In The Beginning. Day 6, The First Sabbath

We wrapped up our study of the six days of creation yesterday and now the author of Genesis says, "Thus the heavens and the earth were completed in all their vast array." (Genesis 2:1) Studying the days of creation this week has done a good job of reminding me just how powerful our God is. It's possible to become too chummy and casual with God, forgetting how holy He is. It's possible to neglect spending time with God, forgetting how much we need His power just to keep on breathing. Genesis reminds us who we are dealing with: the God who spoke everything into existence out of nothing, who perfectly planned every atom and molecule and cell, who created DNA, who finely tuned everything in the universe specifically to support human life. Though the Lord is our friend and He wants us to bring our troubles to Him, keeping the creation story in mind reminds us that He's not our buddy to whom we moan and groan about our bad days, but that the purpose in bringing our concerns to Him is to acknowledge His power and to respectfully request He use that power to intervene in our situations. Reading the Genesis story also helps us to remember that to neglect our relationship with God is to neglect the most awesome experience any human being can ever have.

The creation itself tells us a story. It tells us there is a God and it tells us that He is unimaginably intelligent and mighty. The Apostle Paul said that, even if a person had never heard of the living God, that person would still be without excuse for not believing in God because the creation itself testifies to the existence of a Creator. "For since the creation of the world God's invisible qualities---His eternal power and divine nature---have been clearly seen, being understood from what has been made, so that people are without excuse." (Romans 1:20) We can't see God but we can see God's works. His works tell us that nothing is impossible for Him. His works tell us that He is the giver of life. His works tell us that He is divine and beautiful because the things contained in our universe and the things that inhabit the earth are beautiful. Look around you at the sunrise, the trees, and the animals today. How righteous and holy and beautiful must the God be who made all these?

Look at yourself in the mirror and see how God put you together limb by limb, giving you a mind that thinks and that feels emotions, giving you eyes that see, giving you a mouth that can speak, giving you ears that can hear. Then say what King David said when he pondered the work God put into creating human beings: "I praise You because I am fearfully and wonderfully made; Your works are wonderful, I know that full well." (Psalm 139:14) Our modern culture---no doubt by instigation of the evil one---has tried to tell us we are not fearfully (awesomely, reverently, astonishingly, magnificently, beautifully) and wonderfully made. Our culture tells us we have to be a certain height or weight or body shape in order to feel good about ourselves. This is not so! As we've been studying this week, we are made in the image of the living God. We are beautiful. We are precious. We are loved by God. We can't always be certain of the feelings or the motives of every human being around us, but we can always be certain that God loves us because He proved His love by doing everything possible to redeem us from our sins. "For God so loved the world that He gave His one and only Son, that whoever believes in Him shall not perish but have eternal life. For God did not send His Son into the world to condemn the world, but to save the world through Him." (John 3:16-17) If this isn't love, then I don't know what is, and it tells us everything we need to know about the loving character of God and it tells us everything we need to know about how precious we are to Him.

Now that God has finished His creation work, He rests on the seventh day. "By the seventh day God had finished the work He had been doing; so on the seventh day He rested from all His work." (Genesis 2:2) God didn't rest on the seventh day because He was tired. "Do you not know? Have you not heard? The Lord is the everlasting God, the Creator of the ends of the earth. He will not grow tired or weary, and His understanding no one can fathom." (Isaiah 40:28) God rested on the seventh day to signify that the creation work was complete.

There was no more to be created. God had made everything He intended to make, so He rested on the seventh day. But He has not been resting ever since, because there are other types of work to be done. He is working in your life and in my life. We can be sure of this because the Lord Jesus said while He ministered to people on earth, "My Father is always at His work to this very day, and I too am working." (John 5:17) There are those who are willing to acknowledge the existence of a Creator but who do not believe He personally intervenes in the lives of human beings. The Bible does not present a God to us who is not involved in the lives of human beings. God didn't complete His creation work and then say, "My part is done. I created the universe, set all things in motion, and put laws in place to keep everything working as it should. The creatures will now fend for themselves." No, God works. We know He works because His Son says He does. The God who never becomes weary and who never sleeps is continually on the job watching over us and interacting with us.

Besides resting on the seventh day to signify that the creation work was complete, the Lord rested on the seventh day as an example for us to follow. Human beings get tired. We need rest and recreation and an opportunity to recharge our batteries. Working animals need this too, which is why God said that the animals weren't to work on the Sabbath either. If He had not put these laws in place, countless numbers of human beings and animals would have been worked to death by those in authority over them. It is very detrimental to our physical and mental health to work seven days a week. God created every cell of our bodies and He knows exactly what we need, so He instituted the Sabbath. "Then God blessed the seventh day and made it holy, because on it He rested from all the work of creating He had done." (Genesis 2:3)

God rested from "the work of creating He had done", not from everything else. Right here on September 28, 2019, "in all things God works for the good of those who love Him, who have been called according to His purpose". (Romans 8:28) God is actively working in the lives of believers. He is actively working in the lives of unbelievers as well, for as long as they have breath in their bodies He is dealing with their hearts in His office as God the Holy Spirit, urging them to come to repentance and to come to faith in God the Son. There is not a human being on the face of the earth with whom God is not interacting in some fashion every single day of their lives.

Knowing all this, let's look back to the words of King David who praised the God who so fearfully and wonderfully made him, the God who had His eyes on him every second of his life.

"You have searched me, Lord, and You know me. You know when I sit and when I rise; You perceive my thoughts from afar. You discern my going out and my lying down; You are familiar with all my ways. Before a word is on my tongue, You, Lord, know it completely. You hem me in behind and before, and You lay Your hand upon me. Such knowledge is too wonderful for me, too lofty for me to attain. Where can I go from Your Spirit? Where can I flee from Your presence? If I go up to the heavens, You are there; if I make my bed in the depths, You are there. If I rise on the wings of the dawn, if I settle on the far side of the sea, even there Your hand will guide me, Your right hand will hold me fast." (Psalm 139:1-10) God is close to you, closer than you even know. He knows everything about you, the good and the bad, and He loves you anyway. He's willing and eager to be the Lord of your life and your Helper and Defender.