The Miracle of Creation, part 1

Genesis 1:1-19

The Miracle of Creation, part 1

The definition of the term "miracle"
What is a miracle? A miracle has been defined as a work wrought by a divine power for a divine purpose by means beyond the reach of man. The general idea is that it is something wonderful or unusual - an event, experience, or discovery, so singular and strange as to awaken in one the feeling of awe. Phenomena in nature and events in history are labeled "miracle."
- Herbert Lockyer, All the Miracles of The Bible.

Verse 1
In the beginning, God created the heavens and the earth.

Here we can find a lot of information about everything. First it says, "In the beginning." So there was a beginning, which means that things did not always exist the way they do now. There was a time when it all began. Second, "God created." What does that tell us about God? God existed. God caused new things to come into existence. What did God create? This phrase includes everything there is. God created all of it. Some dumb person will always say, "But who created God?" Here's my answer: if God had to be created, then would he be God? Now, this verse is ascribing glory to God. It is telling us that there is a God, that He created everything in the beginning, and so everything must point back to God and say, "It is because of Him that I am." Only God can say what He said to Moses, "I AM THAT I AM." (Exodus 3:14). God is because He is. There is no cause for Him, He simply is. "I am Alpha and Omega, the beginning and the ending, says the Lord, who is, and who was, and who is to come, the Almighty." (Revelation 1:8).

Verse 2
The earth was without form and void, and darkness was over the face of the deep. And the Spirit of God was hovering over the face of the waters.

Here we have a picture described of formlessness, emptiness, and darkness. But the Spirit of God was there, hovering over the face of the waters. That is, the Spirit of God was moving over the water to begin to make something that was unformed, empty and dark, begin to take shape. It is by God's Spirit that things come into being and are formed (like a pot is formed from a lump of clay).

Verse 3
And God said, "Let there be light," and there was light.

What did God do? He spoke. (Now we have the Word of God introduced. This is Jesus Christ speaking here - John 1:1-3). What did He say? And what happened? This shows us that the power of God is in His Word. When He wants to make something happen. To make something begin to exist when it doesn't exist, He speaks. When God saves a person, it is a miracle just like when He spoke light into being (2 Corinthians 4:6).

Verse 4
And God saw that the light was good. And God separated the light from the darkness.

What did God do in this verse? He stepped back and looked at what He had made. He saw that the light was good. What did God do with the light? He separated it from the darkness. Now this is getting deep. Light and darkness do not mix. They are opposites. 1 John 1:5 says, "God is light, and in him is no darkness at all." God cannot dwell with evil. God will not allow darkness to dwell with light. He will not allow sin and evil to dwell with righteousness and holiness.

Verse 5
God called the light Day, and the darkness he called Night. And there was evening and there was morning, the first day.

What did God do in this verse? He named the light and the darkness. What did He call them? Light He called Day, and darkness He called Night. Notice something, who called them by these names? This is the beginning of language. Language did not start with apes who developed speech in their brains when they became human (that is not even naturally possible). It didn't begin with humans. Language began with God. It is His original way of communicating, and we should be careful never to defile His design. In other words, don't mess with what God originated. Don't misuse what He designed to be used rightly. We are all guilty of this, and oh, how we need grace for how we have stolen God's good way of communicating and tried to do with it what we pleased! Jesus said, "By your words you will be justified, and by your words you will be condemned." Therefore, speech is very important to God. It is He who named light and dark, day and night.

Notice also what happened next - "And there was evening and there was morning, the first day." What is the first day of the week? Sunday is the first day. It is the day God created light, and separated it from dark, and named it.

[Some people have a problem with the length of the days in this chapter. However, if God was weak, and He could become tired, then He might not have had the strength and energy to finish all that He set out to do in one day? In that case, we might have to say, "Well, God needed a little more time to do some of these things in one day. So let's say it took Him a lot longer to do it." The Bible says, "Is anything too hard for the LORD?" (Genesis 18:14). and "With God all things are possible." (Matthew 19:26). Do you think God could ever run out of power? We cannot see God because of our sin, but does that mean that we cannot see from nature and the universe that He is very powerful? So if God wanted to create in a day, He could have. Isaiah 40:28 says, "Do you not know? Have you not heard? The LORD is the everlasting God, the Creator of the ends of the earth. He does not faint or grow weary. He gives power to the faint, and to him who has no might he increases strength." We must understand this by faith, since we were not there to see it all happen. Hebrews 11:3 says this, "By faith we understand that the universe was created by the word of God, so that what is seen was not made out of things that are visible." God has told us what happened here in the book of Genesis. It is by faith that we believe God's word].

Verses 6-7
And God said, "Let there be an expanse in the midst of the waters, and let it separate the waters from the waters." And God made the expanse and separated the waters that were under the expanse from the waters that were above the expanse. And it was so.

What did God do again at the beginning of verse 6? He "said," God spoke. What did He say? Now, verse 7 says, "And God made." So, when God says something, and it happens, it is because He made it happen. So what did He do? God made an expanse (firmament, foundation - in this case I believe it refers to the separation of water on earth and water in clouds above the sky). Now, when we look at a river, a lake, or an ocean, we can see clearly that there is a lot of water there. When we look into the sky on a cloudy day, how much water can we see? Well, to put it simply, you might see something around 100,000 gallons of water floating above you in a cumulus cloud. That would be weighing about 400 metric tons. So on day two, God did something really cool, He separated water on earth from water that can fly around over the earth at up to 50,000 feet above us!


I love the ending phrase in verse 7, "And it was so." God said it, it happened, and there it is. We now have weather, evaporation, condensation, clouds, mist, rain (which began after the flood), and all the amazing stuff that goes along with that. Job 26:7-8 says, "He stretches out the north over the void [emptiness] and hangs the earth on nothing. He binds up the waters in his thick clouds, and the cloud is not split open under them." And verse 14 says, "Behold, these are but the outskirts of his ways, and how small a whisper do we hear of him!"

