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[00:00] It is good to be back teaching.
[00:02] It's been a while for me and I'm excited to do it,
[00:04] but these few weeks have been,
[00:07] I guess really interesting maybe is the word
[00:09] as I've attempted to prepare.
[00:12] I came to the conclusion
[00:13] and then this was just this morning in the shower.
[00:16] That as I had studied,
[00:17] I saw there was really no way to unpack
[00:21] or make a point by point application in our lives
[00:24] from these verses.
[00:26] They're here to lay the foundation
[00:28] for the rest of scripture.
[00:30] And that is that God is infinite.
[00:33] He's powerful, He's intelligent, He's loving and more.
[00:37] And He's worthy of praise.
[00:39] So we can really just stand in awe of that truth.
[00:43] And that's what these verses are intended really to do.
[00:46] Anything else is kind of just like peeking into a room
[00:49] and kind of being overwhelmed by what we see
[00:52] in each of these verses.
[00:54] So that's all we can do this morning.
[00:56] And maybe I can point out a few things within the text
[01:00] that might help you see God for who He really is.
[01:03] So that's really my hope.
[01:04] Before we dive in, I think it's important
[01:08] to kind of back up a couple of verses here,
[01:11] do a quick recap of the two weeks ago section of scripture
[01:14] that Raymond preached on.
[01:16] It was verses three to 13.
[01:17] I'm not gonna go back to one and two
[01:19] because Ray did such a fantastic job there.
[01:23] We don't have to do.
[01:25] But because today's section is really continuation
[01:28] and completion of the seven days,
[01:29] that's why we're gonna do that.
[01:31] I did listen to Raymond's message.
[01:33] He did a fantastic job.
[01:35] I thought he touched on some really good points,
[01:40] open questions and theories about creation,
[01:44] but just describing those events.
[01:47] And so I wanna recap it just really quickly.
[01:49] You need to tell me what took place in the first three days.
[01:53] So day one, somebody remind us what happened day one.
[01:56] - Light. - Light, exactly.
[01:59] God spoke light into existence, crazy.
[02:02] Last week, I thought Lee touched on this
[02:05] at our second Sunday, if you weren't there as well,
[02:08] the importance of light in our understanding of God, right?
[02:11] Because if there's light, where there's light,
[02:14] where light is, God is, right?
[02:17] Light is equated in scripture with the presence of God.
[02:22] So this means that if light is present, God is present.
[02:25] So God is in the affairs of men, like up to today.
[02:29] He's not set apart, didn't wind it up and turn it loose.
[02:33] He's here with us and light is a reminder of that.
[02:37] Day two, someone else.
[02:40] - Sky. - Sky.
[02:43] Right, the firmament and division of water.
[02:45] So I think Raymond did an excellent job describing it.
[02:48] I'd like to add just a little thought.
[02:50] Maybe you teachers will agree with me.
[02:53] I don't, maybe you won't,
[02:53] but I think this is the firmament, what is that?
[02:57] And so when I think it's kind of God setting up things
[02:59] to begin what we know as the water cycle, right?
[03:03] Teachers, Bailey specifically, you know the water cycle.
[03:07] I don't know if your kids are old enough
[03:10] to learn that or teach,
[03:11] but we all learned it in school, right?
[03:12] It's got water evaporates, changes state,
[03:15] it gets up in the clouds,
[03:16] it condenses, it comes back down and so on.
[03:18] And it goes on and on and on, right?
[03:19] (audience laughing)
[03:21] No.
[03:22] So right.
[03:26] - I missed that one last time.
[03:29] - Anyways, we'll talk later.
[03:30] But the next creation day, God's gonna create plants.
[03:34] In my mind, this is God kind of setting it all up
[03:37] for the water cycle to start, right?
[03:38] Soon as the plants come on the scene,
[03:40] we've got water up there ready to rain,
[03:41] it's ready to go.
[03:42] And so off we go.
[03:44] Seems kind of like a logical explanation to me,
[03:47] but, and it's funny 'cause as we go through here,
[03:50] you know, when the creation story was written by Moses,
[03:53] there's many things in there that, you know,
[03:55] have been proven by science, right?
[03:57] And people say, "That's kind of weird."
[03:58] But as you get into it,
[04:00] it's like a little Easter egg in a movie, right?
[04:02] And some Easter egg is what?
[04:03] It's something you know that you can pick out and go,
[04:05] "Ha ha ha, I see that."
[04:07] Well, it's the same here as we go through, you know,
[04:09] science has come back and saw these things
[04:13] and sort of gone, "Wow, they're right."
[04:17] So it's very interesting.
