Whew! In five days of readings now, we've covered a HUGE span of material. We can't exactly say how much time has elapsed, but a LOT has happened. Here's a bit of a recap of SOME of the aspects of the Creation account:
IN THE BEGINNING GOD... the first four words tell us a whole lot about God himself. Eternally present, beyond time, "pre-dating" all of creation. Creation is not eternal; it has a beginning (and an end). God however, has no beginning. He is the Alpha and the Omega, the first and the last. If that doesn't blow your mind...
... CREATED THE HEAVENS AND THE EARTH. The ongoing refrain throughout the creation account... "And God said... and there was... and it was good." The six days of creation unfold in such order and organization. As an artist, I'd call it design, and if I were to coin a phrase that interior home and decorating shows have borrowed (or hijacked), it's "divine design" in the truest sense of those words. We see already in these first chapters of Genesis that God didn't just passively enjoy but He really delighted in the act of creation. He appraised its value in His eyes, seeing on the sixth day the sum total of what He'd made, and he declared, "it was VERY GOOD!" Perhaps we don't realize how striking this is, but it is truly unique.
There are, in fact, many creation accounts that originate in the Ancient Near East, such as the Babylonian Enuma Elish, which perhaps most closely resembles the Genesis creation account, but none of them portray God intentionally creating things and savoring the result.
I found no other religious text outside the Bible that said God created the world out of love and delight. Most ancient pagan religions believed the world was created through struggles and violent battles between opposing gods and supernatural forces. - Tim Keller
How different is your view of the world if you see it as the intentional result of a loving and sovereign God as opposed to the wreckage of various violent battles between disputing deities?
Certainly, many questions remain after these two creation accounts, not the least of which are:
How in the world did God create all these things in six days? Were these six, literal, 24-hour days? The Bible gives us no reason to believe otherwise, as the Hebrew word, yome, as it is used in Scripture, seems to reference a 24-hour passing of time spanning from sundown to sundown as the Jews would measure a day (hence the evening and morning contra morning then evening as we'd render it in English). How is this possible? I don't know. I mean, I really don't know... it causes me both to marvel in worship and to stumble in doubt at the same time.
Is it possible that this occurred over a longer duration of time or that days were longer than our current 24 hours? I'd say that yes, it's possible, but the Bible gives us no other reason to believe it occurred in any other fashion. It is striking that this measuring of time in seven-day weeks is a rhythm that has remained to this day, a rhythm I believe we would do well to respect. If rest from work is important to the Creator, I believe it's an equally important activity for God's precious creation.
Wow, there's a lot here if you start to dive in... Haven't even touched the origin of evil and all its implications. Many more questions here.
Perhaps all of our questions can begin to fall into various categories: (1) those we can answer with a great deal of certainty, (2) those we can put the pieces together and make a reasonable inference, and (3) those we really can't answer this side of eternity.
I could say a lot more, but I'll refrain for now.
I think we may have a few things to discuss when we get together on January 16th for the first time!
Pastor Karl
No comments:
Post a Comment