Blog Navigation

Of Creation

We believe in the Genesis account of creation, and that it is to be accepted literally, and not allegorically or figuratively; that man was created directly in God’s own image and after His own likeness; that man’s creation was not by evolution or change of species or development through interminable periods of time from lower to higher forms; that all animal life and vegetable life were effected by special creation, and God’s established law was that they should bring forth only “after their kind”

 

Genesis 1:26 Then 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 birds of the heavens and over the livestock and over all the earth and over every creeping thing that creeps on the earth.”

 

Genesis 1:27 So God created man in his own image,

in the image of God he created him;

male and female he created them.

 

Genesis 1:31. And God saw everything that he had made, and behold, it was very good. And there was evening and there was morning, the sixth day.

 

Psalm 8:4-6 what is man that you are mindful of him,

and the son of man that you care for him?

Yet you have made him a little lower than the heavenly beings

and crowned him with glory and honor. 

You have given him dominion over the works of your hands;

you have put all things under his feet,

 

What Christians believe about the origins of humanity is incredibly important in how we view ourselves, one another, and ultimately God.  The Christian view of humanity speaks of the love of God and the wisdom of God coming together with purpose and intention in their creation, as part of the greater creation, which He then called “very good,” (Gen. 1:31).  As we look at each created thing we can agree with God that it is very good, in its inherent beauty and ordained function.  This means that their gender, and race having been preordained is whole, complete, functioning and attractive in God’s eyes.  This is God’s intention in creation, and therefore in the perpetual multiplication of humanity through birth.

 

That’s where every person begins. In the created state each man and woman is declared “very good” because it was created with intention, design and purpose. The design of every person ever conceived is ‘good,’ by God’s declaration.  This has incredible implications, not the least of which are the rights to dignity FOR everyone, regardless of gender or race. Another implication is the acceptance of one’s own design BY everyone, regardless of gender or race.  God has an identity and intention for each of us. 

 

That was how God evaluated what He designed.  But what was his intention before he created them?  It’s found in this short, but profound verse: So God created man in his own image, in the image of God he created him; male and female he created them (Gen. 1:27)

 

Men and women were created from love and for love. After the world was populated with animals (Gen. 1:24-25), God said to Himself: Let us make man in our own image.  It is important to remember at this moment that God is not speaking to angels, or to other gods. Though God is One, we know that He exists as Father, Son, and Spirit.  The trinity is a harmonious and loving community, and love’s instinct is to create.  The reason humanity was created was because of the love of God that is core to HIS identity.  We were each created from love.  

 

Remember love is the reason for everything God does.  The rest of the Bible testifies to this.  Humanity was created because of love and redeemed because of love.  A Christian is someone who was born physically because of the love of God, but also has been reborn because of the love of God.  The word “beloved” is used 61 times in the New Testament.  Six of those times it’s used by God to describe how God feels about Jesus. Do you know who the other 55 uses are about?  Us, me, you, and all of humanity.  We are deeply loved by God. That is our core identity (reword/rework).

 

Being created from love they were then created for love. After God declares his intention in creating humanity, he then does it.  And he describes their creation in these words: In the image of God he created them.  Male and female, he created them.   By being created in His image, but different than each other, we see that He created them for love.  This love could be expressed in their complementary genders, as individuals yet with the possibility of union. This shows the value behind the different genders. They then “image” God when in love they “create,” by being “fruitful, multiplying and filling the earth.” They were personally complete, but potentially complementary when given gender by their sexuality in the ability to procreate and in a pre-fall world saturate the world with the love and authority of God. 

 

God’s glory is imprinted on all of creation.  Humanity’s original purpose was to subdue creation, that is to exert authority over it so that God’s glory would be evident in their God-given authority.  That includes our own selves. Understanding our original design, we must fight to discern those temptations, distortions and deceptions that seek to reject God’s authority for our own autonomy.  Created from intention and with purpose secures every human’s identity.  We reject identifying with our bodies, our sexuality, our gender, because we have a greater identifier.  Submitting to God’s design, intention and purpose, makes up our whole identity, which is absolute and by definition therefore not fluid.  Because humanity is not the result of chance, fate, or circumstance, God’s word at creation doesn’t allow for his beloved creation to find its security in themselves, but in Him.  