[04:18] So that was day two, kind of cool day three.
[04:23] I already mentioned the kind of creation of the plants
[04:25] and vegetation, what else?
[04:27] Somebody?
[04:33] Anybody?
[04:34] He separated the land and the sea from the sea, right?
[04:39] Dry land appears.
[04:40] So, and all these things God saw that was good, right?
[04:43] So this is the pattern of speaking into existence
[04:46] and seeing it's good and that continues as we go forward.
[04:50] So now we reach today's passage, verse 14,
[04:54] through the end of chapter one,
[04:55] we're gonna buckle your seat belts
[04:57] as an old Sunday school teacher I had often said,
[05:01] you know, we got a lot of cover
[05:02] and we're gonna try to run through it,
[05:04] but we're gonna try to stop along the way here
[05:08] and see what we can see.
[05:09] So, I really struggled with where God wanted me to focus,
[05:15] as I've already said, but I'd like to start out
[05:17] with just pointing out something
[05:18] that might be obvious to you, somebody like Chad,
[05:21] probably it's super obvious to him.
[05:24] When we get to chapter two, we're gonna hear another,
[05:27] what some say is like another creation story,
[05:30] but it's really the same.
[05:31] Chapter one is the overall descriptive narrative
[05:34] of creation and then chapter two focuses in
[05:37] on the creation of man and really gets
[05:39] into the detail of that.
[05:42] So it's really nothing more than that.
[05:44] Then it's very typical Old Testament writing style
[05:47] and the prophets and you also see it with Paul
[05:50] where something's stated in a narrative way
[05:53] and then it's unpacked in the following verses
[05:55] and it seems repetitive, but it's not,
[05:58] it's just the way that they wrote these things.
[06:01] And it's actually been used to discredit
[06:04] the authorship of Genesis.
[06:05] Some people say, well, you know,
[06:06] somebody else wrote that first narrative,
[06:08] Moses maybe wrote the second one or the other way around.
[06:11] Or they'll say that, you know, the creation story,
[06:14] make up your mind, which one is it, right?
[06:17] So don't fall for that if you see it.
[06:19] So Chad taking over that.
[06:21] So let's look at today's passage.
[06:23] It can be easily divided into four sections.
[06:26] We'll spend some time looking at each section
[06:28] and then at the end, I'm gonna note
[06:30] kind of three overall points that I think
[06:32] might be important that God brought to my attention.
[06:35] So the sections are, and we're gonna go through them
[06:38] kind of one at a time.
[06:39] We're not gonna read the whole thing
[06:40] and then come back and reread it again
[06:41] just in the interest of time.
[06:43] We'll kind of go through it as we go through the sections.
[06:46] So the sections are day four,
[06:48] which is the sun, moon and stars.
[06:50] Day five, which is the animal life from the waters.
[06:54] Day six, A, which is the animal life from the earth.
[06:57] And then day six, B, which is man or mankind.
[07:01] And we're gonna spend most of our time there actually.
[07:04] So let's, do I have a reader for verses 14 through 19?
[07:09] - And God said, let the lights be the ball
[07:14] and the sky will separate the day from night
[07:19] and let them serve as sons to mark sacred times
[07:21] and days and years.
[07:23] And let them make lights in the bottom of the sky
[07:25] and the good light on earth.
[07:27] And it was so, God made two great lights.
[07:29] The greater light could go in the day
[07:31] and the lesser light could go in the night.
[07:33] He also made the stars.
[07:35] God sent them to the bottom of the sky
[07:37] with the light on the earth.
[07:38] It opened the day and night
[07:40] to separate light from darkness.
[07:43] God saw that it was good.
[07:44] And there was evening and there was morning.
[07:47] - Awesome, wow.
[07:49] We could spend like a whole day just right there.
[07:54] So again, God spoke to start it off.
[07:57] And it's interesting,
[07:59] some of the things that I just picked up on,
[08:01] I think it's this concept of order
[08:03] was established with time, right?
[08:06] This period of light and darkness.
[08:08] And it's interesting that God set this up.
[08:13] I mean, why did he do that?
[08:16] You know, it's really,
[08:17] why did God have alternate periods of light and dark?
[08:22] Why did he do that at the beginning of creation?
[08:24] And when I thought about that,
[08:27] to be honest, I think it's really to give us an over,
[08:32] sort of an everlasting picture, if you will,
[08:35] of creation each new day.
[08:36] Each day is a new day.
[08:38] Light comes forth and then darkness returns.
[08:41] So this glory can be revealed again the next day.
[08:45] If you've ever got up early to watch the sunrise,
[08:49] you probably understand it.
