Introduction to Genesis

Genesis 1:1-2 — Introduction and summary of all God created:


•  In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth. (v.1)
  
  •  Now the earth was without shape and empty, and darkness was over the surface of the watery deep, but the Spirit of God was moving over the surface of the water. (v.2)

Verse 1 only summarizes the full extent of God's creative acts, that he is the creator of all else that exists: Since God alone already existed "In the beginning¹," Israel could infer that he created time itself (cf. "before all time" in Jude 25; see below), all space ("the heavens"²) and "the earth"³; representing all matter⁴ in this summary statement. (On Day 4, God placed the sun, moon and all the stars into "the heavens," so even an Israelite would know God created many material objects that were beyond their earthly realm.)

Although its first readers were primarily earth-centric regarding the universe, they still understood from this introductory chapter that God created everything and is outside of both time and space: God is the only being who is truly eternal (Psalm 90:2; Isaiah 43:13; Jude 25: "before all time, now, and forever"⁵) and knows all things (Psalm 147:5: "His understanding is infinite"); including the sense of being everywhere at the same time (Psalm 139:1-13). And just as He has never been confined by the limits of space, God is not constrained by time; neither of these two concepts can be truly comprehended by us, since we are creatures of both the 'flow of time' and the dimensions of space.

Genesis 1:3-5 — Day One:


•  God said, "Let there be light." And there was light! (v.3)
  
  •  God saw that the light was good, so God separated the light from the darkness. (v.4)
    
  •  God called the light "day" and the darkness "night." (v.5a)
    
•  There was evening, and there was morning, marking the first day. (v.5b)
  
  
Verse 3 is a beautiful summary of how creation actually began. If Genesis had been written for scientists of our own time, we can easily imagine there would be many details following "Let there be light." Though its first readers surely pictured visible light, such as that from the sun or a candle, we believe this represents the creation of the entire electromagnetic spectrum and all other forms of energy (both kinetic and potential): Chemical, electromagnetic (EM), gravitational, mechanical, nuclear and thermal.

In verse 4, we find the first of many phrases written in an explanatory way to help us make some bit of sense of topics that are beyond our full understanding. Such words or phrases are often called anthropomorphic, because they describe things from a limited human perspective. God knew the composition and character of all he would create before ever doing so (Psalm 139; Isaiah 46:10: He knows "the end from the beginning and reveals beforehand what has not yet occurred"; 1 John 3:20: "God... knows all things"). The descriptive element, "...saw that the light was good," (and many others like it) are solely for the reader's benefit. God is never surprised by his creation; He does not need to 'see what happens next' since all of His decisions in regards to His creatures have already been made outside of time.

In keeping with the briefness of this chapter, the only mention of the actual creation of the planet earth (and perhaps some other materials in space; not to mention the entire spiritual realm ⁶) is what was already stated in verse 1.

Genesis 1:6-8 — Day Two:


•  God said, "Let there be an expanse in the midst of the waters and let it separate water from water." (v.6)
  
  •  So God made the expanse and separated the water under the expanse from the water above it. It was so. (v.7)
    
  •  God called the expanse "sky." (v.8a)
    
•  There was evening, and there was morning, a second day. (v.8b)
  
  
Genesis 1:9-13 — Day Three:


•  God said, "Let the water under the sky be gathered to one place and let dry ground appear." It was so. (v.9)
  
  •  God called the dry ground "land" and the gathered waters he called "seas." God saw that it was good. (v.10)
    
  •  God said, "Let the land produce vegetation: plants yielding seeds according to their kinds, and fruit trees bearing fruit with seed in it according to their kinds." It was so. (v.11)
    
  •  The land produced vegetation--plants yielding seeds according to their kinds, and trees bearing fruit with seed in it according to their kinds. God saw that it was good. (v.12)
    
•  There was evening, and there was morning, a third day. (v.13)
  
  
Genesis 1:14-19 — Day Four:


•  God said, "Let there be lights in the expanse of the [heavens] to separate the day from the night, and let them be signs to indicate seasons and days and years, and let them serve as lights in the expanse of the [heavens] to give light on the earth."
  It was so. (vv.14-15)
  
  •  God made two great lights--the greater light to rule over the day and the lesser light to rule over the night. He made the stars also. (v.16)
    