 

This is a great act of faith for many. Whether it be for the heterosexual who is struggling to stay in a marriage, the homosexual who is struggling with same-sex attraction, the single who has chosen to be celibate, the gender-fluid who is in physical and emotional tension, believing God’s goodness and grace at creation can be the greatest struggle of all.  It’s important to remember that these struggles were not a part of Adam and Eve’s original human experience.  Rather, they were “naked and knew no shame.”  At the fall, everything changed for them as individuals.  At their sin, they became aware of themselves, became defensive about the self, and ultimately blamed God for the tension with which they found themselves.  Yet, God’s grace pursued them first in profound questions: Where are you?  Who told you?  What have you done?  Those questions are universal questions calling all who have sinned, therefore everyone, to introspection. In exploring the answers to those questions, God’s grace reminds us of the intention and purpose behind our creation is the same for our re-creation.  After covering their nakedness in grace God gives a promise in grace, that one day their offspring will destroy the lies of sin that require the questions of grace.  

 

That offspring was God’s Son. Sent from love and for love, God’s son took on flesh, becoming like us in our humanity so that He might be the means of re-creation and subsequent re-identification.  He lived the Creator’s original intention without flaw, giving us the example of wholeness and connection.  He died in brokenness, being unmade on the cross so that individuals could be remade by faith. He rose in glorification, resurrected destroying the power of distortion and deception, that humanity could find peace instead of tension in their original design. 

 

All of creation display the glory of God, but none to the degree of humanity, men and women created in His image with an inherent design and dignity.  The possibility of wholeness and connection can be experienced by faith in the goodness and grace of God at their creation and re-creation. 

 

—————————————————————————————————-

In the church we have one account of how the world was created. Genesis 1 and 2 tell us the way that God created, in the way that God intended the story to be told and heard. What has happened over centuries is that story has been interpreted a variety of ways, with ramifications to each one. 

 

I am a 6 day creationist believer. Not because it is easier, but because I believe the Bible and theology tells me it is right. Science says that belief is wrong, and provides at least 7 other ways that science says might be correct.

 

We need to look at those other ways, and then I think I need to share why I think 6 day creation is what we should hold as our creation view. I will ‘try’ to define each view briefly, but in no means will it be completely! 

  1. Theistic Evolution - God creates, Adam arrives via evolutionary process aided and guided by God.
  2. Gap Theory - the world was created and populated, then destroyed in the war of rebellion with Satan (creating fossils). Then the creation week account of Genesis happens (how ever you then choose to interpret it). 
  3. Day Age Theory - this view has long time periods of years for each day, not 24 hours per day.
  4. Apparent Age Theory - God created the world to look old. Adam was made full grown, so the earth was made ‘aged’.
  5. Punctuated 24 Hour Theory - this view has 24 hour creation days, with millions of years between the days. 
  6. Framework Interpretation- sees the creation account as a topical guide that is unconcerned with real chronology.
  7. Historical Creationism - sees the universe being created on day one, this views sees the next 6 days as God preparing Eden for His people, not about the creation of the universe.

 

That was a very brief, ‘drink from the firehose’ take on a bunch of creation accounts. Now I want to look at why we need to think theologically on the 6 day literal creation account.

 

We need to understand that as we adopt any sort of creation account that is not what the Bible lays out, we then create new realities and events that must be attached to the creation account we have. These are theological consequences that we have to understand.

 

When God pronounces His creation as good in the creation account over and over it was just that, good! Romans 8:21 tells us that “creation itself will be set free from its bondage to corruption …”. This means that the world was not corrupt, had no death in it until the fall in the garden.. That reality alone creates loads of issues with most of the previously mentioned creation accounts. Genesis 1:30 tells us that every green plant was given for food, so again this implies no killing, no death. 

 

If we are holding to the theological conviction that death is a result of the curse, then that must inform our view of creation to be consistent. Fossil record is really a record of death. So therefore death must be post creation, you can draw the conclusions to the previous creation views as needed. They become obvious when the lease of theology is applied with the Biblical account.

 

If death and corruption aren’t the result of Adam’s sin, that means a few things for Jesus’s work of redemption for both man and creation. If the fall did not transform creation into something evil, that includes death’s origin, than what is redemptions real nature? The only view that places death, corruption, redemption and renewal into the correct order, in my opinion, is 6 day creation account.

 

Moses connected the creation week into our normal weekly flow with the fourth commandment. Isaiah talked about God creating the heavens and earth at the same time as creating man. Jesus talked about the flood and the destruction of the world as it related to the second coming. Luke was able to trace back to creation through the genealogy in the book of Luke. Paul spoke of the sin of Adam and related it to the work of redemption for Jesus Christ. Peter taught about creation, flood, the judgement to come. All of these are inspired Scripture that point consistently to one creation account and that is a literal 6 day account. 

