In our first two days of this study we've talked about the eternal existence of God and about two theories regarding the age of the universe. Today we begin our look at the six days of creation.
"Now the earth was formless and empty, darkness was over the surface of the deep, and the Spirit of God was hovering over the waters." (Genesis 1:2) In the original text, the Lord is "brooding" over the waters. This lends His a protective quality to His actions by comparing them to what a "brooding" hen does. A hen who sits on her eggs to keep them warm and to protect them is doing this so that they will hatch successfully and bring new life into the world. She is creating an incubator effect with her body heat and she is warding off predators by her presence. The Spirit of the Lord, while He brooded over the formless and empty earth, was creating the perfect atmosphere to successfully bring forth life.
"And God said, 'Let there be light,' and there was light." (Genesis 1:3) When God speaks, things happen. When He commanded light to shine out of darkness, the light had to shine.
"God saw that the light was good, and He separated the light from the darkness. God called the light 'day', and the darkness He called 'night'. And there was evening, and there was morning---the first day." (Genesis 1:4-5) Did God need day and night? No, but He knew our human bodies would need them. He gave us the daylight hours in which to work and He gave us the nighttime hours in which to sleep. Our human bodies have to sleep, so here in these verses God is preparing the earth for us, even though He hasn't created us yet.
"And God said, 'Let there be a vault between the waters to separate water from water.' So God made the vault and separated the water under the vault from the water above it. And it was so. God called the vault 'sky'. And there was evening, and there was morning---the second day." (Genesis 1:6-8) It appears that at one time the entire earth must have been covered with water. Verses 6-8 may mean that God left some of the water on the earth but stored some of the water in the clouds. Or these verses may mean that at one time there was a thick vapor canopy surrounding the earth, as some scientists believe. This would mean that God left enough water on the earth to form the oceans and rivers and streams, and that He also lifted enough water into the atmosphere to create the right conditions for the early world to become a lush tropical paradise.
Now God takes the liquid remaining on the earth and forms bodies of water with it, exposing areas of usable ground. "And God said, 'Let the water under the sky be gathered to one place, and let dry ground appear.' And it was so. God called the dry ground 'land', and the gathered waters He called 'seas'. And God saw that it was good." (Genesis 1:9-10)
There is dry ground at this point and it's time for vegetation to spring forth. "Then God said, 'Let the land produce vegetation: seed-bearing plants and trees on the land that bear fruit with seed in it, according to their various kinds.' And it was so. The land produced vegetation; plants bearing seed according to their kinds and trees bearing fruit with seed in it according to their kinds. And God saw that it was good. And there was evening, and there was morning---the third day." (Genesis 1:11-13) The vegetables and fruits need to be able to keep on reproducing so they can provide food for the animals and humans God is going to create, so God made certain that the vegetables and fruits contained seeds.
"And God said, 'Let there be lights in the vault of the sky to separate the day from the night, and let them serve as signs to mark sacred times, and days and years, and let them be lights in the vault of the sky to give light to the earth.' And it was so." (Genesis 1:14-15) There has been controversy over these two verses regarding the order of creation. Some have questioned how God could have created plant life before He created the sun and the moon and the stars. However, the Jewish Talmud and many Christian physicists and scientist state that the sun and moon and stars already existed but could not shine on the earth until God separated the waters and lifted the vapor canopy high enough into the atmosphere. This explanation helps us to reconcile verses 14-15 with verses 3-5 where we already found God creating light and creating the daytime and the nighttime. The vapor canopy would have been thick and heavily condensed when it lay upon the earth, but lifting it high into the atmosphere would have served to spread it out and thin it out so that the heavens could be seen from the land. If this is so, then the author of Genesis is describing the phases of creation in the order in which they would have appeared from the vantage point of earth.
The author now moves on to describe for us the heavenly bodies that would have become visible from earth. "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. God set them in the vault of the sky to give light on the earth, to govern the day and the night, and to separate light from darkness. And God saw that it was good. And there was evening, and there was morning---the fourth day." (Genesis 1:16-19)
Tomorrow we will study the creation of all living creatures, both animal and human. We close today by explaining why the author of Genesis refers to each day as "evening and morning". This is because, although a secular day runs from midnight to the next midnight, the Jewish religious day runs from nightfall to nightfall. For example, the Jewish Sabbath begins on Friday evening and ends on Saturday evening. There are exceptions to this rule, such as days when fasts are observed. Fasts begin in the morning, not in the evening.
A good example of the Jewish day beginning in the evening is found in the gospel accounts of the crucifixion. Jesus died on the cross at 3pm. His friends had to hurry to get His body to the borrowed tomb of Joseph of Arimathea before the Sabbath began at sundown. This is why we consider Jesus to have been dead for portions of three days. He died on Friday at 3pm and was placed in the tomb before Saturday began at sundown. This means He spent the final hours of Friday in the tomb. He spent all of Saturday (from sundown on Friday until sundown on Saturday) in the tomb. He spent up to half of Sunday in the tomb (from sundown on Saturday until the early morning hours of Sunday). We don't know the exact time the resurrection took place because the tomb was already empty when the women arrived on Sunday morning to bring burial spices. No one saw it happen, not even the guards who had been standing by the tomb's entrance ever since the stone was rolled across the doorway to seal it. The time of the resurrection is not what's important; what's important is that the resurrection took place. The tomb, thank God, is still empty. And because it's empty, we have a living hope that can never be taken away from us. "Praise be to the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ! In His great mercy He has given us new birth into a living hope through the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead." (1 Peter 1:3)
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