[08:51] I'm a hunter and right,
[08:52] I get up all the time in the dark and go sit in the tree.
[08:56] And you need to get in the stand while it's still dark
[08:59] so that the deer don't know you're sneaking up on them.
[09:03] And then you'll sit there and wait for Dawn.
[09:07] And without fail, you know, the sunrise just awes me.
[09:11] You hear the forest come alive
[09:12] and all these kinds of things.
[09:14] And I've heard people, I've never been to the beach.
[09:17] Many people have been to the beach and watched the sunrise
[09:19] and it's supposed to be an incredible thing.
[09:21] I've never had a chance to do that, maybe one day, but.
[09:24] (audience laughing)
[09:26] Not to see the sunrise.
[09:28] (audience laughing)
[09:32] But it's good to have your wife there to clarify.
[09:35] So anyways, I think that's some of it, I think.
[09:43] And then we talked about light
[09:46] and how that represents the presence of God.
[09:49] And, you know, just touching on a couple
[09:53] of very brief things very quickly, right?
[09:56] Light itself is a combination of three colors, right?
[10:00] Primary colors, right?
[10:01] Hopefully we all know this.
[10:03] Again, some may not have learned that in school.
[10:07] (audience laughing)
[10:10] But there's pre-primary colors that are blended together
[10:12] and the result is pure white light.
[10:14] You can separate them with a prism and see that.
[10:17] Three into one, does that remind you of anything?
[10:22] All right.
[10:23] The Trinity, a whole 'nother study.
[10:25] Light is an amazing illustration of the Trinity.
[10:28] And I'll leave that with you.
[10:29] Another illustration, two lights are created, right?
[10:32] One is the sun and the other is the moon.
[10:35] Is the moon really a light?
[10:37] No, what is it?
[10:41] It's a reflection, exactly.
[10:43] So the main source of light,
[10:46] the sun reflects off the moon and back to earth,
[10:49] providing some sort of amount of light.
[10:52] We're also a reflection of the light of Jesus Christ
[10:57] as he shines on us.
[11:00] And sometimes the moon doesn't do a great job, right?
[11:01] It's only half or maybe it's not even there at all.
[11:04] But yet God doesn't give up on her, kind of much like us.
[11:09] Gives us another chance to shine, right?
[11:11] The idea of the length of day is established here.
[11:18] There's a thought that maybe the first three days
[11:20] we're at different lengths.
[11:21] Some believe it's possible.
[11:22] I don't think it really matters.
[11:24] If we believe God's God,
[11:25] he could kind of do it either way if he wanted, right?
[11:28] He could do what he wants in creation.
[11:30] And the two lights are basically to rule,
[11:34] which is an interesting concept
[11:36] of the light's ruling over the earth.
[11:41] And then at the end, he throws in this five little words.
[11:43] Oh yeah, he made the stars and the planets
[11:46] and all that stuff too.
[11:48] Almost like an afterthought.
[11:49] It's crazy because you think,
[11:51] well, that's just five little words there.
[11:53] But you think about another Easter egg for the astronomers
[11:56] when they would finally be able to look out
[11:58] at the universe and there was no end to this, right?
[12:01] And we've only looked at a very small parts of the sky,
[12:06] because as you go out further, it opens up.
[12:10] So we haven't even begun to look at what's available
[12:14] as we look into space.
[12:16] It's crazy and it's infinite and it's a picture of God.
[12:20] So again, God saw that it was good and it was perfect.
[12:23] So just a few things on day four that maybe you can think
[12:26] about that hopefully makes us want to praise God, right?
[12:31] All right, day five, verses 20 to 23.
[12:35] Who wants to read that?
[12:37] Get a reader.
[12:38] - Sure, 20 to 23?
[12:42] - Yep.
[12:42] - And God said, let the water swarm with swarms
[12:45] of the creatures and let the birds fly above the earth
[12:47] across the expanse of the heavens.
[12:50] So God created the great sea creatures
[12:51] and every living creature that moves
[12:54] with which the waters swarm, according to their kind.
[12:58] Every winged bird according to its kind
[13:00] and God saw that it was good.
[13:01] - Did you?
[13:05] That sounds good to me.
[13:06] - I don't know, I got 20 to 30.
[13:08] - You did good.
[13:09] - And God blessed them saying, multiply the waters
[13:14] and seas and let birds multiply on the earth.
[13:17] - All right.
[13:18] So out of the seas come fish and fowl.
[13:21] Abundantly, right?
[13:24] Very interesting, you know, after the flood, right?
