Columbiana County Jail 12/19/2025
Notes
Transcript
Genesis 1:11-19 Commentary
Genesis 1:11-19 Commentary
Review
So far, we have established that Genesis is the first book of the Bible. We took a look at the origins of all of the different mainstream views that are out there.
We discovered in our first verse, God created everything, The heaven and the earth. The other huge claim is that there was a beginning. We have all decided that this was a fact.
The next verse begins to describe the process of how it was created. The earth was empty and literally in chaos. Darkness was in existence because light had not been created. The Holy Spirit was moving upon the face of the waters. We have all agreed to this points.
Our next verse, something amazing happens. God speaks for the first time in the Bible. God speaks light into existence. This is where we came into our first difference of opinion.
What we thought the light was?
Adam made the point that the light was Jesus. He based his opinion from the Scripture in the Book of John. We also had an opinion that the light was from the sun. That would be a common sense opinion based on what we know about our natural world.
In a sense, I agree with Adam in this sense. The scripture is meant to be understood as natural light. I clearly believe Jesus created this light. However I don’t think the sun and the stars were created yet. I am not saying anyone is wrong or right, we will discover the truth as we move through the creation story. So I am looking forward to revisiting this topic as we move through the Scripture. That was where we all agreed we should do so we will come back to our opinions later.
We all agreed God saw that the light was good and we also agreed God divided the light from the darkness. We agreed that we are seeing a transition from chaos to order as well.
We also agreed light symbolizes God’s presence and truth. Darkness symbolizes spiritual death and ignorance.
This act of separating light from the darkness is the foundation for all creation.
In our next verse, God names something for the first time. By naming it, God claims ownership over it. He calls the light Day and the darkness Night.
We also see the words “And the evening and the morning were the first day.
So I asked this question. Do you believe that these days were 24 hours ? Now how we understand the natural world and how it works, this creates a problem. Why? Well the sun has not been created yet. So the earth is not rotating to make daylight created by the sun. Now we do know that the light that was created was a natural light and God already knew that He was going to create the sun and how the planets would move in our solar system. So using the words God used tells me that this was a 24 hour period. I believe God was creating the order in our world and we already agreed that the separation of the light from the darkness was the foundation of that order. We need to remember God is quite capable of creating as much as He wants to in a 24 hour period.
In our next verse, we discovered that God has completed His first day of creation. We are now looking at the firmament. We agreed that this was something solid and supportive put in between the waters. We discussed that the firmament was God’s act of bringing order to chaos. He was establishing a structured cosmos.
Now we did discuss the theories of a possible water canopy in the sky, or it could just be clouds of the upper atmosphere. We did not come up with a solid answer but we did understand the idea of the firmament and why it existed.
In the next verse, we are told the firmament is the atmosphere which is placed between the seas below and some layer of water above. Although I think this supports the idea of a water canopy, we can not state that as a fact. We can, however, understand there was water above the seas and divided the waters.
In our next verse, The firmament is called by God Heaven. Now we discussed this that we all understood that this is not what we think of as Heaven. The term God uses is samayim. Although it is translated as heaven, its context is very likely “the heavens” or atmosphere. It is the empty space above the sea. This does not mean the sky, air, or wind are themselves divine. They are an intentional part of God’s creation. This was the end of the second day of creation.
In our next verse, we begin to read about the third day of creation. We all agree that God is adding more detail and order to the earth.
We agree that God separated the land from the ocean. How does He do this? God commands the waters of the earth to be gathered in one place. Once He does this, dry land would appear.
We must understand that for God, this act of creation is no more or less complex than this: He commands , and it is so.
In our last verse we are going to review, we are starting to see a pattern here. God speaks something into existence, names it, and then observes it. He then calls it good. He names the land Earth and the gathering together of the waters , Seas. Now we are ready to move on with our current verses we are going to cover.