Verse 8
And God called the expanse Heaven. And there was evening and there was morning, the second day.

Again, what did God do here? He called the expanse Heaven, or Sky; He named it. We see God creating things by the power of His Word, and then He is naming what He has done. God creates and God gives names to what He creates.

And what day was that on? Notice the "evening" and "morning." The world is turning, God has already established time. There is light and dark, day and night. This was done on Monday.

Verses 9-10
And God said, "Let the waters under the heavens be gathered together into one place, and let the dry land appear." And it was so. God called the dry land Earth, and the waters that were gathered together he called Seas. And God saw that it was good.

What did God say this time? Did the waters listen? Yes! When God speaks, they obey! Luke 8:25 says, "He [Jesus] said to them [to His disciples after He had just calmed the storm], "Where is your faith?" And they were afraid, and they marveled, saying to one another, "Who then is this, that he commands even winds and water, and they obey him?"

Again God names what He just made. What did He call what He made? Earth [or Land] and Seas. Before this, the world was covered with water. 2 Peter 3:5 says about unbelievers, "For they deliberately overlook this fact, that the heavens existed long ago, and the earth was formed out of water and through water by the word of God." [The emphasis here is that everything exists and was made by the Word of God].

What else did God do? "And God saw that it was good." He stepped back and looked at what He just made. He was satisfied with it, and saw it to be good.

Verses 11-13
And God said, "Let the earth sprout vegetation, plants yielding seed, and fruit trees bearing fruit in which is their seed, each according to its kind, on the earth." And it was so. The earth brought forth vegetation, plants yielding seed according to their own kinds, and trees bearing fruit in which is their seed, each according to its kind. And God saw that it was good. And there was evening and there was morning, the third day.

Verses 9-13 described a number of things God did in one day. What day was it? The third day, that would make it Tuesday. What are some of the things that He did on this day? Back in v9-10, He made dry land appear, and divided it with the sea. What else did He do after that? God commanded plants with seed, fruit trees, and all kinds of vegetation to sprout up from the ground. Notice that He made them "each according to its kind" (v12). This means God originated plants from different kinds, i.e. fruit and nut trees, vines and bushes, etc.. We know we can produce hybrid plants, but only plants that are from the same kind originally mix together. For example, it is not possible to get a conifer to mix with a daisy. They are both plants, they are just completely different kinds. The seed God made plants produce contains DNA, which is the most complex information system we know of in the universe. DNA contains all the information necessary for plants to reproduce more plants exactly after their kind.

We also see in these verses that God began with water, moved the water to form land, miraculously spoke seed into being planted in the ground, made them grow, and they produce fruits and oxygen. That prepares the world for the next thing God would make on earth - living creatures. But before He did that, He made some things higher up to prepare the earth for life.

Verses 14-19
And God said, "Let there be lights in the expanse of the heavens to separate the day from the night. And let them be for signs and for seasons, and for days and for years, and let them be lights in the expanse of the heavens to give light upon the earth." And it was so. And God made the two great lights - the greater light to rule the day and the lesser light to rule the night - and the stars. And God set them in the expanse of the heavens to give light on the earth, to rule over the day and over the night, and to separate the light from the darkness. And God saw that it was good. And there was evening and there was morning, the fourth day.

First, we notice this is the fourth day, which is Wednesday. On this day, God made "lights in the expanse of the heavens," and He tells us specific reasons why. What are some of those reasons? God made the heavenly lights to separate day from night, to be for signs and seasons, and mark days and years, and to give light upon the earth. The light shining on the earth is necessary for plants to grow and produce oxygen. God made two very specific and close lights to the earth. What were they? They were the sun and the moon. Only the sun contains its own light source, the moon reflects light on the earth at night. It also pulls on the earth's gravity to make waves and tides in the ocean, and performs some other amazing tasks for the earth. What is the third light source mentioned? The stars. Stars truly are wonderful. Have you ever gone to a place where there is very little light from streets or houses, and you can see multitudes of stars! Well, the universe contains billions of galaxies with billions of stars in each galaxy. And God says they are to give light to the earth. Amazing! Psalm 147:4 tells us how carefully God created the stars, "He determines the number of the stars; he gives to all of them their names. Great is our Lord, and abundant in power; his understanding is beyond measure."

Conclusion:
This is a brief look at the wonders of God's creation of all that exists. God was in the beginning. God is because He is God. God chose to make things exist out of nothing. Creation displays His glorious power. God created the heavens and the earth by His Word. Everything was made by God in the beginning. God the Father was working, God the Son was working, and God the Holy Spirit was working when He made everything, so we see that God is triune. This is why we say God is a Trinity - He is three in ONE. This is our Maker, our Creator and our God. The one we must worship and listen to and love. I want to encourage every one of you to make it an interest of yours to study the works of God's creation, and to think about these things whenever you see the beauties and wonders of nature. Next week, we will finish reading chapter one of Genesis, and learn about when God created life on earth, as well as man and woman. Please make it your ambition to come learn these lessons, and read your Bibles, because I can only point you to the well, where there is an abundance of living waters for your everlasting enjoyment if you believe in the Son, through whom all things were made (John 1:1-3).

[See Psalm 86:8, "There is none like you among the gods, O Lord, nor are there any works like yours."; Psalm 92:5, "How great are your works, O LORD! Your thoughts are very deep!"; Psalm 104:24, "O LORD, how manifold are your works! In wisdom have you made them all; the earth is full of your creatures."; Psalm 111:2, "Great are the works of the LORD, studied by all who delight in them."].