The God Who Created, Genesis 1:1-2:4a
Introduction
Does one duty ever take the precedence over another? It is the old question over which the rabbis disputed. “Which is the first and greatest commandment?” The question was, after all, a legitimate one. Even among unmistakable obligations there are those which have the right to rank first.
The man who builds a house can not leave out the framework, but before that must come the foundation. Roof and framework and foundation are all essential, but imagine the result if he attempts to reverse the order and begin with the roof!
Jesus did not condemn thrift and carefulness about material concerns, but he did say, “Seek ye first the kingdom of God” (Matt. 6:33). It is a significant fact that the first words of the Bible, taken alone, set forth the same thing; “In the beginning God” (Gen. 1:1).
When a person puts God first in considering that which claims their time and talent and in mapping out his plans, they will not be unfaithful to any other obligation.
Transition
Today we will consider the nature of the God who created the Heavens and the Earth and everything which is in it. We will consider the Holy Trinity; the triune nature of God. The very first words of the Bible are beautiful in their simplicity yet profound in the fullness of their meaning; “In the beginning God.”
God is the measure of all things. God is not only the creator but also the sustainer of all things. The God who gave us life also continually gives us meaning for that life. The God who fills us with hope gives us a purpose for that hope.
Deuteronomy 6:4-5, “Hear, O Israel: The LORD our God, the LORD is one! You shall love the LORD your God with all your heart, with all your soul, and with all your strength.” (NKJV)
If God is one then it is important that we understand the nature of His unity and if we are to love Him with all of our heart, soul, and strength then it is important that we know who it is we are to love.
What greater question can be asked than, “Who is God and what is He like?” But who can comprehend the nature of God? Who can plumb the depths of God?
While much can be known, there is a great deal about God that we cannot understand. Who can understand the Trinity? John Wesley very appropriately said, “Bring me a worm that can comprehend a man, and then I will show you a man that can comprehend the Triune God!”
This morning we will not seek so much to completely understand the Trinity; rather we will seek to more fully appreciate the nature of God in a way that we can apply to our lives as followers of the God who created us to worship Him!
Exposition
Genesis 1:1 says that “In the beginning God created.” The Hebrew word used here is the word Bara and that word is reserved only for God in the Bible. Bara means to create but it means much more than that. It means that God created the universe and all that is in it from nothing.
The Bible does not tell us that God stumbled upon some matter which He shaped into the material universe. Outside of the biblical account there is no explanation of origins to be found. All ancient creation myths begin with a preexistent universe complete with space, time, and matter and work from there.
The Greeks believed that the material world was born in fire and that every 10,000 years or so fire would once again consume the world and the process would begin again. Many Native American tribes believed that the world had been created on the back of a giant sea turtle.
Modern evolutionary thought, which dominates the postmodern worldview, does not provide an explanation of origins. Evolutionary thought begins with the “big bang” theory but it fails to offer any explanation of the cause of that monumental event or the source of the material which exploded into the universe.
The Bible’s account of creation is unique. It tells us that God created the world ex-nihilo, that is, out of nothing. When we gaze at the creative nature of God we find meaning for our lives because we do not look merely at our physical surroundings. We look beyond limitations of this world into the face of eternity.
It is only in the biblical account of creation that we find a purpose to this universe and to our lives. Genesis is appropriately the first book in the Bible because it is the starting point for all of the rest of the doctrines and the teachings of the Bible. If God did not create then there is no purpose. Yet, God did create!
God created this universe out of nothing to fulfill His chief aims – to bring glory to Himself and express His perfect nature. God is Holy and it stands to reason that He should bring glory to Himself in creation. Psalms 19:1 says, “The heavens declare the glory of God; And the firmament shows His handiwork.” (NKJV)
God is love and in order to express love it must have an object. 1 John 4:7 says, “Beloved, let us love one another, for love is of God; and everyone who loves is born of God and knows God.” (NKJV) Love is not love until it is expressed to an object of that love. In creation we see God expressing His loving nature to us.
I like the way the Bible Teacher’s Commentary communicates this idea; “What meaning can be found in chance happenings in an impersonal universe? What meaning, when not only our individual lives flicker out after sparking briefly in the endless dark, but when mankind itself must look back to a mindless past and ahead to the certain dimming of our sun and the settling mantle of an eternal chill?”
As we come to examine the nature of the God who created we must treat what is without a doubt one of the most difficult doctrines in all of Christendom – the Trinity. Essential to Christian doctrine is the doctrine that God exists eternally in three distinct, yet unified, persons as Father, Son, and Holy Spirit.
Though we look for a lifetime we will never find the word trinity or triune or Trinitarian in any translation of the Bible. The doctrine of the trinity is what might be called a “compilation doctrine.” It is woven through the Scriptures like a constant thread of truth which binds the Scriptures together as a whole.
Time and again the Bible refers to God in three persons. In Matthew 28:19 Jesus says, “Go therefore and make disciples of all the nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit.” (NKJV)
2 Thessalonians 2:13-15 says, “But we are bound to give thanks to God always for you, brethren beloved by the Lord, because God from the beginning chose you for salvation through sanctification by the Spirit and belief in the truth, to which He called you by our gospel, for the obtaining of the glory of our Lord Jesus Christ. Therefore, brethren, stand fast and hold the traditions which you were taught, whether by word or our epistle.” (NKJV)
This is an incredibly difficult concept to grasp. Centuries of intellectual pursuit, theological endeavor, and philosophical ponderings have born this out. I have spent grueling hours pouring over theological works trying to understand it myself!
From scholar to laymen and everyone in between there has thus far been no explanation or figure of speech put forth which even begins to put the trinity into plain words. It has been suggested that we can understand the trinity through metaphor and word pictures.
