Introduction.
There are more and more people who are sceptical of the creation account among Christians, and that is unfortunately also the case in our own ranks, in God’s end-time church, the Seventh-day Adventists. More and more, the theory of evolution is being introduced into the churches, and one of the arguments is that God created, but the days mentioned in Genesis are only a figurative expression and cannot be considered real days. Other arguments used to defend an evolutionary approach are that it is claimed that the earth may have been created a long, long time ago, but that the creation itself took six days. But what does the Bible actually say about this?
In Genesis 1:1-5 the following is said:
Verse 1: In the beginning God created* the heaven and the earth.
* Here the Hebrew word barah is used which means to create, in the sense that something is created out of nothing, and this verb is only used when it is God who creates.
It says that God in the beginning created (out of nothing) the heaven and the earth, but it does not tell us how long ago this happened. What is implied by the expression in the beginning? Does this mean that the heavens and the earth were created in a separate creation before the rest was created? Many people seem to believe that this is the case.
Verse 2: And the earth was without form, and void; and darkness [was] upon the face of the deep. And the Spirit of God moved upon the face of the waters.
Verse 3: And God said, let there be light: and there was light.
Verse 4: And God saw the light, that [it was] good: and God divided the light from the darkness.
Verse 5: And God called the light Day, and the darkness he called Night. And the evening and the morning were the first day.
Here the text states that this is what God created on the first day of creation.
The first five verses therefore deal with the first day of creation. We can therefore conclude that God created the earth, the heavens and the light on the first day of creation week. This is also clearly evident throughout chapter 1, where the rhythm is the same for all the days, and the rhythm is as follows:
1st day: it starts with what God created, In the beginning created … / and ends by telling which day this happened / … the first day, verses 1-5.
2nd day: and God said … // … the second day, verses 6-8.
3rd day: and God said … // … the third day, verses 9-13.
4th day: and God said … // … the fourth day, verses 14-19.
5th day: and God said … // … the fifth day, verses 20-23.
6th day: and God said … // … the sixth day, verses 24-31.
Day 7: The rhythm is also the same for the seventh day of the creation week. There is only a small, but cosmetic, difference. The description given of what happened on this day begins by telling us that it was the seventh day – which is emphasized by the fact that it is mentioned a total of three times in these two verses that this happened on the seventh day – before it all ends with what God did on the seventh day: And on the seventh day God ended his work which he had made; and he rested on the seventh day from all his work which he had made. And God blessed the seventh day and sanctified it: because that in it he had rested from all his work which God created and made, (Genesis 2:2-3).
All Bible verses are from the King James Version 1611/1769 unless otherwise stated.
God creates. Genesis chapter 1.
The Bible says that God created the world, but why did He do it?
Genesis 1:1 – Genesis 2:3.
When Lucifer rebelled and sinned against God in heaven, he told all of God’s angels that God was unpredictable and acted arbitrarily. Lucifer accused God of being a tyrant and of being arbitrary and vengeful, and that Lucifer’s way of ruling would be so much better than the way God runs the universe. A third of all the angels God had created believed this lie.
To prove that Lucifer’s claims were false, God does two remarkable things. First, God allows Lucifer, Satan, or the devil, to live and continue his rebellion against God. If God had put an end to Satan on the day he rebelled, all creatures in the entire universe would have believed what Satan accused God of. Instead, God allows the devil to continue to slander His name and cast doubt on God’s integrity. Then He created the earth and the humans. Here, on earth, the battle between Jesus and Satan continued. Many would argue that it is cruel of God to allow humans to become part of the cosmic conflict, but we will see a little further down in the text why God allows people to be subjected to this. It is not easy to understand the reason for this, but in this way both God’s method and Satan’s method will be exposed to the entire universe. God’s method is truth, freedom and love, while Satan’s method is lies, hatred and coercion.