11 And God said, Let the earth bring forth grass, the herb yielding seed, and the fruit tree yielding fruit after his kind, whose seed is in itself, upon the earth: and it was so.
The third day of God’s creation involves some interesting developments. In this verse, God once again speaks, commanding vegetation to grow on this newly formed land.
The Hebrew phrasing around “seeds” and “kinds” implies a particular intent within creation. We are meant to understand that these plants and trees produced in themselves their own seeds. Built in them was the ability to reproduce, according to their own kind.
In other words, God’s command was that each kind of plant and tree would bear the seed of the next generation of that specific kind of plant and tree.
This also places a claim to God’s supremacy over all aspects of creation, including the form and function of all living things.
12 And the earth brought forth grass, and herb yielding seed after his kind, and the tree yielding fruit, whose seed was in itself, after his kind: and God saw that it was good.
This verse nearly repeats the same language of the previous verse. God is commanding the development of plants and trees to grow on the earth. This verse is describing that very thing happening, exactly as God has declared it.
Plants and trees of many kinds came into being and each of them carried the seed that would cause the next generation of those specific plants and trees to grow on their own.
Another key fact to take into our account is God built reproduction into His creation from the very start. His intent here is very clear. He would not create the world over and over again. He would create it all once. He would make it good and He would build into His good creation the ability to recreate itself according to its kind.
God alone made living things with the intent of them reproducing from the very beginning.
13 And the evening and the morning were the third day.
This simple verse repeats the pattern for numbering each day of God’s creation week. As we discussed before, the Israelites counted days from sunset to sunset, from evening to morning and on through the daylight hours. This is probably why each day is described in this way.
This completes the pattern of Genesis chapter one, for the first half of the creation “week”. In each case, God speaks, then His words are fulfilled, then He names His creation, and then declares it good. The Bible then applies a number to that creative day.
Each of the first three days of creation produced the conditions needed to support what God will create in each of the second three days. The first three days produced light, the sky and seas, and then land. Now we will see God populate those areas with the sun and the moon, birds and sea creatures, and land creatures, respectively.
The point of Genesis chapter one is to deliver a powerful truth: that God , and God alone, is responsible for the creation we see around us. And, that those created things have no power. Sun, sea, trees, and sky are not gods or spirits, but objects formed by God.
Now we may not have a complete understanding of how God accomplishes this, but we have no doubt about who is responsible and who has the authority over what has been created.
14 And God said, Let there be lights in the firmament of the heaven to divide the day from the night; and let them be for signs, and for seasons, and for days, and years:
God made all the heavenly bodies. For the original readers of Scripture, this countered the widespread belief that stars, comets, and the sun were themselves divine. By clearly showing God’s creation and control, Genesis dispels the idea that there are any true gods others than God.
Days four, five, and six of the Genesis creation week corresponds to days one, two ,and three. That is, God creates in each of these last three days is placed in the setting He created on the corresponding earlier day.
In this case, on day one, God uses His creative words to form light. This verse describes day four where God commands that there exist “lights in the firmament of the heaven to divide the day from the night”. The following verses will explain that these lights are the sun, moon, and stars.
Now we can get into our discussion earlier. This raises a difficult question. How did God create light and day and night on the first day if He had not created the sun? Honestly it is a reasonable question and it is a question that does not have a perfect answer. The best explanation I can come up with is that God caused light to exist apart from the source of the sun and stars until those were created, something that is clearly in His power. The reason I disregard any other options is the simple fact that man did not exist for any other option to explain this, such as a vapor canopy or clouds making the sun not visible. This verse clearly states the lights were created on this day not before.
One key point here is that Scripture does not provide specific details here, meaning they are irrelevant to the point at hand. The main idea of this verse is to describe God’s purpose for these lights, according to His command. They were to separate day from night, as well as to serve as signs of days, years, and seasons, which in this context refers to sacred times.
It is extremely clear that God intended from the beginning for the earth and the solar system to move according to a regular pattern. he meant for days, years, and seasons to be orderly, measurable, and predictable.
