Genesis 1:1-5

 Today is the first of five weeks where I want to deal with common questions of non-Christians. I found these questions on the internet. Perhaps Christians here have been troubled by them as well. Today’s question could come right out of the newspaper. There will be an election this Tuesday which affects the Texas committee that chooses school textbooks. The board is almost evenly split between members who accept evolution and those who accept intelligent design. The election will determine which material is in their textbook and the textbooks of many smaller states who have to buy whatever larger states demand from textbook companies.

 For the non Christians watching the whole drama, many cannot figure out why it matters. Are Christians really claiming that God required 6 days to create the earth? Why did it take that long? Why do Adam and Eve have the same number of ribs if the Lord took one? Why is light created on the first day and the sun on the fourth day?

 So today’s question is ‘Did you really make the world?’ We are going to look at the opening words of Genesis. And I pray that you leave today convinced that God is the Lord of Creation.

 The first question of our series is “Did you really make the world?” We have traveled back to the opening pages of the Bible to find the answer. The answer that I give is not the way that all Christians think about it. Looking again to the internet, you can discover that hundreds of opinions exist.

 The first question is to separate who made the world from how the world was made. If you are a Christian, you have to accept that the world was made by God. Some people believe the world was made in six days and others accept God initiated evolution. The point they share in common is the confession that God is the creative power behind all that has occurred.

 This division of how and who is true to the purpose for writing Genesis. Genesis is not a diary. At times, even Christian assume that the Bible is like a cosmic Myspace, with people making daily entries. Adam was created, woke up, took a tree branch, prune juice, and flat leaf and started to record his experience.

 Tradition has it that Moses wrote this account. I believe Moses wrote this account as an evangelistic tract to protect the people of Israel. There were many other Gods at that time. As the children of Israel prepared to leave Egypt, Moses is rehearsing the stories of God that give them the confidence to escape. One of the problems is that no one else in the ancient world has the idea of a powerful creative God. The most common God of the Babylonians is Tiamat and Marduk, the gods of saltwater and freshwater. Legend has it that Tiamat gathered other gods to fight with Marduk. Chaos ruled in the ancient world and Moses was about to lead his people into the desert.

 And under the inspiration of God, he sits down and writes these comforting words, In the beginning, God created the heavens and the earth. There is no unpredictable war and chaos between unseen powers, there is the good God over all and determined to bring order to this world. For me, the opening words of Genesis, to those about to risk their lives on a long journey, are such beautiful words of comfort that they bring me to tears.

 This religion was one of the first to ask who created the world. Moses writes an incredible argument and his descendants get caught up arguing about the 3^rd and 4^th days of creation. Doug Linder claims that ‘The early Chinese, for example, seem never to have given the question of creation serious attention at all.  Hindus pondered creation, but for them creation seemed less a riddle to be explained than it was a cause for awe.  For the Buddha, too, the question of creation was one without answers.  Among the fourteen unanswerable questions listed by the Buddha was “Is the universe eternal or not eternal, or both?” The Buddha, in a commonsense way that has made his philosophy attractive to millions, asked, “What use would it be to have the beginnings of things revealed?” ‘

 Friends, if you truly think that the world is random, what is the point of the struggle? The very fact that we grasp at dignity and purpose means that our hearts leap up to confirm Scripture’s account.

 I will also mention that Tiamat’s name is the one used in Genesis when Moses writes, God moved on the face of the deep. This book is an evangelistic text that also tells other religions, this God is the one God.

 Obviously, I am looking at this book as more than history or science, to me it is an argument to give confidence to the children of Israel and give hope to others who sit in the darkness of chaos with fighting gods. So why are the days included?

 I believe that the days are a literary device to introduce the topics that God wants to claim as creator. God claims the creation of Adam and Eve. I think that we use our developing ideas on science and try to lay them back on the Scriptures. I am not worried about when God stamped Adam with God’s image and the soul began. From the scriptures, I know that God did it.

 Human life is so valuable because God created it. With all the problems of our society and prejudice, we still count very carefully every person in New York City. No one will be added to day by birth, lost by death, or oppressed by murder without being counted. Why do we use so much energy to keep track? Its evidence that we each carry something wonderful, the image of God placed on us in our creation.

 God is claiming to be a creative God, bringing both order and beauty to the world. This is a story that we often ignore because our world has turned so hateful that we focus only on the evangelistic mandate to redeem. But the first mandate that God gave humans was to use our creative powers, stamped on us by God, to be stewards of the planet and create art and science and more than the mind can image. The creation mandate was only overshadowed by the redemption mandate after rebellion came to the world.

 Even in its retelling, its power and evident truth impress me once again. How can this answer not be embraced by all?

 The other days of creation are also important. I will mention the sea monsters. Again, the context of Moses’ time is critical, because people feared the sea. The Greeks as well as the Babylonians had sea gods with incredible powers. In this day of creation, God calmly claims to have made all that is in the sea and has power of it.

 ‘Did you really make the world?’ The answer is yes, God made the world. You can accept carbon dating and fossils and any other good thing that science brings. Christians have no fear of truth. But we have a unique claim that gives us hope for the future. Our God made the earth and all the good things in it and controls them. This period of injustice, evil, and war will end. If this answer made sense to you, I invite you to offer your creative life to the Lord.