In the book of Job we see how God and Satan work. Even long after the rebellion, Satan still had access to heaven and could come before God’s throne (Job 1:6). Once again, Satan makes several accusations and insinuations against God, saying that it is no wonder that Job fears God, after all God had made Job the richest man of his time. To this God says that Satan can take from Job anything he wants, but he could not take Job’s life. We know how it all turned out. Job continues to be faithful to God, and God praises Job for his faithfulness and for enduring everything Satan sent against him. In the end, God rewarded Job and gave him double of everything he had lost.
God’s Plan.
When God does something, He always has a perfect plan, and the plan of creation was to create a being who would be like God. As it says in Genesis 1:27, God created man in His image. In the image of God He created him. But let’s first look at the world He created, and which man was to live in and manage on behalf of God the Creator:
Genesis 1:3: And God said – and there was light
Genesis 1:6-7: And God said – and it was so
Genesis 1:9: And God said – and it was so
Genesis 1:11: And God said – and it was so
Genesis 1:14-15: And God said – and it was so
Genesis 1:20 and 24: And God said – and it was so
We see from the text that everything, absolutely everything that God created was good, both the heaven, the earth, the light, the land, the sea, the plants, the sun, the moon, the stars, the fish, the birds and the animals. Everything was made with care and love. Everything was good. In other words, God created a perfect world in a perfect universe before He created man.
Then we come to the climax of creation. God created someone who would be like Himself. God created man, and in Genesis 1:26-28 it says: And God said, let us make man in our image, after our likeness: and let them have dominion over the fish of the sea, and over the fowl of the air, and over the cattle, and over all the earth, and over every creeping thing that creepeth upon the earth. So God created man in his [own] image, in the image of God created he him; male and female created he them. And God blessed them, and God said unto them, be fruitful, and multiply, and replenish the earth, and subdue it: and have dominion over the fish of the sea, and over the fowl of the air, and over every living thing that moveth upon the earth.
These people God created were to help refute Satan’s claims that God was a tyrant and had a law that was impossible to keep. Through their faithfulness to God, these people were to show the entire universe that it is possible to keep God’s commandments, all of God’s Ten Commandments, and in that way refute Satan’s claims.
Here we see that God created man, and we learn what mandate God gave humans: They were to have dominion over the fish of the sea, and over the fowl of the air, and over the cattle, and over all the earth, and over every creeping thing that creepeth upon the earth. This is because they were created in God’s likeness, in God’s image, and the man were to be like God in many ways. They were to have some of the tasks that God himself has. Man was to subdue the entire earth and all the living creatures that were in the sea, in the air, and on the dry land. Man was also given the task of subduing the entire earth, which we understand from be fruitful, and multiply, and replenish the earth, and subdue it.
Mans first list of food.
Now we do not find anything, and it was so in the next four verses, neither in verses 26, 27, 28, or 29. In verse 30, God does indeed say once again and it was so, but here the text deals with both man and animals, and what they should eat. Verses 29 and 30: And God said, Behold, I have given you every herb bearing seed, which [is] upon the face of all the earth, and every tree, in the which [is] the fruit of a tree yielding seed; to you it shall be for meat. And to every beast of the earth, and to every fowl of the air, and to everything that creepeth upon the earth, wherein [there is] life, [I have given] every green herb for meat: and it was so.
Man was to eat the fruits of every plant that produces seeds. This was the food that was given to man, and all the green plants were given to the animals for food. If we look at what scientists are slowly but surely discovering they now tell us that everything that produces seeds is the best thing we can put into our bodies, and that most fruits and seeds contain substances that can prevent the various diseases that ravage humanity in our time. Not surprising to me, since God knows what is best for his creatures.
What does the Bible say about what God created?
Genesis 1:4: it was good. Heaven, earth, and light
Genesis 1:10: it was good. Land and sea
Genesis 1:12: it was good. Plants of the earth
Genesis 1:18: it was good. Sun, moon, and stars
Genesis 1:25: it was good. Fish, birds, and animals
Genesis 1:31: it was very good. All of creation.
In Genesis chapter 1 we find the general creation story that explains what God created day by day. In Genesis 2:4-25 the complementary, or supplementary, creation story is told. We get the same creation, just explained in a different way.
