"In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth."
Welcome to the Bible.
I'm fairly certain that any Christian, and probably anyone who has any knowledge of Christianity, could spew off Genesis 1:1 out of their Biblical file cabinet with a distinct ease. I can't say with that same certainty that most people understand what Genesis 1:1 is saying. It seems fairly simple, but it's not simple at all. It probably was for God Himself in that very moment, but it would not be easy for us.
Can we just take a minute to think about what it meant to create the heavens and the earth? The perfection in planning of how the whole "heavens and earth" thing would play out?
We are perfectly placed between two spiral arms of our galaxy in the universe. This is no accident, God put us there for safety. Those bands are vicious arms of stars and planets that culminate in a string of fire. However, God placed His precious Earth in the quiet place in between. If the earth's crust was any thinner, we would suffer from immense radiation that would kill us. If the crust were any thicker, the electromagnetic field would be thrown off and all of a sudden we would have electromagnetic storms all over the earth. To me it seems like He cared enough about our planet from the very beginning to protect us just in our perfect location.
See, we can't overlook Genesis 1:1 just because it's a commonly known verse. The first words of this incredible book express His power and majesty, and do so for a reason. Why would He start His word any other way? Let's go on...
Verses 3-5 can be kind of confusing because when God says, "Let there be light," (v. 3), He doesn't say, "Let there be sun." Although it's hard for us to comprehend having light without the sun, I think of this light and this darkness and picture it as that quiet time right before and after the sun rises and sets. I imagine a watercolor kind of light.
Verses 6-14 talk about the sky, the oceans, and the plants. Pay attention to the order of His creation. We know today that plants need light to grow. Although the sun was not placed in the sky until after vegetation had been created, plants weren't on earth until after the light was there.
Verses 14-19 finally bring the lights that we know into our solar system.
Verse 16 kind of blows my mind as much as verse 1 does.
"God made two great lights- the greater light to govern the day and the lesser light to govern the night. He also made the stars."
The sun is not this bright white light bulb chilling above earth that makes us hot and sweaty in the summer and warms us up on winter days, all while blinding us at the same time. The sun is a raging ball of fire. We are precisely placed 93 million miles from the sun. If we were 5 degrees closer to the sun, we wouldn't exist because of the intense heat that would burn us all up. However, God hung the sun close enough to us that we don't freeze. If we were 5 degrees further away, our world would be a massive snowball.
And the moon? Well somehow, in some way I don't understand, the tides of the oceans are affected by the placement of the moon. We tend to think of the moon as a fairly harmless place, but if we were placed even 1/5 closer to the moon, we would have tsunamis on all of the beaches with up to 50 foot waves twice each day. Our earth would be swallowed up by flood waters. Thankfully, God has promised us that will never happen again, but we'll get to that in a few chapters.
Verses 6-14 talk about the sky, the oceans, and the plants. Pay attention to the order of His creation. We know today that plants need light to grow. Although the sun was not placed in the sky until after vegetation had been created, plants weren't on earth until after the light was there.
Verses 14-19 finally bring the lights that we know into our solar system.
Verse 16 kind of blows my mind as much as verse 1 does.
"God made two great lights- the greater light to govern the day and the lesser light to govern the night. He also made the stars."
The sun is not this bright white light bulb chilling above earth that makes us hot and sweaty in the summer and warms us up on winter days, all while blinding us at the same time. The sun is a raging ball of fire. We are precisely placed 93 million miles from the sun. If we were 5 degrees closer to the sun, we wouldn't exist because of the intense heat that would burn us all up. However, God hung the sun close enough to us that we don't freeze. If we were 5 degrees further away, our world would be a massive snowball.
And the moon? Well somehow, in some way I don't understand, the tides of the oceans are affected by the placement of the moon. We tend to think of the moon as a fairly harmless place, but if we were placed even 1/5 closer to the moon, we would have tsunamis on all of the beaches with up to 50 foot waves twice each day. Our earth would be swallowed up by flood waters. Thankfully, God has promised us that will never happen again, but we'll get to that in a few chapters.
And those stars? Don't get me started. I'll have to let you know of their power in a different post all it's own. But if you want to know, they aren't just twinkling up there for beauty. The sun is a star. Look at that picture up there. That is no "twinkle, twinkle, little star," that is a raging ball of fire, like every star in the universe. We haven't discovered every star created yet, but some scientists believe there are as many stars in the universe as there are grains of sand on the earth. And God knows each one by name.
Verses 20-23 bring forth the first living creatures, the fish and birds to take advantage of the expanse of water and sky that God blessed Earth with.
Verses 24-25 introduce livestock, wild animals, and the creatures of the ground. Also realize that these creatures who would need vegetation to live weren't created until after vegetation was created.
Verses 26-27 give us our big moment! "Then God said, 'Let us make mankind in our image, in our likeness, so that they may rule over the fish in the sea and the birds in the sky, over the livestock and all the wild animals, and over all the creatures that move along the ground.' So God created mankind in His own image, in the image of God He created them; male and female He created them."
I love this. First of all, listen to what God says here. He says, "Let US," as in the trinity, as in Him and His Son and His Spirit. He wasn't talking to the animals that He had just created and saying that man would be created in their image, He was talking to Jesus and the Holy Spirit. Once you understand that, understand that we, you and me, were created in His image, everything changes. We were created to be like Him. The more we follow Christ, the more we begin to look like God. We have a pretty good start, we are created in His image.
I rest my Biblical case for agriculture in verses 28-30. He tells us that we are to, "Rule over the fish in the sea and the birds in the sky and over every living creature that moves on the ground," (v. 28) and that He has given us, "every seed-bearing plant on the face of the whole earth and every tree that has seed in it," for food. Verse 30 continues to tell us, "everything that has the breath of life in it- I give every green plant for food."
Verse 31 wraps up this first chapter of God's word by beginning with saying, "God saw all that He had made, and it was very good."
Very good, indeed. Thank you, Lord.
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