[13:27] There was only two on the ark
[13:29] and they were the progenitors of the species from there.
[13:33] It's interesting at the beginning, God creates,
[13:36] it says that teen, right?
[13:38] The water's teen.
[13:39] So he's not just creating a couple
[13:41] and saying, okay, you guys go off and pop.
[13:42] He's creating it all, vroom.
[13:45] It's just amazing when you think about it.
[13:46] All of a sudden, it's abundant quantities of everything.
[13:51] Just amazing.
[13:52] Also talks about it being according.
[13:55] He created it according to his kind and, you know,
[13:59] we haven't really even touched on this anywhere
[14:01] because it's such a crazy, wild theory to start with,
[14:05] even though it's taught in school as truth
[14:08] and that's evolution.
[14:09] This debunks the general theory of evolution
[14:13] that we come from some chemical soup
[14:16] and all of a sudden, somehow or other,
[14:18] we get more and more complex and we could spend four Sundays
[14:23] talking about evolution and its shortcomings
[14:26] and probably not cover everything.
[14:28] But it says here that creatures were created
[14:32] according to their own kind.
[14:34] And kind is an interesting word
[14:36] because it implies not individual species,
[14:39] but kind of a family of species.
[14:41] So think about horses, for example.
[14:43] You know, there's all kinds of different sizes,
[14:45] colors, breeds of horse.
[14:47] You know, maybe different temperaments.
[14:53] And the word kind allows for a change within
[14:56] sort of a family of animals,
[15:01] which has been demonstrated, apparently, through changes.
[15:05] But one thing that's important is it's always
[15:08] de-evolution, de-evolution,
[15:11] not evolution in terms of becoming more complex.
[15:16] It always becomes less complex.
[15:18] I just want to touch on it briefly
[15:21] and if you want to talk more about it with me after,
[15:24] I'd be happy to.
[15:25] I've done quite a bit of study on it.
[15:27] So, you know, it's an interesting subject,
[15:30] but we need to know as Christians that, you know,
[15:33] we're created, right?
[15:35] And there'll be more that we'll touch on on it.
[15:38] There's something new in the narrative on the fourth day.
[15:42] He said he blessed them by saying be fruitful and multiply,
[15:46] and he instructed them to do so.
[15:48] This is kind of interesting because I used to think
[15:54] that God was really only interested maybe in humans,
[15:57] kind of has the animals around for us to have dominion over,
[16:01] whatever it is, but it's not true.
[16:05] It's very different and the song even speaks of it, you know,
[16:09] is that he spoke to these animals.
[16:13] He had some way of communicating with these animals.
[16:15] It says that he blessed them and he said,
[16:18] be fruitful and multiply.
[16:20] God is in communication with his whole creation.
[16:23] And we know that creation responds to him, right?
[16:27] And in Romans 8, it talks about creation waiting eagerly
[16:31] and that it's groaning for the sons of God to be revealed.
[16:36] It also says in other places that he closed the lilies
[16:42] and the grasses and things like that.
[16:45] So he's active in his creation, right?
[16:47] It's not, again, not a windup theory,
[16:50] which is a theory that you might run into.
[16:53] And it also is something that's accepted in church circles.
[16:56] So, you know, God just kind of sets the world up
[16:59] and he steps back and lets it do its thing.
[17:02] It's not the case.
[17:03] He's involved in speaking to creation
[17:07] and creation is speaking back to him.
[17:09] So I think it's important 'cause if he does,
[17:12] it should give us Christians joy and pause,
[17:17] I guess, at the same time, right?
[17:19] Sometimes we think he maybe doesn't see what we do,
[17:21] but, or think or say, but he does.
[17:26] He's there, he's here.
[17:28] So God said it was good on the fourth, on the fifth day,
[17:31] sorry, and it was perfect.
[17:33] It was perfect.
[17:35] When God says it was good, he created it perfectly.
[17:38] If God can say it's good, the one that's perfect,
[17:41] then it's gotta be perfect.
[17:43] All right, let's move on to day six A.
[17:47] So the morning, I guess, maybe.
[17:49] Verses 24 and 25.
[17:52] Can I get somebody to read that?
[17:53] Perfect.
[17:57] God said that the land produced living creatures
[17:59] according to their kinds, the lifestyle,
[18:01] the creatures that move along the ground
[18:02] and the wild animals each according to its kind.
[18:04] And it was said, God made the wild animals
[18:07] according to their kinds,
[18:08] the lifestyle according to their kinds
[18:09] and all the creatures that move along the ground
[18:11] according to their kinds.
[18:12] And God saw that it was good.