There are many who claim that there are two different creation stories in the Bible, and that the Bible is therefore not to be trusted. But there is no new story told in chapter 2, it is, as I said, the same story, a complementary story, and the difference from chapter 1 is that now we get new information that expands the story of what happened during creation. This is clearly evident when we compare Genesis 1:26-27 with Genesis 2:7. We find this principle, first a basic, or general story and then a complementary, or detailed story that provides new information, in several places in the Bible, such as in the book of Daniel and Revelation.
While Genesis 1:26-27 tells us that God created man, the basic story, and tells this in general terms: verse 26: Let us make man … // … and verse 27: So God created man in his [own] image, in the image of God created he him; male and female created he them … … Genesis 2:7 tells the complementary story, detailing how God created man. And the LORD God formed man [of] the dust of the ground and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life; and man became a living soul.
Why did God create a perfect world?
This question has two answers. The first, and simple answer is that God does nothing without it being perfect. The second, and slightly more complicated answer is that when God created the world, this was the first act of love God performed for humans, even before they were created. God’s desire was for humans to live and thrive in a perfect world with Him.
Day 1: God created the place where He would live with the humans He had planned to create. This place consisted of heaven and earth and light, and God saw that it was good.
Day 2: God created a firmament in the middle of the waters and separated water from water – some above the firmament and some below, which in turn led to a good, stable and just warm enough climate on the entire planet.
Day 3: God gathered the waters under the firmament in one place so that the dry land appeared, and He created what would be food for both humans and animals and God saw that it was good.
Day 4: God created the stars, the sun and the moon, and God saw that it was good.
Day 5: God created all the fish and birds that were blessed and that would fill the earth, and God saw that it was good.
Day 6: God created all the animals of the land, each according to its kind, and God saw that it was good.
Everything that God created was a delight to the eye and stimulated the mind to worship God, because humans had been given the incredibly beautiful world, they were put into to take care of. Everything was in harmony, there was no selfishness, all living things could walk together. There was no sickness, no crying, and no death.
Now everything was in place, and God could crown the work of creation – He created man, and we read in Genesis 1:26-28 the following: … … Let us make man in our image, after our likeness: and let them have dominion over the fish of the sea, and over the fowl of the air, and over the cattle, and over all the earth, and over every creeping thing that creepeth upon the earth. So God created man in his [own] image, in the image of God created he him; male and female created he them. And God blessed them, and God said unto them, be fruitful, and multiply, and replenish the earth, and subdue it: and have dominion over the fish of the sea, and over the fowl of the air, and over every living thing that moveth upon the earth.
After each time God finished creating something, He said it was good, and we find that God said this about the following things He had created in the following verses: light in Genesis 1:4; land and sea in Genesis 1:10; plants of the earth in Genesis 1:12; sun, moon and stars in Genesis 1:18; fish, birds and animals in Genesis 1:25. But now, after God had finished creating man, God said that what He had made was very good. This is intended for the whole of creation, everything was in balance and harmony, it was simply perfect.
Now God had given humans the best place in the universe where they could live, dwell and be with their creator and God for all eternity. That was God’s plan. In order for everything to be in place, the marriage between a man and a woman was also instituted. The man and the woman were to be one as the Father and the Son are one.
The first act of love God did after man was created.
The creation of the physical environment itself was now over, humans were created in the image of God, and they had dominion over all the animals of the earth, in the same way that God has dominion over the entire universe. We have come to the seventh day of the creation week, and it says in Genesis 2:2-3 the following: And on the seventh day God ended his work which he had made; and he rested on the seventh day from all his work which he had made. And God blessed the seventh day and sanctified it: because that in it he had rested from all his work which God created and made.
Many people wonder about the claim that God rested! The question is why God rested and whether God can get tired. God cannot get tired the way we humans get tired. Nor did He rest because humans were tired, because they had just been created.
