Creation

God’s Creation – wow, what a topic to talk about! Where to begin…  Let’s start by by watching a video looking at the scale and vastness of what God has created ​

That is amazing isn’t it. Our earth is so beautiful – and interestingly, from space there is not a single border in sight! I wonder what our world would be like if we did not separate ourselves out into nations, with borders and lived as one whole loving people.

‘In the beginning God created the Heavens and the earth. ’ These incredible Words from God are probably one of the most well known of all time.  We see from these words that God created the earth - now if I asked you to imagine the earth – what would it look like to you? Perhaps like the image on the screen?

Well let’s look at what the Heavens and the earth looked like in ancient times

We can see the image on the screen that the people of that age had a different understanding of the world than we do. They undertook observational science – that is their ideas were formed by what they themselves could see of the world - without the benefit of telescopes or satellites into space. Whilst there were suggestions as early as 300 bce by Aristotle that the world was round, it was not until the 15th century that it was widely accepted that the world was a sphere.  In fact did you know that the first actual public real time image of the earth as a globe was not shown until the early 1960’s? ​

Going back to the ancient world - This earth was flat and suspended by pillars in the sea. Now as both the sea and the sky were blue, and the sea was made of water, the belief was that the sky was also made of water – and of course where else would the rain come from? The earth and the sea were separated by a dome called the firmament. Rain was explained by their belief that there were holes or portals in the firmament which let in the water from the sea above. The sun and moon were of course very important to these ancient people; however all the other stars were seen as sparkling adornment in the firmament. And above all this was Heaven where the God’s lived. I think we can see how this could very much have made sense!

​​Genesis contains the story of Creation - as we heard read at the beginning of the service. It is exquisite – and with so much meaning. So why did God inspire this writing? Well, God meets people where they are – in their own place. He inspired the writing in a way that the people of that time could understand. God met them in their place and made the story of Creation understandable to them – without any lack of awe and wonder.

Creation is such a huge topic with all types of dimensions and this talk will only scratch the surface of some of the aspects. However, hopefully it will whet your appetite for more!

Firstly we will look at some basics. 

Genesis has so much meaning – and it is easy to miss this. Genesis tries to answer the questions we carry in our hearts such as - ‘where are we?’, ‘who are we?’ and ‘why are we here?’ And it, along with the rest of Scriptures does this so well.

To extract any meaning we need some ideas on how we should approach the text. We are of course reading an ancient text written approximately 3000 years ago – in fact a time of the earliest recorded history. This is both a different culture and a different time period. It is written for us but not to us. 

The creation story is, and has been, the subject of much debate and because of this it is easy to miss the beauty of the words and hear what God is saying. A bit like not being able to see the wood for the trees, as we might say. We need to listen, appreciate, and reflect on the words. It is very important to understand what God is telling us – to do otherwise will cause difficulty in understanding the rest of Scriptures. If we ignore the beginning then it is like watching a sequel without understanding the original film.

I am now going to look at some of the words and phrases in the first few verses of Genesis. The words are on screen but they are also in your service leaflet.
1 In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth. 2 Now the earth was formless and empty, darkness was over the surface of the deep, and the Spirit of God was hovering over the waters.

3 And God said, “Let there be light,” and there was light. 4 God saw that the light was good, and he separated the light from the darkness. 5 God called the light “day,” and the darkness he called “night.” And there was evening, and there was morning—the first day.

God says an awful lot in these initial verses. 

Let’s look at some of the words used. The Hebrew word for ‘In the beginning’ is the word rachite. A truer definition would be ‘way back when’. Thus we have no definitive date of the beginning – God is not giving us a time or date.

Verse 2 has much significance  – we read ‘the earth was formless and empty’. The Hebrew word for this is Tohu Vavohu which means ‘wild and waste’ – this is often interpreted as being a desert. 

We then have ‘darkness was over the surface of the deep’ –  implying water – and ocean.

God has described the world consisting of 2 inhabitable places – a desert and an ocean. Neither place suitable for creating a living environment.

However, we then read ‘and the Spirit of God was hovering over the waters’. The Hebrew word for spirit is Ruach – and this means spirit, breath and also wind – familiar words throughout the Bible. God is now overseeing the chaos and is about to bring order.

In verse 3 God speaks, and makes light - which he separates from the darkness – thus forming day and night. So what has God done here? God has created time! The order of time had been created for the world. 

So we see in these first few verses God bringing order to the chaotic world – which ultimately results in a garden suitable for humans. There is so much significance in just these few verses. For example we can see a relationship between the Desert, Ocean and Holy Spirit in these first few verses, with later content such as dust and water making clay to form the first human and life being breathed into him. Dust from the desert, water from the ocean and that word Ruach which can mean the Holy Spirit, wind and also breath.

At this stage I need to point out that there are numerous theories as to every aspect of Genesis. One such looks at the pattern within the first 6 days of creation, with the first 3 days consisting of God ordering the environment – time, weather and agriculture – including fruit trees which of course is very relevant later on – and during the second 3 days, inhabitants are named by God – the sun and the stars, fish and birds, and land animals. I kind of liked that – but I must reiterate that there are many, many more – often conflicting with each other.

God finishes his creation days with a rest – the Sabbath. This has an important meaning and is a rhythm built into creation by God and something He wants us to do as well. God is saying the world is a place where we can safely rest and enjoy being in His amazing world. But of course do we? The world seems busy chasing after material things and not appreciating our natural wonderful world. Such a shame

The world is now ordered but still needs taming, so God makes humans in His image to provide stewardship. God wants to share the world with us. Sadly, rather than share the world with God, we want to be God. And we don’t want to steward the world, we want to rule the animals and land. Enormous islands of plastic waste in our oceans is not good stewardship!

