If you’ll bear with me, I think that I’ll start fashioning a blog miniseries focused on why the first chapters of the Bible really matter. So we’ll make this blog posting Part One. I’m motivated to some degree by all of the current debates on gender, but my pastoral concerns are much more widespread. In a nutshell, I fear that the evangelical church in America is losing its foundation.
So let’s start at the very top (Genesis 1:1): In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth. We need to think of the Bible’s first five books, Genesis through Deuteronomy (often referred to by scholars as the Pentateuch), as one continuous account. All of it was either written or edited by Moses (see John 7:22, for example). And, ultimately and supremely, God authored it all.
Genesis includes some poetry, prophecy, and even drama, but it is primarily theological and historical narrative. Based on Biblical and extrabiblical evidence, we can date it at about the fifteenth century B.C. This really matters, friends, because there are so many voices today urging us to put Genesis into the category of fairytale. This is especially true when it comes to the first eleven chapters.
The Hebrew word translated as “created” is a rare word, and it’s used primarily in connection with something that God does. Creation itself is a noble concept, and quite difficult to capture with human language. But the main point that I’d like to offer today is simply this: don’t ever let anyone persuade you that Creationism is for the weak-minded and the primitive, while Evolution is for the academic, the enlightened, and the sophisticated. And here’s why I’m making this claim: in order to adopt any worldview other than “In the beginning God created …”, you have to swallow at least three outrageous claims …
1. Nothing caused something.
2. Non-life produced life.
3. Chaos naturally morphed into order.
I would urge you to sit with all three of those for a minute. And I invite you to challenge me if you think that I’m oversimplifying things.
“The heavens and the earth” is Hebrew’s way of communicating the totality of creation. It’s not even limited by our Earth or our solar system. So it’s really important that you and I remember that the Bible’s opening sentence is an intentionally broad summary statement. It’s meant to include everything in the universe!
Just to help you wrap your mind around the enormity of the Bible’s opening line, I’ll quote from George P. Dvorsky, a “transhumanist” secular Buddhist: “It’s hard to wrap our heads around the size of our galaxy, let alone the Universe. At 100,000 light-years across, it would take the New Horizons space probe – the fastest object ever launched by humans – some 1,844,000,000 years to travel from one side of the Milky Way to the other (it’s currently moving away from Pluto at 58,536 km/h or 36,373 mph). But there are structures even larger than single galaxies. Back in 2013, astronomers discovered a concentration of galaxy clusters stretching some 10-billion light years across. There are also cosmic filaments to consider – massive strands of rarefied and highly ionized gas which stretch like spider webs across the observable Universe linking galaxy clusters across billions upon billions of light-years. And then there’s the Universe as a whole, an expanse of expanding space that appears to be about 92 billion light-years in diameter. And that’s just the observable Universe.”
Now Mr. Dvorsky and I would not agree on any number of things, but I wanted you to see even his take on how awesome is this thing we call “the world.” And here’s one place where Mr. Dvorsky would likely disagree with me: I’m claiming that God made it ALL.Even before the foundation of the world, there was Someone. Nothing else makes sense.
His first pastorate was the First Presbyterian Church in Lockport, New York, but his ministry would influence college students from around the world, especially those from Johns Hopkins in Baltimore – where Maltbie Davenport Babcock would go on to serve the Brown Memorial Church. But back in New York, not too far from that first church building, Pastor Babcock loved to hike at a spot called the “escarpment” – a natural ledge from which you could see for miles. He’d say to his friends: “I’m going out to see my Father’s world!” In 1901, as he took in those breathtaking views of farms, orchards, and even Lake Ontario about fifteen miles away, Babcock wrote down what his heart took in …
This is my Father’s world, and to my listening ears
All nature sings, and round me rings the music of the spheres.
This is my Father’s world: I rest me in the thought
Of rocks and trees, of skies and seas;
His hand the wonders wrought.
Yours by grace,
Pastor Charles
“Thinking carries a moral imperative…It is easier to entertain than to instruct, it is easier to follow degenerate public taste than to think for oneself..” (A.W. Tozer)