Genesis 2.1-3-The Seventh Day
Thursday August 11, 2005
Genesis: Genesis 2:1-3-The Seventh Day
Lesson # 8
Please turn in your Bibles to Genesis 2:1.
This evening we will study Genesis 2:1-3.
Genesis 2:1-3 is connected to Genesis 1 since it completes the record of the original creation and six days of restoration by giving us the record of the seventh day.
We must also remember that the original Hebrew and Greek texts did not have chapter divisions.
The chapter divisions and the marking of verses in our modern English Bibles was not inspired by God but were just a handy way of referring to the text.
Grammatically, the original Hebrew text of Genesis 2:1-4 is connected to Genesis 1.
Stephen Langton (1155/56 – 1228) in 1205, as a Paris theological professor, was the first to make chapter divisions to facilitate his work with Bible commentaries.
He later became the Archbishop of Canterbury and was a prolific writer of commentaries and biblical essays, which introduced his chapters.
In 1240, Cardinal Hugo of St. Cher published the first Latin Bible with the chapter divisions that exist today.
The Jews started using these chapter divisions in 1330 for their Hebrew Bible.
Robert Stephanus (also known as Robert Estienne), a Protestant book printer living in France, printed Greek and Latin Bibles that French ecclesiastical authorities considered heretical.
As he fled with his family to Geneva on horseback, he arbitrarily made verse divisions of the New Testament within Langton’s chapter divisions.
Stephanus' son reported that his father made up the NT verse divisions on horseback, during a ride from Paris to Lyons.
In 1555, Stephanus printed his first Latin Bible with his New Testament verse system.
However, Stephanus’ work was not the first Bible printed with New Testament verse divisions.
In 1538, seventeen years earlier, a Latin Bible was printed with different verse divisions, but it was Stephanus’ version that was used for the first English Bible –
The Geneva New Testament of 1557, which became the verse system used today.
Genesis 2:1, “Thus the heavens and the earth were completed, and all their hosts.” (NASU)
“Were completed” is the verb kalah (hlK) pronounced kaw-law and means, “to complete a process and expresses the fact that the “process” of creating out of nothing, producing out of existing material, and restoring was “finished” or “completed” by the seventh day.
The verb kalah in Genesis 2:1 is used in relation to the six days of restoration that is recorded in Genesis 1:3-31 and is “not” used in relation to Genesis 1:1.
“Hosts” is the noun tsava (abx) pronounced tsaw-vaw and refers to the systems and organizations, and orderly arrangement of all that God has created, produced, formed, built and restored during the six days that are recorded in Genesis 1:3-31.
“Organization” refers to the “formation into a whole of interdependent and coordinated parts for harmonious and united action” on behalf of God.”
“System” refers to the “assemblage of inanimate and animate objects forming a complex whole” that is under the authority of God.
If you recall, in Genesis 1:2b, we saw that the heavens and the earth were a chaotic disorder after God’s judgment of the Satanic rebellion but after the six days they are a vast, complex organization or orderly arrangement of animate (living creatures) and inanimate objects.
“And all their hosts”: Refers to the totality of animate and inanimate objects that are contained in the first, second and third heavens and the earth: (1) Stars, satellites, and planets that compose the stellar universe. (2) Earth’s sun and moon. (3) Vegetation on the earth (4) Marine life (5) Bird life (6) Terrestrial life (7) Human beings.
Genesis 2:2, “By the seventh day God completed, His work which He had done, and He rested on the seventh day from all His work which He had done.” (NASU)
“His work” is a reference to the activities performed by the Spirit during the six days, which were in response to the commands of God the Son and were in accordance with the Father’s will, purpose and plan.
The fact that Genesis 2:1-2 says that God has completed His work does not mean that God does not continue to work but rather it means that He has completed this particular work.
“By the seventh day” emphasizes that a “special sacredness,” and “marks the totality of a process completed” and lastly, it “marks a time of rest.”
The number seven in the Bible is the number of spiritual perfection.
The seventh day stamps God’s work of the previous six days with perfection and completeness.
Of time, the seventh day tells of the Sabbath, and marks off the week of seven days.
The Sabbath was an ordinance given to the nation of Israel and not the church.
Exodus 20:8, “Remember the sabbath day, to keep it holy.”
Exodus 20:9, “Six days you shall labor and do all your work.”
Exodus 20:10, “but the seventh day is a sabbath of the LORD your God; in it you shall not do any work, you or your son or your daughter, your male or your female servant or your cattle or your sojourner who stays with you.”
Exodus 20:11, “For in six days the LORD made the heavens and the earth, the sea and all that is in them, and rested on the seventh day; therefore the LORD blessed the sabbath day and made it holy.”
Although the church was not given the ordinance to observe the Sabbath, they are commanded to enter into God’s Sabbath rest meaning to rest in the promises of God and one’s union with Christ.
Hebrews 4:1, “Therefore, let us fear if, while a promise remains of entering His rest, any one of you may seem to have come short of it.”
