Poem: He was just a little lad,
and on the week’s first day,
Was wandering home from Sunday School,
and dawdling on the way.
He scuffed his shoes into the grass;
he found a caterpillar
He found a fluffy milkweed pod,
and blew out all the filler.
A bird’s nest in a tree o’er head
so wisely placed and high
Was just another wonder
caught by his eager eye.
A neighbor watched his zig zag course,
and hailed him from the lawn
Asked him where he’d been that day,
and what was going on.
"Oh, I’ve been to Sunday School,
(He carefully turned a sod,
And found a snail beneath it);
I’ve learned a lot about God"
"M’m’m, a very fine way," the neighbor said,
"for a boy to spend his time;
If you’ll tell where God is
I’ll give you a brand new dime."
Quick as a flash his answer came!
Nor were his accents faint -
"I’ll give you a dollar mister,
if you tell me where God ain’t."
APPLY: That boy had the right kind of answer and the right kind of attitude… It’s interesting that the book of Genesis starts out with the same answer and the same attitude: “In the beginning: GOD.”
It didn’t start out: “In the beginning, the earth was without form and void.”
OR “In the beginning, Adam and Eve walked in the garden”
OR “In the beginning when the sun and solar system existed”
OR “In the beginning in a land far far away”
It simply says "In the beginning… God”
For years, scoffers have criticized the Bible for being "geo" centric (centered around the earth). God created the earth & built the sun moon and stars around it. It gave the impression that everything revolved around our planet. Geo-centric.
BUT the Bible isn’t "geo" centric. It’s "Theo" (God) centric. Every thing in Scripture begins and ends with God.
Hebrews 1:10-12 says: "In the beginning, O Lord, you laid the foundations of the earth, and the heavens are the work of your hands. They will perish, but you remain; they will all wear out like a garment. You will roll them up like a robe; like a garment they will be changed. But you remain the same, and your years will never end."
EVERYTHING IN SCRIPTURE IS GOD CENTERED
John 1:1-3 almost echoes Genesis 1 when it says: “In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. He was with God in the beginning. Through him all things were made; without him nothing was made that has been made.”
AND Colossians 1 adds to that: “(Jesus) is the image of the invisible God, the firstborn over all creation. For by him all things were created: things in heaven and on earth, visible and invisible, whether thrones or powers or rulers or authorities; all things were created by him and for him. He is before all things, and in him all things hold together.” (vs. 15-17)
EVERYTHING IN SCRIPTURE IS BUILT (not around the earth or man) BUT around God.
I. Why does Scripture emphasize this from the very beginning? Because God knows that what we focus on influences how we think. The Bible wants us to focus on God.
For example, many people will come to me and complain that they are depressed. I usually give them homework. I tell them to go and make a list of 10 things for which they can be thankful and come back and see me in a week.
Interestingly, they often have trouble coming up with the complete list. But, if I’d given them an assignment to write down the issues in life that had them upset, or disappointed, or distressed - they’d could have written a book. Why? Because what they focused on influenced how they thought. They practiced focusing on those things that were unsatisfactory in their lives and so they became depressed.
What you focus on determines how you think, and the Bible wants us to begin by focusing, not on the things of this earth… but upon God.
Consider what happens when people focus on the things of this earth first: Genesis 1:2 describes the world at creation as being “formless and empty, darkness was over the surface of the deep.” Isn’t that interesting?
Many people view their world as being exactly like that: "without form, empty, and filled with darkness." That’s what happens to people who don’t start out "looking to God" first. They view life as being… empty… formless… filled with darkness. They end up seeing world as depressing & ultimately hopeless.
That’s why in Matthew 6 Jesus said: "Do not store up for yourselves treasures on earth, where moth and rust destroy, and where thieves break in and steal. But store up for yourselves treasures in heaven, where moth and rust do not destroy, and where thieves do not break in and steal. For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also.
"The eye is the lamp of the body. If your eyes are good, your whole body will be full of light. But if your eyes are bad, your whole body will be full of darkness. If then the light within you is darkness, how great is that darkness!”
What Jesus is saying is this: Don’t keep your eyes on the treasures or this earth - all you’ll end up with is an empty, formless & darkened life. Your eyes will become darkened because that’s what they’re focused on (a dark world).
BUT if you keep your eyes – God and His treasures you will receive light & hope (your body filled with light).
If you focus on the things of this earth, and suddenly lose your earthly treasures…(as Jesus predicted you would) then you can feel as if you have lost all reason for living. You can become blinded to everything else of value in your life.
ILLUS: Scottish minister, John Watson, called on a man who had just suffered a heavy financial setback. Totally crushed by his economic losses, the man exclaimed, "Everything is gone!"
Without hesitation, Watson answered, "Oh, I’m sorry to hear that your wife dead."
The man looked up with alarm and questioned the preacher, "My wife?"
His minister continued, "I’m doubly grieved to hear that you have also lost your character."
Watson continued to name off one valuable asset after another, until the man protested, saying that he still possessed the things the preacher had mentioned. "But I thought you said you lost everything!" replied Watson.
This world can be an empty, formless and darkened place. Life can be difficult, cruel and harsh. BUT when we focus on God, He has the power to fill our world with life and shape and light.
