Genesis to Jesus
IV. Starting in the Beginning:
a. The Story of Creation
b. The Word and the Sabbath
V. Study Questions
IV. Starting in the Beginning: An Introduction to Genesis
a. The Story of Creation
We're ready now to start reading the Bible! We're going to start at the beginnings, with Genesis, Chapter 1.
The best way to begin is by reading Genesis, Chapter 1, right now. Then you'll be ready to read what follows.
Too often people read the story of creation in terms of a religion vs. science debate. Yet, that imposes our historical situation on the text and misses the literary clues that explain to us the "religious" meaning the story had for ancient Israel, and the religious meaning that God intends for us in the 21st century.
Genesis 1:1 tells us that in the beginning the world was "formless and empty." The plot proceeds by showing us how God sets out to fix this - first, by giving the world form and then filling it.
In Days 1-3, God creates the "form" or the "realms" of the world - the day and the night; the sky and the sea; the land and the vegetation.
In Days 4-6, God fills these realms with "rulers" or "governors" - the sun, moon & stars (which "rule over the day and over the night"; verses 14-19); the birds and the fish to fill the sky and the seas; and man and beast, which rule the land.
There's a perfect order to all this. First God creates the "structure" of the world, then He fills that structure with living beings. It's like He's making a house and then putting inhabitants into it. And the individual days match up, too.
On Day 1, God creates day and night. On Day 4, He creates the "rulers" for the realms of day and night - the sun the moon and the stars.
On Day 2, He makes the sky and the sea. On Day 5, the sky and the sea are given their "governors," the fish and birds.
On Day 3, the land and the vegetation are created. And on Day 6, animals and the first humans are given dominion, rule over that land.
After each day of creation, God sees that His work is "good." After the six "work days" are through, God sees that His work is "very good." The word "very" is used to mark the end of the creation cycle, since God had finished creating the realms and the rulers.
To Continue Studying Lesson One, Click 3
