The Lost World of Genesis One-Session 15

God’s Roles as Creator and Sustainer Are Less Different Than We Have Thought

Now that we have developed a modified view of the creation account in Genesis and a corresponding modified view of what constitutes creative activity, we can explore how these give us a renewed vision of God as Creator.

Two extremes need to be avoided as we seek to understand God as Creator:

1. that his work as Creator is simply a finished act of the past (potential for deism), or

2. that his work as Creator is in an eternally repeating present (potential for micromanagement)

The first extreme is most common in popular Christianity today. In this view Genesis is an account of material origins and the creation of the physical universe took place in the past (whether the distant past or the more recent past). Consequently God’s role as Creator was focused on a particular time and a particular task, and has been completed. This view can easily result in a practical deism in that it generally assumes that in creation God set up natural laws and physical structures subject to those laws so that the universe now virtually “runs by itself.” This view potentially distances God from the day-to-day operations of the cosmos.

One form of this practical deism is particularly noticeable in some permutations of “theistic evolution” in which God is seen as responsible for “jump-starting” the evolutionary process and then letting it unwind through the eons. Alternatively God is sometimes viewed as involved more regularly at critical junctures to accomplish major jumps in evolution. The problem is that these approaches not only potentially remove God from ongoing operations in nature, but they even write God out of most of the origins story. The deism view gives too much to the ongoing functions of creation as well as rendering them too independent from God. The interventionist view treats the functionality of natural processes too lightly, as being inadequate to accomplish God’s purposes. Potentially, the processes left to run on their own might very well fail to achieve God’s purposes, but this possibility reveals the all-or-nothing assumption behind these two views—that what happens in natural history is either all due to natural processes running on their own or is due to direct divine intervention in the natural operations. That God might be working alongside or through physical and biological processes in a way that science cannot detect is one possibility that this either-or assumption ignores.

But in all fairness the young-earth creationists are not immune from distancing God from the operations of nature. Even though they view God as totally responsible for origins, his Creator work is considered finished after those first six days. The “natural” world has been put in place, and it runs (on its own? vaguely sustained?) by those principles God put in place. For those who see it that way (admittedly not all in this camp), creation is over, and a practical deism looms over the ongoing operations of the world.

A second extreme, rather than adopting the sharp discontinuity between creation and operations as just described, considers there to be such continuity that it virtually eliminates beginning and end. Here creation is a constantly recurring process, and God never ceases creating. One immediate objection to this view is found in the idea of teleology that was presented in the last chapter. For there to be a goal and purpose (telos), there must be a beginning and an end.3 But beyond this important distinction, we need to explore the nature of continuity and discontinuity between the creative acts in Genesis 1 and what might be considered continuing creative activity.

The Bible to some extent offers the idea that creation is ongoing and dynamic. So theologian

God’s creative work is not just the static work of the past, but that it is dynamic as it continues in the present and into the future. -Jürgen Moltmann

This suggestion merits consideration, but key to the discussion is the extent to which what happens after the beginning could still be called creation, or if it is something else (e.g., “sustaining”).5 The answer to this question may be determined by how we understand the nature of creative activity in the Bible, and particularly, the view of origins underlying Genesis 1.

In the position of this book, the idea that Genesis 1 deals with functional origins opens up a new possibility for seeing both continuity and a dynamic aspect in God’s work as Creator, because he continues to sustain the functions moment by moment .

(for example, see Neh 9:6; Job 9:4–10; Job 38; Ps 104; Ps 148; Amos 4:13; Mt 6:26–30; Acts 17:24–28; Col 1:16–17; Heb 1:3).

VERSES

Creation language is used more in the Bible for God’s sustaining work (i.e., his ongoing work as Creator) than it is for his originating work.7 As we reduce the distinction between creating and sustaining, we take a departure from Moltmann, whose idea of dynamic creation considers all of covenant, redemption and eschatology as creative acts.

I contend that there is a line between the seven days of Genesis 1 and the rest of history, making Genesis 1 a distinct beginning that is located in the past. If we see this as an account of functional origins, the line between is dotted rather than solid, as the narrative of Genesis 1 puts God in place to perpetuate the functions after they are established in the six days. In this way, day seven, God taking up his rest in the center of operations of the cosmos, positions him to run it. This continuing activity is not the same as the activity of the six days, but it is the reason why the six days took place. John Stek summarizes it well as he states that “in the speech of the Old Testament authors, whatever exists now and whatever will come into existence in the creaturely realm has been or will have been ‘created’ by God. He is not only the Creator of the original state of affairs but of all present and future realities.” As noted several times already, this does not result in a view of God as a micromanager, but it insists that he cannot be removed from the ongoing operations. The paradox of intimate involvement without micromanagement defies definition.

Returning to the college analogy that we introduced earlier, the origin of the college was intentional, with purpose in mind—all of the courses were designed, faculty and staff hired, students enrolled so that the college could exist. Those functions must continue to be sustained for the college to remain in existence, and it is the ongoing work to keep the college running that constitutes its dynamic aspect. Once the college (or cosmos) is brought into existence, that functional existence must be continually sustained. The physical campus must be maintained (cleaned, kept up, repaired, etc.), but the functional college must be sustained (courses offered again and again, new students enrolled, new employees hired, etc.). Maintaining relates to the material and the physical existence. Sustaining relates to the functional and operational. Consequently, when we take the functional approach to origins and the theological position of God’s continual sustaining work, both originating and sustaining can be seen as variations of the work of the Creator, even though they do not entirely merge together. Genesis 1 is in the past, but the continuing activities of the Creator in the future and present are very much a continuation of that past work. In contrast to the first extreme, creation is not over and done with. In contrast to the second extreme, origins is rightfully distinguished from God’s sustaining work, but both could be considered in the larger category of creation.

As we are going to discuss in the remainder of the book, it is precisely this pervasive role of God as Creator in all aspects of originating and sustaining that serves as the main dispute that Christians have with a purely materialistic view of origins. This materialistic view is often interwoven with biological evolution and at times is referred to as “evolutionism.” The existence of biological processes is not a major concern, whereas the denial of any role to God in relation to those biological processes—whatever they are—are theologically and biblically unacceptable. But that discussion is for another chapter.

The relationship between creation and other aspects of God’s work such as covenant, redemption and eschatology is that each of these also involves God in the process of bringing order to disorder. He also did this for the cosmos in his creating work and continues to do it in sustaining the cosmos. But these—covenant-making, redemption and so on—are more related to his role in progressive revelation than to his Creator role.

In conclusion I suggest that God initiated the functions in Genesis 1 so that they are seen to originate in him. As a result of taking up his residence in the cosmic temple, he sustains the functions moment by moment, as the very existence of the cosmos depends on him entirely. Both initiating and sustaining are the acts of the Creator God. We recognize his role of Creator God by our observance of the sabbath, in which we consciously take our hands off the controls of our lives and recognize that he is in charge. His place in the temple and his role as Creator may have been ritually reenacted annually in temple liturgies. It would be a commendable sacred holiday for the church to reinstate. For even though God does not reside in geographical sacred space any longer, he is still in his cosmic temple, and he now resides in the temple that is his church (1 Cor 3:16; 6:19).

Technical Support

Fretheim, Terence E. God and World in the Old Testament: A Relational Theology of Creation. Nashville: Abingdon, 2005.[1]

[1] Walton, J. H. (2009). The Lost World of Genesis One: Ancient Cosmology and the Origins Debate (pp. 118–123). Downers Grove, IL: IVP Academic.