II. In Genesis 1, we hear God speak and the entire planet snaps to attention.
God speaks and light appears, the earth moves, life springs into being, planets spin in their orbits, and the world is filled with expectation.
BUT not long after creation, the voice of God is rejected and Man hides from God. Once saddled with sin, man no longer wants to hear God speak. They no longer desires His will in their lives. They don’t want God in control anymore. They move God out of His throne room... and they move in.
ILLUS: A preacher told of a phone call that he received in his office. A lady in her fifties who lived in another state asked if he would be willing to perform her wedding ceremony. She and her fiancé lived out of state but had friends and family in his area. In fact, they knew some of the same people in his church. That is how she got his name.
“Tell me what you desire and I will tell you if I will be able,” he responded.
“Well,” she said, “We are both in our fifties. I have never had children; in fact, I have never been married. We are both believe in God, but we just are not religious people. Therefore, we would like to have a church wedding, but we want you to keep God out of the ceremony.”
The preacher answered, “Well, I do not believe I could do that with integrity. I really can’t help you with that.”
She pressed, “Well, if it is O.K. with you, could we have the county clerk perform the ceremony at your church so he could leave God out of it?”
His answer: “Well, since this really is a church, I do not think the elders would be comfortable leaving God out of it on any occasion.”
ILLUS: At Ohio State University, Ravi Zaccharias did an open forum on a radio talk show. The host was an atheist. From the start, the callers were antagonistic. "I could feel the tension as soon as the lines lit up. One angry woman caller said, “All you people have is an agenda you’re trying to promote.” Referring to abortion, she said, “You want to take away our rights and invade our private lives.”
Abortion had not even been brought up.
“Just a minute,” I replied, “we didn’t even raise the subject.”
“Ok,” she said, “what is your position on abortion then?”
I said, “Can I ask you a question? On every university campus I visit, somebody stands up and says that God is an evil God to allow all this evil into our world. This person typically says, ‘A plane crashes: 30 people die, and 20 people live. What kind of God would arbitrarily choose some to live and some to die?’”
I continued, “But when we play God and determine whether a child within a mother’s womb should live, we argue for that as a moral right. So when human beings are given the privilege of playing God, it’s called a moral right. When God plays God, we call it an immoral act. Can you justify this for me?”
That was the end of the conversation.
When people move God out of His throne room - they move in.
III. Now, most of us wouldn’t be as brazen as those people. Most people wouldn’t dream of aborting a child… or getting married in a church building where God was not mentioned. AND YET, even the nicest people can attempt to rope God off into a specialized section of their lives they call "religious." They put Him in a box and take Him out whenever they decided to get churchy. God isn’t the focus of their lives - He’s cobbled onto the side.
As a result, God is more their guest than He is their owner. These people don’t want God to be the center of their lives - they want Him scotch taped onto their plans.
ILLUS: I heard a youth minister at another church tell about a teenage girl that came from a good church family. The girl was at Bible study and the topic that night was "children obey your parents." Now that girl had gone to church for years and knew that’s what the Bible said but this was the first time she’d ever read it for herself.
The youth minister commented that it was amazing to watch the girl’s discomfort as she read.
Up until that time she’d been able to ignore God’s command in her life… BUT NOW she had to make a decision as to whether God was going to be on the throne of her life… or her.
ILLUS. Years ago, I saw an illustration where a person had drawn two circles with thrones in their centers. In the first circle, their was a figure of man on the throne and at the foot of the throne was a single word “Christ.” Then there was this inscription: “Some people live their lives on the throne with Christ as their servant.”
The 2nd circle had Christ on the throne and the man kneeling at the base of it. The author went on to say that what God wants is for us to put Him on the throne, because that’s where He belongs in the lives of those who truly love Him.
ILLUS: And in reality, that’s where He needs to be if we want His blessings in our lives. Because God is all knowing and we are not, if He is not on the throne, we tend to make our decisions based on what we think is right rather than what He knows to be true. I heard recently of a young man of 16 who had just learned to drive the family van. One day, he and a family friend were in the van when it got stuck in a snowdrift. The family friend went into the house to get a shovel, but the boy thought he could solve the problem himself. He had seen others “rock” vehicles out of snow banks before and he got behind the wheel to do just that. He put the car in forward, reverse, forward, reverse etc. but never managed to get the van free. What he did manage to do was to destroy the vehicle’s transmission.
He hadn’t meant to destroy the transmission, but because he was acting upon his ill informed belief, he did extensive damage to the van. That’s what happens to mankind when they place God as servant rather than their guide and God. They do damage to their lives.
CLOSE: A man once had a dream where he saw Jesus standing outside the door of his home. Jesus was knocking on the door and the man opened it for Him, and asked Jesus to come in.
Almost immediately Jesus went to a closed door in the house and began knocking on that door for admission. Somewhat reluctantly (for the man sensed he didn’t really want Jesus to go in that room), he opened that door for Jesus also.
Then, the Lord went to the closed closet door and began knocking on that one too.
At that point, the man awoke from his sleep and was very disturbed, for he knew that had closed many doors in his life so that God couldn’t get in…
