Sermon Tone Analysis

And God Said — Day 2

Genesis 1:1-8

There is inescapable language in the Genesis account of creation that tells us about what God did to create the universe.

It’s plain, unmistakable language that the eternal God at some point in the past — “In the beginning” created out of nothing, without any preexisting material, in six solar days — Everything!

And He culminated it all with the pinnacle of His creation — man, — with personality, self-consciousness, intelligence, cognition, and the ability to think and reason — God created man in His own image.

This creation occurred in six days and on the seventh day, it was over and God rested from creating.

All of this occured about 6,000 years ago, and the entire creation was aged and matured at the instance of creating.

There was no death.

There was no corruption.

There was no decay because there was no sin.

Everything was just as God declared it — “Very Good!”

This goes against the current narrative of science.

But Listen — Science is not a hermeneutic for interpreting Genesis.

It’s not a hermeneutic or principle of interpretation at all.

Science is simply observation, test, and repeat.

It in no way is able to interpret the past — much less the origin of all things.

The Bible does not bow to science.

The accuracy of Genesis is like any other Scripture.

All Scripture is given by inspiration of God.

All Scripture is God-breathed and comes by no interpretation, but holy men of God spoke as they were moved by the Holy Spirit.

In fact, Jesus perfectly summed it up in .

So, whatever the Bible says — is true.

In spite of this clear teaching of the Bible about the Bible, there are theologians, Bible commentators, scholars, pastors, and preachers, Christian lay-people who deny the Genesis account because they accept evolutionary science to one degree or another, being intimidated by so-called science.

Such as John Piper who wrongly concluded — “Whatever science says it is, it is.”

No, whatever the Bible says it is, It is!

There is one true book, that is infallible, inerrant, authoritative — a book that settles the issue of Genesis.

One book that is inarguably divine and heavenly inspired.

What book is it?

It’s the New Testament.

The New Testament does not suggest Genesis is true, or defend Genesis, or try to explain to someone’s incredulity.

It profoundly and powerfully states it as true.

Let me give you just a few references.

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Romans 5:

1 Corinthians 15:29

Over and over and over — again and again, the New Testament refers back to the Genesis creation account.

Let me encourage you this morning.

You are all theologians.

You need to understand that.

You are all theologians.

You may not understand every nuance of theology.

You may not understand the difference between supralapsarian and infralapsarianism or the ins and outs of every theological concept —

But you are all theologians because you know the true and living God as He has revealed Himself in Scripture.

You are all theologians because you know the Word of the living God!

So, with that, let’s review Day 1 —

The is the summation of it all.

That is the foundational truth that now all the rest builds on.

The earth was formless and empty, darkness covered the watery depths.

In other words, the earth was shapeless and inhabitable by any living thing.

God formed and shaped time, space and matter He had created.

The Spirit of God hovered over the surface of the waters.

God said, “Let there be light.”

And there was light.

He separated the light from the darkness, putting the earth in it’s 24 hour rotation.

He called the light day and the darkness night.

God defined the parameters for which man would live.

You see not only was God shaping and forming the earth for biological life, but also shaping and forming life in which man would live, working, resting, and worshiping.

And then the text simply states — there was the evening and the morning, the first Day.

Now let’s look at Day 2.

I.

The Expanse

God continued to shape the earth and make it a habitable environment for life He would later create.

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3 Separations

On Day 1, God separated the light from the darkness.

Here on Day 2, God separated the heavens from the earth.

And as we’ll see, on Day 3, He separated the water on earth from the dry land.

In these 3 separations God makes the earth habitable.

He separated the light from darkness and enacted the 24 hour continuum — and He did it without the Sun and moon, which comes on Day 4!

But here t

Now in Day 2, God made this great separation of the waters to create the Expanse.

This is interesting.

On Day 1, the earth is covered with water.

On Day 2, He separated the water and put an expanse above the earth.

So, there is this water above, then this expanse “in between” and then below is the water that remained on the earth.

So, what we have is this water still on the earth and some water above — and in between the two waters is this Expanse.

The word expanse is raquia.

And it means to “spread out thinness.”

And this is an interesting idea.

Day 2 begins with this “undifferentiated mass of matter covered with water” with no breathing space.

Nothing could have lived here.

It’s just all the material elements present as well as energy.

This separation and organizing of these elements would be necessary to make earth habitable for living things.

Notice again how this happened — and here again we have this Hebrew conjunction “Ve” that means “and” or “then.”

That’s the conjunction I told you begins each of the verses from verse 2 to verse 31, indicating a historical narrative.

It just keeps connecting everything together in a sequential order.

Verse 1 — “In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth.”

Verse 2 — “And (Ve) the earth was formless and void...”

Verse 3 — “And God said, ‘Let there be light...”

Verse 4 — “And God saw that the light was good.”

Verse 5— “And God called the light ‘Day.’”

Verse 6 — “And God said, ‘Let there be an expanse...’”

Verse 7 — “And God made the expanse...”

Verse 8 — “And God called the expanse ‘Sky.’”

So, you can see this sequential, orderly narrative of God creating the heavens and the earth.

This is not poetic or metaphorical.

Also, notice with me how this happened again — God Said… He spoke this expanse into existence, an expanse that wasn’t there before, just like He spoke light into existence.

What?!? Can you imagine this?

He did this like He did everything else so far, and I’ll give away the ending — just like He did everything else after this until He was finished.

He did it by the sheer power of His voice and wisdom of His mind.