[18:14] Awesome, all right, again, God spoke
[18:16] and then somehow or other through that speaking,
[18:20] he made some things and then he saw that it was good.
[18:26] So out of the earth come the living creatures
[18:29] that live on the earth, pretty wild to be honest.
[18:32] Again, teeming with life,
[18:36] just I can't even visualize what that must have been like.
[18:40] I hope there's a movie some day
[18:42] that we can see that when we get to heaven.
[18:45] And again, God saw that it was good.
[18:47] And God's attention to detail is here again
[18:52] in the same way I'm not gonna recover everything
[18:54] from the life coming from the water,
[18:57] but all those things are also here.
[18:59] And one thing that kind of covers all these
[19:03] kind of up to now point in creation,
[19:08] the text says God made.
[19:10] In other words, He's fashioning all these things
[19:12] out of what is there.
[19:13] So He's already what He's created previously,
[19:16] which is pretty wild when you think about it.
[19:20] And I'll touch on that a little bit further
[19:22] as we get to 6B after lunch,
[19:25] God decided to do something a little different.
[19:27] So verse 26 to the end, can I get a reader?
[19:31] - And God said, let us make man in our image,
[19:41] in our likeness and let them rule over the fish and the sea
[19:45] and the birds of the air over the livestock,
[19:47] over all the earth and over all the creatures
[19:50] that move along the ground.
[19:52] So God created man in His own image.
[19:54] In the image of God, He created him.
[19:57] Male and female, He created them.
[20:00] God blessed them and said to them,
[20:02] be fruitful and increase in number,
[20:04] fill the earth and subdue it,
[20:06] rule over the fish and the sea and the birds of the air
[20:09] and over every living creature that moves on the ground.
[20:12] And God said, I give you every seed bearing plant
[20:16] on the face of the whole earth
[20:17] and every tree that has fruit with seed in it.
[20:21] They will be yours for food.
[20:23] And to all the beasts of the earth
[20:25] and all the birds of the air
[20:26] and all the creatures that move on the ground,
[20:28] everything that has the breath of life in it,
[20:31] I give every green plant for food.
[20:33] And it was so.
[20:35] God saw all that He had made and it was very good.
[20:39] And there was evening and there was morning the sixth day.
[20:42] - Very good, thank you.
[20:44] So yeah, there's a lot in here.
[20:50] As I said, God decided to do something a little different.
[20:53] In fact, it was a lot different.
[20:57] It's a lot different as we'll see.
[20:59] One thing that really jumped out of me
[21:02] when I first looked at this and it's God spoke,
[21:06] He spoke some more creation,
[21:08] but He also spoke to Himself here.
[21:10] This is something that's very interesting.
[21:14] The first time in scripture in verse 26,
[21:17] He's speaking to Himself.
[21:19] It's very interesting.
[21:21] We've seen the Father and the Son and the Spirit
[21:23] involved from the very beginning, right?
[21:25] As creation began back in verse one and two.
[21:29] But here we actually see,
[21:33] we have very little information about their relationship,
[21:36] but here we actually see them communicating to each other
[21:40] and acting as one.
[21:42] It's pretty crazy and pretty amazing.
[21:44] And they're talking, what are they talking about?
[21:49] What are they talking about when they talk together?
[21:52] They're talking about man.
[21:54] They're talking about this special creation
[21:57] that they're about to make.
[21:58] And I think this gives some additional level of importance
[22:02] to this special creation, this creative act
[22:06] that they're about to,
[22:07] 'cause they're communicating together about it
[22:09] and saying to each other, let's do this.
[22:12] When I think about that, it kind of blows my mind
[22:16] that we get an inside peek into the actual mind of God,
[22:19] just for a second, right?
[22:20] So he was about to create something very special.
[22:25] And then it goes on to say God created,
[22:28] and he uses the word bara again.
[22:30] I don't know if you remember that,
[22:31] Lee touched on it last week,
[22:33] but even back when Ray was starting,
[22:35] bara means he's creating something from nothing.
[22:39] Now up to now in the six days of creation,
[22:42] he's made from what's there, right?
[22:44] He's brought forth from this,
[22:46] or he's brought forth from that.
[22:48] He's taken the things that he made on day one and two
[22:50] and fashioning them into something.
[22:53] Here it says, again, it goes back to the beginning
[22:55] and says, I'm gonna create something from nothing here.
[22:58] So there's something very special about man,
[23:01] because we know that in a lot of ways,
[23:03] I'm sweating here, wow.
[23:04] We kind of look like the animals, right?
[23:08] We kind of have some of, we breathe, we eat,
[23:12] whatever else we do, right?