But if God was not tired, why did He rest? This is a relevant question, and there are two explanations that essentially say the same thing. But first let’s look at what Genesis 2:2 says about what God did on this day. It says: And on the seventh day God ended his work which he had made; and he rested on the seventh day from all his work which he had made, and this means:
1) That God would give the people He had created a whole day that they could set aside to be with their Creator and God, without having to do their daily work in the garden that God had set them to tend. This day, the seventh day of the week, we call the Sabbath. There are many, almost most other Christians, who say that this day was given to the Jews and call the Sabbath ‘the Jewish Sabbath’ and similar expressions.
The problem with such an explanation is that the first Jew did not appear on the scene of history until nearly 2,200 years later when Jacob’s son Judah was born. The Jews, or the tribe of Judah, are descendants of Judah. But as we see from the text in Genesis 2:2, the seventh day of the week was given to all mankind as a day of rest – the Sabbath. In verse 3 we see God sanctifying and blessing the seventh day. He has not done this with any other day.
2) As we see above, the seventh day, the day that came after God finished creation, was blessed and sanctified by God. To bless is briefly explained to wish someone happiness, in other words, if we follow God’s call, He will let us share in the divine. God will therefore bring us under his grace, power and protection. To sanctify something, be it an object, a person, or as here a day, is something only God can do. When God has sanctified a day, it means that God is especially present on that day.
When God blessed and sanctified the seventh day, the last day of the week, the Sabbath, our Saturday, it means that God, throughout history, at least until eternity begins, will be especially present on the Sabbath to bless those who are willing to meet Him on this day. None of the other six days of the week have ever been blessed or sanctified by God the Creator. But despite the fact that we can read in Genesis 2:3 that God blessed and sanctified the seventh day of the week, many claim that there is no difference between the days of the week. All days are equal, they say.
God creates. Genesis chapter 2.
The complementary creation account.
Genesis 2:4-25.
It says in Genesis 2:5-6 that before any plant of the field was in the earth and before any herb of the field had grown. For the Lord God had not caused it to rain on the earth, and there was no man to till the ground; 6but a mist went up from the earth and watered the whole face of the ground, (New King James Version).
It is clear that such a text can be cut out, crushed and kneaded until it fits into a preconceived view of how the world, and everything came into being. In this story, those who want to manage to insert millions and billions of years, all the time it says in verse 5 that there was no man to till the ground. But those who do that forget to read what is written in chapter 1, where the chronological history is written down. They rather believe in fairy tales and what tickles the ear – the Theory of Evolution and the Big Bang Theory. There is a big difference between evolutionists and me, and that is that evolutionists believe they know, while I know that I believe. They have a much greater and stronger faith than I do, since they believe in such fairy tales. Just add millions and billions of years and people will believe whatever comes from those who call themselves scientists.
We also see that it says that it had not yet rained. This is something we should keep in mind when we come to chapters 7 and 8 and the great flood. The way God had created the world was that dew rose from the earth and watered everything that needed water.
The most important verses in this section are:
Genesis 2:7: And the LORD God formed man [of] the dust of the ground, and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life; and man became a living soul.
This shows us how God created man. This verse shows us that Almighty God, who stretched out the heavens and spread out the earth (Isaiah 44:24), stoops down, kneels in the dust, and forms man with his own hands. Everything else in the entire universe, from the largest stars to the smallest microbes created God by speaking them into existence in the following way … … and God said … … and it was so …
One of the largest stars we know of is called Betelgeuse (/betelgˈøsə/). This star has a radius that is 1,180 times the radius of the sun, and it has a volume that is 1.6 billion times the volume of the sun. If Betelgeuse is Wembley Stadion in London, our sun would be the size of a small apple with a diameter of about 5 cm, then the earth would be a tiny dot with a diameter of less than 1 millimetre. This enormous star was created by God simply speaking it into existence, God said … … and Betelgeuse stood there. From the tiniest speck to the largest star, everything was created by God saying! … … and it stood there, and not least, everything was good.
But when God created man, the Creator of the universe did something unexpected. What did He do? Yes, God Almighty, the Creator of heaven and earth, bent down to the dust and formed man with His own loving hands and breathed the breath of life into his nostrils. As we know, the creation account gives rise to many questions, and here are three:
1) Why did God bend down to the dust when He created man?
2) Why didn’t God speak man into existence like He did everything else He had created?