15 And let them be for lights in the firmament of the heaven to give light upon the earth: and it was so.
This verse concludes the statement begun in the previous verse. God completes His command to create the sun, moon, and stars. In the last verse, God commanded the lights to appear in the firmament, meaning the sky. The purpose of these lights , according to God, is to serve several purposes: to separate the day from the night, to mark days, years, and seasons, and to provide light upon the earth.
This verse concludes with four unmistakable words, “and it was so”. This is a simple way of explaining something so awesome as the creative power of God: He spoke, and the sun, moon, and stars came into being.
Read both Psalm 19 and Romans 1. Both insist that there is no language necessary to see the glory of God from what He has made.
16 And God made two great lights; the greater light to rule the day, and the lesser light to rule the night: he made the stars also.
The sun and the moon are the two great lights mentioned in this verse. Each of them are to govern “or rule” the day and the night. At the time Genesis was written, many cultures worshipped the sun, moon, and stars as if they themselves were gods. The fact is that these “lights” are not deities, merely created things made by one, true God.
This verse ends with another profound statement: God made the stars. Given what we know about the immense universe surrounding us, this is an incredible display of power. The idea that God created the whole expanse of our universe in a day, with a word, should astound and humble us. Not only does our view of the heavens help us track time, it is also intended by God to provoke us to worship Him,
1 The heavens declare the glory of God; And the firmament sheweth his handywork.
through the immensity and beauty of what He has made.
17 And God set them in the firmament of the heaven to give light upon the earth,
This verse repeats statements made in prior verses. This was meant to fit the structured , poetic Hebrew language structure . This is called a chiasm. This is a specific way of arranging the words to emphasize the central idea of what is being described. The central point becomes very clear, the heavenly bodies are not gods, they are created by the One True God.
The central purpose of the sun, moon, and stars was to provide light on the earth. There also allow people to track time and inspire us to glorify God for His creative power. We live in a era often have easy access to artificial light. It is hard to appreciate how powerful and necessary and beautiful natural light truly is. We can easily take for granted this cornerstone of God’s creation.
18 And to rule over the day and over the night, and to divide the light from the darkness: and God saw that it was good.
This is part of a poetic structure known as a chiasm. This arranges ideas around a central theme. This verse repeats the intended purposes of the sun, moon, and the stars as lights in the expanse of the sky. They were made to rule over the day and to rule over the night, to separate the light from the darkness.
The fact that these are said to be appointed by God, in order to “rule over” the day and night is also important. They are not people or gods. They are not to be worshipped in hopes of earning their favor or avoiding their anger. These are created things, subject to the one and only God.
In other words, these things “rule” only in the sense that without their light , all productive life on the earth would come to a halt. Directly or indirectly, all life on earth has become dependent on the sun’s light during the day, and the light of the moon and stars at night.
Even now, in the era of artificial light, the rule of sun, moon, and stars is absolute in that they mark the passing of time. we often speak of running things by the clock, even the clocks themselves only show time passing. In the same sense, the movement of the sun, moon, and stars display the passage of time, though they themselves don’t make time itself operate.
Following the same pattern as the other days in creation, God recognizes His creation as “good”. He approves the sun. moon, and stars, and their dominant place in the life of our planet. In doing so, He declared their glory and His own.
19 And the evening and the morning were the fourth day.
Genesis frames God’s creation in a poetic structure. This follows a strict pattern where God speaks, creates, observes, and blesses His work. The day is then given a number. The last four verses poetically describe God creating the sun, moon, and the stars.
God’s creation of the sun, moon, and stars counters any belief that they are deities themselves. Many cultures . including ancient Egypt, worshipped the sun and moon as gods. Other religions, including modern astrology, believe that the position of these objects determines a person’s fate. By making it clear that these are just pieces of God’s creation, Genesis dispels any claims that there is supernatural power in the heavenly bodies.