[23:14] We reproduce, but that's only on the physical side.
[23:17] So there's something special,
[23:19] something was created from nothing on the other side,
[23:22] on the spiritual side, somewhere where we can't see,
[23:25] and that's what's going on here.
[23:27] So in chapter two, and Ray'll break this down,
[23:32] he's gonna go into much more detail about what that is.
[23:36] But we can be assured that it's very important.
[23:39] And when he said God created bara,
[23:46] he said in his own image, that's the other side of it.
[23:49] That's the other part of it that,
[23:51] and after his own likeness was another term that is used.
[23:55] And the purpose, we had a purpose to subdue
[23:58] and have dominion over the earth and the creatures.
[24:00] So there's so much more to us.
[24:02] We're not just an animal.
[24:04] We're not just coming from monkeys here.
[24:05] We're very, very different.
[24:07] So I just want you to understand that.
[24:11] And I want you to know that you're special to God.
[24:13] I've created you very specially for a purpose.
[24:17] So then just a couple of highlights before we get into,
[24:21] I wanna talk about this concept of in God's image,
[24:24] but before we get into it,
[24:25] there's a couple other little highlights
[24:27] that popped into my mind.
[24:28] Some information that is given about man here
[24:31] that just for information's sake,
[24:34] but before we get into that image,
[24:36] one of them is what, male and female, right?
[24:38] He created the male and female.
[24:40] And so we believe God creates us male and female
[24:44] if we believe the Bible.
[24:46] And this is kind of just coming back to today,
[24:48] one very brief area where we can come back to today's world
[24:52] where people say, no, I can determine my gender, right?
[24:57] And I can determine who I am, I can be who I want.
[25:02] But it's very clear here in the word of God
[25:05] that we don't have a choice over our gender.
[25:09] And really, if you break it down,
[25:12] this choice of gender is kind of anti-God, right?
[25:17] Because it says, hey, I don't believe
[25:19] what God said about me, I believe, I'm God,
[25:23] I'm gonna take the place of God and decide who I am.
[25:26] Satan's oldest trick, as we shall see in chapter two,
[25:30] fruitfulness created to reproduce,
[25:34] a creative aspect of man was built in
[25:37] right at the very beginning.
[25:38] It's interesting, 'cause this is before the fall, right?
[25:40] People are not gonna die in this world that's been created,
[25:44] but he's still giving us the ability to be fruitful
[25:47] and create vegetarians initially, looks like.
[25:52] I don't know how this is gonna work in eternity, Ray.
[25:54] I know you like to go to the oak,
[25:55] but I don't know if there'll be an oak restaurant there.
[26:00] - You used to say fish, right?
[26:01] When you got resurrected, so maybe.
[26:03] - I was, yeah, it's funny.
[26:07] I was gonna, actually, I had written down, you know.
[26:11] So maybe there's hope.
[26:13] I'm not sure.
[26:13] And the other thing is, it's very good, right?
[26:18] Just beyond good.
[26:21] And I read from some commentators
[26:24] that it implies kind of a wholeness and harmony with God
[26:28] that the animals maybe really didn't have
[26:31] beyond what the rest of the creative order had.
[26:35] And this is the closing statement of God
[26:38] about what he accomplished.
[26:39] This is the end of the seventh day.
[26:41] It was very good.
[26:42] So it's also a summary of everything he's done.
[26:44] Okay, so I mentioned I got some three separate points
[26:50] I wanted to touch on.
[26:51] We finally made it.
[26:52] We're through the introduction of the message here.
[26:55] I will try to wrap it up.
[26:57] But the number one point I want you to understand
[27:00] or make clear is the perfection of creation.
[27:05] I really feel that we can't understand very well
[27:08] what it was like before the fall because we're fallen, right?
[27:12] You know, this creation that God came up with,
[27:17] this concept of a perfect creation,
[27:20] you know, we'll see some more detail about it
[27:23] as the idea of Eden has unfolded.
[27:27] But with our position then related to dominion,
[27:32] related to walking with God in the garden eventually,
[27:36] but then the fall.
[27:37] But before that, we really don't understand what it was like.
[27:40] And then the fall came and we haven't stopped falling,
[27:45] to be honest.
[27:46] We were given the command to rule.
[27:50] And with rulership comes power.
[27:53] And I think we can't understand how much power
[27:56] perhaps we did have in the beginning of creation
[27:59] in the garden.
[28:00] I think it's been diminished over time
[28:03] with the introduction of sin and death.
[28:05] And we've continued to slide further down.
[28:07] You know, this is another thing that's anti-evolution.
