Sermon Central
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The Spirit And Creation Series
Contributed by Mike Wilkins on Apr 20, 2005 (message contributor)
Summary: The Holy Spirit Brings life to the creation.
Knowing The Holy Spirit April 17, 2005
The Spirit and Creation
Genesis 1:1-2, 2:7
Last week we saw how the Spirit is in the Trinity, we talked of the trinity as this eternal circle dance, where the Three are One and they are forever giving Glory to each other.
We saw that God always works in Trinity, even in the incarnation, the Father, Son and Spirit were deeply involved.
The creation is also a Trinitarian event – The Spirit is intimately involved in Creation.
The Beginning
1 In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth.
2 Now the earth was [a] formless and empty, darkness was over the surface of the deep, and the Spirit of God was hovering over the waters.
Heaven and Earth
1First this: God created the Heavens and Earth--all you see, all you don’t see. 2Earth was a soup of nothingness, a bottomless emptiness, an inky blackness. God’s Spirit brooded like a bird above the watery abyss
I love this Image – the Spirit of God hovering over the Chaos, brooding over it like a mother hen over her eggs.
“The Spirit brooded over the still earth as a bird broods over its nest, warming the dormant life within, wakening it, releasing it, so that the tiny creatures can come to birth.” – Samuel Ryan
The Hebrew for Sprit is the same word as breath, wind, or air. It is an onomatopoetic word – it sounds like the thing it describes. The Word is “Ruach” in Greek it is the same – the same word means Spirit, breath, wind, or air. It also sounds like what it describes: Pneuma is the word. Even the English words Spirit and Ghost have that quality about them – something elusive, a whispering wind.
I like “Ruach” it sounds more like a storm, or a hurricane (at least a gigantic sneeze) than a whispering wind. Maybe this is why the Celts chose the wild goose as a symbol of the Spirit, because they liked the word “Ruach” as well
The Ruach of God was brooding over the Chaos of the deeps, whipping up the waters, not bringing destruction, but bringing order, bringing creation
The Spirit broods over the Chaos and hatches Cosmos
You might know the word cosmos referring to the world or the universe, but in its original Greek that we borrow the word from it also has the meaning of order, clean, beautiful. The Spirit broods over the chaos and brings order, purity, beauty.
7 the LORD God formed the man from the dust of the ground and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life, and the man became a living being.
He ruached into Adam’s nostrils the ruach of life and the man became a living being.
He breathed into his nostrils the Spirit of life and the man became a living being.
Adam was just a statue, a model, a mannequin until the Spirit breathed life into him.
The Spirit Brings Life!
I have this image of the Trinity Dancing creation into being.
We are told in Genisis that God spoke creation into being – John calls the Son the Word of God.
1In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. 2He was with God in the beginning.
3Through him all things were made; without him nothing was made that has been made. 4In him was life, and that life was the light of men.
The Father Spoke the Word to create, and the Word was Jesus, through him all things were made, and then he Breathed his Spirit and creation became animated with life – the Life of God.
Without God’s Spirit there is no life!
Job tells us in Job 12
7 "But ask the animals, and they will teach you,
or the birds of the air, and they will tell you;
8 or speak to the earth, and it will teach you,
or let the fish of the sea inform you.
9 Which of all these does not know
that the hand of the LORD has done this?
10 In his hand is the life of every creature
and the breath of all mankind.
Even his friend Elihu says in Job 33 & 34
4 The Spirit of God has made me;
the breath of the Almighty gives me life.
14 If it were his intention
and he withdrew his Spirit and breath,
15 all people would perish together
and they would return to the dust.
It is not just that the Spirit’s breath kick started Life like some diving mouth to mouth: that once we were breathing on our own he could back off! No the Spirit gives life and sustains life, and restores life – The presence of the Spirit in all creation is what keeps creation and stops us from returning to Chaos.
