PRIMEVAL HISTORY (2000 years)
The Beginning of the Universe, 1:1-25
Two worldviews exist creation with a Creator or without a Creator. The conflict is not with
true science but with these two worldviews. How things have come to be, cannot be
dogmatically proven so, without taking a cut-and-dried position about the process of creation, I
take a cut-and-dried position about the origin of creation. God created everything. The universe
is not a product of blind chance, but a carefully planned and orderly development of things that
reveals the character and personality of God, the Creator. The visible evidence along with the
references to things that we know from scripture that happened before the foundation of the
world, unfold to us a very purposeful design that has ultimately a beautiful fellowship between
the Creator and the created beings He made in His image to be like Him. We are here. Heavens
and earth are here. How exactly it came to pass isn’t really all that important. The fact is that
things are the way they are, we are the way we are, and God is the way He is. This is all that
we really need to know to have significance.
We know God is creative. We know God is distinct from His creation. We know God is eternal
and in control of the world. We know we are valuable in God’s eyes because He created us.
We know we are more important than animals because we have been made in God’s image.
We know our personhood is not divine but is a reflection of God’s glory. We know that God
intends us to reflect His character, “Be ye holy for I am holy.” We know our worth isn’t in the
physical part of our being, but in the ability, God has given us to respond to Him. We know
God has ultimate authority over everything but has given us responsibilities to be in charge of
those things for which He has qualified us to accomplish.
When God said, “Let there be Light!” darkness heard and vanished. Before that time, the world
was a mass of unarranged material without form or beauty. Impenetrable night covered this
lifeless ball. It was out of this that God produced form, changing disorder into order and
shaping this world and the little we know of the universe, into something of beauty. Rather
than changing it in one instant, to full-blown perfection, God revealed Himself in what He did
during the six days of creation. He still does that today. God works. He follows a process so
that we can learn wisdom and the value of the effort that fills a personality with satisfaction.
Patient diligence leads to well-doing.
The first steps we take, are to make the light of understanding into something that reveals
character, purpose, harmony, and grace that delights the soul when it is beneficial to others.
God’s plan was to bring His Light into the physical darkness that encompassed the earth, and
His spiritual Light into our moral darkness. “The Light of the world,” said that if we follow
Him, we will not walk in the darkness of pessimism and uncertainty, but we would have the
“Light of Life.” That understanding cannot be mixed with darkness, or else all we would have
would be a dim twilight. Light in its nature is pure and bright, like sunlight on new snow.
Man’s hands pollute it and cannot make it come back to its purity and inherent loveliness.
That pure Light is free, nor can it be purchased or added to. It is a precious treasure that we
enjoy physically on a bright summer day, and morally when we are cleansed from sin and its
defilement of our soul and spirit. When we become sick of sin, Light is there as a free gift from
Him who is the Light. It is with a glad heart; our Lord gives from His grace treasure-house. He
loves us because He wants to love us. He calls us because He wants to call us. He blesses us
because He wants to bless us. He saves us because He wants to save us. He shines light into
our souls because He wants us to have light in our souls. But He has given us the free will to
accept by faith what He offers as a gift or to reject all He offers.
A person can live in darkness if that person chooses to. He or she can reject the light of
understanding that comes with faith if they so choose. Everything we take into our minds
comes from faith in something or someone. A person can reject the Light of Life if that is what
they really want to do, which will mean they live in darkness by their own choice. That also
means they will live in the blackness of darkness forever
A UNIFIED ORGANISM.
“I will praise Thee; for I am fearfully and wonderfully made: marvelous are Thy works, and that my soul knows right well.”
Psalm 139:14.
Of all God created, humans are the most wonderful of all because we are spirit, soul, and body. I am a soul. My body is a substance. My spirit is my connection with God.
- Bones form the structure of my body. Muscles keep them together and tendons and muscles together make them move. Blood vessels and nerves travel through the physical flesh, tissues, bones, and muscles, that feed and preserve every part of my body. The digestive system is like a factory that takes raw material and arranges it for my body’s use.
- There are two great bellows that move the oxygen I breathe into the bloodstream to keep all parts of my body functioning the way the Great Designer intends.
- From the control tower of my three-pound brain, all of my body is directed to do what it is supposed to do; from avoiding danger, and feeling pain, to the active power of moving my feet and consequently, my whole body from one place to another.