[28:10] Evolution says we're getting better all the time, right?
[28:12] We're gonna eventually become, you know, whatever it is.
[28:15] We're gonna continue to improve.
[28:18] But in reality, that's not the case.
[28:19] We've continued to decline as men and as society and women.
[28:27] There's one theory, which just I'll touch real quickly.
[28:31] And I don't know if I believe it or not,
[28:32] but there's a theory that man perhaps had very similar powers
[28:35] to what Jesus displayed when he was on the earth
[28:37] in the very beginning.
[28:39] So could we control the weather?
[28:41] We had dominion over, you know, maybe like as Jesus did,
[28:44] control the storms.
[28:45] What about going to play from one place to another
[28:49] in an instant?
[28:50] Like Jesus is able to do and is glorified by audience,
[28:52] even on earth when he was here.
[28:53] What about healing wounds?
[28:56] We don't know.
[28:57] But it's interesting to think about
[28:59] that man was very different before the fall.
[29:02] And when I said that things are continuing to decline,
[29:11] there's proof of that.
[29:12] There's actually proof of that.
[29:13] If you want to take a look, a couple of examples,
[29:17] the pyramids of Egypt, you know,
[29:18] I don't know how many times people say I don't know,
[29:20] how did they build those?
[29:22] You know, nobody knows how they built them.
[29:24] You know, there's some theories, but no,
[29:25] but people say, nah, that wouldn't have worked.
[29:28] So there's really no theory.
[29:29] There's the latest one that's come up in the last few years
[29:32] is this idea of the world's fairs.
[29:34] Have you ever seen any of those pictures
[29:37] where they'll show this fantastic architecture
[29:39] and these towns almost that they built
[29:44] fantastic architecture for a world's fair.
[29:47] And then they tear it all down.
[29:49] And they say, that couldn't have really happened.
[29:51] You know, that couldn't have really, you know,
[29:52] man, we weren't able to do that kind of stuff.
[29:55] Art, I mean, you just look at art
[29:58] and how far it's devolved in architecture.
[30:01] You look at the Gothic cathedrals, you think, wow,
[30:05] how did anybody ever come up with that idea?
[30:07] You look at some of the art.
[30:09] It's just incredible, the sculpture.
[30:11] And now you look at what's supposed to be art
[30:14] and you go, okay, that's true.
[30:19] The moon landing.
[30:20] There's people and people that say man never landed
[30:25] on the moon or they're not sure man landed on the moon
[30:30] 'cause they couldn't have had the technology
[30:31] to do that back then.
[30:32] That was before computers, don't you know?
[30:35] So there's these kinds of things.
[30:36] And then, so it's either fake or in many cases,
[30:39] it's aliens that people say, well, aliens came
[30:42] and, you know, dropped in and took care of that.
[30:45] So it's interesting to see how things have evolved
[30:48] through the years, like the creation, it was perfect.
[30:53] It was exactly as God intended
[30:54] and it reflects his awesome power and his love.
[30:58] And that should be our response back, right?
[31:00] We should stand in awe and offer love to our creator.
[31:05] You know, in the same God that spoke the world
[31:09] into existence, that teamed forth.
[31:12] He's the same one that knit you together
[31:14] and your mother's womb, it's crazy.
[31:19] So the first point, that first point,
[31:21] the perfection of creation, it was perfect.
[31:24] And we can't truly understand what that was like.
[31:26] Second point, man is bara, created out of nothing.
[31:30] We touched on that.
[31:31] And it's only the third time it was used, as I mentioned.
[31:35] And basically, man is created very differently,
[31:43] very specially, and it says
[31:45] that the image of God is put into us.
[31:48] So what does that really mean?
[31:51] I mean, there's a couple of different interpretations
[31:56] that kind of fold together as to what that means.
[32:01] The one you probably heard of,
[32:03] and it's related to the triune nature of God, the Father,
[32:07] the Son and the Holy Spirit, that we're a trifold makeup.
[32:10] We have body, soul and spirit, and that separates us
[32:14] from the animals, body, you know, be easy, right?
[32:18] That's our physical being.
[32:19] Our soul is the person that is in the driver's seat,
[32:22] your intelligence and the person in our spirit,
[32:26] which is something very special.
[32:29] The part of you that makes you uniquely the person
[32:32] that you are, and it gives you the ability
[32:37] to respond to a spiritual God.
[32:40] To understand the concept of sin and morality,
[32:44] to love and be loved, and so much more.
[32:47] So you're indeed a special creation.