Which brings us to Jesus and the Kingdom of God. Jesus comes to be the leader we should be – to teach us how we should steward the world and of course each other. The cross took in our chaos, sin and evil, and the resurrection brings the Holy Spirit within us all to work as we should until He returns. Jesus finally puts things right through the Kingdom of God.

This concludes the first part of my talk. There is far more to be said about the Creation story in Genesis but I will now move to the second part and will focus on what we know now of our world and the universe through the lens of wonder.

So we see the people of the time had a very different understanding of the world than we have today with our scientific discoveries about the formation and being of the Universe and the Theory of Evolution.  To some people science dismisses God – which is so very sad. To me science enhances God and is no way in conflict. When we see the complexities of the universe how can anyone but God have made it?

Going back to Genesis briefly, now we have this scientific knowledge, it can be very tempting to try to read science into the verses of Genesis. This known as concordism and I believe is a mistake. Whilst I personally believe there is absolutely no conflict between science and Christianity, if we try to incorporate our scientific knowledge into Genesis, then we lose the beauty and understanding of these verses – and of God’s word.  

And there is a succinct difference between God and science. God does not seek to provide an explanation of how our world works – that is what science does – and that is the difference. Science shows the how, God and Scriptures show us the Who and the why. Distinctness which enhances the beauty within both spheres of knowledge.

However, we can use the advancements of our scientific knowledge to really appreciate and wonder at the amazing world we live in – a world created by God.  One of the most amazing wonders is the fine tuning of the universe. Let’s watch this short video which gives a taste at how extraordinary this is

​Wow… just wow! As theologian William Lane Craig says – this could only be done by a  transcendent unembodied mind beyond space and time. In other words God!

And let’s look at the impact that ‘fire’ has on our world. Without fire we would never have progressed beyond the stone age. No tools or technology – no microscopes, medical instruments, satellites, computing. In fact no way of understanding our world and Universe as we do through scientific discoveries. No way of truly appreciating what God made for us.

We can also look at ourselves. We have objective moral values and duties which are outside of any qualities arising from natural selection. For example, if may be in our interest to take that bar of chocolate or expensive watch from another person. But whether we do or not, we know that is wrong – and that is our objective moral values given by God. The desire to do the right thing!

​Let’s now think how special God made us and all living creatures in relation to the physical world.  Something I only realised recently was how our eyes and ears work in relation to the outside world. 

You may have heard the following philosophical question…

If a tree fell over in a forest which contained no humans or animals – would it make a sound?

Would it? What do you think?

Well sound consists of soundless vibrations with the mechanisms in our ears translating these vibrations into sounds in our brains. So soundless vibrations hit our ears and our brain translates them to sound. How awesome is that? So sounds do not occur exterior to ourselves – only once they are translated into sound by our ears and brain.

It is similar with our eyes. The colours we see are formed from light entering our eyes and the mechanisms in our eyes translate this light to colours in our brains. So those beautifully coloured flowers we admire are not actually that colour at all – it is our eyes which interpret the light so that we see those colours in our brains.

To me this is even more incredible than if God made the flowers in the colours we see. No - God made US to see these colours. God made US to hear the notes of Mozart….. not to mention the drum beats of Pink Floyd!

This really is the awesome wonder of God’s Creation

We need only to look out of the window to see creation in its splendour.  We look at trees and admire their beauty –  but let’s look at a few tree facts:

• Trees live a very long time – could this be because they provide life giving oxygen to us? And what is the other important ingredient needed for life? Water. Trees seed the clouds to provide rain and snow. God’s work!
• We see forests full of individual trees – yet underground their roots are intertwined. If one tree is not well – others help via its roots. Again God’s work!

God’s creations working together for life.

I could go on but will finish my talk here. Whilst I have only scraped the surface of the subject of creation, I hope I have showed you the beauty yet complexity of Genesis, and that you are enthused to look at it further. I also hope you have enjoyed looking at the world and the wonders and awesomeness of God’s creation. 

I will finish with a quote from the poet Rumi

‘Nothing I say can explain to you Divine Love. Yet all of creation cannot seem to stop talking about it.’
​
K. Griffiths

VIDEO OF CREATION TALK ONLY

VIDEO OF THE WHOLE SERVICE

References

Attridge, Harold W.; Society of Biblical Literature. HarperCollins Study Bible (pp. 126-127). HarperCollins. Kindle Edition.

Craig, William Lane, YouTube https://youtu.be/elZ2V715cqc

Craig, W L, On Guard Conference 2012: William Lane Craig - "The Problem of Evil and Suffering"

Craig, William Lane, Doctrine of Creation: Excursus on Creation and Evolution Part 1
https://youtu.be/elZ2V715cqc

Dr. John Collins and Dr. Joel S. Baden in discussion https://yalebiblestudy.org/courses/genesis/lessons/creation/

Mackie Tim, Bible Project podcast ancient cosmology

Mackie Tim,  YouTube  https://youtu.be/JhTqbfbEaRA

The Theology of the Book of Genesis by Walter Moberly https://hub.commonawards.org/mod/page/view.php?id=2701

Dr. Oscar García-Johnson  https://youtu.be/_LfoNY358NY