Some have said that the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit are like three distinct candles which stand on one slightly divided candle stick. As you look at them from afar off they appear to be one light but as you move closer you see that there are three separate, yet unified lights.
There is a story that says that a recently converted Native American brought the wisdom of his formerly pagan earth religion to bear on the trinity. When asked to describe the Christian God he said that God is like water which, though it can exist as liquid, vapor, or ice is always water. Its form changes but its nature never does.
Some have said that in the economy of Heaven that Father, Son, and Holy Spirit do not add up to three as in 1+1+1, rather they remain one as in 1x1x1. The story is told of a gentleman passing a church with Daniel Webster who asked him, “How can you reconcile the doctrine of the Trinity with reason?” The statesman replied by asking, “Do you understand the arithmetic of heaven?”
The ancient church father, Saint Augustine of Hippo, probably explained it the best when said that we see the trinity expressed in the human composition. He said that just as person exists with one being with the dimensions of memory, understanding and will, so to God is unified as Father, Son, and Holy Spirit.
Even this explanation fails to really get at the nature and majesty of the creator of the entire universe. The Bible is God’s word. We understand that its message is reliable and trustworthy and since it reveals God in Trinitarian language then we are left to ponder this deepest of mysteries.
Proverbs 3:5 says, “Trust in the LORD with all your heart, And lean not on your own understanding.” (NKJV) It has been said that the Bible does not tell us everything that we want to know. It tells us everything that we need to know. Ours is not necessarily to know but to trust, not to discern but to devote.
God’s triune nature is perhaps revealed in the most obvious terms in the creation account. In Genesis 1:1 we see that the triune God created a three part universe in His image, having created space, time, and matter. In creating man He created us likewise in His divine image – mind, body, spirit.
God has imprinted His triune attributes into our very composition and makeup. We, like Him, are in a very real sense triune. Genesis 1:26 says, “Then God said, ‘Let Us make man in Our image, according to Our likeness; let them have dominion over the fish of the sea, over the birds of the air, and over the cattle, over all the earth and over every creeping thing that creeps on the earth.” (NKJV)
The triune God has created us in His image. We have been created “Imageo Dei,” that is, in the image of God! Scholars throughout the ages have pondered the mystery of what it means to have been created in the very image of God. I do not think that it is such a difficult concept to gasp and apply to our lives however.
Illustration
I read the story of a certain man who went through a forest seeking any bird of interest he might find. He caught a young eagle, brought it home, and put it among the fowls and ducks and turkeys, and gave it chicken food to eat even though it was an eagle, the king of birds.
Five years later, a naturalist came to see him and, after passing through his garden, said, “That bird is an eagle, not a chicken.” “Yes,” said the owner, but I have trained it to be a chicken. It is no longer an eagle, it is a chicken, even though it measures fifteen feet from tip to tip of its wings.”
“No,” said the naturalist, “it is an eagle still; it has the heart of an eagle, and I will make it soar high up to the heavens.” “No,” said the owner, “it is a chicken and it will never fly.” They agreed to test it. The naturalist picked up the eagle, held it up and said with great intensity: “Eagle, thou art an eagle; thou dost belong to the sky and not to this earth; stretch forth thy wings and fly.”
The eagle turned this way and that, and then looking down, saw the chickens eating their food, and down he jumped. The owner said, “I told you it was a chicken.” “No,” said the naturalist, “it is an eagle. Give it another chance tomorrow.” So the next day he took it to the top of the house and said, “Eagle, thou art an eagle; stretch forth thy wings and fly.” But again the eagle, seeing the chickens feeding, jumped down and fed with them.
Then the owner said, “I told you it was a chicken.” “No,” asserted the naturalist,” it is an eagle, and it has the heart of an eagle; only give it one more chance, and I will make it fly tomorrow.” The next morning he rose early and took the eagle outside the city and away from the houses, to the foot of a high mountain.
The sun was just rising, gilding the top to the mountain with gold, and every crag was glistening in the joy of the beautiful morning. He picked up the eagle and said to it: “Eagle, thou art an eagle; thou dost belong to the sky and not to the earth; stretch forth thy wings and fly.”
The eagle looked around and trembled as if new life were coming to it. Yet it did not fly. The naturalist then made it look straight at the sun. Suddenly it stretched out its wings and, with the screech of an eagle, it mounted higher and higher and never returned. It was an eagle, though it had been kept and tamed as a chicken.
We have been created in the image of God, but men have made us think that we are chickens, and so we think we are; but we are eagles and we have been made to stretch our wings and fly! We were created Imageo Dei – in the very image of God – we ought not to be content with the food of chickens!
God is triune and holy and magnificent and in many ways He is beyond our comprehension but in spit of this, He is not beyond our grasp!
Conclusion
Understanding God is important but loving Him and experiencing His love is so much more important. Our experience bears this out. I find it truly a thing of beauty that no matter how long I am married to Christina that I am always learning more about who she is, what she thinks, and how she feels.
So it is with God. G.K. Chesterton once said, “Let your religion be less of a theory and more of a love affair.” We do not fully grasp the nature of the triune nature of God because we are not intended to. Ours is not a religion of the mind nearly to the extent that it is a relationship of our souls communing with God’s.
We are the object of God’s love and the crown jewel of His creation. God reveals Himself to the soul alone and the soul is not a theologian. Let us never limit the unsurpassable beauty of God to the extent that we make Him fit in our books!
Knowing about God is important but being in relationship with God is beyond measure and worth more than all of the knowledge in this world. God’s triune nature is both mysterious and beautiful and our chief aim in this life is to be a reflection of the God who created us in His very image.
Today, be reminded that you and I have been created Imageo Dei; in the very image of the perfect and triune God who created!
Amen.