[32:51] And secondly, and kind of on top of and folded into that,
[32:55] is this concept of spirit that takes us even further,
[33:00] and we'll see it more developed in the next chapter,
[33:04] as Ray breaks down how man is built and how man is formed.
[33:10] And it is this, that man is a personality.
[33:13] And as a personality, he's self-conscious.
[33:16] He is the one that makes his own decision or choices.
[33:21] He's a free moral agent.
[33:23] None of the animals are able to do that, right?
[33:26] And you think, well, yeah, my dog has a choice to get up
[33:32] and go and get some food from the bowl when he's hungry.
[33:35] But I'm gonna show you how that's a little different
[33:38] through illustration here.
[33:40] Ladies, you might understand this more than the guys.
[33:45] Let's talk about clothing.
[33:47] Let's talk about wardrobe, if you will.
[33:49] God is the one that clothes the lilies of the field
[33:54] and the birds of the air,
[33:55] but you guys choose what you wear every day.
[33:58] And I do too, but you ladies,
[34:00] you use a complex process of matching style and color
[34:05] with various articles of clothing and accessories.
[34:09] And you come up with an outfit for the day
[34:11] based on all that, plus I'm sure many other things
[34:14] 'cause I'm a man, I wouldn't know.
[34:16] It really amazes me that when you buy something,
[34:21] you're already thinking of what it will match with
[34:24] and what else you might need to get at the next store
[34:27] that we go into.
[34:29] It boggles my mind and it keeps the retailers happy, right?
[34:35] Man just give me some Levi's and some t-shirts
[34:38] except for Steven.
[34:39] Oh, he's wearing jeans today.
[34:42] I thought you didn't wear jeans.
[34:44] - What?
[34:44] - I thought you didn't wear jeans.
[34:45] - All his other clothes are dirty, so.
[34:47] - Oh, okay.
[34:48] (laughing)
[34:50] - Boomeroes.
[34:52] - Boomeroes.
[34:54] But what I'm trying to show here,
[34:57] I do know there are some guys that do get style.
[34:59] I'm not one of them and being colored line doesn't help.
[35:04] But what I'm trying to show is something as simple
[35:05] as getting dressed requires multiple intricate
[35:08] complex decisions and result in actions.
[35:12] No other creature has this ability or desire
[35:15] that I'm aware of, but it's very unique to us.
[35:19] So maybe that's a good illustration
[35:21] of how our decision making comes into play.
[35:25] And there's a saying that a man is a sum of his choices,
[35:29] right, his decisions.
[35:30] And I think it's true to a certain extent.
[35:32] A bad choice can follow you,
[35:35] can define you for the rest of your life.
[35:37] And a good choice can avoid a ton of heartbreak.
[35:41] But choosing is a very important function
[35:42] of this God image that's stamped on us
[35:45] as we shall see in the next chapter.
[35:47] I'd like to close with one other aspect of creation.
[35:55] It's proof that God exists
[35:59] and that man is without excuse in his sins.
[36:03] And I'll read from Romans chapter one, verses 18 to 20.
[36:08] The wrath of God is being revealed from heaven
[36:12] against all godlessness and wickedness of men
[36:14] who suppress the truth by their wickedness.
[36:17] Since what may be known about God is plain to them
[36:21] because God has made it plain to them.
[36:23] For since the creation of the world,
[36:25] God's invisible qualities is eternal power
[36:29] and divine nature have been clearly seen
[36:31] being understood from what has been made or created
[36:35] so that men are without excuse.
[36:38] Let's pray.
[36:40] Father, thank you so much for your word.
[36:46] Thank you so much for this first chapter of Genesis, God.
[36:50] And how our response to it should be
[36:55] to just stand in awe of you, to worship you,
[36:58] to want to know more about you,
[37:00] to watch the rest of the story of history unfold
[37:05] before us through your word.
[37:07] And we know many of these things about you
[37:10] that we've learned are going to be part of the basis
[37:15] or foundation of what we see going forward.
[37:19] We thank you for that.
[37:20] And I hope that we've been able
[37:23] to just see a little bit of it.
[37:25] And remember, we can always go back to it.
[37:26] Thank you that your word is always here.
[37:28] That it's always alive.
[37:29] That it's always speaking to us.
[37:31] And I just praise you for creation, God.
[37:34] We stand in awe of what you've done.
[37:36] You created us.
[37:37] Thank you.
[37:40] We love you.
[37:42] We pray that as we move forward in Genesis
[37:44] that you'll just continue to show who we are in you
[37:49] and demonstrate your love in such a way
[37:54] that our only response can be to worship you.
[37:57] And we do that.
[37:58] Thank you so much, in Jesus' name, amen.