 

I know this is a hotly debated area of theology. I know the world of science and higher learning have stacks of books that teach a multitude of conflicting views. Isaiah wrote in Isaiah 2:22 “Stop regarding man in whose nostrils is breath, for of what account is he?” We place our hope, trust, hearts, minds, souls in one place; Jesus . He is the author and perfecter of our faith. He is the alpha and omega. He was there in creation, and he spoke only truth.

 

- Steve McLean

 

-—————————————————————————————————

Where we came from and why we are here are arguably the most hotly debated questions in history. In the last century and a half or so, as the gap between the answers given by science and the Bible has become wider and wider, the debate has become more and more heated from both sides of the issue and that is unfortunate. One of the consequences is that, for many, the story of creation as recorded in Genesis 1 and 2 (primarily) has been relegated to little more than a polemic against Darwinism. That debate does need to be addressed, but I want to take a step back see what we can learn from the narrative outside the context of creation-evolution debate. We must realize that Genesis 1  and 2 wasn’t written to argue with Darwin. Instead, it was written to argue with all of the creation mythologies of Moses’ (the human author of Genesis) day.

 

When Moses told the Israelites where they came from and why they were here, the Israelites had just left the bonds of horrific Egyptian slavery. For 430 years they had been brainwashed to believe the religious and cultural beliefs of Egypt. There are dozens – perhaps hundreds – of Egyptian creation mythologies, often contradicting each other, but a common theme amongst many of them is that the head deity created a “cosmic” infinite sea and stepped back, not caring what would become of his “proto-creation”. Two of his children, or lessor gods, got into a cosmic fight, and the winner killed the loser, ripped apart his body, and threw the loser’s body parts across the cosmic sea. These became the stars and earth.

 

Contrast this with the creation narrative of Genesis. First, notice that the Egyptian gods couldn’t care less about their creation. Genesis tells us that the creator God of Israel was intimately and lovingly involved in the creation process, and intimately and lovingly in His creation thereafter. Secondly, contrary to Egyptian mythology, creation wasn’t just an accident. It wasn’t just the consequence of two selfish gods doing their own thing. Instead, the God of the bible, like a master sculptor, poured all of His love and intentional creativity into His creation. Lastly, notice that The Egyptians believed that creation came from struggle; from blood, sweat, and tears. From nothing, the creator God of Genesis simply spoke creation into existence. His very voice is more powerful than all the might of the Egyptian Pantheon!

 

As for the creation of man, there are varying myths in this area, too, but most fall into one of two categories. According to Egypt, we were either created to be slaves to the gods, or we were created for the gods’ entertainment, little more than the punchline to some cosmic private joke shared among the gods. And we certainly were nothing like the all-powerful, great, majestic, entirely extraordinary gods of Egypt. In contrast, from Genesis we learn that we were

“made in His image, after His likeness” (Gen. 1:26-27)! Further, we weren’t created to be slaves to the gods, or the gods’ court jesters. We were created to reflect God’s glory to each other and the rest of creation!!!

 

Wow!!! Imagine being told that you were an accident, a joke, and a nuisance for four centuries and all of the sudden you are reminded that you were actually precious and beautiful, and given an incredibly honourable purpose from a creator-God that deeply loves you and wants to be in your life! Wait… we have been told that. The underlying message of ancient near eastern mythology and the theory of evolution is essentially the same: that we are accidents, with no inherent value apart from what benefits we can provide for another, but again I will leave that to Steve. I write this is to help you see that the creation narrative of Genesis was meant entirely to cause us to drop our jaws in awe of the creator God that loves us that much; that wants to be with us that much! It is enough to cause us to sing aloud with the Psalmist:

 

When I look at your heavens, the work of your fingers,

the moon and the stars, which you have set in place,

what is man that you are mindful of him,

and the son of man that you care for him?

Yet you have made him a little lower than the heavenly beings

and crowned him with glory and honor.

You have given him dominion over the works of your hands;

you have put all things under his feet… (Psalms 8:3-6).

 

And as if all this wasn’t enough to cause us to drop to our knees and raise our hands in spontaneous praise, remember that He sent his son to restore or “recreate” the creation that we corrupted through our disobedience in Genesis 3!

 

Halleluiah!!

 

- Richard Magill