- Around 250 bones are all tied together forming and maintaining the function of all 205 pounds of my body. 33 vertebrae form my spine, 64 bones are in my upper limbs, 62 bones are in my lower limbs, 24 ribs are in a form that keeps my major organs safe, and the 22 bones that are in my head, are all tied together, fed and nurtured to make my body work. Each part of my body is dependent upon other parts and they all make up my whole physical body.
God created the whole person:
This body is one-third of what makes me, me. The purpose of the body is that my soul, my
personhood, can function through the five senses that are in this body. It is the intangible person that hears, sees, touches, tastes and smells using the body parts God created out of the dust of the earth. The parts of me that cannot be annihilated, are my soul and spirit. Our life is not a physical thing that can be measured or weighed. God “breathed into man the breath of life and man became a living soul.” Because the Life-Giver gave life, that soul-life never ceases to exist. All that changes and comes to a conclusion is the physical movements and functions of the body. The soul-life is intangible and once it is started, by the very nature of that kind of life, it never stops.
The third part of my personhood is my spirit. That too is without physical attributes but is real and sets human beings apart from other creatures. The ability to reason, not just to react; to know, retain and use that knowledge, and to come to conclusions is part of the function of the human spirit. That is the part of us that makes us unique. We have a mind that we can know, emotions that we can show, and a will that we can make decisions. It is actually the way in which humans were intended to be when God “made man in His own image,” with a mind as He has, that we might know Him; emotions like His so we can love Him, and a will so that we can choose to be like Him and do what He knows is best. The intention of creating human beings in the first place was to be able to share life together. The gift of eternal life is offered to us and can be accepted or rejected. It is not forced upon anyone, otherwise, humans would be no more than a robot without a “mind of their own.”
God reveals Himself in the whole Bible as One we can know personally.
There is unity throughout the whole Bible so that we can learn about God and come to know Him personally by faith. The Father, Son, and Holy Spirit are all One in every way as to personhood, and yet each has a separate personality and works in distinct and designed ways to bring us human beings into a relationship with God. To know God is to be able to share life now with Him in a relational way and experience the fellowship and joys of shared events in a life that has meaning and purpose. These first few years of our existence are the training time for what the real intent is for us to be a person, and be able to exist in a meaningful way, forever.
The Beginning of the Human Race, 1:26-2
Four methods God used to get mankind into the universe
1. Direct creation: Adam – “dust of the ground” implies that there is nothing superimportant about our bodies. Our life and worth come from God’s Spirit. The value of our life doesn’t come from our personal achievements but from God Himself.
2. Indirect creation: Eve
3. Virgin birth: Jesus Christ
4. Natural generation: all the rest of humanity
Adam was placed in the garden:
- Under the law of Gen.2:16
- With a suitable help-meet: the essence of marriage – it was in God’s original plan, 2:18. Marriage is God’s idea [Gen.2:18-24]; commitment is essential to successful marriage [Gen.24: 58-60]; romance is important [S. of S. 4:9-10]; marriage holds times of great joy [Jer.33:10-11]; marriage creates the best environment for raising children [Mal.2:14-15]; unfaithfulness breaks that bond of trust [Mat.5:32]; ideally, only death should dissolve marriage [Rom.7:2-3]; marriage is based on the practice of love, not feelings [Ep.5:21-33]; marriage is a living symbol of Christ and the church [Ep.5:23,32]; marriage is good and honorable [Heb.13:4]
- With the capacity of multiplying
- His food was fruit
- His work was to dress and guard the garden, 2:15
- An enemy was near even at the creation: note the words – guard, 2:15; subdue, 1:28;evil, 2:9
CHARACTERISTICS OF GOD REVEALED: Genesis 1. “God said…”
- v.3. Illumination: Who God is. “God is Light…”; “I am the Light of the world.”
- v.6. Separation: What God says. “You cannot serve two masters.”
- v.9. Manifestation: What God is like. “Order; “By their fruits, ye shall know them.”
- v.11. Production: What God intends. Results from a life given. “What shall it profit a man…”
- v.14. Indication: What God designed. “If any man be in Christ, he is a new creation.”
- v.20. Multiplication: Plans God has made. “Follow me and I will make you fishers…”
- v.24. Reproduction: Provisions of God for the future. “Ye must be born again.”
- v.26. Identification: People in God’s image. “The disciples were called Christians.”
- v.28. Benediction: Purpose of God to be fulfilled. “Go ye into all the world …”
- v.29. Satisfaction: Peace with God the result. “Come unto Me all ye that labor…”