3) What is God trying to tell us here?
What God is trying to tell us here is that man is very special to Him, and God wants to have an intimate and personal relationship with each one of us.
Genesis 2:17: But of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, thou shalt not eat of it: for in the day that thou eatest thereof thou shalt surely die.
This tells us that God gave man complete freedom, and free will to choose. There was only one commandment attached to the existence of the first people and that was that they could not eat from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. We do not know how many different trees there were in Eden, nor how many of each kind. We can assume that there must have been an abundance of all the good that God had given the first people, because it is part of God’s nature to give his creatures in abundance of what is good for us. Even in our days, God will give us in abundance of what is beneficial for us. Despite the degeneration, diseases, greed, envy and all the things that Satan has brought into the world, we see the imprint of God in what we receive every day. Not only does he give generously to those who call on his name, God gives to all people, abundantly and with the same measure. But not all of us know how to appreciate this.
This verse also confirms that man was created to live forever. It is also a statement that many seem to deny, but it does say this: But of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, thou shalt not eat of it: for in the day that thou eatest thereof thou shalt surely die. Implicit in this is that if you do not eat of it, you shall never die forever. The consequence would have been that Adam and Eve would still have lived if they had not eaten of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil.
Genesis 2:18-24: And the LORD God said, [It is] not good that the man should be alone; I will make him a help meet for him. And out of the ground the LORD God formed every beast of the field, and every fowl of the air; and brought [them] unto Adam to see what he would call them: and whatsoever Adam called every living creature, that [was] the name thereof. And Adam gave names to all cattle, and to the fowl of the air, and to every beast of the field; but for Adam there was not found an help meet for him. And the LORD God caused a deep sleep to fall upon Adam, and he slept: and he took one of his ribs and closed up the flesh instead thereof; And the rib, which the LORD God had taken from man, made he a woman, and brought her unto the man. And Adam said, This [is] now bone of my bones, and flesh of my flesh: she shall be called Woman*, because she was taken out of Man*. Therefore shall a man leave his father and his mother and shall cleave unto his wife: and they shall be one flesh.
* This is a Hebrew wordplay; man – ish, woman – isha (taken out of man).
This shows us that God created two equal people, man and woman, for the woman was to be a help meet to him. Here the expression corresponds to is used to show that they are equal. In Christian Standard Bible it says that I will make a helper corresponding to him, (Genesis 2:18). These verses also tell us that God instituted marriage. We see this in verse 24 where God says that a man should leave his father and mother and cleave unto his wife.
We have seen that God instituted two ordinances in the Garden of Eden before sin entered the world. This means that these two ordinances are holy, and that they are intended to last into eternity. If there is one thing Satan hates, it is everything that is holy, and we see in our day that the world follows Satan’s hatred and tries to destroy God’s ordinances. This is nothing new, for Cain already turned away from God and went his own way. Cain’s great-great-grandson was the first to take more than one wife. When we come to the time just before the flood, people were busy with everything else but thinking about God and keeping God’s commandments. After the flood, three generations passed and then people were back to the condition they were in before the flood. Noah’s great-grandson Nimrod built the first cities after the flood and tried to build a tower that would save them from a coming flood. We will come back to these things more in due course.
The Fall.
Genesis 3:1-7.
There are no coincidences in the Bible and in the stories we find there. That Satan chose the serpent as the medium for his diabolical plan is not surprising because when God created the animals, the serpent was the most beautiful creature created. The serpent originally had many beautiful colours, it had wings, and it could fly around everywhere as birds do today. It was a sight for the eyes, and we would be captivated by the serpent’s beauty if we saw how it looked from the Creator’s hand.
On that fateful day when Eve walked alone and approached the tree in the middle of the garden, the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, we can assume that Satan entered the nearest serpent and flew up this tree as Eve approached. Satan could not have chosen any other animal or being than the most beautiful animal in creation for his deception. Adam and Eve had been warned by God about an enemy, but they had never seen him. When the serpent spoke to Eve as she approached the tree, this should perhaps have set alarm bells ringing, and it might have if Eve had not left Adam and gone on her own. But she was alone, and did not reflect on this when the serpent spoke to her. After all, it was the most beautiful animal God had created that spoke to her. When Genesis 3:1 says that the serpent was more crafty than any other animal, we must understand this to mean that Satan had possessed the serpent, and that it refers to Satan being more crafty than any other created being, including humans.
