovering over its surface.” (NLT).
…and so the perspective we have here is from earth level,…and from that view the earth is uninhabitable.
What’s interesting to note here are the Hebrew words here for “empty, formless”…(tohu wabohu).
In the Hebrew these words serve as a common expression for a place that is disordered and empty and therefore uninhabitable and uninhabited,…the very opposite of what earth would be after the six days of creation.
…and spread over this uninhabitable earth was “darkness”,…and all it does is emphasize the emptiness of earth at that stage.
…and if you think about it,…it again speaks of God’s great power,…because darkness is impenetrable to us,…but its transparent to God.
Listen to what David says about God’s great power in Psalm 139v11-12, “I could ask the darkness to hide me and the light around me to become night—but even in darkness I cannot hide from you. To you the night shines as bright as day. Darkness and light are both alike to you.” (NLT).
…and the word used here for “Spirit” in Hebrew also means “breath”.
In other words,…God’s creative breath hovered over the water,…and on one day God’s breath came forth as speech – His Word,…that’s when everything was created by His Word.
Listen to how God describes it for us in Psalm 33v6-9, “The LORD merely spoke,
and the heavens were created. He breathed the word, and all the stars were born. He gave the sea its boundaries and locked the oceans in vast reservoirs. Let everyone in the world fear the LORD, and let everyone stand in awe of him. For when he spoke, the world began!
It appeared at his command.” (NLT).
However,…over all this chaos floated the beauty of God Himself in the form of His Spirit.
…and out of this chaos,…the Spirit of God draws beauty and life!
…and in a sense that’s exactly what God did, when by His Holy Spirit, He created something beautiful of your life out of all the chaos of sin and rebellion.
Here’s how its described for us in 2 Corinthians 4v6, “For God, who said, “Let there be light in the darkness,” has made us understand that this light is the brightness of the glory of God that is seen in the face of Jesus Christ.” (NLT).
In other words,…just as the Spirit of God hovered over the earth’s chaos,…so He hovers over our dark hearts,…preparing us to receive the Word of God that will make us new creations in Jesus Christ.
…and if God can create such great beauty out of nothing,…He can make you new as well.
This great God wants to be in a relationship with you,…because He created you,…but sin has separated you from Him,…that’s why He sent His Son Jesus Christ to die in your place,…to take your sin punishment,…so that you can be reunited with Him.
“What do say about that?”
“Do you want to experience God’s grace in your life?”
“Do you want to know this God who created you?”
Today,…before you leave this place,…you can know Him.