  •  God placed the lights in the expanse of the [heavens] to shine on the earth, to preside over the day and the night, and to separate the light from the darkness. God saw that it was good. (vv.17-18)
    
•  There was evening, and there was morning, a fourth day. (v.19)
  
  
Do the items under Days three and four appear 'out of order' to you? Vegetation before the sun? We can't help but believe God did so explicitly, to show that the "days" in these verses cannot be long periods of time. Obviously, the plants growing on the earth (and all life that depends upon them) could never exist very long without sunlight! (This thought, and many similar ones found in Scripture, should lead us to conclude someone other than the men who penned its books, was behind it all.) Another reason God created the sun and moon after the earth, was to ensure no one; especially the Israelites, would have an excuse for thinking about the sun or moon as many Egyptians did: No matter how great in appearance, they were fashioned by the Creator of the universe for reasons we can all understand; not to be worshipped as gods: Apart from creating the sun to provide just the right amount of energy for earth's needs (e.g., as both heat and light), God also made the sun, moon and stars as "signs to indicate seasons and days and years". These 'lights' were of course not actually in the 'sky' as the NET Bible translates it, but in space; which we've translated as "expanse of the [heavens]" here. However, one must admit that the sun and the moon (especially in daylight) and even the stars, do appear to be just up there in the sky above the earth; rotating around us. And much of Scripture is written from a simple anthropocentric observational perspective. Without the insights from many 'scientific minds' and records of various planetary and stellar observations over hundreds of years; not to mention the invention of the telescope, it would be extremely difficult, if not impossible, to prove otherwise! So why didn't God provide Moses with some 'irrefutable proof' for His existence? Because God wants us to also exercise some faith in Him. Although nothing in Scripture has been found that would refute His existence, it's also true that nothing in Scripture can be used to force someone to believe in Him; some faith is also required, by design.

Genesis 1:20-23 — Day Five:


•  God said, "Let the water swarm with swarms of living creatures and let birds fly above the earth across the expanse of the sky." (v.20)
  •  God created the great sea creatures and every living and moving thing with which the water swarmed, according to their kinds, and every winged bird according to its kind. God saw that it was good. (v.21)
    
  •  God blessed them and said, "Be fruitful and multiply and fill the water in the seas, and let the birds multiply on the earth." (v.22)
    
•  There was evening, and there was morning, a fifth day. (v.23)
  
  
Genesis 1:24-32 — Day Six:


•  God said, "Let the land produce living creatures according to their kinds: cattle, creeping things, and wild animals, each according to its kind." It was so. (v.24)
  
  •  God made the wild animals according to their kinds, the cattle according to their kinds, and all the creatures that creep along the ground according to their kinds. God saw that it was good. (v.25)
    
    
•  Then God said, "Let us make mankind in our image, after our likeness, so they may rule over the fish of the sea and the birds of the air, over the cattle, and over all the earth, and over all the creatures that move on the earth." (v.26)
  
•  God created mankind in his own image, in the image of God he created them, male and female he created them. (v.27)
  
•  God blessed them and said to them, "Be fruitful and multiply! Fill the earth and subdue it! Rule over the fish of the sea and the birds of the air and every creature that moves on the ground." (v.28)
  
•  Then God said, "I now give you every seed-bearing plant on the face of the entire earth and every tree that has fruit with seed in it. They will be yours for food. And to all the animals of the earth, and to every bird of the air, and to all the creatures that move on the ground--everything that has the breath of life in it--I give every green plant for food."
  It was so. (vv.29-30)
  
•  God saw all that he had made--and it was very good! (v.31)
  
•  There was evening, and there was morning, the sixth day. (v.32)
  
  
Genesis 2:1-3 — Conclusion concerning God's Creative Works:


•  The heavens and the earth were completed with everything that was in them. (v.1)
  
  •  By the seventh day God finished the work that he had been doing, and he ceased on the seventh day all the work that he had been doing. (v.2)
    
  •  God blessed the seventh day and made it holy because on it he ceased all the work that he had been doing in creation. (v.3)

² [Return to Text]   (Hebrew: h^ash-shah-m^a-yim, הַשָּׁמַ֖יִם). The heavens, all space. God also created at least one 'plane of existence' beyond the three-dimensional universe we are confined to within our earthly bodies, a 'place' where both angels (currently) and humans in 'glorified bodies' (in the future) can dwell in the presence of God.