Ancient Jewish and Christian writers proposed a six thousand year history of the world with a final millennium of peace based on the six days of restoration and the final seventh day of rest—the Sabbath.
Six is the number of man and 6000 years of human history represents mankind operating without God (6000 is a multiple of 6).
In relation to history or time, it appears that the seventh day (the Sabbath) is a “type” of the seventh millennium (the millennial reign of Christ).
A 7000-year plan of God is an inference from typology and is not explicitly stated in the Bible.
Typology is from the Greek word for form or pattern, which in biblical times denoted both the original model or prototype and the copy that resulted.
Biblical typology involves an analogical correspondence in which earlier events, persons, and places in salvation history become patterns by which later events and the like are interpreted.
A type is a specific parallel between 2 historical entities; the former is indirect and implicit, the latter direct and explicit.
So the seventh day spoken of in Genesis 2:1-3 “typifies” the millennial reign of Christ.
The millennial reign of Christ will be the greatest period of Israel’s history since she will be head of the nations and the Messiah, the Lord Jesus Christ will rule in Jerusalem.
Christ will literally reign in Jerusalem and Israel will be the head of the nations. There will be a perfect world government under the rule of Christ (Isa. 11:1-2; Zech. 14:9).
All of creation will be at peace during the Millennium (Rom. 8:19-20) and there will be no war for 1000 years during the Millennium.
The Scriptures make clear that the world government during the millennium will be under the rule of the Lord Jesus Christ (Is. 2:2-4; 9:3-7; 11:1-10; 16:5; Dan. 2:44; 7:15-28; Obad. 17-21; Mic. 4:1-8; 5:2-5; Zeph. 3:9-10; Zech. 9:10-15; 14:16-17).
Revelation 20:1, “Then I saw an angel coming down from heaven, holding the key of the abyss and a great chain in his hand.”
Revelation 20:2, “And he laid hold of the dragon, the serpent of old, who is the devil and Satan, and bound him for a thousand years.”
Revelation 20:3, “and he threw him into the abyss, and shut it and sealed it over him, so that he would not deceive the nations any longer, until the thousand years were completed; after these things he must be released for a short time.”
Revelation 20:4, “Then I saw thrones, and they sat on them, and judgment was given to them. And I saw the souls of those who had been beheaded because of their testimony of Jesus and because of the word of God, and those who had not worshiped the beast or his image, and had not received the mark on their forehead and on their hand; and they came to life and reigned with Christ for a thousand years.”
Revelation 20:5, “The rest of the dead did not come to life until the thousand years were completed. This is the first resurrection.”
Revelation 20:6, “Blessed and holy is the one who has a part in the first resurrection; over these the second death has no power, but they will be priests of God and of Christ and will reign with Him for a thousand years.”
Zechariah 14:9, “And the LORD will be king over all the earth; in that day the LORD will be the only one, and His name the only one.”
Genesis 2:3, “Then God blessed the seventh day and sanctified it, because in it He rested from all His work which God had created and made.” (NASU)
“Blessed” is the verb barakh (pronounced: bah-rach), which means, “to bless” in the sense that God blessed the seventh day in that He attached special significance to it because He brought to completion His work of the six days of restoration.
He also blessed the seventh day in the sense that He attached special benefit to it for mankind since it would be a day of rest and would typify the millennial reign of Christ and the eternal state and the defeat of Satan.
Therefore, the seventh day would be a blessing to mankind in that it typifies the millennium, which would be a thousand years of peace under the rulership of Christ and the thousand-year imprisonment of Satan and the fallen angels.
Also, the seventh day would be a blessing to mankind in that it typifies the eternal state where there would be perpetual peace and the creation of the new heavens and the new earth.
Finally, Satan and the fallen angels’ sentence would be executed and they will be thrown into the Lake of Fire and reside there forever and ever.
So the fact that God blessed the seventh day is His guaranteeing that He will be victorious over Satan and that Satan’s sentence will be executed and that there will be peace forever for the entire human race that are saved.
Genesis 2:3, “Then God blessed the seventh day and sanctified it, because in it He rested from all His work which God had created and made.” (NASU)
“Sanctified it” means that the seventh day was sanctified in the sense that it was set apart from the other days of the week in order to fulfill God’s purposes for mankind entering His eternal rest.
“He rested” is the verb shavath (pronounced: shaw-vath), “to cease” and is used of God’s activity during the six days.
The fact that God is said to have “ceased” from His activity does not mean that He was tired but simply that He was satisfied with His work, which He had brought to completion by the seventh day.
It means that there was nothing He could add to what He already accomplished during the six days, thus, it was perfect in every detail.
Genesis 2:3, “Then God blessed the seventh day and sanctified it, because in it He rested from all His work which God had created and made.” (NASU)
“Created” is the verb bara, “to create out of nothing” and is used in relation to the following “creative” activities during the six days.
“Made” is the verb `asah, which means, “to restore” and is used of God’s “restorative” activities during the six days.