Creation

Today we will be looking at the acts of creation. The mighty works of God are not something we can fully grasp. What we should be trying to understand are some of the attributes of our great God. Trying to discover more about who He is.

Spirit Hovering

This is an interesting statement that God makes concerning Himself in creation.

Language in Deuteronomy 32:10-12 is borrowed from this.

Deuteronomy 32:10-12

It speaks of God caring for Israel like an eagle caring for it’s chicks.

The eagle lovingly flutters above it’s loved ones before spreading it’s wings and catching them.

This shows the loving protective nature of God.

Holding His people Israel and caring for them.

The word fluttering is the same word.

We see the Spirit lovingly brooding over creation.

This wasn’t a cold act with no forethought, but it is a loving action that God takes in creation.

In The Beginning

We spoke about this last week. In the beginning, there was only God. He is the only self sufficient, self sustaining, eternal thing in the universe.

Created

There are arguments stating that when God created. It means that He merely shaped the matter that was in existence.

However the text doesn’t leave room for that.

In the Hebrew the word yatsar means to shape. But here we see bara, indicating that God didn’t shape what was there, but created afresh.

The latin phrase the Theologians are in love with is ex nihilo. This meaning out of nothing.

When God created, there was no matter to shape.

Day

Many discussions center around the age of the earth. One thing they will go to is the fact that the Hebrew word that is used for Day is the word yom.

Yom can refer to a 24 hour period, a year, or even a generic span of time such as a year.

People will look at this passage to say that it was in six passages of time that the world was created.

The problem that I have with this interpretation is God doesn’t just say a day, but marking the day is morning, and evening.

Those words in the Hebrew clearly mean morning and evening.

Given this, we see not just the world, but the universe itself being created in six literal days.

Living Creatures

We see God creating plants and trees. Marine life & birds. All the animals that roam the earth. God makes them after their kind.

It wasn’t a slow process with them slowly evolving. No God created them immediately.

He created them all after their kind.

It Was Good

After God created each thing, He looks at His creation and says “it is good.”

Think about the impact of those words.

Great Variety

He made fruit bearing tree’s and none fruit bearing trees.

He made things that were on the ground, in the air, and in the water.

A perfect ecosystem that comes together with the variety that God had created.

Yucca tree & the yucca moth.

The Yucca tree can only be pollinated by the Yucca moth.

The moth lays her eggs in the ovary of the plant and pollinates it. Then when her eggs hatch they will live off the seeds of the fruit from the Yucca tree.

Psalm 104:24-25

Psalm 104:24–25 ESV

24 O Lord, how manifold are your works! In wisdom have you made them all; the earth is full of your creatures. 25 Here is the sea, great and wide, which teems with creatures innumerable, living things both small and great.

With the great variety God created, He created it all to work in harmony.

Great Beauty

Any place you go in the world you can see the beauty of God.

The gorgeous mountains here in Montana, to the tropical oceans, even the desert has a unique beauty.

Jeremiah 10:12-13

Jeremiah 10:12–13 ESV

12 It is he who made the earth by his power, who established the world by his wisdom, and by his understanding stretched out the heavens. 13 When he utters his voice, there is a tumult of waters in the heavens, and he makes the mist rise from the ends of the earth. He makes lightning for the rain, and he brings forth the wind from his storehouses.

We see that our God is one who loves beautiful things by how He created.

Great Exactness & Accuracy

Everything works in perfect order.

Our world is moving through space at 18.5 miles per second. That speed is needed to keep us in orbit and keep us from moving closer to the sun.

If we were a little closer, the earth’s glaciers would melt causing sea levels to rise destroying many major cities and other adverse effects.

If we were farther the earth would freeze.

The earth is on an axis of 23 1/2 degrees. This allow 4 seasons and allows the world to stay moderately temperate.

If the world wasn’t on an axis besides parts being unbearably hot, while others, frigid. We would lose half of our present farm able land.

This reveals how our God has thought of all the slightest details in creation.

Proverbs 3:19

Proverbs 3:19 ESV

19 The Lord by wisdom founded the earth; by understanding he established the heavens;

Great Power

I love watching shows about Great White Sharks.

Enormous animals with so much power!

On shark week there was this episode called air jaws.

2000 lb sharks swimming at 40 mph and exploding up to 10 feet out of the air!

That’s power.

That doesn’t even go over the power of hurricanes, tornado’s, earthquakes, volcano’s and tsunami’s.

God has created a world, with great power.

Do we consider the power of the one who has created it?

Who are we to question Him?

Job 40:9

Job 40:9 ESV

9 Have you an arm like God, and can you thunder with a voice like his?

Great Order

Somewhere between 1508 & 1514 Copernicus wrote a treatise revealing earth revolved around the sun. But Kepler in 1609 realized that the universe moves in an orderly way and discovered the laws of planetary motion.

Because of these, we can mathematically determine what the night sky would look like from earth at any given point in history!

We have different laws in mathematics, and laws in physics.

These laws people have made becasue they have learned that whenever you do x....y always happens.

This take place becasue when God said he created the world good, he made it orderly.

This reveals to us that our God is one of order.

We as his people should be people of order, not disorder.

Great Mystery

From things as distant as the outskirts of our galaxy, which we know there are more galaxy’s.

To things as close as the our oceans, we know very little about.

Even down to an atom, the building block of all things.

It’s held together by what’s known as the “strong force.”

But we have no clue what that is!

These things in nature remind us that as much as we can’t understand the world on which we live, what hope do we have in grasping everything about the one who created it?!

Job 5:9

Job 5:9 ESV

9 who does great things and unsearchable, marvelous things without number:

Great in Perfection

When God said “it is good.” What He had created was free from abnormalities.

There wasn’t disease.

These things came about as a result from the fall.

Christ in Creation

For starters, we must remember that Christ existed at creation. He is the eternal God.

What about His role in creation though?

Colossians 1:16-17

Col 1 16-17 “16 For by him all things were created, in heaven and on earth, visible and invisible, whether thrones or dominions or rulers or authorities—all things were created through him and for him. 17 And he is before all things, and in him all things hold together.”

There were false teachers who spoke about creation as being something not directly being related to God.

Here Paul is stating that this isn’t the case.

Even angels and things in the unseen realm that were held in high regard…they were created by Christ.

They were created through Christ.

He is pre-eminent.

He surpasses all others in power and worth.

All things are dependent on Him.

For Him.

There are idea’s going around right now that God is here to serve us.

God is for you is the call of so many preachers.

All things were created for Him, to glorify Jesus.

John 17:1

John 17:1 ESV

1 When Jesus had spoken these words, he lifted up his eyes to heaven, and said, “Father, the hour has come; glorify your Son that the Son may glorify you,

Glorify your son, so He might glorify you.

All of creation is to glorify God, to glorify Jesus.

It was created by Him for Him.

Are we, as His creation doing what we should be doing?

Do our lives and our voices declare the excellencies of God?