We read in Genesis 3:1: Now the serpent was more subtle than any beast of the field which the LORD God had made. And he said unto the woman, Yea, hath God said, Ye shall not eat of every tree of the garden?
That was not what God said, but He said: of every tree of the garden thou mayest freely eat, (Genesis 2:16), and then God adds that it is a small test of man’s loyalty, but of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, thou shalt not eat of it: for in the day that thou eatest thereof thou shalt surely die, (Genesis 2:17). As we see from the dialogue, God told Adam and Eve that they could freely eat of all the trees in the garden except for one single tree. Satan twists this around. Even though he reverses the order and uses slightly different words that have the same meaning in this context, he presents it all as if it were God’s truth; Yea, hath God said: … …? We hear the echoes of this question even in our time. Yea, hath God said … … has become one of the deceiver’s most used and most successful questions throughout history.
In other words, Adam and Eve could eat of all the trees in the garden … … … except for the one tree mentioned. This is what Satan is twisting. He uses different words, but the meaning is the same, then he shuffles the words around a bit and the meaning is completely different. Just look at this subtle way Satan distorts God’s word. This is how Satan has worked every day since that day. He always gets as close to the truth as he can while at the same time being as far away from the truth as he can get.
Now Eve gets into a discussion with Satan, and we read in Genesis 3:2-3:
Verse 2: And the woman said unto the serpent, we may eat of the fruit of the trees of the garden,
Verse 3: But of the fruit of the tree, which [is] in the midst of the garden, God hath said, Ye shall not eat of it, neither shall ye touch it, lest ye die.
Why was it so dangerous for Eve to start a conversation with Satan?
Eve says that they can eat from all trees except this one tree, if they eat from it they will die. Now follows the first lie in history on this planet. Satan says: ye shall not surely die, (Genesis 3:4), and perhaps he said something like: Look at me, I am a serpent, and I have eaten the fruit and I – a serpent – can talk! Think about it, Eve. If I had never heard a lie and found myself in such a situation, I would probably also have swallowed bait, hook and sinker too. Imagine if the most beautiful animal in the world could talk to me and say that it could talk because this animal had eaten the fruit that God had forbidden me to eat. Well, I would probably have been put out like Eve.
Then Eve ate, and she gave it to Adam, who also ate. He probably realized what had happened, and that it was the enemy that God had spoken of who had seduced Eve. But because Eve was for him the only one who was like him, he did not want to live without her, and he repeated the sin that Eve had committed. Sin had entered the world that was perfect from the hand of God.
Satan was right about one thing. He said that their eyes would be opened, and they were. They gradually saw that they had broken God’s commandments, which meant that they were ‘naked‘ or in other words, they were no longer sinless, and their ‘naked‘ shame was visible to both of them, and they tried to justify themselves – by covering their shame and they covered their ‘nakedness‘ by weaving fig leaves together.
When we fall for Satan’s temptations, it has dramatic consequences for our lives. We can learn a lot from the story we find in the first three chapters of Genesis. Satan is subtle, he presents his deceptions in the most beautiful packaging. Boys and men are often completely captivated by young beautiful women, and girls and women are often captivated by young handsome men. Satan deliberately uses this to make us fall, by breaking up marriage. He says that a glass of alcohol is not dangerous and that it is not dangerous to try drugs once. Then they try it once without anything happening, then the devil comes back and whispers in their ear and says: What did I say? … … there you see, there is no danger at all, why don’t you trust me, try again and you will see that it is not dangerous, and soon the poor person finds himself in a world where alcohol, drugs and sex rule their lives, and suddenly this poor person is without job, family, home and friends, and has to live on the streets. Many people live a degrading life until they die, and no one cares. There are just too many people who experience this every year all over the world.